Along the Road to Home

Thanksgiving vacation came and just like that, 9 days later it went.  It was good to have a break from school for both kids and adults, but now it is time to return and get back to the business of learning.  I have missed the 11 little ones that call me "teacher" each day, and I can't wait to hear of all the excitement they have had while we were away from one another. Mike and I were very busy over the course of it all.  We are inching closer each to day to the time when we put our house upon the market for sale.  The bathroom is now finished with only a few tiny details left to be put into place.  Mike worked so very hard to get things taken care of in that room, and I am most grateful for all of the sweat equity he has poured into it.  He has an eye for the way things should go together and once it is all into place, it looks wonderful. Yesterday we set about the task of pulling carpet up in our bedroom in order to expose the hardwood floors underne...

Long ago I was a single mom with a precious 5-year old son.  As a newly divorced and 30-year old woman living on a Kansas teacher's salary, times were lean and scary for a while.   I remember being thankful once that we had just enough toilet paper to last until payday, and yet another time that the gas in the car was sufficient to make it to school one more trip without having to fill up. A quick check of my bank account balance told me that it was either gasoline or medicine for a young boy's ear infection, one not both.  I never forgot those days long ago now that seemed bleak sometimes, and what it took to survive.  Neither of us perished because we went without and I would like to think that I became a better and much wiser person because of the experience.  When I see others struggling today, especially the young folks with small children in tow, one thing in my mind is for certain. I understand. Been there.  Experienced that. Would hate ...

~For nearly 7 1/2 years I wrote a blog called "The View From a Different Window", starting in May of 2011 as I prepared myself to cross the state of Kansas on a bicycle.  It went on from there to tell of what life has been like for me, a Kansas farm kid and teacher.  I've written over 1,200 blog posts there and I'd venture to say that some of them I have forgotten about already.  I'm in the process of making hard copies of those countless diary entries.  Some day I will sit down and share them with my grandchildren and be able to tell them the real life stories of their grandmother's time.  My words were never meant to be Pulitzer Prize winning or even perused by a million readers. Writing them turned out to be the best medicine I could have had in order to get through times that were often hard.  The finished product was proof that I made it.  This new blog, Along the Road to Home, is written with the intent of chronicling what life will be like as we...