Seasonal Changes

I think spring is finally starting to stick. We had a flush of crocuses in the yard that lasted about a day before a deer came and ate the largest bunches.

The pussywillow is coming to the end of its bloom. Snow delayed it twice. This is a valuable first food for the bees. I was happy to catch a few in action.

The goldfinches are throwing off their winter feathers. Their showy, bright yellow plumage is a welcome bit of sunshine at the feeders.

When my children were little, it was my greatest pleasure to take them out in the early days of spring to look for the signs that winter was almost over: tree buds, red-winged blackbirds and grackles, first flowers, early insects, spring peepers and birds singing. All tell the story of the season and the promise of life's renewal.

May you enjoy the longer days in the northern hemisphere.

The Flashcard Fiasco

Like her sister, my youngest has test anxiety. She's also indignant about the whole need to test, because of the randomness of what examiners think kids should know at a particular point in time. I don't know where she gets these ideas. (Who, me?)

Test anxiety is especially a problem with math. Every year I try to prepare her for her tests and every year we face meltdowns because she wants the reassurance of knowing her answers are right. At the same time, she fights me about learning the facts because she doesn't understand how they relate to the real world. I was also bad at math in school, so I'm probably not the best person to explain how irrational numbers help us. 

This year I asked if she would like a workbook to practice with before I ordered the test. She agreed. I then discovered that the company that makes the test we use only makes test prep booklets up to eighth grade. For high school age, they had test prep flashcards.

I usually like flashcards. Question on the front, answer on the back, sometimes with an explanation of why it works It sounded like a good solution, and even though I thought they were a bit pricey, I ordered a set.

I have never seen flashcards like these.

If the test didn't provide enough test anxiety, the flashcards did. Most of them are set up where they ask you to explain a concept, rather than a straightforward question. I was at a loss to explain half of them, and that was after I looked at the answer on the back. I had to enlist the help of my college graduate oldest child to help her with them. Tears have been shed. Tempers have flared. I've wondered if it's too late to move to a state that doesn't require testing. 

I'm kidding, of course. I don't want to move. And as much trouble as the flashcards give her, she keeps doing them. I don't think I ever saw her work so hard on a subject she dislikes. Every day she sits with a few cards, scrap paper, and a box of tissues and she tries. She  tries something that she thinks is hard. Really, no matter how she does on the test, I feel like we accomplished something here.

And when she needs to blow off steam, I completely allow the destruction of a flashcard. They make adorable little hats.

Cold Weather Learning

This morning there was a layer of snow over the front yard. The cold was biting, but it made for a beautiful scene.

There are so many things to do in snow and cold weather. In the past, we've spent short spurts outside in subzero temperatures to do experiments. We toss hot water into the air to make instant snow. We bring out the soap bubbles and watch them freeze and drop. I couldn't find my bubbles this time, but I did notice some tracks in the snow.

Looks like a raccoon walked by last night. That's my boot print next to it.The smaller prints are from the sparrows that came to the feeders this morning.

White Throated Sparrow

There were also several juncos about.

This one is sitting on our rhododendron. Did you know you can tell how cold it is by looking at rhododendron leaves? The tighter they curl into tubes, the colder it is. It was 1 degree this morning with the wind chill. I'm surprised the bush wasn't shivering. At this point, my fingers were feeling frostbitten, so I moved inside to continue taking pictures through the window. They don't come out as clear, but you need to make some sacrifices for warmth.

Chickadee by the feeder

A Cardinal right before he carried this peanut away

Red-Bellied Woodpecker watching a House Sparrow land on the suet feeder

I hope you spent some time outdoors today!

Storytelling: The Next Generation

Last May, I made the decision to stop running storytelling.

It was a difficult choice for me, but I had led it since my oldest started college, and her siblings had no desire to take it on. Their friends had moved on to other activities, and the children coming had gotten younger. I also didn't seem to have any takers from the next generation of storytellers who were attending the workshops I ran. It's easy to do these things when your own kids are a part of them, but when they are no longer interested, it simply adds to your list. When I started working (at a different library) it became even harder. It was time to reach out.

It's always hard to pass the torch. I had run storytelling for 15 years, led it for four. but I was running out of steam. Last May I asked if anyone wanted to lead for the month and no one did. I tried again in June. Two children stepped up. I came to offer moral support. It was a bit chaotic--no one had any stories to share, so it broke down into a conversation--but it was a start.

