Instant Attitude Adjustment--oof!

Spring break is over and it's time to get back to life (I still can't say that without singing Into the Woods). I know that first day back is always challenging. I know this. It is. Knowing doesn't make it easier, but it helps to know why things are hard. It's just the law.

And boy, we followed the law! Second day back wasn't any better. I knew that the next step is my own attitude. I get ugly in my heart after repeated poor treatment. Like I deserve better. It's gross and difficult for me to manage. So, there I was at dinner after two super hard days with the girls, wrestling and forcing myself to be pleasant.

Then it happened. The humbling gut-punch. My girl gushed her multiple thank-yous for a basic dinner of meatloaf and baked potatoes with corn (I was done being sad that we were out of broccoli). Another was pretending to be on a baking show and kept calling the meatloaf meat cake. Other girl was happily smashing everything on her plate and being sure that each person had napkin, utensils, and drinks--repeatedly.

Then a girl said, "I feel like crying because I am so happy to eat this. When we were with (first father), we didn't eat this kind of food. We sometimes had peanut butter sandwiches or nothing. Thank you, Mommy, for making this. Thank you! It is so delicious!"

If I were reading this, I would assume the writer was paraphrasing and exaggerating. Let me tell you, I am toning it down.

My DRA (dirty rotten attitude, doncha know) evaporated, leaving behind humble gratitude tinged with some shame. This life is so much bigger than me and my fragile ego.

Dual Lives: Trauma and Handwriting

Raising kids from hard places is complicated.  Raising kids is complicated. It is more than a 24/7 job. Somehow, we manage to fit more than the allotted time because there is just so much to do, so much to worry about, so much to pray about.

The thing that makes raising kids who have been exposed to trauma different is that the two don't--or shouldn't--go together. Kids are kids. They are wiggly, curious, excited, inexperienced, naive, naughty little sponges. Trauma is traumatic. It breaks and twists. It changes brains and scars personalities. It brings out fearfulness. It brings intimate knowledge of hard things, things no one needs to know. It causes people to exist in the flight/fight realm even when everything should be calm and safe.

Again, the two oughtn't go together. Kids and trauma shouldn't mix. But they do, and all too often.

Raising kids exposed to trauma means embracing the whole unwieldy mess. It means teaching kids about hygiene, handwriting, and how to greet people, but being ready to stop the world when a memory unravels them. 

When it is possible, you have to keep going with normal life. And normal life is engrossing. Brush your teeth already! Please make your lips touch when you have food in your mouth. Julius Caesar had gained popularity with the general public by winning distant wars. But the Roman governing officials didn't want a king. You may play with that after you clean up the toys you were playing with. Suddenly normal life is set aside because something is wrong. What?

It's even more complex when the memories are so buried that the child can't articulate what they are responding to. Triggers are everywhere and every-day life can feel like a mine field. When a sound, a temperature, a texture, a taste, a gas station, an atmosphere, or a smell can remind a child's body of a time when they felt threatened or unsafe, the child doesn't always understand what is happening. They fight to figure things out, when everyone around that continues to act normally, like the world isn't on fire. It is confusing and scary. And their behavior can also become confusing and scary.

As parents, we become detectives. But we must move delicately, like studying a most rare and fragile flower, or navigating a snakes'-den of wires on a bomb. Or both. 

To do it well, you have to walk the tight-rope. You need to press on with normal life, ever vigilant for triggers.  You need to continually strengthen attachment, so that when things get hard, they trust you to see them through. They can't do it alone. And neither can you.

Homeschool Curriculum

I am excited about the next homeschool year because I decided to write the curriculum myself. I am a diehard Sonlight fan and used it to school my first two children from first grade to twelfth. I shopped around and landed back at Sonlight for my girls.

When I made the purchase (with no little kicking myself for getting rid of most of it from the first time around), the price hurt a bit. Then I made adjustments to how we were schooling, which led to more purchases. At the time, I was earning a little income from the job I left to homeschool. I knew that would not be the case any other year.

I was browsing at a local bookstore with my husband and we were looking at some of the great deals they offered.  Offhand as we left, I said, "I'm going to just write my own curriculum and get books from there." I took myself by surprise because I hadn't realized how much I'd been thinking about it until it came out of my mouth. My husband protested, knowing how much I love Sonlight.

But once I said it aloud, it took on a solid form and this enthusiasm started bubbling up. I could hardly wait to get home to start planning. Guess what I will be doing over Spring Break? 

