Year 6, August 23rd - 26th, 2021: Dog Days of Summer

 It finally, finally is those dreaded "Dog Days of Summer" where the temperatures soar and all you want to do is stay inside. And yet, we have a million and one things to do this week. I had a doctor's appointment this morning for myself, which was timely because I had a few things to talk about. I'm still not feeling great from last week's vertigo and being out in the heat on Saturday, so I had the PCP check my ears and throat. She said there was nothing of concern there. She did increase one of my medications and agreed that I could go ahead and increase my gabapentin and actually cymbalta and get rid of the other RSL drug. And then we'll be back at base and go from there. I'm good with that. I had already looked up the dosing on gabapentin so I knew she was hesitating on upping that dosage. We also talked about the therapy thing they do and we'll try that next month on my headaches. Now that I have things financially covered, I'm more at ease about going in and and such. I still feel quite queasy today so I'm not sure what's going on. I took half of a dramimine just to try to survive the day. I've eaten whatever I thought I could tolerate. Probably not the wisest of choices either. But I still feel like crap. 

I did manage to do that appointment, come home in time to do most of Abishai's schoolwork, and eat some lunch. And then he and I went to his eye doctor follow up. Dr. Rich said his depth perception is better, but he still needs some strength in his left eye, so we are going to put a patch over this right eye. Abishai understood right away because Peanut, aka Nate, wears one, too. So, I just spent $60 on big bandaids that are in the form of eye patches in cute boy colors and patterns that he gets to wear 2-4 hrs a day for 4 months yippee! I'm surprised we never had to patch Keturah's eyes. And my parents were never told to patch mine either. But then again, I don't think I ever went back to the eye doctor after my first visit. I had the same pair of glasses from age 9 until I got contacts at age 16 I think? Super embarrassing now that I think about it and not healthy either. But when you choose to spend money else where and you don't have health insurance, it's what you choose. He'll be fine. He helped choose the patches. He seems to understand. And then we came home and finished our schoolwork.

I had to sit all three down in the fireside room because everyone kept scattering. We had to finish up Friday's work, do CC together and go over individual work. Just stay put, would ya? Justin mowed the backyard while I was gone in the morning and Keturah did her trimming (after 5 tries it was finally done). Thankfully, the kids had gotten their work done and did it well. I was actually pretty impressed with their science and math. Justin did very well with the math with his chemistry so I'm not sure what he was worried about. And the next chapter is more theory and less math. He's going to be ok I think, or at least I hope, because I really, really don't want to find another curriculum. I trust this author to be thorough. And I don't know if Justin will go on to other classes. I want the foundation to be there if it can be. I don't want to go the easy route. And there is no way Justin could have done it if he hadn't have gone through Algebra 1 all the way first, so I'm glad there's been a bit of time, too. And Keturah is fine. I just worry that we won't find the time to add our history back in. I have to stop with these appointments and field trips at some point. I'm just trying not to panic. 

I almost panicked today. This sleep deprivation is literally killing me. It's got to stop. I can't deal with it anymore. And I'm so behind on everything because I can't go fast enough during the day. And now I'm worried about my stomach again. It's all tied together, too. So, sleep cannot elude me anymore. I almost forgot that I have a regional newsletter due in two days.  And I want to get these videos of Keturah up so I can share them with my sister. And all those little projects that take my time to figure out. And relationships. Ugh. Quick, somebody clone me! It's a good thing I've trained these kids well to hold the fort and keep working. Even Abishai did his homework while I worked with the others so he could get done faster. I do feel bad that we haven't been adding fun elements to his work, like flashcards or extra readers, or more read alouds, but I can only do so much. Thank goodness for solid curriculums like Abeka that get the job done. I should skip him ahead though. It is really boring at this point. I just might do that. Poor thing. No wonder he doesn't want to do his homework when its' boring. Candy is always a good motivator They all deserve Smarties for the day. Even Abishai caught his new football from Daddy tonight! It's a junior sized college one, so it's slightly bigger than the one we had. But the NFL ones are massive! I can't imagine how big those guys' hands are to grasp that thing! I told Abishai that he and Daddy can kick around the football as much as they want and he can play with friends, but I won't be signing him up for football because there is too much banging into each other, and not just the ball hitting their feet or head. He seemed ok that that. We'll see. They finished everything in the back yard.

