Wednesday the 26th

Here is that book--hope it isn't illegal to show it or whatever...















Here is the elephant you can make.














Here are the frog and fox you can make.



















Here is an underwater scene to work on.














I absolutely love when little ones quietly play trains. Something about it is so sweet and sincere.
















We worked on more of the book Owl Moon today, and talked about "Aerial View". Greta is showing her anthill from three different perspectives. Mickey drew pretzels!













Then we did a bar graph about the amount if sunlight versus dark hours there are in the different seasons.
















The kids worked really hard on them, adding colors and symbols and I was really pleased.








No pics of Casey today--I am out of batteries again! But he stayed in my bed at naptime, watching TV on very low volume. He didn't sleep, but he rested, and thanks to cable and dvr, he wasn't watching all those little princess/little combat commander commercials, hehe.

This work-up of the book Owl Moon has made me a solid fan of Five In A Row. I really am going to stick with this "curriculum". I have already learned alot about the benefits of reading a book more than once--and I don't think we could ever really do all that they give you in just one week. We are completely happy to meander through the activities. Today we did three of them; Aeriel View, Science of Owls, and Hours of Darkness and Light. Owl Moon is a lovely book, but not one that I would have ever gotten "all into". But now I am! I think it might make me a better reader, and I KNOW that it will make the kids better readers.

The Author of Five In A Row really worked hard on this curriculum. It isn't complete, and it needs supplementation--by that, I mean it doesn't have much basic math, etc. But it is a lovely springboard that is working well for us. I really, really like it.

Tuesday, week 3

Baby Charlie
Protein breakfast
French Toast Fort Day

Painting with forks!
Special bunny fort
Burying Casey in the toys!

Well, today is Tuesday, and I haven't written in a while. Not because we haven't gotten anything accomplished, but because we have been really busy.

We didn't go back to the Waldorf co-op last week, but we do plan on going October 3rd. I think I am going to have Mickey go to our good friend's house. I don't know how he will react to this decision, but I really need to figure out if this is something we want to stick with or not. It doesn't appear to be something we can pop in and out of, as the children have ongoing activities such as a play that they would need to keep up on. I was thinking maybe if Greta didn't have to police Mickey, and if I just had to deal with Casey and Charlie, then maybe that would change the dynamic enough for me to be able to think more clearly. It's all so strange, because Mickey certainly isn't "bad", but after some careful thought, I think he might be the one catalyst that was making it not really work for us. We'll see.

We have been working with Casey on ABC's and he knows all of them except "P". Cool! He can count and we have been reading lots of counting books, with Charlie close by pretending to count and saying "A, 2, A, 2, A, 2, O!" So sweet.

Greta and Mickey have been working through the Five In A Row book, with our latest literary pic being a book called Owl Moon. It is a nice little story about a father and daughter who go out into the woods at night to go "owling", which we discover, is to be extremely quiet and to happen upon an owl and observe him. The illustrations are great and it is a Caldecott medal winner so we talked about that. We did a bit more "depth of field" drawing, and talked about how an illustrator can tell us so much about the setting of a place by the kinds of things they draw. We also did this with a book called One Morning In Maine--we talked about how the deciduous trees and evergreens and the way the characters were dressed told us so much about the climate and era and location of the story (Northeast America, 1950's, fall or springtime).

Awesome news--my mom has paid for our entire order of Singapore Math AND science, including manipulatives and teacher's guides. When this package comes in the mail (soon! soon!) I am going to feel an enormous amount of relief and excitement, as my role of floundering math teacher will soon be over, and we will have a nice solid thing to work with everyday. THANK YOU NANNY FRAN!!!!!!!!! I will be blogging about this as soon as it comes, promise!

We have a gorgeous book called Look What I Did With a Leaf, in which there are some amazing art projects to do with leaves you gather. Of course, being early autumn in Michigan, we will have some colored ones to use, which you don't have to do, but it will be nice. I was intrigued at the lengthy process in which the author described the best way to press the leaves for best usage--it takes a WEEK to do! All I ever did with leaves was to stick them in a big old book, and then find them dry and dull a day later. Supposedly this new way will preserve them well. More details to come as we apply this technique!

Things still have a long way to go as far as "running the household". Even before me and Steve got new jobs, it was very hit or miss. I can't even pinpoint what it is, exactly, that seems to throw us "off" every single flippin' day! I really don't know how we can be thrown off of something we are so rarely "on", to be honest.

We follow our schedule, as much as humanly possible. We have the kids cleaning and helping ALOT. Steve and I are still up till 10 at least cleaning and setting up for the next day--but I feel like it is all a quicksand pit by 9 am more often than I'd care to.

The weather is buggin me, I will freely admit. I HATE that it is hot and sticky, with mosquitoes and air conditioners and sunscreen still a big part of our days--and I also hate when people feel it is their duty to tell me what kind of weather I should enjoy--didn't the clouds care that my little calendar has leaves on it? Doesn't Earth care that I have absolutely NO good looking clothes for hot weather? That one week of 61 degrees with a breeze was just the teaser, and I got really, really disappointed when it got back to hot and has stayed. We took down our pool, and now there is just stinking, rotten dead leaves and grass under it that smell like a manure farm, with flies buzzing all over it. Casey stepped on that dead grass area the other morning and I was like a crazy woman, sniffing and sniffing--who has poo? Do you smell poo? It wasn't until I pinpointed it as his little shoes that I realized how bad that dead grass and leaf pile was. I don't remember that from the other years.

