Summer is Officially Over

at least for our oldest. Alex started back to school today carrying with him about 30 lbs of books. It's amazing how much stuff he needs for his classes. It seems like he had a good day although he did come home with homework in his geometry class...no easing into school there. LOL He's decided not to play soccer so it was nice having him home early in the afternoon.

The rest of the kids won't be starting back to school until after Labor Day although Andy doesn't seem too keen to want to start school at all this year. I think everyone has been enjoying their time off even though we haven't done much this summer.

Financial Aid

We finally got around to filling out the Parent Financial Statement (PFS) that the Gunston school gave us when Andy and Alex went to the open house last month. The PFS is submitted to the School and Student Service for Financial Aid (SSS) which processes the information and will then send a report to the schools requested and to yourself detailing how much they think you can afford to pay for schooling. We received the results back today (about 2 days after filing the forms). Boy, filing electronically is great. I was pleasantly surprised to see that they calculated what we could afford to pay for school at pretty much what it costs us for the homeschooling supplies for Alex. Of course, this doesn't really mean anything because it's dependant on how much financial aid the actual school can give out but it's nice to know the school won't (or shouldn't) be expecting us to fork out an arm and a leg because we can't. So, since this report says things are still within our means we'll go ahead with the next steps for Gunston which would be submitting an application for the school. Then he has to take a standardized test...like the SAT but I can't think of the acronym for the one he has to take...so he'll do that either in February or March. Then, assuming he got accepted into the school, we'd have to see how much aid they could offer us to see whether it's really doable or not.

We got new insurance cards for all the kids showing their new pcp except for Kearsyn which is the one we really need. They only put 6 cards in an envelope so I'm assuming the one that has her card in it got separated from the other envelope. I wish it would show up as the others got here a few days ago. I figure I'll give it til after the holidays and if we haven't gotten it by then, I'll have them send another. I know her pcp got changed because I can view the info online so worst case scenario, if she gets sick before we get the new card I'll just print that page out. Updating to say that we received Kearsyn's new insurance card today, 12/22, so we are all set for the new doctor. =)

We finally got our refund check from the over payments to the specialist office for Alex & Kenzie's broken collarbones. I called the beginning of November to request it so it took about a month and a half for them to get it to us.

Today we did some house cleaning since we are having a small piano recital here tomorrow. Will be fun to listen to the kids playing.

I've made up all my days for work where I was short on leave so now I'm free until Jan 2. Yay! I was even able to help with a couple of programming modifications that they needed done so my timing was perfect for this make up work.

Bekah is doing so well with her sign language. She walked up to me today and did the sign for drink and then milk to let me know she was thirsty and wanted a glass of milk to drink. How cool!

I unpacked all my regular clothes and boxed up my maternity ones the other day. Anyone want to take bets on how long they'll stay boxed up? And Andy, you stay out of it! ;)

I was able to get most of the presents wrapped today while the kids were over at a friends house practicing for the recital tomorrow. Still have a few more to do but shouldn't take long...finding the time without the kids around will be the problem. And trying to do it at night it's that easy because that's when Kearsyn is at her grumpiest.

Busy Day

Andy took Alex to the Gunston Open House. Alex really liked it...they both said the place was beautiful. Too bad it costs $18,000 to go there for a year. Yikes! I don't see that happening but we are going to go ahead and fill out the financial aid form just to see what we might get. Can't hurt any.

Bekah had her speech evaluation appt today. I was very impressed with how the ladies did the evaluation. They even taught Bekah how to sign "more" which she still remembers. That's so amazing to me that she can be shown the sign a couple of times and she is still retaining it. Makes me want to learn more signs that can be taught to her. They were totally impressed with her motor skills...she's actually doing a number of things above age level. She is delayed in her speech area so she does qualify for the program. The next steps are for them to write up their report to figure out exactly where she falls, then we'll get together to discuss the findings. During that meeting, we'll decide on how best to proceed with getting her additional speech help. The good news is...actually there are two...1) it's free and 2) they'll come to the house to everything so that will make things easier on us.

Kenzie's softball practices have started back up again. They are only optional at this point but do you think my girl would miss any kind of practice?? No way! LOL So Andy and she made the trek to Trappe to the indoor facility for the practice tonight.

Connor is impatiently waiting for the Ravens game to start. This child loves football!

I've seen so many beautiful pictures of sunrises and sunsets lately...Velda's and Andy's...I thought I would post one that I took tonight as I went out to turn on our outside Christmas lights. I realize now after looking at the picture that I should have walked out farther on the deck so our rain spout and satellite wires weren't in it. Oops! LOL

Too Good to be True

I knew it was too good to be true. Kearsyn was back to her normal nonsleeping pattern last night. At least I know she can sleep when she wants to. ;)

What beautiful weather we have been having here the past couple of days. You sure wouldn't know that it's the last week in November by being outside. Now if we could just get our yard to dry out after all that rain we had last week. It's still extremely soggy out there.

I did some Christmas shopping yesterday and actually went to a store to do it. That's a rarity for me. LOL I usually do most shopping online cause I hate having to hunt for things in the store and they rarely have want I want anyway. I was pleasantly surprised because I actually found most of what I wanted to get for my sister and her DH so they are pretty much done at this point. Yay! The kids presents have all been ordered and are starting to arrive. The only ones left to buy for now are our parents. I also still need to get a birthday present for my dad whose b'day is 12/20. We're going to try and get the family together on the 17th to celebrate. It's always hard with Dad's b'day being so close to Christmas especially now that my sister alternates the holidays with her inlaws.

Thusday is going to be a busy day. We're going to look at a private school that is having an open house in the morning. Not sure that we can actually avoid it, even though they do offer some financial aid to go there, but it can't hurt to check it out. In the afternoon, there is a Homeschoolers Open House at the college. Alex is going to be taking a Composition class there which will be good for him plus it will help lighted the load a little for Andy in the spring since he won't have to cover that subject. Also Thursday afternoon, Bekah has her speech evaluation appointment so we'll see how that goes. She's been in a terrible two's mood here lately. Hope she gets out of it soon cause she's driving me crazy. She thinks she can make up for it by flashing me her cute grin and giving me a kiss...which of course works. LOL

Haven't done any stitching lately although I really need to get a move on finishing up my Christmas ornament. I've had it stitched up for weeks...just can't figure out how to finish it. I wanted to do something different but I can't figure out what so I haven't done anything. :(