Agenda Adendum

Don't correct my spelling. Its good spelling, its just that the letters get in the wrong places sometimes. I'm killing time while I wait for the Jedi to be finished checking his email. Tonight is our anniversary. We ate Chinese, went to a park, and went out for ice cream. I'm a happy girl.

He had to hop on ebay to check on the auction for my OLD phone. Yes, yes, I have a nifty new phone, cause my other one didn't quite have enough memory to run Tom Tom smoothly. So, new phone for me. Grin.

I was blog surfing, and got sidetracked at Joy Comes in the Morning.

You Are Ariel!

Headstrong and fiesty. You have a mind of your own that's full of romantic dreams about the world around you. Exploring exotic places is your ultimate dream, and although you can be a little naive you'll realize that there is something to be gained from your family's wisdom.

Which Disney Princess Are You?

I double dog dare Christopher Robin to take the quiz. Even now I can sense the eye rolling coming my way.

I realized today I needed to add a few goals to my agenda. I'll have to do that tomorrow now, cause I frittered away my time taking Disney Princess quizes.

My Agenda

First off, let me point out that I can copy and paste html with the best of them. Notice that once again, my pic is a neat little link. Why? How did I duplicate this stunning feat of technology? Cause I can copy and paste, baby. Copy and paste all the way :)

Second, let me say it tickles me to no end to be able to title a post "My Agenda." I feel like I am now totally qualified to participate in some giant conspiracy theory. Why? Because I have an agenda.

Third, I cheated on this assignment. Yes, that's right. You can kick me out of the group now. You didn't think it was possible to cheat on a blog meme, did you? And yet, I found a way. (I mean, a way other than the copy/paste trick up above.) Wanna know what I did? I went and read other people's blogs before I started working on my own assignment. Scandalous, I know.

So, if you're still reading, and haven't been shocked away... let me tell you what I'm doing this school year.

My curriculum is a pretty easy thing. Since we participate in OHVA, we use the packaged K-12 curriculum for almost all our subjects. Sweetling just thrives on the traditional, academic, structured program. I'm not sure how much of a long term match it will be for Toa of Boy, but so far the very hands-on, manipulative based kindergarten program is a huge hit. In later years, we might have to reevaluate and chose different curriculum for him....but that's later.

This summer, Sweetling decided that for her devotion time, she was going to read a chapter of the Bible each day. She decided she would start in Genesis and just read one chapter a day till she read through the entire Bible. I, being the finished-challenged individual that I am, was aghast. I tried to cover my dismay at what I thought was an impossible plan, by very gently asking Sweetling if she knew how many chapters there were in the entire Bible. Sweetling didn't. And of course, I didn't know the exact number, just that there were a huge honking number of chapters. So we looked it up. And I gently asked Sweetling if she understood how many years it would take her to read the entire Bible with its 1,189 chapters, if she were reading one chapter every weekday. Sweetling went and did the long division, and seemed perfectly content with her plan. I, still the concerned mommy, gently suggested perhaps a different reading plan, one that would lead her through excerpts from each book of the Bible in just a few months. But no, no, that wasn't the same as reading the entire Bible. Sweetling was steadfast in her plan to read the whole Bible, chapter by chapter, no matter how long it takes her. So, that's our plan for Sweetling's Bible study. ("Our" in that statement is horribly misused. I managed to read through the entire Bible only once in my life, and that only because I found The Daily Bible, which put everything in chronological order, cut out 'redundant' passages, and explained a little of the history and context where needed. It was a major accomplishment for me to stick to a program regularly for an entire year.)

I was stuck on what to do for Toa of Boy's devotions. He needed something. We had, through the summer, read through the Rhyme Bible, by reading one short Bible story in order each day. I thought perhaps he still needed some familiarity with the major events and people in the Bible. I had considered making lapbooks for our Bible study. We could pick a major Bible story, or Bible hero, and work for a week or two on a lapbook. I still think this is a solid plan, and we might come back to it next year. But, in the meantime, Toa of Boy has been asking... "Why can't we see God? Nobody ever sees God? Mommy, does God die? Why did Jesus die?" And I don't want to ignore these questions. I try to answer them as he asks, but I'm often caught off guard on them, and its hard to put responses to such profound questions in the language of a five-year old. So, I wasn't sold on the lapbook projects, because I felt it wouldn't really address what Toa of Boy wanted and needed. But, as I was cheating and reading other blogs, I found this...Leading Little Ones to God.
(Much thanks to Kim @ Homestead Acres.)

Every Thursday we'll be participating in a curriculum based co-op. Since everyone in the co-op uses the same curriculum we do, the subjects and school work they do as part of the co-op isn't in addition to, or instead of, what we'd be doing anyway, it will be a part of and go along with it. I'm really looking forward to it, and so is Sweetling. Toa of Boy isn't as on board, but he will be once he starts hanging out with and playing with the other boys. And I'm the assist in his room in the morning, so that will help him transition into a new environment.

On Wednesday nights, Sweetling will be participating in a Bible Bowl curriculum on Exodus. On Sunday evenings she can pick either a drama/speaking class based on presenting scripture OR she can participate in praise dance that I'll be leading. And of course, she's still in Tae Kwon Do on Tuesday and Thursday nights. Toa of Boy has church activities on Wednesday and Sunday nights. He doesn't have any extra-curricular sports activities. I don't think Tae Kwon Do would be a good fit for him just yet, and I didn't want to add the running around of soccer practice into our schedule.

