the life of a teacher
School is out on Friday. I am so ready to spend my days with my little man! I have a running list of all the things I want to do and experience this summer with him! 🙂
We are also going to the beach!! I can’t wait. My family is a BIG beach family and I am so excited to introduce the ocean to Trey this summer! We usually go every year. It is super important to me that Trey like water and feel safe in water. So I am also thinking of taking some mommy and me swim classes at the YMCA. I think early exposure is key. My dad has a pool at his house so I foresee lots of visits to Grandpa’s as well. 🙂
Keith and I are also moving. We’ve been in the process of selling our house and buying another. It’s been a “fun” process and we will be moving later this month assuming all the closings go smoothly. So that will be another thing that will be occupying a lot of my time.
The only thing that bothers me is the comments I get from people about how lucky I am to be a teacher and get my whole summer off. So really quickly let me just say….eff off! HA! 🙂 But seriously, I had someone the other day sigh, roll their eyes and say, “Oh the life of a teacher.” Seriously Dude!?!?! First off during the school year I am at work every day by 6:30a.m. (before your alarm even goes off). I am not usually home until 4:00 (at the earliest). Once I do the wife and mom thing, I usually have some papers that need grading, lamination that needs cutting, or planning for the coming weeks ahead. I do it after Trey’s asleep. I easily work 11-12+ hour days during the school year. Then over the summer, I get it, I get off for 2 months. But that doesn’t mean I’m not working. I still have summer continuing education classes to attend, a new classroom to set up, planning for a new year and materials to be copied, cut and put together for the beginning of the year. So isn’t like I sit around eating bons bons all day long. So yeah, the life of a teacher. And don’t even get me started that if you broke down my salary across the hours I work…I’ll just stop there. Because why should we pay teachers (the ones responsible for educating America’s youth) a salary competitive with other careers?
But let me be the first to say that the life of a teacher is pretty great! I get to be around kids every day. I get to share in their excitement when they realize they CAN master a math problem or ace a language arts quiz. I get hugs, lots of them, every day from children who look up to me and make me want to be a better person. The notes slipped on my desk that say “I love you” or the excitement in their eyes when they tell me about their weekend all make the life of a teacher pretty great. The tears at the end of the year because they miss you and the courage you see develop because you believe in them makes the life of a teacher pretty great. I do welcome summer vacation with open arms so I can go be a full time mommy to Trey.
But don’t let that confuse you. The life of a teacher is great and it has nothing to do with summer break.
family of three
I can honestly say one of the best moments in my life was when Keith and I went from a family of 2 to a family of 3.
I love our new family. I love how my relationship with Keith has changed as I watch him embrace fatherhood. I love being a mommy and all the emotions that brings up inside of me. Trey made me a mamma and that feels so special.
Here’s what bugs me. It drives me bananas when people ask me when we are going to have number 2. Trey is only 6 months old for goodness sakes!
I feel like this is a typical question pattern throughout life:
Dating for a long time —> When are you getting engaged?
Engaged —> When are you getting married?
Married —> When are you going to have kids?
Have 1 child—> When are you going to have another?
To me, it sends the message that right now is not good enough. We live in a world where we are always working towards another step. But what about right now in this moment? Those constant “when when when” questions send the message that you need to get to another step…..to what, be happy?
It drives me crazy when people ask me when Keith and I are going to have another baby already. And it happens all the time! It took 3 years for us to have Trey and I want to slow down and enjoy him. I want to be present and grow with him. I want to love him completely and give my undivided attention to him. I want to count my blessings and just be Trey’s mama.
That’s all I want right now. It may be all I’ll ever want. Or we may decide to do it again. But whatever we choose it’s right FOR US. But the point is we aren’t talking about it right now.
Right now we are just enjoying life as a family of 3.
“Be happy for this moment.
This moment is your life.”
no i did not fall off the face of the earth
Guys I’ve been B-U-S-Y! Doing what? Let’s see, it’s the end of the school year which is an insanely crazy time for teachers, Keith and I are getting ready to put our house on the market, and any free time I have I spend with Trey. So unfortunately blogging just hasn’t been on the forefront of priorities lately.
But life has been glorious! I know without any shadow of a doubt that I was meant to be Trey’s mama. That kid fills my heart with so much joy that I can not even begin to try to put into words how blessed I feel every single day!
So here’s a recap: Trey turned 6 months old! WHAT?! How on Earth?
We’ve been doing a little of this:
And a little of this:
We’ve also been doing some playing:
And some exercising. Gotta work that core Daddy says!
Life is pretty good these days. And summer…oh summer…I am so ready for you. I have visions of pools, museums and dog parks (oh my!) floating in my head.
I leave you with this: It’s a good day to have a good day!
Cheers!
thirty three
I turned 33 over the weekend. Wow! I feel old. Ha! Time is such a funny thing. In that when you are in the moment it can sometimes seem very slow but when you look back over a period of time it is so fast. I sometimes wonder how on earth I graduated from high school 15 years ago. It seems like it was just yesterday. But a lot has happened to me in those 15 years for sure.
I used to have this weird obsession with hating the number three. I didn’t like a three to be in any number that pertained to me: hotel rooms, phone numbers, dates, etc. I developed this weird hatred for the number sometime around my 23rd birthday. See I always thought threes were bad luck for me. Anytime there had been a three in my age I connected it to something bad happening:
3 years old: I cut my face on a swing set so severely that I had to have surgery to sew it up, every picture of me from thereon out I have vitamin E cream slathered on, and I still have the scar today.
13 years old: I contracted bacterial meningitis and encephalitis (swelling of the brain) and was hospitalized for a while. I ended up having a seizure in a swimming pool at summer camp 90 minutes away from my house. My 10 year old  brother saved my life by dragging an unconcious  me to the side of the pool and alerting the lifeguards that his sister was drowning.
23 years old: This isn’t something I regularly talk about but I was married before Keith. I got married right out of college to a guy who was not very nice. He was verbally and physically abusive and it took me all of 9 months to get he hell out of dodge. I got divorced at 23.
30Â years old: I had two miscarriages.
31 years old: I had fertility problems and couldn’t get pregnant.
So it would seem that threes weren’t exactly very nice to me. But. I realized that for every bad thing that happened there was a good thing too! It’s all in the way you look at things. I tend to be a half glass empty kind of girl but what if I wasn’t. What if I saw the good in the number three.
3 years old: My brother was born. In fact I got into the swing set accident the week my mom brought him home from the hospital.
13 years old: My brother saved my life.
23 years old: I had the courage to walk out on a marriage that was unhealthy and dangerous. I was a strong woman who stood up for herself and walked out to a better life.
30 years old: I decided to go back to school to become a teacher. I stopped working in a career I was unhappy in and sought out one that I actually wanted.
31 years old: We got Bella. After the second miscarriage I needed to be a mother and we adopted the best dog in the world. I feel like Bella really saved me from going through a major depression and helped me to put my feet forward. I also got pregnant with Trey…in what would be our third times a charm baby!
32 years old: I had Trey. I actually had Trey on October 27, 2013 and I had had my first  miscarriage on October 26, 2011. Talk about coming full circle.
33 years old: I have the most amazing 5 1/2 month old in the world with an amazing husband (of almost 8 years) by my side!
What’s ironic is that Trey was our third pregnancy. He was our third times a charm baby and in honor of that we actually named him Trey (which means three) and he was born in the year 2013. And my anniversary is actually on April 30th, a day I married the best man in the world for me. So all in all I’d say the number three has become my lucky number and one that I will always always love.
So 33? This is going to be the best year ever. 🙂
What Kelly Said 