Life in the Fish Pond

This blog has moved

2007-04-15T07:20:00.000-07:00

I am not a patient person. This was illustrated this morning as I fought with Blogger yet again to try to switch over this blog to my new Google/Blogger account. I gave up and made a new one. It's here: The New Fishy Blog.

Cultured

2007-04-13T11:00:00.000-07:00

Today must have been Theater Day.

This morning I was treated to a puppet show that featured an adorable fuzzy duck who was rather maniacal and cannibalistic (but willing to go beyond his own species and sample the members of the audience) and a very rude and insulting raccoon who would have made Tony Clifton proud. After that, Lilly & Maia put on a performance of Cinderella, complete with many wonderful costume changes and great sound effects. (Lilly made this "ripping" noise and then whispered to the audience "that was the sound of Cinderella's dress ripping...wink,wink.) (And yes, that "wink,wink" was verbal).Both actresses played many roles and improvised with props very nicely. In this updated version of Cinderella,it wasn't a Ball they were doing to but the Prom. Prince Christopher (that's the Prince's first name, in case you didn't know) and Cinderella danced to a Dixie Chicks song and in a very daring and edgy move, Dmitri the Naked Toddler was cast as a mouse lacking fur scurrying about the stage.

All this before Noon. I feel like I've gotten enough culture to last me through until Tuesday.

Tuesday is Maia's Teatro Pequeño performance. She's a tiger....a red one with black stripes. Creative licensing and all that,you know. Sometime before then I have to decide on a vegetarian dish to take that's preferably Mexican. The very first thing that came to mind was Apple Flautas. However, I have never made Apple Flautas...I've always had The Schwan's Fairy put them in my freezer. How hard could they be to do myself? Not very, I'm sure. *ponders*

Hairraiser

2007-04-11T14:16:00.000-07:00

Funny (ish) story....

I was in my son's room last week and I saw something ....odd....laying on top of his bookshelf.

Now, finding odd things in our house isn't really that odd but this just wasn't something I recognized immediately.
This is what I saw

I think I did the 180 degree head tilt.

I took a closer look and realized what it was.It's hair. Not just hair, a dreadlock.

If I hadn't remembered him telling me a few days earlier about
his friend who was cutting off his dreadlocks to raise money for cancer, it might have taken me a bit longer to figure it out exactly why my son had a severed dread on his bookshelf.

From the above link:

Trumansburg high school junior Brad Slocum has been selling his dreadlocks to raise money for cancer. He had been planning to cut his hair in anticipation of warm weather, but decided to turn the event into a fundraiser by selling and cutting each dreadlock on demand in return for a donation to the American Cancer Society. He is hoping to raise $150.

He had seven dreads left on his head as of Thursday, but one is reserved for grandma.

WTG,Brad.

Snatched

2007-04-10T16:02:00.000-07:00

:: The Current Stuff::
Reading:info about Raw Milk and Cow Shares
Listening: at this very moment, the acoustic version of Elderly Woman Behind The Counter in A Small Town by Pearl Jam is playing
Wearing:frumpy neo-housewife clothes
Watching(ed): Amores Perros (review at my blog)
Project:reorganizing girls' room and sorting through ALLLL the kids books

I had a funny thing happen to me last week,though. I was searching at a curriculum site for some new ideas and found a lesson plan that I made. I remember having posted it on our home school blog and must be someone liked it so much that they snatched it....and submitted it to a lesson planning site as their own. I don't know if I should be flattered or pissed. I happened to have been pretty proud of the activity that was snatched". It was pretty original and a lot of fun for the kids. Sure, someone possibly could have had the same idea but the way it was written was too close to the way I explained and worded it on my blog.Except they claimed "authorship".

It's not THAT big of a deal. I mean, this person submitted it to a free site and wasn't paid any money for the idea. If they had, then I'd probably be on a rampage.

Just kind of funny that I stumbled upon it,I guess.

(and yes, of course I sent a well worded email to the web master ;) I don't mind if someone uses something and does it with their home schooled kids or in a classroom setting .After all, that's why I post those things...to share!It's just pretty wrong for someone to go,"Wow, now THAT'S a great idea!" and claim it as their own)

Frogs say moo and Andy Serkis is the new Kevin Bacon

2007-02-23T09:32:00.000-08:00

Recent Good Things

1. My Grandmother's health improving
She's set to be released from the nursing home on Monday or possibly Tuesday.I'm so glad...she's miserable there. Dylan really hates the nursing home she's at. He says it's dirty and the staff are snotty,impatient, and "dumb". There have also been issues with one or two of the nurses being very unprofessional w/ my Grandma. Yesterday she had a doctor's appointment that my mother was going to take her to and they tried to make my Grandma get on a bus by herself and go to her appointment alone. Ummm....my Grandma gets lost in my house going to the bathroom and around a town she's lived for 40 years and they were going to put her on a bus in an unfamiliar place to go to a doctor's office she didn't even know where it was? WTF are they thinking?Thankfully ,just a few more days of that nonsense...

2. Inkheart by Cornelia Funke
I absolutely LOVE this book. It's one of the best children's books I've read in awhile. A lot of books being published these days in the "Fantasy" genre for children are just copycat versions of Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings with unoriginal characters and a plot that follows a certain template. Inkheart has a great story with wonderful characters and the fantasy aspects are very original even though they're familiar concepts in fantasy writing.

3. Hugh Jackman Double Feature
Flushed Away followed by The Prestige. I enjoyed Flushed Away, as did the kids. The Prestige was interesting. Interestingly enough, both films also had Andy Serkis in them ,so maybe it was also an Andy Serkis double feature? Oh...and Andy Serkis is playing the Bad Guy in the movie of Inkheart. Maybe this whole list is a 6 Degrees of Andy Serkis.

4. The Departed
Wow, what a great movie. I really hope Scorsese gets his much-deserved Oscar finally for Best Director for this one.

5.Vegetarian Night at The Rongovian Embassy
Julie Jordan cooks on Wednesday nights. it was a daring move on our part but we took the whole family out to dinner this week. Thankfully, they were all on best,best behavior and we had a wonderful dinner. I'm not even going to attempt to spell the entree that I had because when I tried, spell check can't even find the word so I must be WAY off LOL...but it was a delicious pasta dish. I think I need to buy one of her cookbooks so I can make the salsa we had as an appetizer.

6. Snail Mail
I got a lovely card in the mail from Carrie (Moody Cat) "just because", which is always a nice thing Thank you :)
The card had frogs on it and Dmitri was captivated by them.This morning he saw the card on my desk and started hopping around and ribbitting. I told him he was a silly boy and he said,"No boy...frog!". Well, I tried to get it on video but with all cute things kids do, they never do them when you have the camera ready but this still was a cute video.

7.Maia's Birthday
At the end of the day, she told me it was her best birthday ever. Awww. All 6 of them and this one is the best LOL She's such a sweetheart,really she is.

8. My Washing Machine Working

The landlady had turned the water off not realizing it was connected to my washer. All is right in my world again now that I can do laundry.

9. Quinceanera
Magdalena's upcoming Quinceanera (a "coming out" tradition for young latin girls when they turn 15 )is a bit complicated by the fact that she's pregnant and adamantly claims to be a virgin. Winner of Sundance Festival's Audience Award and Jury prize.And deservingly so!

10. Now the Day is Over ,The Innocence Mission
A really wonderful kids CD with soft and soothing versions of some classics and also originals. Maia has been listening to it when she's falling asleep at night.

11. A Chicken Recipe that was a hit
Pasta al Forno
12 oz penne pasta (I used ziti)
12 oz swiss chard(I used spinach)
1 jar Alfredo sauce
1/2 cup chicken broth
1/4 tsp pepper
2 cups cooked cubed chicken
1 can diced tomatoes(I used fresh)
1 1/2 c shredded mozzarella
1/4 cup Parmesan
1/4 cup Italian seasoned breadcrumbs
2 tbs olive oil
(I also added basil,oregano & garlic to the tomatoes)

Cook pasta and drain. Preheat over to 350. Trim and cut swiss chard (or spinach)

In large bowl, combine sauce,broth,and pepper.Add pasta,greens,chicken,tomatoes,and 1/2 cup mozzarella (and add spices if you care to). Transfer to 3qt baking dish.Sprinkle with rest of mozzarella. Combine paresan and breadcrumbs and oil. Sprinkle over top. Bake for 40-45 minutes.

12. Being over the Stomach Flu
Oh my gods...that was soooo,soooo bad.That's not do that again....

I'm turning Japanese

2006-11-26T06:04:00.000-08:00

I have that song stuck in my head. Lilly was trying to teach herself to speak Japanese earlier today and that song popped into my head and stuck there.

Dmitri is such a verbal little guy. Lilly had him repeating words in japanese. Not that he has any clue what the words he said correspond to in English .It's all mimicking ,really but boy,it sure does sound impressive to say that my nearly 20-month old can say Mother,Father,Child and count to three in Japanese.

Yeah, there not a whole lot he won't repeat, which isn't exactly great. His older sister says,"Dmitri,say 'Butthead'"...and he does his best to meet the task. Wonderful.

In the quiz of "What TV show family are you most like?", I have a feeling we'd be most like Malcolm in the Middle.Maybe The Addams Family. Definitely not The Waltons. Well, maybe a little. Can we cross The Waltons with Malcolm in the Middle and The Addams Family? Then we'll have it right.

I love that there is actually a lesson plan on comparing TV families to real families. We may have to explore that a little bit.

Hey, any opportunity to make TV educational,right?

Knowing my luck ,Emily will choose Hannah Montana as her TV family. I'm so sick of that show.

No Random Facts today. Just my 5 Favorite Sites of the Day (thanks to Stumbleupon)

1. Make your own Jackson Pollack...without the mess. Strangely cathartic. Click the mouse to change colors.

2. How to Become a Republican...Since one of the things I have to give up in order to become a Republican is my beloved imported beer, I don't think I'm going to get very far but it was an entertaining guide all the same.

3. Hendrix singling The Wind Cries Mary...Dmitri sat transfixed through the whole song. If it makes a toddler sit still for that long, it deserves to be on some sort of list.

4. HyperHistory...If you need to know what a map looked like during Greek Colonization or who ranked as a celebrity in 600AD or what made the news in 1924, this site is pretty damned handy.

5. Kittens... It should be illegal to be so cute.

The Weekend

2006-10-14T14:09:00.000-07:00

So far today,I have spent way too much time:

1.Playing paparazzi

2.Showing off what a Queen of Useless Trivia I am at funtrivia.com.
(Dylan is making fun of me for getting all the answers right to the Panic! at the Disco lyrics quiz)
(and I was mad that my old account is no longer there with the new system....BUT all the quizzes I made are still on there)
(oh...and I made a Homeschool Families group on there, if any other Trivia Geeks who also homeschool would like to join.It's group # 7093,Homeschool Families.)

3. Trying to get warm. I'm fuh-reezing.

4. Working on this puzzle:

It's not as hard as it looks. The hard part will be keeping Mr. Destructo Baby out of it.

5. Admire my new wall and door...and tried out my spankin' new light switch and outside light that will now NOT cause a fire
(Holy cats, Homeskooled Boy schooled me on faulty wiring yesterday. I didn't understand a word he said but what I gather is that he knows a lot more about electrical wiring than I do and because of that, we now have a non-hazardous light)

6. Watched the new Hamster Coco race around in her new(to her) Race Car (that I picked up this morning off of Freecycle) and her hamster ball.

7. Read some more of Gruel and Unusual Punishment by Tamar Myers. I am not usually one for the standard mystery novels but I really like these! The main character is a Mennonite Inn Keeper in Penn-Dutch country (my Grandma's birthplace) and there's recipes scattered throughout the book that relate to the story. The main characters are quirky and funny. The story would make an awesome TV series.

(and read the novelist's bio: About the author Whoa.

I'm also reading an older National Geographic from October 1991-"1491:America before Columbus". We collect National Geographics and about once a month , I pull one off the shelf and read it cover to cover. If you've ever done more than browse through a NG to look at the pictures, you know how rich and textured the articles are. They're good brain food.

Speaking of National Geographic, our local homeschool community is gathering students to enter the Geo Bee. No definitive word from either of the twins whether or not they'd like to participate but I think it'd be fun. But then again,I'm the geek who plays stupid trivia games online :P

This our latest "game" here at home:

Yes, it's wide ribbon and a bunch of little toys.But it's more than just ribbon and toys! It's a Storytelling Game.

