Things that just dawned on me...

So it dawned on me last night while I was washing the dinner dishes that I will soon have a month off from the day to day tasks of being me.  A month without making school lunches or dinner, a month away from laundry, cleaning house, and grocery shopping.  How odd to go from doing all these things one day to not doing them for a whole month.  Granted I wont miss the cleaning house - who would - but I will miss some things terribly.  I have complete confidence in Randy being able to manage things, he's great at laundry and has no problem doing the grocery shopping (of course when he does it he and the kids get a candy bar at the checkout).  He can cook and will get the hang of making lunches, it's really not that hard and Sydney has decided to buy her lunch for most of the days left in the school year, so he'll really only have to make Tyler's.  I know, rationally and even emotionally, that the kids will be fine, they have four weeks left of school (fun times planned there) and their pets keep them busy with responsibilities, and there's always Skype to keep connected and up to date on what's happening here, and in the grand scheme of their life, and mine, one month isn't that long to be away.... but one thing I will miss is my two favorite times of the day. 

My first favorite is 6:00 a.m.  No I'm not jumping out of bed because I love life and I think I'm burning daylight, it's because I get to go and wake the kids up.  I've always woken Tyler up first; he's my eldest so he was the first one who had to get woken up when Kindergarten started six years ago and I've never really thought to switch it or take turns waking Sydney up first.  Interesting how we get into routines and patterns.  Tyler is usually awake by the time I climb the stairs (he's a morning person like me) and so we have a five minute cuddle and I realize now more then ever the time is counting down when those morning cuddles will end and I don't mean because I'm going to Ukraine for a month.  Sydney is never awake when I arrive at her door so the morning cuddle is more waking her up then cuddle, but I love it anyway.  I get Sydney's bunny Nibbles out of her hutch in the morning and for the past week or so Nibbles has been making the leap from the floor to the bed to come and join in on the cuddling, I think she knows something is up.

My second favorite time of the day is 3:10 p.m. (ish).  That's when the bus driver drops the kids off at the house and they come BURSTING through the front door.  I so love the yellow school bus - picks them up in the morning, brings them home in the afternoon. On the days when I sit at my desk (vs. work from the couch - you all know I do), I can see them walking up to the house, some days they're talking nice to each other, some days they're not.  You can always tell how it's going to be as soon as they walk through the door...some days it's pleasant, some days not so much.  Either way, I always get a smile on my face watching them walk up the driveway and waiting for the door to open and they step through...I'm going to miss that terribly.