This month I talked with the group leader about what she would like to tell or read. I ended up pulling an easy reader of short stories from the shelf called "In a Dark, Dark Room." I had no idea whether it would end up being the only story, but I figured it was a start.

The group did not disappoint. My leader could not find the title story, so she ended up reading the first story in the book. She asked if anyone else would like to read the next story, and the book began passing around. It reminded me why I liked having the children lead in the first place. When you give them choices, they step up. This new group was not ready to move away from the page, as my veteran storytellers did. But with the stories in front of them they were willing to speak and share. It reminded me of the very beginning of our storytelling days.

I'll still come to storytelling to offer support and guidance, but it's nice to be in the background again. I love what kids can come up with when you let them be in charge!

The First Cakes and Other Events

There was a mini comic convention near us, so we went to it. Who turns down a comic con a mile away from home? My oldest came home for the weekend to go to it and to celebrate her sister's birthday a little early.

  Like my son's costume? He had to do a bit of sewing to put it together. He is a character from Undertale.

After the Convention, we went home for cake. There were two to start birthday month, as we celebrated my father's and my daughter's at the same time. My father's cake is a vanilla cake made with coconut flour and sweetened with honey. The honey flavor was a bit overpowering to me, I may have to tweak the recipe if I use it again. The frosting is a basic melted chocolate with a pat of butter to keep it spreadable.

My daughter chose a Mad Tea Party theme for her cake. I used various containers to bake a velvet cake in the shape of a chessboard, a teapot and teacups. They are decorated with buttercream frosting, whipped cream, melted chocolate and strawberry slices. The handles, the tea spout, and the characters are Scotch shortbread. Shortbread worked fairly well, but I did break a couple of handles before I managed to get one to stick on the teapot with chocolate. As usual, my cakes are made for taste, so they are a bit rougher than what might be accomplished with fondant. No one here likes fondant, so I don't use it.

Two down, two to go.

The Finite Career of the Homeschooling Parent

There comes a point in the life of every homeschooling parent when you realize you won't have this job for much longer. It starts when you realize you don't see your friends in the homeschooling community as much as you used to. They are all off facilitating their teens' needs, starting jobs to pay for college, or enjoying their new-found freedom by taking up hobbies or volunteer work. You realize you miss these people who were so integral to your homeschooling life: your support system; your friends.

Today I saw a friend I haven't seen since the monthly Teen Game Night group broke up. Because I was working and she was preparing for an interview, I didn't have a lot of time to catch up, but seeing her brought back all the happy feelings from that time. It wasn't just our teens that needed the social interaction, we parents also craved that time when we could discuss things that non-homeschoolers just can't understand. Issues ranged from parents sending a child to high school after homeschooling, how to get into college without a transcript, to dealing with difficult spouses or exes that are not on board with the whole homeschooling thing. We shared laughs, we comforted each other, we offered suggestions.

And most important, we played together.

Usually we played Bananagrams, but sometimes we brought other games. Nothing too complex that would stop the flow of conversation. Our kids would play board games on one table and we would sit at another, within earshot but not interfering.

At some point, the meetings stopped. The leader started a job, her oldest went to college and her youngest went to school. One parents began taking classes. One family moved. I also started working part-time. Most of our kids outgrew homeschooling. Life happens. The group dissolved.

The friend I saw today thinks we really need to have a reunion. Another group of homeschooling friends does a holiday party every year, and it is a nice way for us all to reconnect. I hope we can work something out. It would be sad to lose touch just because our homeschooling life is ending.

Love What You Do and Enjoy the Challenge

This week, on top of my regular working hours as a library clerk, I also ran a balloon sculpture workshop and storytelling for my homeschooling group. My oldest used to run storytelling, but going to college made this difficult, and her younger siblings had no interest in leading. This was also winter break in our school district, so it has been busier in the children's library as parents look for activities to fill their kids' days and as some of the children come in to work on projects and papers.

Needless to say, it has been a busy week, and the week isn't over yet.

But here's the thing: there is busy, and there is busy. Everything I do I choose to do, so even though I came home exhausted the past couple of nights, ready to soak my feet, I don't regret how I spend my time, especially when I can be with the kids.