So, that's our curriculum. For some unknown reason, I actually thought I was going to have a short post this time.

Now, on to my agenda. <insert maniacal laughter here>

This year...
* I am NOT going to let staying with the curriculum dominate our schooling. I am going to skip units and lessons when appropriate for either or both children.
* I am going to make sure Sweetling has plenty of time during the day, at least one to two hours, to work on her own, independent projects and studies.
*I am going to stick to a basic daily structure and schedule. We will start the day on time. We will take only an hour for a lunch break. We will end the day with plenty of free time left over.
*I am going to insist that morning and afternoon checklists get accomplished each day, including mine.
*I am going to get up at a reasonable hour to get dressed, do my devotions, and get through my morning stuff before school starts instead of waiting till the last minute to roll out of bed.
*I am going to sort and start laundry, clip coupons, vacuum, and get the next weeks worth of lessons done on Sunday afternoon so that we are ready for the week on Monday morning.
*I am going to get most of my grocery list written and in order Monday night, so that I'm ready to go shopping Tuesday after school.
*And I'm going to have to find some way to keep things varied and interesting for me, because doing the same thing week after week isn't going to happen all year long. I'll crash and burn, baby, crash and burn. Blogging is one of those ways, but I know I'll need to cycle through some other things as well. I'm getting back into dance this fall, but I'm not sure if that will increase my happiness or increase my stress levels. I'm going to need some other, fun, relaxing creative outlets. (Hint, hint, and nudge, nudge, to Christopher Robin.)

And that's my agenda.

No one is allowed to burst my little bubble on this one. If the Maven can have a bubble the size of all of Canada, I'm allowed to have a little bubble all of my own.

Quick Update

1. I had a nasty cold. Despite my protests that colds should not be permitted in the summer time, this one pretty much wiped me out and made me useless for the weekend.

2. I loved all the responses and the scriptures I received from my last post. Though, of all the scripture verses, the one that most spoke to me started with "After seventy years and not a day before..." Now, I had heard the promise of that verse many, many times. I love that verse. "For I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord. Plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you hope and a future." BUT, I had never read, or paid attention to the first half of the verse. God had called that verse to mind when I was struggling, but I didn't receive it gracefully. I didn't see how or what God's plan could have been in my circumstances, and it certainly didn't seem like a hopeful, prosperous plan, whatever it was. But, "after seventy years and not a day before," I needed reminding that God's plan includes God's timetable. If we want the plan, we have to accept the timetable as well. So it was the phrase, "after seventy years and not a day before," that I found myself repeating and meditating on when I got discouraged.

3. I spent the morning writing out the first half of a children's sermon. Its long, so it might be a two part sermon. I might use it in children's church, I might not, but I'm really getting into the subject matter. It comes from First Chronicles, of all places, and its about the ways and kinds of worship. I'm considering posting parts of it here, as I finish them, but it is very long. Very. Long.

4. We read Cinderella this week for Toa of Boy’s language arts. Today’s lesson plan said to pick a favorite scene and act it out. Toa of Boy picked the scene where the fairy godmother changes the pumpkin into a coach, the mice into horses, etc. Acting out this scene quickly turned into Toa of Boy chasing Sweetling through the house while waving a magic wand and yelling “Bippity Boppity Boo!”

5. I've tried adding stuff to my blog. The slide show isn't really sliding or showing. I'm going to have to break down and the Jedi for help. I also added links to some of the blogs I found reading the Homeschool Memoirs Assignment. There were TONS of really neat blogs, but I tried to restrain myself and only add a few. I discovered I really like reading the homesteading blogs. Mind you, I am not, and never will be, a homesteader. I am a sissyfied city girl through and through. I can't even grow sunflowers or marigolds. The only potato dish I can conquer is instant mashed, and my idea of from scratch recipes starts with a can of soup or a box mix. But I really love reading about the women who can and do take a homesteading approach to life. (The Oregon Trail and the western pioneers are my favorite period of history as well.) I think reading the homesteading blogs lets me experience the joys of homesteading, without all that work ;)

6. Haven't read the new assignment for today. Not going to until tomorrow. We're heading to the library this afternoon, and they have "Yellow Rose Bride" on hold for me. So, you know no blogging is happening till after I've read my book. The Jedi is going to order "Hearts West" for me from Amazon. I've had this story idea kicking around in my head, and now I need to do reading about the time periods and the circumstances. No, I'm not going to write my story down, that comes back to the 'work' deal that I'm avoiding. But I am enjoying doing the research and the daydreaming for the story.

7. Now I'm off to bake brownies (box mix) to take to church tonight. Then lunch, library, and going to Telephone's house to watch "Camp Rock". Telephone's daughter invited us over for the movie. Telephone's Daughter needs her own blog name. Hmm.....

First Memoir Assignment

If I were cool, I could make the picture a link back to the original assignment. If I were cool. Woo hooo!!!! I am not cool....but Sweetling is!!!!!

Today is not a good day for me to write a little bit about myself. I'm really struggling today with a pretty large, looming issue. If you scroll back a few blog posts, you'll find one titled "Character of God." (I'm not cool, but I can be taught...look how I even linked that for you.) I'm really wrestling with trusting in God's plan, knowing that He has a plan, even when things look a mess. There's a situation that I can't explain here in this blog that I just...grrr...I just want to lay down and have a little temper tantrum about it.

