Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Back to school and other news

The kids are back to school. They started August 11, went one day, then went back Monday- Thursday and then this week only went two days because they have literacy testing. Jessie is in kindergarten half day. They are offering full day with a tuition price, but we do not have the money and I don't think it is worth it for maybe an extra two hours of class time. She goes from 8:00 to 11:30 and Brandon, who is in third grade this year, goes from 8:00-3:30. Because of the buses, Jess gets home anywhere from 12 to 12:30 and Brandon gets home between 4 and 4:30. They both seem to like it so far. I worked with Brandon all summer a little each day, so hopefully that helped him. He likes his teacher and isn't giving me too much trouble about going to school so far. Jessie I knew wouldn't be a problem. I haven't gotten their results back from the testing but I think they did well. This was the first year Brandon finished his testing on time so I take that as a good sign. I think the teachers were impressed by what Jessie knew but that doesn't surprise me since she has been watching Brandon do his homework since he started school. They are already hitting us up for money. First with school supplies, which ends up being about $20- $30 per kid depending on how cheap you can go, then you have to pay a craft fee of $15 per child and then school pictures and fundraisers are the first part of September. Oh joy! Jessie's teacher said that the teachers have to supply all the classroom stuff like decorations and books out of their own pocket. So where exactly is all the education money going to? Anyway hopefully this will be a good year for all the kids in our families.

Onto other news: Chris is doing well in his job. His bosses are sending him to different plants to observe and they trade ideas about how to run the plants more efficiently. He just went on a quick trip to Nebraska with four of his bosses in a car to check out one of the plants. He wasn't exactly looking forward to being stuck in a car with his bosses for 8 hours both ways but he sees this as a good sign that they aren't looking to let him go anytime soon. He was even offered an opportunity to travel the world for 6 months visiting other plants but he had to turn that down since he is married now. Then in September he flies to Florida for 5 days to do more of the same.

Grandma was in the hospital for a few days this weekend after my birthday party. She was having trouble with some new medication so the doctor switched it but her blood pressure started spiking and going all over the place. Mom took her to the emergency room on Sunday evening and they kept her there for a few days to figure out what was going on. In the end they think the medicine that she was allergic to was not out of her system before she started taking the new meds plus her neuropathy is starting to spread to more than just her feet. The hypertension is messing up her kidneys a little so she has to go on a low sodium diet. I guess her age is finally starting to catch up on her body a little. She is doing much better now though and is back home. Nobody at the hospital could believe she was 96, they kept checking her records and asking her if she was sure she is 96? That made her feel pretty good.