Remember the time I said that and I meant that we were moving across the country to start a new life in the Pacific Northwest? Yeah, this isn't like that. This time I'm just changing the address of my blog. Please move with me and reset your bookmark and all that jazz! I'll miss you way too much if you don't come along.
~ The kids and I were driving somewhere in the car and Baylee was telling us all about how God created Adam out of clay and then breathed the breath of life into him. Zach replied in the driest possible voice, "Oh. So he was like Gumby then."
~ A little while ago Drew said, and I quote, "That Billy Gates and his big ideas! Creating something that connects computers all around the world!" I mean, I have no idea if Bill Gates actually created the internet, but that's beside the point. The real question is: Who the heck's grandmother did Drew just channel and why???
~ A couple days ago Zach noticed a little boy huddled on the neighbor's porch in the rain and growing dusk. We kind of know him because our neighbor babysits him occasionally, but he's not one of the kids my kids hang out with on a regular basis. Apparently on that particular day the neighbor forgot all about the commitment she had and wasn't home. The poor kid walked to her house from school only to find it locked and empty. He had no phone and no idea what to do. I told Zach to run over and bring him home to our house, and I watched him for a couple hours until his mom showed up from work. There's just something very scary about that whole picture.
~ "Watching TV with swimming goggles on, of course. Why do you ask?"
~ He's starting to look so tall and grown up to me suddenly. He's not my baby anymore. Wait. Yes, he is. He'll always be that little guy with the bright blonde hair that stuck up like a mohawk and the blueberry eyes.
~ Baylee reading to her "children," as she says. I love that she loves her dolls. I never liked dolls all that much when I was a little girl, so it's fun to see her so into them.
~ The Game of Life, some assembly required. *Cat sold separately.
The one time something exciting happens in church and I miss it because I'm in a different part of the building helping with the children's choir. Mike told me there was a woodpecker outside on the roof today, pecking at something metal on and off through the entire service. The congregation would sing, then ting ting ting ting ting! Ting ting ting! The guest missionary speaker would pray, "Dear Lord..." Ting ting ting! "...we ask you today..." Ting ting ting ting ting ting!
I so wish I could've been there. The missionary did say, though, that he's from Africa and if we think a little thing like a woodpecker is going to make him lose his concentration, we'd better think again. And sure enough he did go fifteen minutes over.
You know that mushroom I was happily snapping pictures of? I got curious tonight and googled "orange mushroom white spots." It led me to a website about poisonous mushrooms, with a huge picture of a mushroom just like my mushroom right on top as a banner!!! Come to find out it's called an Amanita and its poison is one of the most deadly types found in nature. In fact, the website says, " Amanitas are the reason why there are no old, bold mushroom hunters." And this thing is growing in our front yard under the pine tree! Not that I think anybody's going to pop it into their mouth, but still. It's just really weird that we were all fascinated by it, not realizing how dangerous it is. There's gotta be a Sunday School lesson in there somewhere.
Lately the cat sleeps with Baylee every night. It's weird. One day it couldn't stand her, the next it was sleeping with her. What I think is cute, though, is the fact that she covers it with doll blankets. Not only does the cat put up with this, but it'll actually spend the whole night there.
In other news, look at this disgusting mushroom that's growing in our front yard.
First of all I want to say thank you to everyone who responded to my last entry, both as comments here and privately. You guys really encouraged me and gave me some stuff to consider.
Secondly, I just have to say that I'm really excited about our new president for one reason: No more email forwards from my Democrat friends! I cannot tell you how sick I am of getting "I hate Bush, pass it on" emails. I mean, what's up with that? Why do people think that I want to hear all their latest feelings on politics, especially when they know I'm a Republican? Are they trying to use cheesy email forwards to convert me? I actually had to flag someone I know as "spam" because it got so irritating. Of course, that person had no idea I spammed him. That would be rude.
Have any of you other women found that the older you get, the worse you're able to cope with PMS? I'm really wondering and I'd love to hear your thoughts. I'm 37, so I know I haven't started menopause...right? Or perimenopause? My mom didn't start all that until she was in her fifties, I think, so there's no history of being early. But I feel stressed out and worn thin a lot of the time. What's going on with me? Is it PMS? It does seem to get worse around that time. Is it spiritual? Or is it simply that I AM stressed out and worn thin? I feel like lately I'm going through the motions in sort of a semi-detached way. Like if I don't stay in "Do not bother me. Do not stop me. Just let me get my work done." mode, everything will all fall apart, including me.