Tomorrow is a new day. We have the whole morning at home and then we go in the afternoon and get our dow

I texted this tweet to my FB page, and then sent it over to Benaiah since he had applied to IUPUI. He says he won't be there in person because he's working full time. Speaking of which, the Pizer Covid-19 shot was fully approved by the FDA today. Say what?! With it's already long history off doing more harm than other vaccines that were pulled off the market way faster than all of these combine? Hm...questions we will have to wait to have answered down the road. If we could be certain that those cows were Joe's cows based on their tags.

That looks nasty!

Finally getting his school done at night because that's how our day went.

I told Jared no more spending on wants and then within 24 hrs I spent on vitamin supplements and on new slippers. Why? Well, this is why. And when your "work attire" includes slippers and they wear out in a year, I think they become a "need" and not a "want." And yes, this is the same exact brand, different color. Third pair I've bought. Less than $20 a pair. I've had purple, pink, and now blue.

Check out that difference in height after a year or was it 18 months?

Definitely needed new ones.

When you are talking to a new family wanting to move to Indiana and you are trying to convince them that Indy is better for them than Ft. Wayne and they say they need a Trader's Joe's, you look it up for them! They need a trucking job, too. But they are afraid of crime rates. Obviously they don't understand how spread out Indy is and what suburb vs. inner city is. How do you explain that to them? We are like the face of a clock,.....four sides of town that are like mini hubs all on their own,.....each has their own major shopping areas and many have more than one Meijer/Wal-mart/Kroger,.....And none of them have high crime rates. You have to live within the I-465 circle for that. I'm talking very generally here. Because even within the circle, it's only a few areas that are high crime. And downtown during the day is ok. 

So because Benaiah wanted to switch back to an iPhone, Gary went for an upgrade, too, and then Jared ended up with a free upgrade, and yup, he got the same iPhone 11 I did except it's black. Go figure. Less than a year after I did. We be matching, again!

Tuesday was less than ideal, again. I still had a stomachache. We all had dental cleaning appointments in the afternoon. I slept 5 1/2 hrs and had to get up out of bed but was still queasy so I took another half of a dramimine. That means, I was dozing off trying to get Abishai to do his homework. I don't know if what I was saying was actually spoken aloud or not. Which means everything got dragged out and eventually I had to give up and told him not screen time and I had to just simply get up and move on. I didn't have any more time to work on him so he lost screen time. And then when I had gathered everybody up, Justin said he had a migraine and Keturah said her stomach hurt, too. Well, I decided to call Jared then and asked him to take Abishai to his dental appointment. And I had Jared go ahead and get his teeth cleaned a day early. He was supposed to go in tomorrow and get it done. I would take someone in tomorrow but I have a friend coming over tomorrow, assuming we can handle it in the morning. Justin had mowed the front half of the lawn in the morning, so I think he got his migraine from that. He did come out and play his screen time but then went right back to bed afterwards. He did again for dinner and then went back to his room. While Jared and Abishai were gone, I took a nap and did wake up at the right time as to not make my headache worse, but better. So, we'll just have to be put on the waiting list and try to go in when there's an opening. Such a bummer, but I didn't trust myself to drive. 

In fact, I looked up to see if we had one more week to use the Freedom Springs water park pass, and we do, thank goodness because I don't think I'll be ready to go on Thursday. And with Jared helping today, and him running around doing stuff for phones yesterday, he's not going to want to take an afternoon off tomorrow. So, we'll shoot for next week. It won't be as hot, but that might be a good thing for us heatstroke prone people. I could also try to find a family of 3 to go with us, too. But I'm not sure who on this side of town during the day would want to. But I have a few more deadlines to meet before then. Once I took that off our calendar for this week, I felt a huge burden lifted. I can concentrate on friends coming over tomorrow and still have time Thursday to do some schoolwork together and catch up. And rest up, too, maybe another nap or whatever we need to do.I needed some peace and room in this week's schedule. Thankfully, I found it.