March: 2019

Continuing our retrospective into Marches past, we zoom from 2018 to 2019. We lost our precious girl to a Native American family thanks to ICWA laws. It was devastating and our family was still in the deep throes of shock and grief. 

To be honest, the four of us still have wounds from losing our little girl that merely gape a little less. We miss her and pray for her daily.

At this point (in 2019), we were licensed with an agency and hoping to be a safe place for kids in need.  We'd given ourselves a month to make zero decisions after our girl left. Then we discussed whether we would continue as a foster family.  We unanimously decided that if kids didn't get to choose to be foster kids, we WOULD choose to meet them there.  We knew it would be hard, but we could trust Jesus to sustain us.

On a more celebratory note, my first daughter graduated high school! In March, I was writing her transcripts, and she was wrapping up final projects to complete her high school education on the fifth of April. Pretty exciting stuff. She did not enjoy school, and her graduation marked an accomplishment that I hope she still loves.  

Our son was in college, and I decided to join him. In March, we were preparing to begin at WGU on the first of April. I was finally going to get my BA! I spent March hunting down transcripts from my lifetime before raising two kids.

What a March!

We Got a Van

 I mentioned before that we got a van.

You want to meet her? Here she is!  Her name is Penelope Gabrielle Sage, thank you very much! Her official color is green-brown, according to the manufacturer. Who on earth would think that would be a pretty color?  Green-brown?  That is the color of poo. Why did no one speak up in that meeting?

Anyhow, I don't think she looks green-brown.  I can't actually say what color she is. The repairmen reported the color is tan, and I suppose that's a nice catchall name and as good as any.  It's just car-colored like my hair is hair-colored.  The ultimate non-descript.

I am thankful for this gal. Because of her, we get to GO! We've visited the Omaha Science Center, the local children's museum, and friends. It's so nice! Even being able to pick up groceries is a gift.

We have also enrolled the girls in dance and choir.  Our musical girls are gaining a lot of Good Things because of this.  So, welcome, Penelope Gabrielle Sage! Thank you for the adventures AWAY from home!

Homeschooling Schedule

I have the privilege of being a new homeschooler and veteran homeschooler at the same time.  I started homeschooling a few weeks after my second baby was born so that my 2.5-year-old would have dedicated time with me.  We kept going until that baby graduated high school.  Through those years we moved twice, changed churches a few times, and lived several different lifestyles.  I founded and ran a homeschooling group with friends.  We did tours and playdates.  I wrote entire programs for us to carry out in co-op-style classes.  I also counseled new homeschoolers, getting them set up to school their kids successfully from home. Throughout all that, we had different children in our home because I was either homeschooling or nannying them.  

I've got some experience! But, true to the assertion that there are as many ways to homeschool as there are families, this is new and different.  Schooling three kids specifically NOT from the beginning with more special needs than my first crew and in relative isolation is different. So, true to form, I am learning as I go.

I recently changed our homeschooling schedule because I was really overtaxing all of us by trying to do a little bit of everything each day.  I thought the consistency and small bites would provide routine so that growth would be steady and the predictability would give the kids a sense of safety and ownership of their days.  It's a good thought worth its place, but it was time to wriggle things around.

So now I have staggered days. On Mondays and Wednesdays, we do core work using Sonlight curriculum. That is Bible, Social Studies/History, Literature, and Science.  I use the four-day schedule, so we double up and still complete a week's worth of work in a week.  On Tuesdays and Thursdays, we do extracurricular activities like Spanish, Piano, and Recorder.  Fridays are special because my husband is home every other week, so we go on outings with him.  When he is at work, we do arts, cooking, and messy science projects.  Each day we do Movement, Reading, Writing, and Math.  We also do a preschool-style circle time each day with things like prayer, calendar, weather, and Bible verses and stories.

So far, it's working out pretty well.  I might flip-flop the pairs of days because I chose hefty work on the days we are committed to Choir and AWANA.  But I'm going to wait.  Because the change is about looking at the week as a whole, I'm giving myself a solid month to adjust.

Our daily routine still exists regarding blocks of time.  I am eager to see how the opened space allows for more connection and breathing room.  

Don’t Stop Learning

I’m kind of a nerd.  I like words a lot.  Grammar jokes tickle me to an extreme.  It is embarrassing, really. I own and wear this shirt.  And I laugh every time I read it.  I am that big of  a nerd. 

