School

I was in a Christian bookstore yesterday and looking around while my daughter was going to the bathroom (the reason we were in the store this particular time). I came across a scrapbook for school children. I open it up, out of curiosity and on the very first page it says this:

"God created recess
To bring a spot of joy
Into our schools of learning
For every girl and boy
Other memories linger
Though some completely fade
But memories
From the playground
Are the best ever made"

It made me glad the my children's entire lives consist of one big recess.

It also got me thinking about my own school experience. The poem is right. The memories that are most vivid are the ones of recess. How sad.

Mother's Day

I have been thinking about Mothers Day lately.

Typically on Mother's Day I go into "martyr thinking". My dear and devoted husband wouldn't know romance if it bit him on the butt so generally speaking, I don't get anything. I might get something if I whine about how I didn't get anything, but then it feels like he's just doing it to get me to shut up so it doesn't mean anything.

Yesterday I got to thinking about the purpose of Mother's Day. What is it? Well, of course, everyone knows that it is a day to honor mothers. To show them how much you appreciate them, right?

Why do I need/want one day every year to celebrate being a mother? One day to know that i am appreciated by those whom I care for? ONE DAY? You have to be kidding me. I started rethinking that. I don't want ONE day. I want to know I am appreciated every day. I don't need a diamond ring or a piece of paper that tells me that. I need to look at my family in a different way. I need to see the ways that they tell me they love me EVERY SINGLE DAY!

So, I started yesterday.

My first "Mother's Day" was marked by the fact that my two beautiful, very social daughters who are unschooled (and since we haven't had a car in several weeks we haven't been able to make it to local meetings) turned down playing with the local schooled neighborhood kids (whom they have been playing with every day for the last 2+ weeks, might I add so they aren't not getting *any* social interaction right now) to make slime with their mom. What a compliment to hear them tell the kids to go home because they are doing a project with mom. It warmed my heart.

You can see the results of our science project at

http://365daysofsparkle.blogspot.com

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So, after thinking about all this, I had to look up Mother's Day on wikipedia and got to learn the history of Mother's Day.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mother's_Day

Here is some interesting information on it...

At first, it was to honor the Gods in Roman and Greek times. Here's how it came about in the US.

The United States celebrates Mother's Day on the second Sunday in May. In the United States, Mother's Day was loosely inspired by the British day and was imported by social activist Julia Ward Howe after the American Civil War. However, it was intended as a call to unite women against war. In 1870, she wrote the Mother's Day Proclamation as a call for peace and disarmament. Howe failed in her attempt to get formal recognition of a Mother's Day for Peace. Her idea was influenced by Ann Jarvis, a young Appalachian homemaker who, starting in 1858, had attempted to improve sanitation through what she called Mothers' Work Days. She organized women throughout the Civil War to work for better sanitary conditions for both sides, and in 1868 she began work to reconcile Union and Confederate neighbors.

When Jarvis died in 1907, her daughter, named Anna Jarvis, started the crusade to found a memorial day for women. The first such Mother's Day was celebrated in Grafton, West Virginia, on 10 May 1908, in the church where the elder Ann Jarvis had taught Sunday School. Originally the Andrews Methodist Episcopal Church, this building is now the International Mother's Day Shrine (a National Historic Landmark). From there, the custom caught on — spreading eventually to 45 states. The holiday was declared officially by some states beginning in 1912. In 1914 President Woodrow Wilson declared the first national Mother's Day, as a day for American citizens to show the flag in honor of those mothers whose sons had died in war.

Nine years after the first official Mother's Day, commercialization of the U.S. holiday became so rampant that Anna Jarvis herself became a major opponent of what the holiday had become. Mother's Day continues to this day to be one of the most commercially successful U.S. occasions. According to the National Restaurant Association, Mother's Day is now the most popular day of the year to dine out at a restaurant in the United States.

So much for that idea, lol!

"Homeschool Space"

I have neglected this blog for a little too long. I have so many pics I want to post and stuff.

