Exhausted.

I've been back in my classroom since Monday morning, each day (except Wednesday), and I am EXHAUSTED.   It sure takes awhile for a teacher to build up their stamina after the summer break!

This week is particularly tiring because it begins by moving around A TON of furniture.  I've moved to a new classroom (for me), and cleaning it thoroughly and setting it up *just right* is quite the chore.  During the summer, everything has to be stacked in a corner and all of the furniture gets removed for floor cleaning by our caretaking staff, so re-arranging the room is the first job and it sure works the muscles!

I've met my teaching partner, the Early Childhood Educator who is a part of my classroom because of the full-day kindergarten program.  She has been fantastic this week!  She has been cleaning and scrubbing and has shared wonderful ideas.  I'm looking forward to the students arriving next week so we can really dive in to our program planning together.  I think we are well-suited for one another, and I'm really appreciative of her help this week.  It's unpaid and voluntary, so it's much appreciated that she's there to take part in our classroom set-up.

All in all, I'm having a very positive experience being back in my classroom this week... it's just this darn exhaustion at the end of the day!  Time to hop into bed so tomorrow can be extremely productive - it's my last chance to make the classroom perfect before our kiddos arrive on Tuesday morning!   I'm going to take some photos tomorrow and share them this weekend, so you can look forward to that. :-)