After sharing a bedroom by choice her whole life with Mickey, even when we lived in a 5 bedroom bungalow, Greta got her own bedroom last weekend! Mickey and Charlie and Casey have a boy's room now, and the baby sleeps with me and Steve. It is going well and Mickey was pretty cool about the whole thing. He liked staying up late and watching tv with her, but we told him they are going to do that in the basement now and even stocked the mini fridge with juice boxes and such. Now they dont even have to be quiet and everyone is getting a whole lot more sleep.
Its funny how long it has taken us to really settle into this new house. But I do love it. Pictures soon.
Saturday, December 6, 2008
Friday, December 5, 2008
we came, we saw, we said our good-byes...all on good terms!
Well, ladies and gentlemen, back to our regularly scheduled lives. Meaning, after 8 or 9 weeks of public school, we have made a mutual decision with the children to return to homeschooling. Which explains my huge absence from the blogging, emailing or socializing lately. This is BUSY. But wonderful.
You might be a little surprised to hear that I do not have any specific big horror stories to tell you, school ended up being, in general, about what we thought it would be-- but I am sure you can understand how much thought, discussion, and soul searching went into this. all of this. Much more soul-searching went into returning to homeschool than went into going to public school, if you can believe that. So I will attempt to tell our "story", but only this once. Then I am looking forward to this being as it always was meant to be, a Homeschooling Blog about our Homeschooling Days as a family of seven : ) I love saying that!
Well, ok. Where to start--it feels like the story started in June. We had a baby this June and moved to a new house. Things were horrendous. Terrible and terrifying. "carefully planned" c sections and postpartum helpers didnt make a lick of difference, really, once Daddy went back to work, (a week and 3 days after the surgery) I was once again, a paralyzed bleeding woman--this time with a severe sinus infection-- alone with five children in a house that was about 50% unpacked. Nightmares melded into flashbacks and heartbreak is the only way I can describe my world this summer. I was depressed as hell, and for good reason, good reasons indeed. I am sure hormones had a major effect but trust me, what I had "on my plate" was just unbelievable. Alone, astonished, and in major major major pain, unpacking the homeschool stuff was sending me chills of fear and yeah, everything lined up to send the kids to school...but truly, the only reason we actually did it was because they wanted to. They wanted to try it out. It was the last year they could all go to elementary together (Kindergarten, 3rd and 5th grades) the neighborhood was strongly involved in the school system, the new pals were all a-bustle with "who's your homeroom teacher?" and, in hindsight of course, the allure of being in some kind of group, anything to feel less abandoned, adrift, root-less, and completely without a support network or anything was at its all time high and so we went for it. The unknown sounded a tiny bit more promising than the known, which was sucking big time. I dont know a more eloquent way to put that so there you have it.
As I had warned Steve that they might be, from reading these kinds of stories on the homeschool webgroups we have belonged to for nearly a decade now, the grandparents were OVERJOYED. It is hard for that not to be insulting, but hey, we announced what we were doing wth our lives and it was heralded. A pretty good feeling. The neighbors seemed excited (although they were very impressed and curious and "cool" with us being homeschoolers as recently as the July block party and had loads of compliments on our children being "breaths of fresh air" in regards to their lack of bad attitudes, frankly.) everyone was all excited and so we got into it with the kids, too. WOO HOO! sort of.....a very tentative woo hoo.
A whirlwind (much too positive of a word) of dizzying work was to be done by me to and I dragged my wounded carcass all around that hot August, newborn, toddler, and 3 kids in tow, to get us "all signed up". The amount of foot work was seriously insane. Insane. Doctors appointments (no, they do not see your kids all on one day. No they do not give all the shots in one visit.) and shots, o my gosh who WERE we anymore, I am strongly opposed to vaccinations, but in we marched....dentist to fix Casey's teeth lest there be bullies who laugh at stain-y teeth, backpacks, shoes, hip clothes, lunch boxes, haircuts, alarm clocks.....then we find out there is a list of supplies we need to bring. then we buy all that. thn we find out it was the old list and they needed different supplies. Curriculum nights. Meet and greet. Faxing and obtaining records and certificates all times three all with mama still feeling quite cut in half and creaking and leaking all over town I mean, it was just out of control. I have never felt such an onslaught of such paperwork and rigamarole in my life.
This running around had a circular ironic effect of wearing me down so much that I became 100% convinced that climbing into a nice soft bed, Air conditioning, and Noggin/Nick Jr with my 2 nurslings was all I would be able to possibly muster for AT LEAST a year. I developed symptoms of fibromyalgia, including locking jaw, shooting bone pain, weak and immobilized wrists, electric skin pain, and yeah of course ,the good old c section incision adhering to my intestines and pulling my back tightly out of alignment....and establishing breastfeeding again blablabla. I was a M E S S. A fricking mess. I also tripped and fell and tore my rotator cuff and sprained my wrist when i was just 5 weeks postpartum, and with no health insurance, those injuries did nothing but stiffen up and add insult to so much injury. All for a little baby! Who knew?! lol. sort of.
My depression got so bad that I had secretly convinced myself that my kids were being "taken away" and that "I deserved it". There was no one to talk to on a true honest level because really, the kids couldnt stay here with me, and I didnt want to be talked out of or into anything, and so we all just hoped for the best. Although no one knew what that was, underneath all the hurt and all the exhaustion and all the wounds new and old, if you believe in Truth and Honesty, the best would be if Mama got all better and our family was returned intact. Maybe. Or maybe our homeschooling days were behind us now--several family members, both on my side and Steve's were very happy to repeatedly imply and say things to the effect of "Well, you did a great job and now thats over, phew, hooray, case closed". They meant well. But again, that allure of feeling normal, feeling like your grandkids are normal, that can be a strong pull. I understand. But I knew that there was a very real unspoken thing about not ever ever homeschooling again. I didnt have the energy to even deal with all that and so I didnt. You did a great job homeschooling but now thats over, case closed.
Except of course, the case is never closed when you are a parent. The case is never closed ever in life, as long as you live and breathe, and as long as hope and healing fact and truth and communication and intuition are available, no case is closed.
So they went. And I fretted. and I looked out the window, and my stomach burned. And my eyes burned. And I rested. and it was quiet, a little. And Charlie took a loooong nap everyday, and so did the baby. And I organized my little desk. And I balanced the checkbook online and in paper. And I was a great little school-mom. Always there to pick them up at 3:20, always there to walk them to school at 7:50, rain or shine, double jogging stroller full of complaining Charlie and squalling Eska. I hung up their little papers on the dining room wall. I filled out a calender and TWO planners with their incessant "events". I washed laundry more than ever, so the favorite jeans would be available and the gym clothes, etc...and I made the nightmarish perfect lunches often past midnight.
My own lunch duty went from a rowdy, jubilant, hot meal for five everyday to me reheating some little pasta thingie and giving Charlie some bites. Those lunches were really easy, hardly any clean up, but MAN was it lonely. Mister Rogers would talk to us in the background, in his sweet, sad way. After lunch, I would try not to fall asleep nursing anyone to nap, lest I miss the 3:20 pick up time or my online banking time. The cat seemed confused. Charlie seemed confused. I was lost as all hell, but just tried to ride out each day like a quiet surfer. I tried on the idea that i was now just like the other mommies on my block--something i had never ever known, and, heck, even my hair was dyed a sedate medium ash brown--but nope, on my block the mommies go to work and have 2 kids and blazers and pumps and leather purses and those fat little cars called crossovers--2 of them, both silver. So i never did get to be like the other mommies. Just as well. I would rather jam forks in my eyes, but it would have been cool to see another living soul all day besides the mysterious little old man next door who laughs to himself and shakes his head and smokes an actual pipe which fascinates Casey more than I like but I dont dare tell him Pipes Are Bad or else he would give the guy an earful and thats really rude.
All the excitement of our days of course was now concentrated into really bad time slots. If you are a parent of young children, you know how bad these can be: 6:30 am, 330 pm, and about 8 pm. yikes. The jamming the waffles into their sleeping faces. The crying (all three of them, almost every morning) the rushing. The stress. Then when we got home, the stressed out vibe was almost visible, so intense and so deep, the stories the deadlines the tragedies the triumphs but mostly, the confusion, guilt, and fear. Then the evenings--once a time of really awesome family fun, now come the tears again, the accusations, the confusion, the worry, the papers, the money is due! Its all due! Its all overdue! I was supposed to bring you the FORMS!.....tears tears tears. Most nights I was crying, too, and Steve was darn close--as the why did we do this again? For peace and tranquility or some such? dared not be discussed but boy, was it's presence becoming larger and larger in our home.
Now, as to the unfortunately very minor subject of the "education", (this is why school is such a failed experiment in general, how the education gets so lost in the flim flam of the extraneous stuff) the kids did swimmingly. A+, star, and happy face were on every thing they brought home. Hmm. Looks like the homeschooled kids are absolutely perfectly doing just right. Normal. Excellent even. Super! Mickey was bringing home some dear little spelling sheets, decided to use very beautiful handwriting all of a sudden, and they both got the hang of the new-new math within a week. All set on the brains, it appeared. Super!
They endured the MEAP testing and even enjoyed it. They said they were finished so far ahead of the other kids that thye felt a bit worried. Awesome! The teachers were darling, kind and involved. Yay. Seriously! But, umm, just as the vast majority of readers of this blog who are homeschoolers will begin to see, the little spelling lists and the little arithmetic tricks and the abysmal Science (Carnivores eat meat, kids! Did you know that?) and the semi-disturbing nationalist propaganda songs....couldn't that all be obtained in a MUCH easier, much more peaceful way, and in about 1/100th of the time, leaving vast glorious hours for these children to pursue their real thinking and growing time? To read about all the awesome things they are apt to read about, to build and write, to dream and plan, without Kenny or Freddy spitting in their hair, in any old clothes that felt comfortable, with healthy fresh food and water available--and toilets, too! Hmmmm.
Casey was the first one to blatantly object. He often came out of school crying and/or shaking. "Mama?" he would begin asking as he climbed into Eska's empty spot in the double stroller (she hated it and I would have to carry her most days and push the empty thing with the good wrist) "Mama, I don't want to be a school boy anymore." he said in front of "everyone" (strangers, neighbors, staff) Shit. What do I say? "Well, sweetie, lets just talk when we get home, ok?" and, like scummy bad parents, we wouldn't have the talk. Night night kid, your giant issues are not important to us! See you at 630 in the morning!
Steve and I blew him off for about 2 weeks. Might sound short but believe me, 14 days and nights of your own little son coming out of his How-was-yer-day-fine-can-i-have-a-popsicle shell and beginning to tell us all about how-was-his-day for real, and 2 weeks is long enough. All day Kindergarten was not right for Casey. 'nuff said. We heard more than enough and saw all the signs that this child was wilting, fast, and we pulled him out without any ado whatsoever from the school. We didnt even stop to "feel weird" about it and I think maybe because he was so little--5 isnt even "school age" in our state or maybe because the 2 big kids were still enrolled, really, the only conversation longer than 2 minutes was the one I had with my mom, and the consensus from everyone was that of You are the parents and You have to do what feels right. Yes!
Having Casey home changed everything. It was not lonely anymore, that's for sure, and Mama's rest time was completely Kaput. But yet I was ok. We fell into a little routine of him being the oldest kid in the house, and did cute ABC type things that he enjoyed from school, etc. We went to Kids Korner and the Science Center, walks and a few parks. But being tied to the house in a way, having Greta and Mickey in school, its not like we were "free" or anything. Especially since the sicknesses (which I forgot to mention earlier)continued. I had to go get Mickey three times to bring him home sick. That many children all together in those classrooms is very hard on the immune system, especially the respiratory system, and as the days grew colder, the mandatory multiple outside recesses really surprised and bothered me. Greta was pissed, to put it bluntly. She "could not believe they MAKE you stand out in the FREEZING cold like some IDIOT when you are SICK" (I love that kid, shes so hilarious and right-on) I just told her I was so sorry and bought her a new mega warm coat coat and sent her a hat and scarf and gloves and chapsticks and tissues and told her I was sorry again. Mickey found out that the only way you get to stay inside for recess was if you were in trouble and he talked to me pretty honestly about the temptation of that. What do I say? I dug out his warmest coat too and told him to hang in there until ---spring.