(although I have to say,the objects we have used before were a little bit more exciting than the ones pictured )

I choose a handful of random small objects from around the house (there is never any shortage in this house). I unroll a length of wide ribbon (I think that crepe paper would work,too) and starting at one end, hide an object on the ribbon,roll it up and insert objects intermittently untill the whole ribbon is completely rolled up.

Then,the "storytellers" take turns uncovering the objects by unrolling the ribbon.As each object is uncovered, the Storyteller who's turn it is, inserts the object into the story.

None of that made sense,did it? Well, it made sense when I explained it to the girls when we tried it for the first time earlier this week and they enjoyed playing it several times since then :)

Must go. Child staring at me.I think she wants a turn on the computer. Hmmph.

diapers,dr's appt,Dmitri,Darfur...it's a D Day

2006-10-11T06:06:00.000-07:00

Dmitri is wearing a disposable diaper this morning. Yes, I know. Everyone's shocked. Including Bob and the kids.

He has a rash. Considering this is his first diaper rash ever and he's 18 months old, I'd say that's damn good but the thing is, I don't like using ointments/butt balm with my cloth dipes because it really does ruin them and I think this is something yeasty (added tea tree oil to my butt balm so that should clear it) and the cloth dipes really need a good stripping. And I hate the disposable inserts that I have for cloth dipes...and...

Well, I just want to get rid of this quick so nevermind the reasoning.
Dmitri has a dr's appointment next week and it will be his first since he was a week old. I'm obsessing.I want a perfect well visit. With any luck, the scratches where Psycho Kitty atacked him will be gone by them too.

The cat and Dmitri have been fighting over the empty box that his new potty came in ever since the potty was removed from the box and thus leaving the box fair game for games that cats and little boys play in empty boxes.

But they seriously fight over the stupid box. The cat will be in it and he'll scream,"AHHHH,kitty!" and pull her out. He'll get in and the cat will jump on his head and they'll wrestle for control of the box unitl someone bigger comes and breaks it up.

Good fun,good fun.

Does "AHHHH,Kitty!" count as a sentence? Dmitri says one other 2-word entence..."Night-night,baby". Awwww, so cute. Too bad he only pretends to go night-night most of the time.

The cat was made to sit in time-out this morning. Maia put her there. The offense? She tried to eat the new hamster,Coco.

FYI: Cat's don't sit in time-out very well.
Also, FYI: Cats don't think of hamsters as family.

What is it with the name Coco in this family? Remember Dmitri was named Coco in utero? Now the hamster. Ooookaaay.

Did you see what myspace is doing for Darfur? That's awesome. The girls picked up some random magazine article about Darfur one day and were horrified. Yeah.

If you haven't watched George Clooney's video diary of his visits to Sudan & Chad, you should check them out. My opinion of George Clooney just keeps getting elevated higher and higher. After Syriana and Good Night, and Good Luck, I had
new found respect for him and now he's bordering on heroic.

Hey, at least he's doing something and not just sitting at home watching the news and switching the channel evertime pictures of Darfur come on because "it's too awful to watch" like a lot of people do.

Gee, I bet the Holocaust was hard to watch too but something was done about that,wasn't it?

Links-Columbus Day

2006-10-09T06:49:00.000-07:00

I found a lot of good resources in my quest for a good lesson plan about Columbus.Our goal was to provide accurate information that doesn't glorify Columbus as a noble hero. Since the girls are only 9, we didn't want to go too much into the oppression Columbus' arrival in the Americas brought upon Native Americans but give enough information to illustrate that it was not a positive event for them and that Columbus was not exactly an exemplary man.

Sharing links here for future homeschoolers who want to teach in the same manner :)

You will note the absence of cute little fingerplays and adorable crafts of the three ships. Fingerplays and craftiness mark celebratory and happy events in my mind.

The other thing that can be done in conjunction w/ the Columbus information is to also do a study of what typical life was like for the Native Americans before Columbus arrived and about the Taino culture,especially

Columbus Day-Native American perspective lesson plan- kid friendly (for 4th & 5th graders) biographical info and activity/discussion topics.Has a brief read-aloud skit that's cute...and informational.

Enchanted Learning's Columbus Page- Enchanted Learning always has some good stuff and most of the Columbus things are informational and not celebratory. (I have membership if anyone wants a password for printing worksheets)

Interactive Columbus biography- a nice interactive informational thing for kids. Provided more information than the text through clickable things in the pictures that give litle facts about life on the voyages and things that he gave as gifts to Native Americans. The one thing I didn't like? One page says,"At first the natives were happy to see Columbus" and then the next page...Columbus dies. Kind of anti-climactic LOL

Columbus wordsearch -interactive not printable

Columbus Navigation- biographical info and complete info about the voyages and the controversies concerning Columbus

Beyond Columbus:Teaching the lessons of 1492- really thorough lesson plan that covers the hstory.effects and cultural impact. With other links there too.

Should we celebrate Columbus Day? lesson plan -recommended for grades 6-8,9-12 but it's easily adapted for elementary,depending on the information provided as resources

The Round Earth and Columbus-some of this is a bit above my kids yet but still good...

Pics from today

2006-07-06T08:28:00.000-07:00

Oh,say can yooouuuu seeeee

2006-06-14T18:07:00.000-07:00

I've had 2 days back to back that seem neverending. In fact, they just seem to have blended into each other to make one really,really,really loooooong day.

The baby is finally in bed and the girls are headed there soon.*sighs*
I'm drained.

This is what we did today:

There's a very faint blue foorprint where Dmitri walked on the blue and then ran across the rest of it. I'll have to get a close-up of that.

Still have to put the stars on to. I'm not guaranteeing 50 of them though.Just like there's not 13 stripes.

So we took artistic liberties. It's a free country.

If I had more red construction paper ,we would have done this flag project instead. It would have been less messy,that's for sure.

Not that I care,really. My kids are washable.

by the way...it's Flag Day. Just in case you didn't know.But don't worry if you didn't know because a lot of people didn't know.People walked by us and were like,"Getting ready for the 4th?" Nope, it's Flag Day.

"There's such a thing as Flag Day?"

um...yeah.

Just like lots of Americans don't know the words to the Star Spangled Banner.That's just crazy. I like the idea of The National Anthem Project.

There was supposed to be more to this entry but hell if I know what it was. I have girls to put to bed and sewing to be done....

Pics & a video from today

2006-06-13T18:38:00.000-07:00

Dmitri...just being Dmitri

Maia, living up to her namesake (Maia,Greek Goddess of Mothering) by being a little mother to Dmitri. She tends to "help" and guide him everywhere and really, he's very independent and doesn't need her help.

Again

The twins...Em in back,Lil in front

This one I wish I had done in video. Dmitri was trying so hard to sit still but as soon as he heard the camera click, he said,"DONE!" and ran off. The look on his face here is like, "Ready,set....."...just waiting for the "GO!". The girls were less than thrilled at being posed.

Monkey Maia ...& Dmitri inserting himself into the scene.

The Knitting Anthropologist

2006-06-08T13:27:00.000-07:00

"The idea that it is funny to see wild animals coerced into acting like clumsy humans, or thrilling to see powerful beasts reduced to cringing cowards by a whipcracking trainer is primitive and medieval. It stems from the old idea that we are superior to other species and have the right to hold dominion over them."
—Dr. Desmond Morris, anthropologist, animal behaviorist, author

I really hate circuses.

The circus is in town. Maia was invited by Grandma to go,since Emily & Lilly will be spending the evening with their Daddy. She's excited and thrilled and I, who would normally choose to educate my children about this sort of thing and encourage them to be activists, will just bite my tongue and yell, "Have fun and be good! (and don't let the clowns eat you)" , as she walks out the door.

No, I won't actually say that ;ast bit about the clowns .It's not like me to pass on my quirky phobias to my kids...even if I really secretly fear that a clown may indeed eat her when Grandma has her back turned.

In other domestic matters...
I am on the hunt for a babysitter who can be available every Wednesday morning for 5 weeks,beginning June 21st, in the event that Offspring #1 can not fulfill his familial duty of supervising his younger siblings in the rare event that his mother actually has a life.

It shouldn't be hard since it will only be for Offsprings #2,3,&4 and NOT whiney,boobie-obsessed #5. He'll be going with the Mama (and the boobies). Anthropologist Meredith Small...author of the book Our Babies, Ourselves : How Biology and Culture Shape the Way We Parent ...is teaching knitting classes for mothers with their babies.

The woman at the knitting place where the classes are being held said,"you don't need to know very much about knitting to take the class". So,I'm wondering exactly what the "not very much" is that I should know. Like, what sort of knitting needles should I bring? What kind of yarn does one learn to knit with?

I'm a total Knitting Virgin.I'm clueless Yarn is foreign territory for me,unless it's being used to make doll hair or latch hook rugs.

SO, any help from Knitters with Carnal Knowledge would be greatly appreciated.

::School Stuff::
(I am so bad at keeping homeschool logs and including it in entries seems to help me remember to do it)

Em & Lil
* Started Vocab Unit 6- dictionary definitions and rhyming phrases
* cursive writing-A & B
* Em took a math lesson from last month and did it independently. The lesson was calculating nergy usage cost based on cost per kw/hr for our household.
*Lil did a math game at Miss Maggie's Earth Adventures under the game section there.
*They browsed lesson plans for activities they want to try for our unit on Egypt.
* made observations on our potatoe slices.(so far, they all look pretty average)

Maia
She informed me today that she'd rather not do
"things with words and letters." She likes numbers more. (she can't be my kid)
She's been doing simple multiplication concepts. Like, "If a ladybug has 6 legs and there are 5 ladybugs on a leaf, how many legs are there altogether?" She loves doing math stuff like that.

We read a ton of books that she got at the library book sale. One book really affected her. It's a book put out by The Sesame Street folks and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child ,called, "For Every Child A Better World". She kept going back to that book all day long, focusing on the pages with the homeless children and the children who live where there's war. It was a good discussion starter....

This week.....

2006-06-06T13:26:00.000-07:00

We're sprouting root veggies in rocks & water.

We took slices of a potato are doing a science experiment involving germs. We put the first slice right into a plastic baggie to act as a control.The second slice,we all handled with unwashed hands....the third we rubbed on the kitchen counter...the last we all breathed on. All the slices went in there own little baggie.Now we sit back and wait and see what interesting a funky stuff grows.

Georgia O' Keefe is our current artist study. I was all set to concentrate on flower recreations and broke out pastels and watercolors but Lilly is all gung-ho on drawing cow skulls. Lucky for her, I'm the creepy sort that has one laying around.

Well,actually it's not laying around. It's up on a shelf in the living room.

Anywho...

We worked together yesterday to make a rough plan for "unit studies" and activities this month. We'll be learning about/studying/doing....

Egypt
Celebrating Maurice Sendek's Birthday (which we happen to know because it's on our Hathor calendar)
Comic books and superheroes (hey,don't laugh.There is TONS of educational material in this area!) (Did you know that June 30th is Superman's Birhtday? It's also Meteor Day ;) )
Midsummer/Solstice celebration
Flag activities for Flag Day
Father's Day stuff

ooh..and June is Adopt-a-cat Month. Could be we're doing something to celebrate that. *knowing wink*

I guess I wouldn't mind being taller

2006-05-27T06:00:00.000-07:00

You Are Big Bird

Talented, smart, and friendly... you're also one of the sanest people around.

You are usually feeling: Happy. From riding a unicycle to writing poetry, you have plenty of hobbies to keep you busy.

You are famous for: Being a friend to everyone. Even the grumpiest person gets along with you.

How you life your life: Joyfully. "Super. Duper. Flooper."

The Sesame Street Personality Quiz

Hold still!

2006-05-24T05:33:00.000-07:00

Taking a picture of Dmitri is ridiculous. He knows the digital camera has a display screen so when he sees me have the camera, he just tries to get around in back of me where he can see the picture on the screen.

It's like shooting a moving target or playing cat and mouse or ...one of those other analogies.

Today he found one Babyleg in the laundry (the ones that Stephy sent us,actually)...and the mate was upstairs in his dresser...

(FYI: I HATE it when matching or paired things get washed seperately. It's a quirk...I know.)

So,he wanted it on but I didn't feel like going upstairs to go get the other one so I asked Maia if she could go get "the other baby leg from upstairs".

Poor Maia.The look on her face was just sheer horror. ,"Why did his leg come off?!"

hehe

She was relieved when she realized what I was talking about. Whew.

