I have been feeling antsy lately, restless. I am so ready for our adventure, but it's not until September. Bruce thought it might be good to get a big wall calendar so we can count down the weeks/days. I also was visiting Kim at her blog and noticed her countdown widget...what a great idea. Then every day I can see on my computer screen how many weeks/days I have left, that will be just what I need. So I put one on my blog...thanks Kim! Kim is leaving in July, so her days are 1/2 what ours are....lucky dog!
We only have 4 more weeks of regular after-school classes and then our summer program starts. It will be 12 weeks of 1/2 day summer camps. Our schedule will switch from having the morning & early afternoon free and not having to go to work until 3:00 pm to being at the studio at 8:00 am and working until 1:30, so our afternoons will be free. I prefer the morning free, but alas. We will work the same number of hours per week, a light load at 20, but instead of working Tuesday-Saturday, we'll work Tuesday-Friday. Once the camps start the weeks fly by....usually when we start them it goes like this "ugh, 12 weeks of camps", then the next thing we know it's "ah, only 6 more camps"....then "yeah, only 1 more camp". Camps are great fun, we do super cool projects with the kids have a wonderful time, but it's draining and exhausting (in a good way that doing art with kids brings).
It feels like I'm a kid again...."are we there yet?" We were big on road trips when I was younger, as most of the country was back in the 60's and 70's. We had a big green station wagon and all of us would pack in there at least 2 times a year and head to Florida. I think I have been to Florida maybe 25-30 times. My parents are from Florida and my oldest sister and brother we born there. My sister Anne and I were born in Michigan. My father was a golf professional and started out in Florida and then took a job at a private club in Michigan. But anytime we had vacation it would be back to Florida to see the grandparents and Aunts and Uncles and it would allow my dad to golf.
I recently saw my brother, he and his family came out to San Diego for a weeks vacation, so Bruce and I drove down to have dinner with them. We were talking about the hell we had on those car trips. Mom and Dad in the front and 4 kids in the back. I'm sure many of you had those trips. "This is the imaginary line, don't cross it". "Mom, Anne hit me". "Mom, Mark kicked me". We didn't have DVD players in the car or hand-held games or ipods. My Dad would pop in his 8-track and we'd listen to his music, Edie Gourmet, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, etc... We played the alphabet game with license plates. Yee Haa! My brother also reminded me that on the drive down to Florida we'd always stay the night in a Holiday Inn and every time we'd have to eat, we'd stop at a Holiday Inn. He is sick of Holiday Inn's. We'd also stop in the same city for the night...talk about creatures of habit. Florida was our vacation...my dad didn't want to go anywhere else. Sure, we'd stop at Rock City or Mammoth Caves on the way down, but that's it. It was always St. Petersburg Florida. Staying with my grandmother, swimming in her pool, going to Treasure Island beach, going to Disney World when there was no Epicot center. The sunshine state. All my grandparents have passed on and only my cousin and her husband live there now, so no more Florida trips for me.....ever again.
What was I talking about? Sorry, got side-tracked. Ah, yes....counting the days until France. It seems so far away, but I know that once the summer gets going it will come up fast. It's hard to be patient when the countryside is calling you. The picture above was taken in September when we visited the Aveyron region. This is very close to where our house is. The nice thing about that area is that it won't change from when we saw it in September to when we'll be back in September. It is patiently waiting for us.