The children were coughing so hard at night I thought they would vomit, and they missed five days from fevers and malaise in October alone. On those days when all five kids were home, OF COURSE "Homeschool" was on my mind. It was on everybody's minds. "Could we do it? Could we do it? Could we do it?" was the only thing I thought as I doled out children's motrin, robitussin, echinacea drops...filled vaporizers, stepped on kleenexes, pushed fluids---"this is just like the old days! this is just like the old days! this is just like the old days!" the feeling was so palpable, but it took dear true Mickey to finally say it on one of the sick-days. MAMA I DO NOT WANT TO GO TO SCHOOL ANYMORE I WANNA BE HOMESCHOOLED I HATE SCHOOL HOW LONG DO WE HAVE TO DO THIS FOR YOU SAID WE WERE GONNA CHECK IT OUT FOR A WHILE AND IT HAS BEEN A WHILE AND I DONT WANNA GO ANYMORE I WILL NOT BE BAD I WILL DO EVERYTHING YOU TELL ME BUT I DONT WANNA GO TO SCHOOL ANYMORE
Shit. What was all this about I wont be bad? Was some of this a punitive thing to him? What does a die hard homeschooler say, do, what o what? (33 years of propaganda and pedagogy all booming in my head to the tune of dont let them be quitters/teach them to stick with something/life sucks get used to it kid/you cant always have fun young man/get used to gettin up early and get used to standing in line/give me one good reason why your voice should matter.......)
But somehow, in the swirling din of intuition lost and imagined grandmas pissed off and imagined neighbors offended, Steve and I offered up the meek and shaky "Until you can tell us what is wrong or what is happening or why you dont want to go, you need to still go, Honey." We felt very weird, and more phony and fake and distant from our children than ever in our entire lives as parents. There was less eye contact among all of us and I hoped in my mothers true secret heart that someday we would laugh about this all. I just didnt know how or when or if it was a Big Deal or not. Acid reducer is 4 dollars at WalMart, something I knew quite well now. Steve was on them too for the first time in his life. I wondered how many other families had pharmaceuticals at their dinner tables like so much salt and pepper, all in the name of the educations.
And still, time passed, and the papers kept coming home with the happy faces and the stars and the A+'s on them. And the anxiety grew and grew and the children...changed. Greta began to exhibit signs of becoming obsessively perfectionist, crying constantly (isnt that normal at this age? harhar) and becoming paralyzed with fear about everything. EVERYTHING. Lookism ruled her world, and even though the other fifth graders were about as fashion-forward as someone on week two of a camping trip, the pressure to look incredibly right began to take over our daughter's life, and her language and her attitude was really changing fast. Her and Mickey rarely played anymore, there just was no time, and even on weekends all they had energy for were tv shows, they begged us to not come to the grocery store and even the cider mill "I'm just really tired" and Steve and I were really scared.
A lot of racist and sexist slang was now being bandied about the dinner table. Homo, Rapper, Slut, Fart, Loser, Fat, Nerd were the things we got to hear about, and discuss, and Steve and I began to talk in earnest now. All night past the wee hours. All day on his work phone. Why are we doing this? Why is Joy feeling so much better now? Is it because the kids are away or because hey it was a postpartum hell to beat the band but the baby is five months old and sleeps like a log and basically Mama is Much Better Now because time heals? Hmmmmm
And meanwhile, the energy and effort was literally taking our family apart. The crying. The crying and crying and crying.
We got them on the 40 cents a day hot (cold and burnt) lunch program, we were "poor" enough (with 5 kids you had to make A LOT of money to not qualify) but there was only fried meat most days and so they often picked pb+j, and would come home telling me every single day how nasty and bad the lunch was, how they got only seven minutes to eat it, how they didnt get their oranges, how Kenney threw their milk away on purpose, how the lady gave us the wrong food, how the peanut butter and jelly had "clear stuff" on it (?!)......it sucked. It just all sucked. And I pushed the double stroller with the freezing babies in it, listening and listening and told them how sorry I was. I offered to make them home lunches again but apparantly you get teased for that and I think they felt bad about how much I complained about that, so they stuck with "hot" lunch. They were dinner-hungry when they got home and so I made dinner-esque foods at 3:45.
To say that the thrill was gone was certainly a true statement, and so the analysis had to begin in earnest. What was beneficial about the school experince-experiement? What were some good things that we and they had learned and done and accomplished? What were some benefits? How would this experience change our homeschool, what lessons have we all learned? What products would we like to use at home? What resources would be available to us if we did discontinue public schooling? Would be be interested in having the children go to just the "specials" as is their legal right in our state or would that be weird/unnecessary? What are the potential regrets? What would we continue doing i.e. getting up at the crackofnight, keeping a planner, following a specific schedule such as Art on Thursdays, and what of all that was merely crowd control that was irrelevant in the family setting?
Time passes, Steve and I discuss, a dear close friend of mine listens to me until her ear must be bleeding off, and still the crying, the attitudes, the stress.
And the report cards... Not the progress reports, but the real honest to goodness report cards: PERFECTION. Literally excelling in every area imaginable. Greta is a delight to have in class. Mickey is a delight to have in class. (even push ups, sit ups and jumping jacks got the coveted "4" mark) What do we make of this data? Is this the proof that homeschool works and works well, that our children are at or above all the other little tikes in town in all the suppossedly key areas, or is it proof that the poor dear things actually managed to fit in after all those years of Joy's crappy little makeshift school despite all those new siblings and new houses and heavens to betsy even all those dern video games (that taught both Greta and Mickey to read, but I digress)
You might be a little surprised to hear that I do not have any specific big horror stories to tell you, school ended up being, in general, about what we thought it would be-- but I am sure you can understand how much thought, discussion, and soul searching went into this. all of this. Much more soul-searching went into returning to homeschool than went into going to public school, if you can believe that. So I will attempt to tell our "story", but only this once. Then I am looking forward to this being as it always was meant to be, a Homeschooling Blog about our Homeschooling Days as a family of seven : ) I love saying that!
Well, ok. Where to start--it feels like the story started in June. We had a baby this June and moved to a new house. Things were horrendous. Terrible and terrifying. "carefully planned" c sections and postpartum helpers didnt make a lick of difference, really, once Daddy went back to work, (a week and 3 days after the surgery) I was once again, a paralyzed bleeding woman--this time with a severe sinus infection-- alone with five children in a house that was about 50% unpacked. Nightmares melded into flashbacks and heartbreak is the only way I can describe my world this summer. I was depressed as hell, and for good reason, good reasons indeed. I am sure hormones had a major effect but trust me, what I had "on my plate" was just unbelievable. Alone, astonished, and in major major major pain, unpacking the homeschool stuff was sending me chills of fear and yeah, everything lined up to send the kids to school...but truly, the only reason we actually did it was because they wanted to. They wanted to try it out. It was the last year they could all go to elementary together (Kindergarten, 3rd and 5th grades) the neighborhood was strongly involved in the school system, the new pals were all a-bustle with "who's your homeroom teacher?" and, in hindsight of course, the allure of being in some kind of group, anything to feel less abandoned, adrift, root-less, and completely without a support network or anything was at its all time high and so we went for it. The unknown sounded a tiny bit more promising than the known, which was sucking big time. I dont know a more eloquent way to put that so there you have it.
As I had warned Steve that they might be, from reading these kinds of stories on the homeschool webgroups we have belonged to for nearly a decade now, the grandparents were OVERJOYED. It is hard for that not to be insulting, but hey, we announced what we were doing wth our lives and it was heralded. A pretty good feeling. The neighbors seemed excited (although they were very impressed and curious and "cool" with us being homeschoolers as recently as the July block party and had loads of compliments on our children being "breaths of fresh air" in regards to their lack of bad attitudes, frankly.) everyone was all excited and so we got into it with the kids, too. WOO HOO! sort of.....a very tentative woo hoo.
A whirlwind (much too positive of a word) of dizzying work was to be done by me to and I dragged my wounded carcass all around that hot August, newborn, toddler, and 3 kids in tow, to get us "all signed up". The amount of foot work was seriously insane. Insane. Doctors appointments (no, they do not see your kids all on one day. No they do not give all the shots in one visit.) and shots, o my gosh who WERE we anymore, I am strongly opposed to vaccinations, but in we marched....dentist to fix Casey's teeth lest there be bullies who laugh at stain-y teeth, backpacks, shoes, hip clothes, lunch boxes, haircuts, alarm clocks.....then we find out there is a list of supplies we need to bring. then we buy all that. thn we find out it was the old list and they needed different supplies. Curriculum nights. Meet and greet. Faxing and obtaining records and certificates all times three all with mama still feeling quite cut in half and creaking and leaking all over town I mean, it was just out of control. I have never felt such an onslaught of such paperwork and rigamarole in my life.
This running around had a circular ironic effect of wearing me down so much that I became 100% convinced that climbing into a nice soft bed, Air conditioning, and Noggin/Nick Jr with my 2 nurslings was all I would be able to possibly muster for AT LEAST a year. I developed symptoms of fibromyalgia, including locking jaw, shooting bone pain, weak and immobilized wrists, electric skin pain, and yeah of course ,the good old c section incision adhering to my intestines and pulling my back tightly out of alignment....and establishing breastfeeding again blablabla. I was a M E S S. A fricking mess. I also tripped and fell and tore my rotator cuff and sprained my wrist when i was just 5 weeks postpartum, and with no health insurance, those injuries did nothing but stiffen up and add insult to so much injury. All for a little baby! Who knew?! lol. sort of.
My depression got so bad that I had secretly convinced myself that my kids were being "taken away" and that "I deserved it". There was no one to talk to on a true honest level because really, the kids couldnt stay here with me, and I didnt want to be talked out of or into anything, and so we all just hoped for the best. Although no one knew what that was, underneath all the hurt and all the exhaustion and all the wounds new and old, if you believe in Truth and Honesty, the best would be if Mama got all better and our family was returned intact. Maybe. Or maybe our homeschooling days were behind us now--several family members, both on my side and Steve's were very happy to repeatedly imply and say things to the effect of "Well, you did a great job and now thats over, phew, hooray, case closed". They meant well. But again, that allure of feeling normal, feeling like your grandkids are normal, that can be a strong pull. I understand. But I knew that there was a very real unspoken thing about not ever ever homeschooling again. I didnt have the energy to even deal with all that and so I didnt. You did a great job homeschooling but now thats over, case closed.
Except of course, the case is never closed when you are a parent. The case is never closed ever in life, as long as you live and breathe, and as long as hope and healing fact and truth and communication and intuition are available, no case is closed.
So they went. And I fretted. and I looked out the window, and my stomach burned. And my eyes burned. And I rested. and it was quiet, a little. And Charlie took a loooong nap everyday, and so did the baby. And I organized my little desk. And I balanced the checkbook online and in paper. And I was a great little school-mom. Always there to pick them up at 3:20, always there to walk them to school at 7:50, rain or shine, double jogging stroller full of complaining Charlie and squalling Eska. I hung up their little papers on the dining room wall. I filled out a calender and TWO planners with their incessant "events". I washed laundry more than ever, so the favorite jeans would be available and the gym clothes, etc...and I made the nightmarish perfect lunches often past midnight.
My own lunch duty went from a rowdy, jubilant, hot meal for five everyday to me reheating some little pasta thingie and giving Charlie some bites. Those lunches were really easy, hardly any clean up, but MAN was it lonely. Mister Rogers would talk to us in the background, in his sweet, sad way. After lunch, I would try not to fall asleep nursing anyone to nap, lest I miss the 3:20 pick up time or my online banking time. The cat seemed confused. Charlie seemed confused. I was lost as all hell, but just tried to ride out each day like a quiet surfer. I tried on the idea that i was now just like the other mommies on my block--something i had never ever known, and, heck, even my hair was dyed a sedate medium ash brown--but nope, on my block the mommies go to work and have 2 kids and blazers and pumps and leather purses and those fat little cars called crossovers--2 of them, both silver. So i never did get to be like the other mommies. Just as well. I would rather jam forks in my eyes, but it would have been cool to see another living soul all day besides the mysterious little old man next door who laughs to himself and shakes his head and smokes an actual pipe which fascinates Casey more than I like but I dont dare tell him Pipes Are Bad or else he would give the guy an earful and thats really rude.
