Spring Cams

This kind of thing is an example of the very best that the internet has to offer. We should be using it to really study-- second best thing to first hand-- the world around us!

I love nest / den cams!

Hummingbird Nest WebCam (as of 3-21 no eggs left, no babies)


Barn Owl Nest (as of 3-21 one baby has hatched)


Barn Owl 2 (as of 3-21 these guys have hatched and are LOUD)

Wordless Wednesday-- ratatouille

Wordless Wednesday

Back to Work

Your children won't be inspired to do much if their environment is chaos. It's a practical idea for life in general, but it's an important tenet of Montessori. Part of the process is, in fact, seeing organization in your surroundings. The children didn't receive new curriculum with this latest overhaul of their school room, but they've been invigorated with an enthusiasm for their work that I haven't seen for a while. Needless to say, I am happy with that.

New networked stations

Story of the World: Great Wall

Life Cycle of the Frog

Harness Those Hormones!

One of the huge benefits of middle pregnancy is the burst of unexpected energy. Many women want to clean and nest. In my fortunate case, my friend Niki decided that her ire and energy would be aimed at my schoolroom carpet.

Whoever carpeted this house clearly did not have small children. They chose a delicately patterned taupe and put it throughout. This is not a good match for the PNW Homeschooling, chicken-raising, gardening, dust allergic family that we are. Beyond the carpet, we had some furniture placement issues that needed to be resolved before I would unpack the computer the children's grandparents sent them. Since they sent it at Christmastime..... time was well away from us.

So what happens when you tell a pregnant friend she can attack your carpet?

Yes, that.

We still need to do some fine details and hang some maps and pictures, but we're close to done!

New computer from the Grandparents

Science center

Language Arts / Sensory

Arts

Math / Culture / Maps

A few small repairs

My pack arrived! I am babysitting quite a bit this week, while simultaneously beating back the (early, but obvious) spring-time laundry beast and making the tiny home improvements that make life better.

N-man has learned to make grits by himself and is now only eating grits for breakfast. We'll see how long that lasts! I love watching these guys learn to cook. They are so happy with their burgeoning independence!

My cell phone (which had a busted usb port) has been repaired. This was at least a minor issue, but because the phone was under warranty, my contact wanted to get it done. I shouldn't say repaired-- replaced is a more accurate statement. Shiny!

My cranky van is in the shop for its annual tax-time money-suck. No, I am not kidding. Every year at tax time, this van has had something go wrong with it that doesn't involve less than 250.00. Last year, it was my son breaking out a window and then a few months later, a fuel pump failure combined with a shorting out computer. At the time, we chose to replace the fuel pump because that was all the money we had.

This year, it is the brain. One of the ongoing issues with this vehicle has been intermittent failure to stay cranked. It always cranks, but then some kill switch is activated, as if it had an alarm (it doesn't) and it stops. Other, less invasive electrical problems persist as well, but that's the attention grabber. This season's issue involved a two week hiatus for the minivan in which it refused to start at all. Out of the blue-- the day we got our tax return-- it began to start again.

Hmm.
Just "well" enough to get it to the mechanic.

Some people would go along with conventional wisdom and ditch this van altogether. I can't say that isn't tempting. P-daddy had the idea to convert it into a chicken coop, and if we had 5 acres, I might even go along with it. Personally, I have been having fantasies about buying a vintage Vanagon for 2 grand and once again having a vehicle I can repair myself. But rationally, given that we can't yet finance a late-model vehicle, if we were to purchase something we could actually afford right now, we'd still be 1. paying more than this repair will probably cost and 2. buying someone else's problems. The cost-benefit ratio doesn't pay out.

Just in the 4 years we've had this thing, we have replaced so many integral components, it really is a better vehicle than it sounds like it is. The computer issue is probably going to resolve a great many of the trouble spots, and we will at least be able to have an accurate picture of what is going on under that hood. So, whatever. I can't burn energy worrying about it when our path is fairly clear. I don't want to be a one car family, but we can do it if we have to.

Gearing Up

Despite the frigid wintry blizzards slamming the Eastern coast, we're doing fairly well here. The roses and fruit trees are waking up and baby deer are emerging from the forests. While we are still in the grips of our rainy season, the sun has been out more often this winter than in the last three years. A few days ago I pruned back all the roses and the fruit trees. Normally this would have been appropriate, but I am left wondering whether I waited a little too long. Nevertheless, I did a good job out there and it's a pleasant awakening of that part of myself.

