Well, I guess it shouldn't surprise me that this is the first day I've had time to post something since my classes started on Monday. It's been a whirlwind week--at first I felt like I'd been shot out of a cannon, but now I am calming down and I think I'll be able to handle this. I guess the low point came on Tuesday night, when I finished an assignment at about 11:30 and discovered there were also 75 pages of reading assigned! So, I'm learning how to skim. The assigments aren't that hard, it's just a matter of being organized enough to figure out when everything is due and plan accordingly. What makes that a bit difficult (aside from the fact that I've never been in school as a mom before) is that I'm a commuter student (as are most of my fellow students) and I can't just pop over to campus for an hour or two in the library. Well, of course the other thing is that when we are up on Rattlesnake Hill (where the wind blows like crazy!) we are constantly in class. The summer "quarter" is only six weeks long, so class sessions are three and four hours. So far the professors do a pretty good job of keeping it interesting, with a variety of discussion topics, videos, etc. And of course, breaks.
Everyone is very nice and I'm trying to be more outgoing than I usually am, so I won't feel like a loner. Yesterday for the first time someone actually spoke to me without me speaking first--yay! Our class is mostly young women fresh out of college, but there are a few older women and a few men--looks like only two of the men are recent college grads and the others are my age or older. Intellectually, the course material is not terribly challenging, but it's a new field for me so it's interesting enough. It seems like we are getting a lot of theoretical stuff now, and the more nuts-and-bolts things will come later when we're doing student teaching.
So far MLM and the Bear seem to be adjusting OK to the new schedule. I was worried on Friday evening, though, when the Bear came down with a sudden fever and I figured I'd get it, miss school, and have to take incompletes in all my classes! But he got better quickly so it seems more like just a cold and not the flu. I probably will get it soon, but maybe I'll still be able to get to class to infect everyone else, ha ha!