Back To School . . . Oh Happy Day!!!

I have been nesting lately. Not in the "I'm pregnant"sense of the term - I'm not totally crazy people!! But in the "the kids are going back to school" sense. Today I am giddy with excitement at the prospect of what tomorrow brings. I can smell the crayons, freshly sharpened pencils and new school shoes (which is a much better smell than Trace's skanky 4-month old flip-flops that have covered every inch of squishy mud Crystal Springs boasts!) I can hardly wait to take the kids' pictures by the front door holding their new backpacks, er - "Messenger Bags." But what I really can't wait for is the long-lost concept of routine. Yes, I loathed my mother's routines, muttering under my breath every time she said, "Dinner (Actually she usually sung that one word in an opera voice, which stretched it to at least 6 syllables,)time for CCD, you have soccer practice tonight, time to get showered, time for bed." But now as a grown woman with 5 kids of my own, I am literally skipping through the house at the thought of this upcoming week - the start of everything falling into its rightful place. And as my girlfriend Patti so eloquently put it, "Everything has a place, and my kids' place is in school." We are looking forward to the resurgence of a clean house. Not that we don't clean over the summer, but I liken it to shoveling while its still snowing. If you blink, you miss it. Dn't get me wrong, I have enjoyed (almost) every moment of this summer with my kids. I have loved hearing about their summer camp advenures, taking them to the park, going for walks, having their friends over to play, swimming, fishing, running through the sprinkler, watching them on the swingset and seeing them struggle to keep their eyes open at the dinner table after a day playing outside. But at this point, I have probably applied sunscreen 250 times, passed out 300 popsicles, gotten 600 cups of water, swept sand off the patio 50 times, reapplied sunscreen 100 times, been to 15 different parks, bandaged 30 scraped knees or elbows and heard "I'm bored!" 400 times. As my husband would say, "Put a fork in me, I'm done!" Now I look forward to bedtimes and homework, school projects and soccer practice. Until December at least, when I'm wishing for summer again . . .