"that we all have greater powers than we think; that whatever we want to learn or learn to do, we probably can learn; that our lives and our possibilities are not determined and fixed by what happened to us when we were little, or by what experts say we can or cannot do.” - John Holt

He was one of the first modern day proponents of homeschooling and wrote a series of books that are inspiring. He wrote this referring to his learning to play the cello at age 50....i thought it was cool.

thawts

why do I have an obsession with intentionally spelling things wrong? It has been with me as long as I can remember and I just can't seem to shake that habit. it's 11:15 p.m. so sisters...i DO stay up past 9:30 unlike what you guys believe. I'm sitting alone in the school room...silently....

Today was a long and good day. I got up to Addie and Eva telling me to "GET UP!!!" I always wonder about moms that have the discipline to set an alarm for some crazy time to excercise. I sleep until I have people shoving me out of bed.

we did Addie's school really early and ate breakfast while we did her lessons and finished up in time for me to teach a piano lesson to an adult student who has become a really good friend. we always end up laughing hysterically because she won't start the song...she just keeps apologizing for how bad it is and then right when she's about to play...she says "I'm really sorry." This continues usually for like an hour past our lesson time because we get on strange subjects and books we've read and whatever.

Addie and Eva played together well for most of the day with only a couple Dr. visits. (pretend world dr. visits) We chased bee's outside with a flyswatter to keep them away from the swingset...they are those wood burrowing bees and they are SO not eating my swingset!

We found a tiny little birds nest in our bush and it used a trash bag to build it's birds nest. reduce reuse recycle with me...come on now! Seriously that slogan, "reduce reuse recycle" makes me want to hurl my honey nut cheerios. can't go there!

we stayed outside and soaked up this lovely day and planted a bunch of flowers. I felt like ONE with the Earth!! especially as I viciously killed the earth with a horrible chemical weed killer that I sprayed on all of the poison ivy along the back fence. Then we found a large dead mouse chilly caught. Then I was trying to kill bees. so although we were bringing things to beautiful life...we were also witnessing horror and death. all in one delightful evening.

are toddler geniuses real?

I just watched a documentary thingy about how this family had their 1 year old painting abstract art...and then by the age of 4 the kid was selling a load of paintings, and everyone was going crazy over it. But then it came out that really her dad who was like a wannabe artist was helping her do all of them.
Then everyone was angry and she went totally milli va nilli and never sold another painting.


Then earlier in the week I saw this thing about how in England this little 2 year old kid joined mensa because they determined she's a genius because she knows all these countries and capitals and what not.
There also was a 2 year old who could read words off of a flashcard and her parents were like..."SHE's a GENIUS!!!" and acting really crazy every time she read a word off a flash card. And they kept saying how they show the flashcards to her all day so she will remember them. She was like sitting in her high chair, and they were showing her a flash card, she was laying down, and they were like..."Now what does this say?" She looked like she was going to punch one of them.

I just wonder if a child genius is more about the information that you present to a child and train them to respond to, then the kid just popping out nuggets of genius wisdom spontaneously. I mean, if you think about it under 5 year olds are memorizing a humongous amount of information just from daily life. Just learning how to speak requires a large amount of memorization. Most people just don't worry about teaching their toddler to memorize what the word "Hippopotamus" looks like on a flash card. Or memorizing the capital of Sri Lanka.

It's like when Addie was about 3 she always wanted me to sing this song I learned in 5th grade about the fifty nifty united states. I think I sang it to her in the car one day when she was grumpy. After a couple of weeks of her requesting me to sing that lovely tune(rolling eyes) she would sing the song, which is the fifty states in alphabetical order. So I would brag to all the grandma's...Addie knows all fifty states in alphabetical order...and then she would proudly belt out "fifty nifty". So I probably could have like had people pay admission to come meet the child genius right?

so the message of my post is: child geniuses usually have crazy parents that are trying to get rich!

at least that makes me feel better.