Yesterday was such a bad day. Right off the bat in the morning Zach started up. He's got a terrible attitude about going to the clinic right now and Mondays are awful because of it. He told me he wakes up and his first thought is, "Clinic day," and he spirals into the mood from hell. And who do you think gets the brunt of that? So I'm dealing with him, trying very hard to maintain my cool while I teach him about transitive and intransitive verbs, and the doorbell rings. It's Puget Sound Energy wanting their money. But here's the thing. They made a mistake. Our meter wasn't working quite right when we moved in here and, of course, not being meter readers we didn't know. Who could know that? Finally a year and a half later they figured it out and suddenly wanted all the money they failed to collect. Right now. Luckily we had it, but still, that's not a great day maker.
Then we went to the clinic and Zach had his session. Afterward, as always, I went in for a short conference with his teacher, just the two of us. Usually these talks take five minutes during which time we quickly discuss what they accomplished that day and how I can utilize it at home. This time I was in there for twenty minutes, mostly discussing Zach's struggle right now with attitude. I'm glad she has Kleenex on her desk, because I broke down and cried in there, which I've never done. I guess Zach told her that he no longer has a disability, and when she asked him why he thinks that he said, "Because I don't want to have anything wrong with me, so I don't. I decided." He's in denial and is having a bad time of it, and because of that it's a thousand times harder to teach him. I cried because sometimes it feels so hopeless...like I'm looking into a bottomless pit. I feel like we'll never make enough of a difference for him to be able to leave home someday and live successfully. The good thing is that his teacher understands and is able to offer support. She let me cry and said nice things. Then she decided that she, Zach, and I are going to have a meeting together next week to talk with him about his attitude and to kindly tell him some things he needs to hear, things that sometimes are more effective coming from someone who's not your mom. And maybe he'll open up, too, and share where he's at. It could be a really good thing.
And finally yesterday, to top it all off, I broke a wisdom tooth. It already had a filling, so I guess the thing to do now is have it removed. Ugh. Just what I needed.
So. What's going on with me? Stress? Sometimes I feel like I should be able to deal with things like this without it affecting me. I wonder if I'm just more highly strung than other people. I even started taking B Complex vitamins because I read on someone's blog (Thank you, Camille!) that it helps with mood. So far all I've noticed is that it's turned my pee neon yellow.
Anyway. Do you ever feel like this? It would help me to know.
Today I was asked by Baylee and Drew's choir director if I'd consider coming to the practices and lending a hand with the musical this year. Specifically she asked if I'd help kids with their acting. I agreed happily and started right away this morning. Oh my goodness, it was so much fun! I LOVED it. Honestly, though, I have no idea how the director discovered I have some acting experience or what she thinks I might've done in the past. Today she told the kids, "This is Mrs. ---- and she's worked with kids in plays before, so she'll be helping us!" Errr....I've never actually done that. I've been in plays...with adults. Lots of them. I was in three college plays (I had the lead in one.) and then after I got married I joined Master Arts Theatre in Michigan. Plus I've done lots of church drama. But I've never helped other people and I've never worked with kids.
Oh well! I'm not even going to say anything. I'm just going to pitch right in and do what I can. Today I got to give input on a scene with several children and I found myself channeling Pris, my old director from Master Arts. Her big thing was always that acting is every bit as much what you do what you're not speaking as what you do when you are. You have to be in the moment. Don't anticipate. Listen as if it's the first time you're hearing it. Speak as if the thoughts are forming in your mind. Make the audience believe the lines are really yours. I don't remember exactly how I put that to the kids, but they really picked up on it and suddenly that scene came alive. It was so great to watch!
Man, it seems like we did a ton of Halloween-oriented stuff these past few days. On Wednesday the kids carved their pumpkins, then Mike's mom came over and we all went to our church's Harvest Festival for supper and a carnival. I have to tell you the embarrassing thing that happened to me there, though. We'd been there a couple hours and we were having a good time. The kids played lots of games and I won a cake...well, actually a box of Cinnabons, which is even better...in a cake walk, but finally it was about time to go home. I found Mike talking to some other guy and I started walking over to him to ask if he was ready to leave. The only thing is that I was walking and talking to Mike's mom at the same time and so I wasn't paying really close attention to what I was doing. I got to Mike and put my hands around his bicep and kinda cuddled up really close to him. Then he looked at me and I looked closely at him...and oh my gosh it wasn't Mike. It was the other guy! I was like, "I thought you were Mike! I'm so sorry!" He was very nice and he and Mike both got quite a laugh out of it, but still. Oh my gosh.