Not that it didn't come at a price... with the success last year of our front lawn garden, I pretty much ignored most of the rose-herb garden. I paid attention solely to the edibles and let the rest of it run wild, which in Western Washington means the blackberries ran wild. The invasive variety that borders our property makes tasty blackberries that we're grateful to have, but one cane can grow twenty feet long and three inches in a year. I had my work cut out for me as I approached the thicket, and just as I was finishing, one of those suckers latched onto my neck. I had to cut a portion of it from the longer cane and then walk into the house to see what I was doing in order to remove it without gross and bloody injury. My daughter's face was priceless when I asked her, "Honey would you go and get the scissors please?"

Finally though, I am happy because I am getting this delivered sometime soon:



The gravy train has stopped, as my friends' supply of free HP laptop bags has dwindled and the last one I had has now sprung a hole. One per year of heavy use--- time to actually purchase a bag that is meant for the paces I put them through!

Making Music

The older children have been enthusiastically delving into their music lessons this year. From the recorder to the piano, even less enthusiastically to choir, they have been absorbing musical theory with the speed that adults envy of children. They've taken to writing their own tunes, or attempting to transcribe musical scores they like. Sometimes they even bring their homeschooling friends into the endeavor. Today I made them a little gift to support their fun.

Family Style

We took the weekend and packed it full of family stuff. It was nice, reconnecting with just us and carrying no outside plans. We made organic blackberry applesauce, using our own blackberries. I should say that this time, all I did was turn on the stove and mash the product. The kids did all the work.

The tongue of concentration

P-daddy even acquiesced to go to IKEA-- on a Saturday-- so that was a huge deal for him. We have some interior redecorating to do so we're desperately in need of some inspiration for furniture placement for a home-based lifestyle like ours. (I am just not finding it online so if you want to spam me, feel free to do so in the comments!)

D-meister always dresses for the occasion. The perfect outfit for IKEA? Eurotrash!

They're clearly stunned by the Vibrancy

The Entrepreneur Rides Again

Our daughter is still committed to buying herself an airplane ticket. She does want to see some family members, but I think the primary interest at this point is riding the clouds. To that end, she has launched her very first CafePress store.


Before I did one. Whoops.


So please do visit, and if so inclined, help a driven little girl in her own personal fundraiser!

http://www.cafepress.com/grahamartistic

The art, it's always here for G-girl.

A happy heart-shaped beach find.

G-girl still loves model work. They're getting smaller and more detailed.

PacSci

Our friends offered us free admission to the Pacific Science Center so we took a cool day of it. We rode the ferry into Seattle, which never disappoints us-- we accept it as a form of mass transportation, but we still dig the boat ride. It was a fun day, full of antics, to be certain. Thanks ladies!

Quintessential D-meister

If only we could use this to power our home turbine....

The tongue of concentration.

N-meister in particular, could have spent four times as long there. Still really into science and understanding, he didn't just enjoy the cool whiz-bang affectation of the center, he kept trying to go one layer deeper. Love that!

It's trying to get me!

"Don't touch the butterflies" proved to be an intensely difficult directive to follow.

Waiting for the van to be returned. Hesitate to think about what creepy bench guy was waiting for.

Links 2009

Just placeholding. I think this is PERFECT for our family: http://www.commonsensepress.com/GSA-sample_lesson/gs-lesson.htm

They're seen in action here: http://handmadehomeschool.wordpress.com/2009/06/15/tiny-books/

Along with these, which I think are fabulous as well! http://kindovermatter.blogspot.com/2009/03/kind-over-matter-books.html

Diffendoofers at the Library

Peninsula Library was kind enough to offer us a tour of their library, inside and out. The children enjoyed seeing the secret spots as much as the adults did, I think. Those who didn't have them were allowed to sign up for library cards. It was a good event, and a nice way to reconnect with our homeschooling friends after a tough spring for most of us.

Boboli

Probably not a word you'd expect to see on my blog. I would have taken pictures, but they ate the productl.

