First Day of School 2024!

We're back to school again, as of mid-August, August 15th to be exact. 

8th grade for Annabel (last year of middle school!) and sophomore year for Daniel! 

Time continues to fly by. My baby will be in high school next year- what?! But that's getting ahead of myself- first, we'll get this year under wraps. Our first day was celebrated by my annual tradition of chocolate chip cookies, of course.

This year brings just one more year of kids at two different schools. Still juggling the crazy schedule this means, since the kids start at different times and Daniel also has late start on Wednesdays just to really make things interesting.

Annabel is still doing band, her favorite band director is her teacher again, she has a friend who happens to be in basically all of her classes, she still does flute lessons after school (she can walk there!), and she's still doing the local youth symphony orchestra this year. Annabel is also an 8th grade WEB Leader (Where Everybody Belongs, an 8th/6th grade mentorship program) this year (hence the shirt she's wearing in the pictures below)- she had a day of training and then spent a day welcoming the 6th graders to their school with activities and tours. Such a great opportunity for her to do this! 

She's both sad and excited it's the last year of middle school, too. She really liked this school, loved some of her teachers, it's fun and comfortable here, but the middle school years were fairly torturous for her with lots of friend drama, so high school shines ahead brimming with lots of exciting possibilities and hopefully new friends. 8th grade should be a fun year, though, since they do lots of special things for these 8th graders and I know she'll enjoy it all. 

Daniel is taking on AP Gov this semester and has already said it'll be an interesting class and the teacher is really good (yes, these are all his words!), he's doing another semester of Auto class this semester, too, and will of course continue his involvement with Car Club after school. We'll continue working on his driving hours, too, but he's not exactly in any hurry to get that license. But Driver's Ed is done! He did that over the summer and it went great! He's a good driver- we're so proud of his calm demeanor. Anyway, he has a good load of classes and continues to be the responsible, wonderful kid we are so proud of. 

I'll continue volunteering in the middle school library. I've also taken on the Volunteer Coordinator chair position for Home & School, creating the sign ups and communicating volunteer opportunities to the school community. And of course I still run my neighborhood book club. So I'm busy.  

Here's hoping it's a great year for everyone!