Piano Recital

This piano recital officially marks the end of our school year in many ways because we no longer have a regular school agenda outside the home.  Piano lessons are over, science club has ended for the year, tutoring is finished, Awanas ended some time ago.  The last several weeks of beautiful weather and finalizing our extra curricular activities made me in particular a bit stir crazy so we took several field trips and had a more relaxed school schedule here at home.  I have been trying to put together plans for the summer since I want to continue tutoring a couple times a week and I want the children to do math and reading as well.  Truthfully, I am so burnt out, I am wondering if I will be capable of continuing on without a break.  I am also trying to figuring out what our next year will be like.  I had no planning time last year and that really was difficult for me and contributed to a very unorganized year all on accounts.  

 This is what homeschooling looked like in September and October.  We homeschooled in my room surrounded by laundry and boxes, children on the floor with their independent activities, and tutoring on the bed:





Piano practice and school supplies (most of which were packed up).

We got the school room set up at the end of October (wish it still looked this nice!)...

...but the rest of the house looked like this:

And just to share a struggle...today would have been Phil's last day if he were a teacher.  We would be looking forward to the summer ahead.  I would be looking forward to family time and getting myself organized, planned, prepared, and rested for the upcoming school year.  Parenting and homeschooling have been very difficult for me and I don't get time off or breaks except for some hours here and there or an occasional weekend day away.  Sometimes it feels too hard.  Now that Phil works all the time and his summer break is half as long and filled with out of town conferences and still needing to go into work because he oversees summer school, I am not sure how to prepare myself on all accounts for the next school year.  I have really felt the loss of our shared responsibilities, our time together, my art time, family time, and now no longer having our summer break.  It has been a difficult adjustment for all of us.  I am not sure we had any idea how many hours an administrator works and how impacting this is on a family that is used to a very different lifestyle.

On to other things:

I mowed until close to 9:00 the other day.  This was the sunset view.

I have been watching the Killdeer nest, waiting for the eggs to hatch.

The "Forbidden room" (I should call it the parlor) is covered with planning materials as I try and take snippets of time to figure out curriculum next year and how I want to manage summer school.

The recital was lovely!  It was outside, as the sun was going down, on top of the hill, at the Richman Farm.









The student pieces were nice but I could listen for hours, breathing in the sweet air of the grasses (luckily I don't have allergies), with the setting sun warming me, watching the evening breeze sway the fields, listening listening listening...




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