The REST of the Story

Do you remember that blurb last year about us having to wait a month before the job Dan wanted became available? And how we waited, and nothing? And how we drove all the way to Cheyenne, Wyoming with a few suitcases, two kids and a fluffy dog? I DID mention the dog, right?

Well, since then, this is what we've been up to:

• Hannah had to be tested to be admitted into the G/T program here. She registered just south of being a frikken genius, which gave her passage into the "Trailblazer" class. This means we had to move her from the school she had just been moved to two weeks previously in order to attend this program. Let me do the math for you, both she and six year old brother attended three schools within 2.5 months. That confession makes me feel like a shiftless gypsy.
• Logan started hanging with the shadier elements of 1st grade and had recently started coming home with unsatisfactory marks for effort, behavior and following directions. Of course we "persuaded" him vehemently to "reassess his choices" and he's now on the straight and narrow again.
• In my desperation for employment, I took a job working as a cashier for minimum wage at Sears right before Christmas. Grueling. In early January, I was hired to work as a paraprofessional at one of the local elementary schools. Nirvana.
• By the end of January, Dan was offered a job. Oh, and it's in Ft. Hood, Texas. His starting date was February 14th. So that one month estimation we were hoping for was only about 120 days off the mark. That means, once the school year ends, we have to pack the suitcases, kids and dog for that little 1,000 mile jaunt back to Texas. Because yanking the kids from school four times in one academic year bumps me from "shiftless gypsy" to "trashy hobo" and that's just a title I don't need after 9 months of unemployment. Still a sensitive spot for me...so we wait for the last day of school before heading back.
• And the dog? He started talkin' smack to a pair of Great Danes who were passing by the house a coupla months ago and got beat down. Six hundred dollars later, he is MUCH better, thanks for asking.

Here's to less "exciting" times!