 

I think most people have pet peeves.  I think nerds have their own set of pet peeves.  Or maybe not.  Maybe it is just me.  Either way, this is my nerdy pet peeve.  “You use big words. Stop it! I don't want to learn them. I want to be simple. Not high falutin’”

I get this more than I like.  And I obey.  I try to use words that are less exact because I don’t want to get yelled at for using a more beautiful and precise word that the hear-er may not know or like.  But on the inside….

 
So, you are done learning ?!?!?
But you are alive!  Why?  I can think of two options.   First, you have more to learn and there is a possibility that you might need to acquire new words to allow for and to express more mature or broader thoughts, ideas and concepts. The other option is that you truly have no more to learn beyond what you absorbed in high school and you are here only to apportion your prodigious and amaranthine knowledge on the world. Those big scary words that you don’t like to use aren’t words that you don’t know; you just like to be approachable to the bourgeois class.  You are a magnanimous philanthrope !

I know it would be wrong for me to try to judge which of these options is reality in your individual case, so I’ll leave it to you.

You gotta Love Words!

For posterity.

Madi: Do you know what extraordinates me? Whenever I think of creation I think of my children's Bible because I used to read that story all the time. I loved the pictures so much. But now I know about cells and amino acids and organs and the cow's four stomachs and think how much God had to really make when he created the world. It isn't just the pictures that I like of birds flying and fishing jumping out of the sea. That is extraordinary.

There is nothing better than inventing new words. I invented one myself yesterday when my daughter was teasing me about being afraid of the dentist.  I told her that I am not afraid.  It is just sensible to avoid people in the business of causing others crippifying pain.  That is my new word. 

Speaking of words, I asked the kids what was the difference between disturbing and creepy. This is the answer I received:

Creepy is a ghost story. Sitting next to a naked guy is disturbing.

And a final fun with words inspired by my hilarious kids: Playwright or don’t play at all.

Little Green Men…or Grey, if you are so inclined

Somehow during school we got to talking about aliens.  So the question came up. Are there aliens? This led to the next question. Does it even matter?

The world is so big. The distance between planets, solar systems, galaxies. We are just little dots in both a time and a space that seem infinite. Does that make us insignificant?  If course not!  We were made to be in relationship with the One Who made us. That is all that matters. So what if we are the only beings on the only planet orbiting the only sun?  So what if there are countless species of aliens on countless planets and moons across vast stretches of space—or even countless universes?  We can be at the center of the universe or in a tiny pocket that the universe has forgotten. None of that matters when we are face to face with the love of our lives.

What seems to matter is from where we get our identity.  Is it about being in the center?  Being the biggest?   The first? If so, then you can feel pretty unimportant when you compare yourself to all creation.  If, however, you know your identity is connected to your Creator, then however much else He chooses to create has nothing to do with your worth.  He said you were worth the Blood of His Son.  What more needs to be said?

When we got married, my husband asked what we would do if I were to realize I were homo- or bisexual--we are weird and have conversations like that, ok?  My answer was simple: who cares?  Would it be ok for me to cheat on my husband with a man?  No. So how would it be ok for me to fool around with a woman? I am face to face with Brian, my husband, for whom I vowed to forsake all others. All others.

The same is true with God. No number of aliens--even zero--will change my purpose in life. I was made to love and glorify Him. My place is secure.

My Son’s Writings

I gotta do some bragging.  My son’s writings this week have given me great pleasure and I want to share them. 

First up is his blessings poster.  Our Advent traditions have gotten off to a rough start, but I am trying to incorporate some of our plans into our day in spite of circumstances.  The blessings poster is a new one, and both kids had fun doing them.  I was impressed at the depth and breadth of their appreciation.  My daughter listed the precious people in our lives and made her poster so pretty with her artistic flair.  These babies are going on the wall! Here is the list from my son.

• Timothy (our rabbit)

• My creativity

• Bailey and Ava (our dogs)

• The games we play

• Our dad for being a hard worker and loving us

• The ability to keep in touch with family far away

• A wonderful year

• The off time we have to be together

• The park up the street

• School to help us follow the paths given to us

• Our toys and books

• Everyone in our church

• That even in hard times we’re given what we need

• To know that we are saved

• So many reasons

• The deli where we can meet and help people

• That Bailey has made friends with Timothy

• To be able to give in so many ways

• That we’re given all these things we don’t need

• That we have doctors to heal and officers to keep us safe

• That something happens every day to look forward to

• Good music that we listen to often

• A world where we are connected enough to know what’s happening

• Fun snow days!