I think that T-shirt is a little long,eh?

Babylegs

"Hey,lemme see that camera!"
(Notice his fat lip? He had a mishap with the bathroom stool.Sheesh...)

"If I look at you sideways, can I see the little screen thingy better?"

2006-05-23T20:50:00.000-07:00

I laughed when I saw this cartoon because it is so relevant to our life.

I've noticed since we began homeschooling that there is a definite majority of the homeschool population that are strictly no television, no junk food households...and goddess knows what else is forbidden and restricted.They're trying to live the perfect, healthy and natural life amd raise some brainiac kid (who will turn into a pretentious adult with no social skills). That's great for them but these people tend to make me feel uncomfortable. I wouldn't say I feel intimidated but I definitely feel that I could never measure up to their standards and neither would my kids.

Not that it matter, since we're all perfectly happy with our happy little lives filled with simpler standards to measure up to, even if some things that happen in our house wouldn't be acceptable to some.

In our house, we limit TV...we limit junkfood...we eat a nice ,healthy balanced diet (that chocolate is part of)...we buy white bread from the store sometimes instead of baking "organic whole grain" and sometimes we might sleep in until 8:30...and then sit around in our pajamas and do nothing.
My 5 year old daughter is in love with Batman and she can show you the correct way to punch someone so that you won't break your thumb. My 9 year old sighs and swoons over Clark Kent in teenage form on Smallville and of course,Harry Potter. They're normal kids. I kind of like them that way :)

Non-hot air

2006-05-23T05:47:00.000-07:00

One of the homeschool moms in my area is closing her cloth diaper store. Everything is 15-25% off ,in case anyone is interested... The Diaper Drawer. I honestly didn't look to see exactly what she has but hopefully, someone can find some good deals there.

Tonight Dylan has a baseball game...playoffs. If they win,they play the Championship game Wednesday. I'm so paranoid that something is going to happen to him. Last week he got hit twice with a ball...once in the forehead and the other time in the jaw.Both times he was fine but I'm funny about that whole ,"Everything happens in threes" superstition. I'm always looking out for #3 to complete the series.

It's football weather here...not baseball. Yesterday we had to turn the heat on. I think it's only supposed to get up to 60 today. It's pretty crazy to have to bundle up and bring blankets to a baseball game. Pffft. What's that Mother Nature chick thinking?

Today we're making a barometer.
We're studying air right now. How fitting that we have a weather advisory for some freak polar airmass moving into the area. Silly me had kite flying in mind.

The baby is incredibly grumpy lately. I don't know what his issue is but he nursed on and off from 1 a.m. to 7 a.m....and it's only 8:35 right now and he's still on the boob. He just wants to nurse...and then nurse some more and if he's not nursing, he's crying. It's not like him at all.

It'll be interesting to see how much I get done today.

I should really throw something in the crockpot for dinner. I'll feed the girls a late lunch and then after the baseball game, din-din will be ready and waiting for us when we get home. Sounds like a good idear....

Now I just gotta figure out what to make.....

2006-04-20T05:49:00.000-07:00

Mush,mush

2006-03-03T11:34:00.000-08:00

An annual tradition in our household on March 2nd...Oobleck ,accompanied with the story of Bartholomew and the Oobleck by Dr, Seuss,of course.

I can't remember what all we did but I know we did the Dr. Seuss Math Stories...and I will never live down the fact that I could not for the life of me figure out WHY #5 was the answer it was. I was a little brain dead yesterday. Emily had to explain it to Lilly. And me. Dur.

We did not have Green Eggs & Ham this year though. Bob forot to get ham and I did not feel like going out in the snow storm to go get it.

It's still snowing,though not as heavy as yesterday. There was school today,much to Dylan's dismay. I think he would have rather stayed home today.

Today we started our unit about the Iditarod. We each chose our own mushers to track throughout the race. Lilly chose Rick Swenson, who is a former champion. Emily chose Melanie Gould, because she's female I think mostly and Maia & I are following Rachel Scdoris , who is one of the youngest competitors and also the only legally blind person to ever race.

We printed out Musher Check Sheets and we'll keep track of our musher's progress at Iditarod.com with their daily updates.

Hopefully the Iditarod/Dog related books I requested form the library will be in early next week. Piss poor planning on my part that I didn't request them earlier.I seem to do that a lot lately.

I can't decide what I'm going to have for dinner tonight. I have chicken thawing so i guess it'll be chicken-something-or-other. Last night I made this "Mock Mannicotti", which was kind of dumb.Delicious but dumb. I kind of got the idea that if it was "Mock" it'd be super simple to make but it really wasn't. It was basically just lasagna-roll ups. Which is just a pain in the ass and time consuming to "stuff".

The Feta & Chive Muffins were really good though.

If I had more energy, I'd type out the recipe but right now,I have a headache and I'm thinking of encouraging Dmitri to lay down and take a nap with me.Fat chance he'll do it but it's worth a try.

Lost & Found

2006-01-22T17:28:00.000-08:00

This past week,I kept losing things.

I lost the gift certificate we got for free movie rentals (it has $38.00 left on it) ,my camera and my keys for the house & PO box.

I found my camera yesterday morning.It was underneath the table, hiding under a chair.

Last night I had a dream I found my keys underneath a steamer trunk that's in the living room. I had been up for awhile before I remembered the dream.

You know I had to check it out.

I looked underneath and behind the trunk and I found....

- 3 pieces of chalk

- a paintbrush

- a baby sock and...

- a broken candy cane (cinnamon flavored,I think).

So much for my future career as a psychic.

BUT then I decided to look behind the sewing machine cabinet,which is next to the steamer trunk and I found....

- a piece of elastic

-a bead

-a bookmark.

No keys.

But wait! I felt a psychic energy taking over my entire body.I heard a voice inside my head say,"Look in the drawer!" and as if by magic, a powerful energy took hold of my hand and opened the drawer!

Ta-da! My keys!

Wow, I'm nearly psychic! Or maybe just psycho.

No luck at all with the gift certificate yet,though.Maybe it too will (almost) come to me in a dream....hehe.

I had the sort of day where I accomplished stuff that makes it look like you accomplished nada. Like, sorting through stuff,etc.

I weeded out our diaper stash and pulled out the diapers that don't fit anymore or ones that I just don't like to use as much and don't really need.

I resorted Ebay "inventory" that has yet to be sold.

I spent forever looking through my fabric stash trying to find THE perfect fabric to use for something I'm working on. I'm still not sure I found what I was looking for.

Oh...and I made Veggie Soup and a Walnut Pear Coffee Cake for breakfast in the morning.

Tomorrow....

-We resume our battle with NYSEG/HEAP.

-Dylan's going to try to go back to school tomorrow.

-I start teaching the girls how to do simple quilting so we can finish our art projects.

-Basic school stuff...I can't even remember what's on the agenda beyond the sewing. Something to do w/ John Hancock,I think.Other stuff.

I leave you with cuteness:

See, in this picture, he would stand by himself for a while and then get tired and hold on to the bottle(which he took out of the cupboard) for support.

Ways to annoy your children

2006-01-21T18:58:00.000-08:00

Dylan spent the morning in the ER after injuring his ankle last night at an Indoor Track meet.He returned from the ER this afternoon with the official diagnosis being a bad sprain.He has to wear a brace to stabilize and they gave him crutches.

He's fine...just a little cranky at not being able to be as active as he usually is.

I'm probably not helping his mood,either.

I have discovered that one of the delights of being a mother of a teenager is finding ways to irritate them on purpose.Because really,they are SO easy to irritate.

Some of my favorite things to do to push Dylan's buttons:

1. Say, "Git 'er done" a lot . He hates that expression. I guess someone he doesn't like says it all the time.

2. Play Coldplay. Loud.

3. Sing along to Coldplay.Or ANY music,for that matter.

4. Hang pictures of the weird looking guy from My Chemical Romance on the fridge.

5. Talk about what a wonderful actor Orlando Bloom is.

6. Refer to Bono as God.

7. Inform him that we'll be a strickly vegan household beginning next week.

8. Complain loudly about the state of the world (starving children in Africa/Ithaca, war,poverty,censorship, prejudices,the price of gas,old women in spandex and other "wrongs" of the world)

9.Yell at people on TV,especially the President

10. Listen to Air America Radio.

I am easily one of the most obnoxious mothers ever.At least to my teenager. The other ones have a few years to enjoy before I start torturing them.

Although the twins have been embarrassed by me in public a few times recently. Like, when I wear my purple & pink striped sleep bottoms out in public.Or when I walk down the street ,singing outloud an impromptu made up song like:

Oh,the weather out here is frightful
I think I might mooooove...
to Istanbul.
But since I have no money to goooooo,
I'll freeze here in the snooow.

Oh...and let's not forget at the last Le Leche League meeting when I took off my shoes and I was wearing toe socks with little smiley faces on each toe.

Oh...and there's a hat I have that Emily is mortified when iIwear.Especially when I wear it with my long gray coat that they refer to as my Bag Lady Coat.

But those are all things I'm not doing intentionally to annoy. Those other intentional things are so much more fun *smiles*

Stand for ...something

2006-01-20T11:14:00.000-08:00

Lilly spent a lot of time the other day at the Yucky Gross & Cool Body website and all was good until she read this in the section on "Belches and Gas" (which she did last ,because she worked her way from bottom to top,just like her backwards mother would have )

She gave out this horrified gasp,"Not all babies are fed formula! That's SO wrong".

I know it's nitpicking but my militant lactivist side wants to write a letter to them,asking that they change the wording at least. The way it's worded suggests that all babies are formula fed. The "probably" in there sounds more like it's referring to "cried a lot" . If they're presenting themselves as a scientific and educational resource for children,they should be 100% accurate. They could also include that babies who are breastfed do not require burping the same way bottle-fed babies do because of the lack of air that is swallowed during nursing. And I don't think meantioning breastfeeding is out of line at a website devoted to natural bodily functions. It's natural science,after all.

I am just trying to think how to script a letter so that it does not sound overly extremist.That's pretty off-putting and is never well-received,I've discovered. On more issues than one.

I don't want to sound like one of those people who always has to have some cause. I mean,I do usually have some cause I'm concerned about but they're generally important ones to me.

I'm talking about the kind of people who have to boycott everysinglelittlething. A friend of mine was telling me about someone she knew boycotting the company who makes the boppy pillow. Why? because people use them to lay their baby down on and prop a bottle. Well, does this mean ALL boppies should be banned? Not everyone uses them for that,you know.Why not just start a non-propping bottle ampaign if that's how strongly you feel about that. Der.

In one of the homeschool groups,there was this discussion about children's books about kids who are homeschooled. Someone suggested Education of Little Tree.
Someone went on a rant about how the book should be banned and anyone with ethics would never buy or read that book.Why? Because Forrest Carter, who wrote the book, was a KKK leader and huge White Supremicist. Well, I happen to love the book. I own it and I'm not about to burn it because of this fact. If I were to buy a new copy of the book, I wouldn't think of it as supporting a white supremecist or white supremecy itself.Afterall, Forrest Carter is dead. He doesn't receive royalties anymore. The book itself does not encourage or promote racism.

Besides,I won't ever support banning any written (or spoken) word. I don't care what it says.

There's just times that being an activist has no point at all. Not that I don't encourage people to stand up for what they believe in of course...it's just that people invest a lot of energy towards something when it's not going to effect any real change whatsoever.

Having said that, I still won't buy Nestle products, even if they are complying to international marketing laws concerning formula. Why? Because their actions DID result in babies dying and they absolutely knew what they were doing .Buying products from them to me is like saying to some one who goes on a baby-killing spree and then suddenly stops,"Hey, good job! Now just don't kill anymore." and then sending them on a luxury cruise. I just can't "forgive" their actions.

Of course, my boycotting them is also not something that's really going to effect any change either but at least I feel better for standing close to my own ethics.Plus,it's not something I devote time and energy towards.Really, it's just a matter of not buying their stuff. That's pretty easy and effortless to do.

besides ...Hershey makes better chocolate and they also no longer use child labor in plantations in the Carribbean so that's always a plus.

And this is totally not about the fact that Nestle makes formula. I know that some people who are on the boycott Nestle bandwagon really don't understand WHY they're boycotting Nestle.It's like they think that because they make formula,they're not supposed to support the company.

