Summer Break

Since I posted the details about my homeschooling routine in May, I feel like I should also let you all know that we have not maintained our schedule at all this summer. I decided in early June to take all of June & July off of our routine, partly due to VBS and vacation, but mostly just because both I and the kids needed a break. Since June 1st, we have been going on play dates and/or outings every morning and then just playing outside after naps. We go to the zoo and the science center every week, and sometimes twice a week. We also go to friend's houses and have friends over here. Both kids are loving all this extra social time, as am I (of course).

I'm really enjoying this change of pace, though I can see that the lack of structure is causing the boys to annoy each other more quickly when we are at home, and I'm regularly frustrated by the fact that "free play" for boys is more often destructive than not. All in all though, I think it is good for them to entertain themselves a little more and to work out some conflict with minimal instruction/interference. Like everything else in life, all things in moderation is the best way to go, and I have no doubt I will dive back into homeschooling with new energy and ideas as soon as August rolls around.

Florida Trip

On Sunday night, we arrived home from our 9-day trip to Florida to visit family and friends. We spent the first half of the week visiting the Wagner side of the family in Melbourne (and attending sister Wendi's graduation from PA school), and then the second half in Orlando vacationing with three other families.

This same group of families (originally friends from Campus Church in Gainesville) have been taking an annual vacation together for five years now. When we started out, there were three toddlers in the group. Now, the kids actually outnumber the adults! This time there were ten children (ages 1-6) and eight adults. To accommodate our crowd, we rented a gorgeous 6-bedroom/4 bath vacation house in a resort (we got a good deal on it). And despite the increasingly challenging ratios, we had a great time together. We enjoyed hours of swimming, watching the kids play together more creatively than every before, and of course lots of late-night visiting. Understandably, we were all exhausted after the fourth night, and ready to head back to our own homes.

Due to some difficulty in nailing down and coordinating plans, we ended up staying the night in four different places for the first four nights of our trip. All that loading and unloading of the car is the main reason why I forgot to take any pictures while we were in Melbourne...the camera just didn't get carried in most of the time. The highlight of our time with the Wagner's was meeting our newest little niece, Madelyn Belle McGough, Traci's firstborn. She was a little over a month old when we were there, and I was especially excited to be able to go with Traci for little Maddie's newborn pictures. We also enjoyed exploring the new addition to the Melbourne Zoo, a really amazing little lagoon and play area that impressed all four of us and delighted the kids. Another highlight for Marcus and Caleb was going to Disney with Uncle Mike and Cousin Chase for a day. They played hard all day (got back to the house after midnight) and the next day, Caleb slept in past 7 am for the first time in his entire life. (Unfortunately for me, Ethan was up at 5:20, so Caleb sleeping in didn't help me very much.)

All in all, our second trip to Florida this year was less challenging than the one we took in January, but I think I speak for all of us that we are very happy to be back home and in our own beds for a while.

Camping, Again :)

Some people would say that we are gluttons for punishment. After a busy week of VBS, we loaded up the car for another weekend of camping! We went with our equally adventerous friends who have 2-year-old triplets (after raising 3 babies at once, I imagine camping doesn't even cause them pause). Despite the fact that the weather channel was predicting a warm, sunny weekend up until a few days before, it was actually raining and even thunderstorming most of Saturday morning. Regardless, we really had a good time, and were even grateful for the coolness that came with the rain, as a hot weekend would have been much more uncomfortable than a drizzly one. At one point, just after a burst of thunder and lightening, we all piled into our friends' minivan for about 30 minutes and let the kids watch a video. Other than that, the adults hung out under a huge canopy and the kids ran in and out of the drizzling rain carrying their little buckets, and loving the mix of dirt, rocks and water. When the rain let up, we went swimming at the little camp beach. My favorite part of the weekend was roasting and eating unlimited numbers of marshmellows/smores and talking until late in the night around the campfire. Sleep was sort of the exception, since we all stayed up to almost 1:00 am Friday night and our kids were up with the sun at 5:15. Saturday we were more tired so we crashed before midnight. (Our whole family took naps together after we got home from church on Sunday afternoon.)

I can't put my finger on exactly what I love so much about camping, but there is something special about being so much a part of the outdoors from the time you wake up in the morning until you go to sleep at night. In a weird way, I also love smelling like campfire smoke, having frizzy hair, not wearing make-up and NOT EVEN CARING how bad I look. It is very freeing to let go of the expected effort to be attractive, even just for a couple of days. Even though it is a lot of work getting there and there are moments why we wonder what we were thinking, I'm still sitting here the next day looking over the calendar for when we can go again!

