Time to Regroup...

...to be a working girl again.

I will honor my son's request that we help protect his son's security by keeping our conversations about him within the family.  Instead, I celebrate his birth by sharing one of my favorite entries to the Worth1000.com photography contests. 

My mom is doing well.  She had a scare with dehydration but was doing much better when I left yesterday thanks to IV fluids at Kaiser.

I was happy to return to Camarillo, which seemed 20 degrees cooler than my mom's town, and even though we are much closer to the beach it seemed much less humid here.  I got the car unpacked and spent the afternoon catching up on email and pulling together some of the bits and pieces of writing and research I'd worked on at Mom's.

I'll do some writing now, then go to Costco for some prints I ordered last night.  From there I'll go work in my classroom, then home to put together lesson plans for the first week or two.  I had exciting news when I was able to get into my school email.  The principal was able to get me a projector and Elmo.  I will have to make an adjustment from my overhead projector (which was so loud I had to turn it off to hear student comments and which had a bulb that burned out in the middle of lessons about every two months).  Of course, before I adjust anything, I will have to figure out how to get the new stuff hooked up.

My family took GREAT care of my gardens while I was at my mom's.  The summer heat finally arrived, of course, while I was gone and I worried that the schedule I left wouldn't be enough watering to keep everything alive.  But, they adjusted beautifully and everything is looking wonderful.  I even came home to a gardenia full of blooms.  Four of them float next to me, now, and smell divine.

It was a wonderful summer, and now I look forward to dragging these good feelings into the next school year with me.