This past week has been a significant one for me because I spent my final day in the classroom and ended my 25-year teaching career. with retirement That's not all that happened though, so here are some highlights of the whole week, starting with Monday, Memorial Day.
We spent Memorial Day at our new house. We had visited the cemetery where both sets of parents are buried on Saturday, so Monday was a total work-at-home day for us. After a quick trip to the grocery store in the morning, we spent the rest of the day working in our new backyard and garage. We made a ton of progress in the garage. If it still looks we have a lot to do, you are right - but it is much better than it was, and we will keep working on it!
Our goal was to have room for one of the cars in our 2-car garage, and we achieved our goal.
We have another private parking spot right in front of our home, so for now, this is where Charly will park his car. In my last post, someone commented that our entryway looked like a shed. No, it's not. This is our home from another angle. The home has a wonderful covered entryway where you can see the flag. The front door opens into a very nice entryway. The two windows to the right in the picture are picture windows in our formal living room. The two windows on the left of the flag are our great room - kitchen/dining/family room.
Here's another picture of the house at night, which Charly's car in the front parking spot. If you look at the right of the picture you can see the garage which is behind the main living area of the house. The layout of the home is unique, and I love it because I love having a formal entryway and a formal living room, with a large great room. I will post more pictures of the inside of the house soon.
Meanwhile, our old house is still for sale, but we have been having showings. We are hoping to have an open house within the next couple of weeks.
I planted some bareroot Hydrangea plants that I got at my new favorite store, Tractor Supply. The whiskey barrels also came from there. I haven't had great luck with bareroot plants in the past, but with diligent watering, I am hopeful that I will eventually have some beautiful Hydrangeas.
In another barrel, I planted some bareroot grape plants.
I love this rose bush in the front of the house. The roses on this bush are my favorite color for roses.
Tuesday, it was back to school for my last week in the classroom. The students are bored and restless. Grades had already been posted, and so nothing was going on. Many students stopped attending, and those who did show up are trying to see how far they can push the rules. It really wasn't fun, but it did make me grateful that this was my last week.
Thursday afternoon, I walked out of my classroom for the last time, at the end of a 25-year teaching career. Friday was the last day of school, but I found that I had one more day of leave, so I decided to go ahead and take off the last day of school. I've taught at seven different schools in two different states, and I and this last year of my career was definitely the most challenging. I don't think it's just that I'm older, but education has changed, and not for the better. I feel like I've taught at schools where I saw the best of public education, but at this last school, I have definitely seen the worst. I walked out a little sad, but with no regrets, and overall, I am happy to be finished. I hope I made a positive impact somewhere along the way.
When I got home Thursday afternoon, Charly said I should choose where I wanted to eat to celebrate my retirement. I chose IHOP, a favorite place, with lots of good comfort food on the menu. I chose this yummy BLT with fries as my retirement dinner. Interestingly, one of my former students was working at the restaurant and he seemed excited to see me.
Friday, it started to rain about noon, and it rained all Friday night and until about 2 p.m. on Saturday - a full 24-hours of steady rain. This was wonderful because we need rain here in Utah. We spent part of the day Friday at our old house as we continue to clean our cupboards, the garage and our shed. We are living in our new home in Orem, now, sleeping here every night.
Saturday morning it was pouring rain. We had planned to stay home the entire day. I cleaned all of the bathrooms and floors in the house, then started going through my closet again, getting some of my "teaching clothes" out and in the donate box. I am also getting rid of everything plastic in my kitchen, so that also went into the donate box.
Saturday afternoon, I got a message on Facebook Marketplace that someone wanted to buy the old refrigerator that we had in our garage at our old house. We drove to the old house, which is about a 40 minutes drive, to meet the people who wanted the fridge. Here are the purchasers loading the old fridge in their vehicle. They told us that their fridge had gone out and they needed another one right away to save their food. The old fridge was a "work horse" Maytag, known for dependability. I hope it works well for this family for a long time to come. I was pleased to get one more item sold and out of the old house, or in this case the garage. We still have a few items that we plan to donate to The Other Side Thrift Store, which helps those recovering from addiction.
Sunday was a beautiful, sunny day. This is the mountain view from the parking lot of the church, when we got there about 8:45 a.m. Sunday morning.
We had a lovely worship service with messages from a young couple in our congregation who had a baby who was born with some severe health problems. They told of some of the miracles their family had experienced including the fact that their little girl is now a darling 15-month-old. After the worship service, we had a special Sunday School lesson about the importance of the Constitution and why Christians should support and sustain it and all it stands for. This is not "Christian nationalism." It is simply acknowledging that our founding fathers were moral men who believed in a creator who "endowed us with unalienable rights." Our rights come from God, not the government, and God oversaw the founding of this nation. Our Constitution cannot secure our nation's stability and prosperity without a population grounded in moral and ethical principles. With everything going on in our society today, that should concern everyone who loves the USA!
Sunday afternoon, Josh came over to join us for Sunday dinner.
We had Dolly Parton 5-Ingredient Slow Cooker Casserole. We also had a green salad with it. I also made corn muffins. It was a very tasty dinner. We had a very nice visit with Josh, and ended up driving to the cemetery to pick up the flowers and flags we left last weekend for Memorial Day. Josh stayed at our house until after 9 p.m. so I am late in getting this post up.
Gratitude for this past week:
- Finishing up the school year and my teaching career.
- Selling our old refrigerator.
- Spending time with Charly and Josh.
- Living full-time in our new home.
Praying for:
- Adjustment to this new chapter of my life.
- My children and grandchildren.
- Quick sale of our old house.
- Safe travels on an upcoming getaway.
Looking forward to:
- Selling our old house.
- Going on a couple of getaways this summer.
- Enjoying my retirement!
Until next time,
😊Deb💖
“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people.
It is wholly inadequate
to the government of any other”
~John Adams