FYI: It's a free country and they can make formula if they want to and people can even choose to buy it and feed their babies that way. However,it is not ok for them to make said formula and market and sell it in impoverished nations where it will be prepared with unsafe water that will make babies sick and die and where families won't be able to afford it,leaving the baby to starve....and lie to them ,telling them the formula is the best thing they could ever do for their baby.

That's another thing: People who boycott & protest and have NO idea why or what they're speaking out against. None. That's just moronic.

But it does make for good entertainment.Ever ask someone a question about why their boycotting something and they absolutely can't tell you? That's some funny stuff there.

Um,anyway...this was totally an unplanned rant and now I need to get myself away from the computer and go accomplish ...something.

Photo Math: Coffee & Muffins

2006-01-13T05:58:00.000-08:00

This is one of our new weekly activities. We'll take turns taking pictures around town and making up word problems to solve.

Use multiplication to figure out the following problems:
1. On their Girly Date, Lilly got a hot chocolate at the same price as a sm coffee and Mama got a sm coffee. How much did their drinks cost ?

2. Mama went to the store to buy muffins for breakfast the next morning. She needed to buy one for each member of the family. How much did it cost to buy muffins for everyone?

3. Dylan & Brian decided to stop at the Big M to get a soda.Cory & Matt came into the store and decided they wanted one too. Dylan & Matt wanted a large one but Matt and Cory wanted a small one.Dylan decided he would be nice and buy everyone's drinks for them.How much did Dylan spend?

A Birthday Webquest

2006-01-06T05:59:00.000-08:00

What does your name mean?
http://www.behindthename.com/

Can you think of anyone famous with the same first name?
try using Google to see what comes up when you type your name!

What famous people share your birthday?
http://www.scopesys.com/cgi-bin/today2.cgi

Did anyone famous die on your birthday?
http://www.scopesys.com/cgi-bin/today2.cgi

What happened in history on your birthday?
http://www.scopesys.com/cgi-bin/today2.cgi
or watch a movie with a clip at http://www.historychannel.com/broadband/clipview/index.jsp?id=tdih_0105

What was the number 1 song on the day you were born?
http://www.thisdayinmusic.com/member/birthdayno1.php

What movie won an Oscar award the year you were born? http://www.imdb.com/Sections/Awards/Academy_Awards_USA/

What other movies came out that year?
http://us.imdb.com/Sections/Years/1997/

Who was president when you were born?
http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/

What phase was the moon in the day you were born?
http://tycho.usno.navy.mil/vphase.html

Half-Day

2006-01-04T06:25:00.000-08:00

Last night I had this dream that my house was as clean as Photo Mommy's.
(If you don't read Photo Mommy, just let me tell you...that was one clean house to be envious of).

I started the day with baby diarrhea. I don't recommend starting the day out that way. It's just not fun.

Plus...last night, I was supposed to soak the dipes overnight so I could wash them this morning and...

I forgot.

Actually,I didn't forget,exactly. There was already a load in the washer and I didn't have any more detergent, so what I really forgot to do was make more detergent.

I really need to buy some store bought detergent to have on hand for "just in case".

So, this morning....I was barely awake,making detergent because I have 2 diapers left and a baby with a leaky butt. Grating fels naptha soap before even having a first cup of coffee is not on my recommended list of things to do either.

The entire downstairs smells of baby poo. I think I need to have a cleaning marathon. Luckily, we're only having a half day of school today because the girls are going shopping at Walmart w/Grandma. They all got Wal-Mart giftcards for Christmas and...well, seeing how I feel about Wal-Mart....this was the only way they were going to be able to spend their money.

Coincidentally, the public school only has half-day today too because the school system started this goofy thing where the first Wednesday of every month is a half-day.Also lucky for me, because this means Dylan will be home this afternoon. Before I let him play the Warcrack, I'll put him to work helping his Mama around the house.

Speaking of Warcrack...I need to buy this shirt for Bob :"Warcraftck: My Anti-Job"

His birthday is in a few weeks. Too bad I have zero dollars to buy said shirt with.

*psst*He'll be 40

All right, the girls are waiitng for me to get Stinky Butt down for his first nap so we can start school. On this morning's agenda:
-learn about Louis Braille (it's his birthday,ya know)
-do an activity with raised letter blocks to see how hard it would be for a blind person to read that way (which is what they did vefore Braille)
- look at the Braille Alphabet and using a hole puncher, punch dots out of paper and glue them onto another piece of paper to spell something out (like maybe their names)

-make invitations for their birthday/After-Christmas Party.

Pine trees are conifers

2006-01-03T20:05:00.000-08:00

Watching House while printing out worksheets and such for tomorrow. That's my multitasking of the moment.

House is soooo the kind of guy I would fall for in real life.

I'm not sure what that says about me but I'm sure it's not good.

Earlier this evening, I went out and ran some errands alone (strange concept,I know). Went to the library to return books.They were closed so I couldn't pick up the books they had on hold for us/me. Went to the PO to pick up mail. Got a Christmas card from my Dad.

Walking by the carwash on the way home, I spotted Cosmo Charlie (the guy who lives at the laundromat) digging through the trash. He pulled out a nice pair of leather gloves. I said,"Hey,those are some nice gloves.". He said,"Yup.I need 'em".

And I immediately wondered why I had never thought of going through the garbage at the car wash. Just imagine what kind of stuff people throw out when they're vacuuming and cleaning their car out.

I feel kind of bad for Cosmo Charlie right now.The DPW took all the public garbage cans off the streets so it would be easier to clear the sidewalks of snow with their Loud-as-Hell-Outside-My-Bedroom-Window-at-5AM mini-snowplow machine thingys. So now he's limited in his garbage picking.

Anywho....

Today was a good one. We learned about the different calendars and where our current Gregorian calendar came from,which I'm sure doesn't sound too exciting but we managed to make it interesting I guess.

We learned about some different New Year's traditions and made some resolutions (which was the word of the day).

Yes,even I,anti-Resolution Rebecca,made some resolutions.

Here's what their's were:

Emily's

I want to try my best to be a better person and take more care of myself and my surroundings

Lilly's

1. Learn as much as I can about archeology
2. learn how to do division
3. have more niceness in me

Which is just so crazy,because Lilly is just the sweetest girl most of the time. A sweet girl who now wants to be an archeologist.

Favorites of the Day

Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale by Mo Willems- Maia has recently discovered Mo Willems books and we read Knuffle Bunny for the first time tonight. Such a GREAT book...we giggled like crazy reading it.

They Might Be Giants Here Come the ABCs- This is what happens when TMBG have kids. I got this for Maia for Christmas and we just sat down and watched it tonight. The alphabet set to catchy and a little wacky songs. Fun AND obviously educational. C is for Conifers must have made an impression on Maia. Brian walked in the door and she shared w/ him that ,"Pine trees are conifers".No,"Hi,Brian"...just "Pine trees are confiers" . She's a bit goofy :P

2006-01-02T05:27:00.000-08:00

This morning I was reading this article about an 11 year old homeschool girl who read 600 books last year .I read it aloud to the girls who immediately went,"Pffft! That's nothing.I can read 600 books this year."

Okie dokie.We'll see how that pans out.

The other reading related thing has to do with Lilly's Christmas card she received in the mail last week.

She was reading When Pirates Came to Brooklyn by Phyllis Shalant and was really enjoying it so she decided to look up more info about the author and found an address for her. She wrote a letter, sent it the next day and the following week got a lovely Christmas card with a handwritten note on the insidewith a personal reply.

Lilly is uber impressed.As am I. When I was her age,I remember writing to some author and getting a standard form letter with nothing personal at all and it was so disappointing.

Ok,well..I guess that's all I have to say about reading right now. I'm waiting for Bob to get home from work so I can read Anansi Boys, which he and I are "sharing" from the library. He took it to work with him so I have to wait until he comes home to have my turn.

Kinda crazy but it works ;)

2005-12-31T06:26:00.000-08:00

The newest American Girl doll is a homeschooler!How cool is that? Her name is Jess and she's only available this year.

2005-12-30T15:39:00.000-08:00

Listening to: Billie Holiday(over the din of Emily's radio tuned to some country station)
Multi-tasking:nursing the Octopus Baby (who is multi-tasking by trying to "help" type while nursing) while typing and printing out Music,Movie & Book Review forms.

About the Music,Movie,Book Reviews
I hung a bulletin board to post our family "reviews". I thought it would be neat to compile them all at the end of the year in a book and give them out as gifts ...maybe along with a gift certificate for movie rentals and some popcorn. Or maybe even a burned CD of some of our favorite music from the past year.

I'm determined to be "ready" for the holidays next year so therefore, I'm planning now.

In the meantime, this "reviews" will be a good school project in many ways...developing writing skills, classification skills (like different types of music, genres of books,etc)... all sorts of things.

Em & Lil's After-Christmas Birthday Party
The girls recently read Pippi Longstocking's After Christmas Party and were wondering if that was an actual "thing" in Sweden.So,I asked Petra and she filled me in on the whole Tree Plundering tradition. They decided that doing this for their birthday party would be fun so we're having a Pippi After-Christmas Party for their birthday. Their birthday is Thursday but we're not having the party until the week after.

Argh, they're going to be NINE! I started puberty when I was nine. Nine scares me. I've had to buy Emily a training bra already and Lilly isn't far behind. God,help me....

Maia took this picture

2005-12-20T06:34:00.000-08:00

Dmitri looks a little confused by the "9 Times" Table

She not a bad little photographer for a 4 year old,eh?

Yesterday,Dmitri climbed up 3 stairs by himself. The day before,he stood alone unsupported. This is the part where I lose my mind,I think.

Priceless comment from Lilly today,said as I was handing out jobs for the day: "The bad thing about homeschooling is that instead of homework, we do housework"

That's all for now.Youngest child is trying to conquer the mouse for himself.

2005-12-13T04:59:00.000-08:00

I started a blog for me....you know, personal ramblings that come from me that doesn't always have to do with cloth diapers and homeschooling(although sometimes it may,I confess)..I started it forever ago and couldn't seem to remember to update it. I'll have to be better about that.

It's here: The Mama's Blog

Today's Picture

2005-12-10T15:24:00.000-08:00

Today's Picture
Maia Wearing Dmitri's Hat
She overheard me comment on how Dmitri's hat was getting too small so she said,"Well, let me see if it fits me!".

Currently reading...

2005-12-07T06:37:00.000-08:00

Current Reading Material in Our Household

Me

Outloud to the Kids::
The Snow Queen by Hans Christian Anderson, Illustrated by Mary Engelbreit

The Snow Queen is one of my favorite stories and the fact that Mary Engelbreit illustrated a version of it just fills me with all sorts of glee.

I think when we're finished with it,I'll start on Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

::For school w/ the girls

Mrs Frisby and the Rats of NIMH.

::Just Finished::
Wickett's Remedy. It was a good read.I loved the unique style Myla Goldberg used with the "notatiions" in the margins with voices offering different perspective. It illustrates exactly how history can be re-written just by looking at a different perspective.

::Starting Now::
Son of a Witch-the "sequel" to Wicked ! Yay!

Maia
(the books I've read to her most frequently lately)

Mutt Dog - such a cute story about a homeless dog who finds a home

Pirate Girl - This is a great book by the same author of DragonRider. Lilly noticed that the author recycled some names from her other books LOL

Emily
Emily is on a Roald Dahl kick,and now reading BFG.

And of course, ...Rats of NIMH.

Lilly
She has a stack of books I know she's working on (besides the aforementioned ...NIMH), she has Harry Potter ...#5,I think...in her hand at the moment

Bob
He finished Son of a Witch and is reading The Poisonwood bible (one of my favorites)

Dylan
Just finished Cold Sassy Tree,which he had to read for English but he ended up really liking it (and remarked that he thought he was the only one in the class who liked it)

Writing Prompts

2005-12-07T05:35:00.000-08:00

Every day,I try to do some sort of writing prompt or brainstorming activity with the girls. Not only does it help improve their writing skills but it encourages them to think about things they may have not thought about before or maybe in a different way.

Sometimes I make them up.Other times I use something from one of the many,many daily memes or something from a teacher related site (which there are also many of).

Yesterday we used Writing Bug ,in which they had to write a New Twelve Days of Christmas.

Lilly was uninspired to write much (it happens to the best of us).