During our run to T-town, I knew I wouldn't be cooking when we got home, so I picked up some individual boboli crusts and sauce packets from the bread store. We came in and I set to shredding mozzarella. The kids were thrilled with a "project" done so swiftly. While we make pizza fairly often, we usually have to wait for the dough to rise, etc. This time, I only had cheese and sauce to offer so the kids decided they wanted more topping.

"What would you like?" I asked, open to anything at that point.

N-man decided he wanted shredded carrots, because he'd seen that on a show. So we shredded a carrot and he AND our picky, picky daughter put that on their pizza. Then she piped up and suggested I chiffonade some spinach for their toppings. I admit that I was agog at this point, pretty surprised and fully prepared to gloat to anyone who would listen. Yet when I put goat cheese on mine, and they followed suit I about fell off my chair.

YAY! Finally! Wheeeee! Are their palates catching up?

Yes, you cynic, I know what you're thinking. Yes, you over there, I hear you!

They DID eat it, vegetables and all! Although G-girl did go on and on and on about how she was briefly worried while hers baked that she wouldn't like it after all. She is a strictly raw-vegetable kind of girl, unless it's a green bean and she is wielding a chopstick. "You can't even TASTE the vegetables! This is SO GOOD!"

So how does one "update" life this crazy?

Maybe not catastrophic (for us) anyway but crazy. A friend of mine just bulleted through, so I suppose I should too. In no particular order of chronology or importance:

I went blonde. Blonde. Like, really blonde and slightly reddish on the ends, as is the fashion, don't you know. Blonde, as in the first time since I was three years old that I was lighter than a muddled burgundy. I despise that it makes my skin light up-- I look so much younger, they say, and even with my behind still fat and my hair chopped short (to accommodate the perfectly expected damage from such a gigantic chemical step), I get a lot more attention. Go figure. It makes me look good. It does suit my coloring. The color worked very well and looks nice. I hate it. Ugh! I can't determine whether I despise the cut, or whether I am just so resistant to change that the stranger in the mirror makes me uncomfortable. I will leave it for now.

Twilight. Nearly everyone around me has caught the bug. I rented the movie and read her online tome, (what there is), Midnight Sun. I have to admit that it is engaging, but not one to suffer from spoilers, I read ahead and I can't buy into the whole dead-guy-still-makes-active-sperm thing. I do like her take on the Vampire as an animalian subspecies, not a soulless, dead-but-not entity. I have one friend in particular who should lay some bricks when she gets to book 3. I can't wait.

Our garden is growing. P-daddy and I have been working together nicely to shore up the homestead. He built fine, square foot gardening boxes in the front yard. We mixed fill soil from our own compost, store-bought vermiculite, sphagnum moss, and Tagro a friend of ours scooped and delivered to us for free. All told, our garden beds cost us around $72.00. I know we would have done this years ago had we known! We tied them off in grids together, and have recently put in all our starts and our things we are willing to start from seed. Typically, once there is the slightest outside activity, I abandon the computer, so this is what partially explains our absence. The other is that my camera is all funky, so even on days when I would normally have great, wordless blog entries to share, ah, shucks.

Just today, the kids started their own children's gardens. When he built our primary garden beds, P-daddy used our leftover Trex board from building the treehouse and gave each of the kids a 2 X 2 box of their own to fill as they see fit. G-girl and D-meister chose to put them in the front yard with ours, but N-man placed his in the back, close his original garden and adjacent to Presley's grave. He says this is how he will grow flowers for Presleydog. They will still have access to the side gardens, but we have to get P-daddy's yard waste* out of there.

The neighbors moved for real this time. It has really saddened me on a number of levels; we will miss the little girl terribly, we enjoyed having neighbors so close to us in age and family composition; and we would like it if they had left on a completely voluntary basis. Most of all, though, it causes me some discomfiture to benefit so greatly from their departure. They moved offshore, so they left an amazing amount of things behind, including big ticket items like a chest freezer, a 10 X 10 garden shed and a yakima roof box. They gave their swing set to a friend of ours, and they gave us all their lawn furniture, which is great for us because the winter decimated ours. The kids in particular are thrilled with the influx or yard and sports toys. P-daddy has spent the past three weekends helping them sort their last things and then rebuilding the shed over here*. It's been abject chaos, and I am working so hard to be mor egrateful than I feel guilty. My guilt makes little sense, even to me, because when we moved across country, we did the same thing. We gave away or sold things I miss to this day (like our freezer!), so it's nice for some of it to come back to our family.

