Here's Your Change!

This was the title of my yearbook in either 8th grade or 9th grade I can't remember. The title was chosen b/c my class was the first 9th grade class to start back at the high school instead of the middle school. This tidbit of info is totally irrelevant except that I feel like this is the theme of my life right now- CHANGE! If you know me even in the slightest I don't do change really well. If you missed this about me ask the daycare teachers at Mirror Lake Academy and they will confirm it for you. Ms. Sharon (the infant room teacher) especially knows this about me as I have stood before her on 2 occasions and bawled my eyes out because my kids were being moved out of her room. It is big change that I have a hard time with and right now our life is in a season of big change. I'll start first with my job. We have been very lucky to have re-worked some things around here that are going to allow me to start working 2-3 days a week. I am beyond excited about this because I am hoping that this will allow me to get all the not fun household duties taken care of during the day so in the evening and on weekends it can be all about family and fun. I have been going back and forth about should I find a new job or just stay where I am. I could do a entire post on why I should leave where I am but the thought of going somewhere new terrifies me. I have applied a few places so I guess I'll just wait and see what happens. Secondly on the change issue is Addison. She is doing this thing called getting older and will be starting kindergarten in August. I'm not sure if I have mentioned on here before but we have struggled with where to send her to school. The school we were zoned for was not in the best area and we decided we would look into sending her to Carrollton City schools about 20 minutes away. This is where Steve went to school and it is right beside his office. I knew this was the best for her but it still broke my heart to know that she wouldn't know anybody and would have to adjust not only to Kindergarten but also to a new daycare facility for after school. She has been at Mirror Lake since she was 10 weeks old has made some really strong friendships and I hated to see that taken from her. Then we found out about a 2 months ago that our area got re-zoned for Ithica Elementary. It is about 2 years old and Steve's company actually built it. We decided we would have her tested there too just to keep all of our options open. When we took her for her assessment test we both were really impressed with the school. So now we were worse off than before. Will Addison be a Carrollton Trojan or an Ithica Titan? That has been the burning question around here lately. From a logistics stand point Ithica wins hands down. It is just 10 minutes from our house as opposed to 20, if I needed to send her to daycare after school Mirror Lake has a van that picks up there, there are several of her really good friends that are going there and one lives in the neighborhood right across the street. Her Mom has already said we could carpool. The downside of Ithica is that the middle school it feeds into is not a great one. And this is where we have been torn. On the elementary level there is no difference b/n Ithica and Carrollton as far as test scores. They are both at or above state standards and Ithica actually has a smaller teacher student ratio. If you are looking at the bigger long term picture Carrollton would be the best but for the right now Ithica is. And after much discussion and prayer we have decided to send her to Ithica. We will worry about middle school/high school when we need to and right now is not when we need to. I know we have made the right choice because when we were at Ithica I just felt good about it. I can't explain it but it felt like we belonged there and like sending her to kindergarten wasn't going to be as bad as I thought. Now I am just hoping that I can make it through her pre-k graduation without having to big of a sob fest. I know she will be back at Mirror Lake maybe for after school and maybe on school holidays but I still feel like this is the end. (As my eyes fill up with tears.) That place has been home for her for 5 and a half years and the teachers there have loved her like she was their own. Her pre-k teachers have been nothing short of fantastic and she has even said that she wants to stay with Ms. Melissa forever. She doesn't know this yet but she will be seeing a lot of her over the summer and I am thrilled about it. It is just hard for me to imagine only dropping off Carsyn. So I guess this is my change. This is what life is made of. I am just doing my best to adjust and remember that with each new chapter He brings many blessings.