Charlie is talking SO much, and that has been bad and good. He gets extremely angry when we don't know what he is saying, but he also is succeeding at communicating more, too--so now we know that for the past year of "Ungh! Ungh!" he was really trying to tell us that he wanted candy and markers and scotch tape and to go outside! :)

Greta had her first girl scout meeting, and she loved it. There were a few new girls, and all her old favorite pals, too. She was well prepared for her meeting thanks to our friend Julia giving us her old Junior Girl Scout badgebook AND handbook--expensive! She also gave Greta a Junior girl scout hat, sweatshirt, T-shirt, and pants. Too cool.

With Daddy working his new job, our evenings are going to be weird, but I am going to be really cheerful about it. It might even be better, if I have it in my head that he will only be home for about an hour, from 530 to 630, I will have dinner ready, and then he will go to his cleaning job, I will get the 2 "babies" put to bed, and then maybe have some special time with just Greta and Mickey in the evenings. Depending on how long this jib takes Steve, he could play a game with Greta and Mickey when he got home, or they could already be in bed and he could play a game with me! Called "lets clean"! I'm kidding. Partially.

Cold season already :(

The beebee's are sick!
This weekend, I started to feel a little tickle in my throat, but tried to blow it off...but then I got the thing where you feel all hot and exhausted when you do anything, andI thought "oh boy".

Today, Greta and Mickey are flat-out on the couch with sore throats and fevers, and Charlie has a boogery nose and a pale watery looking face. Casey is fine so far, and so my decision for us to not go to the Campfire scouts' field trip made him really mad. Apparantly compassion and empathy for others are not hallmarks of being 4 years old. I feel so bad about leaving my friend Trish to lead the entire little kid's group, but it is 84 degrees out and being out in the summer hot sun all sick sounds like total hell for them and for me. It was going to be a really cool trip, too.

So, today we are resting. Well, the kids are. It is nice for me since they are staying put on the couch, I am cleaning like a madwoman ;) Well, kind of--in between fetching popsicles and ice waters and tissues and blankies and motrins...Im so happy to have them all laying still that I don't mind one bit. Sorry if that sounds terrible, but since they don't seem to have anything dangerous, I just have to be honest.

Does Waldorf meet the needs of boys? My boys?

I was drawn to the Waldorf philosophy at a very early age. My little sister went to a Waldorf school for what was to be her kindergarten year, and I was with my mom when we picked her up and dropped her off. I was absolutely fascinated by the wooden toys, the silk scarves draped in front of the windows, the soft-spoken teacher who seemed more like a beloved grandmother out of a fairy tale than anyone on salary...

They did really different things than cut out little turkeys out of construction paper. They played alot of olden time circle games and seemed to spend a good deal of time out of doors. There were children of many different cultures in attendance, too, which was sort of rare in 1985 in our area, sadly. I loved that my baby sister was spinning wool and playing with dried beans, and it really sparked the embers of my burgeoning interest in alternatives in education. I was fascinated by different types of schooling, testing and procedures from an early age, for sure. In fact, after I got my Bachelor's degree in psychology, I had planned on getting a master's in school psychology. Looks like I am doing work-study instead, huh? :)

Fast forward a few years to my early days with my new baby girl. I wanted the gentlest purest things in her life, as all parent are apt to do. Natural foods, natural fibers, organic everything, nature and flowers and historically significant music would be the only thing to tickle her ears. Everything that was plastic or character-emblazoned that was somehow pouring into our home was NOT of our doing. I didn't like the fact that being "poor" made us more vulnerable to accepting toys and clothes and influences that we did not want in our lives, but before we knew it, our little Greta was covered in Elmo clothes and drowning in a bedroom full of plastic toys, lots of them that "talked"--ewww.

When we moved away from our first house, we took more of an active stance in what we had in our little girl's life. We got rid of a lot of crap. We were feeling stronger and more confident as parents, and we began to feel ok saying no to talking toys and crappy Disney stuff, and as she grew, we began to discuss education. We looked into the 2 Waldorf schools in our area but they were $8000 a year for PRESCHOOL! So that was immediately out of the question.

Why Waldorf? I thought the whole thing seemed to care so much for the spirit of the child, for nature, for goodness and purity and the catalogs that would come to the house with all the natural toys and goodies warmed my heart. I wanted this for my child, and, through the casual placement of both boys and girls in the catalogs, one thing never, ever occured to me, and that was the possibility that Waldorf might be much, much more suited for girls.

I knew it all --harhar--when I was the mother of one little girl, and one of the things that I "knew" was that all the boys who were wild and boisterous and making little weapons out of every twig and berry were surely the unfortunate victims of a terrible violent society, hell-bent on making all male infants into little football players and little marines, and that all those parents were horrible and they were ruining a whole generation of young boys for my daughter.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Even in the womb, Mickey was different than Greta, and no, I didn't know the gender of any of my babies until they were born. Greta rolled and swished in my belly. Mickey did jumping jacks. Ask Steve-- I occasionally CRIED, he would buck so hard in there, I was afraid he would break my ribs.

