I am sick in bed today. Mostly in bed, anyway. I feel fluish, and it stinks. I don't have time to be sick. Who does? I'm also trying to get used to my glasses and a head cold doesn't help. The pressure on my nose makes it worse. Anyway. here I sit. Laptop in the bed and nothing much to say. I received the last shipment of school books so I'm ready to really get going on schoolwork. I'm using First Language Lessons with Reid and Ryan (5 and 6). This morning I introduced the girls (general term used for Katey and Alicia, 16 and 14, but not including Sidney; she gets to go by her name most of the time) to Henle Latin. It will take some getting used to and will definitely not be a piece of cake. Hopefully I'll be able to learn with them, but I'll also be coaching Morgan and Sidney through Martha Wilson's Latin Primer 1. 

A useless bit of trivia: Starbucks baristas are not allowed to stir your coffee beverage; not even if you ask them to. Apparently, it is company policy. At Caribou, they will stir only if asked. I have not polled patrons of  any other coffee shops, so I cannot comment on the stirring policy of your favorite java joint . Feel free to do your own investigating and let me know if this is a universal taboo. In the meantime, be sure to stir your mocha, lest you drink syrup when you reach the bottom.

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I don't actually have a fever, but the head cold that's been going around hit me suddenly today. My nose is stopped up and running at the same time. The sinus headache is made worse by the glasses I got yesterday. I can see a lot better, but they are bothering me. Anyway, there is my bellyaching. Now, what's new?

We had our first week of school this week, and it didn't go especially well, but I wasn't expecting it to. I don't have a schedule up yet, and it is going to take some time to get into a groove that works and allows me to get everything done. We didn't do all our subjects. Only a few in fact. This week we'll have Monday off and I had planned to have Tuesday off as well, because my brother and his wife are visiting. They will probably leave Monday evening now, so we'll be able to regroup and get something done that day. I did get my FlyLady zones printed out so I can post them and get back on that schedule.

I feel yucky. I think I'll turn in. I cannot really think of much to say.  

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Here I am back again. On the same day, too. I think I have just time enough to record the events of Tuesday last. It was an unusual day first because we went shopping. Not grocery shopping, mind you, but shoe shopping. A rarety but Katey needed some shoes pretty badly. I didn't really want to get out, but I figured we may as well get that marked off the "to-do" list. Matthew was here, as he has been the last few Tuesdays. He is nearly three and he stays with us some. His mom is a children's minister. Anyway, we loaded Matthew in the van and Katey, Sidney and I went shoe shopping. About seven stores later she found some acceptable brown flats and some white ones, too. I got a pair of flip flops from the Bass Outlet. I love Bass shoes but don't have the budget for them usually. These were on clearance, as was much of the store. Even on clearance they were about $17 for the plainest leather- thonged flip flops they had. So that was that. We came home successful, Matthew behaved fairly well, and the van smelled like fast food.

Later we had a tragic death of one of the goats. It was Katey's goat and Katey's dog that killed it. I knew it would happen sooner or later. He had been trying since she arrived. It's a good thing we bought this dog for a pet because he is certainly a terrible representation of his breed. The details need not be recorded, but it was sad and the lone goat must go back to her previous owners because she is very lonely.

Later that night we were getting ready for bed- it was about 9:00- when we heard a helicopter. I thought this unusual because it was dark. I walked into the girls' bedroom and could see the helicopter out the window. I said to Katey, "Why don't you wave because that thing is so close they can probably see you". As I processed what I had just said and realized it really was close enough to see us, it kept getting closer and closer and then turned sideways so that big spotlights were shining at our house. At this point I called in Chad and so there were eight faces at the window looking at this helicopter that was, literally, right in front of our upstairs windows. I couldn't read anything on the side of the chopper because of the lights. Chad went downstairs and called 9-1-1 to see if there was an escaped convict or something, but the lights were shining into the house, not in the woods behind the house so escaped cons didn't seem likely. The dispatcher didn't know anything and asked if we'd like an officer to come out and talk to us. Not knowing what good that would do, he said that wouldn't be necessary. We never will know, I guess, what it was. I was uneasy the next day, expecting cops to raid my house thinking we were growing pot or something. Who knows?

That was Tuesday. It's time to read now, but I found a great quote today that I would like to share. It is so applicable for moms, especially homeschool moms. It's in the book The Deadliest Monster by Jeff Baldwin.  Jeff is talking about dying daily and he says:

                       Like lighthouse keepers, the toughest part of our work is vigilance- doing our                                             duty every day and night, even when we don't feel like it, for years and years.               Christians must work hard today, and then, whether we [feel like it or not] work hard again tomorrow.

