Shrug

Wow, where has the time gone.

Today on the fiber side of things, I finished picking through Dexter’s fleece. I really can’t wait to start spinning it. The first time I saw it, my reaction was….what did I just get myself into. Recently, I realized that I should be picky with which fiber I choose to keep, and which not to. It all comes down to effort. Considering that I do not think that Dexter’s fleece was skirted, I think I came away with the good fiber and will be donating the unusable fiber to the garbage heap. But there was a lot of good stuff

On the knitting front, I am just about done with my sisters socks. Granted, I started them sometime in January, but all I have to do now is stitch up the toe. I hope she likes her Christmas present! As soon as I have some of my fiber spun up I will be working on some nice warm mittens. Granted, the weather has to cool off first.

I had a rather disappointing week this week. I had decided to homeschool 2 of my kids. That was until the husband decided he was not sure my heart was in it. I find that very frustrating, since I just spent 2 months learning just about everything there is to know about homeschooling. We even homeschooled for 3 weeks, and the only complaint was that the kids wanted less worksheets…..but workbooks were ok. So now, Xander and Rachel will be attending public school again this year. I am ok with this really However, my concern is with Brianna.

I am not totally sure that the public school is really the best learning environment for my child. Brianna is a bright, creative, loving, naive 4th grader. However, she believes that the only way to learn is for someone to teach her, and she still has problems with reading and writing.

To be perfectly honest, I am not sure that I can do better than the public schools. The advantage of homeschooling is that I do not have to convince the teachers that they should talk to me. I will be able to see what my child is capable of and help her find ways to improve in areas she struggles with. The disadvantage is that Brianna wants nothing to do with homeschooling. No matter how I explain that this is not just sitting at the home working on schoolwork, she is indoctrinated in the public schools, and won’t listen to alternatives.

So, I am trying to contact Brianna’s teacher for this year, and see if she is the kind of teacher who will take the time to help Brianna. If she is not, then I will just have to keep her home and hope for the best. If she is, we will still be trying to find a tutor for her, and we will just have to keep a close eye on things. Needless to say, this is going to be an interesting year.

It is no secret that I have been having way too much geocaching. I find it very relaxing to go out into the woods and hunt for little things. So when I saw an Earthcache near my house, I decided that it was something we had to do.

So I took the kids out to learn about rocks. They had to discover the 3 different types of rocks and how they were formed. There were examples of each type of rock for the kids to inspect and climb upon. I pointed out some of the distinguishing features an we learned about the glaciers bringing the rocks to Kensington. Afterwords, we took a hike around Wildwing lake, looking for any other boulders that my have been brought by the glaciers. We found one on the way up to the nature center, and the kids stated they thought that it was a metamorphic rock.  Here is a picture of them all on the rock:

While walking around Wildwing lake, we found a really interesting tree. The kids all wanted their picture taken in the tree, so here is one Xander took of the girls.

I really like doing these types of things with my kids. If homeschooling was always this easy, it would be a no brainer. However, I know better.