Day 75

I fell asleep last night before I posted. My head was hurting kind of suddenly. Well, maybe I was ignoring it for several hours and then I couldn't ignore it any longer, so I went to sleep. Still hurts.

I'm going to have to admit that we're never going to have school before lunch. So that will mean that we need to be more willing to go until 5:00 or something. Nobody wants to do that, so what should we do? I've been all for conversation and "living" to learn for several years, but I think I still have some underlying worry about that. Some doubt that it actually works. Maybe that's because I haven't had a child graduate yet that was homeschooled that way.

My only graduate was homeschooled with textbooks and plenty of school-type assignments. We do still have those, just not as many. I try to make the ones we do more meaningful, and I talk to them about what there is to learn from them. I'm more of a partner. With Wilson, I had him do assignments, graded them, and we moved on. Now, I talk with the kids about what they're doing, and I think it's more visible to them what they're actually getting out of doing their work.

The things we talk about all morning are important. Sometimes someone will bring up a concern that we need to discuss. A lot of times, we talk about current events. That's not really what they want to talk about, but I do it anyway. We have personal and family scripture study in the mornings--essential to start the day. We eat. That takes a little while since we have to cook everything from scratch. We usually talk to Jeff on the phone or Skype, and when he's here with us we're sure to have some big conversation. Sam and Sarah go outside and play a bit, and Rachel reads or writes every minute she can. I guess we're doing school in the mornings after all. Whew!

Yesterday, the kids got to do some more service with the other teenagers at church. They raked leaves, baked cakes, made buckeyes, and decorated for Christmas for someone that has a small business in town. It was to help get ready for a sort of open house event this weekend. They also get to go help with that by handing out hot chocolate and talking to people Saturday. I think they had a lot of fun helping. It always feels so good to serve. We love it.

While they were helping with that, I tried to do some work on my online college stuff. I'm not sure how far I got. I need to get over this stuck place I'm in. I guess I'm going to have to let go of wanting to do my best and just get it done. That bothers me, but I guess it's ok sometimes.

See you tomorrow (tonight actually)!