Before I ate lunch today, I put in a video of some worship dance, and that calmed me down enough to eat and then to be cheerful and positive enough to do school. I need a scripture verse that I can just recite over and over again. But even more than that, I need to receive the scripture verse.

I get on Toa of Boy's case when he keeps whining or arguing after what he wants, when I've tried first to gently explain why he can't have it, then firmly state why he can't have it, until it just gets to a point when I say "enough, cut it out already". But I'm doing the same thing in this circumstance. I'm like an incessant toddler. I've passed the "But why? why? why?" stage and am now in the foot stomping and pouting stage.

If you have a good scripture, and wouldn't mind leaving it for me, that would be a blessing. (Your reply won't show up immediately, cause I've got moderate comments turned on, but I'm desperate, so I'll check back this evening and get the comments read and up.)

Normally, when I'm not having a battle of wills with the Almighty, I'm a rather laid-back, bubbly person. I definitely fall into the "free-spirit" category. I would have made a great hippie in the 70s ;) I like creative projects. I like unique approaches to life. I don't like schedules, and I struggle with punctuality. I love art, works of fiction, praise dance, daydreaming, and starting many projects. God has placed me under the care of a husband who loves my tender nature, understands and cherishes my playfulness, and is great at managing all the details of life that I detest dealing with. He is very organized, and he thrives on schedules, completion, and predictability. He has his degree in chemistry and is now working as a computer programmer. I call him "The Jedi" in my blog...both for his love of Star Wars and because he is my Knight Protector.

God has blessed us with three children. Our oldest is "Vaya", who is our foster daughter and came to us when she was 15. She's married now and is out on her own, and tells me the only grandchildren I will ever have through her are her two parrots. (Let me tell you how much the lizards *don't* count.) Her blog name, "Vaya", comes from the name of an elf character. She loves fantasy (as do I). Vaya homeschooled with us through her highschool years, using whatever curriculum I could get my hands on that might interest her.

Sweetling, ours by birth, is the reason I am not firmly in the ranks of the unschooling community. Sweetling is like a cloned copy of the Jedi. For Sweetling's sake, we follow a highly structured, extremely traditional, advanced academic curriculum (K-12). Sweetling is in her 'fifth' grade year, but in her second year of pre-algebra. Let me restate that the curriculum is chosen for the student, and not for the mommy. I knew I was in for a long haul at the beginning of her 'second grade' year. I opened her 4th grade math textbook, and the thing was full of nothing but math! Where were the cute bunny cartoons? Where were the fluffy chicks? Who wanted to do pages of long division without some cute little drawing breaking the monotony of the yucky math? Sweetling did, that's who.

Toa of Boy is starting his kindergarten year. We're using the same curriculum program that Sweetling uses. This time I actually get to do the kindgergarten work. Sweetling pretty much skipped over that. The kindergarten curriculum is very hand's on, manipulitve based. That appeals to both Toa of Boy and his playful mother. We can totally sit down and play with blocks for math. Bring it on :) Toa of Boy is named for his love of his bionicles, his "all boy" nature, and his constant supply of energy. We brought Toa of Boy home from Guatemala at the end of May 2007. He completely changed our family dynamic, but its now strange to remember a time when Toa of Boy wasn't here.

I started homeschooling with my brother and sister when Sweetling was just a toddler. It was a concept that the Jedi and I had already been discussing as a possibility when Sweetling grew older. I have my degree in teaching, and I quit working to stay home once Sweetling was born. We knew we didn't want Sweetling in the regular public school, because we wanted our faith to be a central part of her education. When she was an infant, it seemed silly for me to go back to work later in order to pay the tuition for her to go to a private Christian school. I would be getting paid to teach other children so that I could turn around and pay someone to teach my own. (Then, when Sweetling was reading books independently before she was three, there was no way I could stick her in *any* kindergarten classroom where they were just learning the alphabet.)

As the Jedi and I were casually discussing our options, my sister, Smurf, began having problems in the public high school. After a great deal of discussion, I took on homeschooling Smurf and Baby Brother (who was going into third grade.) Vaya got thrown into that mix a couple of years later. So, for one crazy year, I had two teenagers and a preteen and a preschooler. Though, to be fair, Smurf unschooled herself, and that worked wonderfully for everyone involved. Then Smurf moved on to terrorize professors at the University level, which she is still doing. Vaya got a job and began taking on-line classes for certification as a veterinary assistant. And Baby Brother went back to the public middle school. (I still don't have peace about that one.) Sometime during those transitions, I started the formal curriculum with Sweetling, who just ate it up and clamored for more.

Were joining a curriculum based co-op this year, and I'm pretty pumped up about that. I get to teach the fifth grade composition class *BIG GRIN*. At one of their orientation meetings, the leaders were remarking about how the mothers that used the k-12 curriculum tended to be ones who liked structure and order and so their co-op always ran smoothly. I'm going to be a whirlwind blowing through their tidy little world. But I think I'll be forgiven, because composition is not going to be a drudgery anymore. Over my dead body is composition going to be an onerous chore.

Reading back over what I've written, I've decided that today was, after all, the perfect day to write about myself. I feel so much more at peace now than when I first started writing. I'm still really looking forward to some great scripture verses, so please share some!

