Is It Naptime Yet

In my homeschooling quest I’ve joined two online groups that have regular meet ups. One group, Life Learners, got back to me right away and have regular meet ups at parks every Wednesday. They take more of the learn what you want how you want and just live life. The other group I’ve joined is a little more of the traditional homeschooling, with parents using curriculum to teach their children.

The second group, or the Las Vegas homeschool meetup group, just got back to me about signing up this week. It turns out they were having a local weatherperson do a small assembly this week.  A station in town does these assemblies regularly around the valley’s school’s. I thought it would be fun for the girls since Lilah has a fascination with television and I would be able to meet some of the other parents and families in the group.

Wrong. It turns out it was a number of homeschooling groups, which lead to no good way to find out who was in the group I had joined. The girls still had fun and there’s a chance they’ll be on the news Saturday or Sunday morning, though they were kinda behind some bigger boys for the short tapping.

So I’m not sure if this was useful or useless, though I think it was a little of both.

The next two errands I ran came about this morning. Before we left I received two separate phone calls telling me my contacts had come in and my glasses were ready to be picked up also. I thought score, I get to run all the necessary Henderson errands in one day.

I went to my doctor’s office first. I picked up the contacts and the prescription and got the girls right back into the car. I headed towards Costco and at the first light I had the thought that I should check the prescription. It turned out to be -4.75, but I need -5.00. The doctor had tried the lesser strength but after wearing -5.00 for a year or two, my eyes were not handling it when I drove and that’s when I need my contacts the most. So, I turned around to correct the mistake. The doctor wasn’t there so I just left and had the receptionist call me since I knew I was correct. So they’re ordering more contacts which will be ready to be picked up next week sometime.

Useful or useless? I think useless.

I then headed to Carolyn’s work. I saw her car wasn’t there but decided to go in anyways. She was gone. So that was definitely useless.

I then packed the girls into the car for the fourth time in twenty minutes and headed to Costco. I got there and a woman adjusted the glasses to fit my face. While she was cleaning them she noticed some streaks. The anti glare had been put on improperly. Ugh. So those too will be ordered again.
Also useless.

I am happy that the doctors office and Costco happened on a day I was already heading out to Henderson and I hadn’t gone out there specifically to pick up the contacts or glasses.

The day started so well. Now I’m just blogging to keep awake and avoid doing dishes.

Monday was the first day of dance for the girls. When I was trying to get them going, because they were slow, hearing it was for dance perked them right up and they got ready quickly, at least for two easily distracted girls.

We got there and Eden immediately started acting shy. She was hiding behind me and not wanting to look Sam in the eye. I got her inside and we put her ballet slippers on and she was not wanting to be outgoing. She sat on her piece of blue tape and slumped her shoulders over and would not make eye contact with Sam. She basically stood or sat there the whole time.

At one point she did follow the leader. (I have a video of her participating.)

At another point she stood there while Sam held her arms and tried to dance with her.

It broke this mama’s heart to watch her daughter be so shy and non participative. I almost cried, but Eden wants to go back, so I guess it wasn’t all that bad for her.

Lilah’s class was after Eden’s and I spent a lot of the time in the hall with Eden, Britta, and my friend Emilie, who’s has a daughter Eden’s age and one 6 months younger than Lilah.
Lilah asked for me to be in her class longer so next week another mom, also named Emilie, will be taking Britta to the park during the class so I can sit with Eden and we can watch Lilah more.

I know Lilah really enjoyed herself. I hope Eden enjoys herself more as time goes on.

(I was trying to let Sam be the teacher and let her deal with Eden’s shyness rather then being intrusive. I also want Eden to gain some independence, and since their were no tears and she wasn’t trying to come to me, I figured I’d let her shyness run the course. )

Also Lilah and I were in the hallway during Eden’s class, in reality a foyer outside the class, a work out room, and a door to the gymnasium. Lilah was having fun running circles, taking up maybe a third of the foyer and not making much noise, while Britta ate her snack and we waited for Eden’s class. A woman came out of the gym and gave Lilah a ‘you need to stop that’ condescending look and Lilah immediately stopped running and came to my side.

