Most days the doorbell doesn't get used. It was used quite a few times today! The cleaning ladies showed up, and I wasn't expecting them. I had called the company's office in mid December and said I'd take the next several weeks off since I was on a break at school. It had been a month since they had come. I had left a message asking what date they would be coming next, and they never called back. I felt badly that they showed up for nothing, but there was no way they could clean the house without me having prepared ahead of time. Too many toys and books lying on the floor and such. We saved some money by going 6 weeks without the cleaning service as they'll be returning in two weeks.
Beth (our neighbor) also showed up. I had called her in the morning to ask if she could also babysit next Friday as yesterday the Dean sent notice of a faculty meeting being held on the 27th. Classes resume next week, and Beth will be babysitting the kids on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 2:50-5:30 (until Paul comes home). Gabby or Alexis will watch the kids from 3:30-5:30 on those days (after they come home from school). When I called her this morning she said she was in the middle of making stuffed shells. I commented that is one of Paul's favorite dishes, and I should make some this week as well. I certainly wasn't trying to hint in any way, but she brought over a small dish of shells to share with us. How sweet! We had stored her swimming pool in our garage for a week (while she was drying it out and cleaning it) several months ago, and she said this was her way of thanking us for that.
The mailman and UPS delivery man also rang the doorbell today. We had a lot of packages delivered in November and December because I did a lot of my Christmas and birthday shopping online. Not much has been delivered over the past month. Today we received three packages. One contained a 11x14 print I ordered from Shutterfly when they sent me a $20 off anything coupon code recently. Another contained Inchimals. I think they're really neat. Nadia was using them to measure things (like Sweetpea), and Ian enjoyed comparing them (bigger/smaller) and putting them in order from smallest to longest. The third box was from a lot I purchased on eBay. It had an assortment of things -some I had on my list of things I definitely wanted to buy and a few I wasn't planning to buy but sounded like they could be used. It included things like cuisinaire rods (which are based on centimeters), the teacher's manual for the pre-kindergarten level of Handwriting without Tears, some ABC flashcards from My Father's World curriculum, the Kindergarten teacher's manual for My Father's World, and some other supplies from Handwriting without Tears (such as sentence strips, a small slate, etc.). Fun, fun, fun!
I finished reading Charlotte's Web to Nadia today. In honor of that we watched part of a movie based on the book. We'll finish it tomorrow. Nadia of course wasn't very happy that Charlotte died at the end. She kept asking, "Why did she have to die?."
I have been having two pregnancy symptoms the past couple of days. I keep reminding myself that I'm taking Progesterone 3 times a day, and that is probably what is causing these symptoms. It's so hard not to read into things during the dreaded "two week wait" (which is actually a 12 day wait for me since I always break out the hpts by 12pdo). Just four more days....
Last night I checked online to see if the fall semester schedules had been posted yet. I was stunned to see what my schedule is supposed to be. I had asked for any two evening or online courses and ten student teachers. I thought that seemed very reasonable, but I figured the worst case scenario would be that I'd have a schedule similar to what I had from 2004-2008 which was to teach 2-3 classes either MWF or T/TH morning (or afternoon) and 1-2 evening classes. It never crossed my mind that I'd be scheduled to teach 2 classes on T/Th mornings (starting at 8am) and 2 classes on MWF (one in the morning and one in the afternoon). I looked up all the other schedules for the other faculty in my department for next semester, and I'm the only one who has a 5 day schedule. What?!?!?! I emailed my department chair and Dean today asking that I be given a schedule similar to my colleagues for next semester - either M/W/F or T/Th. There are only two professors in my department who have more seniority than I do, but that's really a moot point since I was the only one given such an awful schedule. If I didn't have children and lived really close to campus, I really wouldn't care, but I do have two young children and also don't want to spend 6.5 hours commuting to and from work each week. I'm hoping they will give me a more reasonable schedule. I didn't even ask for any particular courses. The two courses I was assigned will be new ones for me. I didn't even bring that up. It really hurt when I viewed my schedule because I considered my department chair to be a friend. It felt like a slap in the face that he would give me (and only me) such a schedule, especially when I have always tried to help him whenever he's asked such as when he asked me to write an accreditation report in June or when he's asked me to chair a committee. If I am pregnant right now, I won't be teaching the whole semester in the fall, but I do plan to start out teaching FT at the beginning of the semester in August as my due date would be October 4. My chair said the reason they gave me this schedule was because they want me to mentor a new ECE tenure track faculty member that we're attempting to hire right now. I'm happy to be a mentor to another new faculty member as I have done in the past, but being a mentor has never before meant you needed to teach 5 days a week. I hope I am feeling better about this situation next week when I'm on campus because right now I just feel very hurt.
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