1930's wife

Now, I would maintain that the very fact that I'm horsing around taking quizzes on the computer rather than doing the laundry, cutting and sorting the coupons, or helping Toa of Boy hang his artwork, would mean that I'm definitely not a 1930's wife. Nonetheless...

85 As a 1930s wife, I am Very Superior Take the test!

But it brings up the question, if you were born in any era other than this one, which era do you feel would be your best fit? I wouldn't pick the 30's. I would never have handled the Great Depression. Assuming that our family was reasonably well off, I think I could have handled the Victorian Era. If we had a housekeeper, and my only responsibility was to be a wife and a mother and to socialize with friends, yeah, yeah, I could have done that.

Compromising

Sweetling and Toa of Boy were in the living room playing a make-believe game with the webkinz. I was in the kitchen cooking or cleaning or something. My mother ears picked up the beginning of a disagreement, and so I tuned into the discussion in the other room. I was silently listening to see how they resolved the dispute, or to discern if they needed intervention. Here's what I overheard:

Sweetling: They are in a car going up and down a road with huge hills.
Toa of Boy: No, a plane.
Sweetling: No, they are in a car.
Toa of Boy: I want a plane.
Sweetling: Well, I want them to be in a car going up and down a road with huge hills.
Toa of Boy: How about a plane?
Sweetling: Toa!
Toa of Boy: How about they are in a car that can turn into a plane.
Sweetling: Ok, they can be in a car that can turn into a plane, but right now its a car going up and down a road with huge hills on it.
Toa of Boy: Ok.
(Pause and game recommences.)
Toa of Boy: Hmmm...I wonder what this button does?

(If you're missing the humor in the discussion...the button that Toa of Boy discovered was the button that turned the imaginary car into a plane. Sweetling, trapped by the compromise, went along with the new direction in the game. The game swiftly dissolved into pushing random buttons in the imaginary vehicle with each child making up all sorts of crazy results. Nevertheless, they both had a blast.)

Character of God

On what do I base my belief about the character and nature of God?

Do I base it on the promises of scripture? If so, then how do I reconcile what I perceive to be 'inconsistancies' between God's promises and the details of the unfolding of history? Why did God choose Jerobaum as a king of Israel? (For these questions were born out of my reading of 1 Kings 11-12.)

Do I base it on my own personal experiences? If so, then how do I know to trust God in times of trouble? If I say, I know God is good, because he has been good to me... Then what do I say when illness or difficulties come my way and I do not have immediate tangible evidence of God's goodness?

And yet, I know God is good. I trust Him even when I do not understand, will never understand the details of His plan. Do I simply say that my trust and knowledge of God's goodness is an blind act of faith? I am unsatisfied with that response. And yet the very nature of this dissatisfaction I cannot quantify. (Quantify is the wrong word there. Qualify? Explain? Bah.)

Do I place God on a scale and say His actions are more often good than bad? Never. Who am I to try to judge the Author of All? And like Job, if I can be so arrogant as to compare myself to Job, in the end I think that all my arguments and questions will come back to a single question which resounds with the truth of ages.

"Who is this that darkens my counsel
with words without knowledge?

3 Brace yourself like a man;
I will question you,
and you shall answer me.

4 "Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation?
Tell me, if you understand.

5 Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know!
Who stretched a measuring line across it?

6 On what were its footings set,
or who laid its cornerstone-

7 while the morning stars sang together
and all the angels shouted for joy?

It is, I think, no coincidence that the last few chapters of Job are among my favorite passages of scripture.

Mango's Fault

I had a dream last night which I am absolutely blaming on Mango. The blame is well placed.

So, in my dream, bread was on sale at Meijer's for 6 cents a loaf. I was freaking out, because I had just bought bread at Bigg's for $1.79 a loaf. Seriously, in my dream, I was beside myself. The remainder of the dream was spent trying to convince the Jedi that we needed to buy a freezer so that I could buy and freeze many loaves of 6 cent bread. We had this huge debate over how we could clean out the laundry room to fit a freezer in there.

Is that not the absolute height of patheticness?

Totally Mango's fault.

In other news, you can tell that school has started again, because here I sit sharing my lame dream with the world wide web while I wait for Sweetling to finish a math skills update.

Also, scotch tape does not stick to dust covered surfaces.

Aren't you glad I have time at the computer again?

What I Did This Summer

You all know consistency is not my strong point. Neither is spelling for that matter. My blog entries are sporadic even when I have to be sitting at my computer every weekday. In the summer, when I don't have to be at my computer...I'm not :P

But I can bring my blog up to speed with one epic post. This is a letter I wrote to my dear friend from high school. The Jedi used his awesome ways with the force to track her down for me, since we had lost touch in the *sigh* twenty years since high school. We got to see each other briefly in June, and have been in touch (a little bit) via email. Not a lot because its summer and I'm not sitting at my computer. Her blog name shall be Mme Presidente, for reasons she will immediately recognize. (Cause we all thought we were so funny in our high school French club). And because Awesome Supplier of Yummy Chocolate Chip Cookies was a rather long name to type. ;)

Anyway, here be the letter...

So, three weeks later, and I’m finally sitting down to write about my summer. I feel like I’m doing a September school report, “How I Spent My Summer.” Anyway, if you don’t mind, I think when I’m finished writing this, I’ll edit it and use most of it as a blog update, cause I’m just that lazy…and let’s be real, I’m never going to get around to writing twice today. (or even twice this month, for that matter).