First, I have been working on a couple other things and wanted to "announce" them. I have a new blog, 365 days of Sparkle. I meant to post on it everyday, but it isn't turning out that way. I am also working on my photography, most of which gets posted at my deviant art site, but I haven't posted there lately either.

Okay, here are a couple pics of recent life in our house.

This is Lilly offering to do chores on her own (for chore wars).






The Girls, working with daddy on a wood project of his.




The little people on the trampoline that came and visited Lilly and I.


Marti showing of the loss of her 4th tooth


Our new "garden".




Also, I wrote this post on a message board that I frequent. Someone was asking for pics of how their homeschool space was organized. I put my revelations in red.

Well, we don't do "school-at-home" (we unschool) so I am not sure this will help you (everything is learning material in our house), but here are a few pics of my messy house, actually, just of the 2 main rooms downstairs and part of the bathroom.

In reality everything is "sprawled" all over our house, which bugs me a bit (the "everything has a place and everything in it's place" part of me), but sort of fits with our life. None of our "school stuff" is segregated into appropriate catergories because our lives aren't split up into subjects. We live the way we learn, we learn the way we live.

I didn't include the trampoline, sandbox and swingset out back, where they spend most of their warm days feeling the sand between their toes, learning about worms, climbing trees and jumping to their hearts content. I didn't include the front porch where we spend much time talking, playing in the rice box and have a mini garden planted (this is my first year doing a "garden" and a big thing in the backyard without a tiller was a bit intimidating to me).

I didn't include the upstairs either. Most of their "toys" are up there. Right now the hallway (which is a large open space, not a narrow typical hallway) is set up with barbie stuff galore. I was thinking the other day that my girls don't play with their toys enough. So, I set up their barbie stuff how I would have if I were going to play with it. I didn't even get halfway done when Lil was up there playing with me, and Marti wasn't far behind.

Their play food and dolly stuff is in Marti's room (which she asked for and slept in for about 2 weeks and is now back in our family bed). Their stuffed animals and dress up stuff are in my sewing room/photography studio. And we also have 3 shelves of books in our family bedroom.

So, in terms of helping you organize, I bet that I did sqat for that :lostit: , but it's what works for us at the moment (it's subject to change at mom's will and does *very* often).

So, here are my pics then. You'll have to forgive the state of the house. It needs a great many repairs and we are working on them slowly.

The Yellow arrow in this pic is pointing to something I forgot to photograph. This is the CD shelf. On top of the shelf are a couple baskets which have past mini pages (from the newspaper), flashcards, etc.









This is where we store library books




Audio/Visual area

Being taught proper English by an 8 year old.

I feel like I am getting behind now for some reason.

I wanted to share this story.
Today, while eating lunch as a family I said "we haven't 'ate' like this in a while" because we haven't been actually sitting down at the table and eating together lately. Marti (who will be 8 in July) said to me, "Mom, it's 'eaten' not 'ate'. This girl has been to 1/2 a year of preschool and 3 weeks of Kindergarten. We have never had success with a curriculum (I tried for 2 weeks in what would have been 1st grade and for 2 weeks at the beginning of this school year) and has *never* had an English lesson in her entire life!

Also, I wanted to thank all the patient people on the unschooling lists over the last 3 years. Today has been a "wow" day for me. I feel like Superman, "leaping tall buildings in a single bound" and stuff. Here are some of my random thoughts today.

About not having a car (a dilema we may be facing)...
DH and I have been back and forth on this issue. I think that maybe *not* having a car won't really be all that bad. He sees not having a car as a lack of freedom and independence.

Today I asked him what *not* having a car meant to him because I was tired of butting head with him. I wanted to know where he was coming from, not so I could change his mind, but so I could relate. He said things like "no freedom" and "no independance". He didn't want to have to rely on the others or the bus.

After he told me what it meant to him I told him that to me, not having a car *meant* freedom AND independence. Freedom from debt was of course the first thing I thought of. We have can save $140 per month not having a car, which at first can be partially used to pay off our debt. Since we only make $600-700 per month, that is a lot of money. Freedom from debt led to so much more. Freedom to be *able* to live on a part time job (currently reading How To Survive Without A Salary) and have the extra time to be with each other. The list goes on.

