Dizzy

The past two days (actually 3, but Tuesday wasn't nearly as bad), I have felt utterly crappy from the time I wake up until sometime around 9 or 10pm, when I start feeling fine. I'm dizzy, weak, nauseous, and headachey. It's incredibly annoying because I have a lot to do today. I think I may take an old prenatal pill because I'm thinking it might be a lack of iron problem. (???)

Here's some pics from our last park day (Tuesday).

I Made a Hat out of Duct Tape and Other Stories

Nurlo

I felt it was in my best interest to stop participating in blogtober. Like I was saying in my previous entry, it was starting to feel like more of a drag than a joy and in the midst of feeling burdened with my obligation to blog every day, I realized that I am free to let go of things that are not making me happy. Oh yeah! Duh.

Anyway, maybe 15, 16, 17 days in a row of writing is my personal limit and I should use that in regards to my writing goals. Something like, I will write every day for 17 days straight, take a 3 day break, and then do it again.

So, yesterday's big excitement was that the new Barbie movie, The Twelve Dancing Princesses came in the mail from Netflix. Also, we (I) cleaned the livingroom and now it's apparantly fit for doing obstacle courses. Also, I found an online riddle game, which I now must devote every waking moment to.

Oh.

This blogging every day thing started to get old about halfway through. It was interesting because that first half of the month, I was really just sailing along. It was easy peasy and I was really enjoying it. But it's harder lately. I mean, the contrast is pretty big between the wanting to blog half of the month and the not so much wanting to blog part of the month, and I'm finding it kind of weird. Seek balance, my refrigerator says.

I do have two posts in draft form so maybe I'll work on one of them for tomorrow.

True Story

Whenever I open a can of anything in the kitchen, the cats come running and meowing. I always say to them, "It's not a tuna!" in the voice of Arnold Schwarzenegger.

What I Did on My Summer Vacation

All my entries fall in the day-to-day category. Boring!

Today we went to a friend's house for Life Learners. It was an Exploraganza day, which just means that our gathering had a theme. This time the theme was ATCs. We did it at the suggestion of myself and the friend whose house we were at today. I managed to make, I think, three ATCs. The girls made, I think, three thousand. Those kids just crank 'em out, dude. We had a lot of fun. I think everybody else liked it a lot too. ATCs are awesome. So small! So cute! So non-intimidating! Everybody should try them!

Later on, Saren and I went to JoAnn's (I feel like I live there lately. I also feel like I should get a job there to offset the amount of money I spend on craft supplies.) and I got her some pink and purple duct tape. She's busily making things with it right now. It was $4 a roll. Doesn't that seem excessive?

Oh, and since I'm on the subject of expensive, yesterday the girls and I went into The Limited Too because we wanted to look at the Neopets plushies and I also happened to look at some of the clothes. Listen, do people really pay $28 for a child's t-shirt? This just doesn't make sense to me.

Internets and Netflix to the Rescue

We do not have cable. We watch the teevee that we like either with rabbit ears or on DVD, via Netflix. At times, the rabbit ears don't seem to do much good. At these times, I whine to Pat and ask him why we don't get cable, even though I know I don't want to pay 45 dollars a month for it because I don't feel it's worth that much. Usually the rabbit ears are okay. Sometimes, like tonight, I also whine about not having Tivo. I was making dinner rather late and I knew I was going to miss part of Heroes, which I have been watching since it began last month, because we would be eating (eating in front of the tv wasn't an option in this case). So, I wished we had Tivo (like a VCR wouldn't do?). And then I remembered that all the networks are putting their teevee on the internets now, so I can watch it tomorrow (probably, maybe a bit later) on their website. Plus I can pause when I want to. Hooray! Keeping this in my mind and keeping our Netflix subscription in my mind will keep me from wanting to get cable or Tivo. Most of the time.

Progress?

Today I tackled the arts and crafts mess. It wasn't as huge as it seemed, though I should probably mention that I'm not done. There's still a bunch of stuff in the closet that I need to incorporate into the larger arts and crafts whole and there's this big box of finished artwork that I need to go through with the girls to find out what they can let go of and what they want to keep. I'm going to make them each a portfolio and whatever fits is what they can keep. (Theoretically. We'll see how that goes.) I should remind myself that the huge piles of disorganization are always not as horrifying as they seem. That's my problem with cleaning and organizing. I look at the mess and it just seems so overwhelming that I don't want to have anything to do with it. And then I dive right in and I think to myself, "Really, was that such a big deal?" And it never was a big deal.