You know from my blog my plan at the beginning of the summer to do a “space camp” theme. We absolutely did that, and it went *great*. The kids really got into decorating the fridge to be our mission control center. I cut sections out of colored paper and taped them together to make on sheet of paper with five colored sections in yellow, orange, red, purple, blue. At the top of each section I wrote a day of the week, then I laminated the paper. That was our dry erase board for our “shuttle flights”. Since Little Guy is working on learning to tell time, I also printed some blank clock faces, cut them out, and laminated them as well. For each “shuttle flight” I used sticky tack to put a clock face on that day, and drew clock hands to show what time we were leaving the house for that outing. We also each had a “pre-flight routine” and a “landing procedure”…which were our checklists for our morning and afternoon tasks. I got foil star stickers and kept a sheet of them on the fridge. Each day, when the kids finished the items on their lists, they put a star next to that item. At the end of the week, whoever had the most stars, got to pick a special activity that we all did together (like family game night, bike riding, pick a movie from blockbusters, make cookies, etc). And if they tied, or came close to tying, they each got to pick an activity. The whole system worked so well, and was enjoyed so much, we going to continue it through the school year. Sweetling has already planned out our “themes” for the different months and seasons. In August and September, we’re going to switch from Mission Control to Emergency Dispatch Center and have a safety theme.

Also on the fridge, we put the list of things we wanted to do this summer. I slipped it in a page protector, and each week, we tried to make sure that at least on of the activities made it into our flight plans. Then we put a check by the activity. We got most of our list checked off. Plus, we got to do many cool things that weren’t on the list. Some of the favorite extras were going on a cicada hunt, collecting fossils, holding Madagascar cockroaches (*I* did not do that, but the kids did), petting a baby alligator, participating in a hotwheels race, going to ‘the goody shop’ outdoor dairy whip, going to Young’s Dairy Farm and petting a cow and feeding a pig. Petting the cow was my own personal favorite, mostly because all the other mothers we were with told me it wasn’t going to happen. The trip to the dairy farm, which is up by Dayton, was organized by one of the moms at church. Several of us all caravanned up there. We ate lunch, and toured the petting farm. A few of us dug through our purses and found dimes for the kids to get goat feed out of a remodeled gumball machine. Little Guy feed his goat food to the pig, and was thrilled to death. The goats tried to eat the long hair of the girls in the group, and they were less than thrilled. We washed our hands at their outdoor sinks, and I insisted that I wanted to pet a cow. They had baby cows in the petting barn, but I wanted to pet a big cow. The other moms told me forget it, all the grown cows were way out to pasture. Which you know, was *exactly* the sort of encouragement I needed. So I went around the side of the barn to the fence and gate that led into the muddy milking yard. No, I did NOT climb the fence, Sweetling and Little Guy were with me after all. But I did stay by the fence and start talking to the cows which were milling about by the silo. Sure enough, after about ten minutes of coaxing, one of the cows came on over to the fence and let me and the kids pet her. That drew a crowd of other children, but she was the sweetest, gentlest cow and let everyone pet her. I went home that night and worried about that cow. Was she lonely? Were the diary workers nice to her? Did she have a name? Did anyone pet and love her every day? I told the Jedi about my worries. He just looked at me and said, completely serious, “We are not getting a pet cow.”

Every now and then it strikes me as highly ironic that I’m the “adult in charge” during the day. Not only am I responsible for my own dear ones every day, but adults who *know* me and who should know better regularly leave their children with me, whether its moms bringing their children over for a play date or girls for a home Bible study, or adults at church leaving me with the preschoolers or letting me lead the children’s musical practice. (After one such practice this spring, Pastor came over to me and asked if I was the one who had gotten his children all wound up. I looked him in the eye and asked, “Would *I* do that?” He got the biggest smile on his face and said, “Yes, yes you would.”) I mean really, there is no one here during the day to tell me that I can’t have s’mores for lunch. (I did have fudge pop-tarts and ice cream for breakfast once, but it wasn’t as yummy as it sounded.) Granted, Sweetling is always here, and in her little girl voice will tell me very matter of factly, “I don’t think that’s such a good idea, Mommy.” Case in point, we were having family cooking night, which happens on Mondays. We were making spaghetti together. The Jedi wasn’t home for work yet….it’s really for the best that the Jedi doesn’t witness many of these things first hand…. Anyway, I had the water boiling on the stove, and we were breaking the spaghetti over a big bowl on the table, then I was going to dump the spaghetti into the boiling water. Well, I decided it would be much more fun to karate chop the spaghetti. So, I held a small bunch of spaghetti, one end in each hand, and told Sweetling to karate chop through the group. Sweetling looked at me like I was crazy, and told me she really didn’t think it was such a great idea. I said, sure it was, it would work great. Watch, says me, Little Guy will do it. So I held the bundle of spaghetti out for Little Guy. He did indeed karate chop through the spaghetti, and on his downstroke, his hand hit the edge of the large plastic bowl. To say the bowl tipped wouldn’t be accurate. The bowl was turned into a catapult and little spaghetti pieces went *everywhere*. After a moment of stunned silence, we all burst out laughing. We salvaged the spaghetti pieces that were still on the table, and then, after some repositioning of where and how we held the spaghetti bundles, the kids took turns karate chopping through the rest of the spaghetti. And Little Guy, bless his little heart, is always the first to talk about my little misadventures for the day at the dinner table. “Daddy,” he will say, “Mommy almost hit a tree…” And then I’m left explaining, over Sweetling’s peels of laughter, why it was not my fault that the trees at the sculpture park were growing right up against the narrow strip of blacktop that passed for a road, especially when there were really cool sculptures on the other side of the road distracting my attention. We used to have a song that we sang, when my sister Smurf was living with us, that went “Don’t tell the Jedi, ‘cause he does not need to know, no, no, no…”