• The sledding hill

• Our great neighborhood

• God’s protection

• The material to make great things

• The good food in our pantry

• That mommy can stay home

• That we have so many blessings

• A good weekly schedule

• The freedom to express our faith

• People in our lives to help and love and to receive help and love from

• Our car that’s lasted so long

• Our wonderful school program

• That our house can hold us and anyone who comes to it

• The shows we watch together

• The trips we go on

• A family full of love and respect

• Every day we spend as a family

• Schooling Rylee

• Money to afford what we have

• That we always have someone to look to for comfort

• People and things that came along to remind us to not get distracted

• Foundations class, where we have so much fun

• The privileges we get and the trust we have throughout the family

• Things to keep us productive (smelly markers)

Isn’t that cool?  Another assignment was to give three silly excuses for missing a Christmas party.  Here is My son’s paper.

 

I’m sorry I missed your Christmas party.  I would have come, really, but something came up.  My pet gopher grabbed my pie recipe and buried it.  He has so many holes, and I had to go through all of them before I found out that it never even went into the ground, but instead got blown by the wind out of my gopher’s mouth and into a neighbor’s yard.

So then I had to go to all my neighbors and find out which one’s yard my recipe got blown into.  The owner of said yard turned out to be away, so I decided to climb over his fence and grab it myself.  But that didn’t work because my neighbor has twenty-seven cats who, when they saw me, panicked, clawed me up and ate the recipe.

Then I had no recipe anyway, so I had to go back to the store from which I got the recipe and ask for another one.  But when they started writing the recipe out for me the power went out.  And then the nice worker there couldn’t write the recipe because she couldn’t see what she was writing.  So then we decided that she should go to my house and bake the pie herself, if I could bring her to the party.

But then, while making the pie we needed eggs.  I pulled out the carton and dropped it, breaking every single egg.  So then we would have had to go to the store to get more eggs, except that the power was out at the store where the eggs were.  So we then figured it wasn’t worth the trouble.  I drover her back to her own home and then returned to mine so I could sit down and write the letter.

 

He is a funny dude. Finally, this is a short essay about what he most anticipates this winter.  True to his form, he cannot select just one thing.

It is December, the first month of winter.  It’s very cold, and it gets dark quickly, so some adjustments have to be made.  But there are also some things I’m looking forward to that can’t be done any other time of the year.

One of the biggest things I’m looking forward to is sledding.  There’s a great sledding hill just behind our neighborhood that we visited multiple times last year.  We don’t have any sleds, but we know friends who will happily bring them if they can use them with us.

Snow is another thing I’m looking forward to.  We have some right now, but it’s only a couple of inches, so it just gets in your shoes, and is very, very cold.  What I’m really looking forward to is lots of snow!  My sister and I have built snow forts and trench systems in the past, and played on  huge mountains created when the driveway is shoveled.  A lot of people don’t like this neighborhood because they say it gets too much snow.  But more snow is more fun!

And of course there's Christmas.  We don’t have a lot of money for presents this year, but I think that’s a good thing.  It helps us remember that we’re actually celebrating Jesus, instead of presents.  Also sweet doggie Bailey just came back from the hospital, so she’s Christmas present enough.

This summer was the best summer I can remember.  This winter is also going to be great as we get together with friends and celebrate God’s grace.  It’ll be great! 

China!

We have taken another step forward in our trek through the Eastern Hemisphere and have entered the country with such a long history: China!  My kids saw, way back on Box Day, my kids saw the beautiful China Treasure Chests, but were not allowed to peek inside.  On our first day of studying China, we opened them!  What excitement!  They sure packed a lot into those little boxes and my kids oohed and ahhed all over them. 

Now we have something neat to anticipate each week as we use each piece of treasure.  We will decorate a traditional fan, build a section of the great wall, use a traditional calligraphy brush and ink stone, work with a beautiful map…  So cool!

 

Box day!  We got the supplies to this year’s school back in June.  We had to finish up the year we were doing before we could being this new adventure—which we did in October.  Now we are in week 11 and exploring China!

 

Each child has his and her own treasure chest, so they will be able to use all the contents to the fullest, infusing each activity with their own unique style and personality.  Have I mentioned that I am LOVING this school year?  (I could drop kick the stinking workbook and encyclopedia, now more than ever, and wish there were a better way to attain the vital information regarding each country, but every rose has its thorn, yes?)