Travels, Training, and Teaching

It seems to finally be spring here in mid-Michigan. Just about all of the snow has melted - it is completely gone from our yard. My daffodils are pushing through, I'm glad I had time to rake away the leaves leftover from last fall and uncovered some that were pale green from lake of sun. I wish we had found the time to plant the crocus bulbs last fall! One of our neighbors planted bulbs all over one of her flower beds, so she has a generous sprinkling of purple throughout the shrubs!

Martin and I were in Illinois last weekend, he attended the 2 Year Chemistry College instructor conference hosted by Joliet JC. I used the opportunity to be free of distractions for an entire 1 1/2 days and got a lot of grading done, it is so easy to have the piles get high on my on-line courses! We took our time getting back - hitting a Trader Joe's and a Bass Pro Shop on the way home. I found myself looking at larger tents, sleeping bags, etc., thinking if we can adopt this year we will need more room on our camping trips! We used the college mini-van, and I found myself thinking how great the space was!

So, on our return we hit the phone again. We are registered for "PRIDE" training beginning next week, part of the required foster parent training we must do to adopt through the state ward program. I hate that term "state ward" - it makes the children sound like property!

We are on the downhill side of the semester, if you think about running downhill you can get the idea of the possibility of things rapidly getting out of control! Hopefully, that will not happen as we try to finish the semester with transformed students, but still a balanced happy home life!

It does look like Martin will get to go to Vietnam with other MI CC teachers in May! It is my summer to bring home the bacon - I'll be teaching a class for CMU in May, a class here at MMCC on-line through the summer, and reading AP Psychology tests in June for a week for Education Testing Services (I'll be in Louisville! Yee ha!). I'm also going to take an on line course beginning in June - a graduate level course through the Univerity of New Hampshire! I'm very excited about that!