Friday Drew realized that he didn't have a Halloween costume, even though I'd taken him to two different stores this past week and warned him he really should make some kind of choice. The following is the result of leaving it to the last minute:
It says, "I went to the costume store and all I got was this lousy t-shirt." He loved it. He thinks it's the best costume he's ever had. In fact, next year he plans to make another one that says, "This IS my costume. Deal with it."
On Friday afternoon the neighbor boy, Jacob, came over as he does almost every day and he spent a couple hours playing, and somehow that turned into having supper over here and going trick-or-treating with us. And then somehow that turned into just going ahead and spending the night. The boys had a great time with him. After trick-or-treating they all ate themselves sick on candy while watching Journey to the Center of the Earth, then they camped out in their room and "gambled" with their Halloween stash. A good time was had by all...except Mike. He's the one who got to stay up keeping an eye on things until the boys dropped off to sleep in the wee hours of the night.
Have you guys seen this? It's all over Facebook and I've seen it on various blogs. It's a website called Yearbook Yourself where you can plug your face into different hairstyles going all the way back to the '50s. Last night Mike's mom was here and we had a good laugh messing around with it.
Here's me in 1954, followed by my steady, Mike. Don't we make a handsome pair? The only trouble is I missed a couple pieces of hair when I rolled it that morning.
Here we are in 1960, still madly in love and on the cutting edge of fashion.
The rest of the '60s was rather a blur for me...too much hairspray I think.
1964
1966
(Oh my gosh, it's my mom's senior picture!)
Luckily I caught up with my man again in 1970, just in time to see him rocking the plaid suit coat and combover!
The '80s were a tough decade for me. Here's me in 1982. Need I say more?
And finally the '90s. Here's where I decided that more than anything in the world I wanted to be my college dorm RD, Lisa.
And Mike decided...er...something else.
So go try it yourself! It's fun! Here's the website: Yearbook Yourself
...But I have to talk about our dessert meeting we went to last night. We met with two other couples in a gorgeous home to discuss the social events our peer group is going to put on over the next year. Both couples were wonderful, classy people, the dessert was delicious, and the meeting went well. We got a lot accomplished. But I walked out of there feeling like the biggest dufus ever. Why? Because somehow Mike and I, mostly Mike, ended up discussing all of our aches and pains with these people! I mean, what??? Who does that? But we did! We were total boors! Ohhhh, the agony of the memory.
It all started when the six of us were standing in the kitchen of this place and somehow the conversation came around to allergies. Oh, I know what it was. The people whose house it was had a little dog and they wanted to know if we were allergic to it. We said no and it should've been left at that, right? You'd think it would be. But one of the women pressed further, asking if we had any allergies whatsoever. Well. That was Mike's cue to talk all about his trouble with processed food and exactly what happened to him last time he ate the chili at the church potluck. I felt like I was in one of those bad dreams where you're trying to run but your body is moving in slow motion. In my head I'm chanting "Please don't talk about diarrhea. Please don't talk about diarrhea." He didn't, but it was touch and go for awhile there. Finally he finished up that story and the spotlight turned on me. "Do you have any allergies?" they wanted to know. "Well, yes." "What kind? Please, enlighten us!" So I admitted that I do have an anaphylactic reaction to certain preservatives. I tried being vague, oh, I tried! But one of the people there...nicest woman in the world...is a question asker from way back, and somehow she got me talking about how the first time I had an episode we didn't know what was going on and an ambulance was called. Oh my goodness, somehow that was like pulling the lever on a slot machine and having hundreds of quarters pour out. The questions just rained down. "What was it like? Would you recommend it or do you think driving yourself to the hospital is better? How did it make you feel being loaded into one? Was it embarrassing? What about the expense?" I mean, I tried changing the subject. I even tried moving to a different room. There was no deterring her. Finally I was like, "Wow. Umm. You really have a thing for ambulances." That seemed to stem the tide a little.
Seriously, though. We have to find a new church. I can't face those people again.
Today the kids and I decided to skip school and make it a "Project Day, " the project being to switch bedrooms so that the boys share a room and Baylee has her own. It's been on the agenda for awhile because Baylee and Drew are getting too old to be together. But holy cow it turned out to be a huge job. Who knew those kids had so much junk?! And then there was the fiasco with not being able to get Zach's desk from one room to the other. (Me on phone: "Uhhh...honey? Are you at the office? Could you come home for ten minutes? No reason. Well, except Zach's desk is sort of wedged in the doorway...) Anyway, it's done now and both rooms look really nice. Oh, and Baylee has a brand new (to her) desk!
