Before Elementary School Started

Hope has been in town since Friday. She stayed with Dave one night but otherwise stayed with us. On Friday she paid for my summer tuition at UNT, so my fall financial aid wouldn't be held up. Then terror of terrors!!! On Monday I found from UNT that my renewal FAFSA wasn't sent to the school yet. So NO fall aide was impending yet. Hope took me up to campus because my home internet had been shut off. I went to the FAFSA website and sure enough, I had updated some information on the website in the last 6 months, but NOT completed a renewal FAFSA yet. So I was essentially starting from scratch and it will be 5 weeks before my fall aid is all worked out. *Scary* I got a short-term loan from UNT to pay for the first payment for my fall tuition. Then Hope went online and paid for my tuition at Midland College for my Spanish class. Our church paid our electric bill. Our friends Allan & Fumie loaned us $ for our lot and trailer rents. (They rounded up on their check, so we were also able to get the internet turned back on). My FAFSA has been processed at the state level and now we are just waiting on UNT.Elaine and Hope at UNT

Jim was very sick Saturday night and Sunday morning, so Hope took the kids and I to church. Jim had chest pains, and stomach flu symptoms. We're gonna try to get him on Medicaid like the kids so we can make sure the chest pains are nothing to worry about.
Elaine got new shoes and socks. She pushed up her pants so everyone could see her Dora socks.

At Meet the Teacher Night on Monday, Elaine and Allan played dress-up with some kids while we met the teacher, Mrs.Wallace. We live so close to the school, that we didn't leave until 5 minutes before the event. Elaine walked in to Mrs. Wallace and her first words were "I'm sorry we're late", even though we were right on time. Mrs. Wallace laughed. She sent us home with a family project for the night. I'll get back to that later.




Hope drove us out to Garland to meet Dave and our family friend Katie for dinner. We had Mexican food at El Chico. Then we drove by a friend's house, who is loaning us money.








The "Family Project" Elaine received for homework ended up being fun for Elaine and I, after Hope and Allan had gone to bed. We were supposed to decorate this paper doll child (20" tall) to look like Elaine and put photos of our family on the doll. It's to help her feel comfortable at school. I drew the face and helped Elaine make clothes. Elaine went wild with stickers all over the doll. Mrs. Wallace thought it was cute and put Elaine's on the center of the wall display at the school.