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Hill Country Blog

There are as many experiences as there are people living here. This is our story, about our special places, activities and taking life day by day. See more stories to the right in our Blog Listing.

Back to School in the Hill Country

For those of you that don't live in Texas or haven't lived here very long, let me tell you about a special weekend here in Texas called "tax-free weekend." During these three days (usually the weekend before school starts), you can tell the state to take a hike.

Before you get too excited, let me give you the scoop on how it works lest you embarras your teens like I did getting educated by the manager of the first store we visited.

First, it's tax free on clothing and back packs only. I assumed it covered school supplies and grilled the manager at the local office supply store when I saw that I was taxed for everything in my basket. Yep, it was a rude awakening, but I always enjoy being in the know and passing along information. [Update 2009 - they began to offer tax-free on school supplies this year]. Second piece of critical information: Single items over $100 don't qualify for tax-free status. My son's $109.99 Nike basketball shoes didn't qualify. Do you think Nike could have knocked them down to $99? I mean heck -- $8.00 -- I could have saved $8 in tax if they'd kept their pricing below $100.

So the kids are happily - for me - back to school and a few things have changed. One went off to 8th grade and one went off to 10th grade and both of them are riding the bus this year. This is a switch. Used to be that my pampered teens were dropped off and picked up every day by Dad. He lives to provide them an idyllic childhood. Well, when gas prices skyrocketed my suggestion that they ride the bus turned to a directive. They bitched and moaned the first few days - Dad included, but they're settling into the routine and I've got to say that they keep on schedule now that the Daddy bus is no longer running. If they miss the school bus, it's $10 out of their allowance to cover gas and time to make a run into town with them.