Sweetling, as you may have surmised, is very calm, quiet, and very intellectual. I would call her practical, but she has a bit too much of an absent-minded professor personality to be considered practical. She gets so absorbed in her own thoughts, that she completely loses track of where she is, or what she’s supposed to be doing. She can get sent into her room, to do a very simple task. I’ll come by twenty minutes later to check on her, and she’ll just be standing in the middle of her room thinking and completely oblivious to how much time has gone by. And yet, despite this, she’s still appreciates routines and structure. She doesn’t like spontenaity or free-style exploration. When we went to Eden Park, and got a little turned around, I said that we weren’t lost, we were exploring. Sweetling’s suggestion was, “next time, can we print a map from the internet?” She is a brilliant little girl, and I speak from more than just a bragging mother. One of her favorite books is “Geometry, Relativity, and the Forth Dimension.” Her favorite subjects are science and math (in which she starting her second year of Introductory Algebra.) Sweetling has spent most of her free time this summer on the computer. She’s been really into a website called Webkinz Insider. She writes short stories and poems and makes graphic art and whatnot to post on their forums.

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Little Guy, in contrast, is very outgoing, very energetic, very personable. I’m not tempted to call him practical, though he will make a great engineer or architect. He is an amazing builder. Amazing. He puts together these complex bionicle lego people by following their multi-page, step by step build booklet. He can also look at just a picture of a Lincoln logs structure and recreate the little ranch house complete with attached horse coral completely on his own. He’s close to learning how to read…I think that skill will completely fall into place in the next couple of months. But he does any “desk work” standing up at his desk, cause sitting still in a chair is just unbearable for him. I also keep a mini-trampoline in the living room because he is going to bounce on something while his watching his PBS kids shows. It can either by my couch or his trampoline…but the bouncing itself is just inevitable. And at five, he is quite the ladies man. At church a few weeks ago, I came out of my Wednesday night class to find that the preschool department had already dismissed, and they had left Little Guy with a very good friend of mine. Little Guy and my friend Telephone were hanging out at our little ‘café’ tables. At one of the tables, a group of three teenage girls were sitting. Little Guy had perched himself on one of the teenager’s laps and was having a great time going through the girls’ purses. He was eating their tic tacs, trying on their sunglasses, brushing their hair with their little hairbrushes, and getting them to take pictures of him with their cell phones. This sort of encounter is not that unusual for Little Guy. Just about wherever we go, Little Guy eventually has some girl or group of girls going out of their way to please and entertain him. We went to the Hamilton County Fair yesterday, and Little Guy scored a ride on the kiddie coaster with some cute little blond girl.

I’ve been considering coming up with a new blog name for Little Guy. Little Guy just doesn’t quite fit him anymore. He’s too grown up for it now. Plus, it doesn’t quite embrace the dynamic nature of his personality. I’ve tossed around several possibilities in my mind. Mr. Personality was pretty high up there on the list. The Jedi calls him “a regular Casanova” or “our little Don Juan”. Before he came home with us, I used the blog name of “Energy” because I just had this sense that it was going to fit our little boy. When we met him, I discarded Energy in favor of Our Little Guy. But now, I’m thinking Energy was still a close fit. He was an electron at our church costume party on New Year’s Eve. (Sweetling was a neutrino and I was a proton. The Jedi wore his UC chemistry lab coat and safety glasses). And the electron was very wisely chosen for him. So, I considered going back to Energy, or using Electron, Mr. Random, or Captain Chaos….but he isn’t really a source of chaos…he just has a lot of energy. Sweetling suggested Toa Boy, and a good friend on line, independently suggest Toa of something. (Toa’s are the guardian robot warriors in the bionicle world). I really like the suggestion. It fits him. Toa of Boy suits him. It describes his love for building, and bionicles are one of his favorite things right now. Plus the toa warriors all channel some form of energy or element, and he definitely channels energy. And he is in many ways, all boy.

Last week we had our vacation bible school at church. Which is the primary reason I didn’t get back to finishing this letter. VBS week is one of my favorite weeks of the year, but all other aspects of my life get shuffled to the side lines during VBS week. When the Jedi uploads the pictures from the camera, I’ll have to send you some, or put some up on my blog, or both. In the meantime, cause I think you’ll appreciate this, I’m on this site called “twitter.” It’s a micro-blog…which I’m more inclined to keep up with during the summer. I’ll send you some of my ‘updates’ from that, just cause I think you’ll find them an amusing snapshot of a day in my life.

