Gearing up for grad school (Update!)

That is a less commonly seen set of choices, outside of electrical engineering anyway.

Anyway I was boring and picked essentially a focus me and teach me more for what postgrad stuff I have done. Mind you I pick jobs and education courses because they are interesting, not really for any other reason, and it is not quite as much money around here.

That said
a) is grad school the thing for you -- a lot of them limit your later choices a bit, probably end up being a bit better paid should you be able to find employment in those fields (which can be a bit harder, and you will also possibly not be considered for a lower level job if you have a shiny masters, phd or something). Or if you prefer it sounds like you moved jobs -- in interviews for the later ones how many people asked you about your previous education rather than the work you have already done? Always be learning but is it really the thing for you here?
and b) "Then I had to add in all the other things I was okay/good at." seems potentially a bit limiting. A lot of people pick a grad school subject not necessarily to further what they know but maybe retask a bit and specialise in an adjunct area.

I am also not sure what "Manufacturing IT systems" entails in this case -- I have met a few IT people when playing in the manufacturing world and some are doing things like optimising CNC and manufacturing paths, others are doing almost embedded electronics and messing around attaching snmp traps to big clunking iron and the difference between those worlds is somewhat akin to that of hardcore cryptography to high end 3d graphics. ERP/Supply Chain is another thing in that world but I imagine it will take you further away from the floor/guys on the tools if that is a concern, on the other hand if you know how the real world works and go there and can help prevent purchasing from not wishing to meet me in a dark alley one night then I am OK with that as well. Others still find themselves basically sysadmins, albeit ones that occasionally have to run fire/temperature rated CAT cable and network gear up a chimney.
Equally as the automation level rises in an attempt to out compete wherever the cheap labour is at then such fields are going to get even more fun.

I will leave it there for now. I should also say you do still have my chosen way of making such choices -- if you have ? equally good choices then act randomly. Just don't be doing it when the careers teacher walks in, for some reason they don't like that.