Emily's went like this:

On the Twelfth Day of Christmas,my true love gave to me....
twelve sisters blabbing;
eleven snowmen dancing;
ten crayons in one box;
nine boxes of chocolate;
eight little teddy bears;
seven stocking hanging on the mantle;
six banana muffins;
five candy canes for all my siblings;
four cute kittens in a crate;
three little puppies in a box;
two small ponies ;
and...
a Harry Potter DVD.

They also wrote letters to Santa at Email Santa Dot Com.

I guess yesterday was just a good writing day.

We revisited Ebay Math again,too,although we seemed pressed for time yesterday and it was done orally on the way to the post office. Hey...we're good at multi-tasking ;)

2005-11-29T12:53:00.000-08:00

my cute little sweet potato face :)

These pics are definitely going into my "Kitchen Collection".I always think of the kitchen as being to Heart of the Home so I've saved pictures of the kids and other family members to hang in the kitchen :)

2005-11-29T10:43:00.000-08:00

Since I don't have MY computer set up in our new house yet, I'll just stash links here and add them to my bookmarks on my computer later.Well,hopefull sooner than later....

Multiplication Mystery game

Wear Your Baby

2005-11-14T15:36:00.000-08:00

Reason Number 11 to Wear Your Baby:

When you have baby in a sling or carrier, no one can see the smooshed banana,dollop of cream cheese and coffee stains on your shirt.

Veteran's Day

2005-11-11T13:49:00.000-08:00

Today I had one of those days with my girls'. We spent the entire morning out and about town while the baby stayed with Daddy. It was Girls' Day Out. But the girls' acted like ...like...well... like one of those kids you see acting horribly in public and you think to yourself,"Ha! Glad that's not my kid. My kid would never act like that."

Karmic law says that if you even have that fleeting thought at some point in your life as a parewnt,then you shall be the parent at some time or other of one of those kids.

Today being Veteran's Day,there was no public school and everyone we encountered throughout the morning remarked,"Oh,isn't it terrible when the kids don't have school?". And there I was,left top say,"Well, actually...they're homeschooled so they're with me everyday." This got me some very apologetic looks,as if to say,"Oh,you poor thing" but I would quickly add,"They're not like this all the time.REALLY,they're not".

This afternoon we spent the day at home and everyone was perfectly behaved.Go figure.

I had no intention of really having school today, since it was a holiday officially,but the girls took it upon themselves to have school anyway. Lilly browsed through websites that have reproducible worksheets (I,not a fan of worksheets,don't understand why she seems to like them so much) and printed off about 10 pages of math worksheets. Most were review ,more or less but they were things she felt she needed to review.

Emily planned Thanksgiving activities and crafts to do next week and looked up some recipes to use for Thanksgiving Day,which somehow turned into her making a cookbook.

I have to agree that it's a rather good idea to have a cookbook full of "Fall Recipes". I think she's onto something there...

2005-10-10T07:49:00.000-07:00

Oh,my poor neglected blog *sigh*

I haven't had a whole lot of time to sit down and update. Our house is in absolute chaos with house moving stuff. And I'm a little stressed about having less than 3 weeks to move and still having no place to move to.Fun,fun..whee.

After we get moved to our new place (wherever that may be),I'll start updating again.
Thanks everyone for all the emails wondering where I (we) have been :)

school stuff from last week

2005-09-05T08:18:00.000-07:00

(What we did LAST week. Tried many times to finish writing it and post it but it's becoming increasingly hard to type with a baby in the Octopus Stage on my lap)

Week of August 29th-September 2nd

Author Study
Thsi week we started an Author & Illustrator Study of Chris Van Allsburg.

We started by reading The Garden of Abdul Gasazi,which was his first book. We talked about Van Allsburg's use of shadows and contrast in the book.

Afterwards I revealed to the girls a secret about Van Allsburg's books: Fritz the Dog appears in each book he wrote after The Garden of Abdul Gasazi. The girls poured over all of the books we had taken out of the library to see if they could find Fritz (which was also a good opportunity for them to see the different styles of artwork in his books)

On Wednesday, we read outloud The Mysteries of Harris Burdick. Before reading it,I explained the concept of the book.Chris Van Allsburg was shown these 14 drawings by a publisher. Each drawing had with it a title and caption,suggesting each was part of it;s own book. The drawings had been done by a man named Harris Burdick, who had brought the pages to show the publisher as examples of his work. The publisher was so impressed with the work that he asked Burdick to bring to his office the remaining pages but Burdick never returned and the publisher never could find him.

So,after reading this book, I had the girls choose a picture and write a story based on the art and the caption & title that went with it. These illustrations make GREAT story prompts.

We also read Two Bad Ants and did a little mini-unit about ants.

Artist Study
We're onto Matisse,to compliment Picasso,whom we just finished. I adore Matisse but the girls seem less thrilled. Maybe when they're older they'll appreciate his work more.

Of course,I may have killed it for them with this very,very boring dvd I got out from the library about Matisse.

They did like the paper cutouts art project we did though. Toward the end of Matisse's life, he was wheelchair bound and painting in his usual style became difficult.He started using painted paper to cut out shapes and glue them onto other paper. And that ,ladies and gentlemen,was collage.

We looked at pictures of some of his later paper cut-out pieces as inspiration and the girls used construction paper to make their own art.

The art museum at Cornell now has it's own copy of Matisse's Jazz (one of one hundred) and I'd love to go look at it. Don't know if the girls will be into it but I could always just take them to the ArtFull Saturdays they have and then i can steal a peek at Matisse's Jazz while we're there.

Penpals
All 3 girls have new penpals that they're really excited to write to. Maia already received drawings from her's and immediately made 2 pictures to send back to her. Her penpal is in Pennsylvania,Eily's is in Hawaii and lilly's is in Alaska.

Totally coincidentally that the twins got penpals from states that are not part of the contiguous US.

Math
Ugh.

Oops,did I say that out loud?

I hate math so I feel like that's the area I work the hardest in with the girls. We're working on the times table right now and this week worked on 1-4.Sure,I could just have them memorize the times table but I'd rather they actually learn it.

We played little multiplication games or a short activity for each number. They really didn't need to do 1 & 2 but we did anyway. For 3,I made this bingo-type game.The game boards had all products of 3 in the squares and made cards with the numbers 0-9. On each turn, you draw a card and multiply that number by 3 and mark that space on the game board. First person to fill in the whole thing wins.

*makes mental note to buy poster board to make a better version of the game*

For 4, we counted groups of things in the room that had 4 corners. Like windows,doors,books,etc. The object was to find how many corners in all.

And I we learned the "x4 Trick". When multiplying by 4,double the number and double it again.

Friday, they filled out a blank multiplication table for the numbers 1-4

Then of course throughout the week, there were probably a zillion other math related things we did without even realizing it.

Spelling
I've tried so many different spelling lists and curriculums and they just don't work for us. What I started doing instead is I look over each girl's writing from the previous week and pull out the words the misspell frequently (or just make a note when they ask me out loud,"How do you spell such-andsuch") and make a list using that. This makes the most sense to me because obviously, these are words they want/need to be using and can't spell them correctly,so that means they need to work on them,right?

Right. Makes sense to me anyway.

This week was the first week we did this.The girls had entirely different lists, so integrating the words into games was a bit more challenging.

During their spelling test (hey,THEY wanted weekly spelling tests, not me!) , they worked on a crossword puzzle (this week's was all hurricane related words) while the other one had their test. It worked out pretty good.

Hurricane Katrina
I know a lot of homeschool families made this past week or so an opportunity to learn about hurricanes but my girls seemed way more interested in talking about the human tragedy of it so we went that direction instead.

We have this big jar that everyone throws their change into.That's the "Car Fund" .Well, it WAS the Car Fund but now since we're looking for a place to live,it's the House Fund. I've indulged this,even though I know it would take forever to save enough change to buy a house but that's a lesson they need to learn,you know?

Anyway, they chose to use that money for the hurricane relief efforts. They're actually still not done wrapping but they've wrapped $15.00 so far.

(oh...there was another math thing. Counting,sorting money)

Also, we found out about
Project Noah,which collects supplies and curriculum materials for homeschool families displaced by natural disasters or otherwise in crisis. This coming week, we plan to completely clean out our shelves and closets and donate what we don't need (as long as I can afford to ship it,I guess).
New and Used Curriculum and/or school supplies:

PROJECT NOAH

15807 Brickman Ct

Houston, TX 77084 USA

Since then,though, I've found out that members of a message board I belong to are evacuees,as well, so perhaps once they get settled in one place (until they find a permanent place) ,I can send items to them directly.

One mom said she would be thrilled to just have paper and crayons right now. They're looking for a sense of normalcy. Also,there have been messages posted from shelter coordinators asking for school items because the parents in the shelters are basically cooperatively homeschooling all the children,since there are no schools open,obviously and they feel it's important for them to be learning something.

(I have addresses for those shelters in case some of you teacher/ homeschool people would like to send something)

Do you have room for more?

2005-09-03T16:05:00.000-07:00

Share your home with Katrina's victims

RIP Juliet

2005-08-10T13:54:00.000-07:00

I came home from an appointment this morning and on my way out to get the mail,I saw my Juliet kitty laying in the grass. I said,"Hey,Julie Kitty" and she didn't move :(

My favorite cat I've ever had ...the one I expected would die a quiet,peaceful death in her old age, got hit by a car,I guess.

We're all pretty sad about it. We put a "memorial" by the road near where I found her with her picture on it and saying we loved her and miss her.

When Bob saw me putting the sign out,I think he thought I was putting something out that said,"The scumbag who killed my cat must die!" but no .... I just figured it would be a good way to helpo the kids heal and memorialize her AND serve as notice to whoever did hit her that the cat they killed meant something to us.

Ok, so I realize that it was most likely an accident but I don't know...I think if I hit a cat in a residential area,I'd stop and try to find the owner to let them know and apologize (and I'd probably be bawling my head off the whole time). I just think that's the decent thing to do,isn't it?

*sigh*

I'm just very sad about it right now. That cat wasn't just a cat...she was family.

Army Men & Unicorns

2005-08-09T16:36:00.000-07:00

We hit the Free Pile Mother Lode over the weekend. The house I used to live in before I moved here had a yard sale on Saturday and put all the leftovers curbside and posted on freecycle.

The girls liked seeing where we used to live,since they don't really remeber it. Of course it was inconceivable to Maia that there was such a thing as a time before she existed so she couldn't figure out why I lived there with Dylan,Emily & Lilly and not her or even Daddy.

I hate what the dumbass that bought it did to the front. The house used to be a ~~church~~ Jehovah Witness Kingdom Hall . It was built by all the members of the congregation,using all their pooled resources. the frame is made from various timber from a couple of member's properties and one of the members was a mason so the whole facade was stone....kind of mosaiced a bit. I liked the way it looked.It was very unique and the stone was prettycool.

The guy who lived downstairs bought the place after I moved and apparantly he didn't like it because he painted the stone white. It looks so ugly now.

He was such a jerk,anyway.He was the one who was a mild manned (yet sleazy) insurance salesman by day and DJ/Party Animal by night. He would DJ at some place and then bring everyone home with him. 1 a.m., some already-drunk person would knock on my door asking,"Is this where the party's at?". Um,no. And some stranger knocking on your door at 1 a.m. when your a single mother living alone is not the most comforting feeling in the world. But of course the worst thing was the actual party,which was so loud it would wake all 3 kids.

I was a bitch and called the police several times so after the fourth time or so, he had them less and less.

Anyway....he doesn't live there now, just rents it.

But back to the free stuff....

We got a baby bath tub (looks new),a jumpy bouncey baby thingy,a sleeping bag,a huge box of kid's books, some tapes (namely Elvis Costello) , various toys AND....

a box of little plastic army men and accoutrments.

You should have seen the funny looks I got from the kids when i picked them out and loaded them into the wagon.
It was kind of like they were waiting for pigs to fly and the world to end.

Really, i was thinking how much Bob would be happy if I brought them home.
(Just pretend I did not just say I picked up toys specifically for my husband)...but as it turned out,the girls enjoyed playing with them too.

I guess there were elephant poachers killing elephants so the army had to put a stop to that. Also, the army guys seem to be fond of the pink unicorn they rescued from certain death.

I think this confirms my suspicious that toys that are seen as violent are really only violent in the hands of children that have been taught to play with them like that.Or something like that.

By the way, does anyone know how much it hurts to step on those little buggers barefoot? I was pretty sure little legos and dinosaurs were the worst things to step on barefoot but I think I may have to reconsider that position.