As a newborn he and his sister were vaguely similar--he was much more fussy and loud, but I don't know how much of that had to do with his birth, etc... but pretty early on he was different from Greta. The way he played with the exact same toys she had was different. He threw things across the room at 4 months old that caused me to think really cheesy thoughts like "He's got an arm on him!" At 6 months old, he could kick little toys across the whole front of the house from his doorway jumper, and really did prefer rock n roll to any of the toddler tunes that Greta still loved. If I gave him a soft blankie, he would rip it off his head, cackling with brillaint laughter, where she would be likely to leave it on her head, maybe holding it undr her chin like a little bonnet. Greta also CUDDLED, HUNG OUT WITH YOU, STAYED PUT in general! I didnt know anything about little tots running AWAY at 100 miles per hour until I had been a mother for 4 years and my son was mobile. Goodness! Why wont he HANG OUT like Greta did? I look at the videotapes of her walking calmly down the street for her 2 year old Halloween and I am stunned. I would NEVER have Mickey, Casey, or Charlie anywhere near the street if they weren't in a stroller, with shoulderstraps, thanks you very much! Are you kidding me?

Another thing Greta did was that she would cradle and caress any and everything, even cans in the grocery cart. Mickey would throw them. She loved stuffed animals and coloring--he HATED stuffed animals and ate the crayons like a stack of fresh pretzels.

Don't even get me started on baby Casey...he made Mickey look positively tame! He climbed the actual TV/entertainment center at FIVE MONTHS OLD, forcing us to make dozens of emergency trips to buy all sorts of "babyproofing" products that we never in our wildest dreams imagined that any good family should ever need.

Was it ok for me to now proclaim it a boy-girl thing?

What about when our third boy in five years came along? Did that qualify me yet?

Look, I know most of you know this, but I had big dreams of gender neutrality. Big ones. I dressed my little girl in jean overalls at birthday parties, for pete's sake. We eschewed ALL Barbie, Bratz, and lil' slut clothes. We nurtured and loved our children outside of the realm of media as much as humanly possible. We never told our daughter to be meek and pleasant and we never told our sons don't cry/toughen up/be a man. Ever. We model a balanced marriage for them, and we really, really try.

BUT

Some things are just not up our kids' alleys. and those kids happen to be boys. And now I get to my point, sort of.

I do not know if Waldorf really meets the needs of most boys.

I find an EXTRAORDINARILY unbalanced ratio of women with only daughters being drawn to this philosophy. Such an unbalanced ratio that I even have wondered if there is something in the very ethereal woman that prevents her from bearing a son. I swear. Its food for thought at least.

Anyhow.
Maybe I am completely insane. Maybe I need a babysitter for maybe just Mickey to give this co-op thing a chance. I do not know if I can go tomorrow, and I really want to. Maybe I am making this huge gender thing out of nothing. But I doubt it.

It seems very lovely, for a certain type of kid. a type of kid that I do not honestly know if you can "create" just by providing a certain kind of upbringing. Maybe you can. I did not and now that I see my kids' personalities, I think for certain this this is not Mickey's cup of tea.

Doesn't mean he can't be gentle and insightful or artistic or love feathers and flowers as much as the next guy. But when he shines is when he is around numbers and action, building and planning, mazes and maps and rules and puzzles and sports and maths, big messes and big laughter and plenty of burp and fart jokes and that is TOTALLY TOTALLY O-KAY.

So,
given the physical restraints and stresses of me going to this thing with the baby and Casey and Greta and given that I have concluded that Mickey only liked playing in the tiny house but could do without the rest of Waldorf Co-Op (I think...)

I don't know if we are going back tomorrow. I don't even have any money for whole foods luncheon and would have to write a check to Kroger that wasn't really "good" until Friday in hopes it took its time to "go through", if you catch my drift...

But I do want to talk to the Wiccan mama and I do want to go back. I think Casey would be so happy to play in the little house and Greta might be more apt to settle in to the "classes" without Mickey there and her perceived duty to keep him from saying bad things...whatever it was that he said.
I just don't know.

Social butterflies

Jeez o Petes, we have been busy doing everything but what I envisioned.

I guess its ok, it is still summer, for crying out loud. But all this running around has left our homelife in an absolute shambles. Our baby is losing his mind, crying from about 5pm until 9 pm...we try to put him to bed at 7:30 or so and it is just hell...no naps mean evenings of terror, evenings of terror mean no laughing family moments in the setting sun, no family story time, no hum a merry tune and put clothes away...just screaming everyone, dishes and dishes and dishes to the moon and back, no baths, no nothing, really, just hell and crying and then me and Steve completely collapsing.

Campfire Scouts, which is starting off well, lots of new faces and cool families, is the worst one yet--1pm on a Monday. So all morning, I ran around collecting all the stuff we needed for the events--I am a leader of the Little Stars, the under 7 year old group, and I made a scavenger hunt--one was a nature check list and one was a collect as you go thing. i didn't have to save it for today, I could have been more prepared, but today was the only time slot I had, to be honest. It all went well, and the parents and kids seemed to be having a nice time at the meeting today. But alot goes into it, so Monday is completely blown, which I am NOT ok with. Especially when the meetings are technically--get this--one hour long! For me, I was at the park which we met at around 12:15, and left around 3:30. Part of being a leader, I guess.

Charlie fell asleep in the 1/2 mile car ride home, so I parked the car in the driveway and let him sleep, and sat right next to the window and read the newspaper. Then we had to go get Steve from work at 5.

I will have to make big, big strides to have Mondays be salvaged and not be completely given to Campfire scouts, which I know I need to quit griping about, but USED TO BE on Fridays at 10:30am.

tomorrow we will have a day of homeschool. Thank goodness.

Wednesday is the Waldorf Co-Op again, and I do not know if I can do it again with the four of them.