All the excitement of our days of course was now concentrated into really bad time slots. If you are a parent of young children, you know how bad these can be: 6:30 am, 330 pm, and about 8 pm. yikes. The jamming the waffles into their sleeping faces. The crying (all three of them, almost every morning) the rushing. The stress. Then when we got home, the stressed out vibe was almost visible, so intense and so deep, the stories the deadlines the tragedies the triumphs but mostly, the confusion, guilt, and fear. Then the evenings--once a time of really awesome family fun, now come the tears again, the accusations, the confusion, the worry, the papers, the money is due! Its all due! Its all overdue! I was supposed to bring you the FORMS!.....tears tears tears. Most nights I was crying, too, and Steve was darn close--as the why did we do this again? For peace and tranquility or some such? dared not be discussed but boy, was it's presence becoming larger and larger in our home.
Now, as to the unfortunately very minor subject of the "education", (this is why school is such a failed experiment in general, how the education gets so lost in the flim flam of the extraneous stuff) the kids did swimmingly. A+, star, and happy face were on every thing they brought home. Hmm. Looks like the homeschooled kids are absolutely perfectly doing just right. Normal. Excellent even. Super! Mickey was bringing home some dear little spelling sheets, decided to use very beautiful handwriting all of a sudden, and they both got the hang of the new-new math within a week. All set on the brains, it appeared. Super!
They endured the MEAP testing and even enjoyed it. They said they were finished so far ahead of the other kids that thye felt a bit worried. Awesome! The teachers were darling, kind and involved. Yay. Seriously! But, umm, just as the vast majority of readers of this blog who are homeschoolers will begin to see, the little spelling lists and the little arithmetic tricks and the abysmal Science (Carnivores eat meat, kids! Did you know that?) and the semi-disturbing nationalist propaganda songs....couldn't that all be obtained in a MUCH easier, much more peaceful way, and in about 1/100th of the time, leaving vast glorious hours for these children to pursue their real thinking and growing time? To read about all the awesome things they are apt to read about, to build and write, to dream and plan, without Kenny or Freddy spitting in their hair, in any old clothes that felt comfortable, with healthy fresh food and water available--and toilets, too! Hmmmm.
Casey was the first one to blatantly object. He often came out of school crying and/or shaking. "Mama?" he would begin asking as he climbed into Eska's empty spot in the double stroller (she hated it and I would have to carry her most days and push the empty thing with the good wrist) "Mama, I don't want to be a school boy anymore." he said in front of "everyone" (strangers, neighbors, staff) Shit. What do I say? "Well, sweetie, lets just talk when we get home, ok?" and, like scummy bad parents, we wouldn't have the talk. Night night kid, your giant issues are not important to us! See you at 630 in the morning!
Steve and I blew him off for about 2 weeks. Might sound short but believe me, 14 days and nights of your own little son coming out of his How-was-yer-day-fine-can-i-have-a-popsicle shell and beginning to tell us all about how-was-his-day for real, and 2 weeks is long enough. All day Kindergarten was not right for Casey. 'nuff said. We heard more than enough and saw all the signs that this child was wilting, fast, and we pulled him out without any ado whatsoever from the school. We didnt even stop to "feel weird" about it and I think maybe because he was so little--5 isnt even "school age" in our state or maybe because the 2 big kids were still enrolled, really, the only conversation longer than 2 minutes was the one I had with my mom, and the consensus from everyone was that of You are the parents and You have to do what feels right. Yes!
Having Casey home changed everything. It was not lonely anymore, that's for sure, and Mama's rest time was completely Kaput. But yet I was ok. We fell into a little routine of him being the oldest kid in the house, and did cute ABC type things that he enjoyed from school, etc. We went to Kids Korner and the Science Center, walks and a few parks. But being tied to the house in a way, having Greta and Mickey in school, its not like we were "free" or anything. Especially since the sicknesses (which I forgot to mention earlier)continued. I had to go get Mickey three times to bring him home sick. That many children all together in those classrooms is very hard on the immune system, especially the respiratory system, and as the days grew colder, the mandatory multiple outside recesses really surprised and bothered me. Greta was pissed, to put it bluntly. She "could not believe they MAKE you stand out in the FREEZING cold like some IDIOT when you are SICK" (I love that kid, shes so hilarious and right-on) I just told her I was so sorry and bought her a new mega warm coat coat and sent her a hat and scarf and gloves and chapsticks and tissues and told her I was sorry again. Mickey found out that the only way you get to stay inside for recess was if you were in trouble and he talked to me pretty honestly about the temptation of that. What do I say? I dug out his warmest coat too and told him to hang in there until ---spring.
The children were coughing so hard at night I thought they would vomit, and they missed five days from fevers and malaise in October alone. On those days when all five kids were home, OF COURSE "Homeschool" was on my mind. It was on everybody's minds. "Could we do it? Could we do it? Could we do it?" was the only thing I thought as I doled out children's motrin, robitussin, echinacea drops...filled vaporizers, stepped on kleenexes, pushed fluids---"this is just like the old days! this is just like the old days! this is just like the old days!" the feeling was so palpable, but it took dear true Mickey to finally say it on one of the sick-days. MAMA I DO NOT WANT TO GO TO SCHOOL ANYMORE I WANNA BE HOMESCHOOLED I HATE SCHOOL HOW LONG DO WE HAVE TO DO THIS FOR YOU SAID WE WERE GONNA CHECK IT OUT FOR A WHILE AND IT HAS BEEN A WHILE AND I DONT WANNA GO ANYMORE I WILL NOT BE BAD I WILL DO EVERYTHING YOU TELL ME BUT I DONT WANNA GO TO SCHOOL ANYMORE
Shit. What was all this about I wont be bad? Was some of this a punitive thing to him? What does a die hard homeschooler say, do, what o what? (33 years of propaganda and pedagogy all booming in my head to the tune of dont let them be quitters/teach them to stick with something/life sucks get used to it kid/you cant always have fun young man/get used to gettin up early and get used to standing in line/give me one good reason why your voice should matter.......)
But somehow, in the swirling din of intuition lost and imagined grandmas pissed off and imagined neighbors offended, Steve and I offered up the meek and shaky "Until you can tell us what is wrong or what is happening or why you dont want to go, you need to still go, Honey." We felt very weird, and more phony and fake and distant from our children than ever in our entire lives as parents. There was less eye contact among all of us and I hoped in my mothers true secret heart that someday we would laugh about this all. I just didnt know how or when or if it was a Big Deal or not. Acid reducer is 4 dollars at WalMart, something I knew quite well now. Steve was on them too for the first time in his life. I wondered how many other families had pharmaceuticals at their dinner tables like so much salt and pepper, all in the name of the educations.
And still, time passed, and the papers kept coming home with the happy faces and the stars and the A+'s on them. And the anxiety grew and grew and the children...changed. Greta began to exhibit signs of becoming obsessively perfectionist, crying constantly (isnt that normal at this age? harhar) and becoming paralyzed with fear about everything. EVERYTHING. Lookism ruled her world, and even though the other fifth graders were about as fashion-forward as someone on week two of a camping trip, the pressure to look incredibly right began to take over our daughter's life, and her language and her attitude was really changing fast. Her and Mickey rarely played anymore, there just was no time, and even on weekends all they had energy for were tv shows, they begged us to not come to the grocery store and even the cider mill "I'm just really tired" and Steve and I were really scared.
A lot of racist and sexist slang was now being bandied about the dinner table. Homo, Rapper, Slut, Fart, Loser, Fat, Nerd were the things we got to hear about, and discuss, and Steve and I began to talk in earnest now. All night past the wee hours. All day on his work phone. Why are we doing this? Why is Joy feeling so much better now? Is it because the kids are away or because hey it was a postpartum hell to beat the band but the baby is five months old and sleeps like a log and basically Mama is Much Better Now because time heals? Hmmmmm
And meanwhile, the energy and effort was literally taking our family apart. The crying. The crying and crying and crying.
We got them on the 40 cents a day hot (cold and burnt) lunch program, we were "poor" enough (with 5 kids you had to make A LOT of money to not qualify) but there was only fried meat most days and so they often picked pb+j, and would come home telling me every single day how nasty and bad the lunch was, how they got only seven minutes to eat it, how they didnt get their oranges, how Kenney threw their milk away on purpose, how the lady gave us the wrong food, how the peanut butter and jelly had "clear stuff" on it (?!)......it sucked. It just all sucked. And I pushed the double stroller with the freezing babies in it, listening and listening and told them how sorry I was. I offered to make them home lunches again but apparantly you get teased for that and I think they felt bad about how much I complained about that, so they stuck with "hot" lunch. They were dinner-hungry when they got home and so I made dinner-esque foods at 3:45.
To say that the thrill was gone was certainly a true statement, and so the analysis had to begin in earnest. What was beneficial about the school experince-experiement? What were some good things that we and they had learned and done and accomplished? What were some benefits? How would this experience change our homeschool, what lessons have we all learned? What products would we like to use at home? What resources would be available to us if we did discontinue public schooling? Would be be interested in having the children go to just the "specials" as is their legal right in our state or would that be weird/unnecessary? What are the potential regrets? What would we continue doing i.e. getting up at the crackofnight, keeping a planner, following a specific schedule such as Art on Thursdays, and what of all that was merely crowd control that was irrelevant in the family setting?
Time passes, Steve and I discuss, a dear close friend of mine listens to me until her ear must be bleeding off, and still the crying, the attitudes, the stress.
And the report cards... Not the progress reports, but the real honest to goodness report cards: PERFECTION. Literally excelling in every area imaginable. Greta is a delight to have in class. Mickey is a delight to have in class. (even push ups, sit ups and jumping jacks got the coveted "4" mark) What do we make of this data? Is this the proof that homeschool works and works well, that our children are at or above all the other little tikes in town in all the suppossedly key areas, or is it proof that the poor dear things actually managed to fit in after all those years of Joy's crappy little makeshift school despite all those new siblings and new houses and heavens to betsy even all those dern video games (that taught both Greta and Mickey to read, but I digress)
I think it showed the adaptibility of happy well adjusted kids, and the general openness to data acquisition aka learning that was alive and well in them. It showed that they were willing and capable of following new and probably strange rules despite general dissatisfaction, and it showed that they were just fine.
The incredibly cool part now: Part One
When we decided as a family that yes we were really really REALLY sure that we did not want to go to public school anymore, really really really, we contacted their teachers. Greta's teacher responded immediatly, and was awesome. She wrote, "Greta has touched my heart. She is a wonderful person and a wonderful student. I will miss her deeply. With your permission, may the other children write her good bye cards?"
Thats all?? How kind and awesome! Wow. Of course, I wrote to her, she would love some cards. I asked her if Friday would be an ok day to come in and get all of her stuff and she said yes. No questions asked. Very professional, very super cool. As it should be, but you never know.
That Friday, Steve and Greta went to school. He was feeling a little shy but she was all gung ho--"Come on, Daddy! My desk is soooo messy dont freak out!" : )
When they got there, Greta's teacher, math teacher, and science teacher were all in the room, and although the word homeschool was not mentioned, they were super super nice and friendly and full of good luck and come back and visit and come to the Christmas Party and she got a big bag of cards from all the kids.
The math teacher came up to Steve and Greta and told them whata great student Greta was, often the only one to answer in class, never afraid to take risks or give a potentially wrong answer. She offered our family all the math books to keep and unlkimited help from her, anytime, now or down the line.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
When I heard this, I just browk down in tears of joy and amazement. this was so beyond anything I had expected, so beyond what they had to do, you know what I mean? Greta had a great chuckle reading the cards from the kids, especially the ones from kids who were not her friends at all but whom were obligated to write "Something nice to Greta". They were really funny. Dear Greta well goodbye Greta---in loopy cursive, all sliding down the page. She loved it.
Mickey's teacher never wrote me back or called me. I am really bummed out and surprised. He is still waiting for his bag of cards. (Sheesh, even Casey got a bag of cards and he hit the other children, went to the principals office twice and only was there 4 weeks)
Super Cool part, part 2:
News travels like lightening in our neighborhood, and by the very first day out of school, one of the big-wig Moms on our block made a chance to talk to Greta for a moment. She wanted her son to come get Greta to show her his new lizard, and when Greta got in their house, she told Greta "I heard that you guys are going to be homeschooling again." (I appreciate that wording, so much, not dropped out or not gonna go to school anymore, you kmow?) and Greta said "Yeah...." and the Mom said "Public school is pretty crazy, huh? Well, youre a lucky girl." and that was it!
Wow!
Super Cool part, part 3:
We were feeling less nervous and weird about this than ever, but there were still the family members to contend with. All of our friends knew now. the neighbors knew, the teachers and principal knew, and Earth still turned. But oh man, grandmas and the others, even though we have been homeschoolers from the very start, those 9 weeks seemed to give them such security or contentment, gulp.