2005-08-04T16:37:00.000-07:00

Well, it's finally happened. I've become one of those kinds of mommies.

Here I sit, pondering what to write an entry about and the first thing that pops into my mind is about Dmitri and his poopy diaper.

Gawd,help me.

But seriously. He pooped today.I say this like it's a rare event because it is. He's one of those breastfed babies that only has a BM every week or so. For him,it's 7-10 days between poopy diapers. I'm not sure whether I'd rather change normal poopy diapers every day or one really stinky and massive poopy diaper once every 7-10 days.

Both have their pluses and minuses.

My neck & my head are KILLING me.It started last night and I woke up in the middle of the night feeling kind of feverish and like I had the flu.

This morning I dragged myself and the kids to the library and went and had lunch with my Grandma and felt worse as the morning went on. Came home and napped but my neck & head are still killing me.

The weird thing is my mom called in sick to work today because she had a stiff neck.

Hypochondria says I have viral meninghitis transmitted to me somehow through my mother who works in a germ-laden hospital.

Of course,it could just be that i tweaked something when I slipped and fell in the kitchhen yesterday although I would have thought I'd feel it more in my hips since I did a slpit falling.

So glad no one saw that.

Today when we were at my Grandma's, I noticed that Maia was sitting on the floor in front of a picture of my grandparents that my Grandma has propped against the wall. She just sat there quietly touching my Grandpa's face in the picture. I nudged Dylan and we both watcxhed her for a little bit. Dylan looked like he was going to cry watching her.

Then she got up and I thought that she'd move on but instead she went into the kitchen and told my Grandma, "I miss Grandpa" and got all sad.

I was sure my Grandma would get emotional but she took it well.

Today I noticed she was doing better than most days lately. She even made us lunch ...even though she had to cook it in the microwave because they've taken away her oven & stove so she doesn't burn the place down.

Oh...but she did call me at the library,which is a little ....awkward.
She just wanted to know when i was going to be there (even though I told her 10 times I'd be there as soon as I left the library,around noon. I guess it's good it's a smalltown library and they know who I am...

Oh,but while I was on the phone with her (I had to go behind the checkout desk to talk to my Grandma), Maia left without me. This is the 3rd time she'd done this to me in the past few weeks. Just up and leaves without me when we're out and about . Oh my god, panic attack city. Some woman found her outside hiding in between or behind the columns (the columns on the right hand side of the picture,to be exact).

Oy.

And I know this probably sound really stupid but I really,really hate when one of the kids does something like that in public, not only because of the potential for disaster(that's what freaks me out the most,obviously) but also because I feel like it makes me look like I'm not in control of my kids and maybe can't handle all that I have.

But then again, I know that I am so who cares what they think? Except that we have the whole small town thing going on and well....if you've ver lived in a small town,you know how much people love to talk about others and right now,I'm "the one with all the kids". Last Saturday, Ruth made a comment about me being "a rabbit". Well, the actual comment was that I was a rabbit like she was(she had 7 children)...but she said it within earshot of lots of people that give me those looks , including my uncle and I heard audible snickers from some.

*rolls eyes*
Just annoying,that's all.

Anyway....

Hmmm...what else....

I read Ida B : . . . and Her Plans to Maximize Fun, Avoid Disaster, and (Possibly) Save the World this afternoon. I was pre-reading it to see if it's something the girls could/would want to read.
I love the first part of the book. Ida B spent 3 weeks and 2 days in Kindergarten before her Mama brought her home to the farm and homeschooled her. She spends her days talking to trees and the brook, along with her other lessons. She has this very secure,happy little life, full of creativity and fun. Then her mother gets cancer and they send her to public school and that's where the book went ..."eh" for me.

I can't put my finger on what it is,though. I get that she's angry and tries to shut herself off to keep from getitng hurt and how she makes amends in the end but to me, her actions from the beginning of the book and the second half are so extreme from each other,that it just doesn't make sense. There's just a lot of little things that bother me...like the way everyone is so distant from each other and how the mother's cancer doesn't even seem to be a concern to the little girl...her anger and everything comes from having to go to school and not being allowed to stay home. She's in 4th grade so it's not like she's too young to understand.

I'll have the girls read it and they can decide what they think of Ida B.

Skip to my Lugh

2005-08-01T14:29:00.000-07:00

Oh my gods..what a ridiculous day.

Namely when it comes to anything to do with food.

Today is Lughnasad so my original plan was to spend the day preparing for some resemblance of a feast to honor ...whatever it is I'm supposed to honor on Lughnasad. Is it bread I'm honoring or is it Lugh...or Lugh's mother or...the first harvest or...what? Or is it all of it? See, all these years as a good little Pagan and I'm still lost.

Anyway, so we decided to make these Spiral Cookies. I've made them before.They're really yummy. Really,they are but everyone will have to take my word for it because on this day,there are no Spiral Cookies to have.

We made the batter. It was this delicious,smooth creamy light batter. We took a cup of it and added chocolate to it so then we had this nice creamy light batter and this rich chocolately dark batter. The plan was to spread the light batte rbetween 2 pieces of wax paper and roll it out (because it's not firm like sugar cookie dough so rolling it without the wax paper won't work) .Then do the same thing with the dark batter.Then take the top wax paper off both batters and then put them together and THEN take the top layer of wax paper off and roll it all up and cut it into slices to make the cookies.

Really it is not as hard as it sounds.

Unless you put the batter on the NON wax side of the wax paper so that the dough just doesn't slide off like it would if you put it on the waxy side.

During this whole fiasco,i have 3 little girls giving some "helpful" insights like ,"Mommy, I don't think this is working right" and "I think you messed up".

Ya think?

And the whole time I'm batting away 3 little hands that keep trying to dip their fingers into the dough that's managed to escape from the sides of the wax paper sandwich.

Well, they won. I gave up took the 2 halves apart and spread them out and the table and told the girls to go get spoons and help themselves.
Emily said today's lesson was that when mommy screws up, you get to eat cookie dough.Smart one,that one is.

Hmmph.

Then my Cantaloupe Smoothies didn't taste very cantaloupy...they just tasted like vanilla yogurt and the pitas i was trying to stuff at lunch time just would NOT open up at all to make a pocket to stuff.

I planned on making Cabbage Rolls for dinner but sheesh...i think I should just stay away from food for the day. Anyway,the kids all went blueberry picking (except for Dmitri,obviously) and they were going to eat dinner out with my mom and Grandma,I guess so i might as well not make dinner since no one will be here to eat it.

Oh...and I was trying to upload pics from my camera so I could get the next batch of stuff posted on ebay and one of the pins in my USB cable broke! Thankfully, I have $15.00 left in my Paypal account so I bought another cable. What else was I going to do? I have to have a cable to get the pics uploaded so i can make some money. So now I have $5 whole dollars. Yippee!

Hey, it's $5 more than some people have,right?

I despise money.

*spits*

Anyway....

I hate talking about money.

I shall talk about watermelon instead.

Did you know that it's impossible to find a watermelon WITH seeds around here? Everyone sells seedless ones. I need watermelon seeds for a math activity and an art project I'm doing tomorrow with the girls.
Doesn't anyone think about this sort of thing when they decide to carry only seedless watermelons? Sheesh.

2005-07-29T15:50:00.000-07:00

Knock,knock.

Who's there?

Butter.

Butter who?

Just butter.

*insert hysterical laughter from 4 year old*
*insert blank stare from mama *

Knock,knock.

Who's there?

Butter.

Butter who?

Butter you!

I so don't get it.

Lilly

2005-07-20T19:10:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow we're going to see a stage production of Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse at the Hangar Theater .
The girls are all very excited about it and spent the afternoon reading the book and we played Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse Game.
I think I bought it for Lilly's 4th birthday and for some reason it got shelved until now. They loved it. You pick the picture cards (one for each year old the child is plus one for luck) and then have to tell a story using the cards. After teling the story, the storyteller puts the Lilly Blindfold on and the other players hide one of the cards in the Purple Plastic Purse.The storyteller has to use their memory to figure out which card is missing. It got my seal of approval anyway.Impromptu storytelling and a memory game. Very cool.

Copacabana

2005-07-19T19:06:00.000-07:00

I had the song "Oats,Peas,Beans and Barley Grow" stuck in my head all day and then this afternoon, we were doing an art project and Emily named her drawing "Lola".

Well, you can't hear the name Lola without thinking about the showgirl with red ribbons in her hair and her dress cut down to there.I have been singing "Copacabana" all afternoon. My poor kids.

We're doing an artist study of Picasso this week (or as long as the girls want and decide to move on to a different artist). We read a short bio about Picasso and started browsing through pictures of his artwork,beginning from when he was young up until cubism. We did an art project where the girls made two different faces on 2 pieces of construction paper using chalk as their medium. When they were done with their two faces, they cut the paper in half vertically and glued a half from each face to another piece of paper to create a new face, the result being a definitely skewed,non-symmetrical face much like Cubist art.

Lilly's

Emily's

This was "Frank" and "Lola" separately but when she combined them,she felt she had to title her artwork "Frank & Lola".

I'm guessing Lola is NOT a showgirl.;)

Oats,Peas,Beans & Barley Grow

2005-07-19T16:53:00.000-07:00

This week we decided we should put in a second planting of peas and beans . I made a word problem so they could figure out if there was enough time for the beans to mature before the end of the growing season. Emily LOVES word problems. Lilly went and crawled under the table to play with the dog.

Yes,I know we don't have a dog.It isn't our dog. We are dog sitting for my mother while she is in Philadelphia.

Anyway...gardening math...
It takes 63 days for the bean plants to reach maturity.How many weeks will it take for the beans to be ready? What day should they be ready to harvest?

As it turned out, Lilly was the one who ended up figuring the problem out correctly ,which put Emily is a rather wah-wah mood. Grrr.I hate it when she gets in one of her moods.

She got over it though.

We had soaked some peas overnight. When we poured water over them into the container,we used exactly 1 cup of water. We didn't plan it that way...that just happened to be what I used to fill up with water. So,today when we were about to drain the water off the peas, one of the girls decided to measure the water.

It was less than a cup.

Now they are tryng to figure out what happened to the missing water...did it evaporate or or all soak into the peas? Hmmm. Now we have to figure out some experiment to use to find out.Should be fun.

We decided to plant both unsoaked peas and soaked peas to see if they grow differently.
I'm thinking this peas & beans growing will be a good opportunity to learn beyond what they already know and get into plant anatomy and seed parts and all that jazz. Dicots...monocots...hypocotyl....cotyledon...all that good stuff.

It's been scorching hot here and very dry. Gardening was not fun,even though we made a point to do it first thing this morning before the hottest part of the day. I had planned on getting some spinach planted too but just the time it took to plant the peas and beans was enough for me...and the kids were complaining.

Yesterday I ended up getting dehydrated.I just got busy and didn't make sure to drink water. Well, come to think of it,it was dinner time before I even ate.I went to bed feeling like crap & with a wicked headache. Woke up feeling the same. It's almost 1:00 and I'm surprised I've made it this far through the day and still managed to be productive.

I suppose I should go.It's reading time and Maia is bugging Emily to read to her but Emily is absolutely not interested in reading to her, She's trying to read the rest of the fifth Harry Potter so she can start on the 6th.

*hopes Maia doesn't pick out that bear book we ALL hate to read to her*

2005-07-17T12:12:00.000-07:00

I really have very little time for blogging anymore so it's beyond me why I started a new one at Homeschoolblogger.com. I guess I will try it out and see if I like it there and then get rid of one or the other.

Level Up

2005-07-16T14:37:00.000-07:00

A sign your kid has been playing too many video games: When she comes to you and says,"Mommy, The Secret Garden is a really,really good book so far and I'm only on Level 3".

She realized right away what she had said and changed it to "CHAPTER 3" and added, "I think I've been playing too many computer games".

from weeks ago....

2005-07-13T17:13:00.000-07:00

These are all pics I took weeks ago and just got around to emptying off the camera.

Bob took this one as he was spinning her

a pistol shot Montana gallop

2005-06-27T19:48:00.000-07:00

I gave Maia a dish of ice cream this afternoon. She in turn gave Dmitri some.

She came to me while I wa sin the kitchen and proudly exclaimed,"Mamai,Dmitri likes ice cream!"

Great.

His little face was covered with Cookies & Cream ice cream and he was definitely happy about it.

He's pretty happy in general,anyway but the ice cream was a definite hit with him.

