Teach Your Children Well

Last night our new neighbors, the renters next door,  invited us over for a drink, along with some other neighbors who've helped them out.

This couple, Mark and Lisa,  moved a houseful of furniture from a four-story Victorian in San Francisco and somehow fit it artfully into a smaller house--pictures on the walls, books unpacked--so that it looks as though they've lived there for years.

Their three kids started at Berkeley schools last week.   The younger two somehow got into the school closest to us, Thousand Oaks Elementary (often kids from this neighborhood are bussed across town).  They like it, but it's very different from the Catholic private school they went to in San Francisco. 

The fifth-grader came home and reported that everyone in the class had to describe their family, based on interviews each kid did with parents.  Then her teacher, known as Teacher Bob, talked about his family, which consists of his husband (also some pets, I think).

The mother looked delighted as she told us this.  Her daughter was a bit wide-eyed, she said, but accepting.  The third-grader has a teacher with multiple tattoos.  The son, an eighth grader, continues to pop in with spiders to show Jerry.