Spreading the Happiness...

(otherwise called being lazy and borrowing from Cursing Mama's What Makes Me Smile Wednesday comments box and expanding upon it here, just may be a regular Thursday item round here...)

What makes me smile...

Yesterday we finally received the ACT scores we have been waiting on. The teen took the test back in spring and did pretty good however it was on the lower end of what the college of choice is accepting, about 4 points below the average incoming freshman. Since our list of colleges is short (due to location, in state tuition and the fact that we get a discount at a few) we wanted to up her chances of getting admitted. So we signed her up for an ACT Prep class over the summer. It cost an arm and half a leg but thankfully she dedicated herself to the classes, all 32 hours of it with nary a word of complaint about attending even though it did take up some of her free summer time. She worked hard and it paid off. She pushed her composite score up 3 points by increasing 3 of the 4 subscores between 4-6 points. Only one went down but that didn't matter since she rocked on that one in spring and the college supercedes the scores which means the top score out all attempts count. So taking the reading score from spring with what she got this fall she actually hit the target score, the exact average of the incoming freshmen. I am so proud of her (and so glad that the money was not wasted on the class). The next step is to get the application in before the priority deadline of November 1.

Add this also to my son who now INSISTS on being dropped at the door. He actually complains a bit if I even suggest walking him in which actually is a good thing this week. It is Book Fair week. It is ever so difficult to walk a child down a hall lined with new books especially when they include books with sharks, Pokemon, Transformers and fish on the cover. I'll probably relent on Friday and let him pick something out since he has ever so nicely asked to get something from the Book Fairy.

And to round out everything, this morning I bought my first latte in quite awhile from my usual location. And they rang me up just as I asked without a single argument. I wonder if they already received the memo from corporate.

Oh and one more thing that causes me to smile is just now remembering that it is Thursday which means a new Grey's, Ugly Betty and Dirty Sexy Money.