Back to School

Today my kids started school.
My oldest... officially a high schooler.
My little two.. sixth and third grade.



It really seems like we just did this. Hard to believe it was a year ago already.

They say time flies when you are having fun, but I think time just flies. Every year that goes by seems to go by at a rate exponentially faster than the one before. I remember with my first I couldn't wait for her to reach the next milestone that "What to Expect the First Year" told me she would. With the second, I eagerly awaited the next step in hopes that the screaming would stop (if only I knew she would be 9 before she could effectively use her words). With the youngest, I had finally learned to stop looking forward, and just enjoy NOW. I relished every moment of what she was doing right now, without being in a hurry for what would come next. Of course right now she is going through that inquisitive phase where she asks a bazillion questions a day, and well frankly, I wouldn't mind THAT being over.

Today my littlest one got up at the same time as her big sister the high schooler. The high school starts two hours earlier than the elementary school. Meaning that my little one was up, dressed and ready to go THREE hours before school was going to start. So for three hours I endured her endless questions about everything from lunch, to when the puppies are going to be born. She asked about a hundred times when we were going to leave for school. She asked about her birthday that is still weeks away and why mommy likes coffee so much. She asked and asked and asked, and finally I smiled thinking that today, for the first time in two and a half months, for 6 whole hours, she'd have someone else at which to direct her questions.

Homeward Bound

Today is my last day here in Hawaii. Most people would expect that I would be sad about going home, but it hasn't been beaches and mai tai's. The only water my feet have touched is in the shower, and I'm losing my tan from spending my days inside the hospital. It's been a rough nine days. Not only have I cooked and cleaned more than I ever do in my own home, it's been emotionally draining to be the only one thinking rationally in a house full of people grieving over a sick family member. My mother in law is a wreck. My sister in law is emotionally vacant. I worry about how they will cope when I'm gone. I've suggested they find some kind of therapy or support group so that they get the emotional support that they need when I'm gone. I hope they do, because they will need it, but I'm not holding my breath. I love them because they are my husband's family, but I miss my own kids and my own bed. It will be so good to be home.

Once I get home I need to get busy getting everything ready for school to start. There are backpacks and crayons to buy, doctor's appointments to attend, prescriptions to fill. Not to mention the meetings with the PTA to get everything ready to go the first week of school. I've got a lot to do over the next two weeks to get my house in order to start school. I still can't believe that summer is almost over. It feels like we haven't done anything.

I had my chance..

and didn't take it.

What you ask?

My kids are going to a new school next year. This whole moving thing has thrust us into the boundaries of a different school and despite my best efforts the kids will not be able to stay at their old school. Budget crisis' suck, but that's a whole other post.

Leaving our previous school prematurely ended my term as PTA Vice President. I could have gone to the new school and pretended I didn't know what a PTA was. I could have laid low, bought my catalog crap and cookie dough, and left the work to some other sucker. But NOOO.

The day after school ended I went to the new school with the kids withdrawal paperwork from the other school and got them all signed up. She took me and the kids on a tour of the school and I got a little giddy about all the cool things they have at this school as opposed to the old one. It's a technology math/science concept school and beyond awesome. As I was preparing to leave, I heard myself say "so how do I get in touch with your PTA?".

I wasn't planning on asking about the PTA. Where those words came from, I have absolutely no clue. The very nice office lady took this opportunity to tell me that the newly elected PTA was short a few officers, a VP, treasurer, and secretary to be exact. Yeah, they're just short 3/5ths of their board. They NEED my help. And so it starts again.

I don't know why I can't just run away from the PTA. I've spent eleventy billion hours this last year alone doing PTA stuff. I should be a little burnt out on it by now. It's not like I have an excess of time on my hands as is evidenced by my lack of blogging for the last month. I have other things I like to do with my time and PTA cuts into that, but I still can't seem to walk away.

It's like Stockholm Syndrome, even when I have the chance to leave, I don't because I identify with my captors. I feel bad for them. They NEED me. So I have a meeting next week to meet with their two members and compare notes. To tell them all about what I know that works and to find out what they are planning. I'll probably end up involved.

The fact is, I like being on the PTA. I like the Principal knowing me by name. I like not having to show my ID when I pull my kids out for a doctor's appointment because the staff knows exactly who I am. I like it when the teachers take the extra bit of time to listen to my concerns because I'm the one that hooks them up with money for field trips. I like that my kids know that I value them and their education enough to give my time to get involved. I like the fact that they, and all the other kids, get to have cool things like Holiday Shops and Carnivals that I put together.