He really is just such a super,super baby. He needs a little Tshirt with a big "S" on it for Super Baby.

This afternoon though I dumped half a bag of coffee beans all over the place and he laughed at me. I didn't think that was very nice,silly boy.

(Oh,and ,Kemma....I'm good on coffee! Dylan just bought me a bag from Gimme!coffee. It's the "WoW Blend. Yes,that's right....they named a coffee after World of War~~craft~~crack. The label reads like this:

WoW:the High Octane Blend
Roast Medium-dark
Aroma:deep,with apricot-citron
Taste a pistol-shot Montana gallop
Body a pensive maverick
Aftertaste long road bourbonesque

Yeah, too bad I'm not a WoW Junkie.I'll bet i could get lots of game play in while drinking this stuff. But I guess I'll just use it for getting extra loads of laundry done.)

Did I ever mention about when I applied for a job at Gimme last year? I have never seen a job application like that before. I mean, not for a coffee shop anyway. Look: Gimme Application
What is my purpose in life??!!On a application for a coffee shop? Why, to serve the good people of Trumansburg,NY coffee and do it with a smile,of course. I plan on saving the world one cup of coffee at a time.

I was totally writing about something entirely different before this coffee spiel but now I've lost my train of thought.

Oh...Dmitri laughing.

This baby has laughed for a long time,like since he was just a few weeks old. I don't mean gassy little smiles combined with squeaks or whatever. Real laughs. At first,this only happened in his sleep but still..they were unmistakable laughs.I tried telling him that all the books about infant development clearly state that he should not laugh yet but he's a rebel and it didn't put an end to his laughing.

He's been laughing more and more though during waking hours and it delights his sisters to no end to hear him giggle and then they try to recreate whatever it was that made him laugh in the first place. Sometimes he'll just start laughing and we'll have no clue what it was that he thought was so funny so we all act like total fools trying to make him laugh. One day,Maia put a towel over her head and he thought it was hysterical so she did it again and again to hear him laugh until he got bored of it.Then she was puzzled because he didn't think it was funny anymore.

i think the better questioin is why did he think it was so funny in the first place.

Well, I was not going to dump all those coffee beans all over the counter again just so I could hear him laugh. Call me crazy....

2005-06-25T18:20:00.000-07:00

I got this email from lilly this evening:

guess what i went on this train on world of warcraft and it went under water it was cool i also said wahoo when i was in front of the train i went under the train and i was like cool its going to sqush me

What a goofy girl.

And ya think maybe we need to work on punctuation a little bit? hehe

2005-06-24T09:42:00.000-07:00

I think I'm experiencing some sort of weird delayed post-partum depression. I don't know for a fact,really. I've never had PPD before so I'm a little clueless to be honest.

All i know,is I'm not having fun. I have waves of sadness that come over me. I'm just sad and I have no real reason to be. I feel really overwhelmed a lot...and when i feel that way are at times when I shouldn't feel that way.

I feel the Mommy Guilt big time. I know this will get better as Dmitri gets older but at the moment,getting the one-on-one time in w/ each child just is not happening. I think it would happen easily if this house wasn't so chaotic & disorganized and I AM trying to get there but everytime I try, the feelings of being overwhelmed take over and I just feel lost and useless.

I have not talked to Bob at all about how I'm feeling.I suppose I should. I just feel like he'll see it as me using it as an excuse to not be Super Mommy & Wifey.

Wet diapers

2005-06-17T14:28:00.000-07:00

I prayed for rain and Mother Nature decided to give me something for once I asked for.
It's been raining on and off for a few days and the temperature has dropped tot he 60's. That is not something i asked for. Warm and rainy would have been preferable

Once again, I am struggling to dry the diapers without a dryer on these rainy days. I have a rope strung across our bedroom with diapers hanging,fans blasting on them and occassionally I'll sit there with a hair dryer and blow dry them. I'm one step above pioneer women.I have electricity.

There was a dryer offered last week on Freecycle and I spent the whole week trying to find someone I knew w/ a truck to go pick it up. I finally had to say to the people who were offering it that they should pass it on to someone else. I got an email a little while ago from them offereing to come deliver it.

These people are saints. I have to think of some divine goodies to bake that scream,"Thank you,thank you,thank you!".

We overslept this morning and the girls missed the bus.

Four more school days until the girls are "officially" done w/ public school and we enter the realm of homeschooling.I am thrilled.

Lilly spent this morning doodling at Mr. Picasso Head. I think we'll do an artist study on Picasso at some point this summer. She seemed pretty intrigued by abstract art.

All three girls are sprawled on the floor now watching Grave of the Fireflies. It's beyond me why they always want to watch that movie. It's the most depressing,heart wrenching movie i have ever seen in my entire life and they love it. I would like to read the book "Hotaru no Haka", by Akiyuki NOSAKA but it seems to be rather difficult to find here.

Weekend To -Do List

finish Curious George quilt
clean out laundry room so we can move new dryer in
relax?

I dont know what to title this babbling.....

2005-06-02T06:08:00.000-07:00

I'm skipping Story Hour @ the library today because:
A) my hips and legs and sciatica are really,really bothering me and I don't feel like walking that far

B) I either have carpal tunnel acting up or some weird pinched nerves and I'm having a hard time grabbing on to anything and if I hold something for a long time, my hand goes numb.This makes drinking coffee a bitch so I imagine pulling the wagon would be 10 times as bad.

C) We were just at the library on Tuesday and got videos out. Videos have to be returned in 5 days, which means Saturday I would have to walk down to the library again to return them. I love the library but every other day is getting silly,especially when I have to walk 2 miles to get there.

D) I really ,really have to get something done around the house. It's quite the mess.

So, Saturday we'll go. Maybe I'll get lucky and *D* will actually end up coming for daycare tomorrow and I'll have cash and I can take them out for lunch or something.

I probably should hang up some more flyers for daycare while I'm downtown,as well. Honestly,I think about having daycare kids again and I just feel....blah. But I have to so that's that.

Maybe I'll get lucky and get some super nice,well adjusted family/kid. They DO exist, I know they do. I've seen them! Actually had times when I've had them in daycare.They're few and far between but they DO exist! Really!
Hey, I love a challenge when it comes to kids but right now,I am really not up for a challenge. Just your average,ordinary kid with well balanced parents would be fabulous for me right now. Average,ordinary kids are challenging enough w/ out adding extra social and behavioral issues to the mix (because generally, average ,ordinary people have social and behavioral issues all on their own. Start labelling it and that's when the fun begins)

Why do people send their kids to school for "socialization"? Personally, I wouldn't want to socialize w/ people who are ill mannered ,rude and otherwise socially unacceptable. Why would my kids?

That was a random thought. It just happens to be something I was thinking of though in relation to putting my kids in with a group of other kids that behave a way I wouldn't find acceptable for my own children.

And that's the thing about being a daycare provider. I might just end up with some kid who is totally doesn't even register on the radar with social skills. Totally deficient and devoid. So then it becomes my responsibility to role model and positively guide them(which their parents and previous daycare providers should have done already but c'est la vie) ....but while I'm doing so, my kids get the joy of socializing w/ such a creature.

And see....most of the kids who are like the ones I just described have been in daycare since birth and/or in preschool...or even in regular school. So by some people's standards, that kid is "socialized" because they went to school or was in a setting w/ other kids? That's why i cringe when I hear that whole socialization agument about homeschooling. I've seen kids who had tons of socialization from those sources and they are not socially acceptable at all. They have not always learned how to "get along with others" in the "real world". You learn how to get along in the real world by BEING in the real world and by being taught a basis of good social skills by your parents. School is not the real world. It's a microcosm of society. Hell,it's a seperate society all together. One that has very little application socially in the real Real World.

yeah...

where did that all come from this morning? Here I was going to boast about my latest Freecycle scores and babble about the Young Housewife Shoes that Bob bought me yesterday and I end up on the "S" word. I clearly am just not happy unless I'm bitching about something.

Accomplishments

2005-05-17T15:07:00.000-07:00

I hate those days where you feel like you accomplished a ton but when you look around,you realize it's nothing you can visibly see. No visible accomplishment. Blah.

I cleaned out the closet in the girls room. Well, I've been cleaning it out for a week now but I haven't had a block of time to work on it and get it done. But today Dmitri napped on Maia's bed while I finished sorting.

EIGHT years worth of accumulated clothing. Well, basically...give or take a year. I had gotten rid of the infant clothes just before I got pregnant for Dmitri *smacks self for being dumbass*

Now the only thing in the closet is the stuff for Maia to grow into.Um...
and 2 boxes of stuff I wanna keep.

Most of them went to a single mom who has a 3 year old who posted eons ago on freecycle that she was looking for clothes for her daughter. I happened to be thinking at the time and saved her email address. Some were ebayable...some are being sent out to people in cyberworld.

Some were rags :P

But in my defense,let me explain WHY I have 2 boxes of baby/kid's clothes to keep. See, I look at some of their outgrown clothes and I have a lot of sentimental attachment to them. Some of the clothes I kept because I want the actual outfit but most of them I kept for the fabric so I can make a quilt using their outgrown clothes.

I already plan on making it using a Grandmother's Flower Garden design. That's my favorite quilt pattern anyway.

And Bob think I should make a quilt for each of the kids as keepsake quilts using their outgrown clothes but oh,no way Jose....
Those clothes are going into MY quilt.Mine. All mine.

Hmmmph.

Anyway...

I did accomplish other today too. Don't ask me what they were now but I just know I did.

Here's one thing I accomplished:

The funny thing about diapers hanging on the line is that when I see them all hanging there, it feels very productive...like I did accomplish something. Really,though all I've done is wash a bunch of rectangular shaped pieces of cotton that the baby pooped and peed in just so he can poop and pee in them again.

At least they're all white and there's not a single stain on any of them. Now THAT is an accomplishment.

Oh...and another accomplishment for today...

I made it through the day without selling this child to gypsies and still managed to stay semi-sane:

Don't let that angelic face fool ya. She hasn't earned the title Little Dictator for nothing,you know.

Oh...and this.This is an accomplishment:

I weighed him the other day and he now weighs 12 pounds.Thanks all to the Boobie Juice. All hail the boobie and praise the breatsmilk. Yup.

Well, at least I've accomplished something someone can see, even if it is a gradual change ;)

And I leave you with Ten on Tuesday
10 Brand Names You Can't Live Without

1) Burt's Bees Butt Cream
2) Burt's Bees Apricot Baby Oil
3) Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda
4) Fels Naptha Soap
5) Mozilla Firefox
6) Mozilla Thunderbird
7) Snappi Diaper Fasteners
8) Wegman's Store Brand Tea Bags
9) Hershey's Chocolate
10)Ithaca Tofu Tofu-Kan

Piggyback Toads

2005-05-13T05:06:00.000-07:00

"Where is a dolphin's vagina?"

I'd say that's about the most interesting question I've been asked by a kid this week.

"Mommy,why is that toad giving the other one a piggyback ride?" was another favorite.

The pond is alive with toads spawning. I have never seen so many toads in one place in my life.It was like a Toad Orgy or something.

It was the first chance we had this year to make observations for Frogwatch USA.Maia loves listening to the frog & toad sounds and trying to match them up with what we hear at the pond.

The pair of ducks that've been hanging out at the pond are mallards.I can't wait until we have baby duckies. Ok, I can't wait until they have their baby duckies. I just can't help but refer to them as our ducks sometimes. Same as the goslings.

After all, I have gone out and stopped traffic for them so they could cross the road. That should entitle me to some sort of honorary duck/goose-motherhood,shouldn't it?

Here is a pic of 2 of our toads riding piggyback. Or would it by Toadyback?

Today is Monday

2005-05-09T06:50:00.000-07:00

Maia is occupied with Sesame Street & Dmitri is nursing so I guess I shall try to update a bit.

(btw...I always typo Dmitri. I somehow always type it like this: "Dmitir")

We finally have gorgeous weather so I'm getting caught up with things of a gardening nature. I only spent about $25 on seeds this year(but I haven't gotten my tomato plants yet) ...I don't have huge plans for gardening like I usually do. I just have not been too enthused about the whole idea of putting in a garden in a place I don't really want to be. I love the summer and fall here but after that,it sucks. Maybe I wouldn't mind it so much if we had money and the winters weren't such a drain on our resources and therefore,spirits. I might feel differently about living here if we didn't have to struggle so much through the winters.

Ah,well.

