Honestly, I know I've neglected friends/comments/and regular posting on this blog, but my non-cyber life just took over!  Thank you for stopping by to comment and for emailing me, too. I'm not gone, just forgetful.

It's the last month of what may be my last pregnancy and have had so much going on. It's been a time to thank God for his goodness in bringing baby and me healthfully this far, a time to plan and dream, and  prepare for baby.

As of today, we already have forty days of our 180 day schoolyear completed. We've stayed current with every subject this first quarter and worked ahead on several others. Now that we are very close to taking our "baby vacation", we can do so with a sense of accomplishment. Areas that need further work [place value for the six year old, verb tenses for the nine year old] have been spotted and we can deal with them when we return to class.

LIttle do the kids realize, but they'll still be learning. This time of welcoming a new baby will be the most memorable part of this year, and that's exactly how Dad and I want it.  While it certainly isn't a children''s book, a passage from To Kill A Mockingbird came to mind about the inadvertant learning of children---and how a wise parent takes advantage of it. 

"....I never figured out how Atticus knew I was listening, and it was not until many years later that I realized he wanted me to hear every word he said...."

Of course, reading that book again as homeschool Mom, other appealing pasages demand my notice:

The remainder of my schooldays were no more auspicious than the first. Indeed, they were an endless Project that slowly evolved into a Unit, in which miles of construction paper and wax crayon were expended by the state of Alabama in its well-meaning but fruitless efforts to teach me Group Dynamics....I could only look around me: Atticus and my uncle, who went to school at home, knew everything---at least, what one didn't know the other did. Furthermore, I couldn't help noticing that my father had served for years in the state legislature, elected each time without opposition, innocent of the adjustments my teachers thought esssential to the development of Good Citizenship....As for me, I knew nothing except what I gathered from ...reading everything I could lay my hands on at home, but as I inclined sluggishly along the Maycomb County school system, I could not help receiving the impression that I was being cheated out of something. Out of what I knew not, yet I did not believe that twelve years of unrelieved boredom was exactly what the state had in mind for me....

...but I digress.

Per the policy of Doehill, I won't be posting pics of Charlene darling when she arrives, but I will announce it on the blog. I've told my friends and family there'll be a shout of Hallelujah to fill the entire Tennessee Valley when she gets here. My husband, insensible of the rigors of a difficult pregnancy, insists that having a kidney stone earlier this year is comparable to bearing children. Three days of pain & nausea versus nearly nine months of pain and nausea---well, it balances out to him. You just have to know my dear hubby to appreciate his sense of humor. He enjoys getting me to respond to such silliness. It's how the family learns new vocabulary words. [All clean, just multi-syllabic.]

This month has been eventful. Hubby fell off a building, cracking a rib and scaring us all half to death. An old lady clutching a half-melted ice cream sandwich attacked the Big Dodge Truck in the parking lot of a local grocery store with a shopping cart, and then swore her buggy never touched the truck. I just let hubby handle the situation---I didn't know whether to hand the poor soul a napkin for her drippy dairy treat or call the police to come and help her find her way home.  She shouldn't have been driving a cart, let alone that big sedan she parked crookedly in the crowded lot. I hope she got home alright.

Sleepless nights have provided time for reading.  So far I've read and re-read   Othello,  King Lear,  a collection of O. Henry stories [I nearly roused the house at 3:30 am one morning laughing at Memoirs of a Yellow Dog], some Father Brown mysteries by G.K. Chesterton, almost 200 pages in an old book I found late one night on my bookshelf, Favorite Poems of the American People.   When my son was born,  I read a collection of Edith Wharton short stories. When my daughter was born, I read the entire Tolkien Rings series in a week and a half. I'm not sure what I'll be reading in the wee small hours after Charlene Darling gets here. The only thing I haven't finished is Dostoevky's Crime and Punishment,  but I'm afraid that might sour my breast milk for the baby. The search for nursing-time reading material thus continues.

All in all, I'd say we're as ready as any parents can be for another child. Diapers, bottles, clothes, blankets, socks, sheets,  more diapers, and extra laundry detergent are all on hand. Bags are packed and kids are ready for a holiday with their Grandpa while I'm at the hospital. They told me they are going to look at their Uncle's Tennessee Walking Horses, watch cartoons, eat a lot [ a diet at my dad's house consists of fried potatoes and onions with generous portions of fried bologna topped off with pears from Cousin Steve's pear tree and a box of little Debbie cakes and washing it all down with Pepsi Cola], play golf in the yard, chase the cats, and play priates in the back of Papaw's truck. Oh, yes, and watch Gene Autry movies because "Papaw's got the Western Channel at his house, Mom!"  They have already packed cowboy hats, bandanas, cap guns, and some gun belts made out of several of my old purse straps .

So, that's life at Doehill.  I'll post soon after Baby #3 makes her grand debut.  And whether or not Papaw survived babysitting.