Busy

Whew- this is the first time all week I've had a few free minutes to sit down and update our blog.  Things have gotten a bit busy here to say the least!!!  Jon is back to school and the boys are rockin' their second week of first grade here at home.  As if that wasn't exhausting enough (and believe me- it is!), there are a few new things we've added to the mix this fall :)

I'll start with the most exciting because well, I'm super excited about it!  While we were elbow deep in buttercream frosting last Saturday, I got a phone call that turned out to be an incredible offer for my first professional writing job.  After reading my blog entry about the episode of the talk show I taped, Kali and Dr. Partha Nandi asked me to blog for their hit show Ask Dr. Nandi.  They are truly the sweetest people you could ever hope to meet and I feel that Dr. Nandi is a beacon of hope in the medical field as well as in the terribly awful thing that is the world of television programming.  I will be blogging about the shows he tapes as well as other topics, and I hope you can all head on over to his page to follow...  the first show I'm working on is just incredible!!!

Previous to that popping up, I had taken on another small job this school year- one that may mean I have completely lost my mind!  For two days a week my charges will multiply from two to four as I will be watching another set of twins :)  I am truly honored that a friend's cousin is trusting me to care for her nearly 6 month old boy-girl twins while she returns to work part time.  I'm sure things will get a little crazy around here, but I am so excited to get to return to that baby stage for just a little bit!  The boys are excited to help me and want to teach the babies everything they know about shipwrecks.  I'm sure that will go over well!

Oh that's not all!  This Saturday I will also be starting another very part time job.  While it is something I've done my whole life, it is in a totally new setting and I've got to admit I'm a tad nervous.  Last spring the boys found a tap dancer at Eastern Market and were just mesmerized.  Ever since they have wanted to take tap dancing classes.  Unfortunately that is not something we can afford, but I eventually gave in and contacted a local dance studio to see if they needed any help teaching some preschool gymnastics classes and voila- I have a job and the boys have a tap class!  Turns out that our local dance studio isn't just any dance studio.  When Jon told some of his students about where I will be working, they about fell over.  Not only does the studio have an incredible national reputation, but it is also where Amy Yakima- the winner of this season's So You Think You Can Dance show- has trained her whole life.  Anyways- I had one hell of a time finding tap shoes and ballet shoes that were small enough to fit the boys.  Apparently our kids have feet the size of an 18 month old and 18 month olds tend not to take dance classes.  But we did finally find their tap shoes and ballet slippers and oh my gosh are they adorable!!!  So starting this weekend, our Saturday mornings will be spent at Noretta Dunworth School of Dance.  I will be teaching parent and tot and preschool gymnastics classes, the boys will be taking tap and ballet, and Jon will be sitting out in the lobby with the other dance moms.  Believe it or not, he's actually pretty excited about this.  I told him to be careful though.  Not only will those moms be swooning over his willingness to be a dance dad, but they are gonna flat out attack him when they realize that he could sew their kids costumes better than any dance mom on the planet!

And lastly, Jon is taking a graduate class for a reading requirement to renew his teaching certification.  It is an entire semester course crammed into seven weeks- and he registered a week late so this week I've been helping him do two weeks worth of work in three days.  It's a course on teaching reading that is a state requirement for all teachers- though ironically none of the master's programs at the major Michigan universities include it in their master's degrees but let's not get me started on how ridiculous that is.  Luckily one of us is semi-interested in the material...  Jon isn't exactly responsible for teaching any of his kids to read in eighth grade science but I am teaching the boys to read here at home, so its kind of relevant- maybe?   It will be a crazy couple of weeks but then it will be over so hopefully we can all survive it and move on with the rest of our crazy busy schedule!!!!