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I made quite a display of selfish pigism last night. Oh, the woes I loudly expressed and the extent to which I pitied myself and expected pity from everyone else. No, of course I am not ready to start school on Monday. We are starting anyway, but it has not been a good week for planning and of course I am convinced it is all because my children are uncooperative. So last night I ascted like a big baby, and it really wasn't even triggered by school related stress. Looking back now in the light of day I cannot even remember what all I griped about. The van window was left down and we had an awful storm. I had to take the little ones to my parents' house so I could take the big girls to the north side of Atlanta today for Ceili band practice. I had to come back home and get pullups because they didn't pack them, even though they were told to. Somehow some other little things were added to that and it turned into a fit. It didn't help that the day before someone dumped a whole glass of water on my schedule and all the little pieces of paper I had cut out and labeled with everyone's activities. And it didn't help that we had been gone all Friday doing stuff for them (little ungrateful brats) and all I get is whining when we get home. And they want me to cook supper of all things. Who do they think I am ? Oh, I know who I am. Don't think I'm actually being serious. I am the mother. THE MOTHER. The nurturer. The chief cook and bottle washer. The foreman of this place. "Who put you in charge of this outfit?" if I may quote O, Brother Where art thou? The good Lord gave me these wonderful people. Me, a sinner in need of a savior.  And like Paul, I know darn well what I should do, I just plain don't do it. Weak fleshly creature that I am, and full of excuses. So, again I resolve to do better, and again I'm sure I'll get to 5:00 and another brother battle and undone sink of dishes and play the martyr again. I should win an Academy Award for the martyr role. I am sooooo good at it. It is probably my biggest vice that I should work on but isn't noticeable by most. It's one of those sins that is mostly secret because it's all in my thoughts. Made all the more potent, though, by the way I sometimes entertain the thoughts of pity.

Okay, on to better topics. I am tired of talking about that. I just finally joined HSLDA. After 12 years of homeschooling, it is about time.  I have gotten some school planning done and besided waiting on a few things from Rainbow Resource we're ready to get started. We certainly need the structure to our days .

I have unexpected company so I will pause. Hopefully I will find another moment or two to relate the evenful week we've had. If I don't I'll be sure to forget it.  

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I have two weeks to get the year together. For me, the more I do now, the easier it will be. I can say I can do it as I go, but I know me and it won't happen. I never seem to get he time to sit down and evaluate how we're doing and plan the next month. So, I've been to the copy store, and I've been working on an overview for each kid. Tomorrow, I'll be having a meeting with each of the older ones to go over their goals for the year and help them take ownership of the things they need to learn this year. 

It helps that I have three pairs, basically, who do a lot of the same things.  I've decided to try Easy Grammar 4th and 5th with both Morgan (who is 5th grade) and Sidney (who is third). I think it should go fine. I've copied worksheets for the preposition unit as well as capitalization and punctuation. We'll get through those slowly and go from there.

Reid and Ryan will be doing pretty much everything together.  Hopefully Reid will not be too frustrated. Ryan usually answers before him.

Katey and Alicia will be doing Literary Lessons From Lord of the Rings. It will be our literature for the entire year. That was tough to get my mind around for a while, even though I know it's plenty to keep us busy. But since we do history and literature together chronologically, I had a list of Modern period books for them to read this year. It's okay, though. We will thoroughly enjoy this study and maybe we'll just read the modern books next year and do geography instead of going back to Ancients. I don't think it'll hurt anybody.  Katey needs to finish her government and economics anyway and she could spend her senior year finishing up a lot of things.

I'll keep posting as the planning goes on this week.

I still need to explain the "Potter problem". Hmmm. . another day. Now, I'm going to read The Hobbit aloud. It's our current family reading. It's too hot to be outside so we decided to go ahead and start. We usually only do it in winter. With exceptions, and I always read to the little ones. We're still reading Wind in the Willows during the day. I just love that book. It's such a wonderful picture of friendship.

There is a goat in my house. I must go discourage that. Tata.

Happy reading.

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I have been reprimanded for not posting. I haven't had time, though there has been no lack of hilarity around here to post on. I cannot think of any right now, of course. Literarily, if that is a word, I am reading aloud to the little three from The Wind in the Willows, and Alicia got a nice hard bound copy of Little Women for her birthday (from me). We are gearing up to do Literary Lessons From The Lord of the Rings this year and we are currently having some Harry Potter issues, which will have to be discussed in a later post.

As for the picture of Rabbit, I just chose him because he is the 100 Acre Wood character I am most like. No, that is not necessarily a positive.  I must now retire and promise to post more this week as I am doing school planning. We are set to begin our new year on the 27th of August. 

