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!