I work part-time out of the house.  I'm pretty sure that I have mentioned this before.  I'm a preschool teacher.  I teach 3 and 4 year-olds.  I love my job.  I love the women I work with.  I love the kids in my classes.  I love that it's only 2 days a week and I get to spend the rest of the week with my babies.

This week, however, it hasn't been like that.  I can't tell you how insane this week has been.  ER all day on Sunday...PCP visit with Danika Monday morning...Funeral home all day on Monday...Funeral on Tuesday...Work all day on Wednesday - even the evening for the Art Show.  So, of course, I had some pretty unhappy babies.  Guess what, though -  They aren't unhappy today.

Growing up I didn't miss a lot of school.  That isn't to say that I NEVER missed school - but I didn't stay home unless I was really sick.  The rule was - if you miss school then you aren't allowed to do anything in the evening.  If you missed on a Friday, you were stuck in the house for the entire weekend!  So, I tried not to miss much school.  I don't think there was ever a year when I had perfect attendance, but we were never going to get a phone call from a truancy officer.

I didn't realize it at the time (although I should have because my dad always said, "I have to go to work if I'm sick or not - you should go to school") but my parents were setting me up to have a good work ethic.  I very rarely take days off from work.  When I taught 5 days a week, I never used all my days.  Now that I teach only 2 days a week, I still have days left at the end of the year to use up!

Today, I used one of those days.  I swear that God was sending me multiple signs that I needed to take today off.

First, last week I happened to ask how many days I had left.  I had 2.  I scheduled a day off in May but decided that I would just lose the other day...I didn't have time to take another day off.

I already mentioned the crazy week that I have had so far.  I'm tired and really missing my babies.  I mentioned to my "boss" yesterday that I was missing them because I had been away from them so much and was already thinking about all the time I was going to spend away from them up until Sunday.

Then, my MIL (who watches my babies on Thurs.) had a filling fall out!  She is headed to the dentist today to get that fixed and the twins were going to stay with my FIL until she got back.  My FIL is totally capable to watching the boys for a short period of time - plus, my SIL was probably going to show up at some point, too.  They would have been fine...but, David had a fever last night and coughed a lot all night and had a fever this morning...so, I was a little nervous about leaving him with my FIL because I could see him screaming for 2 hours and my FIL not being able to calm him down and losing it.   Probably wouldn't have happened. . . but I would have worried about it the whole afternoon.

I mentioned this to my "boss" last night when I was leaving the Art Show and she said that it would be no big deal if I took today off and took care of my baby.  (Of course, she already knew I was missing them)  She assured me that they could handle things without me - which I never doubted but was happy to hear!

So, I took the day off.  I feel a little bit guilty - because that is how I was raised - but I look at my babies, happy even though they are coughing, and I know that I did the right thing.  They need this day this week.  I need this day this week.