Children are honest. They tell you when they aren't interested in what you are doing. It's more of a challenge to pull them into an activity and then keep them focused on it. I don't always succeed, but I appreciate that challenge because it helps me to grow. My storytelling workshops started as simply teaching and playing games to help children learn how to tell stories. Now that I do it every month, I found it necessary to expand it. Last month I taught them debate. This month I had them make up "how-to" instructions for a favorite hobby or to explain how to cook something. I recognize the need to adapt and change based on my audience.

Balloon sculpting is also only as fun as your most challenged student. This group was older than past groups, so I was able to do much more with them. As I went along, I talked about proportions and twisting and the fear of popping. By the end, everyone went home with at least four balloon animals and sculptures. I considered that a successful night and I was really glad I brought my son along to inflate extra balloons.

Enjoyment should not be a bonus to what we do. It's an important part of a fulfilling work life. I encourage my kids to enjoy what they do. That doesn't simply mean look for jobs that you think you would like. Every job, every career, has aspects that are tedious or difficult or not fun and that includes the unpaid careers of parenting and homeschooling. But we have the ability to decide if we will consider those mundane parts the deal-breaker or the challenge we will overcome.

Cutthroat Kitchen and Creativity

My family loves Alton Brown from the Food Network. I think I owe a lot of their cooking ability to his shows, especially Good Eats. If you ever want some good lessons in chemistry, do yourself a favor and get some episodes of Good Eats. The food science is explained in a way that I could understand it. Believe me, that is impressive. Alton is right up there with one of my other favorites, Beakman.

One of Alton's latest shows is Cutthroat Kitchen. I know a lot of fans were turned off by this show, where contestants bid on sabotages for their opponents (imagine Survivor with cooking), but we find it fascinating. A contestant without sabotages isn't as interesting as the ones who get them. You can really tell who the creative players are. They are unafraid of a sabotage. They may not win, but they try. My family likes to figure out how we would beat some of the sabotages. I think the tool and work station sabotages are easiest. It's fun to think how you would mix all of your ingredients in colander or prepare food on an odd surface, like a rocking counter or in a ball pit. The sabotages that replace their ingredients vary in difficulty. We watch and discuss what the players could do to work around their food sabotages, especially when they get canned items to replace fresh food. Of course, there are the players who sabotage themselves by forgetting an ingredient or straying too far from the dish they were asked to prepare. Forgetting staples like eggs or cream can really hinder your chances of making it to the next round.

Hardest are the challenges that force you to collaborate with an opponent, especially when they are tied together in some way or need to rely on the other player. There was an episode where two players had to cook each others' meals. They couldn't see the preparation, they could only give instructions to prep and cook it. It was a good lesson in clear communication and good listening skills.

Once the food is plated, a judge (who does not know who was sabotaged or how) samples their offerings and decides who goes on to the next round. Even at this point, creativity can help a contestant who is best able to convince the judge that the meal came out exactly the way it was supposed to. There is a joke on the show that when it doesn't come out right, the chef refers to his dish as "deconstructed." I recently made muffins that got stuck in the tins (I had rushed and didn't grease the pans enough.) I told my son they were deconstructed muffins. He asked what sabotage I got.

It's the little "in" jokes that keep a family together.

What I'm Working On: Recycled Book Art

 I haven't decided whether I'm finished or not. I might cover over the eyes. I might paint it. Then again, I do prefer the rough look of it, much like the author's drawings. I might leave it alone and see how I feel about it next week. I just hope it's recognizable.

For me, art is more process than product. Figuring out how to do something and fiddling with it. I guess I look at many aspects of life that way.

An Autumn Thought in Haiku

Change is eternal

Life is sun through colored leaves

Every moment unique

(Haiku by me, photo by my youngest, from a recent walk on a chill October afternoon.)

Intangible Talent

My oldest is a tough act to follow.

She's multi-talented, an A student at college, and able to make everyone around her fall in love with her charm, her sense of humor, and her ability to get excited and talk about any number of topics.

My son is the middle child. He is also very talented, but not in the same way as his big sister. He's doing an internship rather than the college route, which is a hard road in our college oriented community. He's also very shy, and if you are not able to hit on one of his topics of interest, any attempts at conversation will fall flat.