I knew she was an employee of the rec center because of her badge, and later I found out she’s one of the managers/ supervisors of the rec center. I was really annoyed and if I was a confrontational person would have said something. I was just annoyed that someone would be so stern when a child was just having harmless fun and wasn’t bothering anyone, with the parent right there. It is a recreation center after all. Jon says if it happens again I should calmly respond that I’m watching her and allowing her get her energy out, or something a lot less confrontational than what comes to my mind.

As I think about it I get a little more upset. If she had said thank you once Lilah stopped running I may have forgiven the look . I wish she had approached me and asked me to have my daughter stop running for safety issues, that I could handle.  But to give ‘the look’ and and not even make eye contact with the parent, that really bothers me. I’m the only person who can give my daughter ‘the look’ and maybe family, but I have got to know you if you’re gonna use the look to have my child stop doing something.

After watching Eden be so shy and then to have Lilah’s feelings hurt by a complete stranger I almost cried again. I also didn’t know how I should respond and it just shocked me a little. Maybe it was getting up at 5:30 am, but I was an emotional person during dance class.

On a positive note here are some pictures I snapped and a short video. I mostly took it since Jon’s at work during their classes but Eden’s also really enjoyed watching it. I’m hoping it helps her be a little more herself at the next class.

Shy Eden.

Following the leader.

Hands “glued” to her hips.

Sam’s a good teacher. (Lilah’s the second from the front.)

I guess I’ll need to take more pictures of Lilah next time.

Here’s the video.

Wednesday we had Lilah’s class. Lilah knows so much that I sometimes have a hard time reading each day with her and having learning time.
Since Beth’s my mentor, and I can call her that since she called herself my mentor, we had a talk and my goal was to set a time to have “school time”. This is kinda against unschooling, but I’m not going for complete unschooling. The thought is if we have a routine we can guarantee some learning everyday or a time to stimulate learning. I have a box of special school things that I’m taking out at our “school time” and I let the girls do what they want.

Beth also gave me lots of cool things so the girls have loved it. One thing Lilah discovered was there are four ways to add six. Beth gave us a set of domino’s. Lilah was counting the dots and drawing pictures and she brought me some domino’s and asked how they could all have six dots when they where so different. So we had a lesson on adding six and the different ways you could add it. I thought it was fun.

So my school time is after lunch. We’re usually running around and doing things in the morning but home by lunch. So after lunch is our school time. It also goes with my reading a story or two before putting Eden down for her nap but I haven’t read to them in days. We go through cycles. All I do is read, read, read and then we go weeks with just reading once or twice. I should be better about that.

I figure we might be gone some days after lunch, but those are usually days we go to the park for the unschooling group, so that can count as “school time” too.

After lunch we went to the park for the unschooling group, or Life learners which I will now refer to them as. On the discussion board our coordinator, or Tara, was sick and a few others said they would still be there, but when I showed up at the park only one other person was there, and this was her first time. She has a daughter who is 6, so that makes me happy, and her daughter, Sarahphina which I’m guessing how to spell, played really well with Lilah and Eden. The mom was really easy to talk to and we had a good discussion which just got better when one other mom showed up. This mom has a teen aged son, he actually stayed home, and had just returned from living in Hollywood while her son was pursuing an acting career.
We left the park around 4 o’clock, and had a regular night.

Thursday was my busy doctor’s appointment day. Sam was kind enough to watch the girls all morning for me. She had them from 8:40 am till 12:45 pm so I could attend my dermatologist appointment and eye appointment.
I had a mole removed on my arm in July, and it too was precancerous, but does not need suturing. This makes 4 moles precancerous, one normal, for the five I’ve had removed. She removed another mole in my right shoulder, so if she doesn’t call sooner to say it needs suturing we’ll find out in six months if it too is precancerous.

