Tuesday, July 25

What Day Is This?

I'd make a truly deplorable farmer. Come to think of it, I'd have made a lousy Mayan, too. They'd have run me out of the village for my total disregard for all things chronological. I guess my best hope would have been that they'd keep me around as the village idiot. Which wouldn't necessarily have been all that bad, as it might have made me unfit for sacrifices to the gods. Always a plus.

We got so much accomplished yesterday that I just had to whip up a strawberry dacquari and sit on the clean, comfy porch to recover. The boys hung in there with me while we moved the wood pile off the porch (yeah, now that summer's half over and we're only going to have to move it back in a couple of months - that irony probably won't hit them for another couple of years, though). They played on the freshly mowed grass while I worked on the other stuff. Got about two acres mowed, and I vacillated between feeling quite good about not having a tractor mower because I was getting all kinds of wonderful exercize and fresh air, and thinking I'd rather get a tractor mower AND cough up the dough for a gym membership because at least at the gym, I'd be in a climate controlled environment while I worked out.

Never did get that room painted. I wonder how much of that had to do with the dacquari?

Anyway, this is the in-between period of life. This is the daily to and fro that lends itself to strong bonds, gentle memories, and really crappy blogging. This is the laundry list, and the laundry, but it must be done.

The boys have new binders, and this year I think I may have pulled it off! They have sections for reading, history, science, and memory work. I gave them composition books for their phonics, spelling, and copywork. They have binder pouches, each with their own markers, pencils, lead refills (because what kind of geeks would I be raising if they didn't have mechanical pencils?) Plus, there is hope they'll now quit stealing Zorak's. They have their own scissors (again, the hope for less theivery among the household supplies). In fact, they are now decked out for lessons like little kings. They decorated the subject dividers, and the images are hilarious. I'll have to see if my scanner still works and post some of them. It's fun to see how they view things, how they interpret subjects, and what the world looks like to them. With my scissors safely in my kitchen drawer, I've got to say the world looks pretty darned good to me, right now!

Miss Emily is just one big fat blob of happy. She's so... round. It's delightful. She squawks and squeals and makes all manner of ruckus. She has discovered depth, and knows that if she can't reach that tantalizing little object, she can dislocate her shoulders and other various limbs with one good lunge to get another inch or two of reach. She'd really like to crawl, but right now her butt's too heavy. She gets up and... thar she goes! But the idea is there, and that's what this life is built on: ideas and persistence. If we give her nothing else over the years, we will give her the motivation to be determined to reach her goals. What goals they may be, I have no idea (you should have seen the havoc that ensued upon checking the mouse traps yesterday!), but she will attain them, and she'll have plenty of laughter along the way.

This is good stuff.

Kiss those babies!
~Dy

1 comment:

Bob and Claire said...

Ooh, sounds like you all are all set to go! I'm working on organizing binders now too! You know, not to discourage you, but we have actually SEVERAL pairs of scissors for each boy now, and somehow, when scissors are needed, nary a pair can be found! (Mr. Nobody? Are you stealing them?! LOL!) Hopefully your system will work better than ours! : )