I've noticed how hard it is for others to engage him. Family members won't even notice when they cross the line and shut him down. Many don't make it past the hair. He has a lot of it, and it is like my own, very curly and hard to manage. Since he doesn't want to cut it, it is very high maintenance. I'm still teaching him not to forget to condition it regularly, and even with conditioning, there are days when his hair simply decides to do its own thing. His is thicker than mine (which is pretty thick) so it takes a lot of work to get it to look calm. People treat you different when your hair is not tamed. Even when it is, a young man meets regular questions about when he plans to cut it. My son doesn't do well with snappy comebacks, so he simply stops talking. He's not able to play the social games as well as my oldest. If you are nice to him, if you appreciate him, he will respond in kind. If he thinks you will mock his interests, he withdraws.

Those who are able to move past the hair have trouble moving past his computer time. He's on a lot. Not just for games, but for his artwork. His internship at the Digital Arts Experience has really been great. He's learned so much about the process of creating animation, which is necessary if he wants to do game development. The problem with most of your work being online is that it is hard to whip out at a gathering. My daughter is always knitting or crafting gifts. Her skill is very tangible. Most of our family and friends don't know how talented my son is because it's not something that you can display until it's finished. Unfinished computer animation is just pictures on the screen. 

The people at the DAE appreciate him. They always tell me how helpful and creative he is, how hard he works. You need that support when you are an artist. After a year of designing, modeling, rigging, lighting, and everything else that goes into the process of creating animation, he now has something very cool to show family and friends. I hope you enjoy Steve the Gunnasaurus.

Shifting Identities

Coming to my blog makes me feel guilty lately. It's been so long since I posted a comic strip.

Life as a part-time unschooler has been wearing on me lately. I love my job and I love being mom to creative homeschooled kids, but at the same time I'm frustrated. My focus has shifted. I'm not the one home with my youngest and last homeschooler. I don't bring her to as many activities as I used to bring her siblings to. I can't even convince her to come to work with me regularly, which I considered an advantage of working in the library. I miss being around my kids.

At the library, I meet a lot of children and their parents, as well as children with babysitters. The majority are on the public school path. I don't see as many homeschoolers here. There simply isn't that large a population of homeschoolers in our area. To the patrons, I'm the library clerk (or librarian, as most don't know the difference). I feel a loss of identity here, or a second identity forming, as if I were a superhero or spy, living a double life. I can hear the intro...

Strange visitor from an alternative reality, she is Homeschooling Mom! Protector of learning, advocate for her kids, and who, disguised as Cristina, mild-mannered library clerk, fights for truth, knowledge, and a homeschooling lifestyle!

Except I don't talk about homeschooling much at work. Homeschooling isn't something we do, it's who we are. Instead, I compliment kids who borrow books my family loves. I recommend biographies by Mike Venezia to young readers because they were engaging to all of my children. I suggest graphic novels for reluctant readers (which some of their parents don't approve of--"You mean...comic books?"). I've reassured parents that it's OK to let their kids read books below their reading level if the children really love them. It's weird, I feel like I'm trying to homeschool the community.

Lately, my time has also been eaten up by my volunteer work at the library and the nature center. Each have big events coming up on the same weekend. These are also separate identities with their own sets of responsibilities. Superman had it easy. I'm stretched a bit thin.

To maintain my sanity, I try to do some creative things, even though I don't have the time or energy for comics. Here are my latest CD creations. I'm hoping to add more soon. Because I don't have enough to do!

Cat

Spirit of the Wind

Minotaur

A Little Classical Unschooling

Last week, Sierra decided that she wanted more structured learning. She didn't think unschooling was working out for her. I said okay.

I neglected to mention that taking ownership of her education is one of the reasons I decided to try this method.

We set aside time to sit outside and discuss how she learns best and what she is interested in. I always fall back on the classical trivium since it's a very logical setup. Each year, I throw books and information in her path from where we would be on the trivium if she were classically educated. This year would be the modern age and physics. When I'm working in the children's room at the library, I scan the shelves for interesting books on various physics topics and biographies. We pulled down an old Science-in-a-Nutshell levers kit I had saved from the older two. I'm thinking I'll have her build a bridge at some point. Math will be freestyle. I'm planning on using our bathroom dry erase board for writing problems. She's also expressed interest in learning about different places, so she started the year reading about Australia. London will be next.

At the same time, I've started watching Sailor Moon with her. She watched it a while back with her big sister. The two of them learned that it was much better in the original Japanese with subtitles than in dubbed English, so that is how we are watching it now. My kids enjoy anime, and seeing it this way has given me new respect for the style. Did you know some of the earliest anime movies were inspired by art coming out of the Disney studios? I thought that was interesting.

