Yet another...why we homeschool

We started home schooling a little over a year ago. It was not in the master plan at all, but it ended up being the right decision for us at the time. The year was good so we have decided to go for it again this year.

There was really one reasons that we chose this route over public or private school - his reading level was slightly above anything that the classrooms were ready to deal with and we didn't want him to learn to be complacent in his learning.

After making this decision, there have been more and more reasons as to why this continues to be a good decision for us right now. I was forwarded this article that I found interesting. http://www.newsweek.com/id/157898/page/1 "The parents of nearly one of every five boys in the United States were concerned enough about what they saw as their sons' emotional or behavioral problems that they consulted a doctor or a health-care professional."

Since we have not been in the school system, I cannot comment on how we would deal with the situation. I do think that I agree with the author that the kids need time to play. We get together with other families frequently and our boys still love to play together. It's really wonderful to see 7 boys out running around in a yard with some made-up game that they are playing!

On a day to day basis, we definitely have more play time at our house than school time. I honestly cannot imagine that we could do the number of things that we do if school was an all day thing. I applaud our neighbors that do send their children to school for limiting the number of activities that their children can be involved in so they can have more unstructured and family time.

A Lovely 15 years

Not marriage yet, but years with my current employer! It was a month ago that I passed this milestone and at Cerner the longevity is reason for celebration. About the time of my anniversary I received an e-mail that asked if I wanted a surprise or if I wanted the details. Being that I like surprises, I passed along my husband's contact information.

He set Friday night at "the night" for the big event. I knew a little, but was excited about what the evening was to hold. My little guy runs in the house as I was getting ready and said your "Stop" was here. I still don't know what he meant, but this was waiting for me...

As I finished getting ready, the neighborhood kids were taken for a spin but then it was our turn. Next we to a friend's place. Before heading one we went into their house where I was presented with gifts from Cerner that my husband chose. My first gift was a new suitcase. I was in need a of a new one of those because the ball bearings on my current one are shot and the wheels are really loud!


My next gift was a major splurge! An Automatic Composter! Yes, we are gadget people and this is a green gadget!


We then went to Sybil's for dinner and had a lovely evening - a nice bottle of wine, spinach artichoke dip, gnocchi and peanut butter pie. There was enough time left on the limo that he even took the babysitter home in style.

I am very appreciative of my 15 years at Cerner. It's been a great career and afforded me experiences that I could not have imagined. It was a very nice evening to celebrate my anniversary!

Mmmm Apples

We were invited on Friday to pick apples with our dairy farmer!

I said that I wanted a lot of them and I came home with a bunch after picking for a little more than an hour.

Last night we washed about half of them. We quartered apples until we had filled our largest four pots that we own (large pressure cooker, small pressure cooker, spaghetti cooker/stock pot, and a regular dutch oven). After cooking them down, we ended up with about 3 gallons of applesauce. It's in the frig this morning waiting to be canned for enjoyment for the next year.

Our three gallons of applesauce is about 1/3 of the apples that we picked!

This morning will be canning the apple sauce and making fillings for apple pies. It will be an apply fall for us!

Happy Birthday little guy

So, now that you are 5 years old, what do you want to be when you grow up?

"A fireman, or maybe a police man. I may want to be a computer guy like Mr. McClanahan used to be [notice not like mom or dad!]. Though most of all I want to be a dad!"

You are a great guy and we love you very much!

Your older brother piped in that maybe he would like to be a recycle guy if it wasn't too stinky!

How often does your smoke detector go off?

After a funny event this week, too many times would be the answer in my house.

My husbands alarm went off on his phone. It's not a sound that we are familiar with hearing and my husband didn't happen to be around his phone at the time. The boys and I start looking around.

I was trying to figure out what the sound was and I turn around and see my darling younger son looking around for something. It's an alarm sound but not terribly loud. I watch him procure a pot holder and begin waving it under the kitchen smoke detector. It was very cute to see this little four year old waving a pot holder not anywhere close enough to the smoke detector to make a difference...and to boot it wasn't the smoke detector that was making the noise!

Obviously from seeing his reaction to the noise by attempting to clear out the smoke detector, he's seen the drill enough times that it was his first reaction!

My brain is overwhelmed

It is so beautiful! I don't have enough words to explain. Yesterday I took to the rails and road from Anchorage to Seward. The railway meanders slowly through the mountains and by glaciers to be able to drink in the view!

On the way, I decided to take a boat trip in Seward to view wild life and calving glaciers. I met another female traveling along and we had good conversation and were able to enjoy the trip together!

The train ride back was just as beautiful. The skies had cleared and we were able to see some moose closer!

I know that I could not capture the beauty that God gave to us...but here are a few pics!

On the way to Seward it was very cloudy and the tops of the mountains were not always visible.

We saw seals in a couple of different places. I did see four humpback whales including one beautiful tail in the air. I enjoyed the moment for what it was instead of attempting to take pictures.

Alaska Arrival

I need to go to bed, but thought I would add a blurb beforen the sun goes down, whenever that may be...

This afternoon I arrived safely in Anchorage, Alaska, making this the 46th state that I have visited in my lifetime. The trip was smooth sailing, but it was very apparent to me that the life of a road warrior is not where I need to be right now. I reminised about my days on the road and all of the great places that I have been blessed to go and experience. My realization though that this is the phase of my life where I am very fortunate and happy to focus much more on my family than a career.

Alaska has been very nice so far. I had a great dinner of seared fresh Ahi tuna at a place called Ginger. I walked along a wonderful trail in 60 degree temps (close to 100 at home today). Tomorrow I'm off on a train ride to Seward and everyone tells me that it's beautiful.