School is in Session

The five oldest girls are back in school. Hard to believe, but Summer is a junior and Rachel has started high school this year. Heather is in 6th grade, Gwen is in 5th and I am homeschooling Kelly in 2nd. It is quiet at home with only three kids around during the day.

Everyone seems to be enjoying school and comes home happy, which makes me happy. I did have a bit of an email run-in with one of the girl's high school English teachers. She assigned three novels with lots of bad language and I objected. I thought it was silly that the high school had a rule that "Students must not be vulgar, obscene, or profane in speaking, acting or writing," but they were expected to read books with incessant profanity. The teacher was unwilling to compromise and, per the daughter's request, I didn't push any more. It still frustrates me, though. Oh, well.

Just in time for school to start, we replaced the van that was totaled with the same exact vehicle, same color and everything, just two years newer. It was nice to skip the learning curve that comes with a new, unfamiliar car :) I also started driving again in time to do school pick-ups, which is uncomfortable in my brace, but it is nice to be able to get out!

Shoe Shopping

Yesterday, Stan had to work all day, so I decided it was a good day to take the kids and get the shoe shopping done I've needed to do for them.

Did I say done? Having a thirteen year old means never having the shoe shopping done, EVER. Even though we went to five different shoe stores, it still isn't done.

But...I digress. In the course of our shopping, we purchased five pairs of shoes, returned two, are keeping two and have two pairs sitting in the laundry room waiting to be returned. In case you are doing the math, that includes a pair purchased for the thirteen year old two months ago.

Overall the trip went well. We all survived. And if you don't know why barely surviving a shopping trip is a good outcome, you haven't ever taken six kids including a toddler shopping for four hours. We had the mandatory mad rush to a public restroom, one minor injury and at least 75 instances of me saying, "One, two, three, four, five...WHERE"S MICHAEL?"

The highlights of our trip were getting two pairs of keepers (Yea!), finding a cute green velveteen purse for me, the trip to In-N-Out when we were done and seeing Heather and Rachel try on boots. Everyone tried on a couple pairs of shoes they knew I wouldn't buy, but Rachel and Heather went to town with the boots. I was wishing I had taken the camera, but I had no idea Heather would look so adorable in the silver slouch boots at Payless or that Rachel would be so smashing in the red suede stiletto heels she slipped on over her jeans. So instead of seeing my cute girls in boots too big for them, you get a cheesy picture of me with the pigeon I caught last year on the beach. This was almost as much of an accomplishment as shoe shopping. I've only done it once before, in Central Park, and I never forgot the thrill.