Still, there's lots left to do around here and I am relatively certain that we're not going to be able to meet our self-imposed deadline of the end of October. We will, however, continue to work at it (such as that is). I'm thinking that after the holidays will be a much more do-able goal. Particularly since houses don't move well during the holidays.

In other news, on Friday night, Barenaked Family was on Nightline*. It was so cool to see them on the teevee. Not that we've met them in real life or anything, but reading about their story on their website and having been so inspired by them, I kind of feel like we do. Sorta. Anyway, they filmed some the segment here in Vegas, which was also neat. Also, also neat was that we saw one of the families that we met at the conference and we saw a water bottle from the conference. Famous water bottle! We have one just like it! Actually, we have four!

I think the story turned out overall pretty positive, even the homeschooling aspect. There was a funny part where the correspondent was sitting at the dinette talking to the parents about education and in the background, the two youngest kids were sitting on the bed reading an easy reader book to eachother. It looked to me like the older was helping the younger out, pointing out some words to her, telling her what it said. And the news guy was all amazed that they had done that of their own volition. What??? Reading even though they don't have to??? Bizarre!!!

Then, today, I read the Barenakeds account of the story. Funny to see that compared to the five minute segment. It was like a behind the scenes. Anyway, the whole thing was just more fuel to my fire. Let's go, let's go!

Incidentally, the Barenakeds have now decided to shed their RV and just have two jeeps and backpack. They wanted to let go of even more. I'm not sure, but I think they intend to get another rig when they're done with the backpacking.

*there are two parts to this link; night and line

COPS is not a good show.

Yesterday we went to the Renaissance Faire. It was as good as it ever is. Which is... I don't know. I always leave feeling a bit unsatisfied. I feel like there should be more stuff to do and see and less to buy. I also always feel like an outsider. All the Ren Faire people are always laughing and joking together and many of them are in character and I'm just a gawking, clueless civilian. And if I got dressed up, I would just feel fake. Maybe I just have too many issues. Also we couldn't find the camels to ride and that's always been one of our highlights.

We went with my friend, Miranda, and her girls, and we got in for free thanks to Pat's work. I was thinking that if we hadn't gotten those tickets from his work, I wouldn't have wanted to do it again this year. The girls had fun together. Pat and Saren did archery. The girls and I went into a maze. It rained on us as we were leaving. We ate ice cream. I forgot my camera. And that just about sums things up.

Today we went to my cousin's baby's second birthday party. My other cousin's baby was there and she is 13 months (I think) and bigger than Irina. Saren and Harper got a ton of candy from a pinata. And that about sums that up.

FYI

Just so you know, trying to explain the concept of time with regards to its manipulation in science fiction movies (I mean romances with a sci-fi element!) to a nine year old is an exercise in futility. I just don't think she's ready to make that particular cognitive leap. "No, see they both existed in each other's times as earlier or later versions of themselves, but they couldn't meet because, in the first case, she didn't know him yet, and in the second case, she had told him to forget about her. No, no, no, time didn't stop for her so that he could catch up, he was there at that time, it was just later for him."

Here's a better idea. Don't watch The Lake House. Man, movies/books that deal with time travel (for humans or letters) always just really irk me. There's always something that just doesn't sit well with me. Same thing happened with The Time Traveler's Wife. What was otherwise a pretty good story* became irritating because of all the niggling little time things. If that happened then, then how could that happen then? If it already happened, how could it not happen? Aaargh.

*except The Lake House wasn't otherwise a pretty good story, it was unexceptional, meh

ATCs

The girls and I stayed up until midnight last night finishing up our sets of ATCs for a trade with the imagination tribe list. The theme was zodiac. Here's how they turned out.

Photo Friday ~ Thin

Photo Friday
Challenge ~ Thin

Okay. Ready Now.

Yesterday we went to a new park with the Life Learners. It had a western theme and a windmill. There were few enough kids there that Harper felt comfortable playing nearly the whole time. Irina fell in love with the twirly slide and had me go down it with her over and over. And over. When I was ready to go home, Saren and Harper and their friends, A and E, were not ready to part, so they finagled a dinner together at the mall. Here are some pictures from yesterday plus one of the Walloween, which has more stuffs on it now.

Way too tired to blog.

So I'll just save it until tomorrow. Bwahahahahahahaha!




This counts.

Thoughts

I was thinking about unschooling and why "getting it" can be difficult. I think it's because in order to get unschooling, there is a letting go of ideas, not a filling up of new ones.

