The end of the vacation
Sunday, August 29th, 2010After the long summer break, preschool starts for the rest of the family on Wednesday. Stefania starts her third and final year, whilst Daniele goes for the first time. Pinuccia has accepted a job at a school in the centre of Trento from 2.30pm to 5.30pm; that is, the after school care. It means she will be at home almost an hour later than she was last year, which means an hour per day less with the children. She is not happy about this (and neither will Stefania and Daniele be once school starts), but there was nothing better available. On the other hand, with both children at school, Pinuccia and I will both get a lot more time to do other things. After a few years in which I have been able to do a lot less than what I had wanted to do, it will be a big change. I wonder though if we will suffer from the “empty nest” syndrome, having such an empty house during the day.
Although the school restarts on the 1st, it will be a couple of weeks before we actually arrive at the normal rhythm. Firstly because Daniele has a gradual insertion at the preschool, first doing 1.5 hours per day, then a few more hours, before starting full time attendance in the second half of the month. At the same time, my mother arrives on the 1st for a visit for a couple of weeks, which will help to fill the hole left by all my family going out every day!
The first couple of weeks of September are also filled with the preparations for the new church year, and getting the groups restarted. Pinuccia will be leading a meeting for the Sunday School teachers on Thursday, with the classes starting probably on the 12th. She will also have to work out a program for the monthly ladies’ meetings. I will be getting two cell groups started, as well as helping the other groups start looking after the enrolments. So I will have a gradual insertion into my normal pattern of church ministry as well.