Steve told his mom over the phone and she did not freak out whatsoever. She said you guys are the parents and you know what you are doing. Im sure public school was really alot for all of you and as long as Joy is feeling like she can handle it, I am super happy for you guys.
?!?!?!?!?!?
I am beginning to feel like my old self again, and my new self is geting stronger, too. This has been a time of tremendous changes, but all necessary and good, despite the chaos of it all, such is life. Next entry will be all about the A W E S O M E stuff we are doing and getting ready to do after the Holidays. Our homeschool was forever changed by this experience, and it was for the best. I am really glad they got to check it out and I am incredibly impressed with the teachers. It has been a wild ride, but alot of good came out of it. Weve got a real connection in this town, now, and tons of new things on the horizon.
Greta has returned 100% to her old happy self, enjoying lip gloss, rock n roll and making a cool outfit now and then, but mostly can be found cuddled up in some cozy pants among her infinite drawings of reptiles, her nose buried in a book. Mickey sleeps in like never before, he was really depleted by this lingering cough, but he has stuck with the beautiful new handwriting and doing all of his (home) schoolwork without fussing, which is a joy. Casey is Casey, and he is an out of sync little guy, but his mastery of language has gone from recognizing most capital letters to reading many common sightwords and drawing letters all the time for fun. He went from being able to kind of draw a scrawly happy face to drawing animals, scenes, people and I think we might have another artist in the family! We look forward to him entering therapy and hopefully that will help him get his right brain and left brain all lined up or whatever it is all about. He even takes a nap again, which has been very good for the family. Charlie is loud and funny and he amuses himself with things like dominoes and blocks much better than the other kids did at age three. He keeps us all laughing, even when he is being naughty. Eska is still a dream baby, revving up to crawl and making happy noises in her doorway jumper. Greta and Mickey both cried when they told us how much they missed her when they were at school.
Welcome back to Homeschool Is Love!
Monday, November 17, 2008
Sensory Processing Disorder---much more than "my tags itch"!
A patron saint of our family turned me onto this website and this is the path we are going to pursue now for Casey.
I do not have any energy or time to commit to blogging or gosh even basic needs right now. But now we have hope for our son.
Please check it out, if you are interested. I was literally crying this morning like so many mornings, just wracking my brain with WHAT THE HELL IS W R O N G WITH HIM???? and this email popped into my inbox, suggesting this disorder and I googled it and....well now I have to go call the pediatrician and demand a referral for Occupational therapist. If they are stupid about it I will switch doctors asap.
Be thinking of my Casey and our whole family as we start the journey of discovery and adaptation after 5 years of calling this little boy "bad", and living in a circle and a society that has also called him AND our parenting "bad", we have a whole lot of healing to do.
Peace,
Joy
I do not have any energy or time to commit to blogging or gosh even basic needs right now. But now we have hope for our son.
Please check it out, if you are interested. I was literally crying this morning like so many mornings, just wracking my brain with WHAT THE HELL IS W R O N G WITH HIM???? and this email popped into my inbox, suggesting this disorder and I googled it and....well now I have to go call the pediatrician and demand a referral for Occupational therapist. If they are stupid about it I will switch doctors asap.
Be thinking of my Casey and our whole family as we start the journey of discovery and adaptation after 5 years of calling this little boy "bad", and living in a circle and a society that has also called him AND our parenting "bad", we have a whole lot of healing to do.
Peace,
Joy
Monday, November 3, 2008
Happy Birthday, Charlie Linden!
Charlie had a wonderful third birthday. Literally all of our friends got together at the old house and helped to disassemble our wooden playscape, lent us a pick up truck, and came and re-built the monstrously heavy old thing in our new backyard. Charlie was extremely surprised and they have been playing on it since Saturday afternoon almost non-stop!
This is the pink cake with all the sprinkles and all the candles that he wanted. It was a great day. Thank you everyone!!!!!!
Happy Halloween!
We had a warm and lovely Halloween. Eska was a little pea-pod, Mickey was a phantom, Greta was a skeleton, Casey was a zombie firefirefighter, and Charlie was a pink bunny.
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Pink bunnies and Nail Polish. For boys.
Ahh how soon we forget that age, that age when everything is a drama, everything is a tragedy, and nearly every note out of their rosebud lips is a whiney-screech. In my family, I am talking about 2 1/2 to about 3 1/2 years old. oh my god just give him the little jelly packet! who cares! Is the kind of thing we all do in a semi-panic to stop that horrific squealing. Honey can you please please say it nicely? Mommy cant understand you when you whine like that, dear darling. Shut up or Ill....just please please say it nicely, honey....it is so intense. It is intense when you are alone with this ultra-sensitive, ultra-demanding, ultra-freaked out little person, but add to it an older sibling or two or three who seem (am I imagining it? I am afraid not) to purposefully disturb/disrupt the little tragic toddler all day long, and there is no end to the weird stuff you might "let slide" just to get 2 or 3 minutes of reward in the form of the most adorable, precious, happy, proud little cherub that you love so much, eating the jelly packet with a knife at the restaurant. Wearing rainboots, a diaper, and a backwards sweater to the store. And yes, trying out that most interesting of Mama's crafts, nail polish. It is darling on little fat hands, and the little fat hands have often been those belonging to--gasp!--a boy.
Now, I don't give one hoot if you are open minded, closed minded, traditional, progressive, cool or uncool, I think we can all admit that painting is very alluring to toddlers, and I hope we can all admit that there is nothing wrong with paint. So when we come up against folks who flip out over boys in nail polish, what we are dealing with is something very ingrained and I do not think they realize on the surface just what their upset can seem to symbolize. Misogyny, homophobia, its all there but a 2 dollar bottle of wet-n-wild does not a gay man make. If your child has the genetic makeup to want to wear makeup as an adult lifestyle choice, you did not make or break that by allowing him to try the freakin nail polish, ok? No matter how many Maury episodes you watched in 1991, it doesnt work that way. tO be perfectly honest, I think that making some its just for ladies, ooh la la thing out of it would increase the mystique and allure a hundredfold. Its not sex, its not gender, its PAINT. Im even gonna go out on a limb here and guess that if someone was truly gender dysphoric, transgender, or homosexual, what a wonderful thing they could have in their life's story: " my mom and dad wre always so cool to me about little stuff." You know? But back to reality:
I for one do not have the energy, interest, or inclination to tell a pestering toddler anything besides yes or no. and for me, if they wanna have little red or blue fingernails for a couple of days (it chips off at lightning speed unless you wanna go the extra mile for a base coat top coat and sealer which god bless you my toddlers dont stay still that long) GO FOR IT. Nobody cares at all.
Now, onto Halloween:
Charlie is right there, at that age. He is delighted and contented about 15% of the time and the rest he is extremely concerned, freaking out, wigging out, trying to explain himself with his limited vocab, and yes, he whines so so so much. He also succumbed to being afraid of all things Halloween about a month ago. Maybe it was the entire aisle clever candy dishes with skeletal hands in them that all turned on by themselves when we walked past them at WalMart. Maybe it was Casey whispering horrible things in his ear. Who knows. But Charlie, like Mickey, is more of a worrywort/fraidy cat than a daredevil guy, and he didnt want to have anything to do with Halloween. When we tried to talk to him about "you get candy and it is really---" He just starts running around saying "Candy! I want candy! I want candy! I want candy! I want some candy!" and thats sort of hard to listen to. so its weird. a weird year. I didnt know what ?I wanted to do, I wanted us all to go out trick or treating.
Well, then we went shopping for some costumes. Many years I have been more than creative, sewing and gluing and duct taping up some real darling little things: Mickey especially has been a race car, a lego, and Im gonna go on ahead and bless my own heart here: a bowling pin that I made while 42 weeks pregnant and in early labor. For real. But this year, I dont know, we just went to Target and bought stuff.
Greta got a skeleton outfit, very scary and cool. I am so proud that she is not the Slut-o-ween type that saying yes to the skeleton suit was a no-brainer.
Mickey got an "unknown phantom" outfit--it didnt look like much in the package but it is so cool! He is such a skinny little wisp, and it is this little black tunic, black cloak-hood thing with glowing eyes! Its really scary, but in this interesting way, not gory just really cool effect with the little glowing eye glasses.
Casey chose a fireman outfit and now hates it because it isnt scary. Of course. We told him we will help him be a scary fireman, maybe with facepaint. It came with a fake Axe so he liked that, naturally. ah, Casey.
But Charlie, who didnt want to dress up, didnt want to talk about it, announced in Target, in the Charlie-and-Eska cart (Steve and I have to do 2 carts, one with Casey and products, one with Charlie and Eska) that he was gonna be a "Pink Bunny". i think he said a Pink Baby Bunny.
I loved the idea and I was so touched by the thought and symbolism that he must have gone through to come up with what I can only guess was the un-scariest thing in the whole world--a pink baby bunny. We were going to go look at the costume area but no no no he was too afraid, so we went over to the baby clothes area and I was thinking I could get him a girl's pink one piece footed pajama and then go to JoAnn fabrics and sew him little ears, when all of a sudden we saw an actual baby hat that was pink with ears and a bunny face on it. Presto! I grabbed him a pink sweatshirt and pink sweatpants (to be enjoyed by Eska in a couple of years no doubt) and there you have it folks! A pink baby bunny. To try and talk him into a blue bunny or anything else would just be so so weird. Just so weird. this is a child who overcame great fears, and came up with his own heartfelt solution to a big dilemma in his life--planning for a holiday that he does not remember from last time, I dont know--I just think the whole thing is fabulous.
I think it is so classic and such a great family story already. With five kids, I am all nostalgic and grandmotherly in a lot of ways now. The little transgressions just touch my heart, it all goes so fast. It all goes by so flipping fast. He is gonna be the coolest cutest most wonderful pink baby bunny there ever was. Maybe ill paint his nails black for little claws, too.
Now, I don't give one hoot if you are open minded, closed minded, traditional, progressive, cool or uncool, I think we can all admit that painting is very alluring to toddlers, and I hope we can all admit that there is nothing wrong with paint. So when we come up against folks who flip out over boys in nail polish, what we are dealing with is something very ingrained and I do not think they realize on the surface just what their upset can seem to symbolize. Misogyny, homophobia, its all there but a 2 dollar bottle of wet-n-wild does not a gay man make. If your child has the genetic makeup to want to wear makeup as an adult lifestyle choice, you did not make or break that by allowing him to try the freakin nail polish, ok? No matter how many Maury episodes you watched in 1991, it doesnt work that way. tO be perfectly honest, I think that making some its just for ladies, ooh la la thing out of it would increase the mystique and allure a hundredfold. Its not sex, its not gender, its PAINT. Im even gonna go out on a limb here and guess that if someone was truly gender dysphoric, transgender, or homosexual, what a wonderful thing they could have in their life's story: " my mom and dad wre always so cool to me about little stuff." You know? But back to reality:
I for one do not have the energy, interest, or inclination to tell a pestering toddler anything besides yes or no. and for me, if they wanna have little red or blue fingernails for a couple of days (it chips off at lightning speed unless you wanna go the extra mile for a base coat top coat and sealer which god bless you my toddlers dont stay still that long) GO FOR IT. Nobody cares at all.
Now, onto Halloween:
Charlie is right there, at that age. He is delighted and contented about 15% of the time and the rest he is extremely concerned, freaking out, wigging out, trying to explain himself with his limited vocab, and yes, he whines so so so much. He also succumbed to being afraid of all things Halloween about a month ago. Maybe it was the entire aisle clever candy dishes with skeletal hands in them that all turned on by themselves when we walked past them at WalMart. Maybe it was Casey whispering horrible things in his ear. Who knows. But Charlie, like Mickey, is more of a worrywort/fraidy cat than a daredevil guy, and he didnt want to have anything to do with Halloween. When we tried to talk to him about "you get candy and it is really---" He just starts running around saying "Candy! I want candy! I want candy! I want candy! I want some candy!" and thats sort of hard to listen to. so its weird. a weird year. I didnt know what ?I wanted to do, I wanted us all to go out trick or treating.
Well, then we went shopping for some costumes. Many years I have been more than creative, sewing and gluing and duct taping up some real darling little things: Mickey especially has been a race car, a lego, and Im gonna go on ahead and bless my own heart here: a bowling pin that I made while 42 weeks pregnant and in early labor. For real. But this year, I dont know, we just went to Target and bought stuff.