We all once understood unschooling. Look in any baby's eyes and you can see it. They know that living is learning and learning is living. The knowing of it is inherent. We're born with it. It's so obvious that it doesn't even need saying, which is why a baby, who doesn't even have words, can know it so deeply.

It's after that that we begin to be filled up with other ideas. You can't learn on your own, you need someone to help you do it. You're too stupid to know what to learn and when, so trust someone who knows better than you to tell you. You're too lazy to want to learn on your own, so you need someone to offer you bribes or threaten punishment in order for learning to happen. Learning is difficult, painful, and boring.

The deeper these ideas have taken root in our souls, the more difficult it is to dislodge them. But if they had never been planted there in the first place, there would be nothing to understand. Unschooling=life. In the absence of school, what would we say? Life=life? "Getting" unschooling means peeling away the layers of what we've been told until we are left with what we knew all along.

We're Drowning in Clothes!

I've spent a good portion of the day going through clothes, sorting out of season things and things to donate to the thrift store. And doing laundry and sorting through that as it gets cleaned. I've just put two overflowing boxes of clothing in the back of the van to take to the thrift store and we still have a ton of clothes.

In other news, Pie just found a new home. I put him up on Freecycle and someone came and picked him up today. The girls were pretty sad about it, but the woman who came and picked him up seemed really nice and I know they feel better about it after seeing that he is going to a good home. She said they used to have seven cats. And now they have two. Well, three, counting Pie.

That's about all I've got today. Sorry.

Beaded Creations and Halloween Decorations

The girls are heavily into making beaded jewelry lately. I usually don't wear jewelry at all. But I just made myself this necklace yesterday and I love it. I love it so much I have to go and look at it on myself in the mirror every so often.



Here's a snake that Saren made out of dice beads.



Here are some creations of Harper's. Actually, looking closer, I made three of the four bracelets that she's wearing.



Here's our Halloween wall. It's a work in progress. We're working on the Parade of Ghosts right now. Okay, not right now.



Here is the spoooooky ghost I made out of paper and a garbage bag.



And here is the screen that Saren got when she recently placed first in Mario Kart. Yay!

Happy Blogiversary to Me!

Today I have had my blog for four years. In none of the previous three years have I ever bothered to mention that today was my blogiversary, so we'll just have to celebrate extra hard this year.

Here is how we celebrate. We (I) go into my archives and gather up links to and excerpts from old entries. Super fun! After that we eat cake (please provide your own cake).

Entries in which I spell out a word phonetically for the title
Egg. Zah. Stead.
Un. Buh. Leev. Uh. Bull.

Huh. I thought there were more than that.

Excerpt of myself funnier than I ever am in the present

...The water guy knocked on our door today to tell us that our usage had gone from 20,000 gallons last month to 324,000 gallons this month and that we probably had a leak. Hm. Ya think? At first I thought he had come to chastise me for not changing the sprinkler schedule yet to the new MWF drought restrictions. I was all set to say, "But... but... I was definitely going to do it today! I swear! Don't take me to water abuse jail!" But then I didn't have to. That's good because I don't want to be anybody's water-waste-criminal bitch....

Excerpt of myself figuring out something completely obvious

...I think school is a very powerful thing in making a person submit to authority. I'm not saying that school is the only thing that makes a person less likely to question authority and I'm not saying that school made you, dear reader, more likely to submit to authority [/disclaimer]. What I'm saying is that I think I see a definite connection between what school does to people and what I failed to do when I was at the hospital having my baby. School teaches people to stay in line. School teaches people that the people who are in authority know more than you do and are not to be questioned. Teachers and principals are exchanged for nurses and doctors (in that case)....

Excerpt in which I omit ginormous parts of the story

...On the way home, we got a flat tire....

Hilarious things my kids have said

...First I'm going to color, first I'm going to run, first I'm going to play a game with you....

...H: Are you hinking what I'm hinking?
Saren: What are you thinking?
H: I do not know!....

...Mom, what did you make this smoothie out of? Throw up?...

Hooray! Long live Four of Two! Until I decided to change my blog title!

Don't Forget to Blog!

Okay!

Today the girls and I went to book club (held at a fellow unschooling family's house). The theme was fall/harvest/halloween/scary or just whatever you want. Saren brought a Goosebumps book that she had recently read (#1 Welcome to Dead House). Harper decided that she didn't want to do it this time so she just clung to hung out with me. The first book club we went to, she talked about her book easily. The second time, she started to cry, but then stopped when Saren and I reassured her and went on to talk about her book easily. This time she just opted out. Interesting.