And also, Michael W. Smith released the first song from the new album, "Breathe," as a live stream song on Apple and spoftify and Amzaon music but I don't have those platforms so I still have to wait for the pre order to come to fully enjoy it. Phew! I can't wait! That was a highlight of my day. I needed to hear that. Same goosebumps, same tears, same gorgeous music. This album really did take some very old music and breathe new life into it for me. I'm excited to blast it one it's fully out. I saved the video link to a new private listening playlist beause I'm sure their will be a couple more early releases and someone will copyright the rest onto YouTube. Anyway, the TBN special is just a few weeks away. Yeah!

I'm starting to fade already. I was helping Abishai look for his fire fighter fire extinguisher. We can't find it anywhere. And, instead of just leaving it, I did end up cleaning out the bottom of the dress up box and resorting all the toys. That was a job and a half! It was on my forever to do list, but still, I hadn't intended on doing it tonight, but it felt right ,so I just did it. all things are rough, and now I have to figure out how to have for tomorrow night's food. Hm,.....

The Easter lilies I planted after Easter are still alive and growing! Woot! Woot!

Crappy day. Ok, not totally crappy. My friend did come to look through some books and talk for a bit, but I felt like a poor host because I had a hard time tracking with what she was saying and engaging in conversation, with wasn't like me in our previous conversations. And I just hoped she didn't notice too much. Her daughter seemed to have fun playing Lord of the Rings Monopoly with Justin and Keturah, so I guess Justin can bring it along on Friday to play again with her and the other kids. It was a bit stormy outside today, actually, and we got more rain in 50 minutes (1.25 inches) than we did in 40 DAYS (1.19inches) in Indianapolis according to the NWS out at the airport. Yeah, it's been super dry around here. I did let Abishai play on his video games so my friend and I could try to talk for a bit. I also just didn't feel great either, like I was shaky or hungry and I hadn't had that much caffeine yet, so I don't know. I was just feeling pretty out of it. Maybe because I was wide awake after 6 am and then Jared's alarm was blaring at 7 am and I should have just gotten up and still putzed around and wasted the morning until I finally showered at 10am. Ugh! 

I think I'll just get up when I'm awake and stop fighting it. Maybe I'll get other stuff done in the morning when I'm fresh. If that means I have to give up on Jared making me tea, so be it, because I can't wait two hrs for him to get up to do it like it was today. That would mean, I simply need to go to sleep at night. Not sure how I feel about that. Maybe I need to get up and write the blog. But then maybe I would forget what happened the day before? Hm,....I need to think on that as well. Or, instead of me feeling rushed in the afternoon, I do that stuff at 6am like my IAHE friend does and I rest in the afternoon instead. I don't know. We'll see. It's a work in progress. But sleeping 4-5hrs a night is not enough. I'm miserable.

I did get Jared to finally turn off the thing on my phone that "limits" my screen time and yet I can work around it anyway. I think it was interfering with the loudness of my phone alarm. So hopefully, mine is just as loud as Jared's now. Because his is blaring! And it's the same model phone, and I always turn mine way up, so why is mine so dainty sounding? I usually choose the loudest alarms, so who knows. Not that I need an alarm right now, but just in case.

Once I got my lunch and coffee in, I felt a little bit better. I didn't touch school again today. I just can't put sentences together when I'm this tired. I will try again tomorrow. And I totally feel guilty about that. I praise the kids on FB about it. But then inside I'm beating myself up because all I can do is check my email 100 times and I can't make myself put two and two together to check their math. I have no will power at all. All plans, and no get up and go. Well, barely plans at this point. So Abishai ended up with no schoolwork, extra screen time, and finally Chick Fil A for dinner. Way to go me, super mom. Once in a while those days are ok, but there's way too many of those days. Tomorrow won't be that way. We'll hit the books really hard tomorrow for sure. 

What happened was I thought I had to get the IAHE Newsletter out today and it didn't need to be finished until next Wednesday. The first Monday of the month isn't until September 6th, it's a late Monday. So I didn't think I had time to try to do school today, although our guests left in plenty of time. I didn't have time to fight it either. The middles got their schoolwork done in record time because we were having guests. See, when the motivation is there, the work gets done. Ok then. duly noted. I've got to pull myself together after next week and add in the rest of our studies. Then I'll be super worried about getting it all done. No more appointments. No more sidetracks. No more naps. We have to get this under control. Bwahahaha, yeah right, it still won't happen. But I'll give it a try anyway. We'll have the ASL class, too, to squeeze in. This is why I have to start sleeping no matter what. I have to stop watching TV at night if I have to. Period. End of discussion.

