Year 5, Novemeber 6th-8th, 2020: Surviving the Week/End

 Well, the week is done but we have the weekend still to go. Today we visited a lovely facility not 20 minutes from our house, right off the highway with 200 acres of woods and buildings called Camp Belzer, a facility/camp run by the Boy Scouts of America. We were invited there as homeschool leaders to a special "preview" day to listen to a little talk and a long tour of the facility and all that it has to offer to the general public. Yes, it's a Boy Scouts of America camp. But, we found out, that this facility has always been open for the public to reserve buildings and be part of programming in the summer. They had a homeschool parent/DNR employee that led us on the nature hike part of the morning and it was obvious that they had done their job well of learning about what needs there are in the homeschool community and what kinds of programming they could offer. They are trying to rebrand themselves a bit and get the word out. Incredibly smart business move. Lovely people, too. You could tell that they cared for the property and for the community, and even said that they don't want to push anything Boy Scouts. What they offer of course is what Boy Scouts do, but can be with an educational twist, like STEM classes. They want to start offering 3 classes a month, $5-15 per student depending on materials. I found the property incredibly clean and well kept, not run down at all. And they are in the process of building a new pool, new maintenance building, and restoring an older building that has been used for maintenance to include an indoor BB gun shooting range, archery range, and rock climbing walls. What impressed me the most was their willingness to be flexible and make a customizable program if a group wanted that.

 

I know what it's like to have an incredible property and want it to be used well for the purposes of others. Our home is that. We set this house up specifically to be hospitable to others. Now, it doesn't have any open floor plan, it doesn't have a large living room, it doesn't have a large kitchen. But, we set up in mind for kids to play a bit separately from the adults and to have backyard equipment and toys and games for every age. And that's exactly what we did today when we got back from our time at Camp Belzar. We had our Friday afternoon park day friends over. Now, it was a gorgeous day, so we spent the whole time outside. But, when the weather cools off, we'll have to the ability to move inside. I think we can have about 5 other families come over at once, maybe. Today it was Molly's family and Autumn and her mom. Keturah stayed outside, too, the whole time. It was awesome! We ladies chatted as normal, too. It makes my heart so happy and full to share what "little" we have. "Little" in the eyes of the average suburban home around is. Ok, we have a lot of stuff, I'm mainly talking about the sq footage. I'm thinking ahead to if/when we shutdown again and if we could still maintain a Covid "bubble" with these homeschool families. And I simply like not having to gather up all my "what if" supplies, having access to my own bathroom, not driving anywhere, and then getting right back to the next thing on my list without having to "settle" back down after being out. It suits me well. 

The kids got on electronics as soon as everyone left, so we had a few minutes of quiet time before supper. I was able to get some Bible study done but no phone calls as it was already 5pm. So it was successful in that way. Justin got to shoot a BB gun, Abishai tried to do some "bass" fishing, and they had smores for lunch. And a long hike with some tall hills, and loads of leaves on the trail! The trail was "easy" compared to what Jared and I went on in Madison, but it was leaf covered. The crunching of the leaves was incredible music to my ears. We did a scavenger hunt, and Miss Liv taught the kids some things that Abishai even repeated at dinner! It was 65 degrees and I'm so glad we spent the majority of our day outside for once! No bookwork got done with the boys and I didn't get to check Keturah's work, but that will have to wait until Sunday or Monday. We have IAHE training on Saturday and Sunday is a normal full day. 

Normally I would say I would be peopled out, but one on one conversations aren't as wearisome as group settings. And tomorrow, I get to be with some of my most favorite peeps! Yes, those ultra conservative passionate loud intense homeschool leaders that lead the charge to the next thing we need to do for our fellow homeschoolers. Lots to talk about and I'm anxious to see what they are thinking and what are next steps are. Jared is coming along for the ride, and we'll have to have a little bit of discussion on the way there about how to not isolate oneself, lol. But he'll survive and my cup will be overflowing. And then next week is totally silent. We'll have to catch up on things then. 

Pretty hilarious!

The counterpart to yesterday's photo of Benaiah. THEY are so cute TOGETHER. Adorable!

I remember doing this in our co op on PEI. Spaghetti and mini marshmallow building projects! I helped him a lot, but I made it work!

He was very proud of his new mask, too. I wasn't impressed with mine because I thought it had the cross piece in it and it didn't.

Gorgeous facility!

Mommy, stay with me!

Abishai like the scavenger hunt!

There's some apartments over there. Never far enough from the city. But, still cool that this is IN the city limits!