today

We are going to the Circus, having over the fam. and having Mark's Birthday at our house....hey could someone bring plastic or paper plates, peas? (since Eva is such a cute little talker the way she says things gets stuck in my head.....I'm stuck on toddler talk)

This week I've been in a weird mood. I felt kinda nasty and sick with a horrible headache/cold the first half of the week and the last half of the week I just felt like my brain was stuffed with cotton. I've had a hard time living in the present...my mind is wandering alot. At ALDIS the checkout lady like yelled at me..."LOAD YOUR STUFF ON THE BELT PLEASE!!!" because I was just standing there staring at the orange wall border with fascination while everyone waited behind me. whoops. Then I was like...."Oh thank you...I think I would have just zoned out here for a really long time." and I was really grateful she yelled at me. thank you check out lady for your kind words of assistance.
So that has been ME this week...out of it, dizzy, headache, unable to focus. I think I need a brain scan! The nice weather the past two days too has made it really hard to do school with Addie in the morning. We just want to run outside and swing all day. Last night I made her do math in bed while she was about to pass out. I was like....."MATH TIME!!!" she looked at me like I had LOST IT.

on the other hand...she is learning to read!!! There is nothing as cool as seeing her learn and progress.

Last night we went to the Dayton Library book sale at the Hara Arena. a.k.a Scary Arena. It's cool...there are a LOT of books and if you are one who shops on Sunday (curse you) you can get everything you can carry out for only $1.

more pictures

ever since I had Addie and she was old enough to scream in horror every time she went to nursery, I miraculously would be called as the teacher of whatever class she is in. this is our super CTR class as we call ourselves. we have a good time :)
Dannys spring break project. It's not totally finished yet but here it is.....
all the dates are wrong on these pictures! I'm so technologically retarded.

Easter sunday
good bye

Ocho Anos

8 years ago....................... we were both skinnier!!!!

We've lived through most of our 20's together and have learned and grown and I can honestly say I didn't know how lucky I was that day 8 years ago. danny you rock!

aldis day

I hate grocery shopping with a strange passion.
I always have.
When Danny and I were first married it was a chore we'd both save until the weekend and then race through Aldis and Kroger as fast as we could.

After I had Addie I kinda took the responsibility of grocery shopping on and I would take her out once a week or so and go grocery shopping. It was okay. I still didn't enjoy it but I kinda just dealt with it.

Then I had Eva and things changed once again.

Because grocery shopping became torturous to the point of me just not going at all.

For one...I can't focus in the grocery store. I get distracted by all the different things that I could possibly buy. I try to take a list but even making a list is really annoying .

So I'd end up getting nothing on my list, plus frozen pizzas, strange looking tropical fruit, and ice cream and popsicles.

So later on in the week we'd be out of everything and I'd be eating the last can of old pears and I'd tell everyone to eat oatmeal for dinner.

also when I'm in the store with the kids they start to get so hungry all they can think about is getting lunchables and juice. and we get distracted once again.


as a wonderful, loving service Danny does the grocery shopping on Saturdays. He takes the kids or one kid and does the dirty work and I can't tell you how happy that makes me. So I haven't had to enter aldis in several months.

but today I'm going. Because his bro. is coming over to help him build our swingset and I told him I'd take the kids and brave Aldis on a saturday. I'm actually okay with it because I haven't been there in so long I think I need to experience it so I once again have a renewed appreciation for the saturday grocery service.

I really do like Aldis. IT only has 3 aisles, there is only one brand to pick from, and there's very little confusion. Besides the interesting people you run into at aldis.

One day when addie was a baby we were all in Aldis and an older lady came up to us and pointed at Addie's hat and said..."DID YOU MAKE THAT HAT?" I was like "Yes." Then she was like...."That is soooo wonderful. that is just amazing. Look at that HAT! NEVER STOP MAKING THOSE HATS!"
then she like poked danny in the chest and was like "NEVER LET HER STOP MAKING THOSE HATS!"
he was like "Okay."
then she went into a discussion of how her husband made her stop doing things.

so I learned to NEVER STOP MAKING THOSE HATS.