By the way, Libby Louise, the doll leaning against the wall, is now a double amputee. Baylee loves her, though, and always props her up where she can watch the action.
On Wednesday night our car was vandalized. Somebody smashed one of the backseat windows with a rock or something and left a softball-sized hole. When I sent Zach outside the next day to see what "that weird white thing is all over the window of the car, " it all fell into a million pieces as soon as it was lightly touched.
Anyway, it's taken care of. I filed a police report and Mike brought the car to a glass repair shop. One hundred sixty dollars later it's over. But it's hard to let it go, you know? It's hard to not wonder why. Was it a random act? Was it Halloween season destruction? Or was it personal? Nothing in the car was touched or stolen.
Part of me can laugh about it a little. I was talking to my friend Angie the next day and I mentioned to her that even though this is a decent neighborhood, we've had trouble. This summer one of the boys had his bike stolen, and more recently we've had firewood taken from our backyard shed. She listened to my worries and then gently told me that it sounded like small-time kid stuff. Nothing serious. I acted incredulous. "What are you telling me, Angie? Are you saying you don't think we're the target of some kind of crime ring?!"
But another part of me feels a little scared. The same day the car was broken into, our pet, Cooper, didn't come home. Now this is a cat, so okay...I guess...even though he always comes home before we go to sleep at night. I was uneasy. Then Mike voiced what I was trying to push down. "What if someone is messing with us?" I knew exactly what he was saying and refused to hear anymore. "Honey, no! You don't really believe that!" And we both fell asleep uneasy. Mike woke up before the alarm and I knew it was to see if our kitty came home. He did, of course. He was waiting at the front door, a little put out that we didn't wait up for him.
It's been a few days now and it's okay. Most of the icky feelings have worn themselves out, and seeing the new shiny window on the car helps. It's almost like it didn't happen. Almost.
I was going to show this picture of Drew teaching Baylee how to play the guitar, and it was going to be a nice Wordless Wednesday post, but then I felt chatty. So now it's a Wordless Wednesday post with words. What can I say? I'm a rule breaker. (Not really. Actually, I'm one of those people that gets very nervous when anyone even thinks of breaking rules.)
Drew is really loving guitar class. He and Zach both go every Monday, but Drew seems to be the one who's constantly messing around with it and practicing. He's getting callouses on his fingers from playing the one song he knows so far, Louie Louie, so many times every day. To give him credit, he told me he also knows several "power chords, man!"
Even though Drew's the one who has taken off, both boys really enjoy the class. The guy who teaches it has several kids sitting at desks in a regular classroom, and he stands in the front by the chalkboard lecturing and demonstrating. All the kids have to listen and do what he says. It's a good experience for my homeschooled kids, and just a well run operation all the way around.
In other news, today's a busy day. We all got up earlier than usual and started school an hour and a half ahead of schedule. Around here that means we started at 8:00 instead of 9:30. (Does that sound decadent or organized? I have no frame of reference.) The reason we did that was to be completely done with school before we started a new activity we're trying, which is a "kid exchange." I drove over to my friend Marcie's house, dropped off Baylee, and picked up her son Nicholas. Baylee is playing over there with Marcie's 3rd grade daughter, Grace, for a few hours this afternoon, while Nicholas, who's in 5th grade, is playing with Zach and Drew over here. So far, so good! The boys have been ripstiking outside and I haven't had to do a thing except hand them a sleeve of Ritz crackers. Next week it'll be the girls over here and the boys over there.
A man came and fixed the washing machine again this morning. That makes the 5th time they've sent someone over here to repair it in order to honor the one year warranty. Now, mind you, this is a brand new machine, just purchased in January. It's a dud. Anyone in the world would have to admit that by now you'd think, but no. This place would rather spend literally thousands of dollars in parts and labor rather than bite the bullet and give us a new washer. Mike has been complaining up and down, but they told him they'd have their "committee take it under advisement." Something tells me they don't even have a committee. Their committee is probably one balding guy wearing a wife beater t-shirt who chomps on a cigar and says things like, "I'll tell you what you can do with your so-called dud." Anyway, today the machine broke again after one load. It's times like this I'm glad we rent.
Okay, I think that about does it for my Wordless Wednesday.
I'm Sue and I'm happily married to my best friend in the world, Mike. We have three children: Zach (13), Drew (10), and Baylee (7). This blog will be about our homeschooling experiences and just life in general.