I'm pretty sure if I don't do it, nobody will. The fact that this board only has two out of five members just goes to show that not many people want to devote their time to a job that only pays in kid's smiles. This has been my experience with every school my kids have ever been to. The same eight people show up to every meeting and the other thousand parents take the attitude that someone else will do it. I want my kids to have the things that the PTA provides, and I'm willing to work to make sure they have it.

Is it summer yet?

This happens every year. The day when the kids (or namely just the kid, you know, the ADD kid) just give up for the year. Classwork gets blown off and homework is a nightmare. It's like they know that it's ALMOST summer, so it should be goofing off time, right?

Yesterday I get an email from the teacher. "Kimberly refused to do ANYTHING today, I'm sending all the work home [for you to deal with]." Fabulous. Because I had soooo much extra time in MY evening to deal with homework PLUS three assignments she didn't get done in class.

Yesterday after school we had a meeting to review Kimberly's 504 plan. It went well. We made a couple of changes, took out some stuff that was outdated, and looked at what would need to be done differently for 6th grade. They start switching classes in 6th grade, so things are going to get interesting. Some things were rephrased, much to my delight, since I was a little miffed that the previous teacher's label of "disruptive" had remained in one section. All in all a good meeting, but because of it we had an hour and a half less time for homework and stuff that should have been finished in class.

Needless to say we weren't able to get it all done, so it carried over to today. When I picked the kids up from school Kimberly was rambling on and on about some video assignment she had to do. Now I have to admit I wasn't completly listening. For one thing, I have ADD too, and for another, Kimberly loves to talk. I swear she talks just to hear herself talk. Really. Like she will read the makes and models of all the cars we pass on the road. So I kinda tune her out sometimes. So I'm all whatever, she has some kind of report, it will probably be due in a couple of weeks and we will have some time to work on it. I tell her that we don't have a working video camera and I'm thinking to myself maybe some kinda powerpoint presentation will suffice.

We get home and I tell her to start on her homework, that she has a lot to do, because she has to get the rest of the assignments done tonight too. She asks "so you want me to do tonight's homework first, then work on the assignments from yesterday?" I tell her yes. She goes off to her room. An hour later I go to check on her thinking that she should be done by now and I need to prod her to get to work on the other stuff.

I find her sitting on her bed watching tv. I ask her where her homework is and she pulls her assignment sheet out of her backpack. Wanna take a wild guess what it said?? "Read for 20 minutes. Timeline - didn't do in class. 10 events in her life. She wants to do a video instead of writing." So not only has she wasted an hour doing nothing, we have last night's assignments PLUS now a timeline video thing that I don't have a video camera to do.

So I tell her "guess what? since you spent an hour goofing off AND this timeline thing could have been done in class to begin with, I'm not going out of my way to help you do a powerpoint on it, you are just going to write it." I'm such a mean mommy. For Kimberly writing is the most difficult thing on the planet. Not that she isn't incredibly creative, it just requires the kind of sustained attention that she is so terribly lacking in. So it's in her 504 that she can do alternative assignments that don't require as much writing.

Now it's time to play "let's make a deal". Kimberly loves to try and bargain. Someday she's going to make a great lawyer or snake oil salesman. After 15 minutes of her trying to bargain, now I'm getting frustrated. "YOU AREN'T GOING TO CHANGE MY MIND CHILD, NOW GET TO WORK, YOU ARE RUNNING OUT OF TIME TO GET THIS DONE".

Finally she sits down to work. On one of the assignments from yesterday. Answering 3 questions about a chapter in a book they are reading in class. Five minutes later she's whining about how she can't answer the questions because she didn't read the chapter, because she was still working on one of the other assignments that she didn't get done yesterday. ARE.YOU.FREAKING.KIDDING.ME??

I tell her to go work on the timeline and I start thinking of how to solve this little dilema.
I search online for the answers.
No luck.
Maybe the library that is 3 minutes from my house has the book.
Nope.
Call Barnes & Noble.
They have it.
Hold it for me, I'm on my way.

Forty five minutes later I'm back with the book. She's finished the timeline and showered. She reads the chapter. She answers the questions. It's 10:15 and she finally goes to bed. Bedtime is supposed to be 8:30. Tomorrow she will be tired. When she's tired she has bad days at school. So her inability to get her work done yesterday is going to snowball and ruin our whole week.

I just want it to be summer. No more school. No more homework. I'm done too.