Babies Growing Up

JT turned 16 over the holiday break. We usually only have family parties for birthdays, but this year, he had a party with his friends too. The party was basically one big Nerf gun battle. We used our church fellowship hall to set up the war zone. The picture is the bin of darts used by his nine party-goers. I was happy to one was permanently injured and all had fun.

Now that he has turned 16, we need to start thinking about driving. He isn't in a big hurry to get a license, mostly because he will be paying his own insurance and that will require him to get a job. In PA, drivers can have a permit without carrying their own insurance, so he will go for the permit test later this spring and then spend the summer logging the hours necessary to apply for a license. We found a few online helps to study for the permit, but I'm going old school and driving out to the license center to get a study book. I know having him drive will make my life easier in some ways, mostly I won't need to sit around and wait while he's in classes anymore, but the cost involved in having insurance for a 16 year old male driver is a little more than I can take. We'll see how things go once he has his permit and then make a decision on the license.

On Tuesday, the book list for his spring classes became available to access online. I can't believe that people are willing to pay full price for these new text books. If I had bought his three books from the school store, it would have cost me over $300. Instead, I bought a used copy of the music appreciation text from Amazon for $10. I couldn't find the other two books for less than $70 each used, so I decided to give Amazon's textbook rental program a try. For about $15 a book, he can have the books until the end of the semester. As long as we have them postmarked by May 29th, we will have no additional costs, and they pay return shipping. Seems like a great deal to me! JT is pretty careful with books, so I think this will go well.

Today I am waiting for EM while he is at his homeschool gym class. The new session started today and will continue for 12 weeks. He really enjoys the time spent with the other kids. I really enjoy hanging out in the coffee shop drinking my latte. Next week we start back to schooling full time. This weekend will be spent getting things organized in the classroom again. It became the gift wrapping, holiday prep center over Christmas break, and I need to get things back to normal before Monday. I'm looking forward to the second half of our school year. I know it will be over in a blink of the eye.