Ten Things I'm Looking Forward to in 2011

Of course I want to lose ten pounds, finally learn Spanish, and keep my house sparkling clean while I also continue to enjoy my two great guys. But those things are always on my list, every New Year.

Here's ten things I'm looking forward to this year, this specific year of 2011.

1. Turning 60! I know, I know, I'm way too young, but there you are! And I am so glad and grateful, really, to have made it this far and to have had so much fun along the way. So glad, as a matter of fact, that I think I'll spread the celebration out over the whole year.

2. Reading the rest of the Artemis Fowl series by Eoin Colfer. Paul and I are slowly making our way through these as his bedtime reading, and the more I read, the more I enjoy them. I'd never have thought that the intersection of master-mind teenager and high-tech creatures from the fairy world could be so full of action, intrigue, and intelligence. And what a vocabulary builder; it seems like every word from Paul's Wordly Wise Grade 6 book pops up sooner or later in this highly literate text.

3. Getting our porch redone. Oh boy, is it time.

4. Redecorating the downstairs hallway. Ditto.

5. Completing a big task in my school library, that of weeding the fiction book collection.

6. Watching this year's eighth grade class graduate. We started together at the Middle School campus four years ago, so they are the first group of students that I've seen go all the way through the program. I expect to feel quite sentimental on their graduation night.

7. Getting Paul through fifth grade, his first year of Middle School. Surely everything else will be easier than this first hard year of working together to figure out the system and develop effective study habits.



8. Going to Turks & Caicos Islands over the Easter break. Looks like a heavenly place to relax between the first wave of standardized test (which I handle as the school's Test Coordinator) and the final wave, which leads right into making the graduation Memory Book and Slide Show. We already have our tickets!




9. Another summer trip to Maine.

10. Some kind of special trip to my sister, Jean, and our good friend, Janice, to celebrate ten years of getting together each summer.