So, I worked on the newsletter and emails while kids did their screen time. And then, it was too late to make dinner. And Justin had to be at small group on the other side of the township by 6:30 at a restaurant. So, I grabbed the Chick Fil A gift cards off my desk, didn't tell the other kids where we were going, but told everyone to put their socks and shoes on and get in the van. We dropped off Justin and suprised the youngest two with CFA sitting INSIDE the restaurant for the first time in over 18 months! Yes, they finally opened up the dining room! I knew it had opened because my friend and her kids had been there and had shown us on FB. The dining room was empty for it being 6:45pm. And the playground was not open. So weird. And no Benaiah of course either. No more discount. Same chicken though. And a new half lemonade/half tea drink like we've been loving at home but they called it "sunny up." Ah, hits the spot with just a little bit of caffeine! And then we had to wait for Justin to be done, so Jared got Abishai into the Kroger on County Line and they found some Christmas gifts I guess and some Legos and puzzles. Ok then. Whatever. Keep spending money on things we don't need when I told you to stop spending money. (We had gift cards for Chick Fil A). 

But we got home and went our separate ways as usual. Time to chill out, calm down, and figure out what's next. I've had quite a few "You are wrong" moments thrown at me in the last few days, so without going into what those are, I had myself a good cry over those. And now I'm ready to move on and tackle the next best thing. Whatever is next on the to do list. Whatever I know I'm good at or I've set myself to do, that I know I can do well, that I've deemed important. I am confident, right? Yes, I am. And tomorrow is a new day. Next week is a new week. And whatever gets done, gets done. I have a plan, and as long as I get some sleep, I can work the plan. Now go away so I can get some sleep. That's what I need the world to do. Just let me try to sleep. And legs, you, too, stop moving. stop creeping and crawling and hurting. Medication, do your thing, keep them quiet. And someday, I'll feel more normal again. Someday.

Abishai was sad when I told him only Justin's friend was coming and not the other two younger friends that we played with last week. Sorry bud, I didn't make that clear either way. Bummers!

Abishai eye patches came! Yes I "splurged" and bought the colorful ones. I don't think the plain colored ones were much cheaper anyways. He wore it for 25 minutes with a lot of complaining. He was most unhappy when he couldn't see his Legos that well. That's the whole point. We are trying to make the weak eye stronger! He looks kind of cute though. My one eyed pirate!

Gotta love Facebook ads.

First time sitting in CFA in over 18 months!

Oh, Mom! Why! Stop it!

The usual! Except, it's not Cherry Coke, but "sunny up" which is their sweat tea mixed with their lemonade, yup, very good!

Yup, it's been that kind of dry summer.

On Thursday, we did do a full day of school including read alouds. And oh how timely they were talking about "Proof by lack of evidence" fallacy, which is the opposite of innocent until proven guilty idea and "post hoc ergo propter hoc" in statistics, basically A came before B therefore A caused B. Oh my goodness, that second one can be applied on both sides to any part of the Covid crisis discussion. And then we read, again, about the first Thanksgiving and how it really worked out those first few years in Plymouth, Jamestown and the early colonies and how socialism doesn't work because everyone will put in as little effort as they can and everyone will try to take as much as they can from the common store house. Doesn't that sound like today and government handouts and surplus jobs we have right now? No one wants to work, especially under these government mandates. We have plenty of jobs. Gobs of jobs. Even Starbucks can't stay open because of lack of staffing. Not lack of business. Lack of staffing. Because people are getting government handouts. Or they don't want to wear masks or get vaccinated. And on and on and on it goes. Hospitals are short staffed for the same reasons. Soon there will be a shortage of food on the shelves. And today I heard a rumor to buy Christmas gifts now. Yes. Crazy! 