Interrupting all of this was a month-long illness on my part; I finally caught the flu / pneumonia / bronchitis beast that took out half of Puget Sound. Thankfully, all our family was better when it took me down. I have never needed an inhaler in my life, and needing one, plus antibiotics, plus weeks of absolute stillness to heal this, was truly startling. The illness prevented me from doing a lot of my planned work for the garden (never got my grow lights hung or my cold frame built) and it made dealing with the suddeen windfall from next door very inconvenient, despite how welcome it was. I simply haven't been fit for anything, much less extra putting-away.

I am having issues with challenging kids, my own and my friends'. My children have been celebrating spring by being mouthy and willful, scrapping with their siblings, disputing my authority and ideas on a daily, if not hourly basis. That's hard enough to deal with from just the three of them, but the thought of adding friends has become so very untenable. With a few exceptions, most of the children I know right now are half-deaf and completely bonkers. Combine that with the extreme physicality I have noticed lately in all of them, and people are getting hurt. Being bullied by my schoolmates and abused my some family, I am very sensitive to getting "beaten up." I am not very tolerant of verbal sparring either, but I really have a very hard time drawing the line between acceptable rough-housing and its resulting misunderstandings and out-and-out bullying. I think because of my awareness of my own sensitivities, I err on the side of letting it go too far. I am fully sick of stick-fighting, whoop-screaming, rock-throwing**"fun". They're all getting hurt, actual bleeding, bruising, why-won't-you-stop-I-said-enough! hurt. I don't know how to handle it; I am not willing to do some of what I've read I should do (remove the offenders from your life-- how does one do that when ones' own child is a full participant?), and furthermore a lot of that advice doesn't apply to our lifestyle as homeschoolers. While it's not natural to get cooped up all day with 35 others of your same age and real estate, its also not natural to just be able to shove people to the curb when you feel like its just too hard, either. Community means being stuck with the same folks sometimes. The goal here is to work forward towards some form of maturity and you know, having FUN when we get together or need to babysit. I'm working on it. The other Moms are good, smart people and do see what I see, so it's all good. I am hoping it's just a rough Spring on the heels of a brutal winter.

**D-meister broke the window out of my van during one of these festivities of "fun." He had a compatriot in the rock-throwing glee, but lucky for everyone it was actually my kid who broke my window. Lucky him I actually DO think spanking is a bad idea. Witholding dessert? That is something I am perfectly comfortable dishing out, especially for 200.00. (get it? Hardy har.)

The economy, in a very direct way. My husband works for a state contractor doing pretty integrated work with the department of corrections. I can't elaborate more on that here, but I can say that both the contract (every 7 years) and the state budget were up in the air this year. Anyone who lives here knows that Washington state has a 9 billion dollar shortfall in it's budget for the forthcoming year. That's a LOT of cuts, a lot. Even if his company does win the contract (fairly likely) which was decided in secret last week, the state budget will have to be appropriate to fund the work. It's been a potentially disastrous, completely perfect storm of happenstance-- the real estate crash, the stock market decline, the state budget crisis, the unemployment rate, the contract renewal date-- that has all these factors working together to a climax to come this month. It's been wearing on us for six months now but I haven't wanted to write any of it out here. All our life savings is in this house, which of course has lost all of its equity from the last four years. If he loses his job, that's it. We start over, middle-aged with three kids and three degrees between us. No home of our own, no job.

So I do what I can, I focus on gratitude and on ways to mitigate the changes for the children, if the worst should come to pass. We have very basic goals-- keep the family together, try to stay in Washington (even better, in this house!) if we can. We will see. Again, that Dalai Llama quote: "If you have fear of some pain or suffering, you should examine whether there is anything you can do about it. If you can, there is no need to worry about it; if you cannot do anything, then there is also no need to worry."

Fire Station Tour

Our homeschool group had the privilege of attending a fire station tour yesterday. Bonus: another mother set this up for us! She said she'd heard this was the best station to access for this kind of educational tour and she wasn't wrong.

The kids really got to see everything they had going on, and I admit to being very impressed with the station. We had two firefighters and a liaison leading our group through every nook and cranny of the station. The children went in every office, met the fire chief, saw the day room where the firefighters relax, explored the kitchen with its bank of refrigerators, and even went into the cells where they sleep.