So far today I have, scrubbed out a car seat and washed its cover (not mine), referred bionicle disagreements,.... tried to save our house from a veritable infestation of ants in the foundation cracks, but was thwarted by a broken nozzle on the... insecticide bottle. so I emailed the Jedi in a panic and told him our front stoop looked like something from a horror film….Now I'm going to make lunch for three little boys and a diappointed, lonely little girl. After lunch I'm going to hope 1pm comes quickly…Then I'm going to help Sweetling sew an elastic waist band in a skirt for a webkins, go get another spray bottle of insecticide from... the hardware store. Come home to spray my foundation. Then I'm taking kids on a rock collecting hike. (Just my kids). I don't know where yet…And tonight we're meeting with a life insurance agent about updating our policy. Read all these updates from bottom to top to make sense :)…. And somehow in all this I have lost my dish detergent. I took it outside when I was spraying and scrubbing a car seat. Now its gone….Add scraped off the burnt parts of the grilled cheese sandwiches to the list….And tried to convince a two year old ninja that he did not need extra sugar in his chocolate milk. Guess what my sanity outlet is today?

The other new thing in my life right now is that I’m taking Tae Kwon Do classes. I’ve had two weeks of classes so far. (It would have been three weeks, but I missed a week for VBS.) Sweetling has been taking Tae Kwon Do for a year and a half now, and the Jedi started taking lessons sometime last spring. I went to a safety seminar at church about a month ago and part of the seminar was some self-defense training. I hadn’t realized when I signed up that any mat-work was involved. I’ve always taken the attitude of, I need to be cautious and aware of my surroundings, because I’d never stand a chance if I actually got attacked. I thought I’d just be done for. I’m too small and weak, I thought, to ever really defend myself. But here I was a few Saturday’s ago. The instructor of the class had been a police officer, had worked for the FBI for a time, and now was back on the police force again training other officers in self-defense. He started the mat portion of the seminar by asking, “I’m 6’2” and weigh 240lbs. Do any of you think you could take me?” And the small group of church women just stared at him in stunned silence. He told us that he was not going to make the exercises easy for us. He promised us that we wouldn’t get hurt, but said he wasn’t going to either let go of us, or go down to make us feel good. He said he wanted us to know that if it were a real situation, we could really, truly get away from someone who had grabbed us. The only way we would know that fur sure would be to know that our practice sessions were are real as possible. And that meant that he wasn’t going to make it unrealistically easy for us. I was surprised and thrilled to discover that I did have a slim chance against an attacker that was bigger and stronger than me. (I managed to flip the instructor). I loved the sense of confidence and strength I walked away with after just that very basic practice in self-defense. The Jedi had asked me many times over the past few months if I would be interested in taking Tae Kwon Do classes with him. I always said no. I explained I would never be able to do the sparring practice. I would be, I was sure, too timid, too small, too wimpy for Tae Kwon Do. But after that Saturday class, I was ready to try the martial arts.

My first class was on a Tuesday. It was really, really physically demanding. I’m just not used to that amount of sustained activity level. Nevertheless, I kept up pretty well and was proud and excited about my accomplishment. The next day, however, I woke up and felt like I wasn’t going to be able to lift myself out of bed. I dragged myself through the day with the aid of motrin, and wondered whatever possessed me to put myself through that. I’m not sure I have ever been so muscle sore and tired other than after giving birth. Thursday I was marginally better, but I was still sore and still tired, and thought I would never, ever, make it through class that night. But, I did make it, and did fairly well. I was even more pleased then than I was after the first class. So, we signed me up for two months of classes. My intentions, during VBS week, were to keep up with the stretches and at least some of the forms and exercises so that I wouldn’t be back at square one. I did the stretches on Monday morning, but after that it just didn’t happen. I’m worried that come Tuesday I’ll be back at square one. I’ll try to squeeze in some time tomorrow and Monday to stretch and exercise, but I think even with that, Tuesday is going to be rough.

Next week is our last week of summer vacation. I’m hoping that all our books and curriculum arrive during the week, and that our on-line courses get activated so that we can start school on August 11th. I wasn’t going to put *anything* on our schedule for the week. I’m exhausted and really want the week of down time. But, likely our week will be filled soon enough. As it is, we’re going to the library on Monday, because Toa of Boy won the grand prize drawing for their summer reading program. We’re meeting the children’s librarian at 1pm and she’s going to take his picture and award him a gift certificate for a bike that he gets to pick out (I think from Toys R Us, but I’m not sure.) On Thursday, Sweetling and I are going up to church to help pack up school supply kits for our annual back-to-school give away. We’ll have 250 kits of school supplies that we give away on a first come, first served basis this coming Saturday to families in the area. And one of those days I want to get together with my friend Christopher Robin and watch a movie or just hang out. So, there’s three of my five “non-scheduled” days already booked out. Oh, and I want to let Sweetling have an end-of-summer sleepover. I don’t really want to do that on Friday night, but I don’t know what other night would work. Maybe Monday? Maybe Saturday and we could take the girls to church with us on Sunday. At any rate, last week of summer vacation for our family.