Meanwhile, the Indianapolis Symphonic Orchestra has decided to "card" everyone. Aka, show them your vaccination card or that you've had a negative PCR test in order to go to their concerts before Nov. 1st. After Nov. 1st., you HAVE to be vaccinated. That's absolutely ridiculous. Since they are a non profit or private organization or whatever, I guess they can maybe do this legally? Maybe? I don't know. We'll see how this plays out over the next few days. But this scares me now for my October concert. I know Live Nation was starting to do this as well and it was NOT up to the artist either, or the venue. Infringement. No where in my personally history have I ever been asked to show my vaccination status. Ever. Maybe my parents were when I went to kindergarten. I possibly was when I went to college? I vaguely remember getting a shot for whatever that 10 yr one is, not tetanus, the other one, when I went to UIndy, I think, not Indiana Wesleyan. I don't remember, really. But for jobs, venues, anywhere else, no one ever cared if I had a shot for the flu. Or any virus. Or the chickenpox. Or anything. Why start now? What is so different now? I'm not understanding. Scare tactics. They've bent everyone's ear now. Blown it all out of proportion. And everyone has now become numb. Following the shepherd like the dumb sheep that they are so they can get on with their lives. But some are not. Some are really taking a stand. I'm one of them. And so are many that are pulling their kids out. And some are quitting their jobs. And we have to keep going. We have to take up arms. Our ancestors did. And we need to know our history and we help others remember it, too.

And after writing about it on Facebook, I now know why I haven't wanted to tackle getting our history studies together. Well, for one, I really didn't want to study the World Wars AGAIN and pop culture of the 20th century AGAIN. Everybody wants to do 50's theme nights. Or watch a TV show set in the 1920's. And what about the conspiracies around JFK's assassination? And if I want to know what houses were built of in the 1960's, I can go scrape my own walls because my house is that old and has original brickwork for better or worse, ok? And I lived through the 80's, 90's, War on Terrorism, etc. But beyond that, why I didn't want to tackle it again, in part, is because I'm afraid of what I am going to find. I'm afraid I'm going to find some eerie parallels of Nazi Germany and socialism before it and communism during it to our own modern day America. And it's going to suck! It's going to scare me even further into hiding from everyone and everything. Or speaking my mind and making more enemies. But, instead, I'm going to turn this into my why we NEED to dig down and go beyond the basics this time around. Or at least try. My kids NEED to do this again. We need to be sure that we do NOT become communist Germany and socialist Russia. My children NEED to know the difference and be able to point it out to their brainwashed peers. I have a duty to do it one more time for Justin. Maybe I don't focus on the decades and make it lighthearted and fun. Maybe at least for the World Wars, I really do go through some of Hitler's letters piece by piece with Justin and let Keturah do the fun stuff. I don't know. But now that I have a "why," I can figure out the "how" and move forward."

Other than that, it was a better day. I had an energy bar that said it had enough caffeine from green tea that equaled an espresso coffee and they weren't kidding. I felt that kick of energy. It said I wouldn't feel jittery, but I did, so that's a great sign that the package wasn't lying with how much green tea they put in there. I bought them for Justin, too, to see if that would help him concentrate without all the chemicals in the Monster energy drinks. It's from the organic produce box we get so the ingredients are more "clean." It's bite sized so it won't take me forever to eat. I do have to eat something else with it though, especially some protein. Eek. I did a little bit of computer work in the morning and some schoolwork with Abishai. I treated him with some Smarties, 1 per assignment completed, and by the time we were finished, he had like 8 or so Smarties packages. Well, note to self, that's a bit too much. Because at supper time, he became a Cheetah and ran back and forth through the house. It was still way too hot to send him outside to run it off. It's supposed to cool off to the lower 80's next week, so I'll feel more comfortable with us not getting heatstroke. Actually, I saw that the water company is telling people to use less water. We have a well, but we should use less as well just in case. Not that we water our lawn or take too many showers anyway. 

The skies had turned pretty dark and Jared had filmed what he thought was some swirling clouds, but the National Weather Service hadn't put out any warnings of severe weather. The radar indicated some pop storms about they literally were surrounding us in a C formation, so whatever Jared saw was off in the distance. We didn't actually get any storming when all was said and done and Keturah went out and rollerbladed when Jared went to Bible study. I helped Abishai build a Lincoln Log cabin that I think I hadn't tried with the other boys because it was hard to build back then, too. I only had a photo to go by. Abishai had built the other regular cabins all by himself this morning without any help. Then Daddy came home and it was time for them to watch some more Clone Wars or something.