Right now, Sierra is reading Watership Down and the final Skulduggery Pleasant book by Derek Landy. We still get together with other homeschoolers on Wednesdays and she's still volunteering at the nature center cleaning cages and feeding the resident animals. I hope I'll have the time for some museum trips as well. And because it is harder for me to keep track now, she's started telling me what she's doing so I can keep notes of everything for the quarterlies. 

Life is different, but still very much the same.

Show and Tell

 

My son designed the costume above for a cosplay contest at the library. He is the League of Legends character, Karthus. He must have done a good job. The League of Legends players at the event knew who he was. It's unfortunate there was only a first and second prize, as he was in a close race with the girl who received second place. Ah well. There is always next year!

~~~~~~~~ ☼ ~~~~~~~~

I still volunteer at the library, even though I now work there part time. We got a donation of computer games recently. Many were too old to work in today's systems, so I took them home. I had an idea about turning them into art. The top dragon is my first piece. It was OK, but I saw flaws that needed correcting. The second came out much better. I'm planning to make more, possibly to sell. I want to try other creatures. Maybe I'll make a unicorn or pegasus next.

 

I need to take pictures of my daughters' creations. Hopefully this will be continued.....

Update on our Life

Some of my readers wondered how my family is doing. I figured I would post an update.

My husband has work! It is temporary for now, through September, but hopefully they will hire him for longer term. We will take any well wishes, thoughts, prayers, or crossed fingers that they keep him on. He is also working from home. This is good and bad. On the bad side, I've had to give up part of my bedroom to the home office. We have little room to spare. On the plus side, having him home gives me an easy answer for those awkward questions of "How will you continue to homeschool while working?" Much easier to say someone is home with my youngest than try to explain that we don't really follow school hours.

Marina and I are working regularly at the library. It's neat to carpool with my daughter. I'll miss this when she heads back to university the end of the month. I am getting the hang of clerking, although the circulation desk is still anxiety-provoking for me. Every time I'm at the desk, there seems to be a new and unusual problem. It keeps me on my toes. Which is why I prefer working in the back, checking in library materials. I like knowing I can handle things without asking my supervisor for help every five minutes. I also enjoy the children's room. Kids make me smile.

My son continues interning at the Digital Arts Experience. He also helped me run a few workshops this summer teaching juggling and balloon sculpture. And I think he is now my height or a little taller. I'm not sure. He slouches.

Sierra has been volunteering at the nature center. I help her to clean cages and feed the menagerie there. She's become adept at handling the hedgehog, doves, turtles, and chinchillas. We haven't lost one yet. She is also really good at giving food and water to the hissing cockroaches, a task that turns my stomach every time. I'm afraid one of them might crawl up my arm when I take their dishes out. She doesn't even flinch when they hiss because she needs to push them aside to set the bowls down. She's a brave girl, that one.

That's about it for now. We are really grateful for all the support everyone has given us, in our solid and virtual lives. Your positive vibes kept us on track through the uncertainty, and I feel honored--blessed--to know so many kind and caring people. I have some posts in my head, and as soon as I have some time and energy I plan to write them down.

Please forgive any errors as the cat has taken to laying in front of my screen when I sit at the computer. This makes proofreading a challenge.

Active Education

Here are some of the activities that have kept me busy lately:

• Books! I finished reading Lockwood & Co. by Jonathan Stroud (writer of the Bartimeus series). I then handed Stroud's book to Sierra and she finished it in two days. Imagine a teenage Sherlock Holmes with his own Ghostbusters agency and you have this book. Except with scarier bits. I also read The Giver by Lois Lowry. Lowry's book is about a boy living in a dystopian society where there is no choice. I would call it a junior 1984. I considered letting Sierra read it, but some of the subject matter is intense. 
• Sewing. I found this pattern for a Minecraft Creeper doll, thanks to Once Upon a Family. Sierra loves Minecraft, so we decided to try to make it. Let me just say right now that I am sewing machine challenged. Helping Sierra make this was a "blind leading the blind" situation. I think her skills have improved as we pieced this together. Mine have not. I kept having issues of the thread getting stuck and pulling out of the needle. We broke two threaders (my sewing machine is not self-threading) and Sierra became my threader after that. She gained lots of experience threading the machine as I lost the thread regularly. I did about half of the cutting and sewing for her, usually when she started getting bored. It's almost together now. We just need to sew on the legs.