Greta got a skeleton outfit, very scary and cool. I am so proud that she is not the Slut-o-ween type that saying yes to the skeleton suit was a no-brainer.
Mickey got an "unknown phantom" outfit--it didnt look like much in the package but it is so cool! He is such a skinny little wisp, and it is this little black tunic, black cloak-hood thing with glowing eyes! Its really scary, but in this interesting way, not gory just really cool effect with the little glowing eye glasses.
Casey chose a fireman outfit and now hates it because it isnt scary. Of course. We told him we will help him be a scary fireman, maybe with facepaint. It came with a fake Axe so he liked that, naturally. ah, Casey.
But Charlie, who didnt want to dress up, didnt want to talk about it, announced in Target, in the Charlie-and-Eska cart (Steve and I have to do 2 carts, one with Casey and products, one with Charlie and Eska) that he was gonna be a "Pink Bunny". i think he said a Pink Baby Bunny.
I loved the idea and I was so touched by the thought and symbolism that he must have gone through to come up with what I can only guess was the un-scariest thing in the whole world--a pink baby bunny. We were going to go look at the costume area but no no no he was too afraid, so we went over to the baby clothes area and I was thinking I could get him a girl's pink one piece footed pajama and then go to JoAnn fabrics and sew him little ears, when all of a sudden we saw an actual baby hat that was pink with ears and a bunny face on it. Presto! I grabbed him a pink sweatshirt and pink sweatpants (to be enjoyed by Eska in a couple of years no doubt) and there you have it folks! A pink baby bunny. To try and talk him into a blue bunny or anything else would just be so so weird. Just so weird. this is a child who overcame great fears, and came up with his own heartfelt solution to a big dilemma in his life--planning for a holiday that he does not remember from last time, I dont know--I just think the whole thing is fabulous.
I think it is so classic and such a great family story already. With five kids, I am all nostalgic and grandmotherly in a lot of ways now. The little transgressions just touch my heart, it all goes so fast. It all goes by so flipping fast. He is gonna be the coolest cutest most wonderful pink baby bunny there ever was. Maybe ill paint his nails black for little claws, too.
Friday, October 24, 2008
Friday School: G, black, and spiral
Sorry I havent had pictures lately. Out of batteries/too tired.
Today we did the letter Gg and the color black and the shape spiral. We cut spirals, talked about spirals in nature and had a rip roaringly successful color-walk: 220 black things on our street, I kid you not! Addresses, lampposts and garbage cans, as well as car tires were hugely numerous. It was fun and cold!
We sing the days of the week song and we even did some science, by reading in a darling old science book that I have called Nature Wonderland. We talked about feathers and fur, stems leaves and flowers, and insects having 6 legs. Both Casey and Charlie knew alot more than I thought, I think this is supposed to be like maybe a second grade book? Anyhow it was nice. A nice day of school. They were good boys and Casey is starting to see that I really slather on the praise when he is loving and brotherly towards Charlie. SO now he chases Charlie around hugging and kissing him (too hard of course) and I laugh. they also have shared a room for a while now but just now are starting to talk and laugh with each other before Charlie calls "Mama....." to have me or Steve get him out of the crib. I heard Casey trying to tell Charlie how to get out and I was like; "NO NO NO NON ONONONONON CASEY!!!!! COME TALK TO MAMA FOR A MINUTE, HONEY!"
I told him point blank that if he teaches Charlie to get out of his crib that my life would be over and he asked why and I said well we just really need Charlie to stay safe in there.......phew!.....NOt ready for that whole nightmare of big-boy-bed yet. not even close. I wonder if seasoned parents are as quick to push that as first timers, the big boy big girl bed crap? No thanks. Outside of cosleeping which I am all in favor of, I need to have those littles in their cribby-land until they are truly in need of access to the potty or the springs break. I couldnt be more serious. I think the crib is a cozy and safe haven for little ones and I really couldnt sleep if I wasnt certain that Junior wasn't nipping at the Drano, maybe its just me. We keep our kids in highchairs for a "long" time, too. It works for us.
Looking forward to the nice weekend! Steve is gonna take the kids to a cider mill and i get to stay home with Eskarina! YAY!!!!!!!!
Today we did the letter Gg and the color black and the shape spiral. We cut spirals, talked about spirals in nature and had a rip roaringly successful color-walk: 220 black things on our street, I kid you not! Addresses, lampposts and garbage cans, as well as car tires were hugely numerous. It was fun and cold!
We sing the days of the week song and we even did some science, by reading in a darling old science book that I have called Nature Wonderland. We talked about feathers and fur, stems leaves and flowers, and insects having 6 legs. Both Casey and Charlie knew alot more than I thought, I think this is supposed to be like maybe a second grade book? Anyhow it was nice. A nice day of school. They were good boys and Casey is starting to see that I really slather on the praise when he is loving and brotherly towards Charlie. SO now he chases Charlie around hugging and kissing him (too hard of course) and I laugh. they also have shared a room for a while now but just now are starting to talk and laugh with each other before Charlie calls "Mama....." to have me or Steve get him out of the crib. I heard Casey trying to tell Charlie how to get out and I was like; "NO NO NO NON ONONONONON CASEY!!!!! COME TALK TO MAMA FOR A MINUTE, HONEY!"
I told him point blank that if he teaches Charlie to get out of his crib that my life would be over and he asked why and I said well we just really need Charlie to stay safe in there.......phew!.....NOt ready for that whole nightmare of big-boy-bed yet. not even close. I wonder if seasoned parents are as quick to push that as first timers, the big boy big girl bed crap? No thanks. Outside of cosleeping which I am all in favor of, I need to have those littles in their cribby-land until they are truly in need of access to the potty or the springs break. I couldnt be more serious. I think the crib is a cozy and safe haven for little ones and I really couldnt sleep if I wasnt certain that Junior wasn't nipping at the Drano, maybe its just me. We keep our kids in highchairs for a "long" time, too. It works for us.
Looking forward to the nice weekend! Steve is gonna take the kids to a cider mill and i get to stay home with Eskarina! YAY!!!!!!!!
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Thursday School: no more
Today for school, um , to be perfectly frank, we drove Daddy to work at 9am and never came back home. I could tell by 6:15am that things were not right with my dear little fooligans. I was not about to try and do anything besides go go go. Letter G would have to wait : )
We went back to Kids Korner and not only was that a great idea, but they have the gymnasium open on Thursdays, so a truly acceptable and appropriate letting off of wild steam was had, and me and the baby didnt have to freeze our buns off in some frosty park! Hooray! The other Mamas flagrantly disobeyed the "no food or drinks" rule, which I think was for allergy children, so I might be naughty and have a coffee next time. then it would be actual paradise!
I love my kids, but it gets outrageously hard and draining by Thursday. what was so great on Monday just is not by Thursday. Thursday has always been this thing in our family because our Daddy (is that creepy when I say that? We are fast becoming those old couples who call each other mom and dad--just kidding! only on the blog--I think....) works until 8pm on Thursday night. So there is no family dinner. There is no helper. there is no break or end in sight, I have to do it all all all the day the afternoon the dinner the homework the cleanup the bedtime, too. Ok, so not usually the cleanup. Lol. ANYWAYS, Thursday is this weird day and if you peek back, last Thursday was bad too so we officialy (see? I am getting rhythms! yippee!) do not do our regular homeschool on Thursdays. Call it no school, call it field trip, call it what you like we go to kids korner now on Thursdays. I hope that cool babysitter girl is there everytime, too--she was so nice! She seemed like a nanny, maybe 20 years old, and we were swapping local places to take kids in the bad weather, little McDonalds with good or bad playscapes, etc. she was so nice! she totally understood what I was saying about everyplace around town, except when I came to the money or price part, her face went a little blank. haha. thats ok, she is a nanny, her employers give her money. whatever! I told her alot of places she hadnt been to and she told me about which libraries are flexible about the age-range for "toddler storytime". Awesome!
Anyhow, we went to kids korner, then we ate lunch out (! scandal! eleven dollars! so incredibly worth it! ) then we went to a park. It sounds like woo woo I am so brave and strong, but no, no, my friends, I am lazy and relaxin! The little kid energy was of the charts and outside, especially way outside like a big big park, there really isnt anything I have to say no to. The shout and scramble on the ground (I hate that in the house, the crawling and flopping on the ground--do your kids do that? Our house is too little for that it is awful!) and throw stuff and throw stuff and throw stuff. Whee! Childhood fun while Mama sits on her bum and waves. Yes, I am a hero. wink.
We didnt get home until Greta and Mickey were almost home. I was totally casual about dinner "sure, have an egg sandwhich, Greta. Yeah Mickey you can have some noodles. Sure, sure, have some cereal." nobody cared. I know that if I had one child we would do that all the time, and I also know that 5 kids and chaos equals horrific depression and badness so we only do this on Thursday evening now, but it was cool. the whole thing was cool. We are definitely going to do this again.
We went back to Kids Korner and not only was that a great idea, but they have the gymnasium open on Thursdays, so a truly acceptable and appropriate letting off of wild steam was had, and me and the baby didnt have to freeze our buns off in some frosty park! Hooray! The other Mamas flagrantly disobeyed the "no food or drinks" rule, which I think was for allergy children, so I might be naughty and have a coffee next time. then it would be actual paradise!
I love my kids, but it gets outrageously hard and draining by Thursday. what was so great on Monday just is not by Thursday. Thursday has always been this thing in our family because our Daddy (is that creepy when I say that? We are fast becoming those old couples who call each other mom and dad--just kidding! only on the blog--I think....) works until 8pm on Thursday night. So there is no family dinner. There is no helper. there is no break or end in sight, I have to do it all all all the day the afternoon the dinner the homework the cleanup the bedtime, too. Ok, so not usually the cleanup. Lol. ANYWAYS, Thursday is this weird day and if you peek back, last Thursday was bad too so we officialy (see? I am getting rhythms! yippee!) do not do our regular homeschool on Thursdays. Call it no school, call it field trip, call it what you like we go to kids korner now on Thursdays. I hope that cool babysitter girl is there everytime, too--she was so nice! She seemed like a nanny, maybe 20 years old, and we were swapping local places to take kids in the bad weather, little McDonalds with good or bad playscapes, etc. she was so nice! she totally understood what I was saying about everyplace around town, except when I came to the money or price part, her face went a little blank. haha. thats ok, she is a nanny, her employers give her money. whatever! I told her alot of places she hadnt been to and she told me about which libraries are flexible about the age-range for "toddler storytime". Awesome!
Anyhow, we went to kids korner, then we ate lunch out (! scandal! eleven dollars! so incredibly worth it! ) then we went to a park. It sounds like woo woo I am so brave and strong, but no, no, my friends, I am lazy and relaxin! The little kid energy was of the charts and outside, especially way outside like a big big park, there really isnt anything I have to say no to. The shout and scramble on the ground (I hate that in the house, the crawling and flopping on the ground--do your kids do that? Our house is too little for that it is awful!) and throw stuff and throw stuff and throw stuff. Whee! Childhood fun while Mama sits on her bum and waves. Yes, I am a hero. wink.
We didnt get home until Greta and Mickey were almost home. I was totally casual about dinner "sure, have an egg sandwhich, Greta. Yeah Mickey you can have some noodles. Sure, sure, have some cereal." nobody cared. I know that if I had one child we would do that all the time, and I also know that 5 kids and chaos equals horrific depression and badness so we only do this on Thursday evening now, but it was cool. the whole thing was cool. We are definitely going to do this again.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Wednesday School: F, white, and diamond
Wednesday we did the letter Ff and the color white and the shape diamond. We had plans for a visit which got cancelled and so it was a rather quiet day. Eska was fussy, she is getting a tooth soon, and so we had to bring her on the color walk, in the baby sling, which hurt my back and front and everything else. I couldn't push the stroller and write the things we saw, so I got the "cute" idea to wear her in a sling. Well, it turns out that there is so much white that I ended up just making little tally marks and you will never believe how many white things we found: 216! For real! It was amazing.
I read the boys a very cool book called How To Dig a Hole To The Other Side of The Earth and they wanted to go try and I aid yes. cool mom, huh? Well it was very hard digging in our yard and very very cold, but they had fun and it was a nice day.