Of course,the girls will be planting their Three Sisters garden,as usual. Emily is corn,Lilly is beans and Maia is pumpkins. I don't think they're represented accurately by their veggie like in the Native American tales but that's the way it's always been so we'll stick to it.I see Lilly as more of the corn and Emily more of the squash and maia as the bean but oh,well.

I spent time this weekend making up my menu for my Once a Month Cooking day and making out my shopping list.We still don't have our new food stamp card so we haven't been able to go grocery shopping.I'm hoping it comes today so Bob can do the shopping tonight after work,since it's his last day of work this week until Friday.Then I can cook on Wednesday.

And because I spent so much time menu planning this weekend ,I didn't do plans for Maia for this week so I've spent this morning doing that. This week, she chose letter "P" as the Letter of the Week. This means plenty of opportunities for pink and purply goodness all week,I suppose. Maybe something to do with Princesses. Maybe I'll do a fairy tale theme with her.Then I can work in princesses and pigs (as in,the three little ones).

It's a good thing I'm good at winging it.

I'm printing out these Days of the Week ..thingys . I thought I could use them on a daily bulletin board.
Maia is working on the days of the week a lot lately so some sort of additional reinforcement will be good.

Maybe when we go to the library on Thurday,I'll get Today is Monday out for her. There's another book I remember doing a days thing with a few years ago but I can't remember who it's by. I guess I'll have to google it.Something about a paper chain in the title and I think the characters are bunnies.I just remember having the kids make a paperchain and tearing them off for each day that went by .

Anyway...

She's obsessively checking the orange seeds she planted last week. Let's hope they actually do germinate :P
The one seed looked like it had a good chance but the other 3 looked pretty sad. I let her hypothesize which one would grow better and she chose the not-sad looking one so we marked that cup with a red golf tee.

Why do I even have golf tees in my house? It's one of those weird mysteries that come up in our household on a daily basis.

Dmitri is asleep...Sesame Street is almost over.I guess it's time to go do something worthwhile with the day.

2005-05-04T12:59:00.000-07:00

My little guy at 1 month...

Notes to self

2005-04-17T11:23:00.000-07:00

Listening to:Breakfast with the Beatles

Multitasking: nursing Dmitri while typing

Wearing: pajama pants with stars & moons,T-shirt that says"Starry,Starry Night" (it's the shirt Bob wore on our first date)

Note to self: Get mattress pad for our bed.

The baby boy and I are very leaky individuals. This morning when
I woke up,I was laying in a wet spot (in fact my whole shirt was wet)
from leaking milk. There was a wet spot underneath the boy's head from
spit-up and another wet spot from his very,very wet diaper.

Another note to self: Go thrift whoring for wool sweaters so I can make butt sweaters for the boy.

When I got up and went downstairs,I was greeted by two 8 year old girls
acting very suspiciously. It seems I was supposed to stay upstairs a
little while longer.. The pancakes they were making weren't finished
yet.

I peeked into the kitchen and had a mini-coronary but hid it well. I
just kind of walked away,ignoring the flour and sugar coated floor and
counters and every sdingle cupboard & drawer opened and
rummaged through and yelled back over my shoulder, "Make sure you clean
up after your done!".

Tomorrow morning I have a date with the same two 8 year olds so
we can have a "How to Make Pancakes" cooking lesson. Which is kind of
funny because I have always done tons of cooking WITH my kids(and they
always help me make pancakes) so I would assume they know HOW to cook
but it's much different when Mom is standing right there with the right
measuring cup or teaspoon.

So,yeah...the pancakes weren't edible,really. After making a
batch,Emily looked at it and realized there wasn't enough and I told
her that I usually double the recipe for our family .She decided to
make another batch. Well, the first batch had WAY WAY too much salt
(she saw the 3/4 in the recipe and missed the "tsp" part and used
a 3/4 CUP of salt) . The second batch just tasted like the baking
powder wasn't mixed through.

I kind of flip flopped back and forth between whether or not it's ok
for them to use the electric griddle to cook alone . Then I thought
about it and I look at it this way: They've been taught how to use it
and know enough to turn it off when they're done, not to touch it,etc .
And also, I think about when I was their age. I was a latch key kid and
left home alone a lot at their age. I fended for myself and could cook
simple things. I never burned the house down or burned myself so it
can't be all that dangerous for them,since they're cooking with an
adult or 2 actually in the house at the time.

Another note to self: check batteries in smoke detector.

The other kids are home from their walk in the woods and I'm being
inundated with their tales from their adventures. I'm good at
multitasking but I can't listen to them and type at the same time
for some reason.

Yet Another Note to Self: Clone self so multitasking is no longer a neccesity

Couch Co-Sleeping

2005-04-14T16:10:00.000-07:00

We had a looong and busy day yesterday (spent the day at Sciencenter with maia & Dmitri) and
when we got home last night, I nursed Dmitri and we fell asleep on the couch...soon to be joined by Maia,who conked out too. I woke up and was buried under children LOL Bob snapped this pic,then carried Maia to bed so I could extricate myself from the pile.

He's FINALLY here!

2005-04-10T11:39:00.000-07:00

Dmitri James was born April 1st,2005,weighing in at 8 lbs and measuring 20 inches long.

Here's the basic rough version of events...rather non-flowery and not too terribly poetic but the story,nonetheless ;) )

I woke up at 4 a.m. on the 31st to some pretty strong contractions and knew that this was finally it. After weeks of signs and symptoms that teased me into thinking "This is it" when all they really meant was,"It's coming soon", I was ecstatic. I was pretty sure that by afternoon, we'd FINALLY have a new baby.

I kept the girls home and went through the day as usual, just like any other day really ...dishes,laundry,mommy stuff...
Contactions were consistently 6 -10 minutes apart all morning . I took walks around the pond and up and down the road in front of out house,trying to let gravity do some work and get things going.

By evening, there was no change at all in the contractions and I was feeling so frustrated and irritable. Bob pointed out at dinner (pot roast I had thrown in the crock pot that morning) that maybe the reason I wasn't progressing was that I wasn't relaxing,which made sense. After I tucked the kids into bed,I took a shower ,drank some tea,watched TV....

Still no real change.

I went downstairs to snooze on the couch around 11p.m. and managed to doze a bit between contractions. They were definitely getting more intense. Around 12:30, I woke up to a doozy of a contraction and decided to get up and go to the bathroom.

I came back out into the living room and informed Bob that I had FINALLY lost the rest of the mucous plug.I think. My mucous plug had been shedding little by little over the past couple of days. I would lose a big glop of it and think,"OOH, that's the rest of it!" and it would turn out not to be. The whole mucous plug thing was maddening.

I laid back down and suddenly felt very wet. I jumped back up and announced that my water broke. Back into the shower I went...drip,drip,gush,gush. The contractions went quickly to 4 minutes apart and with every contraction, I'd gush more fluid.

At that point,we went upstairs to the bedroom. For the next couple of hours, I just alternated between standing,kneeling,squatting and laying down through the contractions. At the point where I felt like I was going through transitioning soon and would soon be pushing, Bob went and got the girls up so they could watch the birth. Dylan had decided he didn't want us to wake him unless we needed his help with something.

All 3 girls were pretty excited at first but as time went on, it wasn't so exciting. I had a major contraction and right as it was ending, I had to puke (another one of those transitioning signs). Maia was thoroughly unimpressed and said she was going back to bed. After an hour of no baby ,the twins starting getting fidgeting,which as the contractions starting getting stacked right on top of each other, was not helping me to focus.Emily crinkled a piece of paper and it took every ounce of willpower to not snap at her.So, we sent them back to bed and they weren't all that disappointed,thankfully.

Now, transitioning from laboring to pushing has always been the part where I kind of lose it during labor, as do a lot of women. . For some odd reason, when I was pregnant I told myself that since I know this to be how I am, that this time when I'm going through the transition,I'd be able to talk myself out of it and tell myself I'd be pushing soon and soon it would be over. Well, I really can't say my non-laboring rationale worked very well. I really needed Bob rightthere to talk me through the contractions as they got intense and remind me to breathe,etc. Thankfully,it wasn't until the last hour before pushing that I was having a hard time managing the pain on my own without the added support from him. That last hour was a doozy,though.

At one point,I was laying on the bed and was having intense pain in the area right where the bottom of my c-section scar is and I kept thinking of all the signs of uterine rupture . One of the signs is pain between contractions . I think that was my only fear inspired moment during the labor and it passed quickly as we rationalized that if my uterus had ruptured ,there probably would have been blood and the bulging in the lower abdomen wasn't there so...carry on. I realize now that he was most likely a bit stuck and that was what the pain was from. After that,I went through a couple of contractions standing and squatting and it must have done the trick to shift his position because after that,pushing was much smoother.Hard but smooth. I ended up having to use Bob's thighs to brace my feet against (my legs were shaking like crazy when I had contractions) and he held my hands and I pulled as I pushed .
After I started intense pushing,I didn't have such a hard time because I knew that it was all going to be over soon.

Finally, the baby's head started to crown and Bob says that's the time when every bad thing that could happen went through his mind but he stayed calm and collected. The baby's head emerged and the rest of the body slipped out....it's a bit of a blur on my end.I remember him handing me the baby almost immediately and the baby let out a good cry.I watched him for a few minutes to see he was breathing ok ,checked coloring...all that good stuff. I think at that point,Bob went and announced to the kids that the baby was born...or perhaps they came in on their own. The end is kind of a blur to me,I was so focused on the baby.

Dmitri James, minutes old

After Dmitri's birth, it was just kind of a relaxing time. He latched onto the breast within a few minutes after birth like an old pro.The girls watched him nurse for awhile and then went and got ready for school. Around 6:45.,I finally delivered the placenta,more or less I force delivered it (although definitely not as forced as it would have been in the hospital) because I wanted to get up and move around and clean the baby off properly. Bob examined it, showing the girls the different parts of it and explaining how the placenta works. They were grossed out yet fascinated.

The rest of the morning was spent checking the baby over and cleaning up the whole mess of childbirth (and oh,what a mess it was). I had been awake for over 24 hours at this point and Bob had slept very little in the last 24 hours.We were both exhausted. I let him sleep for a few hours while I spent the morning with Maia and the baby. Around 12:30, we switched places once the baby was asleep and I slept the whole afternoon until Dmitri woke up around 4:30. That was certainly the nice thing about being at home after the birth.Both baby and I were allowed to rest as much as we wanted/needed and didn't have to deal with nurses coming in to poke and prod or telling me I had to wake the baby up to nurse on some schedule. That was just one of the many pluses I found in comparison to the hospital but that's another story...

Overall, this birth...the last one I shall ever have....was the best and most special.It was THE perfect birth experience for me personally.I can't imagine having done it any other way.

Preparations

2005-02-10T05:22:00.000-08:00

Only 6 weeks left until my "due date". I'm definitely in nesting mode and all the children are starting to get excited in their own way.

My quest for books that portray children becoming big brothers or sisters and having a new baby in the house went deeper as I searched for children's literature that did not depict Mommy leaving the child with relatives and going off to the hospital to have the baby. I found some great kiddie lit that have a very homebirth aspect to it.

The favorite with the girls seems to be Welcome with Love by Jenni Overend and Julie Vivas. I think it's my favorite that we've read so far ,too.

The other day,both Grandmas (Great and Regular) were visiting and Maia insisted Great-Grandma read it to her. Then Lilly took the book and read it to Grandma.

Both Grandmas see birth as a rather messy event but I was happy that MY Grandma at least didn't express it to the girls when they were clearly so excitied about sharing what they know of it so far.

Of course, most of this birthing business will remain a mystery for them until the day of the birth but at least they now have a general idea from the books we've been reading. Emily said a couple of weeks ago after reading one ,"I didn't think that anyone but you wanted to have babies at home". It's always good to read a book that shows a mother who does things like your own Mama ,I suppose.

Updating

2004-11-24T11:08:00.000-08:00

Wow...I can't believe it's been so long since I updated here. Whoops!

It's been a busy last month. The twins and Dylan are all doing really well in school, Maia is doing great and the Mama & Papa are also faring pretty well. I (Rebecca), have been REALLY tired with this pregnancy but other than that, everything s going well :)

The girls are ineterested in doing some writing here so look forward to some of their posts :)

2004-09-19T14:22:00.000-07:00

Since our last family blog died, we thought we'd try to start a new one. This blog will be used to update family & friends on the happenings of the kidlets and just family life in general.

Enjoy and feel free to use the comment feature!