After that, we ran some shopping-like errands. We bought some items for everyone's Halloween costumes and a bunch of beads for beading and some yarn for knitting.

It was rainy all day long. It was nice. I love the rain. I realize that I say that as a desert-dweller. It may well be that I would not love the rain if I lived somewhere that it was more abundant. But I love it. I love the smell. I love the sound. I love how today it was cloudy and rainy all day long and then, in the early evening, an area of the sky close to the horizon was clear and the setting sun found it's way into the human world and its rays bounced all over the place, making everything all yellow and beautiful. And we saw a rainbow on the way home (after picking up Pat from work). Here's a picture of it over Al-mart.



Oh, yes. And here's my weird story of the rain. Last night I woke up at about 2am. I didn't wake up because of what happened next, but it happened almost immediately after I woke up. It started to rain and it went from 0 to 100 in the space of about 1 second. It rained HARD for 5 seconds. Then it went from 100 to 0 in the space of about 1 second. I had to go out to the livingroom and look out the window to make sure I wasn't insane. And, sure enough, there was water out there and there was about as much as you would expect from a five second storm. Weird.

Random?

Yep. Random.

Annika's comment on the last post reminded me that I had intended to make an entry updating about Saren's feelings on the school issue. I thought about it on the first day of school. (I used to never realize when school was starting, ending for the summer, letting out for vacations or whatever. This year, though, I knew.) I forgot to make that entry and then I kept forgetting when remembering mattered, namely when I was blogging. I have been thinking about it though.

When the time for school came around again, I asked Saren if how she felt about it. She said she kind of wanted to go, but she said it rather lukewarmly. I asked her if she was happy with our unschooling lives and she said yes. So I told her that judging from her reaction, and taking into consideration the experience we had with her attending part of last year, I would rather she not go this year. She was cool with that. She said okay and that was pretty much that. I feel like if she had been clamoring for it and clearly wanting it very badly and it was clear that she was miserable with my decision to not enroll her for another year, then I would have put her in school. But I had to weigh her desire (which was not great) against my knowledge of how it would all play out and it seemed pretty clear to me that her not going would be better for the family as a whole.

I asked her again about it today. She didn't give me a real clear answer; I don't think she likes to be put on the spot. But I can tell just by looking at her that she's content with her life. She loves to see all of her unschooling friends, she loves to hang out at home and do crafts, watch movies, play on the computer, read books, and play with Harper. She's good. I suspect that we may have the school conversation again in the future and if we do, I'm sure that all the considerations will be different. She'll be older, Harper and Irina will be older, and we most likely won't be here anymore. So, school may yet be in our future again.

Moving on. You know how toddlers go through a stage where they say no to everything even if they mean yes? I believe Irina is starting on that stage. Only she doesn't say no, she shakes her head. Or, you know, it could just be that she doesn't fully understand the whole nodding, head shaking thing and she's experimenting with it.

The girls have been making a lot of beaded jewelry lately. They've also done a lot of drawing. It's like the ATCs have been a catalyst for them. They've started putting a lot more time and effort into their art than they previously did. I don't know why. I should scan some of their stuff and post it because they've made some really cool stuff.

In other news, Lost is on in 13 minutes.

Egg. Zah. Stead.

Today we went to Red Rock with the Life Learners. We have a favorite little picnic spot that the group has been to at least 3 times. I feel like there might have been other times that I missed, but I'm not sure. There's a little spring there and lots of trees for shade and great big boulders for climbing on. The spring always has these teensy little snails in it and there's always lots of pretty butterflies, birds, lizards, and horrible, disgusting (but interesting!) bugs for the kids to check out. It's always a lot of fun. Last year it was just Harper, Irina and I because Saren was in school. I remembered that and felt glad that she was there with us. The first time we went Saren wore a hole in the butt of her shorts by sliding down the rocks and she did it again! This time it was pants though. We had a good day and came home tired.

Today

I discovered that the tax system is baffling. BAFFLING and POINTLESS.

I think Irina grew two inches today. Maybe yesterday.

Not much else happened.

Things That Will Happen in October

1. I will blog every day.
2. At the end of it, we will have made the house and its environs suitable for sellage (as-is sellage, anyway).
3. Small people will collect candy.
4. We will go camping and I will spend the whole time fretting about how we're not getting anything done with regards to number 2.
5. Maybe not the whole time.
6. I will work on homemade Christmas presents for people I love (thereby not putting it off 'til the very last minute and making it impossible).
7. I will come up with a plot for NaNo.
8. I will wonder if doing NaNo is a smart idea.
9. I will finish this list.