Thursday is Girl Scouts, from 1-3 pm, about 20 miles from here, no siblings allowed. In the past, I have taken the little boys to McDonalds and done the playscape/french fry thing for 90 minutes while Greta is in her meeting. We'll see if that is in the budget this week, money is really, really tight. There is also a semi-nearby library, but it is hard to get them all in, do some fun stuff, and get back out in time. Its alot of backbreaking with Charlie, and I will be ecstatic when he gets to an age where he can just--walk, like a kid. Right now, if/when you put him down on the ground, he RUNS AWAY to kingdom come, to Timbuktu, to China...so I have to haul him in and out of stroller, carseat, baby sling, or most likely, on my crooked ole' right hip. So a trip to anywhere is an effort in major heavy lifting, and so again, that will completely take over Thursday. Ack!

Friday is Homeschool Park Day, which is the kids' favorite thing ever but really, is "socializing" all we do?

Tonight Greta and Mickey, after a harrowing evening of screaming and wailing from Charlie AND Casey, are playing a board game with Daddy. Charlie cried so hard to go to bed that he jumped and jumped and BROKE his crib. The whole bottom fell out.Yeah, cool, right? Like we have $100-300 bucks for some new crib. I know, I know, look online. In all my spare time I will hunt down some old brown crib from some family with fleas and then get some mystery truck and haul it here (when? how?) and then assemble it and have Charlie break it again! yip-pee.

He is in the playpen tonight. Maybe that can be his bed until he is older.

So I am taking a moment to type on my blogs. It is 8:45 pm and the kitchen is condemned, seriously. But I cannot move a muscle in my shoulders, and I am nodding off...

The Waldorf Co-Op

A few weeks back, I was truly touched and flattered when one of the moms in our county-wide homeschooling groups asked me rather secretly, if I would be interested in checking out their co-op that her and her 4 friends do on Wednesdays. I was intrigued! She told me it was Waldorf-based, and that they got together at one of the women's small beach houses that she has decided to use for just this purpose. It sounded precious. But I was nervous. Did she mean all five of us, really mean me and my four children, or what? She said absolutely, and so we looked forward to it.

The very first week (which was last week) we did not go. A million reasons, but we didn't. So yesterday we did. It was really, really something!

On a lake, which was surprisingly nearby, was this cool old white and black house. It had a long gravel driveway and a little tiny house to match it in the backyard. Wild flowers were everywhere. There was a ring of tree stumps which reminded me of an old campground ring or something. There was a huge vegetable garden, and just flowers, flowers, flowers. Very aged, very New England, I was charmed before I even came in.

We were met by the original friend, who is just a nice, nice woman from a nearby town to me. Mom of 2 girls, wears tshirts and pants, has funky glasses, seems really funny and down to Earth. Seeing her there first was reassuring, as I was finding myself incredibly nervous and self conscious. I was actually astonished at the flood of insecurity and almost dread I was experiencing. If I wasn't keeping track of 4 kids, I could have spent some time thinking about what in the heck my deal was, but I was too busy! We were welcomed into the house, which was so wonderful. It had hardwood floors, completely bare and empty except for a few pieces of furniture, rugs, and mirrors. In front, right on the lake, was a beautiful room which was all painted white woodwork, with windows on all 3 sides, rocking chair, wicker couches...I can't even explain. Like a catalog, where they work super hard to make it seem all weathered and old but this really was.

There were immediate signs of "Waldorf" products being brought out, the little dolls, the silk rectangles, wooden baskets filled with natural puffs of wool. Yarn. Sticks. A glockenspiel, and wooden recorders. Very precious.

I them met the woman whose house this was, and she was very kind and welcoming, but when I say gentle and natural, I am talking wowee wow wow, she was the real deal. Like, her voice was all ethereal, and her hands were itty bitty, and she had long long hair, and spoke just like someone would on a meditation CD. Same intonation, slight accent, extremely quiet. She had one little girl with some lyrical name, lanky long hair, pale skin, shy.

I am NOT trying to make fun of these people, and I even have one or two whom I am seriously considering steering towards my breast and belly blog--I am truly just trying to paint a picture for you. I will pre-empt any misunderstandings and tell you that every single woman I met and every single child was as sweet and pure and earnest as an actual time traveling stalk of Celandine. The way that they were just so happened to make me feel about as ethereal and wispy as a bag of Pork Rinds and a can of Miller high Life.

So, the next woman I meet, is even sweeter and gentler than the first one! She was dressed in what appeared to be possibly flax, anyway it was a white ethereal gown to the floor, and she had long long dark brown hair and rosy cheeks. She looked really familiar, and we talked about how we thought we might have met before. I was conscious of the fact that I was trying to alter my voice to more align with the quiet, quiet lilted accented voices of these women, and then I felt like they would think I was making fun of them, oh jeez! Why was I so wigged out?? anyhow, it turned out that I had met her 4 years ago at another Waldorfy thing. Long story, whatever. So she had a 2 daughters, both with lyrical names, long lanky hair, pale and sweet and shy and gentle.

Then, another one of my friends whom I knew from my homeschool group was there! Yay! She was a breath of reality (again, I don't mean this to sound mean, it was just so surreal!) in her jean shorts and bobbed hair. She good naturedly whispered "very Waldorfy!" to me when she saw how I was dressed--which thank goodness I had the sense to scrounge up what I did--and thankfully it was very very cold out--in the 50's. I had on a long woolen sweater and a long long skirt and big woolly socks and birkenstocks and my hair was in two little buns with no eyemakeup. (Awww) phew!

So anyways, she has a little boy and a little girl. What--a boy?? Yes. But he is 3 and I have never heard him make a single noise. Her children are so so so so so quiet and so sweet and gentle, they look like little paintings. Her girl is 5.