My eyes are the same. They haven’t changed since before I had Eden. It seems amazing to me to keep the same prescription. For so much of my youth my eyes changed drastically each year. I was so relieved to learn that your eyes come to a plateau and stay the same. If we didn’t have so many other things to worry about I would so do laser eye surgery, but atlas we do.

I went to a new doctor and he seemed perplexed that I only wear my contacts part time and my glasses most of the time. I don’t think he understood that glasses are a necessity and contacts are a luxury in my life. He mentioned my children pulling on my glasses, but since they’re older they’re obviously past that stage, plus they learned fairly quickly not to pull on glasses since Jon and I both wore them. My doctor is all about contacts and being to the most “natural state”. I guess glasses don’t bother me, though I like the way I look with contacts.
I am getting new frames this year. My current frames are getting too old and breaking in different places, plus I’m looking forward to getting something a little more up to date.

Friday we stayed home. I sewed a blanket for a baby shower I went to today. I didn’t take any pictures though. (If you could Emilie it would be appreciated and just e-mail me one.)
Today we got a leotard for Eden and Lilah and Jon’s date was to the dollar store to choose gifts for Eden and me. Last week Lilah was obsessed with giving me a gift but she had to wait till her date with Daddy.

I had a baby shower this afternoon and then tonight I took the girls to a carnival that was at Anna’s church. They had a small ferris wheel, which the girls loved, a “train”, and a couple jumper things. One was a regular bouncy thing for kinds to jump in and the other was an obstacle course type thing.
Lilah loved it and Eden had fun watching her, since she was just a little to little for the obstacle course. It was a fun night.

Now it’s time for bed, and if you read all of this you must have nothing else to do.

When we had our family pictures taken a couple weeks ago we ventured out into the mall while they were uploading or getting edited or whatever they do for 20 minutes.

Lilah saw the fountain downstairs and wanted to see it up close, but we didn’t have time. So when it was time to pick up our pictures on Friday I got to the mall early enough to show them the fountain.

First we went shopping for me.  I was in need for new yoga pants so I found a pair I was happy with and a shirt for only $3.97.

Then we walked around and saw the fountains. The girls were impressed but liked the elevator more so we rode the elevator upstairs to the food court where we enjoyed a Cinnabon and raspberry lemonade.

After getting food we had a little more time to kill so I went through the clearance rack looking for shirts for Jon. I found two for just $6.47 each and one for $14.95. I figured they evened out to a nice $10 each with tax.

Then we picked up pictures and rode the escalator back downstairs. It was a sight I’m sure since I was holding the envelope the pictures came in with my mouth so I could give a hand to each girl and had my head watching the stairs to make sure neither of them tripped.
We don’t have much practice with moving stairs.

Sometimes the girls surprise me with their actions. They were very caring towards each other this day. As they waited for me to lock the car and get our bags they held hands by the rear of our car, both being careful not to venture into danger. Then they held hands and hugged each other periodically while we were shopping. There were times that Eden ran off but overall they were really well behaved.

The girls really enjoyed the mall and I was just happy to find some great deals.

I feel the need to talk a little about Lilah and some of the things she’s been up too, besides home school.

Lately, as in the last two or three weeks, though for four of those days we were gone,  Lilah’s taken to making her bed. Every morning she arranges the sheet to lay over her pillow as neat as a five year old can. For a time she would also place her blanket folded on her bed with her stuffed animal she had slept with. She was sleeping with Jon’s mouse for a while and then two weeks ago she started sleeping with Teddy, her bear. (We have such original names, Eden’s toy dog is Puppy.) I’m not sure where she got the idea to make her bed every morning because, well, we don’t. I’ve just never been much of a bed maker in my life and since it doesn’t bother Jon it doesn’t bother me, unless company comes over and then I pull up the sheet so it looks a little nicer.

I think her bed making is adorable.

Lilah is also obsessed with taking pictures. If I’m taking a picture she wants to take a picture. It’s fun and annoying at the same time. Eden also likes to take pictures now, which just makes it a little more difficult.

