The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

On Wednesday, Ben turned 34. He joked that these next couple of weeks are my favorite time of the year because he and I are the same age. He is right, it's my favorite time of the year (but it has nothing to do with age).

Starting in August we have Ben's birthday and Carter's birthday. September brings college football, back to school, our anniversary, and my birthday. October is falling leaves and Halloween, November is Thanksgiving, and December is Christmas.

Summer time is like the climb to the top of a very tall slide. By August 1 you are sitting at the top of slide, ready for the fast ride down. And then, whoosh, you are at the bottom and it's New Year's Eve.

When thinking about "back to school" I got lost in some memories. I can remember getting a new dress to wear to the first day of school. Do kids do that any more? I remember my mom buying me new shoes and new clothes that I couldn't wear until the school year started.

I remember wanting to buy up all the school supplies as soon as they hit the stores right after the 4th of July holiday. Oh, and my favorite...a new box of crayons, preferably one with a built in sharpener. When I was in elementary school, there was nothing better than a new box of crayons. OK, so maybe when the JC Penny Christmas catalog arrived and I would circle all the things I wanted for Christmas...that was pretty awesome, too.

Crayons! I loved to color. Even when I was in college, I would bust out a coloring book and box of crayons and color for 20 minutes as a stress reliever during exam time. I know, I know...what a wild child I was. I still love to color. If only my son would color with me. I try so hard to get him to sit down and color with me. He'll last about 5 minutes and then he's off to other (cooler) things.

Elementary school was the best. I went to George F. Roberts Elementary School. I still remember the school song: "we're Roberts Raiders, we're number one...." I could not wait for the first day of school. I remember starting in mid-August riding my bike out to the school every day to see if they had the class lists posted. You didn't know which teacher you would have and who would be in your class until just before the school year started. I loved school back then. Third grade was the only time in my life that I got straight A's. It was pretty much all downhill from there.

Does anyone remember having a black plastic box type thing that the elementary school provided to store your books and supplies? It was supposed to hang from a set of tracks from the underside of your table/desk. It was a like a drawer but it was always too heavy to stay on the tracks. I loved mined and I can't for the life of me remember what it was called.

Anyway, the whole point of this post is that I love August because it wraps up summer and kicks off fall (my favorite time of the year). This year I think the next 4-5 months are just going to fly by. With our days in Germany numbered, we are trying to make the most of them.