Spring Break

I told myself and my husband that I wouldn’t wait until the very last minute to write my blog anymore. Yet here I am once again, it’s almost 10:00pm Sunday night, before I have to go back to work after Spring Break. And instead of getting a good nights sleep like I should, I’m here tapping away at this laptop. There is something to be said about my consistency. This is far more consistent than I’ve ever been in my writing, even if it is happening late Sunday night after I’ve had another whirl wind of a weekend. 

This weekend is the end of my first Spring Break as a teacher. Was it good? Yes and no. There were a lot more deaths than I’d like to have happened. We got a lot of chores done, but not everything that was on the endless to do list. But we did at least make some progress. 

So about those deaths. I don’t know what it is lately, but we’ve had a number of people in our lives die. The first most shocking that we heard about was our old neighbor, who lived cat-a-corner from the house we just moved out of. She was older but not necessarily elderly. I believe she was in her early to mid seventies and appeared to be in relatively good health. The last I talked to her a couple of weeks ago, she was contemplating taking in our wild husky-lab puppy for us, at least until Sweetums outgrew the wildness of being a puppy. Ultimately shed decided she would not be able to take the dog, because she wasn’t feeling the greatest and thought for sure the dog would outlive her, because for some reason she didn’t think she would have much more time on this earth. I had no idea that she meant she only had a few more weeks left.

It really was a shocker to learn of her death, especially where I learned it from. I received a text from our old next door neighbor, who lived across the street from her. Those two neighbors really didn’t get along very well, but for some reason they both liked us. 

Then we found out that two family members passed away this week. Though neither one was surprising; they were both elderly and had been sick for some time. One was a Great-Aunt the other a Great-Uncle, no they were not married to each other either. I personally didn’t know either one very well, although my husband grew up with the Great-Uncle and has fond memories of him. It was hard for my husband to see his great-uncle so frail and old the last time he saw him, his memories of him as a younger man were of this strong tough man, that age didn’t allow any longer.

But our Spring Break was not all about death. In fact there were a lot of exciting things that happened too. We had our first flag football games, though both teams lost. It makes me regret not coaching this year. Last year we were so incredibly successful, thanks to my husband and his football knowledge, patience, and teaching ability. We won the championship and it was the first time we coached and played in that flag football league. We were going to coach again this year, but since my job changed, and we bought a house, when it came time for the mandatory coaches meeting we couldn’t commit to coaching a team. Even now, as much as I want to be involved and coach, I’m hesitant to help because what if it becomes too much for me? 

My husband is coaching this year, but he is an assistant coach, rather than the head coach which has a different feel for him than it did last year. I am seriously contemplating jumping in and helping our older son’s team. The lady who is coaching his team has never coached before and after our loss of 34-6, and watching her try to do it all by herself, it seems like she could use my help. My hesitation is that I don’t have the knowledge that my husband has and it may end up being the blind leading the blind, but at the same time after watching the game yesterday, I think what little I know, could be very helpful for the team. I think I’ll just ask her at the next practice and see how it goes.

We got our furniture that we ordered for our great room. That’s really exciting. It’s nice to have furniture in the room. Although it’s still weird to see. They weren’t going to deliver until the 27^th and then I was going to have to take the day off to receive it, so we decided to take two pickup trucks to the store and pick it up. Well my husband and brother-in-law picked it up, while I entertained three little boys at home. 

I really like what we decided on, even though it took us multiple Saturdays and over seven stores to finally choose. What we picked was perfect for us, we decided on fabric even though we both wanted leather, but after bringing the furniture home, I’m glad we decided on fabric. I’ve watched the boys make a game of leaping from couch to couch with their shoes on and I’ve seen the new throw pillows all lined up along the floor forming a bridge from couch to couch while one kid runs across the bridge and the other chases him down. We picked the ideal set for our current lifestyle. Maybe when the kids are teenagers or off to college we will get a leather sofa set. 

My husband completed some honey do projects. The first and most complicated was the gutters. Our house has a flat roof, that was relatively recently slanted to force the rain to run off, instead of sitting on the top of the roof. The previous home owner suggested we add gutters to the back of the house. We didn’t realize how important those gutters would be until we had a ton of rainfall this winter. Pools of water were forming in the backyard and draining into our carport. So my husband bless his heart set out to research how to add gutters to the house and completed it over the break. Of course as he says nothing is ever easy for him. While he was in the process of installing the gutters, he was digging a trench for the drainage pipe and broke the same kitchen drain pipe that we had replaced in January. So he had to back track and repair that pipe by teaching himself how to be plumber too. Did I mention how truly amazing this man is that I married? Not only did he install gutters, bring home furniture, fix the laundry doors, coach football, taxi me back and forth to drop my car off and pick it up from the repair shop, but he also wrote up a report for work. Which is probably why he sound asleep right now, while I am still typing. 

All in all this was a much needed Spring Break. The best part of the break was spending time with good friends and family. I will cherish the memories of playing baseball in the driveway with my boys. Also watching them jump into our freezing cold swimming pool and floating in the camping boat that my husband and I once long ago declared our love for each other in. 

Like I said I didn’t get everything done on my list, but we got some chunks done. The master is all unpacked, I just have wall hangings and some decorative pieces to either get rid of or find a place for. I’ve made a dent on the office, but still have quite a few boxes to go through. I feel ready to get back to work, although I don’t want to quite yet. I’d rather have another day or two off. Especially since I’m now fighting a full blown sinus infection. And as luck would have it, my laptop for work is giving me fits and I can’t get my lesson plan completed for my third period tomorrow. Oh well, hopefully I can improvise and get it done tomorrow morning. For now, I’ve really got to get some rest.