Here’s a picture Lilah took of Eden and me on the couch.

Here’s a picture Lilah took of Teddy on the floor. I just resized this one because I love the shadow in the corner because her finger was over the flash and her skirt and toes in the bottom of the frame.

Lastly Lilah has taken to making sure I have something to bring me comfort. A few nights ago Eden offered me Puppy to sleep with but in the end decided she wanted him for herself. Lilah then decided that I should have something to comfort me and gave me her ladybug blanket, which is her favorite of the two she has. She’s done this for a few nights now, except maybe one. Also yesterday on our drive to church she gave me her blanket, while she had Teddy for the drive. She’s also drawn me a picture of Teddy to bring me comfort.

The picture of Teddy. (I think he must have gotten a hold of some Just for Men hair dye and been in a very cold place since his extremities are blue.)

She’s a sweety pie sometimes.

The girls point out different vehicles while we’re driving. School buses are the favorite, city buses are common, delivery man trucks are also fun for them.

Today while entering the freeway I saw a school bus.

Me: “Look girls, to our right, there’s a school bus. Hurry we’re passing it.”
Lilah: “That’s the left.”
Me: “Oh, yeah. That is the left. It’s a good thing you know your directions.”

This is a classic Lacey mistake. For the life of me I cannot get my directions right. I get them correct about 65% of the time,  and the rest I just confuse and anger myself or the people I’m giving directions to.

Countless times I’ve told Jon “Go right” and I’m pointing to the left. I keep telling him that my hands are always correct. Then there are the times I’m not using my hands and I tell him the wrong direction and have to correct myself.  Lastly, there are the times I am telling him the correct direction and he asks me if I’m sure. “Of course I’m sure. I know my left  hand from my right.”  Sometimes.

I’m just glad Lilah has inherited Jon sense of direction, or at least knowledge of the right from the left. I actually have a better sense of direction when we’re driving. It just gets lost in translation.

I have too many pictures to look through so that’s gonna wait, but so I can remember parts of the trip I’m doing the journal post now.

Saturday was the day of the actual reunion. We got to my Aunt Pat and Uncle Don’s house fairly early, or around noon. My father has one whole brother and three half sisters and one half brother. I met a lot of my cousins, many of whom I never knew existed. Most of them are a little older than I, by at least eight years. Some have children just seven years younger than me. Most of them grew up in Idaho, Oregon, or Washington. Places we never visited since they’re so far, and for other reasons such as by the third day of traveling my father would be completely annoyed with all of us kids, there are six of us. I’m sure the thought of being in a car for that long was probably too much. I am slightly grateful because trips to Utah were hard enough on me. I had to sit up front between my parents in our station wagon, since I was the youngest and smallest, until I was around twelve.

Sharma, my cousin Don Jr.’s wife, kept the kids occupied with different crafts. They decorated a folder to put the crafts in, made bookmarks, necklaces, etc. After we ate she gave the kids bubbles and side walk chalk to occupy them. Then even later in the day she organized the egg run races for the kids and adults.
I lost.
Lilah participated in two races. One with all the kids and one with the six and younger children, since the older kids were winning a lot. For the first race they had to run the whole length of the yard. For the second race they only had to run half the length of the yard. She ran the whole length and one of the cousin’s child suggested she get an award for the extra effort, so she got a pen that had both blue and red ink to it.

Eden was doing her own thing for most of the day. She also hung out with Amarah, my Uncle Mike’s granddaughter who is just two weeks older than her. I have pictures of them trading bubbles. They were really cute. She did the second egg run and  lost like her mother.