When I explained to him that in the past month we have been able to set back $110 (granted, it is to fix the car) he started to come over to the "dark side". I said, "Imagine what we could do with that money if we didn't have to spend it on fixing the car." I didn't set out to convince him. I set out to understand him.

Other kids
My girls have been playing with these other (public schooled) kids in the neighborhood. They aren't the most respectful kids in the world, but they are okay. Today, Lil and I made cookies shortly before the kids showed up (after school got out) so I thought I would send a few out to the kids. The kids scarfed them down and begged for more. I let them have another and told them we didn't have anymore (even though I really wanted to say we didn't have any more to share, dh would kill me if I gave them all away). They didn't say thank you. They asked for more. When I told them we had no more, they asked for milk. I told them we didn't have any (we have 1/2 a gallon and dh drinks *lots* of milk, especially with his cookies).

Finally they quit asking for things and I couldn't help but to grumble (to myself) about how ungrateful they had been. As I was grumbling, I got to thinking. Maybe they saw right through me. Maybe they knew we had more of this or that. Maybe they knew I wasn't sharing what I had with love. I was being stingy (because we don't have the extra money). Even now, when they are back and asking for more cookies, I am still being stingy. It's no wonder they weren't thankful.

On college (yes, I know my oldest is only 8-almost 8 I mean)
There was a post recently on a board I frequent (called Diaperswappers) about unschooling. Someone asked about how unschooling prepared kids for college. Here is my reply.

I provided a bunch of links, but then thought... Maybe she doesn't want to read all that so I pulled a few quotes out. I can't testify to the college question because my oldest is 8, but I trust her to do what is best for her. I can say that at this point, it doesn't look like she will follow a traditional college route. She wants to be a mom. She loves babies and she wants to be able to stay at home with them. That said, she has also expressed interest in being a homebirth midwife. We have a local midwife that teaches that outside the typical college setting. I do hear that most unschoolers who choose to go to college do great because that is in fact their choice and they haven't been stuffed full of curriculum for the past 13 years. I know that I had had plenty of curriculum by the time I graduated and chose to wait on college. I am 27 and still waiting because now I have kids. My kids won't be so full of "institutionalization" and curriculum that if they want to go to college they will succeed at a high level.

Then I quoted Joyce's website and found an article on about.com and one on nehn.org. I am so glad that I have you all to fall back on.

On Bananas
My youngest DD *loves* bananas! I *hate* finding banana peels all over the house so yesterday before I gave her a banana I peeled it for her and threw it away. No mess to clean up or get annoyed with later. Simple, huh? It's the simple things that count.

I think that will be it for now. See you next time.

Feel the POWER

What an amazing day, and it isn't even 9 am (wow, it has taken me an hour to write this, due to breaking for breakfast and to put a movie in for Lilly).

First a little background. Unschooling doesn't always come easy to me. In fact, it doesn't often come easy to me. You would think it would come a little more easy than most because my mom came as close to unschooling (though she didn't know the term) as one could given her circumstances, but sadly, it doesn't.

Also, a bit on our current circumstances. I am an introvert, and do need time alone. In "good" times, I don't *need* a lot of alone time. In stressful times, I need more than I like to admit (or ask for). Currently, life is stressful.

~We are attempting to live on $600-700 per month (although we don't have rent or mortgage, but it's not as easy as it sounds, even given that).

~Our only car broke down 2 1/2 weeks ago. It's transmission related, but we don't know exactly what until this coming Thursday.

~Because our car is broke down, the girls and I have been having to stay home most of the time and I think "cabin fever" is running high, as we naturally love to be out and about.

~At the beginning of March (so the bill for February) we got a $650 electric bill (apparently they had only *estimated* for December and January, but they had estimated low so they tacked on the rest to that bill). Obviously, with only $669 of income in March we weren't able to pay it, so now we have the $625 (I did pay a little) shut off notice and another $300 bill for April (March's bill). To answer questions, yes, we are trying to get help with it and I am pretty sure we can, it's just a tad more difficult now that we don't have a car.

