New Pencils and Clean Erasers

Hello dears,
I just spent 12 hours at my "apartment". I have some food in the fridge, some crackers in the cupboard, a bit of chocolate stashed, and lots and lots of books, and plenty of plants. Sounds like a place I'd live, right? I clean it, vacuum it, wash dishes there, rearrange furniture, and do a lot of picking up. The difference between this place where I live quite a bit of my life, and my real home is that I share the apartment with between 22-27 ten year olds.
But some of the things my homes have in common is that they are both filled with people I care about, try to teach, try to set an example for, try to laugh with, try to help them in all the ways a mom can. (Some times my kids get confused when I say, "My kids.." Once I said that and Emily said, "I don't remember that" and Dad said, "She means her other kids." I'm not even conscious I do it some of the time.) Both sets of kids keep me awake at night some times, I wish them all the very best of everything. I feel so responsible for their success. If my kids at school don't learn all they must they won't pass a state test called WASL, but if they don't learn all the things that are really important, they won't pass the test called life.
I started a very cool mural of a bit of forest outside my doorway today, I think it's going to be pretty. I'll try to take a picture of it and post it for you to see. I spend a lot of time trying to make our apartment an environment in which one would like to spend a lot of time, since we do.
I will try to keep up with the blog commitment I started, but don't be afraid to email me with a nudge if it starts to get dusty. New pencils and clean erasers, feels like anything is possible in this new year, doesn't it?