Bright eyes, Richard Simmons, and sweet thoughts

What my life is full of these days as I teach full time (FULL TIME!!! if I would have been able to see what future posts on my blog would say a year ago, I'd never have imagined reading that I was working FULL TIME!!!) is

• Bright eyes full of pride on a student that just "got" it
• Sweet comments about sending love notes to Jesus from a 1st grader drawing a picture about John 14:7 (Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength) (and this student happened to be my very own princess)
• 60 kids in unity with praise hands in the air during a rehearsal for our Christmas musical
• 5 high school boys gathered around my computer You Tubing for Christian Spanish Praise music
• Folders full of hopeful lesson plans
• Listening to a student tell me after music class how "his heart is full of emotions - not on the outside, but on the inside...It feels GOOD! Like Christmas morning!"
• Blowing kisses to my son as I cruise by his classroom
• Early morning, daily staff meetings; 8 different classes to prep for; a Christmas musical to organize with 120 singers, 20 actors, choreography, and tons of solos; and 170 students to learn names of
• Sweating all day long like Richard Simmons himself as I teach high energy choreography to 120 students that circle through my music classroom throughout the week
  

But, I still run just as much as I ever have. Got in a gorgeous 7 mile run through Shevlin Park - lots of trails, hills, and sunlit golden leaved trees. I smiled the entire run with my God and I.

I still play barefoot in my garden. Harvested 50 plus pounds of potatoes yesterday and half that in carrots. Potatoes are a must to eat organically as they are basically poisonous otherwise, but organic taters are so expensive. We are stocked for months now!

Made some yummy zucchini/banana honey and agave sweetened cookies yesterday, cooked down 10 pounds of tomatoes into a delicious sauce, and did laundry.

Somehow doing chores at home is just refreshing when you are gone all day. Somehow doing chores all day at home when there is nothing else to look forward to doing was not as fun...how could adding a full time job make home chores fun? I don't know how, but it has. I just like the variety I suppose. And this year, I do my chores with 3 hard working partners, all with their own jobs turning what used to take me a couple of days into a little over an hour and we are done.