• Yardwork. The weather has started to warm, at least enough for the crocuses to put in an appearance. We had so much snow this year that it compacted the leaves. I needed to gently lift my leaf mulch away from the shoots where they couldn't spear through. And then the flowers started blooming. And then deer started eating them. Or was it the squirrels? Maybe both. I pointed out deer tracks and scat to Sierra and we talked about how the deer usually shear off the vegetation while the squirrels pluck the flower blooms. I did manage to get a few pictures before the carnage.
  
  Next year, I might leave the leaf litter alone. Maybe the deer won't eat what they can't see.
• Nature. We visited Cranberry Lake Preserve to see if anything was wriggling in the vernal pools. Unfortunately, the day we picked was cold. We heard plenty of spring peepers, but nothing was visible in the water. The nature center has several animals. One of the latest is a hedgehog. Sierra took photos of her. The hedgehog growls a lot, so the curator is thinking of naming her Monster. Have you ever felt a hedgehog? They are as prickly as they look. I poked myself trying to remove a scrap of wood shaving from her head.
  
  

• Testing. Blah. But it's time to prove to our district that Sierra is surviving her unconventional education.

That's it for now. I hope life slows down soon, but since we are heading into Easter and then birthday month, I doubt a slow down will come any time soon!

Last Week...In Which my Activities Form a Harmonic Convergence

My life seems to be a whirlwind of activity lately.

I thought things would slow down once Marina was settled into college. I have read studies that culling deer doesn't work because new deer simply move in to fill the void. I think this can be applied to a homeschooling family's activities. As long as there is still someone left at home, there will always be a full schedule.

Who am I kidding? I can make my life busy without my children's help!

Last week's activities began the Friday before. I drove out to the university to pick up Marina for spring break. I'm not going to blame her, because we are a family of night owls, but we do seem to stay up later when Marina is in the house. You would think I could just go to bed ahead of everyone else and close the door. Not in my house. Somehow, they all end up sitting on my bed, talking and laughing together. It's wonderful having this level of family togetherness, but incredibly tiring! Add to that a cat who has been sick and wakes me up early because she can't breathe through her nose and it's a recipe for sleep deprivation.

Somehow I plow through. I count my blessings and enjoy every minute we have together. I take my son to his monthly teen game night and his internship two days a week. My monthly storytelling workshop was the same week. Marina needed to be at the library two days to work, and I volunteered there three days to help set up the mini-book sale (which I hear was a huge success!). Not to be outdone, Sierra had her weekly religious ed. class, but she also did a Minecraft build competition at the Digital Arts Experience, where her brother interns. I'm very proud of her for doing it. She didn't win, but she was complimented by many of her fellow Minecrafters on her build--a robot bunny spaceship--which I think was better praise than any award. Someday she'll believe me about that!

Anyway, one of the neat things we did together this week was to head to the Hudson River Museum for an Art of Video Games exhibit. I have been waiting two years for this exhibit to hit our area, ever since a blogger friend talked about it. It was so interesting! I enjoyed pointing out the games I remembered from my childhood, like Pitfall and Utopia. I hope we can make a trip back there for one of their special nights before the exhibit moves on.

A Few Notes on Electric Guitar

Remember when Guitar Hero came out? I do. My first thought was "Wow! What a great idea! Use a video game to help teach kids how to play guitar!"

Unfortunately, playing Guitar Hero was more like playing Simon (remember Simon?) than playing a guitar. Nevertheless, my son loved playing Guitar Hero when we went to the arcade.

Then one of his friends started learning electric guitar. Let's hear it for peer pressure. My son saved up his money and a little over two years ago, he bought himself an electric guitar.

The plan was that he would look for sites online and DVDs to begin learning, and then once he showed a real interest (and we had the money) we would find an instructor. The first month, he tried. He looked at YouTube videos and I brought home DVDs from the library. He worked on the fingering. He even managed to play Happy Birthday on my birthday. But it was slow progress. Unfortunately, guitar is one of those things you really need to stick with, and if you don't really know how to tune your guitar, can't keep the chords straight in your head and you put off practicing because you hate how it hurts to press those strings, you practice less.

And less.

And less.

Until your guitar sits on its stand in the corner of your room and mom has to remind you to dust it off or put it in its case.

