Milestone: Melissa's Classroom Packed

A few weeks ago, Melissa made it official and resigned from her position at Southside Elementary.  She had been teaching Kindergarten there for the last seven years.  We had hoped she might be able to take some sort of year long "leave of absence" to hold onto the job even as we serve at Cowman School in Vaudreuil, Haiti next year.  Turns out it wasn't even a remote possibility - such leaves are granted only for furthering one's education and the year's leave is predicated on a promise of serving at least two more years in the district following the leave.  So, no safety net for us; Melissa had to cut ties completely.

On the last day of school, a Friday, one of Melissa's coworkers asked if she would be spending all weekend cleaning out her classroom so she could be out of the building by the following Monday.  Ha!  It is not the sort of job that is completed in two days.  More like two weeks.

First, Melissa had a huge room - about as much square footage as a small house.  (Not exaggerating!) She had to sort through all sorts of furniture, games and files.  Secondly, the sorting wasn't simple and straightforward.  A flowchart would have been helpful... Bought with PTO money?  - Stays for the next teacher.  Bought with our money?  - Then ask Is this needed in Haiti? If "No", then stays for the next teacher or goes into long term storage.  If "Yes", then ask Is it feasible to ship? - If "No" to feasibility, then long term storage ... etc., etc.

Finally, Melissa has the spiritual gift of organization, so the resources bound for Haiti were not just tossed together into boxes randomly.  No, they stand largely ready to pull out of tubs and be put right to use.  (But just between you and me, I will bet you a thousand dollars it will take her almost two weeks to organize her classroom at Cowman once we reach Haiti in August!)

So every spare moment over the past two weeks has been devoted to clearing out the old classroom and preparing for the new.

The kids "helped" quite a bit over the last few days when both Melissa and I had to be there.  The best part apparently was the ride back to the classroom on the dolly after loading boxes into the van.

Since we are going through a similar sorting process at home, we decided for sanity's sake to rent a storage unit for the next two months in which to store items we HOPE to ship to Haiti.  (No guarantees - we'll have to see what we can afford.) These are all Melissa's classroom boxes.  I dare say that if we can get these things all shipped, she'll have one of the best supplied Kindergarten classroom on the entire island!

The classroom is almost empty and Caleb is ready to celebrate!

One last walk-through reveals a solar system we almost left behind.  How could we miss entire planets?!

Signed out and heading home!  Melissa will meet with her principal and the newly hired replacement on Monday and then her time at Southside will be officially over.

I tend to struggle with multi-tasking on the macro level, so I am glad for this milestone.  Now we can turn our attention to getting the house sold or rented, arranging various events on the calendar for these last two months, and raising the financial support we are still lacking. 

Caleb heads to Nerd Camp tomorrow and the rest of the family will be gearing up for a trip to Pennsylvania in a couple of days to speak at the church of some friends in Warfordsburg and to visit family and friends in the Pittsburgh area. 

Things are definitely moving and we'd love your prayer support. These milestones are wonderful, but they can be emotionally taxing.  Leaving Southside is bittersweet for Melissa.  She is so excited about getting started at Cowman, but she has wonderful memories from her years at Southside, including some exceptional classes, parents, helpers and co-workers.  Goodbyes are tough!

 Let us know of specific ways we can lift you in prayer, too!