Starting a new year

Well times flies when you're working your buns off. We have been steadily working to open a new middle school room, changing rooms for our Lower Elementary class, and expanding our toddler room.  We started the year this week with 73 children (and 5 more to arrive in the Spring). Once again we'll need to increase our capacity with the City very soon. Two years ago we started with 42 children and now we have nearly doubled that number. It's all very exciting and the school is truly bustling.

Liam is now in 6th grade and Livy is in 2nd grade. Can't believe how quickly they've grown. Both are enjoying school already, and even though the days are long, they feel like they are an integral part of the school. This past week, Liam and Rebekah (one of the other owners' daughters) calculated how many extra hours they've spent at the school cleaning, painting, prepping for hurricanes, sweeping, carrying books, working on the library, and now eBaying items that are no longer used. Apparently they calculated that they've spent an extra year of their lives helping out. :)  While I think this is probably a bit of an exaggeration, they do help out a lot!

So grateful things have worked out the way they are supposed to. We will be able to take a paycheck every month this year, which is amazing. Several months last year were pretty lean and we couldn't pay ourselves. While salaries aren't high, they are steadily increasing. We have several new staff members, all of whom are very excited to be at Atala. We're very glad to have so many new fresh and energetic faces around campus.

Not much else to say. We are moving onward and upcoming at an astoundingly quick pace. And things are going great.

Spread Your Wings!