Our enrollment was last week, and we ended up opting to send C (turned 8 this summer/starting 3rd grade). Our youngest is still in daycare and while DH and I are still WFH, we’ve been told our return to office date will be early September, the same day C starts school.

When I picked in person, I was (naively) assuming the kids would likely all be remote at some point. However, our district just sent out more info today, and based on our county health departments plan and recommendations, elementary kiddos in the in person option will be full-time at school regardless of whether cases in our county make us green, yellow or red. The middle and high schools, though, will be all in person, hybrid, or all remote depending on cases in the county.

Our revised school calendar was just approved by the board tonight (originally was slated to start school next week, but pushed back to after Labor Day). Our school day starts earlier than normal, and a couple of days off were switched to virtual learning days, but most of our breaks and holidays are the same. Which annoys me, but probably shouldn’t. It seems like we could move most of the teacher in service days to before school starts since we’re starting later in my district.

I feel for teachers. Our teachers seem to be finding out information at the same time the parents/public find out, so they’re scrambling as well. And I can’t imagine knowing I have to go to work with so many germy kids each day. It seems like a lose-lose situation for everyone.

All the feels about return to school. I just enrolled C this weekend. We opted for in person as that’s his preference, he definitely will learn better, and right now, DH and I are supposed to return to our office the same day school starts, so we won’t be home with him and I can’t leave him alone.

That said, I suspect we won’t be in school for long, if at all, based on cases in my area. Which also means work will probably push back the return to office date, but so far they haven’t. So who the heck knows. I also have feelings of guilt that I’m possibly endangering my kid, the teachers/staff at the school because more in person kids means more in person teachers, and that maybe we should just figure out a way to suck it up and do remote learning. Argh.

And also, daycare sent a message this weekend - the county health department updated their guidelines and now C has to wear a mask at daycare (all school aged kids do, but not the younger kids). He is fine with it, so that’s good, but I was selfishly hoping he’d get a couple more weeks of somewhat normal before school starts next month. It also pushes up my timeline to find the kid some more masks. We definitely need one for each weekday plus 2-3 extras.

July was not my best month - between being less motivated and the heat/humidity levels for most of the month making me not want to walk outside, my steps were way down. August is a new month, and we got a break in the weather, so took long walks with the family yesterday and today. I've also realized (or admitted...because I really already knew this) my core is very weak, how I sit while WFH doesn't help, and I'm going to end up with some back problems if I don't do anything about it. So, I found some beginner core moves to try, and my goal is to do them at least 5 days/week. I'm hoping I can do them during the day when I get a break between meetings, and don't end up doing them right before bed like last night and tonight, but as long as they get done, I'll call it a win.

July Update:


Checking/Savings: $146k
House: $428k
Retirement: $1.338M
Brokerage: $4.3k
529s: $41k


Total NW: $1,957,255


As usual, the list above excludes our cars they're 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.


We're up about 5% over June - our combined retirement accounts went up over $90k since last month, which blows my mind. We are now back up over where we were in December 2019/January 2020.  Maybe there's a chance after all we hit the next big milestone by the end of the year. 

I am so sorry about your DH, empress. Thinking about you.

Happy birthday, Gwen!!

Ditto the recommendation to get monitors and a keyboard and mouse for home - plus a chair! It waited for almost 2 months to get a chair and I should have gotten it the first week I was home.

Ditto. I’m pretty sure our governor would have loved to say 100% online - she was the first governor to cancel in person school for a state for the remainder of the school year back in mid-March, but she’s a democrat governor in a red state with a red legislature. After she shut down in person schools and closed in-person dining, bars, etc and made the mandate to WFH unless you’re an essential work, the legislature went and stripped her of some of her power in May or June. I think her moving to delay the start of school by 3+ weeks was a compromise move on her part in the hopes that would be amendable to the conservative crazies in our legislature and not have them override it.

Our governor announced on Wednesday that schools can’t start up again until at least after Labor Day (for reference, our first day was supposed to be August 12, which is about the normal range for the state). Our school district was set to approve and announce the new guidelines and regulations in effect for the fall (as well as what was going on with the all in-person and all virtual learning options) on Thursday/Friday, but the governor’s announcement put all that on hold (she’s also releasing more info next week).

I do think it’s a good thing to wait a few more weeks, but I’m also frustrated that it probably won’t give teachers and staff any more time to prepare as the school districts will just delay publishing their guidelines and regulations. I’m also grateful C is at daycare with M this summer so we don’t have to cobble together another month of childcare - he can just stay there a few extra weeks.

I hope you like your new area, startsmart! I grew up about 2.5 hours from KC in the SE corner of the state, have family in Wichita and a couple other small towns in central Kansas, and generally love the whole area, but there are definitely some things that drive me batty about it.

Agreed! If we end up at home, my preference is to find a few other classmates to do this with. 4-5 kids total would be awesome because we could rotate weeks or days at different houses, making it easier on all of the parents. DH and I could manage 1 week every month or 1 day/week with 4-5 kids much easier than we could fill-time with our kid since we also have to work.

Ditto for us. I took a gamble and assumed we’d still need before/after care.

No idea if they can or not but I’m sure I’ll find out through the family grapevine!

The girl just finished middle school, and I think it’s at least partially driven by her, but not 100% sure. It especially blows my mind because she’s a twin, and the money could go a long way towards college for her and her twin brother. Oh well, not my money, not my problem.

Yay, swamp!