Several days later...

I'm still here and still functioning. I warned you I would be buried under a pile of books and that is exactly what happened. There's also a little more to the story.

J. really wanted to get everyone up to Michigan at least once this year and this past weekend was pretty much the only window. Due to our upcoming and trip and other reasons, we really couldn't afford to pay someone to watch the animals one more time. So we decided that J. would take everyone and I would stay home and watch the animals. That way I could still teach my lessons and see my clients, the animals would be cared for, and I would have uninterrupted hours in which to plan the school year. They all left on Thursday and came home in time for dinner tonight.

I had a lovely four days. I met a friend for lunch one day and a different friend for dinner on another. TM stopped by and brought me treats (which were so generous I'm still working through them). I picked up the house...once.... and it stayed picked up the entire weekend. And I spread out all my books on the dining room table where they were able to stay while I figured out how school was going to work.

I did successfully get a broad outline for both the middle ages and for botany done. It isn't finished, but at least I know what topics we're covering and what we're reading from our main books. As I do this, I am constantly adding books to my holds at the library because I realize that I need supplemental resources for certain topics. It turns out that our library has a hold limit of 40 books and I reached that before I was done. I ended up texting J. the names of the books I still needed so he could put them on hold on his card. Once I look at those books, figure out if and how we can use them, slot them in, add art projects and individual work, then it will be done. It's a good thing we still have several weeks before our trip. 

I also still need to do outlines for my co-op classes I'm teaching as well as sort out K.'s study on Afghanistan (his choice) that he'll work on for the school year. I am not done by a long shot, but I have done the part of the planning that requires the most thinking and planning. It was close! I finished sketching out the outline and assigning dates late this afternoon and had just finished putting books away when everyone arrived home. 

The animals, at least some of them, were challenging. Midnight in particular. He does not like P. to be gone and becomes very needy. By today he was clinging to me like a limpet for most of the day. Literally clinging. In order to eat my lunch in peace I had to take it outside to get away from the cats. And instead of being followed around by children all day, the animals seemed to think there was a void which needed to be filled and stepped in.

This is what I saw when I turned around at one point this afternoon. Only Nefertiti was missing, but since I'm her person and I was here, she seemed to be just fine.

Everyone is home having had a nice time at the beach (despite Saturday being rainy all day) and tomorrow is back to life as usual.