And it begins again - I can hear the music!

Another September and school begins again today. Alexa and I managed to prepare for the start of the school year without either of us coming to blows. We did all her school supplies last week and supplemented her ever growing wardrobe this week. The rest of the house was clueless that she even started school today! Her dad and my MIL thought she started next week. Sure, that's why I've been running around like a chicken with it's head cut off for the past two weeks! So now I'm doing the happy dance - it truly is the most wonderful time of the year!

It was a little harder to take the usual pictures as she is getting so grown up. We finally got her hair cut last night and despite having that lovely Vera Bradley large tote her father got her last year, she went and bought a new Aero portfolio to be her usual styling self. She's not carrying so much because last week we did the ritual decorating of the locker. This year we did (or I should say I did) all four walls in a contrasting print of pink and purple flowers and purple solid. She also had the appropriate hand sanitizer, mirror, wipe off board, and metal racks - pink, of course.

Our garage sale was a success. We did a really good day on Friday. Before I started to bring things out at 7:30 a.m. I had a neighbor from down the street ask about Alexa's swing set. I put an ad on Craigslist at about 11:30 the night before advertising the sale and listing our swing set for free for anyone who was willing to take it. Boom! before 8:00 a.m. we had a taker and our sale didn't offically start until 9:00 a.m. We were busy the entire day and stayed open an hour passed our advertised closing. Saturday we had rain early in the morning. It cleared fairly quickly but we didn't do anywhere near what we did the day before.

Alexa made out like a bandit. She kept track of all her sales and even learned to haggle a bit and cut deals in order to sell her items. Her total take accounted for a quarter of our total profits! The good news is she wants to bank over 90% of it and only keep a nominal amount of cash. We must be doing something right.