Last November, I lamented about how little his guitar was used over the past year and wished again that Guitar Hero actually taught guitar. That was when my son told me there was a game that taught electric guitar. It's called Rocksmith. 

Rocksmith comes with a special USB cable (only they sell it) that hooks your guitar up to your computer. We bought it for him for Christmas. The premise is similar to Guitar Hero in that you play notes as they shoot toward you. The difference is that you are actually playing notes. To set up, you let it know what you want to play--lead, rhythm, or bass--and whether you are right or left handed. It gauges how well you play and slows down or adds notes based on your skill level. Best of all, you play using actual songs instead of simply practicing chords. It teaches the notes as you go so that you work on a few notes at a time until your accuracy improves. Other features include interactive lessons on the chords and different ways to play them; an arcade with fun mini-games where you do things like shoot zombies with the correct notes and chords; and it helps you tune your guitar.

The guitar now sits at the ready by his computer. We no longer need to dust it. That makes me happy.

"I got my first real six string
Bought it at the five and dime
Played it till my fingers bled..."
     ~Bryan Adams, Summer of '69

A Moment of Calm

It's quiet. The blur of activity that defined last week is past. I'm in a moment of calm. 

Whenever I think back over a busy week, I'm surprised I did as much as I did. In the midst of it, all I can think of is getting through it. As I drive from the doctor's office to drop off two kids and take the third to his internship, I mentally tick it off my list. I think, only one more activity, then pick up my son, and I'm done. Then I try to focus back on driving, because mentally checking your to-do list is as dangerous as talking on your phone or texting while driving.

This past week included setting up the homeschooling carnival, a doctor's appointment for my three children, my storytelling workshop, and helping Marina gather what she needs to return to the university for the spring term (she left on Sunday). This is on top of the usual: mom-taxi services for Sierra's religious ed class and Chase's internship, volunteering at the library, and lots of laundry, and grocery shopping.

So I face each challenge as a stepping stone. I stand on the stone I am on and then focus on the next step. It's too easy to stumble when you look at all of your responsibilities at once. I'm not saying that I never stumble. Things can get overwhelming if I haven't slept enough, if someone is sick, or if I simply overscheduled myself and my kids. When I feel overwhelmed, I try to return to my breath and refocus. At the end of the week, I look back to see how far I've come.

Being busy isn't an occasional thing, it's life. Homeschooling is about managing several schedules and hoping you didn't forget anything, whether you have one child or ten. The secret is to make sure some of your own activities end up on that to-do list. For me, that means making the time for writing, exercising, and volunteering at the library. It isn't always easy to fit in time, but I consider it necessary to help carry me through the week.

And when it comes, it is just as important to savor a moment of calm.

Better to Bake than Curse the Cold

It's cold right now. January is supposed to be cold in New York. I think we sometimes forget that. We spend a lot of time wishing it was warm when it's cold and wishing it was cool when it's hot. I include myself. I definitely wish it were warmer right now. Relatively speaking. I wish the temperature was in the thirties instead of the teens. I can tolerate normal cold, it's extreme cold that bothers me.

Preparing chocolate crinkles.

But still,  it is January, and January is a cold month. If you want to survive the winter months, it is best to look at some of the positives, especially if you don't have the money to spend winter in the Caribbean. So here are a few ways to warm my heart in the winter, if not my hands.

~ Hot chocolate and baked goods. There is no better time to heat up the kitchen than in the winter. Our oven usually works overtime in December, cranking out treats to give as gifts. I bake more bread in the winter and nothing tastes as good as a mug of hot chocolate after shoveling snow from the driveway.

~ Bird watching. I was given a cute new feeder for Christmas. I love bird-watching, and nothing brings the birds to the feeders better than a snowstorm. The feeder has been well used. I may need to ask for sunflower seeds next year. Once the squirrels discovered this, I was filling it every other day.

A nuthatch picks out sunflower seeds.

Look! Winter Easter eggs!

~ Experiments and cold weather activities. If you haven't thrown a cup of boiling water into the air when it's -10 with the wind chill, you don't know what you're missing. (Why yes, we are easily amused.) This year, we also found directions for freezing balloons full of colored water. We only had little water balloons, but the results were pretty....cool.*

*Note: Freezing yellow water does not look so pretty when it starts to melt.


What do you do to enjoy the winter season?