school shopping

Today I planned on getting the boys' school supplies. Trevor works best with an accordion folder rather than a three ring binder. Both boys are back pack stuffers of loose papers. Riley at least keeps track of the papers. Trevor's work ends up a crumpled mass in the bottom of his back pack. Both their back packs were in tatters after last year. We had used up all the spares. They needed new everything.

We have discovered that with accordion binders that Trevor can stuff his work in a file slot and find it again later. I was able to find accordion binders in multiple colors so he can even dedicate a color to a class. Trevor also wanted graph paper in spiral notebooks, one for each class. He said it helped line up his work and keep his writing tidier. Anything to help him succeed in school. He had a backpack he liked last year that was an attache style fold over but with shoulder straps. We hunted  four different stores unsuccessfully. It took three stores to find the graph paper in spiral notebooks.

The boys also convinced me to buy them graphing calculators. They have been using the school supplied ones, but there is a limited number.They are encouraged to have their own and have been pleading with me for several years. Riley said it would have helped tremendously last year, so I caved in and bought them both graphing calculators at $95 each, ouch. Modern technology is winning. I made them swear on pain of tourture that they would not lose or break or have someone else vandalize their new calculators.

We went to Denny's as I had buy one entree get one free coupons that expire next month. It was our way of toasting the end of summer. Everyone likes Denny's as they serve burgers and breakfast all day long.  We brought a friend of Riley's with us since I had two of these coupons, two ate free.

 Denny's has a new order form for building your own burger and shake. I warned the boys it would take longer, but Trevor was in heaven as he built his dream burger with a chicken Patti and a hamburger Patti and onion rings and hash browns all piled on the bun with his lettuce and fresh tomatoes. Both boys built their own shakes. Riley did a vanilla shake with pecans and Carmel added. Trevor's shake was a strawberry with Oreo cookies.

 Riley's shake arrived and he took a straight whip cream bite right off the top. The shake went along with his banana Carmel french toast meal he ordered. I was impressed that both boys did full justice to their meals.

The shopping trip was a marathon as not one store had everything we were needing. That graphing paper and Trevor's special backpack were both issues. I still have two or three more stores I could try for that attache case style back pack. We have yet to go bike shopping either. Just buying school supplies cost us four hundred dollars, including $200 for those graphing calculators, and still without the backpack for Trevor. Riley found a backpack for himself that cost $50, ack. That seemed to be the going price this year as I was able to do a little price comparison having stopped at Rite Aid, Target, Walmart, and Office Max. We had the best success at Walmart. Walmart had the backpack Riley liked, and the graphing paper in spiral notebooks Trevor wanted. I bought seven of those spiral notebooks as Riley wanted a couple for math and science. Trevor asked for five. He said they were good for band and all his other classes. Seven may not be enough, but that was all Walmart had left. I bought every one.  

Everyone was exhausted when we headed home. Trevor had about twenty minutes to rest before he needed to head to football at 3:00 pm. I need to head to the store for ground beef and more apples and bananas. Last night I made chicken drumsticks for dinner. I could tell Tom wanted something else. Chicken is not cow. He likes his red meat. It was scout night so I had to prepare something quickly. Have to figure out what we are serving tonight for dinner.