Back to School

Oh man what a day! My son and I headed off to his high school this morning to pick up his class schedule, pay fees, and take pics for his student ID. Last year was absolutely chaotic. Somehow his registration did not get processed, and we spent all day at the school! It was a bloody nightmare. Today was fairly smooth sailing. We stood in a huge line until the doors opened and then a few minor lines and by 10:00 am, we were on our way! Oh what a dream!

Of course it didn't end there. We picked up a few back to school supplies yesterday, but today was our back to school shopping day. My son Alex and I hit Ross today for some back-to-school bargains. I love that place. I also love that I have such a wonderful. He is an amazing kid, but he is also a kid with very down to earth tastes. My son has never groused at shopping clearance racks, thrift stores and yard sales. Of course that is how we have always done it so it is all very typical. Give him jeans and t-shirts and he is a happy boy. Thankfully Ross had plenty of both. We picked up two pairs of Polo jeans that Alex just loved. I was so used to Polo being a little over the top preppy for my taste, but these are perfectly casual and look great. We also grabbed two pairs of Quick Silver jeans in a nice dark denim, five shirts (the usual faves for my son which are basically Quick Silver, Hurley and No Fear) and one zip hoodie which was a must. Alex has to catch the bus at 6:30 am so I figured it would be a good idea to have something warm enough for the morning but light weight enough to toss in his back pack and not take too much room.

Our total was $166.43. I did throw it on the credit card. I pulled the cash out of the bank this morning, but that will actually go to the hubby who pays the credit card bill (we love gathering up points). One thing I thought of when I saw the bill was how I just hate paying taxes on clothes. That is one of the things I definitely miss about living in Rhode Island. I hate paying sales tax on food and clothing. It just feels so wrong.

Those clothes combine with some amazing thrift store deals I picked up when in California have really put us in a good position clothing wise for the upcoming school year. Now all I really need to do is pick up socks and underwear! Yay!!!!!

My son and I hit Target after Ross. My main goal was to pick up some spiral notebooks (5 at 15 cents) and index cards (10 packs of 100 at 44 cents) and filler paper (3 at 75 cents). There were also some really good deals on colored construction paper (88 cents for 96 sheets), crayons (20 cents -we picked up 3 for 5 cents at Office Max) and Elmer's glue sticks (six pack for $1.00). We grabbed a bunch of these goodies for one of the charter schools in the town. I know one of the TAs (actually with budget cuts she is the only TA), and we thought it would be nice to gift some deals there way. The index cards were an absolute must as my son is taking Japanese and he is constantly making homemade flash cards plus who can pass up 44 cents per 100? Our Target total was $13.29.

All in all it was a great day. We did one thing though that we hardly ever do. We ate at Wendys! I don't justify this at all. I do give us a pass today as we pretty much do fast food once every six months or so. I have to forgive myself this one. Plus although I am working on being thriftier. One of the things I am also doing this month is keeping track of expenses so I don't want to cheat by not doing something I normally would do. When we have a son and mom day, my son and I usually do get lunch together.

Now I am off to organize two dresser drawers. Oh what total joy! ;) I took today out of work to be there for my son, and now it is time to get a little organizing done. My husband is a neat freak so he will be thrilled.