Is anyone getting to where I am getting to at this point? That me and my big wild self and my big wild bunch of 75% big wild boys have landed ourselves smack dab in the middle of some kind of photo shoot for Celtic Clothiers, or Pagan Petites, or, I dunno, Edwardian country diary girl world of flowery flowers incorporated? I felt literally dumbstruck. I loved everything about this place, but really wondered if we were "ok". then I felt so awful, thinking such insecure thoughts like that. then the whole cycle would start over. Ack!! Why must I be this way. (I have alot of insights as to why, but I will type them later)

So.

the last woman to arrive was really really cool looking. she had these huge earrings, and dreadlocked hair up in two huge piles on her head. she had some wool thing tied around her head, and at least 2 or 3 pairs of wool giant socks on, under some colorful dress. She did not seem like a little ghost from Scotland, she seemed like a fire breather from Lollapalooza. She had a gorgeous silk baby sling, out from which peered the dearest plump little baby head. (a girl, of course) The baby had on some kind of fantastic woolen or crocheted hat, and was wearing some fancy little cardigan. Be still my heart, I die for those kinds of baby clothes. Pant, pant, this baby was so cute. Then she pulls her out of the pouch and she is a big girl, and walks away and talks and stuff! I was like staring at this lady and her baby like a freak. they seemed so interesting!!! Oh and p.s., if you care about this detail the baby had on some kind of fabulous little jumper and mystery woolen socks and precious mystery baby shoes. Sigh Sigh Sigh. So so cute. Like a daguerreotype of Baby Queen Victoria or something. Cant deal with how cute this tot was.

So, there was a light suggestion of an activity, which was to make a frame out of sticks and to weave some yarn in and out of this frame and then for the children to go and gather natural things from out side to weave into the frame. Darling, right? Except that Greta and Mickey were completely blowing the heads off of these kids with their jokes and sarcasms and I was dying and mortified and stressed and I kept telling them (in private) that if they were not able to be gentle and calm and to respectfully participate in what clearly was a gentle and lovely handicraft then we would have to leave. ((big forced smile from me))

It wasn't working.

When the "children" were sent out to "gather", Greta and Mickey were just totally leading them astray. I felt so worried and I had no one to reassure me, really. I knew with all my heart that if we were not there, then these Waldorfy little girls would have been merrily gatherin' their bundles of thyme and marigolds...pondering each sweet feather, and wondering aloud with their Mommy which birdie the pretty feather might have lit from....instead we have Casey trying to break some hammock frame, Greta telling stories about some Harry Potter thing on YouTube to a girl who never had pop before in her life--(never had soda pop, so I bet no YouTube then, right??) Mickey saying stuff that had the kids cracking up and Greta smashing her had over his mouth and saying "DON'T BE BAD, MICKEY!!!"

Did I mention Charlie?

He was a freak. Crying crying crying. Wanting to nurse, but then not doing it. Wanting to go outside, then back in. Obsessed with the fridge. Obsessed with the bathroom. I was SWEATING my little woolen outfit off, lemme tell ya.

Now I know that I have painted sort of a hellish portrait for you up to this point. But the women were sweet. They smiled at me. One told me she liked my skirt. They seemed surprised by my stress. I was in and out, up and down, wiping my brow, apologizing profusely for my missing out on Morning Meditation, Morning handicrafts, and for my children's seeming inability to go pick some flipping flowers and to come back in to stick them into the loom. (Which turned out really pretty, by the way.)

They made a communal soup, for which I bought and brought carrots to contribute to, but I was so busy with Charlie and every thing else (the property was not all the way fenced and less than 100 feet from a lake-yikes!) that I never even got to give the ladies my carrots. Which I went out for at 10 the night before. Damn.

the soup smelled fantastic, and it was soon time to eat. They apparently all chip in all their food and we all share it. I knew this, and yet, like so many other insecurities that I was being bombarded with that day, I worried about my food I brought. Simple, whole, natural stuff. But not like theirs. Not in heirloom glass dishes, but in gladware. Not organic or picked fresh that morning with my black cat playing his lute, but bought from meijers and rinsed well. I brought:

French bread

Carrots

Cucumber slices

Apples

Sunflower seeds

Hummous

Cream cheese

Cheddar cheese

Raisins

Pickles

and of course, Mickey's pasta, precooked.

It all looked so nice, the huge spread all over the giant antique table, all the moms and children all filling their plates with the wholesome foods, the smell of the dill and the onions and the tomatoes from the soup mingling with the warm wood smells and the lake air...except there was nowhere for my kids to sit except Casey!

You know what, though, I was glad.

there was a picnic table outside and I tended to Charlie and Mickey's plates out there. I did risk Charlie being out in the yard alone as I rushed my butt off trying to do all this, but obviously he lived. I got about 2 bites of soup, and felt so sad about it. But Charlie didn't want much of the nice plate I made him, so I got to eat something which tasted like zucchini bread, and had some vegetables. Maybe that's how you get wispy--tee hee.

After lunch, the "7 years old and over" children went upstairs to do something with one (or more?) of the moms, and Charlie finally was wanting to nurse and actually stay on. Cool, right? Once Charlie fell asleep, I did the "walk somehow discreetly while the baby is still latched on" waddle across the house and plunked myself and my nearly 40 pound baby down on a wicker couch. the women in the room were knitting. I don't know how to do any of that stuff, as my hands have been full literally, since 1997, (and before that you were more likely to find a videogame controller or a beer or a copy of BUST or worse in my hand than a knitting needle, I must say) but it didn't matter. I was happy to be nursing my baby, sitting on that beautiful sunroom porch, when suddenly Casey--where was Casey? I didn't know what to do. I had Charlie asleep on my lap, to lay him down would mean my boob hanging out, and him screaming and freaking out, so I just sat there. It turns out he went upstairs. The "7 and older" was too much for my little curious one, and he just HAD to see what the deal was up there. They gently shoo'ed him down, and he was pouty.