Those are the *main* things that are stressing me out, I think. And believe me, I know it could be worse (in 2002 we were living in a tent in my mom's backyard after our home was repo'd), but things are crazy stressful and life in general feels out of my control.

I should also add that we live in Michigan, which has the highest unemployment rate in the nation (aside from Puerto Rico) by a margin of 1.2%, so "go get a [better] job" is a lot harder than it sounds.

http://www.fxstreet.com/news/forex-news/article.aspx?StoryId=aea7fdc2-c8df-40a9-b1f5-f6d6c0055879 (Feb 2008 unemployment 7.2%)

Anyway, after all that babbling, I wanted to tell a story today about Power. Not like electric, but the kind of thing that you see most "business tycoon" type people craving and pursing until they become domineering, pompous prats.

I've already said, I haven't been able to get much alone time lately. Usually my mom takes my girls every two weeks for a couple nights (I can just hear a lot of you say "LUCKY!" and yes, I know I am *very* blessed by this. It's the one thing that keeps me sane.) and that is enough time for me to rejuvanate. Two weeks ago, she had to work and this weekend she couldn't take them either. So, now I am faced with another 2 weeks of no alone time, which stresses me out even more.

I asked my SIL if she could take the girls for a couple hours this weekend to the park or something, but it's supposed to rain so it doesn't look like that is going to happen.

I asked my dh if he would take the girls to see a free movie today, but he would be out all day (with the having to ride the bus issue) with a movie *and* having to work. When he said no, the disappointment shone clearly on my face, I know it and I could see him worried about how I would handle it. Usually, especially in the past, I would blow up at him and everything would become his fault.

Instead, I went upstairs and brushed my teeth (I have also been known lately to take a shower). While brushing (and thinking I could really use a really high dose of patience today), a line from a movie came to me (forgive me, my brain works a lot in lines from movies, increasingly over the last ten years).

From Evan Almighty:
God is speaking to Joan Baxter, the main character's wife.

"Let me ask you something. If someone prays for patience, you think God gives them patience? Or does he give them the opportunity to be patient? If he prayed for courage, does God give him courage, or does he give him opportunities to be courageous? If someone prayed for the family to be closer, do you think God zaps them with warm fuzzy feelings, or does he give them opportunities to love each other? "

So, I started thinking of the situation as an opportunity to be patient. Lilly had followed me upstairs and was talking to me, playing with the hair dryer, etc which was becoming increasingly annoying (the thought "Can't I just have 30 seconds alone!" screaming loudly *in my head*). I yelled at her, then apologized, put the hair dryer away and asked if she wanted to take a bath (her *favorite* thing to do). Then, I came downstairs and Rog was walking around trying to be helpful, but obviously thought he was walking on egg shells, expecting me to blow up at any moment.

Here is where the (think of Genie from Aladdin said in your best Robin Williams voice) *absolute power* comes in.

I asked him if he was going back to bed if he would please take the box [of cloth diapers] upstairs with him.

Seem silly? I basically gave him permission to go back to bed. I wasn't trying to be controlling. I don't think that the power is the fact that I controlled him, but in that I controlled me, and my response to the situation.

I think the trick was, I *wanted* him to go upstairs. I didn't say it so that when he walked away I could fume inside my head about how he should have wanted to sit here and talk to me.

Before, I would have started picking up the house, huffily, all the while yelling at him because I wasn't able to get my alone time.

The feeling was amazing.

Bus Ride

This is Roger, Amanda's husband, and I have a story about our 4-year-old, Lilly. First, there are two things that led up to the situation. The first is that our car stopped functioning two weeks ago, and getting around has been interesting to say the least. Our girls had their first bus ride ever last Wednesday as a result. The second thing that led to this situation is a shut off notice from the electric company. Amanda had been talking with our Case Worker had the Department of Human Services about help, and she had filled out an Emergency Application that she had printed off from the internet. Lilly and I took the bus to DHS to drop off this application. While we were there, since we had time and money, we had a snack and a couple drinks from the vending machines there. Lilly asked if we could make the trip again the next day. Later on, on the bus ride home, she asked me where the papers I had were. That's when I realized that she thought the whole trip was about having a snack together someplace new.