Each family was in charge of a skit,  song, or some activity. My Uncle Don had a quiz which you matched the fact with a person from his family. We had the girls, and I helped, perform the Wheels on the Bus. (I was going to do Oh Hey Oh Hi Hello, but we needed the CD and the wheels song had actions and more people could join in so I thought it would take the pressure off. ) The girls did really well. I wish I would have had someone record it, but I forgot.
My aunt Mary’s family dance to the Village People’s YMCA. Aunt Marcia’s family did a little skit where a cousin was placing their family members pretending to be trees, birds, the sun etc, and called it the gathering of the nuts. My Aunt Cheryl and her daughter sang to a Judd’s song and Uncle Mike did karate, while two of his grandchildren were to shy to demonstrate with him.

We had Christmas in August so everyone brought an age and gender appropriate gift. My Uncle Don was in charge of that and wasn’t taking any initiative on what or how to trade gifts, so I took the initiative and got them organized for the different ages and genders. He says he’s a good supervisor, but I think he needs to work on how to motivate his workers.

I liked meeting all these new family members and the girls had fun, despite some clinginess they had towards me. I’m sure all the people didn’t help. We had around 26 adults and about 25 children under the age of 18. It was busy.

I felt a little like the odd one out. My cousins that are my age didn’t come up, and everyone else was older than me or younger by at least seven years.

Sunday morning we ate breakfast at my Uncle Don’s house and then headed over to the cemetery where my grandma is buried. It was wet from a morning rain and the mosquitoes were out so after a few pictures  my mom and I packed us and the girls back into the car. I had to keep swatting mosquitoes off of Eden’s legs and Lilah had one land on her finger. I got two out of my three bites that morning and luckily the girls were never bit enough to get a bug bite.

We traveled back to Ely on Sunday. We followed my Uncle Mike to Twin Falls, ID and ate Taco Bell with him, my Aunt Robin, and their three grand kids. My Aunt Robin had a new puppy, some very small breed so it was only 4-6 lbs. Lilah adored the dog and since they shared a balcony with us at the hotel so we snuck over there and held the puppy at night. Eden warmed up to the puppy, but since it still liked to nip and chew on people she was weary of her.

My dad hurt his ankle as we were leaving the hotel Sunday morning so we stayed at Andrea’s house while my parents got a ground floor room at the motel in Ely, our original room was upstairs and the only room that had three beds to it.  Eden was not happy and wanted to  go to the hotel. She eventually got over it and was fine sharing a room with Zarina and Lilah.

I stayed up talking with Andrea and Brien till nearly midnight and then slept on their couch. We all got up a little after 8 am, or when Zarina started making noises, and my parents showed up shortly after that.

After getting fed and ready to go we stopped and fed the ducks, geese and swan at a fountain area in Ely. The girls love feeding the ducks.

We took the long way home through Caliente, opposed to going through Lund. We stopped and ate lunch and then let the girls watch another movie for the drive home.

We got in around 4:30 and Eden fell asleep right as we got to town. The little stinker did not want to take a nap. I had her wait 20 minutes before she could draw after the movie was done and since she stayed awake I gave her the items to draw with and then magazines to look at. She was being stubborn, but maybe it was because she missed daddy.

Lilah told Jon lots of things that happened and then once Eden was awake she also told Daddy what we did on the trip.

I think I’m good for any long car rides for a while.

For the unschooling group last week, as in on Wednesday the 20th, there was a party to celebrate not going back to school. Everyone brought something for a potluck and there were bubbles for the kids. I brought some bubbles we had from home, but the big hit with Eden and Lilah was the home made bubble solution. Someone had brought fly swatters, which Lilah loved, and cookie cutters for blowing bubbles. The girls had tons of fun and Eden got covered in bubble solution. Luckily they weren’t scared of the water features at this park and I was able to rinse them off before getting in the car.

I forgot my camera, but one of the other moms, Tara, took the following pictures.

Additional thoughts: I knew there were water features at this park, but for the last two parks they had not gone into the water. The previous parks had water that would come from the ground and would squirt in different patterns and since the girls saw no predictability they did not want to play in them.  This water came from stationary statues of seals and once it was on they knew exactly where it would be, no surprises.

