College.. Personal musings of the holidays, and a look to the future

I went to a community college at 17 for a GED.  I then took just a few courses in Art, creative writing, and philosophy, with the help of financial aide/grants and some support from my dad and his wife Diane.  I realized right away that I was pretty talented, however creative on demand was not ever going to work for me.  So a career in the arts was not going to happen.  A happy home life was always the most important thing to me, so I married really young (too young) and when my hopes of starting a family were dashed, circumstances landed me my current career at a fruit and produce import/export company.  My goal was to be able to keep my head just above water, able to pay bills and do most things I want to do, happiness was more important.  I am happy to say I have a wonderful husband that has made my life just wonderful.

I guess what I am getting at is, I didn't really have a job in mind at all growing up. Stability was more what I craved. 

I always loved gardening.  When I was 9 I was just crazy for Peter Frampton, that curly long spiral hair was the best!  So I decided I wanted my hair like his.  I knew there was a lady behind my grandmothers house that was a hair stylist.  I knocked on her door and made a proposal.  I asked her is she had any work I could do to earn a home permanent.  We agreed on yard work. I did such a good job, she introduced me to another much older lady across the street and I fed her cat and weeded for her too  I weeded for two ladies at a Quarter a medium wheel barrow full.  Yeah, even then I thought that was cheap labor.  But hey, when you are 9, you have energy, determination and no aches and pains like I do now!..
I worked until I was told I had enough for the lady to give me an in home permanent. The other lady I worked for just for spending money.

The permanent turned out great.  With the other money, I had an idea.  I had a friend at the time whose dad was a wood worker. I would sometimes be walking back to my grandmothers house after playing games with his daughter Sheryl and hear a saw buzzing away in the open garage.  I was so curious, I would watch in fascination as he cut things on a circular saw, sometimes I stared until I heard a yell from a few houses away, "Kimberlyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy come hooooooooooooooomeeee!!! 

Eventually I asked him how much it would cost if he cut me some wood in the shape of Angels and let me use his paints for gifts for my mom and grandmother for Christmas.  He wouldn't take my money, and cut the angels from scraps he had.  He cut shapes for his daughter too and we painted them together.

Mom and Grandma were so surprised.  I gave them the angels, and bought candy for the kids.    My grandmother made pies and I am not sure if we had a tree that year or other gifts, but it was one Christmas I gave gifts from my heart.  Since then I try to make some ornaments or cookies, or something that is home made.  I know in this age it is not always practical to have all home made gifts, but if I could, I would. (except for the Cameo I want) heee.

Wow, this year is flying by.   Thinking about Christmas's past...

And all I wanted to talk about was preparing for college.  I always wanted to go to a better college.  Now that I am rasing a child, and one that is already half way to graduating, it is scary thinking about it.
Conrad  (as most of you know) is my precotious 9yr old nephew that we are adopting.  When asked what he wants to do when he grows up, his answer has always been to be a video game designer.  This could be a phase, but since Scott works in the video game industry for Suckerpunch productions/Sony LLC a company that design and makes video games exclusively for Sony Playstation, I think that this ambition will stick around for awhile.

There are 2 schools in our area one is Digipen Technology Institute in Redmond.
If all colleges average $10,000 for tuition, Digipen is $19,000.

Wow.  That is mind blowing. I would love to hear from some one that has paid for, or mostly paid for a college education using the GET (529 plan) or something similar and how it went.

Scott's education was very, very, expensive as he earned a Bachelors of Fine Art with honors at Pasadena's Art Center of Design. 

Maybe I need a second job?  Oh well, I will work on that.