Winter arrived!

It started out as a beautiful snowy morning. The kids eagerly got outside.

However, in Cincinnati, at the freezing/not-freezing line, things can change quickly while you're outside playing. Snow changed to rain, but they played on. They came home from playing with friends very wet! (There's a pic of E actually crying as she walked up the driveway, but I didn't choose it (for her sake).)


Can you see how wet their shirts are? They were wet to their underwear!

Some hot chocolate really turned things around!

Calvin is funny...

As part of a science project, we brought some dirt in from the backyard. Calvin's job was to put it back out there, but he was crabby about having to go to the basement to get shoes to wear into the very wet backyard. After laying on the floor resisting his job for a while, he popped up with an alternative that didn't require going downstairs.

Those are newspaper bags on his feet. More than anyone in the family, he finds the funny in surprising places.

This is for you (you know who!)

Some people complain that the last entry was too depressing. They want puppy dogs and smiles if they are going to keep coming to our blog. Here you go! We don't want to lose the friendship to honesty!

"How is the homeschooling going?"

Everyone asks how the homeschooling is going and some people have encouraged us to keep blogging now that we're home. It's hard to blog now for lots of reasons. In explaining them, you will learn how homeschooling is going. First, homeschooling is a routine now so it doesn't seem like there's much to say. In the mornings the kids have their routine work. They have their various activities as well--gym, swimming, parks programs, etc. I'm with them in the mornings three days, late afternoon two days; Matt has the rest of the daytimes. Second, lately there's been a high level of family stress. While on the trip we could write about the occasional meltdown and tension with less seriousness. Every situation was temporary, which made it easier to laugh at. Now I don't want to write about the troubles for all the world to see. I will say, however, that things have been better lately, and I hope that we're on the right track now. Third, I feel like I can't find enough time to work, be a homeschooling parent, and have time to do my own things, so blogging doesn't fit into my routine well anymore.

All of that said, I am really happy with what we're doing. We live at our own pace most of the time. The kids get dressed when they want to most days. They do their work and play and chat on their own schedule. (Things do have deadlines, but they get them done in time.) We all stay up later and sleep later and have lots of time to cuddle in the morning (even with Rosie in the bed now!). They don't mind their school work and they are proud of what they do. Eleanor says that she "loves algebra!" Calvin's love of popular culture is being more fully realized (am I happy about that?) as he simultaneously reads Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, A Series of Unfortunate Events, and comic books. Eleanor is reading more than ever in her life, mostly about being a girl her age (which is now the beginning of adolescence?!). Both kids are playing the piano happily and beautifully. Eleanor practices for 45 minute or more with no prompting. The kids bake and make soup with me, and I really love that.

So, to answer the question that I think most of you are really wondering, my dream of homeschooling has been harder than I expected since we got home. But still, I have no regrets and no ideas of changing course. I love homeschooling my kids as much as I thought I would.

P.S. And now I feel like I spent too much of "my" time making this entry and not working!