Everybody has stayed up to date on schoolwork so far. I just need to add in the history and with that comes the literature. I might add in the other literature type stuff for Justin, but we'll see. I might not. That might be second semester. Plus we have to add in Bible with Grandpa and ASL class next week. Oh, and I was in just the right mood and clarity to write the blurb for the top of the IAHE regional newsletter after I reread some emails today, so I got that part done. Now I just need to wait and see if there are any other submissions to add to it next week or add my own bits. So I guess I'm ahead of that game.

Tomorrow is park day, and a quick stop at the grocery store to get frozen stuff (boys will just love me for making them stop on the way home but it's right there!) and a some vegetables for our outing on Saturday, and then home to make food for the IAHE picnic on Saturday. Then Justin mows on Saturday morning and then we have the least distance to travel for the picnic this year, woot! Woot! Indy's westside! It will be extremely hot again thought. And then Sunday is normal with a twist for me as I get to set up another booth but this time inside at a a little parenting talk. And then here comes Monday again. Oh joy. See in the next one!

You didn't know there were benefits, did you? Well, I should go back and screenshot the rest....I'll just leave you in limbo until the next post. Lol.

I pulled this off the shelf this morning. I was looking for something for maybe Jared to read to help him understand where I'm coming from. The funny thing is with this book is that Todd Wilson is coming on Saturday to our IAHE picnic for a little entertainment because well, our leadership is well connected and he lives in northern Indiana. However, I got this book at least 10 years ago, and the copyright date is actually 2006. The address label I put in it is from the Beech Grove house. I'm wondering if Todd Wilson is the person that Jared and I went to see that one time way back before we moved to Canada at a church kind of hidden in the woods in the middle of Indy. And then I rediscovered that church when Keturah had dance lessons there a couple of years ago. I can't quite tell from the photo on the back. But I do subscribe to Todd's emails and have for years. I just don't know. So this should be interesting. He's a comedian, by the way. So there's some funny cartoons in here as well some great advice.

This should be a must read for every new homechooler. How many times have I seen or answered these questions in the last week? Nearly daily!

Shake, shake, shake. Is it Legos? Well, I texted the photo to Jared and he said, "Get your hands off my tea box!" So I guess it's not Legos.

Poor kids. Mommy's been so lazy and out of it and in her own world that they wait and wait and finally just go ahead and correct their own work. Part of me feels really guilty about this. But then, I look at it and part of me is super proud. Why? Because, we've been using the same curriculum in the same way for so many years, they know exactly where to find the answer key, and they know exactly how I grade things. Justin gave himself half credit for getting the right answer but took off the other half credit for not using the right formula. Way to go for honesty! He is redoing Algebra 1 to make sure he has it super solid before heading into Algebra II. Therefore, he is self pacing and basically just doing one practice page and one test page per lesson. If the test for this lesson is also not done as well, we'll do more practice. Don't worry, the teacher books are kept in a main room so no cheating can take place. I learned that lesson the hard way with Benaiah when he cheated his way through Algebra 1.

Same thing with Keturah. She used the red pen, didn't try to erase and correct her mistakes, just marked them wrong, wrote the right answer, wrote how many wrong out of total number of problems at the top of the page, and bingo, ready for the next lesson. She even went over the extra homework page by herself writing in the details to find the right solution. All the years of training is paying off in these moments. 8th grade and 11 grade, teaching themselves how to do math (ok with a short weekly video lesson), correcting it honestly and accurately, no spoon feeding here. And people wonder why homeschool kids are self starters. This right here. Proof.

Speaking of proof. We read a section in Thomas Jefferson reminding us of how Plymouth colony almost died of starvation because of socialism principles, same as Jamestown. But once free market principles were introduced, each family had their own plot of ground to work and do with how they saw fit, they began to prosper. Capitalism vs. socialism. Extremely applicable to the way today's government is running itself. And then oh the fallacies we are using in the Covid crisis. Again, totally applicable.

The cheetah baby (see videos below of the Cheetah mommy running around) taking a nap.

There is no way this child is already growing out of this chair. No. Nope. He can't. I'm not ready for this.

The End