Chinese School, Kitchen Doors and Door-to-Door Salesmen

This weekend turned out to be a bit of a wild goose chase for me, partly my fault and partly some mis-information on the website of a local Chinese school that we wanted to get Lauren enrolled into. There's Chinese school that holds classes on Friday evenings at Lynbrook High School, where my cousins Jeff and Eric attended part of their high school years. It's apparently very popular with the Chinese parents, and the timing and location were the most convenient of any Chinese school we've looked at.

According their website registration for the 2011-2012 school year had already started and they were taking registration forms during class hours (Fridays, 7-9pm). So on Friday we trudged off to Lynbrook hoping to talk to someone. But the 2010-2011 school year had already ended, and no one was in the classrooms. Strike one.

So back to the Chinese school website, and I noticed that you could register online, and take your child to a test at Lynbrook (the test was required to sign up for 1st graders and above) on June 5. Of course my own brain's been a little off, and I interpreted that as Saturday. So I took Lauren on Saturday to Lynbrook, only to realize that June 5 was Sunday. Strike two.

Okay, one more attempt on Sunday, June 5. We arrived on time. Lots of Asian people arriving the same time. It's a good sign. We get to the registration desk and I explain Lauren's dilemma. That while she's going into 1st grade, she actually doesn't speak any Chinese, and everyone agrees that taking a test for her is pointless. We get passed around to a few different people before someone mentions that for the 2011-2012 school year they're adding a "CSL" class for 4-7 year olds. CSL stands for Chinese for Second Language learners. Basically Chinese for those who don't speak Chinese as a primary language. Perfect for Lauren! We get her registered and I pay the tuition for the 2011-2012 year and we're set for this fall. So the third time is the charm!

As for other things I worked on this weekend, the glass for the kitchen cabinet doors for the house in Tucson came in the mail on Friday, so I got to work on that project. The reason for putting glass in the kitchen cabinet doors, is that we were actually short 4 doors, for the kitchen setup in the door style that I purchased from Home Depot. Instead, they had 4 other doors in a different style, but the same color (white), that was a recessed panel style, perfect for conversion to glass front doors, so we could use them with the other doors and not have them look out of place. I had already spent the time the past weekend removing the center recessed panels out of the four doors, and spent this weekend putting in custom cut tempered glass panels in their place using glazing points and glazing compound. I'm finished now, so all I have to do is wait for the glazing to cure, and then possibly a light coat of white semi-gloss paint over the glazing.

While we were home Saturday evening, a door-to-door salesman knocked on our door and tried to sell Lars some frozen meat and seafood. Apparently the deal was so good that Lars bought the package, which was way more than we could ever use. The sales guy also gave us his route info and explained he toured the neighborhood regularly and that we could pre-order what we wanted as well for his next visit. With way too much frozen meat, Lars asked me to call Marie and offer her some, so we went to visit Marie's family on Sunday with a cooler chest of frozen goodies.

Lauren had a lot of fun as usual, and even managed to score four new stuffed animal friends to bring home thanks to Michaela and Mariah (and Aunt Marie and Uncle Michael). Unfortunately now, Lauren's stuffed animal collection exceeds the size of her room. Just kidding, but it does seem like that sometimes.