Hmmmm...

I have been sitting in front of the computer screen for 4 minutes trying to think of a title. My wit has deserted me. It's not the only thing. However, my humour is intact, as is my love for my family.

Fiona is having a great week. She loves her teacher and has sat at the dinner table giving us a play by play of her day for three days in a row. This is new for her. Getting details about what she was learning last year was like pulling teeth. It is wonderful to have her share about the things she is working on. Today they made fish, but, she clarified, not cooked fish. Paper fish.

Jo is barely crying at all when we drop him off in the mornings and is quite content when we arrive to pick him up, often playing with the other children or listening to a story. I am very glad that he is adjusting more quickly than we anticipated. I am increasingly positive that this experience will be good for him.

LK and I are pulling 13 hour work days and then all the family stuff on top of that. It is exhausting, but I hope that as he becomes more comfortable with reading curriculum guides and learns more of the teacher jargon, he will feel more comfortable planning lessons. I remember those first few days of the first placement where I was sure the students could tell that I had no idea what I was doing and just hoped that everything would work out. I at least had curriculum courses and a supervising teacher to provide some guidance, he is being baptized with fire.

There are people who are natural teachers, who are able to explain or support other people in learning well without a lot of training or instruction. LK has that gift. I have seen it in the way he interacts with our kids and with others. I see it in the way he thinks about planning lessons and how his students will or will not understand an idea. He asks the necessary questions without having been told what they are.

I really hope that we can survive the first 6 weeks and get to a place where this commonality is something we can enjoy rather than just endure. Because there is something really special about being able to share the things you love with your spouse. We have had the blessing of music for our entire relationship, we have enjoyed a short commonality in teaching while he was teaching band in TO, and now we have that overlap with Fi too. What a blessing!