No Car :(

So, we have been without a car now for nearly a week and a half. It has been different and a bit stressful, but all things considered I think we are handling it well. The first week was rough. The girls started fighting quite a bit and we realized that we needed to get out of the house every day to help with that. So far, so good.

Here are a couple pics from the last 10 days or so, then I have a bunch from yesterday.

Lilly helping me make laundry soap.



Lilly working on her masterpiece. This was so cute! I wish I had gotten a video.



This is a pic of a castle that Lilly made for her dad.



Yesterday was a big day for us. We decided to ride the metro bus downtown to the library (not the one we usually go to, a closer one actually). It was the girls' first ride on the bus (and my second!). We had fun, but we stayed out just a little too long. Lil had an issue getting off the bus because dad told her to follow me, and she wanted to stay by him. We were holding the bus up so I picked her up (as well as I could with other things in my hands), while she screamed then I carried her home (which was only across the street). We were all tired and went upstairs and fell asleep shortly after getting home.

Oh, we also did a science experiment before we left yesterday. So, here is the experiment. It is a little milk in the bottom of a container, then a couple drops of food coloring and finally you stick a toothpick in with a bit of dishsoap at the end.








Here are the girls' puppet shows at the library, well, Marti's isn't uploading, so here is just Lilly's.





At the park...







Feeding the ducks...





Riding the bus home...

Snow again??? and more

First, I wanted to post a few more pics from our nice day a little over two weeks ago, on the 13th. After dad got home from work we went to the park and to the library.

Here they are riding their bikes, then playing on the park equipment.







And of course, I have to post this pic of Rog. I absolutely love it. I am working on a way to play with it in photoshop.



This next picture is of Lilly cleaning the kitchen floor, VOLUNTARILY. Yep, you read right. She just WANTED to do it. You might say that it is just her age. Kids at that age love to help, right? Keep reading! (Pardon the crazy mess of a floor/cupboards. We are working on remodeling.)



Are you ready for this, you people who thought it was just age? Here is my 7 1/2 year old playing chore wars. On the 18th she just up and decided to log into her chore wars account, which she hasn't been in since October, when we were requiring chores.

Marti rarely WANTS to help out with chores. I would say "never" but often give her the line "Absolutes are rarely true, my young padawan", so I guess I should take my own advice. Anyway, when I say, "Marti rarely WANTS to help out with chores", that is like, almost never and when we ask her to do a chore (ie please put away your clothes) she grumbles and groans about it. We don't ask her often.



Anyway, since I have a record of it at chore wars, here is a list of things that she CHOSE to do a couple of days ago, on her own. No one asked. When she asked me if she could do chore wars, I told her that the prize really didn't hold any weight anymore (the prize was free time which she would usually use to play video games, but now she has unlimited game time) and she didn't care. She still wanted to play.

~Dusted
~Washed Kitchen Floor
~Took the laundry out of the dryer and put it in the appropriate basket
~Washed the TV
~Washed the floor in the front entrance
~Watered the cat
~Washed the mirror
~Washed the front door, inside and out
~Sanitized the door knobs

And she did some more chores the next day!!!

This next picture is of Marti and Lilly playing with their new toys yesterday that they bought with their allowances. They were getting along grandly. After playing for awhile with those toys the girls went outside and played in the backyard. When I told Lil it was time to come in to go to preschool she said she didn't want to go. So, we had a talk and decided that she is done with school. She is a homeschooler now, just like Marti and she was very excited about it.



THIS morning, the 2nd day of spring, when I left the house, it was a little chili, but was free of snow. I just took some pictures of our front step and our back porch a few minutes ago. We have gotten like 5 inches of snow. And I just put away the snow blower. Looks like I am going to have to get it out again. Curses! Michigan weather bites!

If you look carefully enough at the second picture you can make out dh's footprints from when he went to work only 4 hours ago.