And, because you’re my good friend, I’ll tell you a secret I haven’t fessed up to anyone else yet. (Of course, since I’ll be posting this on my blog soon, the rest of my friends will find out soon enough.) For the past few weeks, on a fairly regular basis, I have been having the most vivid dreams about foster care. They’ve made me wake up nearly every morning really wishing there was a way we could become foster parents again. In each dream, I’m like an outside observer in the life of a child or a pair of siblings. I know so many details about them. I’ve witnessed what they’ve been through, I know their personalities and their hopes and fears. They each have a name, a face, a history that is so real and so known to me in the dream. And in each dream, these little children are being placed in the state foster care. And I know how desperately they need a loving family and a good home…and then I always wake up before I learn where they have been placed. Now, before we adopted Toa of Boy, we were discussing and praying about whether to pursue an international or domestic adoption. The Jedi, at one time, was leaning toward domestic. But, after having to deal with the process of foster care and social workers and agencies and forms and weekly visits and appointments and lack of any authority or say *I* had in the process and in the bureaucracy when Vaya was with us, I was very, very resistant to considering going back down that path again. I eventually came to a place of surrendering to God’s will through a great deal of tearful prayer, but three years ago, I just wasn’t ready to go through that again. Now though, now that I’m having these recurring dreams and I feel like I know and love these children who need a home, now I want to pursue foster care again. We can’t right now. We simply don’t have a bed or a bedroom to put another child in. So, why am I having these dreams if I can’t act on them?

And now, I need to go give Toa of Boy a bath and get him tucked into bed. It’s 8:23 and his bedtime is supposed to be 8:30. Let me know what happens with your interview for that teaching position!

Love,
Your long lost friend ;)

Moonwalks

Mornings

I'm never a huge fan of mornings. Yes, sunrise and birdsongs are beautiful, but do they have to happen so early? yesterday (Thursday...since I won't be publishing this today), I got up at seven (give or take 10 minutes...which means, in my case, give, always give). But despite my earnest desire to be out the door by 10, we weren't out the door till 10 till 11. Where did the morning go? I don't know.

This is my attempt to find out.

Friday 6:10. Woke up. Had to pee. (The only thing that would actually motivate me to get out of bed. Came upstairs. Had to wait for the bathroom to be open. Those of you with multiple bathrooms can't understand this phenomena. While waiting cleaned off kitchen whiteboard. Pee'd. Doctored my hand because the tiny puncture wound I got climbing a tree at VBS last night looked red and oozy. yes, yes, you did need to know that detail. Doctoring the wound involved finding the box of bandaids in the pile of CVS and Walgreens bags lumped on the floor of the living room after yesterday's grocery trip. Wrote this.

6:32-6:40 Resist desire to go back to bed. Instead write out weekend to do list on newly cleaned whiteboard. List goes like this....
---put away groceries...F
---make and do Sunday checklist...F, then Sun
---pack bag for food pantry...F
---sort Sweetling's fall clothes...Sun
---buy Ninja's b-day present...F
---go to Meyer...F
---clip and sort coupons...Sun
---finish letter to Mme Presidente...F
---send photos to winkflash and order...ha ha
---August budget...F

6:40-6:49 Why is keeping the Sabbath the only one of the ten commandments I just don't prioritize enough to keep regularly. It shouldn't be a hard one. Especially for me. C'mon, a divinely mandated day off? Woo hoo! I should have no problem, no problem, keeping *that* one. And yet, every weekend, there's just this one project that *has* to be done on Saturday. Looking over my list to see what can get done on Friday (ha ha) and what can get dune on Sunday. Editing list. How realistic is it? Not at all. Not at all Sam-I-Am. I need a friend to whom I can give the blog name Sam-I-Am.

6:49- 7:33 Bathroom is open again. Going to get a shower.

7:33-- 7:36 Got a shower. Got dressed. Put my hair in a pony tail. Redoctored my hand, because, of course, the bandaid came off in the shower. And, of course, I had to go dig the box of bandaids out of the pile of plastic bags in the living room (again.) This time I wised up and put the bandaids in the bathroom medicine chest. Very hungry. Debating between sitting down with breakfast and devotions and getting some groceries unpacked. Going to opt for the groceries. Maybe I'll set my timer for 15 minutes. FlyLady would be proud. I'm even dressed to my socks and shoes.

7:53-- Got 5 of 6 paper bags in the kitchen put away in the downstairs pantry. Started packing a bag for the food pantry as I went. Sweetling's awake. Thinking of turning on the AC. It's already hot. We're going to be gone for most of the day, but if I don't turn on the AC now, the house is going to be *sweltering* by the time we get home. The AC will never catch up. Closing windows, turning on AC. Then having breakfast and doing devotions.

8:17--8:19 Didn't have breakfast. Instead closed windows, turned on AC and set the timer for 15 minutes. Got dishwasher unloaded and mountain of dishes in sink in dishwasher. Put pots and pans in to 'soak' b/c decided it was just too difficult to wash them without getting my right hand wet. Cleared off counter and wiped down stove and counter. Told Sweetling she couldn't read her book on the brain till after her morning list was done. Mean mommy. Doing breakfast now.

8:49--Had breakfast. Made little guy breakfast. Going to read Little Guy's devotions to him now.

8:58--Ready to go back to bed now. :( Really going to put breakfast dishes in dishwasher, brush my teeth, and start packing lunches.

Yeah, well, Mango called at about ten after nine. We managed to get out of the driveway at 9:33. I wanted to be leaving at 9:20 at the latest. Not bad. Not great.

Its 10:16 now, and we've pretty much been gone all day. I'm exhausted and I'm going to eat an eggroll. I can't check a single thing off my "get done Friday" list. Oh, oh, no, I bought the birthday present.