This whole thing was from 10 to 2, and before I knew it, it was nearly 2. Unfortunately, this was when the best funnest part happened! They let the kids go into the little house. This is a tiny scaled house in the flowers, in the yard, which is even more adorable inside. It had a tiny broom and wooden containers with silks in it to play with. A rocking chair, a little wood play-stove, a porch...and I had to be the bad guy who had to tell them it was time to leave! I also did not clean up whatsoever, but I think I was suppossed to. Again, I only have 2 arms.

The leaving was really good. These ladies give hugs, and that was nice. They seemed genuine in their saying it was lovely to meet me. The children hugged, too, which was sweet. Casey was so sad to go and said he wanted to live there. They were all rosy cheeked and asking when we were coming back. My friend who invited me to this whole thing was like "Everything is ok! Don't be stressed! Its all good!" and I smiled a feeble smile and just said that I would relax in a week or two and she seemed worried about me, which of course made me even more self conscious, arggg.

I didn't want to meet new people like this. I love my children and I love myself. I do not think I am inferior or bad or wrong. I am just unique, and multifaceted, and complex. I do no know who I "appeal to" and mostly I do not care. I get quite mental when I have PMS and this was a bad time for me to be doing this. So lets assess:

My reality is that I have four children. Three of them are boys. We are as likely to be pressing wildflowers as we are to be watching spongebob. We are as likely to be listening to our new CD "Lakeside Retreat" (ambient nature sounds with some flute and harp) as we are the Beatles, Bjork, or Japanese techno. We eat junk food and we eat whole foods. Yes my kids have had pop. Today. Probably tomorrow. They are allergic to juice and milk, and I honestly think it through and think it is ok. Mostly we drink water. From the tap. :)

Although it was mind blowingly difficult to not quite get what I was supposed to do, and to feel like my kids were "too" regular, too rowdy, too male, was sucky, we really did have an amazing experience. The firebreather looking awesome and fun Wiccan Mama told me about some extraordinary gynecologist in the area who works with women who have had difficulties healing properly from c-sections, and she is going to email me some info. I got to talk about homebirth, and knitting, and raising a boy (or three) with some really different people. My children got to experience something really lovely and unique, which they are begging to go back to. I feel myself treating them with much more patience today, and it is nice. We are going to buy tons of yarn this weekend.

I don't know what to do about Charlie. the little cardigan girl fussed as much as he did.

Next week they told me it will be much more structured, with all sorts of lessons and classes.

That's my story. We'll go give it a try again next Wednesday. I won't be under the influence of mind altering hormones and hopefully, I will be somehow more prepared for the whole vibe.

Third day of homeschool

Eventually these titles will get sort of dumb..so maybe just for the first week :)

Today was good again. I had some urgent internet stuff to do so the kids all kind of played and made stuff all morning. They have fallen into their most comfortable old patterns of Greta being mostly the leader/grand idea creator, and the boys, happy to have such an awesome and fun idea-generating, enthusiastic fun sister to play with, join in!

I wish I could tell you that I knew all about what they were doing, but all I know it that it was something about tying 5 bikes together and making 600 signs and it was CatWorld and there was an elaborate tuna menu and tickets and stamping of hands and enemy cats and mice and dogs and they were extremely loud and extremely happy and the gym-room was totally unrecognizable and I got to do what I had to do. I WISH I took pictures but my batteries died arggg we need more AA's soon!

We had lunch, we put Charlie to bed, and then Casey begged to play for five more minutes with Greta and Mickey. Sure--I am happy they are getting along like they haven't in 2 years, and I still had some business to attend to. I let them go 20 minutes and then I told Casey it was time for nap and he was not too happy. Which was a bummer since yesterday went so smoothly and I thought he really got it that he slept and that we were so proud, but I don't think he fully gets that he has 2 sleeping cycles or even the whole concept of days, I really do not. After a failed attempt to recreate the nap time of yesterday, we ended up putting him in Mickey's bed and he did sleep! YAY!

For school today we went into more fractions and decimals, as prompted by the show Cyberchase on PBS. We talked about tenths and cut paper into ten pieces and stacked them up, .1, .2, .3, .4, .5, .6, .7, .8, .9, 1.0

We went more into carrying, which I know is supposedly first grade math, but it is something that we needed to review, and borrowing which I am leaving for Steve since it seems to cause deep emotional reaction in Greta. Sigh.

We ate all of the Combos which I bought as a special treat, and tried to do some fraction thing with them but then just gave up and laughed about that idea.

We did more with Ferdinand and discussed "Line" and the idea of creating a sense of distance when we draw forms and figures. We read a USA book that has the states and the capitals and the state flowers and the state birds and they acted like it was just a beloved old storybook, not a dry little fact-book. We actually sat and cuddled on the love seat, one child on each side of me, reading the little USA book and talking about states. This was closer to my idealistic homeschool visions than I have come in a long long time and it was a completely heartwarming and healing experience. I feel like the way that I have worked to arrange our little schoolroom, the vibe, the feng sui, whatever, enabled us to be able to do that--it just didn't happen in the old house, no matter how hard I tired.

