Looking forward to summer changes

I miss this space. I miss taking time to process life. To find the lessons and beauty all around. But life is busy. Too busy if I am honest. And in that vein, I am making some changes to try and find a better balance between being productive and being present.

Studying for classes is 100 times harder with a baby. Considerably more than I had anticipated and stress levels have been rising in all areas of life as I have let things slide in order to get assignments completed. With only three classes left to take after this quarter I had considered just plowing on, but for the health of our family as well as me personally I am going to take the summer off to focus on being wife and mother. I am SO looking froward to the break.

I am signed up for a math class this fall. Gross, but it's all I have left. And signing up makes me feel better about taking time off for summer. This means that if I take one class a quarter I will begin the new calendar year with 2 quarters left. Sigh. I had desperately wanted to be finished in 2013, but it was just not to be - especially considering all the classes I  have left are prerequisites for the next. Plodding along, the end in sight, just a little further off than I had expected.

I will get this Associates Degree if it kills me. Which it might, but hopefully that will be less likely after some long summer days enjoying the sunshine, spray parks days at the zoo, picnics, trips to the beach, outdoor concerts, hikes and generally squeezing the juice out of the summer here in the Pacific Northwest with both the wonderful men in my life.

Hoping the summer will also give me time to be here more, because the days are passing so fast, and I would love to have more memories of this time recorded to look back on. Levi is at such a darling stage right now. He is a sponge, learning things all the time. He doesn't miss a beat and sometimes it feels hard to keep up with his curiosity.

He wakes up early, and from the second he pops up to walk laps around the crib, Lovie in his hand, he is jabbering at HIGH volume. Telling us all about his night and how much he has missed us and sharing his plans hopes for the days ahead. It would be way less fun to wake up if he wasn't such a chipper little guy. I just want to stay in these moments forever.