Tidbits

• Collectively, we've been sick three times in two months, all upper respiratory infections, and this last one has a deep, nasty cough to go along with it.  I just can't wait until it is done. It is oh-so-very unpleasant to miss out on summer with coughing, hacking, and lethargy.
• Not to mention all the screaming and ill-tempered fighting.  I've kept Eliah in the backpack for a good part of the part two days, mostly to keep him from rooting up turmoil wherever he goes.  He is calmed by being with me and on my person, while I am still able to accomplish my tasks at hand.
• Speaking of . . . I am feeling somewhat mournful over just that: the endlessness of my tasks at hand: the bulldozer effect that inhibits enjoying my little guys with more leisure.  For the first time, I really understand my mom's admonition that she remembers my younger years much better than my sister's, 11 years younger than me.  Life is a blur with so many needs to meet.  I feel sad about it.  The blur.

 He was so pleased about this tree

• I am full-bore in the thrust of planning for our little homeschool for 2015-2016.  It has been a lot of fun - I can tell I am getting better at it.  I have a better sense of the rhythm of our days, how to plan it out, what to expect.  I am also very excited for our new material: literature, poetry, nature study, history.  We will be delving into "early modern times" and studying the beginnings of the US, as well as what was going on in the surrounding world at the time.
• I am totally sold on Festina Lente in my growing philosophy of education, to "make haste slowly" - the idea of not cramming it all in, but letting it slowly settle.  Not trying to conquer or cover everything, but following a slow, well-trodden path.  Saturation vs. sprinkling.  I love it.

 Playdough festival

• We made playdough the week before last.  Each boy got to pick out his own color and spent hours over the course of a couple of days cutting, rolling, lumping, and bumping.  It was great fun. And a good table-time activity for a menagerie of sickies.
• Blaine made the boys a tree house in a younger ash in the tree-line along our driveway.  Truen picked it out on a day that Blaine was planting pumpkins in our "front four" acres.  We are carving out a section (currently in alfalfa) as a test-run.  Truen perched himself in a tree to watch and realized it was the perfect spot.  
• Truby has been talking about tree houses for so long that Blaine decided to bite the bullet and just do it finally.  He cobbled together a nice little platform from scrap lumber.  Three boys can be up there at a time, but we are sticking to a Two Boy rule.  We can just picture them starting a tussle if there were more than two at a time.  
• And actually, if Diego and Jamie are together alone longer than just a few minutes, sometimes [what feels like] just a few seconds, fights inevitably break out.  They are currently under quarantine from each other and can only play together if udder brudders or friends are involved.  Seriously.  It is bad.
• I am still working on nailing down time for Mother Culture.  I've found that I can only read Pride and Prejudice before bed, otherwise my mind wanders (and it isn't too long before it shuts down completely at that time of night anyway).  Dakota is best read while I'm eating, otherwise I feel antsy, and Home Education is best in the morning before anyone else is awake. It isn't a daily guarantee, but I am slowly pecking away at them.
• It has been very interesting to re-read Pride and Prejudice and Dakota as a woman of 37, instead of a girl of 20 (P&P) and a young woman of 27 (Dak).  My sense of insight and understanding is undoubtedly deeper. I love noticing that.
• I have also started a commonplace book to keep track of myself while I read: thoughts, insight, significant passages, excellent quotes.  It pleases me.  I picked the Pegasus Decomposition Book for added whimsy.