Funny Story

The girls are at my mom's house this weekend.

Last night Rog and I watched a video with Suze Orman discussing financial matters called Young, Fabulous and Broke. It got me thinking about our financial state, which like most Americans, is currently (and pretty much always has been) in a state of peril.

So....

Roger and I were in the car driving to pick up something from Freecycle this morning and my head is reeling about what I need to be doing to help our financial state. I am driving and thinking (which I do a lot) when suddenly Roger pipes up with a question.

"Why do Pirates wear big hats?". I laughed and laughed. It made me think about all the self help books that I have read about the "complexity of women" and "simplicity of men". Roger said it was like something out of a movie.

I just had to share.

1 Gig of videos, the trampoline & countdown to spring

First, I have an announcement to make. My daughter is growing up too fast!



The story of every parent's life, I know.

My oldest is 7 1/2 and about 3 days ago she told her dad that she wanted her own room so she could "keep it clean and make her bed." So, I made it happen, even though my first a year ago would have been "we don't have enough room for that".

You know what though? She has only been in there for two nights, but she has kept it clean (even though some of my sewing stuff was still in there) and she has kept the bed made. If eventually she decides that she doesn't want to clean or make the bed, that will certainly be fine with us.

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We have been anxiously awaiting warmer weather here in Michigan the last couple of weeks. We even have a sort of countdown going on and Marti knows that the 20th is the first day of spring. The weather has been "teasing" us with back and forth warm and cold days. Today is not overly warm, but the big trampoline outside was dry for the first time in months so the girls went out to jump. Lil was actually trying to not be in this picture, but ended up in it anyway.



Oh, and I have to share this pic too. This pose was Marti's idea. Before I had gotten out there, she was meditating and she decided, after I had taken several pictures of her meditating that they were going to pose for one, like this. What makes this picture kind of comical is that Lilly (the one that is "praying") doesn't think God is real (completely of her own accord, but I suspect it is because she is more the logical "I don't believe in anything I can't see" sort of person because the same statement applies to Santa and the Easter Bunny as well) and the one meditating does believe in God.



Of course, I knew that that was going to be something that I was going to want to blog so I grabbed the camera to take the picture. I turned it on to find that the memory card was COMPLETELY full of videos. All of them made by Lilly. Now these videos are generally of her just dancing, talking to the camera and often, forgetting about it being on and going about her business. Here is a short example from the 1 gig of videos that I downloaded today. Can you guess that she has been watching a lot of Shark Tale lately?



I have many times had thoughts of deleting some of these videos. Then I think of Hannah, a girl from family I have never met, but who's story touches my heart. And I think of Isaac, a little man who changed my life. I just can't help but to think that if I ever lost my Lilly that I would never be able to forgive myself for deleting those videos.

Thank you Hannah and thank you Isaac.

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Oh, I completely forgot to include these pictures in this post (I usually go chronologically).

This picture is from March 2nd. We were on our way home from Grandma Gail's and Lilly wanted to go out to eat at Stir Max. We were actually on our way home so that Dad could go to work, so Stir Max wasn't an option, plus, we didn't have the money.

We actually only had a few minutes until we got home so I was trying to quickly understand what I could do to help her to quit crying. I offered to make her some rice when we got home or stop and buy her some fruit or ice cream (her usuals at Stir Max). Nope! Not what she wanted. So, I offered to set up our table with chop sticks and Chinese calendar placements, just like the restaurant.

Lilly: "No, that will be too much work."
Me: "But I am willing to do it if it will make you happy."
Lilly: "We can just stop for ice cream, mom."

Great! And just in time too because the last grocery store on the way home was coming into view and we were cutting the time pretty close for Rog getting to work. Anyway, she was very proud of getting her very own ice cream.



These next two pictures are from the Science Literacy Night that we went to at the local public school (my oldest LOVES Science and was exceptionally excited to go). Both girls got to test simulated blood from a crime scene, make silly putty, slime, learn about the periodic table of elements where they showed this video, and much more. They really enjoyed themselves. You even get to see the hand print smudges on my TV! Yay!