I took Greta and Eska to the little local library in the evening to do homework in quiet. We thought they were open till 9 but it was only open till 8 so we didnt get long. I checked out some little puberty book and was gonna give it a peruse and then share it with Greta and Mickey but OH MY GOD this thing was really out there! I have alot of issues to overcome, I guess but this thing was absolutely nasty and tacky and crude with its ugly cartoons. I am so glad I read it first. There is a definite need on the market for a nice how we grow book that isnt all about hellfire and damnation nor is it chock full of disturbing, ugly 1980's cartoons that look like something out of Mad magazine or playboy. I was very grossed out by this book, the whole thing. Disappointing. We might have to continue tackling subjects without a book. No biggie. yuck.
I read the boys a very cool book called How To Dig a Hole To The Other Side of The Earth and they wanted to go try and I aid yes. cool mom, huh? Well it was very hard digging in our yard and very very cold, but they had fun and it was a nice day.
I took Greta and Eska to the little local library in the evening to do homework in quiet. We thought they were open till 9 but it was only open till 8 so we didnt get long. I checked out some little puberty book and was gonna give it a peruse and then share it with Greta and Mickey but OH MY GOD this thing was really out there! I have alot of issues to overcome, I guess but this thing was absolutely nasty and tacky and crude with its ugly cartoons. I am so glad I read it first. There is a definite need on the market for a nice how we grow book that isnt all about hellfire and damnation nor is it chock full of disturbing, ugly 1980's cartoons that look like something out of Mad magazine or playboy. I was very grossed out by this book, the whole thing. Disappointing. We might have to continue tackling subjects without a book. No biggie. yuck.
Tuesday school: scary dragon library/ bad judgement
So Tuesday, I thought we could go take Daddy to work and motor on to our local library. It isnt huge but it is nice and close. (Steve works different shifts each day, but Tuesday and Thursday he doesnt have to be in until 9am so they are good days for me and the three littlest ones to drive him to work so we have the vehicle all day. I say car and van and minivan interchangeably, but we have one vehicle, it is a minivan.) Well, we got there about 9:15 and it didnt open until 10! Argg. I got the idea to take them to the slightly farther away but enormous and gorgeous and huge and massive library about 5 miles away. This place is an architectural masterpiece, a glowing beacon of steel and glass, absolutely breathtaking. they have puppets and computers and a cafe and it is truly amazing. the kind of place I was ready to spend hours in. It has a tree house and a fake castle theme with a roaring dragon....and so after parking far away, setting up the double jogging stroller in the windy freezing parking lot, hooking up the diaperbag, the water cups, my coffee, the baby and her buckles and her protective blankets, reassuring Charlie over the din of the high winds and the dangers of the busy parking lot that no, there were no bugs in his stroller (there was an earwig like a month ago) and keeping Casey from darting away to his doom, we plodded in to the magic giant library.
and then
Charlie saw and heard the dragon. the neat, interesting, terribly poorly planned DRAGON, the fake dragon with Bose surround sound bass trembling "Snoring" and glowing eyes and ummm yep you guessed it, "Mama......I wanna go home. I wanna go home now. I wanna go home!!!!!!!!"
I have not been one of those moms who leaves the store to teach little Billy the lesson. I never have. I am too lazy too tired too overstrapped, I cant imagine being that cool or flexible or patient. If you are an ass in the store then there will be consequences, but I really have never just left on request. but dude, Charlie was HORRIFIED. He has a grimace on his face that only meant one thing: We had to leave. We tried to talk to him, but he was SO freaked out and upset that he was looking all around himself maniacally like anything could be scary, he was scared of the entire library. So we left.
On the carride home, he was already talking about "Its just pwetend, da dwagon is just pwetend, it is just a toy, he is not scawey." Maybe I did the right thing and maybe HOPEFULLY we can go back there someday soon.
We tried to "Still do" our regular school stuff and it just didnt work. they were off their schedules and everything was weird. We ended up playing in the basement and folding clothes and letting our bunny hop around and oh yeah-- we checked out a cool CD I did get to do at least that and we listened to it. It is Pete Seeger folk songs and it really is awesome. Lots of talking and story telling it is from 1959 and I think our adult friends might really appreciate it. We'll have to "burn a copy" and keep it. that still always feels like stealing!
and then
Charlie saw and heard the dragon. the neat, interesting, terribly poorly planned DRAGON, the fake dragon with Bose surround sound bass trembling "Snoring" and glowing eyes and ummm yep you guessed it, "Mama......I wanna go home. I wanna go home now. I wanna go home!!!!!!!!"
I have not been one of those moms who leaves the store to teach little Billy the lesson. I never have. I am too lazy too tired too overstrapped, I cant imagine being that cool or flexible or patient. If you are an ass in the store then there will be consequences, but I really have never just left on request. but dude, Charlie was HORRIFIED. He has a grimace on his face that only meant one thing: We had to leave. We tried to talk to him, but he was SO freaked out and upset that he was looking all around himself maniacally like anything could be scary, he was scared of the entire library. So we left.
On the carride home, he was already talking about "Its just pwetend, da dwagon is just pwetend, it is just a toy, he is not scawey." Maybe I did the right thing and maybe HOPEFULLY we can go back there someday soon.
We tried to "Still do" our regular school stuff and it just didnt work. they were off their schedules and everything was weird. We ended up playing in the basement and folding clothes and letting our bunny hop around and oh yeah-- we checked out a cool CD I did get to do at least that and we listened to it. It is Pete Seeger folk songs and it really is awesome. Lots of talking and story telling it is from 1959 and I think our adult friends might really appreciate it. We'll have to "burn a copy" and keep it. that still always feels like stealing!
Monday, October 20, 2008
Monday school: Purple, E, Oval, and rhythms working nicely
Today we did the letter E, the color purple, and the shape oval.
We are making books, 3 ring binders with those clear sleeve things in them. We fill out our letter, trace it, draw it freehand (Casey only) and do a little tracing and gluing and cutting of the letter shape and color. Although this might be remedial or babyish, they love it now and it is something that brings us together for "table time" every morning.
I am much more interested in setting up rhythms than learning new facts right now. You cant stop people especially little children from learning new facts, it happens constantly, but them forming their own connections in their own little days is their own job, I am here providing them with nice structures, rhythms, routines and some guidance, food, and love in an environment that I hope is conducive to positive safe times which ids the only way anyone can "LEARN", in safety and peace.
I am sure this ABC-123 stuff is what was going on the public school kindergarten, too, I do not fault them for "doing" "easy" stuff its just that...well the social aspects were bringing out the absolute worst in Casey and it wasnt appropriate to his positive development. None of it. As John Holt points out, and I am paraphrasing, when children are in an adverse hostile or perceived-to-be upsetting situation, they are not ready to learn and make connections, they are ready to fight, cry, rebel, act out, withdraw, and mimic negative behaviors of the 26 little strangers from who knows what kind of families.
Being around 26 little kids all day in a strange understaffed environment with confusing rules, unaccommodating scheduling, scary giant alone hot lunch program cafeteria chaos scene "I didnt get my peaches, Mama and noone helped me!" , well it was all wrong.
We are getting into a very set day now, and I love it. The boys know exactly what we are gonna do and when, and it fits their temperament and even the baby is getting a little schedule of her own! Crazy! Even though I did not set out to have set clock-times for most of this, it is becoming very precise when we do our things:
6-7 ish wake up
8 the big kids are gone and we do our letter, shape and color work at the table, including breakfast snacking. They seem to prefer grazing on apples cheese nuts etc and do not like more typical (sugary simple carbs) breakfast fare which is GOOD--so no pancakes, cereal, toast for the boys which is good good good.
930 we switch to watching signing time or playing music toys or regular working/playing such as playdoh or legos/duplos or cars, train tracks, etc.
10 we get all geared up (coat wether now) and go on our "Color Hunt". Eska sleeps in her car seat (not much longer!) while we go out front and search for items of our day's color. We found fifty two PURPLE things--imagine!
I thought purple was gonna be a weak one, but lots of purple-mauve shutters and flowers and leaves on our block. Like I said, they have known their colors since they were like 18 months old but it is the idea of a goal-oriented nature walk of sorts, as well as an exercises in paying attention-- truely stopping and being observant little people--that is the "point". We are so cute with our clipboard, walking all around our side of the street. I wonder if the neighbors see us and wonder what we are doing.
11ish the outside time turns into "Im hungry", or, they just want to play and roll and poll so I go in and make lunch, nurse Eska, etc.
1130 we eat lunch. If I have had too much coffee, I might eat quietly alone at 1. It depends.
12 we sing and read "wild stories". We get to be nice and loud, baby is awake, and they are enjoying my singing voice as I belt out the tunes I learned from back in the days of working at the nursery school, little songs about Jump Up And Down, and The Old Kentucky Fair, and all of my songs I have made up over the years. They know naptime is coming and if they are "bad", meaning, kicking each other or purposefully dancing into the glass windows and knocking everything off the shelves (hooligan boys!!) that they will have to go to bed without their special story.
1245 we read a special story or two or three :).
100pm sharp is naptime. Not too much complaining anymore, all the blame goes on the clock itself! "Oh wow look it is one oclock, guys, we have to go to rest time now"!
Casey gets to watch DIY Network in my bed and learn about installing pipes and plumbing and Charlie sleeps in his crib properly
1:05to 2:00 is MY TIME. Do the online banking, balance the budget, checking email, blogging, searching for a new dentist, pediatrician, whatnot.
2:00 Casey pops right out. Sigh. But he will play quietly and I can tidy or rest with Eska.
3:00 I get Charlie up. He is a bear and red faced and out of it for a good 15 minutes. We try to get this part over before the hurricane that is Greta, Mickey and whatever kid they drag home with them come blaring in.
3:30 hurricane
mish mosh of telling about school, snacking, dinner prep, etc.
530 dinner (???)
600 start homework
7-8 Casey to bed first, Charlie 8ish
930 big kids alseep
So our schedule is tight and yet not all the way. We are also trying to visit with little nice friends several days of the week so that would be instead of Caseys naptime. this also forgoes my rest time which is tricky. Steve has been awesomer and awesomer about "letting" me do what i need to do in the evenings if i need to. Mental health mini-errand running with just Eska, computer time, shower, rest, whatnot.
We clean all evening and have tried to say we have to stop cleaning at 10 pm so we can watch a little TV or whatever ; ) but its hard. I do not clean at all during the days right now and I guess it will slowly fit back in someday!
We are making books, 3 ring binders with those clear sleeve things in them. We fill out our letter, trace it, draw it freehand (Casey only) and do a little tracing and gluing and cutting of the letter shape and color. Although this might be remedial or babyish, they love it now and it is something that brings us together for "table time" every morning.
I am much more interested in setting up rhythms than learning new facts right now. You cant stop people especially little children from learning new facts, it happens constantly, but them forming their own connections in their own little days is their own job, I am here providing them with nice structures, rhythms, routines and some guidance, food, and love in an environment that I hope is conducive to positive safe times which ids the only way anyone can "LEARN", in safety and peace.
I am sure this ABC-123 stuff is what was going on the public school kindergarten, too, I do not fault them for "doing" "easy" stuff its just that...well the social aspects were bringing out the absolute worst in Casey and it wasnt appropriate to his positive development. None of it. As John Holt points out, and I am paraphrasing, when children are in an adverse hostile or perceived-to-be upsetting situation, they are not ready to learn and make connections, they are ready to fight, cry, rebel, act out, withdraw, and mimic negative behaviors of the 26 little strangers from who knows what kind of families.
Being around 26 little kids all day in a strange understaffed environment with confusing rules, unaccommodating scheduling, scary giant alone hot lunch program cafeteria chaos scene "I didnt get my peaches, Mama and noone helped me!" , well it was all wrong.
We are getting into a very set day now, and I love it. The boys know exactly what we are gonna do and when, and it fits their temperament and even the baby is getting a little schedule of her own! Crazy! Even though I did not set out to have set clock-times for most of this, it is becoming very precise when we do our things:
6-7 ish wake up
8 the big kids are gone and we do our letter, shape and color work at the table, including breakfast snacking. They seem to prefer grazing on apples cheese nuts etc and do not like more typical (sugary simple carbs) breakfast fare which is GOOD--so no pancakes, cereal, toast for the boys which is good good good.
930 we switch to watching signing time or playing music toys or regular working/playing such as playdoh or legos/duplos or cars, train tracks, etc.
10 we get all geared up (coat wether now) and go on our "Color Hunt". Eska sleeps in her car seat (not much longer!) while we go out front and search for items of our day's color. We found fifty two PURPLE things--imagine!
