A Fly On My Homeschool Wall

 Little Princess graduated and came home from Cadet Officer School!  Graduation was available to families via Zoom, and we cheered for our girl at the dinner table as the rest of the kids prepared to head out the door to church activities. Little Princess with her flight There were twelve flights of 10 cadets each at COS. The extra people you see in this picture are her flight commander and sergeant. Our busy girl had one day off before heading into two days of work, a doctor's appointment, and babysitting her nephew. Then we found out that the daddy of one of our former daycare families died suddenly at work on Friday.  Little Princess joined the rest of our family in taking care of the two little boys as well as helping to clean their house.  We offered to take the boys again today (Mom is literally bed-ridden with grief, and Grandma is fragile), but they had a bad night last night, so they opted to have a quiet day at home together. They talked axles and wheels an...

 As a family, we've been in a stable place for a season. And now we are not, again. We are facing some of the old challenges grown larger.  Weare facing some new challenges that feel simply too big. This week a few of the kids are at CAP Encampment. One, who should have been there, is not because of a mistake he made that had large consequences attached. In the past I have written somewhat freely about our challenges. Now, I feel inclined to turn inward. The only homeschool business I have to write about is that we're still reading My Friend Flicka , and we quite enjoy it.  It's wordy, and has some racially biased tendencies (and a nasty word or two).  I edit that out as I read aloud (or sometimes I stop for a conversation about what's in the story and why it's not okay).  The plot is quite engaging, and the peril level is just right for my crew to feel excited as the story progresses, but not actually frightened. We've got kids coming and going so much now that...

I think the worst ending of the past two weeks is the ending of a friendship that I thought was solid.   It's a long and ridiculous story. Pride. Pride is a terrible thing. So is self doubt. Both of which I have in spades. (We literally just finished The Screwtape Letters this week, so we've been studying pride and self-doubt!   " . . . if you want to find out how proud you are the easiest way is to ask yourself, ‘How much do I dislike it when other people snub me, or refuse to take any notice of me, or shove their oar in, or patronise me, or show off?’" I was snubbed, not taken notice of, had an oar shoved in what I thought was my space, patronized, and shown off in front of, and I got mad. Really mad. I am trying very hard to repent. I am trying very hard to forgive. But I no longer feel safe around this person that I previously trusted with my real self. My flawed, imperfect, real self. I think I'm somewhat muddled up with the teachings of Christ and the teach...

 I'm not doing well. I have built habits and routines that are keeping us up and running, though. Morning Meeting and morning meds Cleaning/Meal Prep  High School literature/geography Snack Elementary/Middle school subjects Lunch Independent schoolwork Cleaning/Correcting independent schoolwork Meal Prep Dinner/Scripture reading/Family Prayer Showers/Bedtime reading or Evening activities/get ready for bed Evening meds If anything interrupts us, I flail about, lost. Several times in the past few weeks, Sir Walter Scott has found me standing in the living room unable to move or think clearly.   Then I remember where I am, and I do what I can. I've taken kids to keep medical/psych appointments. In the pulmonary function lab I've kept everyone fed. We've gone to dance performances and practices. In the circle before our show, our little friend loved on Mister Man--one of her favorite humans. They've attended church activities. This activity was interrupted by tornado wa...

 Note:  This post was written in two parts.  One I started last Sunday and never finished.  I'm not even a tiny bit in the mood to rewrite it and make a cohesive post.  Blocky and real is what is happening. Sunday, July 20, 2025 I will abstain from details, but life has been complicated this week. I'm writing from the hospital room of one of my children.  We have been given news that makes very little sense to us that we must do our best to understand. As time passes, I'm sure I'll post more, but I do need to be mindful of my child's privacy (which is funny given how much I do share here!). Until yesterday, things were no more challenging than usual.  We finished The Mysterious Benedict Society  (Can you picture how mad the kids are that I refused to read the second volume aloud right now?) and started The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle .  We're a hair over halfway through it now.  It's been hard on Brother to process Captain Jagger...

 Seriously, it's getting ridiculous. How am I still this sick? I am so grateful that I changed my mind about how we would do Christmas School this year.   Had I invested in craft and baking supplies and watched day after day of lesson plans fall to the wayside, I'd be feeling far crazier than I do now. I haven't read to the kids in over a week! However, I do have blessings to count. My decision regarding Christmas School was to celebrate and make do with what we have.        *Read books we already own.      *Forage for supplies we already own to craft and decorate.      *Bake old favorite recipes.      *Watch movies from the library and on streaming services we already have.      *Celebrate traditions that are already dear to us. Even though I sat on the couch and lay in my bed far more than I would have liked, and even though the bare minimum of talking sent me into coughing fits, we did...