Endings bring new Beginnings

So today is the last day of Summer. Many of you are watching the leaves change and feeling the cooler winds and rains move in. We usually are too but, this year, we are marking the end of Summer with 96 degrees and sunshine. Yep, LA is going to be different and full of lots of new beginnings.

One of our first new beginnings was starting Kieran in an online school program.  I am happy to report that he is adjusting well to it and I am impressed with his dedication to completing his work and doing well on the assignments.  I was a bit worried that he would think it was a prolonged vacation but that reality hasn't surfaced!

Ellysa's new school didn't start until yesterday.  Boy oh Boy did I get an introduction into why CA is in such a mess! First of all, by all accounts, Ellysa should only need World History to graduate.  She is far ahead of most other Seniors having taken two english courses last year on top of doing independent study for the AP Language course which she received a 4! But, she has to take yet another year of English because her tenth grade course was based upon American Literature and they base theirs on WORLD literature! Also, they didn't want to do the analysis of her classes from Interlochen so they pretty much discounted her ENTIRE year there! So she gets to take an additional PE course and Elective course in order to graduate...when they even said she has WAY MORE credits than "fit into" their check boxes.  So, why then does she need an ELECTIVE? So, that will be something that Ellysa will try to fix...mom is going to take a step back (Yes...I really am...otherwise I don't know if I could handle the illogical nature of this whole thing!) Or, she will just have to "buck up" and take the extra classes! (It's not that it would be difficult for her...just sets her back a month from graduation.  She is eager to enroll at the community college for winter semester and get a head start on her Bachelor's degree!

We aren't the only ones with new beginnings...Keith and Zac are on their way to new adventures as well! Zac started at UofM Dearborn this fall and seems to really be enjoying it. (Not sure he is loving the commute from Sterling Heights twice a week but that will end eventually when he gets a place closer to school this winter.) He will start practicing with the soccer team in the winter as well, which will require him to be on campus five days a week, but for that reason, he won't mind! He also intends to apply for a co-op position so that will be another new thing for him to tackle but all of these things are great new beginnings!

Keith is still in limbo as the company sale hasn't finalized yet so his schedule is a bit up in the air.  He has to do a lot of travelling this fall but some of it is local and some of it includes China and Australia. In October, he will be attending the Darden School for Emerging Leaders as he was selected as the one person from his division to attend...quite an honor! We are hoping that some of his travels will allow him to stop over in LA so we can spend a day or two with him.

I am finally feeling like things are getting settled...the kids' bunk bed arrived yesterday so I will be assembling that later today and getting their room organized. Once that is done, I plan to start my new website...EXSTATETRIATES.com   This is a website geared to the growing nomadic lifestyle of those of us in the USA.  The current economic climate has us moving all around the US to find jobs and while there are lots of resources for Expatriates, there aren't many for the local American who may be very unfamiliar with their new location as well.  The only advantage they may have over an Expat is that they speak the language! So, with chapters formed in Indiana, Michigan and California, we will be well on our way to helping struggling newcomers find things a bit easier.  We hope to set up monthly coffee mornings, outings and a local help section on the website where people can go to to get their questions answered.  All this moving around will finally pay off!

So, while we say good-bye to Summer, we are saying hello to all these new experiences! It's going to be a fun journey and we hope you enjoy coming along on it with us!

One week in...

Well, we are one week into our big move to LA and in some ways it feels like we have been here forever! But what, in reality, does it mean to have been here for a week?

First of all, a week has been long enough for us to start to get on each other's nerves in a small apartment...coping mechanisms will have to be put in place and routines worked out but we can do that.

Routine has settled in that includes early morning wake ups which the youngest among us aren't too excited about but Mom insists is necessary to make this whole home school thing work out. There is still a lot we need to add into our routine but we should be in a pretty good rhythm by the end of the first month.

In the past 7 days, the car, which has never really acted up, has had one dead battery, two jumpstarts, a new battery, ongoing low coolant sensor problems and our most recent issue, a rear window that is off the track and no longer operates. We solved it with our own Jay Leno worthy "White Trash Repair" by pulling it up and inserting three pink rubber erasers in the frame to wedge it closed. (Of course this is after a disasterous try to fix it with blue tack...I'm going to be cleaning that one up for a while :( )

A week has been long enough to have to drive to one teen church session (which ran an hour and a half late...) 3 acting classes and 3 improv sessions. 3 Improv sessions? yep, three. Apparently a week was also long enough for Kieran to decide that he wanted try his hand at comedy so he has signed up for improv too. Today marks his first class and show. The first time he decided to follow in Ellysa's footsteps was a few years back when he was a mouse and she was Cinderella. I don't know how far he will take this new interest but with a great big sister to teach him the ropes, who knows where this may lead?...

I don't know what next week or the week after that will bring us but we survived the pitfalls and excitement of the first week so I think we can handle anything that comes our way!

And So it Begins...

Well, we arrived in Burbank yesterday afternoon...after having my misplaced cashier's check replaced at Chase Bank (which I of course found this morning) we got the keys to our new apartment. Before we unloaded the car though, Kieran and I headed to downtown burbank to have dinner with Ellysa's friend Grace and her mom, Vicki. They have just made the big move as well and Ellysa has been staying with them for the past week until we could get here. It is nice for the two girls, both former Interlochen students and best friends, to be able to start this journey together and for us moms to have someone to lean on as well. And lean on them, we did!

They helped us unpack the car which held more stuff than I realized. I am including a picture that illustrates this point. If the first big hurdle was getting here, then the second was unpacking the car! The third big hurdle was dealing with a dead battery this afternoon, right before Improv! With the battery replace and the leads cleared of corrosion, Kieran and I made it just in time to see the show.

So, all the big hurdles out of the way, we can begin to settle in and start our new adventure here in Burbank. With the support of all the wonderful people in our lives, both here in CA and around the world, we can conquer all the other hurdles that will come along the way...Now if we can just figure out where to put all of this stuff?!!!