I thought purple was gonna be a weak one, but lots of purple-mauve shutters and flowers and leaves on our block. Like I said, they have known their colors since they were like 18 months old but it is the idea of a goal-oriented nature walk of sorts, as well as an exercises in paying attention-- truely stopping and being observant little people--that is the "point". We are so cute with our clipboard, walking all around our side of the street. I wonder if the neighbors see us and wonder what we are doing.
11ish the outside time turns into "Im hungry", or, they just want to play and roll and poll so I go in and make lunch, nurse Eska, etc.
1130 we eat lunch. If I have had too much coffee, I might eat quietly alone at 1. It depends.
12 we sing and read "wild stories". We get to be nice and loud, baby is awake, and they are enjoying my singing voice as I belt out the tunes I learned from back in the days of working at the nursery school, little songs about Jump Up And Down, and The Old Kentucky Fair, and all of my songs I have made up over the years. They know naptime is coming and if they are "bad", meaning, kicking each other or purposefully dancing into the glass windows and knocking everything off the shelves (hooligan boys!!) that they will have to go to bed without their special story.
1245 we read a special story or two or three :).
100pm sharp is naptime. Not too much complaining anymore, all the blame goes on the clock itself! "Oh wow look it is one oclock, guys, we have to go to rest time now"!
Casey gets to watch DIY Network in my bed and learn about installing pipes and plumbing and Charlie sleeps in his crib properly
1:05to 2:00 is MY TIME. Do the online banking, balance the budget, checking email, blogging, searching for a new dentist, pediatrician, whatnot.
2:00 Casey pops right out. Sigh. But he will play quietly and I can tidy or rest with Eska.
3:00 I get Charlie up. He is a bear and red faced and out of it for a good 15 minutes. We try to get this part over before the hurricane that is Greta, Mickey and whatever kid they drag home with them come blaring in.
3:30 hurricane
mish mosh of telling about school, snacking, dinner prep, etc.
530 dinner (???)
600 start homework
7-8 Casey to bed first, Charlie 8ish
930 big kids alseep
So our schedule is tight and yet not all the way. We are also trying to visit with little nice friends several days of the week so that would be instead of Caseys naptime. this also forgoes my rest time which is tricky. Steve has been awesomer and awesomer about "letting" me do what i need to do in the evenings if i need to. Mental health mini-errand running with just Eska, computer time, shower, rest, whatnot.
We clean all evening and have tried to say we have to stop cleaning at 10 pm so we can watch a little TV or whatever ; ) but its hard. I do not clean at all during the days right now and I guess it will slowly fit back in someday!
Friday, October 17, 2008
Friday school: Green, D, heart, construction paper, outdoors quiet fun
Today has been great!
We did letter D, and our days of the week song, and worked with construction paper on some Halloweenish stuff, and drew hearts and played Wii bowling and Wii tennis and then went outside for a grand hunt of GREEN--we got 102 things! We stayed outside for a long long time and the boys "made instruments" out of wood and cement and rubbish and got into this real nice zone of quietly playing and working and talking to themselves. about 2 hours of that and then I announced naptime to no complaints.
This new routine is getting nicer and nicer!
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Thursday
Today we didnt do school too much. We had to run Daddy around on errands all morning and then we met some good old friends at a park and it was super cold and Charlie was crying and bad. It happens.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Wednesday school: C, Orange, Square, Visiting
Today was letter C. And color Orange. We found 46 Orange things on our hike. The boys are falling into their routine nicely now. Eska chews her rattle and growls..she is getting some teeth soon it seems! We went visiting our good friend and her little girl and had lunch time with them at their place. The boys are so calm and well mannered at places--very good and odd I must admit! Makes me want to live on the road! I am excited about these new habits and there is a new sweet twist: MICKEY is all supportive of us homeschooling Casey (!) and he sets up our white board every night. He has become a much nicer brother lately. Maybe he needed some space without toddlers. They are adorable in moderate doses, aren't they?
(For those of you who wanted some pictures of our house on the Heart and Home blog, Iam going to take some official ones soon, but you can appreciate how tiny our cute little kitchen is in some of the pictures here, you can see the little "footprint" of white tiles--thats the whole thing! Also, in the picture where Charlie is gluing you can see the little opening to my bedroom and over there is the bathroom and nursery.)
I have been trying to buy a planner, returned two, looked into printables, making my own, but I finally got one at WalMart for 5 bucks that will work! Now I will begin the monumental task of filling it out with all the school stuff....
I think I will get creative and MAKE by hand something that works for me and then xerox the pages and make a binder. Maybe I'll handwrite it in black marker so it is extra cool. Do people still say xerox? LOL have a great day!
MamaJoy
"I had it made"
Things were incredibly easy and calm for me those 5 weeks that Casey was in school. It was kind of insane, how quiet and Joy-Centered my time instantly became. I went from completely harried and overwhelmed depressed anxious chaos Mom of 5 to clean and serene lady sipping coffee in her squeaky clean house with a sleeping newborn and one little Charlie who was playing playdoh all morning with classical music on. It was awesome.
BUT it was not awesome for Casey and the rest taught me alot. I learned to budget time and money in a whole new way. I caught up on my house. I rearranged some rooms (didnt do the heavy lifting, I promise) and straightened stuff up. I read. I thought. I...could have used more time but it was enough to feel ready for the task that is raising Casey. It is completely different than any other childcare I have ever encountered.
So, I "had it made" and yet that is ridiculous. No mother has it made whose child is miserable. Now I have it made...in a different way. My child is safe and happy and therefore, we all "have it made".
BUT it was not awesome for Casey and the rest taught me alot. I learned to budget time and money in a whole new way. I caught up on my house. I rearranged some rooms (didnt do the heavy lifting, I promise) and straightened stuff up. I read. I thought. I...could have used more time but it was enough to feel ready for the task that is raising Casey. It is completely different than any other childcare I have ever encountered.
So, I "had it made" and yet that is ridiculous. No mother has it made whose child is miserable. Now I have it made...in a different way. My child is safe and happy and therefore, we all "have it made".
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Tuesday school: B, Yellow, cookies, and a visit
Today we did B. Coloring, cutting, drawing, gluing, tracing and then writing big B and little b. Our color was yellow and we went outside for a hunt of yellow things. We found forty-two! We also made and baked cookies and then had a fine lunch of black bean and tomato nachos. The boys watched one TV show while I tidied and retidied and tidied some more for our guests: My mom and my 5 1/2 year old nephew.
It was freezing and rainy all morning, thus the 2 coats in the pictures..but by the time they came it was warm and sunny : ) Charlie got to visit a bit before his nap (he is the first child we have had who CANNOT miss his nap lest hell be unleashed in the form of screeching and tantruming and worse by 3pm)
Casey and his cousin played that they were "chopping guys" (Ax Men?) and took huge branches and whacked away at the wood pile out back, then talked us into a little video game action. I was happy to show my mom a little that not all video games are "bad" and she had to admit that the Wii Bowling was very harmless, simple, and amusing. She and I disagree about video games to some extent, but they are a real part of our family's life and so is outdoor play and wood toys and imagination and all that stuff too and so I appreciate her checking out the video-bowling with us, it ended up fun and funny. and alot easier than taking 4 little kids to actual bowling, LOL
Greta and Mickey had MEAP testing today at school and they said it wasn't too bad. The school gave them lots of extra recess in between tests and they loved that. It was literally perfect weather today, maybe 68 and sunny, so all in all, a good day if not somewhat exhausting.
Monday, October 13, 2008
so far, cool
OOH I forgot to tell you!
I dropped off a letter sealed in an envelope to the Principal's mailbox Friday. It was extremely succinct and basically said Casey will no longer be attending ___elementary for the 2008-2009 schoolyear, we have made alternate arrangements for his education. Signed, Joy and Steve...
He called today and left a neutral sounding message, just wanted to "touch base". Then I called him back, and was happy to play phone tag and get HIS voicemail, to which I left a cheery message thanking him for calling and then I just spat out some little thing about we like your school but we have found something that we feel is more appropriate for Casey--click--
I wonder if there will be anymore "fallout"? I don't have to walk up there anymore so I can kind of "hide"...the neighbors haven't found out yet....I'm just not in the mood to retell the (non) "story" everyday you know? I am sure there will be some stuff to come but so far smooth sailing :)
I dropped off a letter sealed in an envelope to the Principal's mailbox Friday. It was extremely succinct and basically said Casey will no longer be attending ___elementary for the 2008-2009 schoolyear, we have made alternate arrangements for his education. Signed, Joy and Steve...
He called today and left a neutral sounding message, just wanted to "touch base". Then I called him back, and was happy to play phone tag and get HIS voicemail, to which I left a cheery message thanking him for calling and then I just spat out some little thing about we like your school but we have found something that we feel is more appropriate for Casey--click--
I wonder if there will be anymore "fallout"? I don't have to walk up there anymore so I can kind of "hide"...the neighbors haven't found out yet....I'm just not in the mood to retell the (non) "story" everyday you know? I am sure there will be some stuff to come but so far smooth sailing :)
Monday school: A, Red, fire safety, and fresh air play
Today we "did" the letter A. What does that mean?
I drew a huge Aa and then I wrote one made out of dashes to be traced and then Casey had to write his very best A and a freehand. Then we sang a song about the 2 sounds that A makes. Then we thought of some words that start with A.
Our color of the day today was red. We went outside and found fifty three things that were red, and wrote them down together, in, of course, red crayon!
Then I read to them all about fire safety--we had some really impressive pamphlets from the Boy Scout fire safety thing that Mickey attended this weekend that had some good information in them so we read all about stop drop and roll, crawling below the smoke, don't play with matches, gas, or candles and how to treat burns.
We made Jello for dinnertime together, played out in the leaves for a good long while, and had a healthy lunch of:
sunflower seeds
cheese cubes
whole grain pb+j
cottage cheese
and Tang or chocolate milk.
Now is naptime which we preceded with a reading of Green Eyes, a sweet library book about the seasons.
Mickey was feverish and congested yesterday and was when he woke up so per school rules about fevers, he stayed home today. That is why he is in these pictures. Tomorrow they have MEAP tests and he cant miss those so we erred on the side of caution.
All three boys are resting and Eska is hungry so gotta go for now! Enjoy this warm weather...
Thursday, October 9, 2008
listing what we did and looking for what works so we can have a schedule soon
Tuesday we went to Kids Korner in the morning, came home and had healthy lunch, a little free time with playdoh and music, and then naps. For Casey AND Charlie. I was hoping Casey would stay in bed but not sleep and thats exactly what he did. Cool. If he sleeps he will not be tired anywhere near bedtime (730 to 9 ish) and that will be a problem, especially for Steve. But I want my afternoon break! Need is more like it! So Casey rested for about an hour, Charlie took his usually 2+ hour nap.
Wednesday we did a bit of school at home. We talked about what Casey liked about school and what he wanted to continue at home. He didnt "like" anything except gym but he said they were on letter "Y" and so we made some Y's out of cheerios and paper and he spontaneously wrote Yo-yo over and over and we agreed that that was a great fun Y word.
Casey Charlie and I did "music class" with Eska in the basement around 9 in the morning. I played Woody Guthries childrens songs (they are super primal and great, really a beautiful side of Woody) and I laid out 4 little receiving blankets on the floor. White, yellow, blue, and pink, each with one instrument in the middle. I acted all teachery and said "Pick a color!" and the boys scrambled to one blanket, then I went to another one, and one was empty. We then played along with Woody for maybe a minute and then I yelled SWITCH! again. They were very into it but then there was a scuffle about them both wanting the drum. See? Socialization! LOL Later the game turned into dancing and then the interest was waning and so we made a production about folding all the blankets up and turning down all the lights and watching Signing Time, a precious show on PBS about sign language. Eska jumped in her doorway jumper thing (yes she is strong enough for that already! she LOVES it!) and then Daddy brought us the minivan home for his lunchbreak and we took him back to work and went to good ole WalMart for a few things.
We got a whiteboard/dry erase thing and a few more little officey supplies that Casey adores. 3 dollar stapler, etc. SO he "made books" for the rest of the day, evening and now is currently doing so! I must hook up the scanner to show you his cute work.
Today is Thursday and all the kids have no school for Yom Kippur. Things are a bit haphazard which is sometimes ok but I am really sleepy this morning so it has to be. Greta is still asleep and it is 11am. Poor kid.
