8 Weeks Done, 28 to Go

Well, here I am 40% through this week and I haven't even written my post from last week! Truth is, it wasn't the best week we've had this year. I mean, it was still a pretty good week, but I didn't get that many hours in. Every so often I get kind of tired of persevering and striding purposefully forth with making sure that I homeschool each and every available minute. When that doesn't happen, sometimes I start feeling guilty about not doing enough, and eventually that feeling becomes extremely pesky and burdensome.

I mean, at any given moment, I feel like it is REQUIRED for me to be attending to more than one thing and last week I was trying to figure out if it is possible to do what needs to be done and not just be on autopilot. It's hard to ever stop to breathe or smell the proverbial roses when I am running a marathon where there is a finish line and/or a deadline.

So, this was a week where I added in a few extra things, and ended up reaching the limits of what I could attend to and get done. But I ended the week with an overnight visit to my BFF and that was a wonderful pick-me-up encouraging time.

Highlight of the week was probably staying home Thursday morning instead of going to Kepler's play group, in order to re-group and have a minute to catch my breath. Also, we had the extended family October-birthday birthday dinner and after we eat, I led the group in playing a couple of the theater games I played with my kids a few weeks ago. It was extremely enjoyable to see everyone, even the normally reticent, joining in and laughing uproariously.

Still love the curriculum. Still love homeschooling. This week, trying to get everything done felt very tricky, but seeing as I am writing this in the NEXT week, I can guarantee you that THIS week is going much better!

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13 Years Ago Tuesday (Told You I Was Busy)

I guess we were all a little shell-shocked right after the birth
Eli has had time to get used to being in the world.
Child of the 90's: Doing JumpStart Toddlers while in the high chair. (Love the computer stand?)
Eli has always loved helping with the laundry (well, not so much anymore).
Living the life of a gardener to its fullest.

Eli was born, five days after his due date, and not a moment too soon. Since Joel had burst into the world with a mere 3 hour labor, and the hospital was 1 hour away, we erred on the early side with Eli. Labored all night and said hello to him at 5:30 in the morning. One of the noteworthy aspects of that hospital stay was that because of the time he was born, and the time of day I left the hospital, although I arrived Friday minutes after midnight, and didn't leave until Sunday afternoon, our insurance only had to pay for one day of hospital care.

At only 9 lbs 12 oz, he seemed small compared to the first two. Of course, he wasn't small -- I noticed that at about 5:35 am, but all babies seem very tiny at the beginning.

Eli brings so much energy and joy into our lives. He is a passionate boy who feels everything at least twice as deeply as most other people I know. This makes for some REALLY high highs, and some really low lows. But how sweet to see this boy taking care of his little brother -- they seem to have a special bond, and I love to hear Kepler laughing at Eli's antics.

Eli has always loved colors. Much of his artwork is filled with intense colors, especially purple, and he often fills every inch of the canvas. He certainly does know how to get the most out of an experience.

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The worst Blogger in the World . . .

is CERTAINLY not yours truly! And yet, my blogging frequency has dwindled, declined, tapered, withered, slacked off. Could it be that I am BUSY? All I know is I had to cancel an appointment today in order to have a day to do some of those little pesky things like clean the utility sink (for real), cut another section of Kepler's hair, place an order long overdue, and other similarly exciting and important things.

Here's the thing. I am sure I am the 7,600,428th blogger to post a similar post (you know: golly i can't think of anything to say so i am posting that really important fact). Actually, in my case, I don't think it's not having anything to say, as much as just trying to find the time to say it.

To prove my point, I will now write multiple posts which will post at pre-ordained times over the next one or two or even three days and you can again be treated to some of Siouxsie's Musings.

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7 Weeks in the Basket, 29 to Go

What a great week!

I am convinced that my continuing practice of doing "morning pages" is making a huge difference in how my days go. (In Julia Cameron's words: : The morning pages are three pages of stream-of-consciousness longhand morning writing. You should think of them not as "art" but as an active form of meditation for Westerners. In the morning pages we declare to the world—and ourselves—what we like, what we dislike, what we wish, what we hope, what we regret, and what we plan.) Getting all the cobwebs out of my brain first thing in the morning seems to be making me much more able to be creative and energetic all day long.

Friday is always my big homeschool day because every other day is interrupted at least once by some appointment.

I think the highlight of the week was two-fold. First, an emphasis on seeing God as loving, and fitting everything else into that understanding (or not fitting it, but having that understanding). Second, an ongoing discussion about love which expanded into several things, including a persuasive essay activity where the kids created dialogues between two people who held differing viewpoints on what they were trying to be persuasive about. These two kids so love to be creative. They got behind closed doors and worked and worked on their dialogues. Then they both crammed into one desk chair and typed up the dialogues. Finally, they performed them for me, and later for Greg. Don't tell anyone, but I was actually persuaded!

Had some GREAT discussions that arose from several books we are reading, and we were lucky enough to have Joel in the room while we read the very biased history book, which is pretty strong on talking about how bad the European explorers were, and minimizing any bad things that the Native Americans did. Joel was pretty amazed at how much the book left out. So, he gave us a little history lesson, too.

Still love the curriculum. Love teaching the kids. Best year ever homeschooling.

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Happy Birthday to . . . . ME!

My sweet Anna-Jessie posted on her blog today and wrote a very lovely post about me. Here it is.

This is the best birthday I have ever had. I am happier than I have ever been in my life. I have a huge sense of being blessed, with my husband, my kids, my family of origin, my best friends, my other friends, the job I have as full-time mom, my health, my humor and just being glad to be me.

Sidenote: In searching the internet for this post's illustration, I saw that there is actually an entry in wikipedia for the number 47. Wow, who comes up with this stuff? Who has time to figure out or notice where this number shows up in astronomy, movies, television, etc? I did enjoy finding out it is the 15th prime number. And now you know.

Happy Birthday to everyone else born 10/4!

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6 Weeks Fulfilled, 30 Weeks Yet to Fill

Aha! The truth is, some weeks are more noteworthy than others. This week would be an "other." We worked on spelling, history, math, math, math, writing, grammar, physical education, geography, civics, government, typing, computer skills, good citizenship, and some of our group worked on working steadily while mommy went to work out.

Well, I STILL love the curriculum I have chosen, I am STILL pleased with the progress we are making, and I am STILL glad to be homeschooling. I THOUGHT about taking pictures this week.

The highlight of the week this week: we decided to walk to the park today, we being Eli, Anna-Jessie, Kepler, and me. Kepler's legs are only about thiiiiiiiiis long so he doesn't walk fast. And we took a new path through the front yards of our neighbors instead of walking on the street. Our neighbors have such interesting climbing trees, and little walls by the driveway that one can JUMP off of. So instead of making it all the way to the park, we only made it three doors up the street, but we certainly did have a good time. I wisely added in a trip to the library for the edification of my students and because I knew Kepler would fall asleep, which he desperately needed to do.

So, it's not all algorithms and alphabetical order and gerunds and split infinitives around here. Sometimes it's also exploration, and sunshine, and experiential education. And sometimes, it's both!

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Five Days Since My Last Post?!?!

What in the world have I been doing?

Well, the truth is, another has stolen my heart, or at least my attention for the time being. I set up a blog for our homeschool organization this week and it took some doing to get an email sent out to everyone about it. Feel free to check it out right here. I promise I will be more thoughtful, trustworthy, and regularly posting.

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