The tour moved outside at this point and the kids saw the huge garage, where they were allowed to explore a fire engine and a first response ambulance. The kids were amazed at both the ski-dos and the boat, and their presence launched a discussion of living in a harbor city, and how the municipality takes care of the docks and the boats. Not one of them missed that there was a gaping, clear area in the garage and the liaison let them know that they were correct, that engine was out on a call.




One of the firefighters gave a demonstration of all the gear they wear into emergency situations and then held a Q&A for the kids. It was an in depth tour, and the parents learned things new to them, as well.

The next time N-man saw the firefighter who lives next door, he rattled on about it all, and the neighbor just smiled. I have to admit, I like firefighters!
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Diffendoofers: If I have not sent you your pictures, please let me know!


While I want to share our homeschooling projects, it is a compulsion for me to write it "down" because I want to demonstrate the kids' experience, not my perceptions. I was writing this blog and thinking, "You know, I sound like a kid writing a report. What a great idea!" G-girl wrote it up, and when I told her she'd written a "report," she was a little surprised. I love how learning sneaks up on our kids. G-girl knows a lot of the buzzwords from her friends in school, but it all seems like an intimidating mystery until she realizes just what they're talking about.







and I SO miss my photo editing software.

Someone's feeling better!

Or, the day where we visit the Fire Station with a homeschool group, then come home and open a coconut!

Spring has Sprung (?)

It is officially the first day of spring. Read that???

SPRING

SPRING

SPRING

Happily, I have hundreds of seeds optimistically tucked away in homemade, optimum seed starting mix. They're loosely covered with saran wrap and located where it's warm. I look forward to hanging the lights in the garage so I can move them out there when they're ready. I look forward to putting out the frames for the square foot gardens we're using to fill the front lawn. I look forward to being able to work the soil in the big, back garden, that I do indeed plan to use again this year, much to my own surprise. The birds are going nutso in the backyard, and for all the world it sounds like spring.

But it's grey. It's raining. It's 48 degrees. The children are happily making kites and running them, outside, in between showers. The kids planted indoor terrariums a few weeks ago and we can happily look on those sprouts when we need a boost. We got the seeds started in time this year. Hopefully, we can keep them as happy, flourishing starts so that we can put them out and save a bazillion dollars on our Freedom Garden. Think Victory Garden, but no war effort.

So despite its grey and overcast beginning, despite my being on antibiotics for the first time in years, despite the errant economy, despite me forgetting to obtain tomato seeds; spring has come at last. The birds are partying and taking their fill at our feeders. And we are here, simmering beans on the stove and planting beans in our garden. Let's get a move on!

Peter Pan

N-meister was on stage yesterday, fearlessly and joyfully, as Boy #2 in Peter Pan. At least, a skit from Peter Pan. The teacher in his class at Broadway Center nailed it when she chose to have her class of 4 to 6 year olds run around on stage in their PJs singing "We can fly, we can fly!" It was truly adorable, and the audience couldn't help but laugh at the spectacle of it. We are happy to report, Nick was among those who remembered their lines and blocking.

The other classes were entertaining and exuberant, and I felt some comfort when my two kids in the audience with us not only sat through the hour, but did it with rapt attention to the stage. They recognized the skits from Annie, mouthing the words to the song along with the actors.

As for our actor, we brought him home after the cookie social ....

("Honey I am sorry, I don't think we can get through this crowd to get to the cookies,"

"Oh, I can GET through!")

.....and P-daddy fed him a dinner of fried shrimp. After supper, where he ate way too many shrimp, he lay on the couch and said "Daddy I really can't move." P-daddy carried him to bed, where he slept and maybe dreamed of Neverland.

Mom forgot both the flowers and the camera, so we only have these cameraphone shots of him onstage after the sharing was over. I think we will remember just fine. I had an acute awareness of being in the moment while we were sitting there, P-daddy with our kids, waiting to see N-meister come on stage. This is what the journey is; celebrating these little milestones along the way, but not our own. We were there with and for our kids. It was cool.

This morning we woke early to motion outside, which is alarming to those so sightless as we are without our glases. I squinted and realized the trees were white and the snow was coming DOWN. Argh, March in Washington. P-daddy's comment was apropos: "It was NOT supposed to do that today!" As of this moment we've gotten three inches on the rainbow bar and it's still a-coming.