The Pursuit of Happiness

Many, many times during my life, I have wished that I did not feel things so intensely. But that is how God made me, and unless he chooses to intervene, I imagine I will go to my grave vascillating between the heights and depths of strong emotion. This afternoon, I am grieving for someone that I don't even know. Her story was relayed to me by a close friend. It is not a new or surprising story; in fact it has been told many times before, but that does not diminish its pain for everyone involved. It is the story of a marriage destroyed by one person's belief that happiness is attainable by discarding his original life partner for a new one. My friend described to me the devastation that is occurring in this family, and I have spent some time reflecting on this all-too-common scenario.

I think the root of the problem is the belief that we are entitled to our hearts' desires. Most Christians would agree, at least in an intellectual conversation, that no person should have all or even most of his or her wants fulfilled. But when it comes right down to it, we are in the habit of self-gratification. When we want a new "toy", we scrounge up the money to buy it. Even if it takes a while, we still expect to get it eventually. The culture of our nation boasts that anybody can achieve and attain anything with the right combination of ambition and hard work. The Preamble to our Constitution describes the "pursuit of happiness" as an inalienable right. "You deserve it, so do what it takes to get it," seems to be the status quo.

Back to the family I mentioned in the beginning...in the midst of this culture of desire/strive/attain, it is no wonder that when confronted with the potency of mutual attraction, many people barely attempt to deny themselves. Even in the church, we lack a healthy dose of "I'm sorry, but no matter how much you want it, this may never be yours." Whether it is the desire for a career, a child, a status, a house, or a relationship, we often view its pursuit as good and respectable. We fail to realize that, sometimes, giving a desire to the Lord and accepting its indefinite unfulfillment is the higher calling.

Since I have been meditating on this weakness in our culture and in my own life, I am convicted of the importance of practicing self-denial as a spiritual discipline. I think restarting an old habit of regular fasting is a good place to start. I also want to amp up my efforts to teach my boys to handle unfulfilled desires on a daily basis. (They give me plenty of opportunity for this since it seems like I listen to a steady stream of requests from dawn to dusk.) I pray that the Lord will teach us all that He is the only one who can truly fulfill the longings of our heart.

Sorry for the sermonette, but every once in a while I cook one up, and since I'm a woman in the Church of Christ, this is my only preaching venue :)

Veggie Garden!

I'm so excited to finally have a garden...my first since I was a child. (My dad kept a pretty big garden and we ate fresh vegetables for many years when I was growing up.) The fact that we finally have one now is thanks to a friend who gave me a book called Square Foot Gardening. I read it cover-to-cover in a few days, and I couldn't wait to get started. The basic concept is that you plan your garden based on 1-foot-squares rather than the traditional rows, resulting in a much lower-maintenance garden, no wasted space, and just the right amount of harvest for your family. If you have any interest in gardening, but have been held back by space or time concerns, I really recommend this book.

I chose to go with a raised garden box on my deck. The deck gets plenty of sunlight, and there are very few bugs since it is a long way down to the yard and trees below. Also, the kids and I spend at least an hour out there every day, and so it doesn't require any change in our routine to water and maintain the garden.

Saturday was our marathon gardening day. I had already planned the dimensions, materials and location for the garden, so we started the day with a trip to Home Depot to buy the supplies (one of 3 trips that day). I bought the wood and had it cut, and then brought everything home for Marcus to build the box. While the kids napped, we put the 2'x8' box together and up on the posts. Mixing the soil in the raised garden was the most fun, especially because the kids got to participate. We "made" the soil based loosely on the formula in the book (combination of garden soil, peat moss, compost and sand). We opened bag after bag and mixed them together by hand. The kids loved being up to their elbows in dirt, and I have to admit Marcus and I had a lot of fun with it, too! We ended the day with baths and a final trip to Home Depot to buy some transplants (I'd already bought seeds). Sunday afternoon, we planted the garden. Now there is okra, broccoli, bell peppers, spinach, carrots, green beans, tomatoes, cilantro, basil, oregano, and best of all, strawberries, all growing on my deck! I am SO excited, and I will let you all know how the harvest turns out :)