The love seat right in the front of the window, facing outward, is the nicest idea I have had in a long time.

(not my photo but this is Him)

Today we saw a White-Breasted Nuthatch again, a bird that doesn't usually come to seed feeders, as he is mostly an insect eater. So cute. Chipmunks galore, and Sparrows, Cardinals, Cowbirds, Grackles, Starlings, Pigeons, Doves, squirrels and a sassy cat who tortures our indoor kitty. We joke that she is his girlfriend.

We talked about the seasons even more and started to get into the pagan holidays that were based on the equinoxes and solstices, and then got into the Renaissance Festival somehow and they want to go next year.
We looked at Google maps at the state of Maine, which they turned very interested in today.

That's about it...we got up the babies from naps and they went right back to CatWorld and I folded clothes till I was dizzy. Made dinner, ate it, and then they begged me for slurpees "with their own money". So when Steve got home at 8:15 (I hate Thursday late night!!!!) they got slurpees with their own money and got to watch Charlotte's Web. Part of it.

What happened to bed at 8? That will most likely be in the winter. Seems like they are up late, but they have been so so so good this week, and it is ok. For now.

I wrote to my homeschool group to ask if there is still Homeschool Park Day, or if that was a summer thing. No one wrote back yet. So maybe all of tomorrow will be fun and frolic and maybe it won't. We'll see!

FTF Day

Blankets are all ready....

Tomorrow is French Toast Fort Day.

This is a new-ish tradition that started out being just a day we had early this summer where we just so happened to have French Toast and make forts all over the living room. The kids called it FrenchToastFort day and asked "can we do this every Friday?" Casey especially. I told them maybe and then we never did it again.

So....
tomorrow it is. I even got real maple syrup and whole grain bread.

I think it will be in the morning. There is no huge difference really, it is me making breakfast and them playing happily...I hope.

I remember the first time they pushed the couches out and under them was so much horrifying filth that I ended up sweeping and mopping and that was cool--but I did this recently enough that if indeed couches are moved, it will be ok.

I hope they all have fun and that they aren't all freaky and screaming at baby Charlie to not wreck the forts...it really hurts his feelings, plus why should he be banished all morning and have to sleep all afternoon? That's mean.

Second day of the schoolyear, in pictures

Today was MUCH better than yesterday, because Casey was--ahem--- forced to take a real nap :)

We did everything I had planned and so much more.

HOORAY for 2-kid naptime!!!!!!!!!!!!

Our first day of homeschool, 2007-2008

Well, to-day was the day!

We started school today, with some very last minute house cleaning and straightening and re-arranging done over the weekend, and I am happy to report that it went quite well!

I got up at 6, to an alarm. I was not the least bit horrified, although I was sleepy, I put on my outfit that was laid out for me :) and went to start my coffee when I heard Charlie crying--darn! So much for having special time to myself. thats ok....so he had his morning diaper change, nursey, and was happy to trot around while I got out breakfast stuff and fed the outside birds. So hilarious that he is SO happy/surprised to see me outside and waves and yells HI MAMA! when I go outside :)


Casey came out of his bed soon after, and we enjoyed cuddling for the two minutes every morning that I get to savor when he is all warm and still and sweet and cozy. Then SNAP! he starts up in his special Casey way, and I tighten the bolts on my resolve and my patience and my sense of humor, trying to steer him away from destruction and downright rudeness, and towards the more positive sides of his personality which are energetic cheer, hilarious observations, creativity, and curiosity to rival anything I have ever seen. This is my nice way of saying I took away his knife and gave him some scotch tape instead. This is my nice way of saying I ignored him when he told me that my coffee "smells like horse poo", but that when he shoved his breakfast on the floor, he was punished.

I was going to get Greta and Mickey up, when I discovered that they were already awake--at 7:30, I was surprised! They seemed chipper enough, and, seeing as I am trying to be somewhat LESS of an all day chef, I requested that they join us for breakfast. We all ate the embellished granola bars I made last week, except Mickey, for whom they were really made, who pretended he wasn't hungry and then begged for "butter bread". Ack.





Greta and Mickey, as per the plan of me doing nursery school in the mornings, and that being their "freetime" for the most part, decided to watch the first Harry Potter movie on the TV that has been newly installed in their bedroom, displaced from it's original home in our backroom which is now a gym. Still with me? :)


It doesn't have cable or any antenna or any capabilities besides watching DVDs and playing GameCube, so we are not worried about them langushiing in bed watching weird broadcast shows, so that's cool by me and Steve, the whole TV in your bedroom thing. We needed there to be no one watching a movie or playing a video game in the living room when I was having preschooley times with Casey and Charlie--too too distracting. (We have no basement or upstairs, it is a long one story house.)





So, with the big kids tucked away with Harry Potter, Charlie and Casey and I dug into some crafts! Pipe cleaners, googly eyes, rubber bands, glue, stickers, felt, and tape tape tape tape tape were the objects of our creation, and no, I wasn't reading the New York times, looking at email, or folding clothes. I was truly truly with my little ones. We listened to Woody Guthrie and The Babysitters on the CD player, and I tried not to look at the clock. (I knew it was barely into the 8 o'clock hour and the school room was already obliterated with the signs of our fun.)





Then, we sat down at our newly placed love seat that faces right out the window, and watched the chipmunks for a few minutes, wondering aloud if any would dare be brave enough to come and take the peanuts we put on our windowsill (they weren't). We then had story time, and after fumbling through a few board books that seemed to be more suited for Charlie, Casey and I really had a blast with an old book about signs. Signs, signs, he was really enthralled pointing to each one and asking "What is that one? What does that say? What about that one?"--It was cool.