I didn’t go to this park prepared for water play since they had not played in the last two, but I did go with the mind set that if they got wet, oh well, I guess I’ll just be taking home wet girls. Lilah played in the water and was soaked, Eden played a little but mostly got soaked by the bubble solution. I rinsed them off, took them home and gave them a bath once in the door. I think going there with the mindset of “it’s okay if they get wet” helped me avoid any anger towards the girls getting wet. (I am a bit of a control freak about that sort of thing at times.) Also being around such laid back woman helped me to not be upset at Eden getting so soaked by the bubble solution. Of course it helped that there was water there to rinse her off with and that she wasn’t freaking out while I cleaned her off. I think I get a little tightly wound and this particular group of woman are not, so I’m able to relax and let the girls be kids. I think they have a calming influence over me as a mother.

Also, I’m getting a little more comfortable with some of the woman in the group. They all seem very nice, but it’s easier to talk a select few for me. I’m trying to open up a little more and find out what I have in common with them. The kids around 7-12 are more in their  own world and associate well with one another. There are kids around Lilah and Eden’s age so that makes me happy that as they get older hopefully they’ll have new peers to associate with because right now they mostly ignore kids their age since they have each other to play with.  I was really impressed with the teenagers in the group because the seem really nice and were very aware of the littler ones, i.e. they blew bubbles with my girls and tried to include Eden in a game of hide and seek.

With being away from my house so often I feel like I’m back in my college days. It’s always a mess and even if I “catch up” in one room, there’s always another mess waiting. I think it’s starting to take a small toll on me and my desire to clean. As in I only do the bare necessity. Dishes when we need something to eat off of, laundry when we need something to wear. Life is busy and when I’m home I’m lazy.

Monday was the dentist.
Tuesday I was home and I did cleaning in my kitchen and other areas.
Wednesday I had the reading/writing class I’m doing with Lilah with my friend Beth. I think I’ll have to write more about it later because I’ve only vaguely talked about it in my blog.
After the class I came home, made cookies and went to a local park for the unschooling group.
The girls had tons of fun, a post to come later with pictures.

Thursday I hung out at home for the morning. Doing more of the bare minimum house work or maybe I was reading blogs to avoid housework. The days become so blurry. That afternoon I went to my sister Kristi’s house to watch her kids while she had some doctor appointments.

Friday we went to Nancy Skinner’s house, a woman in our ward, for some water fun. She and her husband had a huge inflatable water slide for their grandchildren and she invited some of the moms to bring our kids over and have fun. My girls didn’t do the slide, but once the trampoline was free from bigger kids they jumped on that. Nancy had a sprinkler underneath it to keep it wet and the girls had fun bouncing each other.
I was home for the rest of the day washing laundry and doing other random things.

Today we had family pictures. We went to the JC Penny portrait studio at the Galleria Mall and really liked the photographer. In the past we’ve gone to the Penny’s at the Boulevard Mall, right after Jon’s gotten off of work, but the last two years portraits just weren’t very good. (Our original photographer went out on her own and it was just too expensive for us.) As long as this photographer stays there or an equally qualified one does the portraits I think we’ll continue to use Penny’s. We’re spending a high amount for the CD so we’ll have the rights and will be able to print out whatever portraits we want, and you want, possibly for a small fee if you want more than one ’cause this CD cost us a lot, but there won’t be any regrets that we didn’t buy a copy of this or that pose. Jon’s also a sucker for originals and I am just hoping we can find a nice but cheap place to print out the photo’s.

Now I just need to go over my church lesson before Jon and Eden come home from their date. She wanted to go to the Library, but her nap went to long, so she asked to go to the Springs Preserve, but it was also a little late, so he took her to the temple, ’cause she’s been asking to go. I think it’s funny that he took her to the temple to walk the grounds for their date. I guess it shows his support for the girls decisions. ( I love you honey.)

Update: Now that’s it’s past midnight I’m finally getting around to posting this and I still have to finish going over my lesson. I’m just not feeling it this week so hopefully it goes well tomorrow, I mean today.

I guess it’s time for bed.