Friday, June 17, 2011

Thinking About Babies with Sunshine

Sunshine: I wish we had a baby

Me: What kind of baby?

A plain baby.

A baby from India?

No. With this kind of skin. Touching my cheek. A girl baby.

Why do you want a baby?

Just because.

What would you do with a baby?

Feed and dress it. Feed it supper and lunch.

What about when it has a poopy diaper?

It have a diaper change.

Who's going to change it?

YOU!

Why not you?

Cuz, it stinky!

Thursday, June 16, 2011

Summertime

The first week of summer has gone by so slowly!  It's heavenly!

Rose Bud has been treating herself to the luxury of doing nothing. She's read about 10 books already. Other than running each day, she just lies around. And she earned it. Her report card came. A 4.0 for her first year of high school. She definitely takes after her dad. Whereas I slouched around in high school and put in a valiant effort the night before a test or paper was due and got good grades, he studied and planned and organized and budgeted his time and got straight A's. She is a budgeter and an organizer and a planner and a worker.

Today she went to volunteer at the food pantry. And she works 4 nights this week. Other than that: lying around.

Daisy and Pepper are doing homeschool-lite. They each have Bible, Math and Science every day. Daisy is also keeping up with her Spanish. For science, they are working together through a botany book and really enjoying it. One day this week they got out the cutting board and sharp knives and dissected a flower. They pulled out the microscope and Rose Bud helped them look at an onion cell and some of their flower parts (having just come out of Biology, she's a microscope expert now--more than I am anyway. It's been 25 years!) Today they made a flower out of Sculpey clay and are baking them. They are also keeping nature journals.

Daisy is working on her latest short story, The Orphan Boy. She won't share more than that until it is finished, but every day when she works on it, she wriggles and exclaims, "I can't wait until it's finished so I can READ it!" We had a little virus scare with the PC the other day, so now she's backing it up on a flash drive.

Pepper spends the rest of her free time playing with Charles, the runt chick, or Alexander the Gray, our $300 barn cat. Or her brothers. Or the dog. Or the pigs.

Banana Boy has summer school these two weeks, along with summer classes at his dance studio. In summer school, he's doing a Reader's Theater class, a class where they bike a mile out of town and then read a book and eat a snack, and a class about knights and castles. At his dance studio, he's taking two classes, acting and voice. He is in heaven!

Summer school is nice for him because he's getting familiar with the school building, the teachers and some of the kids for next fall when he goes to public school.

Yesterday when he brought his castle home (made from toilet tubes and a pizza box, he got all the wedding people (Playmobil) knights and princesses out and set everything up.

Sunshine is homeschooling with me and it takes 2 hours every morning. That is going great and his reading is really taking off, but he's still adjusting to the new schedule, or lack thereof. He's fine while we're doing school, but then free time hits and he doesn't know what to do. Especially with everyone else involved in their own projects, he kind of has no one to play with.

Today we're going to sign up for the summer reading program at the library and bring home a boatload of books.

Oh, and I almost killed the dog today. She is such a mellow and quiet thing, never fusses. She rode along to drop BB off at school. She sits in the middle seat of the van (the only time she's allowed on any furniture). So Rose Bud (who drove) and I got out of the van and Chaya snoozed away on her seat. Neither of us thought of her. A little over an hour later, I was looking for her and was calling and calling her outside. She has this nice habit of hanging out at the pigpen, licking the pigs. She didn't come and didn't come. Suddenly, I remembered she'd ridden in the van with us. And there she was, still sleeping on her seat. She was hot, though, and thirsty. Luckily, it's only about 70 outside! Poor Dogger!



Saturday, June 4, 2011

Our Little Brush With History


Political leanings aside, it's not every day you can get your picture taken with the governor.


I had my picture taken with Governor Dreyfus (in his red vest) one time. I was 12 or 13 (you do the math) and it was our 7th grade field trip to the state capitol. Unfortunately, the picture was lost. I have other pictures from the trip--my group and I on the steps of the capitol, sleeping on the floor of the bus (eww!), but the proof that I touched history is gone. I'm still not over the loss.

Years later, Mr. GT and I were having ice cream at Wilson's in Ephraim (really? You've never been there? Go get a cone! Sit on the bench across the road down by the water. Look under the bench. See! Everyone else who doesn't like their jellybean throws them on the ground too!) Anyway, we were having ice cream one day and guess who else was having a cone? In his vest! He still wore one years later, although it wasn't red. Mr. GT wanted me to go over and get a new picture, but I was too chicken. So I have those two images only in my mind.

Sunshine also got his picture taken with a part of the detail set to keep Governor Walker safe, or something.

Mmmm! Dairy!

Wednesday, June 1, 2011

Persons Offended By Parts

UPDATE:  scratch the not sharing with the public school teacher part.  A third person who is NOT offended by parts, dropped his pants on the playground and showed his to another student, who WAS offended by said parts.  I got a not-so happy email from the teacher. :( 

Really.  This is becoming over the top.

This morning a certain unnamed Person Who Is Offended By Parts (PWIOBP) said, while sitting next to me listening to me read the Bible:

PWIOBP (interrupting): "AARGH! I am so mad! I hate this!

Whips down garment covering offending part and displays it.

PWIOBP (in a disgusted voice): "This goes up and it annoys me! And you can't do anything about it! The bones in it get all straight and you can't bend it back down because you'll break the bones! Aargh!" Replaces clothing.

Me (slightly shocked at having had to see said part and trying not to laugh): "Mmm hmm. It happens to everyone (of your gender)."

PWIOBP: "Not DAD!"

Me: "Mmm hmm." Return to Bible reading, wondering where Dad is at a moment like this.

One hour later....

PWIOBP #2 (whips up article of clothing in the middle of grammar lesson): "Mom!!! Feel these!"

Me: "I felt them last week. They look fine. You can't do anything about them."

PWIOBP #2: "But they hurt! No. Actually they don't hurt anymore. They just feel all blubbery."

Me: "Mmm hmm. They're growing. Everybody (of your gender) has them." sighing

Modesty is obviously in short supply in this house, although in each case PWIOBP and I were the only people in the room.

Apparently, this is why I homeschool....   I wouldn't trade these precious memories with anyone (and I'd sure hate for the public school to have to share them!!!)