We are now, um, 3 weeks into this homeschooling gig. I have had moments of loving it, moments of thinking I'm crazy and The Kid will grow up to hate me, and moments of thinking I really want to do this for the rest of The Kid's academic career. Last week we had a lot going on with my sister-in-law in the hospital, The Baby having to go to two pediatrician visits, and The Husband working 2 nights and therefore being home in the mornings. I also didn't plan that well, so of course things didn't go right. You live and you learn, though, so I'm keeping my head up.

I've been devouring books on homeschooling and today I took a little quiz-type thing that informed me that I feel somewhere in between "unschooling" and "eclecting homeschooling". The eclectic part didn't surprise me. The unschooling part kind of did. I definitely think we both need more structure than unschooling provides on a day-to-day basis, but I think the overall philosophy is what appeals to me. With that in mind, I've worked up a sort of to-do list for The Kid. There are 6 small things, ranging from a half hour of reading to feeding the cat, that he must do every day. These are all things he can do on his own with little to no prompting from me. All told those things should take 3 hours on a hard day. The rest of the time we are going to have projects ongoing, mostly chosen by him, with some guidance from me.

Thrown in there, somewhere, are some long-term projects that affect everyone in the house. The biggest of these is gardening. I'm planning a vegetable garden for our front yard while The Husband tackles the job of building a deck in the backyard. The garden is really part of a much larger goal of becoming more self-sufficient as a family and having a lighter impact but stronger connection to our environment. Lofty goals, but if we take it slow I think we'll get there.

Meanwhile, grad school is in full-swing, I'm finally learning how to sew, and the house is ever so slowly getting organized.

last year, my new year's resolution was to read 50 books in 2008. i read 46. while i didn't meet my goal, i was feel very successful. i have loved reading as long as i can remember. when i read a good book, i disappear inside of the story. in recent years i had gotten away from that. i still had stretches of intense reading, but i had longer stretches of no reading. so, those 46 books led me back to my first true love. i even made amends with the public library, which i had neglected horribly.

right now, i am trying to fully participate in every area of my life, and i'm having a hard time finding balance. this tells me that there are too many areas. the areas i have chosen to make top priority are: my family, my home, my education. i'm just basically getting by at work. luckily, i can treat it as a past time and do okay. that's another post.

i am fully nesting, which seems slightly ridiculous being only 5 months along, but there it is. every sunday, when i don't have work or school obligations, i turn into a type a interior decorator, but a pregnant one. meaning, i have a lot of things i want to get done! done! done! and i can't do any of the heavy lifting. lucky partner, i have, huh?

okay, a hungry adolescent boy is begging for food. must go.