Ugh, that stinks Rae. Awesome that he handled it so well, but absolutely horrible that the sub said something like that. Any chance you can also send an email to the principal and maybe whatever assistant superintendent is over staff, and ask them to address this with the sub so something like this doesn’t happen to him again or any other kids in the future?

Sounds like Abby is going to be so excited, drama - yay!

I have an extra blush brush and an eyeshadow blending brush that I keep on my bathroom counter with my other makeup stuff. M loves to use those and “apply” makeup. I’ll be sad when she realizes that she’s not doing anything other than touching her face with an empty makeup brush, but I’ll continue to enjoy the cuteness of it while it lasts. It also cracks me up that she always asks permission first. 🥰

I’m currently planning to attend an event at the Kauffman next month and I’m really impressed by their COVID policy that all in-person attendees have to provide proof of full COVID-19 vaccination.

Any tips for teaching my newly turned 5yo to blow her nose? She’s got allergies and is seriously struggling with the stopped up nose. Nothing I’ve tried has worked so far for it to click for her.

We went to New Orleans, LA; Gulfport, MS; Pensacola, FL; and Mobile, AL for 8 nights at the end of July/beginning of August. 

Flights for 4: $1000
Rental Car/Transportation/Gas: $605
Hotels: $875 (used points for 3 nights in Pensacola)

Food: $725 (combo of eating out and grocery pick up order; if our hotel didn't have free breakfast, we ate granola bars and/or fruit)
Parking: $6.75 (used a bunch of points from work travel to cover almost all of our airport parking)
Excursions/Fun Stuff: $665 (aquariums, zoos, USS Alabama, etc - we also used our local science center pass to get free entry to a couple of kids/science centers; we were supposed to do a dolphin boat ride, but a storm cancelled it and we couldn't reschedule that, so ended up spending less than expected here)

Total: $3877

First day of school for my kiddos today. We do have a mask mandate per our school board, so I was happy when that happened late last week. M is in kindergarten and C is in 4th grade.

Pic for those not on FB.

Good luck, mpl! I hope the surgery goes well and helps with his issues.

Checking in - we just got back yesterday from 8 nights/9 days in the south, aka what has turned into a Delta variant covid hotspot (which wasn't the case when I booked everything 5 months ago, naturally). We ended up deciding to go as we all needed a break, and much of our plans were outdoors. We visited New Orleans, Gulfport, Mobile and Pensacola and mostly had fun exploring everything, though I definitely wanted to strangle my kids a few times, and DH, for that matter. Mask use was definitely not high enough by most of the people we saw. I was really impressed with the Louisiana Children's Museum on mask use, though - they required it of everyone over the age of 2, and I heard staff reminding people when they weren't compliant.

M's last day of daycare is tomorrow - we ended up sending her today/tomorrow as her absolute favorite teacher has been on vacation for the last 3 weeks, and wanted to see her again. While I'm excited to only have before/after care fees, I'm still feeling a little sad and bittersweet that this is the end. Our center has been a really great fit for our family, and my kids have received wonderful care there, plus we've made some amazing friends with other kids/their families over the years. We don't live close to our center, so the kids will not be in the same school, which is okay. But definitely bittersweet. M will likely be back there next summer as I don't think she'll be old enough for the local day camps - she turns 5 at the end of August, and most of the camps require you to have completed kindergarten and be 6 - she won't be 6 until after 1st grade starts next year. 

We find out the kids' teachers this weekend. We already know that M "won" the Spanish immersion lottery, so I know which 2 teachers she will have, but don't know which kids will be in her section. Our next door neighbor's son also got in, so we're hoping those 2 are in the same class.  And C is just hoping that his BFF is in his 4th grade class - no teacher preference. 

 
Similar here! We always start on Wednesday, but for whatever reason, we're starting Thursday, 8/12 this year.  One week to go!

I’ve been traveling again since June 2020 - we do building design, and have to visit sites to review the work done to make sure it complied with the construction and permit docs, and/or do scopes to confirm what is on site before we do design. It’s been fine - I’ve actually felt okay as last year people seemed to comply better with airport/airplane masking requirements and my clients require masking on sites by contractors and their employees.

The major conferences I typically attend are still virtual, so no travel for those.

I don’t typically travel to our other offices, but that travel is very slowly starting to happen again. We have a principals meeting next month that was supposed to be in person for the first time in a couple of years at our corporate HQ (which is where I’m located, so I wasn’t going to need to travel), but they just announced it’ll now be virtual. Though if the non-locals have already booked travel and want to still fly/drive in, they can, but will have to use zoom for the meeting like everyone else.

I’ll bite. We’re going to New Orleans, Gulfport, and Pensacola later this month. It’ll be DH, DS (9) and DD (4). Anyone have any food or things to do recommendations? We have hotels booked.

Good to “see” you! Now we need the rest of the details!

June 2021 Update:

ASSETS:

Checking/Savings: $144,962
House: $512.7k
Retirement: $1.859M
Brokerage: $5.5k
529s: $66.8k
Company Stock: $208k

DEBTS:
Company Stock Loan (to shareholder I'm buying stock from, at 0.52% for 7 years): $175k

Total NW: $2,623,332

We're up over 2.4% since last month, which is basically all market gains. DH is *this* close to having 2 commas in his 401k account (he's been at the same employer from college, so his entire retirement savings except for the Roth IRA is in the one 401k, which makes it easy).

As usual, the list above excludes our cars, which are worth around $30k combined, but I leave them out because we're unlikely to sell, and need them to get to/from work, kids schools, etc. in the land of suburbia.

Blurgh - M went to a birthday party at a local pool for a daycare friend. I asked the mom what he wanted/needed and she said no gift needed, just her going was enough. I got him a birthday card, had M sign it and write his name, and we took that. Every other kid brought a gift and they opened gifts during the party. 🤦‍♀️🤷‍♀️ Seriously - I would have put in a gift card or gotten him something if I had known that. I don’t know if I’m the only one who asked or no one else listened.