Why did I have to come?! Because Mom knows Abishai is a handful. And I knew he would like the BB guns. He also learned how to make an acorn cap whistle!

Miss Liv couldn't wait to show us this "beautiful" "chicken" mushroom. It tastes like chicken when cooked people say. Ew!

Silly iPhone exposure correction. But he's a cute hiker! And he said, "This is a great spot to sit, Mom!"

The leaves were so thick on the trail! A couple of big hills, but otherwise, an "easy" walk.

Time to go fishing with polls, clothespins and pretend fish in the grass.

Justin said the BB guns were hard to aim straight. The director also agreed with him.

It was getting warm, but they did have a fire going for s'mores! That was nice of them! In fact, it's the ONLY thing Abishai had for lunch. When we got home, Justin showered, put pizza rolls in the toaster oven, and then ended up only eating 1 tiny pizza roll as his lunch with guests came. Whoops!

'

This kid did a decent job of not getting too messy. And he ate the whole thing! He was so hungry! He hate a HUGE dinner, too!

So adorable!

That was the extent of his mess. Not much!

We brought Friends Friday to our house today! Park day! Woot! Woot! It was good to see Keturah out there as well.

We had both a field trip to Camp Belzer and Friends Friday with two families over our house today. We are definitely socialized!

Gorgeous weather!

Daddy came home early to work on the treehouse! He's sad he can't work on it tomorrow because we have training day, but we'll get it done eventually. I'm not sure I like it's current position though. So, we'll see. I'll have him move it before the roof is put on.

Abishai remembered Miss Liv talking about the squirrels finding other squirrels' nut stashes and that helps them survive the winter. He was pretty diligent looking for things.

 

Our little fisherman who didn't catch anything. But at least he tried!

I don't think I have any photos to share from today! Jared and I were at IAHE training all day and the kiddos spent the day at Grandma's house, while Justin stayed home and did school work, mowed, and had screen time. It was a good training day. Some things were repetitive but necessary. I still learned a lot and I'm sure Jared picked up on more things. We were both done with the "loud and proud" voices of the day, but that's just a handful of people that spur us on and we can handle in bite sized moments.  There was a lot to talk about like cancelling convention for 2021 and the impact of other conventions and organizations and how the whole atmosphere has changed. They addressed Tech Trep or whatever it is again and other legislative issues. They shared what we should be working on and what to be aware of. We had a great brainstorming session about Homeschool Day at the Capital and I joined the committee since it's in my region.  Jared and I did talk to a few people and got to know them. So overall, it was a great day. Not as exciting to me as the one in January, but more comfortable and I was able to focus on other things. 

One of the cool things was that we were in the building that Jared had been to for their livestream for e2 a few weeks back. However, we were in the part of the building that was for this unique post graduate program called Apprentice University. It's almost like a career readiness program, with some specific tracks. Basically, they work in as an apprentice with a real paying job for a company for 5-6 months from Mon-Thurs and then on Fridays, they are in class having a discussion, doing projects, learning the basics of communication, and all kinds of things that look great on a resume. There's no tests except mastery learning and no grades. It's not a college credit based program. But it sounds like something Justin might be able to do and be interested in. And because you work full time, some of your funds can go to pay for the school so you come away with zero debt. Their tenants of operations are so agreeable to what my goals are for homeschooling. Mastery learning. Life long learning. On the job training. Zero debt. Hm,....and it's only 30 minutes from home, all highway, and easy to get to right off the highway. I think we might go to their preview day in December just to see more. They will take high school students just for the classwork part starting when they are 17 or something like that. They have social media and videography type stuff, business management, IT tech, etc. So, I sent off a couple of invites to SCS and Lisa Strunk for Ethan. So, we'll see. Benaiah wouldn't do it, but I might try to convince him to come with Ethan or something.

Other than that, I'm tired. There's not much to talk about that others would really understand. 

So, in lieu of photos, here's the website to Apprentice University

And there's their preview day event: AU Preview Day Dec 4th, 2020

And here's the Iahe of course. 

