Just so you know...

...the boys and their obsessions are taking over my mind. Last night, I dreamed about Darth Vader being made entirely out of Legos. We (I have no idea who "we" were) were trying to eliminate ol' Vader by dismantling him and burying the multitude of Lego pieces all over the place in different piles. This involved much sneaking around and evading alarm systems. Once the pieces were buried, though, they kept finding each other and bringing Vader back to life. This repeated numerous times.

I wonder if there's some hidden message in all this. Maybe it's meant simply to help me appreciate the boys' delight with all things Lego and all things Star Wars. If that were the case, though, you'd think I would have succeeded in doing away with ol' Vader. Then, at least, I would have woken up happy and feeling like I'd accomplished something...instead of frustrated at the futility both of keeping track of all the darned Lego pieces and of ever defeating the Dark Side. Sigh. :)

Diagramming Yoda...

Quick homeschooling thoughts...

1. I have a new-found respect for all teachers. (Okay, it's not really new-found...I've thought this for years, but it's worth mentioning again.) I can't imagine trying to make lessons "personal" for 25+ students...it's hard enough for three. (See my earlier post about trying to remember why I'm doing a lesson rather than just doing the lesson.) For those who manage, hats off to you!

2. The boys and I have been working our way through First Language Lessons for our grammar studies. This particular curriculum and I have a love-hate relationship. I've tried it. Stopped. Tried again with a different level. Stopped. And now find myself using both Level 1/2 (the original combined book) and Level 3. I'm still not thrilled, but it's been working better than anything else we've tried. In any case, the older two boys and I have been learning aplenty about diagramming sentences...something I've previously scoffed as unnecessary. I still don't know when in life one might use this skill, but do now recognize that the process is a useful teaching tool. 

3. In diagramming sentences, though, I really have to wonder how much work it would be to diagram all of Yoda's dialogue in any given episode of Star Wars. (Yes, we're still Star Wars crazy here...it's rubbing off on me.) Hmmm. Methinks that may be an awesome assignment... ;) (Probably not the whole episode, though, lol.)

A woman's prerogative...

Okay, remember back when I was talking about my word for the year? Still quite happy with my choice (and a little behind in posting my weekly quotes here). But. I said my first quote was going to be "No great thing is created suddenly." I've changed my mind. I can do that...it's a woman's prerogative, right?;) 

So. My first quote of the week for 2011 is this:

Begin with the end in mind. -Stephen Covey

This was the primary quote I had in mind when I was looking for a word for 2011. I want to go beyond weekly lessons in our homeschooling journey and start focusing on what we want to get out of the entire journey. Don’t get me wrong. I feel very good about where we are right now and how we’ve been doing. We’re establishing a solid foundation and routine, and that’s valuable. But. Before we even started homeschooling, we made a mission statement outlining why we want to homeschool. I think it’s time to frame that and hang it somewhere so I won’t forget and just do the next lesson for the sake of doing the next lesson. 

And, since I'm a bit behind, here's my quote of the week for this week:

Life is not a path of coincidence, happenstance, and luck, but rather an unexplainable, meticulously charted course for one to touch the lives of others and make a difference in the world. -Barbara Dillinham

I watched a movie recently. It really struck a chord. It was called “Charlie St. Cloud” and was about a young man who lost his brother and needed help finding his way back to living a full life rather than dwelling on the past. Basically, the message that I took from the movie was that everything happens for a reason and it’s up to us to find that reason. It’s become somewhat of the backbone of my faith. Throughout the losses and trials of my life, this has helped me through…the need to find meaning and look to the positive…to make a difference through my own actions, be they small or large.

So. That's that. ;) I'll do better about posting my quote of the week each Monday from here out. Probably.

Add on...

Just a few more not so deep thoughts...

...I had an ah-ha moment last night. I realized that my attitude toward cooking actually follows suit to my attitude about much in my life. It's *not* actually that I dislike cooking. It's that I very much more enjoy and appreciate the PLANNING & ORGANIZING portion of things to the actual DOING of things. Somehow I feel better for having recognized this. ;)

...do you suppose it's normal for kindergartners, when asked for a word that starts with the letter "Q", to reply "quantum mechanics"? Yeah. Me neither. I really don't know where Micah gets this stuff. (During the portion of his Options day where he's with the kindergarten class instead of the first graders, his teacher has been going over the letters of the alphabet...showing the kids how to write each letter, asking them for their own ideas of words to add to their group list, etc. On occasion, like yesterday, his teacher will take me aside to note Micah's contribution of the day.) I'm told that Micah's word for "I" was "intimidation" and for "P" was "pomegranate." I kid you not.

...I have hereby resolved to trash all those Lego instruction sets. Tania, I'm almost tempted to take you up on your offer just to show you how crazy you are, lol, but I love you too much. ;) After more contemplation, I realized:

• that the boys never revisit those instructions anyhow (preferring to modify things to their own liking with whatever pieces they find);
• that I'm very unlikely to ever try to gather all the pieces for a particular set (finding them would be a nightmare in the yellow/Lego room...incidentally, the total number of new Lego pieces from Christmas ended up at 5809, meaning that we probably added 20,000 pieces easily between 2009's Christmas, our trip to Legoland, the boys' own purchases, their birthdays and this Christmas); and,
• that most of them are available online anyhow. (Thanks, awesome Lego site!) Whew. 

...Over the weekend I found myself sorting through all my scrapbook albums...finally putting a huge stack of layouts into albums, rearranging/replacing albums and attempting to label them all. As I've mentioned before and as has been evident by my posts, I've pretty much neglected my scrapbooking this past year. Looking through all those layouts has given me pause, though. I love looking through them...the boys love looking through them (and Micah was a bit distraught at not having more recent layouts in his own albums)...and I enjoyed making them. Why is it, then, that I'm so overwhelmed at how much work it will be to "catch up"...to start again? Don't get me wrong, I let go of the notion that I had to scrap every photo years ago. But. I have a system and a number of layouts/stories that I know I want to document. I'm a little worried, though, that getting back into all of this will take my focus from homeschooling, which is why I slowed down/stopped in the first place. I'm still thinking...

Not so deep thoughts...

...why do people say they're going to "sleep like a baby"? Have these people never had babies? It just dawned on me the other day when Nathan said this phrase on his way to bed. I stopped and thought about it. Um, folks, babies (most of them anyhow) don't sleep all that well...or at least not all that long or deep. At least not in my experience. Just sayin'.

...do you suppose I'm insane in that I keep all the boys' Lego instruction booklets? I'm pretty sure we have almost every one of 'em. The box runneth over, though. Will I have seven years of bad luck if I toss them?

...why the freak do stores start displaying all the Valentine's Day stuff immediately after Christmas? I know of no one who does anything about Valentine's Day sooner than a week in advance, at most. Who are these other people?

...does anyone else find it odd that the setting of Asher's broken arm in the ER was coded in as "surgery"? I asked the gal at the doctor's office about it last week and discovered that anything that deals with stuff under the skin is deemed "surgery"...even injections, she said. Since they had to manipulate the bones (which are obviously and thankfully under his skin), it goes under "surgery." I'm not sure if this is just this particular office or what, but found it odd. Still. Compared to some of the stories I've read on the web about the cost of a broken arm, we'll take it. Very, very thankful that we didn't require actual surgery or pins or anything. 

...am I alone in finding it weirdly appropriate and fitting that the Seahawks were the first ever team to win a division title with a losing record? I'm sure my dad is cheering (and chuckling)...

...is it worth it to keep trying to prevent Asher from leaping off of and over things? Yeah. I didn't think so. Sigh. :)