After the sign book, we decided to paint. I put both Casey and Charlie in the high chairs, with smocks (we found so much of our cool stuff in the garage this weekend--even though we have lived here a year now, the garage is still quite unpacked) and they watercolored for a while. Charlie seemed fondest of painting and painting in one spot until the paper shredded through to the high chair tray, where as Casey was really into mixing colors. After that, the schoolroom was truly, truly decimated, and we needed to just get out of there, and so me and the 2 little boys went into the backroom, a.k.a. the "gym".





They ran and jumped and kicked and drove little bikes around, and it was only then that I took one or two phone calls and snuck in a load of laundry. It was 10 am.


Greta and Mickey were done with Harry Potter and we all went outside to hang up clothes and t play on the swing set before it got too hot out. The pool has been drained for almost a week, but somehow no one had noticed until now, and they were complaining, begging for me to refill it. We'll see. I know it will most likely be hot out for a few more weeks, but they just weren't swimming, and the water gets neon green every time it rains, so we drained it for the second time this summer.

Around 10:30 I started making lunch preparations, we were having grilled cheese and lentil soup and macaroni and cheese and applesauce. Steve was a bit late, but ended up eating with us. While he was here, I mostly tried to tidy up some of the outrageous fall-out from the crafting, and did have a mini panic attack about how in the world would I possibly get anything down with the big kids with our schoolroom so blown out...but I reassured myself by remembering it is the first day, and that being NOT crabby was the main thing....

I put Charlie to bed at noon, and he laid down without a fuss--he was truly tired!

I checked email, and by the time I got back, Greta Mickey and Casey were playing some big, big game involving all the craft stuff. Cutting and stapling and writing furiously, Greta making play money, Casey filling some old toy with pom poms, Mickey under the table making a shoebox into something......ok, do I "let" them be happy, or do I enforce the schedule? Hmmmm...


We compromised, with me telling them that I was so happy that they were all doing such cool stuff, but that Charlie's naptime was really supposed to be for me and the big kids to do our schoolwork, and so I let them do 1/2 hour of their miscellanea, and then it was gonna be time for Casey's couch-nap.


It kind of didn't go as well as I wanted, but, being very determined to not turn evil, we went on with our school stuff, even though Casey was being a pain in the___. He laid on the couch for about 2 minutes and then was determined to just be bad. I offered him to watch TV, to play a game, to go outside, to have a Popsicle. No no no he seemed to want to make weird noises and interrupt me when I spoke. Mickey was getting really flaky and I was starting to panic that this whole idea was already horrible. But, we continued on. Casey was vaguely placated by doing his craft stuff on the couch.

Greta and Mickey and I first did a reading of the book Ferdinand the Bull. A simple little book that we only "did" because it is the ONLY book we own that is in the Five In A Row curriculum--our interlibrary loan has not been able to get the book we wanted to do first, called Owl Moon to us yet.


We read Ferdinand and made our way through a bit about Spain, and its culture. We found Spain on the globe, and talked about the Straights of Gibraltar. And maps. and how stuff that looks tiny on a globe could actually be hundreds of miles across, etc.


Following along in the Five In A Row book, we talked about how the illustrator of the book used emotion and symbolism to great comedic effect, and tried our own hand at drawing simple faces with different eyebrows and facial feature placement to create different emotions. We talked about how in one picture, Ferdinand, the bull, had his back to the crowd, and how that was showing his disinterest, etc.

We then switched gears and talked about the 12 months of the year, which ones have how many days, when the seasons really are, how does that match up with the weather here in the midwest, and we looked up on Wikipedia what was the real deal with leapyear. We talked about babies that are born on February 29th and stuff.


We cannot afford to order our math program yet, so we rifled through some of our very sub-par mathy stuff we have and just went over greater than/less than. It actually ended up surprisingly fun, because I wrote out some "tricky" ones, such as 209___209.0001 and we talked about how the second number was greater, even though by a tiny amount. For some reason I said it was like "Which is heavier, Mickey, or Mickey with a chocolate chip on his head?" and that broke the icy/awkward vibe that was going on. We laughed and started drawing all sorts of funny, funny pictures on the dry erase board.


Charlie cried and it was almost 3pm. (A good nap, if I do say so!) they got to eat some sweets. I haven't kicked these completely out of our lives, and this seemed the "best" time of day to allow a cookie or brownie.


Wrong.

4pm, everyone is whining, fighting, begging for more sweets. Bad call.

4:30pm, and my fantasy that they will all play in the "gym" while I make dinner is sort of a flop. Greta is flopped on my bed, Mickey is extremely tense, driving Casey nutso in subtle ways, Charlie is pretty happy driving the little bikes around, but the other boys seemed hell bent on disrupting him. Grrr.





5pm dinner is ready, too early. I eat my portion and set up all the drinks, toppings, etc for tacos.


by 5:45 Casey and Charlie are being bathed by Steve and I get to relax for a sec. Steve and the kids cleaned up the giant mess in the schoolroom in about 10 minutes, and I couldn't believe how fast they did it! I love him so much :)

By 6:30 I read a book to Casey and he went to bed. Yikes--so early! But he was completely and utterly MENTAL. (Hope he sleeps 13 hours! )

Charlie played while I took a phone call from my mom, and our friend came over. Charlie went to bed a little before 8.

Greta and Mickey played around and ran around a little and then read in their room until 9.

So that was our first day!

Thanks for reading.