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Since I have not changed my description on the side bar there, I'd better say something about food and literature. I don't think I've ever said anything profound, unless I am quoting someone else.  I suppose my profound thought for today, which isn't mine originally but it is good, would be that homeschooling is about steady plodding. Once you've made some major goals for your children, determined their learning style, decided on your education style and chosen the curriculum, you just have to do it. It's about doing the next right thing. There aren't fireworks very often. At least not the kind that are celebrating the wonderful job you're doing. You just have to get up everyday with those goals in mind, seek the Lord's guidance and get to it.  "Just keep swimming", as Dory would say. 

Okay, back to food and literature, which I guess are my two favorite things. I don't like food in great quantities, but excellent food is quite enjoyable. Tonight I am making Chicken Caesar pasta, so here is the recipe:

2 large boneless skinnless chicken breats, cut up as for stir fry 

1 pkg mushrooms, sliced

1 bag or 1 bunch spinach, washed and spun dry

1 box bowtie noodles

1 bottle Caesar dressing ( I use Cardini's. Don't use Kraft or something really white and creamy)

Saute the chicken in a few tablespoons of dressing. Add the mushrooms and cook until the chicken is done. Meanwhile bring your water to boil for the noodles. Add the rest of the bottle of dressing and the spinach to the chicken and mushrooms and cover and turn off the heat. Pour  the noodles in the boiling salted water.  When they are done drain them and add to the sauce. That's it.

Okay, literature. Alicia (13) is currently reading The Portrait of A Lady, by Henry James. Katey (16) is finishing up Sherlock Holmes, and plans next to read Anna Karenina. I, on the other hand, am not reading anything at the moment. I tried Uncle Tom's cabin but, knowing what happens, essentually, I couldn't get into it. I have discovered happily that Jeff Baldwin has a Great Books website. I really like his writing on literature and he has written a book about worldviews. I cannot recall the exact name offhand, but it has the word monster in it. He uses, appropriately for an English major, Frankenstein and Jekyll and Hyde as metaphors for the worldview discussion. I will add links later for those things. Now I must go finish supper.

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So I've volunteered to plan Moms' Nights Out for our homeschool group next school year. Sounds fun. Now I just have to do it. I don't like planning field trips and don't really need any co ops so MNO was a good thing for me to do. I like Mom's Night Out. It's fun. So I'm trying to think of things to do: I want a good mix of serious and fun. Fun will be easy. There are plenty of fun things to do.  Serious probably won't be too hard either. So far I've decided that we'll have a kick off at my parents' pool. They have lots of chairs and a gazebo with a counter for snacks so that will be a fun way for people to get aquainted or catch up. We'll follow that in September with a guided discussion on getting organized. Well, actually staying organized would be better. Getting organized isn't all that hard. It's maintaining that's the problem. I plan to make up an outline and try to have at least one person to share how they've been successful in each different area on the outline. For October I think lapbooking will be the topic; I just don't know what we'll do yet. I think I can borrow a video and show some examples of lapbooks we've made. That way it's free. In November or early December we'll take some sort of field trip. Something you wouldn't want to do with kids. Maybe something for the holidays. January will be a soup supper with a speaker, whom I have not yet scheduled. I have no budget, so it needs to be someone willing to come on a love offering basis, which means they need to be local. That's as far as I've gotten on that. Now I need to start planning my school year and see what I still need to buy. I'd better blog about that so I can look back next year and see how I did and how much time I spent on things that didn't work out. No, I'm not being negative; just realistic. We could probably take half a school year to finish last year's plans. And they weren't really too much to get done in a year. I should have this down by now. This is year 12 in this homeschool thing.

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Well, my modem got fried last week by lightning. It took a couple days to get the new one to work right when I got it. This weekend was nice. Our dear friend Caitlin is a graduate and we attended her homeschool graduation festivities Saturday afternoon. I have a lovely picture of her to frame and display.

In church today, when it was time for the young kids to go to bible class, Ryan walked right up to the pastor and whispered something to him. Scary moment. You never know what he is going to say and we have not been able as of yet to teach him to be respectful of adults. He is not rude, but has no problem talking to adults as if he were equal. So, we held our breath to see what the pastor was going to do. He whispered something back to Ryan and he ran on his way. Pastor Jeff looked up grinning and asked if we knew what he said. We replied that we didn't want to know. "Oh, we're gonna know," he grinned as he waited for Ryan to get out of the door. He then told the entire congregation that Ryan said he couldn't sing those songs today. I don't think we sang any that he knew, so it bothered him. Everyone laughed, and we moved on.

I go now to read Winne the Pooh and get ready to start another week.

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There's a pretty sad state of affairs here in Georgia. The fires continue to burn in the south of the state. Here is the most recent email I received about it:

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