January 2016 – The Diary of a Lagos Mum

I have neglected you all, haven’t I?

It’s ok – don’t feel bad.

I’ve neglected everyone over the last few weeks.

My home, my friends, my dog, LagosDad and yes, even my kids.

Why?

Because I’m back at school!

Since last September, I’ve been feeling a bit restless and discontent. As though there had to be more to life than playgroup, school runs and managing my home. Don’t get me wrong, I love spending time with my children (mostly), but there’s more. Right?

Then I realised that I wanted to go back to school. I missed being in the classroom (And being surrounded by other people’s children!).

I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be back full-time, so I applied for a job as a substitute teacher. I had an interview. And I didn’t hear anything for weeks.

Suddenly I got an email asking if I’d be interested in covering someone’s maternity leave in January for twelve weeks. EH? Really? Me? Which grade? Full-time?

I got in touch with the school immediately to say yes, I was interested. But I still didn’t get any more information. I had to come in the following week to meet with the middle school principal. Middle school? That sounded like quite big kids. And didn’t they have different teachers for each subject? Which subject would I have to teach? What if it was science? What if it was *gulp* math?

I Googled ‘middle school’ and found out the age of the students – yes, they were a bit older than the five to seven year olds I was used to. It was only the following week, when I had the meeting that all was revealed.

7th grade. Geography. Errr. Not my age range and not my subject. But I could do it.

So since November, I’ve been in and out of school. Sometimes they ring me in advance to cover for someone. But mostly they ring me at 6 am and ask me if I can come in that day. Since my aim is to get a full-time job, I’ve had to accept more often than I wanted to. I mean… SIX AM!

And since January 11th, I’ve been in full-time teaching geography to 7th graders. The hours are long – 7 am to 3.15 pm (but usually I get home at about 4 pm). I don’t see my children much (is it a terrible thing that although I feel guilty about it, I don’t mind that much?). It’s taken a lot of preparation and a lot of reading up and researching stuff – but I LOVE IT!

I used to be quite a regular on Pinterest.

I was not, like other Pinterest users I know, pinning art and craft ideas, organisational stuff or home DIY projects. I was very busy pinning pictures of shoes, handbags, jewellery and furniture that I wanted. I eventually, out of guilt, created a ‘Kids’ board and started pinning nursery ideas and cute outfits and shoes.

I can’t remember why, but I lost interest and kind of forgot about it all – for a year or two at least!

And now I’ve rediscovered my love for it. My love for pinning expensive shoes and handbags, places I’ll probably never go to, make up I’ll never be able to do myself, stunning women with beautiful bodies I’ll never look like and jewellery that I’ll never have. Oh, and walk-in closets. Lots of walk-in closets! But you know what? It doesn’t matter! It actually makes me happy.

LagosDad gave me an iPhone for Christmas (yay!) and I absolutely love it. I’m also terrified of dropping it, banging it against something or Booni getting a hold of it and throwing it across the room. So I’ve been looking for a (not boring) cover for it. I found the most amazing covers on Pinterest.