 

Sunday was normal. I had my same meltdown issues as normal. Feeling the "I'm not good enough" vibes. I wanted to take a mental health day and not think too much, so I tried to listen to "The Scarlett Letter" audio book again. Ugh, I just can't concentrate on it! I think I've understood about two scenes out of the whole thing. I can tell it's a really deep book, too, with a ton of deep thinking about how we treat sinners, especially how they treated sinners in the Puritan culture. Justin seems to understand it. But I'm giving up. It put me into a tail spin of "I can't teach literature" and fear that he, and the rest of them, won't grow up to appreciate this kind of literature because I can't get through it myself. I can teach math and science and some basics in history all day long, but literature, writing, and foreign language, while I can appreciate their importance, I just can't seem to master enough to help them. What if Keturah is made to be into this stuff? But I can't even get her hooked on it? It's hard when you have some very specific homeschooling bloggers and speakers as your heroes. Maybe God designed our kids to NOT be literature buffs and put them in our care because they are meant to be more math/science/ministry oriented. Sigh. At least I tried. I'll try again. I'll use a curriculum next year, that was my plan anyway. I have so much more to read and learn right now. My pile of books to read is huge. I need to call behavioral health tomorrow and take my ADD testing done. I need answers. I need to know if I can have medication and I need to try it to see if I can get over this blocked mind. I need to finish the DVDs about how your mind works. Then we can try heavier literature again. 

The thing is, Jared has the mental and intellectual capacity to think deep. He also has the physically capacity to work faster. But it doesn't. He doesn't do any of the homeschooling. And he just isn't efficient with household projects. Drives me nuts when I'm laying on the couch trying to gather my thoughts and forcing myself to physically rest so I CAN tackle the more physical projects this week or just have more energy for science experiments we need to catch up on or cleaning projects like prepping the outside for winter. It's just super frustrating when you are chronically ill and you see 4 other very capable people doing nothing. So I got super mad. And started tackling my pile for the week that I made this morning. I finalized our health insurance for the year. I wrote a bunch of posts and emails and things. I cleaned up my email a lot and need to do more. I didn't touch any other schoolwork today. I will start fresh tomorrow. Hopefully my mind will be more clear.

Here's to a new week of NO appointments and NO field trips.  Also, Alec Trebeck, host of Jeopardy for more than 30 years, died today at the age of 80 from pancreatic cancer. He fought a long hard battle and just filmed what will be his last episodes two weeks ago. The last one will air on Christmas Day and after watching a video, I learned that he shares a special Christmas message. He was a great guy and I can't wait to read his autobiography I bought someday.

Yes, it did get that warm today!

I couldn't find my blue notebook that I use for sermons, so I did a bit of highlighting in my online Bible as a reminder. Pretty basic sermon on gratitude and contentment. But of course, this verse was very appropriate for this past week and this past year and why I can't stand all the bickering and name calling.

If you aren't thankful, you are going to become fools and become bitter. I can relate to that and how it plays out in my own life.

I'll take more pics when it's finished, but I let the kids get up on the soon to be treehouse, aka Keturah's old bunk bed. They were actually fighting a ton about how got what pillows and blankets. I let them figure themselves out and Abishai came in crying. Dude, just because Daddy said it's your treehouse, doesn't mean it is. Everything like this is to be shared in our house.

Meanwhile, Keturah 11 yrs ago....when she let me put bows in her hair. I don't have many naked pictures of the kids because they really weren't naked that often. And I especially was careful with Keturah being a girl. But I do have a few.

He might always hold my hand, but just in case, I took this picture to remember that he held my hand on our walk to Grandma's house for Sunday lunch. Which, btw, was a great discussion about many things! Benaiah's work and school, the election, and several other smaller things.

Gotta crush the litter and then throw it away.

Gary and Leah's front tree.

All squished up.

Keturah was doing some kind of puzzle and Benaiah was talking to Grandpa who had attended the Fountain church because it was their first time in their new worship space.

Our walk home. Gorgeous day.

One little maple tree that I didn't pick out of the flower bed actually had it's leaves change color!

Wow! You could actually watch the game LIVE on the app because it was a home game! We lost, but that's cool!

Random, but yes, if I EVER get to the UK, I will be visiting Cornwall and Cardiff. Cardiff is where a lot of Doctor Who stuff was filmed.

I didn't know it was finalized. Well, it's not until the electoral college happens, but there ya go. Good job, George W. Bush, whom, for the record, I love as a person, and his wife Laura. GREAT people, even if his policies created problems which I don't have a clue about, but other people say he didn't do things well after 9/11.

My girlie is actually being active and playing 9 square! She was doing it this morning as well.

Justin spent the afternoon with the Schnecks at Eagle Creek park. A 4 mile hike!

So I just thoroughly read this email from the Access Pass blog and with our Access Pass (through the kids' Medicaid), we can get into all of these cool Christmas things for the normal entry fee to the museums they are at! So that's like $2 a person! Jingle Rails is normally like $15 a person! I'm so doing this, this year! We can easily do one a week. Most of them are best in the evening, so I'll have to get tickets early on, but so cool!

Emilee, Eliot, one of their friends, Jennae, and Justin.

 

The End