One more week!

Ah the beautiful August days of summer in Minnesota are upon us, hot sunny days and cool quiet nights. A time of year that is usually simultaneously busy with school prep and relaxing as the lazy days of summer settle upon us.  While my southern sister has been talking about mid-August school starts for years, up north we start school after Labor day.  However, both my boys start school at Normandale Community College next Monday!  We are not used to these early school starts and are not at all prepared for our lives to change so much in 7 short days.  Yikes!

It is going to be interesting.  Both boys are taking 14 credits, Jake is doing it in 3 classes and John is taking 4.  Jake is taking 2 hybrid classes with both class and internet work so his actual clocked time in school is only 9 hours a week.  What exactly he plans to do with all this time alone at home we haven't exactly figured out but I am foreseeing myself having that live in chef I have always wanted.

John on the other hand wasn't sure he was ready for internet classes after so many years out of school and will be clocking in all 14 hours of class work every week.  He did manage a schedule with one day of no classes and 2 other days with only a couple hours of classes which is important since he will also have to find about 20 hours a week for work.  Not to mention studying.

I have had a wonderful, supportive husband and son all summer long as I transitioned from a homemaker to a working mother, I am seeing the end of this phase and the beginning of a phase in which my husband will need that same support from me as he becomes a full time student.  (Interestingly he hasn't been a full time student for almost the same number of years I haven't worked full time.)  While I am still grieving the loss of my time at home in some ways I have come to find the routine of my new life comfortable and the job is keeping me busy enough that the days go quickly.  I realize I no longer have the time I once had to accomplish things but I am learning that if I am patient in time everything can still get done.

So I prepare to move back into the nurturing wife and mother role that I have been able to put on the back burner for a few months knowing that while it won't look the same I will be the same.  And I love taking care of my family.

Of course, I do still have one week left so I think I will let John put Isabelle to bed tonight while I get to bed on time.