Anywhere, Texas. Home to friendly little subdivisions with playgrounds, pools, basketball courts, tennis courts, elementary school, and beautiful walking trials through your very own preserve over looking Lake Austin.
"Oh what a family friendly little neighborhood!" Me and every other mother in the world thought so too.....
Issue One: Pre-school, Sign up early, get in fight if necessary...
In fact, unless you already have a child at the school and get the PRE-registration forms and fill them out and submit them with your $85 dollar check to hold your spot...then YOU GET A SPOT! If you don't have a child already in that pre-school you better get your boxing gloves on because you are going to have to beat down every other mother in West Austin for the two remaining spots on the day, no the morning, no 1/2 hour before the school opens the morning of registration.
Not realizing any of this I decided to take my time and look at other pre-schhol programs before deciding on a school for Ethan. Which I did. And WHAT HAVE I ACCOMPLISHED!!!!! BY LOOKING AROUND???????? Two things
1)WAITING LIST #1, waiting list #2, waiting list #3, and waiting list number #4. Oh and I am like between #3-#20 down on the list and they all accompany a $40 wait-list fee!!!!!! What in the world is a "WAit-list fee!!!!" That's like Walmart running out of diapers and you pay them $10 to put you on a list of the next people to receive them when they become available again!
2) "Next year"- I have accomplished "next year" Each pre-school administrator has assured me that by being on the wait-list for this year, it gives me not first, (because first goes to families of kids already in the school) but second dibs on a spot for NEXT YEAR!!! I just about fell out of my chair when they said, I was literally going to have to wait till NEXT YEAR!!!! I thought ok maybe we wait a month, two months, even three months, but no DUE TO MY BAD BAD BAD procrastination BAD BAD BADNESS, my little ETHAN who was so so so so so so so excited to start pre-school CAN NOT!!!!
Issue Two: The Gym
Every morning I wake around 8 a.m., eat breakfast, check my email, pack lunches, get the kids dressed, take Ryan to pre-school/summer camp, and then head for the 9:30 exercise class at my wonderful little gym. It is the perfect time 9:30 a.m. They rotate the classes to alternate cardio/strength training for me so I just have to show-up and I am guaranteed a good sweat....well almost....
Come to find out what's good for me is also good for the thousands of other west austin mammas and thier ideal little family neighborhoods once again! The class starts at 9:30. Get there at 9:10 sign your kids in for their kids center and you walk to the class and stand there and watch all the fake boobs walk in the room. The is Option #1 and THE ONLY OPTION!!! Get there at 9:15 and you are staring at all the boobs in low-cut tank tops and daisy duke shorts in the lobby of the kids area for another 20 minutes!!!!!!! And you guessed it, you are on another WAIT LIST! This time it doesn't cost you extra though I guess because you write your own name on the list and stand there till you get in instead of expecting them to call you???
When you pull in the parking lot, you scan the area for any IMWK (pronounced eem-wauks) this stands for "incoming moms with kids." If so, we go into emergency, "move as if your pants are on fire and it will not extinguish until you get the kids out of the car and beat every other IMWK to the front gym doors. Don't make eye-contact though because they will stare you down and try to intimidate you with there guilty-pouty "your not going to rush in there and beat me in there and make me have to put my name in the waiting list, are ya, are ya, are ya?????"
Issue Three: Area Association Youth Sports
Fact one: Registration opened Aug. 1
Fact Two: Practices and games begin on Sept. 1
Fact Three: I forgot about fact one and just knew that it wasn't time for fact two
So after Seth reminding me I went on the website last night and this is what it read,"Registration is now closed for our fall programs: Please note that we will accept a limited number of wait list registrations through August 23" Oh You've got to be kidding me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Luckily I persisted and found that there actually was ONE spot still available for the baseball program....BUT now instead of it already being a whopping $140/ for two months....it was $195!!!! You guess it because of a late registration fee!
HOW CAN YOU BE LATE FOR SOMETHING THAT DOESN"T START FOR TWO MORE WEEKS!!!!!!
I am sick sick sick of wait-list, wait-list and more wait-list!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have learned my lesson I guess.
The moral of the story is "get there early and sign up for things even if your not sure you want to do it...."
or GET OUT!!!! or pay another 20%. That works too.
5 comments:
I feel your pain- this has happened to me too- I have been waitlisted for multiple things not realizing how competitive they are to get in. It stinks! That story about the moms at the club though, is hilarious!!! :)I don't doubt it is completely true! (and I won't complain again about the $45 non resident fee for Kenny to play soccer in the town he does- cheap compared to yours!)
CRAZY!!! Sounds like you get a workout just trying to GET into the gym!! =)
You are having some bad luck!! That all stinks!! I am sorry- the wait list thing just boggles me- the cost too! I love how you write, I am laughing, but not at your expense- but a part of me is just smiling- sorry about all the hassle- but without it, what would you post about to make me smile?! Good luck with the waiting....
this all sounds like CT. But I think it gets worse than that. Trust me. I've been here for over 6 years though and I got the routine down.
That is EXACTLY how it is here, too. Only, you get wait listed for the crappy pre-schools. You have no shot of getting into any of the good schools unless you have had a child go there previously or have been on a wait list since the kid was 6 months old. (That's why we got SOOO lucky when we put Kyle in because it was a brand new shcool that had opened registration late and just happened to be registering the morning I was looking) We could have put Evan in there this year, but it was almost $300 a month for a 4 year old!!! So, I am just working with him at home. We decided not to even do the sports here, because the cost was soooo ridiculous! And they make you wokr in the concession stand!! No thank you! We will just do the YMCA, thank you very much. At least you got a spot on the baseball team. That will be fun. I can't wait to see pictures!
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