We are going to go to the zoo or park or something later, all of the kids and me. We get along great when we are out but when we are all home everyone dissipates, which is to be expected, but it makes me a little sad. I miss when we all sat and played together. If I drag them to a place it might happen!
I am looking forward to trying out little things and seeing rhythms and patterns. It is of great importance for me to come up with "Tuesday is library day", etc for the homeschool year. I think it is abundantly clear that a "third party", even if it is the homemade chart or calendar, helps us a great deal to know what to do. I know our timeline at least:
6ish Casey and Charlie wake up
7 wake up Greta and Mickey
8 Greta and Mickey have to be in school
8 to 11 Homeschool activities
11 to 12ish lunchtime
12 to 1 quiet play/I read to the boys
1 naptime
2 Casey gets up (?)
3 I get Charlie up
330 the big kids get home
now this part is all a mess, the 330 to dinner.......
Some nights are boy scouts, girls scouts, daddy needs a ride, daddy works late, all a mess
Some ideas bandied about of me taking one kid to the library for quiet homework help, hasnt happened yet
730 Casey to bed
745 Charlie to bed
830 to 9ish Greta and Mickey go upstairs and hang out/play video game/watch tv
930 Greta and Mickey asleep
Thats it so far! We haven't had one full week yet where there was no holiday or noone home sick so time will tell. Ideas?
Wednesday we did a bit of school at home. We talked about what Casey liked about school and what he wanted to continue at home. He didnt "like" anything except gym but he said they were on letter "Y" and so we made some Y's out of cheerios and paper and he spontaneously wrote Yo-yo over and over and we agreed that that was a great fun Y word.
Casey Charlie and I did "music class" with Eska in the basement around 9 in the morning. I played Woody Guthries childrens songs (they are super primal and great, really a beautiful side of Woody) and I laid out 4 little receiving blankets on the floor. White, yellow, blue, and pink, each with one instrument in the middle. I acted all teachery and said "Pick a color!" and the boys scrambled to one blanket, then I went to another one, and one was empty. We then played along with Woody for maybe a minute and then I yelled SWITCH! again. They were very into it but then there was a scuffle about them both wanting the drum. See? Socialization! LOL Later the game turned into dancing and then the interest was waning and so we made a production about folding all the blankets up and turning down all the lights and watching Signing Time, a precious show on PBS about sign language. Eska jumped in her doorway jumper thing (yes she is strong enough for that already! she LOVES it!) and then Daddy brought us the minivan home for his lunchbreak and we took him back to work and went to good ole WalMart for a few things.
We got a whiteboard/dry erase thing and a few more little officey supplies that Casey adores. 3 dollar stapler, etc. SO he "made books" for the rest of the day, evening and now is currently doing so! I must hook up the scanner to show you his cute work.
Today is Thursday and all the kids have no school for Yom Kippur. Things are a bit haphazard which is sometimes ok but I am really sleepy this morning so it has to be. Greta is still asleep and it is 11am. Poor kid.
We are going to go to the zoo or park or something later, all of the kids and me. We get along great when we are out but when we are all home everyone dissipates, which is to be expected, but it makes me a little sad. I miss when we all sat and played together. If I drag them to a place it might happen!
I am looking forward to trying out little things and seeing rhythms and patterns. It is of great importance for me to come up with "Tuesday is library day", etc for the homeschool year. I think it is abundantly clear that a "third party", even if it is the homemade chart or calendar, helps us a great deal to know what to do. I know our timeline at least:
6ish Casey and Charlie wake up
7 wake up Greta and Mickey
8 Greta and Mickey have to be in school
8 to 11 Homeschool activities
11 to 12ish lunchtime
12 to 1 quiet play/I read to the boys
1 naptime
2 Casey gets up (?)
3 I get Charlie up
330 the big kids get home
now this part is all a mess, the 330 to dinner.......
Some nights are boy scouts, girls scouts, daddy needs a ride, daddy works late, all a mess
Some ideas bandied about of me taking one kid to the library for quiet homework help, hasnt happened yet
730 Casey to bed
745 Charlie to bed
830 to 9ish Greta and Mickey go upstairs and hang out/play video game/watch tv
930 Greta and Mickey asleep
Thats it so far! We haven't had one full week yet where there was no holiday or noone home sick so time will tell. Ideas?
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
Trust
First read this. It is more eloquent than I can muster today or maybe ever. Then brace yourselves for not too much of a shock: Casey is coming back home. Today is Tuesday and I called him in "sick". They have Thursday off anyways and well, I think he is done, done. As of what happened yesterday and the continued stories that are coming to us via the teacher, the principal, and Casey himself, there really is no need to waste even one more iota of anyone's time with this little failed experiment. I am sure his poor teacher, bless her heart, won't be too heartbroken LOL
He, his brother Charlie, and his baby sister Eskarina and I spent a very gentle and quiet and beautiful morning today at Kids Korner, which is a little place in a nearby town that is near and dear to our hearts. All it is is a room at the community center which is filled with toys, both gross motor and fine motor, and they worked and built and dug and drew and laughed and ran and hugged and kissed and climbed and chatted and shared and sang and co-operated and thought and grew and learned in peace and safety and--peace some more. Casey was a wonderful boy and extraordinarily kind and composed. I got multiple complements on my children--Casey in particular--something I used to take for granted but something that doesn't seem to happen much lately, especially in the past year. We came home to a preservative-free whole foods lunch of tomatos, carrots, apples, red peppers, popcorn and cheddar cheese with ice water. We will be eating like this from now on, at least for lunch. The TV never came on once. (Neither did any tantrums, outbursts or bad behavior! Hmm...)
It IS funny and ironic how we were just this homeschooling family for over 7 years, who tried school on for a change and now that it is working beautifully for the 2 oldest kids and failing miserably for little Casey, that I find myself feeling all nervous and outcast and shy and even scared to "announce" (?!?!) our radical plans to "everyone". Who gives a flying crap? I think my whole ride on the postpartum depression coaster has still got me a bit shaky as far as changes and self confidence are concerned--but that is improving rapidly, daily, hourly, even. I actually havent been this happy in a very, very long time.
I did note to Steve last night that it is amazing what a HUGE thing school truly, truly is in the community, how it can completley take over the entire life of a family--and how confidently and casually we just didnt participate in it, ever. Now I feel scared and freaky to write the big letter proclaiming that Mister Casey is gonna drop out. LOL. Be Homeschooled. Not be returning. See ya in 3rd grade or something, maybe. I do not anticipate any trouble, but I feel weird and I feel weird about feeling weird--silly, right?
I don't want to have to have some "big explanation" every time we leave the house, but I am going to have to, in a way. See, we have neighbors now, everywhere, in fact, and they are ALL deeply invested in this school system. Coaches, Den Leaders, Volunteers, Helpers, Parents, Friends. They will not "get it" and will want a big story and I am not going to give it to them. So I searched my soul and didn't have to search too deeply to come up with this answer:
Our family thinks that early childhood is spent best in homeschool, and that we can provide a better educational environment for our kids when they are very young. Casey will probably be going to ___Elementary in a year or two.
He had another social run-in yesterday which landed him in the Principal's office. If any of you could possibly, possibly get your hands on any of the books by The Moores that I linked to last post, and read what they have to say about 4, 5 and 6 year olds and even a little bit older being in a age-segregated peer group all day long, and then if you could see and read and follow us as we start our own "school year" here at home, I hope you will agree that we are doing what is truly best for this particular child.
but if not, I guess you will just have to trust that we trust, and believe that we believe...in Casey.
This isn't rash or hasty--only sending him was. I am more excited about this than even back in 2001--I feel more than ready for the challenge(s) ahead. I love my little Casey and am 100% certain that there was not one thing positive going on there for him, and a whole lotta negative stuff that was only just beginning.
Thanks in advance for your support, and, your TRUST. I leave you with my most heartfelt observation/conclusion:
I feel more certain than ever that little kids do not belong in that environment. I feel more sure than ever that when a child is given a gentle and sheltered --(yes that controversial word that is totally appropriate if not our most important job as parents!--) early childhood filled with a true love of learning and a safe space in which to unfold and unfurl as a person, under the close supervision on a loving dedicated caregiver in a very low adult-to-child ratio, that they can go on to become wonderful, dedicated and committed, connected, self-motivated and solid students in any capacity. We provided that for Mickey and Greta and so we will continue on with the littlest three.
After a few weeks of "de-tox" we do plan on re-joining our local homeschool groups on some of their outings and little classses, field trips, etc.
Tomorrow I think we'll use our zoo pass! Yipee!
He, his brother Charlie, and his baby sister Eskarina and I spent a very gentle and quiet and beautiful morning today at Kids Korner, which is a little place in a nearby town that is near and dear to our hearts. All it is is a room at the community center which is filled with toys, both gross motor and fine motor, and they worked and built and dug and drew and laughed and ran and hugged and kissed and climbed and chatted and shared and sang and co-operated and thought and grew and learned in peace and safety and--peace some more. Casey was a wonderful boy and extraordinarily kind and composed. I got multiple complements on my children--Casey in particular--something I used to take for granted but something that doesn't seem to happen much lately, especially in the past year. We came home to a preservative-free whole foods lunch of tomatos, carrots, apples, red peppers, popcorn and cheddar cheese with ice water. We will be eating like this from now on, at least for lunch. The TV never came on once. (Neither did any tantrums, outbursts or bad behavior! Hmm...)
It IS funny and ironic how we were just this homeschooling family for over 7 years, who tried school on for a change and now that it is working beautifully for the 2 oldest kids and failing miserably for little Casey, that I find myself feeling all nervous and outcast and shy and even scared to "announce" (?!?!) our radical plans to "everyone". Who gives a flying crap? I think my whole ride on the postpartum depression coaster has still got me a bit shaky as far as changes and self confidence are concerned--but that is improving rapidly, daily, hourly, even. I actually havent been this happy in a very, very long time.
I did note to Steve last night that it is amazing what a HUGE thing school truly, truly is in the community, how it can completley take over the entire life of a family--and how confidently and casually we just didnt participate in it, ever. Now I feel scared and freaky to write the big letter proclaiming that Mister Casey is gonna drop out. LOL. Be Homeschooled. Not be returning. See ya in 3rd grade or something, maybe. I do not anticipate any trouble, but I feel weird and I feel weird about feeling weird--silly, right?
I don't want to have to have some "big explanation" every time we leave the house, but I am going to have to, in a way. See, we have neighbors now, everywhere, in fact, and they are ALL deeply invested in this school system. Coaches, Den Leaders, Volunteers, Helpers, Parents, Friends. They will not "get it" and will want a big story and I am not going to give it to them. So I searched my soul and didn't have to search too deeply to come up with this answer:
Our family thinks that early childhood is spent best in homeschool, and that we can provide a better educational environment for our kids when they are very young. Casey will probably be going to ___Elementary in a year or two.
He had another social run-in yesterday which landed him in the Principal's office. If any of you could possibly, possibly get your hands on any of the books by The Moores that I linked to last post, and read what they have to say about 4, 5 and 6 year olds and even a little bit older being in a age-segregated peer group all day long, and then if you could see and read and follow us as we start our own "school year" here at home, I hope you will agree that we are doing what is truly best for this particular child.
but if not, I guess you will just have to trust that we trust, and believe that we believe...in Casey.
This isn't rash or hasty--only sending him was. I am more excited about this than even back in 2001--I feel more than ready for the challenge(s) ahead. I love my little Casey and am 100% certain that there was not one thing positive going on there for him, and a whole lotta negative stuff that was only just beginning.
Thanks in advance for your support, and, your TRUST. I leave you with my most heartfelt observation/conclusion:
For Casey, School was only a pathetic substitute for home.
For Greta and Mickey, home was becoming pathetic substitute for school.
I feel more certain than ever that little kids do not belong in that environment. I feel more sure than ever that when a child is given a gentle and sheltered --(yes that controversial word that is totally appropriate if not our most important job as parents!--) early childhood filled with a true love of learning and a safe space in which to unfold and unfurl as a person, under the close supervision on a loving dedicated caregiver in a very low adult-to-child ratio, that they can go on to become wonderful, dedicated and committed, connected, self-motivated and solid students in any capacity. We provided that for Mickey and Greta and so we will continue on with the littlest three.
After a few weeks of "de-tox" we do plan on re-joining our local homeschool groups on some of their outings and little classses, field trips, etc.
Tomorrow I think we'll use our zoo pass! Yipee!
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