avflinsch

Weekly grocery bill - about $250, this is for 4 1/2 people - me, wife, 10 yo son, 24 yo son (usually gets his own dinner when working), and 24 yo daughter (when she is visiting or needs extras @ school). This is almost entirely organic, and locally produced products when available. We grow and freeze quite a bit of of our own veggies during the summer, and hit up all of the local farm markets for other seasonal items. I also spend an additional 40-50/week on daily lunches & dinners for the evenings that I have classes. Beer & wine budgets are not included (but this is mostly homebrew anyway)

punching bag

dart board

Spring semester here runs from the day after MLK day to the first week in May (folloowed by exams and commencement activities). The period between Christmas and MLK is our winter semester.

score card

bird dog

pop music

chocolate pudding

Brothers Grimm

Smith Brothers

word craft

duck season

I have only taken one online class, and my experience is that they tend to take up way more of your time than you would expect. This is especially true if you are expected to have some sort of online dialog with the other class members. It seems like you are always checking in, to see if there is something that you need to comment on. That being said, the class that I took online was one of the more interesting ones, and had a great instructor.

bum's rush

Just got home from the first meeting of my second class, have several assignments to do over the weekend, and I am waiting for the Amazon fairy to deliver the books. Thank god for the Amazon fairy.

rose garden (this could go into an infinite loop - rose garden, rose kennedy, jackie kennedy, jackie o.....)

First class of the second semester is tonight. 6-9 pm, plus an hour drive back home, then some unwind time = bed @ 11pm. Up again tomorrow @ 4:30, leave for work, then class from 6-9, drive home ... repeat it looks like I will really be dragging my a$$ on Thursdays this semester, why did I schedule 2 late nights back to back?

Wacky Weed

Mrs. Fields

frozen yogurt

My daughter is doing something similar right now. She currently has 2 applications in to the same university, but in her case it is to two different departments. What she did was to carefully word her personal statements to reflect how her interests overlap both fields. Your case seems to be a bit different as it seems to be the same department. Personally I would apply to both. I am curious as to why you are limited to only applying to programs at your undergrad school (probably the same as mine - employee tuition benefits or something similar).

One thing I found helpful when I was finishing my undergrad, was to involve my kids in some of the activities that happen on campus over the weekends - there is usually some sort of event that is kid friendly. This way they were able to see where dad was at night, it also encouraged my teenaged (at the time) daughter to go to the same school - she is now in the process of applying to grad schools also.

Much of this was learned when I returned to finish my undergrad degree when I was in my mid 40's #1 - the school let you in, that means that they think you will succeed, if they believe in you, believe in yourself #2 - talk to your advisor early & often #3 - check out whatever services your school has for non traditional students #4 - learn to adjust #5 - create a work area for yourself most important - remember to have fun

Not worried about that, full time employee of the university = free tuition for me (undergrad & grad) and my kids (undergrad only) just need to pay the fees. It makes up for the fact that they pay about half of what I was earning the the real corporate world 10 years ago.

At least you didn't try to swat the spider with the iPad. That would have been bad.