Stupidly, I thought parenting babies was the hardest phase of parenting. Surely it got easier after that, no? Sleepless nights, teething, poopy diapers...what could be worse?

Well, I'm finding out what could be worse. Parenting older kids. It's hard! And my oldest is only seven. But he's got the twin super powers of logic and back talk on his side. And I am a puny mortal, no match for such powers. When I tell him to do something and I see that flapping hand gesture (you know, to match my flapping mouth obviously) and the opening and closing mouth (you know, to demonstrate how my mouth is moving but apparently nothing of interest is coming out) I just want to scream! Where did this disrespectful kid come from?

At the same time, he's my first born. Still a baby in so many ways. And I think he's at that stage where he's trying to figure out if he's still a little boy or a somewhat bigger boy. He's testing boundaries...I just wasn't ready for my boundaries to be tested yet. Life just gets more interesting every day...sigh.

I had one of those moments today. You know, when you’re not sure what the proper reaction should be, you want to scream, cry and punch someone all at the same time?

One of the neighborhood kids, we’ll call her Summer, likes to hang out at our house. She’s one of those kids who can totally annoy you with her lack of social graces, but you try to overlook it since it’s really not her fault. I can tell by watching her family interact across the street that no one has taken an interest in teaching Summer the ins and outs of dealing with other people. She’s told me I’m fat before. Now, granted, I AM fat, but at almost eight years old most kids know not to just out and out tell someone that. She walks right into our house without knocking. She comes in even when we’ve said the kids can’t play right then, or we’re in the middle of dinner. She has no couth. But again, I figure she’s not been taught these things so I do my best to model good behavior in front of her.

Well, today. She came over and we were all sitting on the front porch. She was pushing Mason lazily back and forth in his stroller when she announced “my daddy touched my privates”. I didn’t think I’d heard her right. “What?!” I ask. Then she proceeded to tell me the whole story. A short while ago she had come home from her fathers (she lives with her mother and step father) and told her mom she hurt down there. Come to find out it was her father. I felt sick. I wanted to cry and scream and punch someone. I know things like this happen, but I’ve never seen it up close and personal before. I felt so very sad for her, for what she was having to process in that eight year old mind.

I know no one's reading this damn thing, but...or I should be glad because I can spew all kinds of things about people here and no one will ever be the wiser...bwahahahaha....

So I've started back on the weight loss wagon again. I quit around Easter and being the queen of accomplishment that I am, I gained back about 10 pounds pretty easily. I'm down a few and I mean to stick with it for another twenty pounds or so. Go me, Go me!

That is all...

Eight years ago this week, I was a very different woman than I am today. I was newly married, only six months in. We were only three months past having a miscarriage that was my first brush with the delicate divine I was trying so desperately to achieve. Eight years ago this week, we were trying to get pregnant again, not really understanding the enormity of the task. Eight years ago this week, I whizzed on a white stick and found out we were expecting our first child, Gage.

I’ve been thinking a lot about this, and who I was back then compared to who I am now. Sure I sometimes miss life being all about me. I admit to missing the ability to sleep in until however late I wanted, to being able to have relations with my husband whenever I wanted (and it was better back then, was it not?), I miss a lot of things about my pre-child self. But it seems like she was a different person completely than the one who sits here typing today. I’ve gone through an utter transformation in my views and thoughts on the world in general and my life in particular.

Who was I back then? A worker bee, a drone. I thought it was all about working a lot, “getting ahead” and being a grown up. I remember Scott trying to tell me it didn’t have to be that way, but I thought he was just not wanting to accept realities. He knew I just wasn’t ready to see the light just then. Looking back now, that woman was boring and going through life eyes closed.

But now....I think I see where we’re going, I don’t have to be responsible every minute, I can be a kid with my kids. I don’t have to know all the answers or even balance my checkbook regularly. I feel like shouting from the rooftops “I DON’T KNOW THE BALANCE OF MY CHECKING ACCOUNT!” I’ve let go of a lot of the notions I had back then about how life should be. I know now that it’s all open and out there and ready to be dived into. Okay, so many days I’m wading in the kiddie pool, but it’s nice knowing I can dive when I feel like it...I’m not stuck in the shallow end if I don’t want to be.

My life is full of boundless riches these days, and I do attribute that to my little family in many ways. They forced me to open my eyes and see the divine in the everyday.

After a recent disagreement with my family over the wonders of eating the flesh of other creatures, I’ve been thinking about the ever expanding chasm between myself and my family. It seems I’m questioned almost relentlessly over every decision we make, from vegetarianism to cloth diapering to homeschooling. I’m told there’s no reason to be environmentally conscious, as it doesn’t make a difference anyway. I’m told I need to toughen up my kids to get them ready for “the real world”. And no matter how much I explain why we do what we do, they continue to think we’re doing these things for no good reason. I’ve read reams of information about the decisions we make. No one needs to read anything to go with the flow, to send their kids to school, to use all the paper products they can buy, to eat meat and they never get questioned. I try to make informed decisions and I get flak about it.

I do know this is because the choices we’ve made are different, they differ from those our parents and our friends have made for the most part. I’m okay with other people making different choices. But it seems those who have made mainstream choices feel threatened by what we’re doing. Maybe because father culture is whispering in their ears; maybe because they feel that questioning the status quo is dangerous. Or maybe they just think we’re stupid.

I truly think that’s it. They really don’t listen to our reasoning for not vaccinating our kids, they don’t listen to our reasons for using cloth diapers, they don’t hear anything positive about homeschooling. They just think it’s weird and not good for our kids. Based on nothing but their opinions! They won’t read anything about these things, they just think because it’s different it’s ultimately not right.

I’m sad about this, because it really is making a difference in how much I want to interact with my family. No one wants to be questioned constantly. I don’t want to have to explain over and over that no, I don’t want my kids eating bacon. And it kills me that my family can’t respect my decisions like this. They try to undermine me whenever possible, by getting Gage alone and telling him how wonderful school is and how he really should go, by encouraging our kids to eat meat when we’re not right there. These things make me extremely hesitant to leave the kids with them for any length of time at all. They’re not respecting us as adults, competent enough to make our own decisions about our family’s well being. It’s at times like these that I feel like I could move to a more progressive community and never look back.

Assessment went swimmingly. Gage is doing really well, he's good to go for another year of homeschooling. Now just to figure out if I'm ready...

Wow, that was a really judgemental post, eh? I know I'm supposed to thank the Buddha for every person I encounter (and I'm assuming that extends to MTV-types) and look for their true Buddha nature. But shit, this stuff begs for commentary!

If I drive by your house at night, and you have your blinds open or drapes pulled back, I’m going to look in your house. I want to see your living rooms, your dining rooms, your kitchens. I want to see you through your decor. I’m nosey like that.

It’s this blind desire that brings me to sometimes linger on MTV and watch Cribs. This is the show where music artists/actors/misc glitteratti open their doors to MTV and take MTV and you on a guided tour through their home. It’s a dumb show and I’m ashamed to say I’ve watched it. I have to say that most of these people have homes that are as vapid and superficial as their music is. Case in point? Mariah Carey. Her house is just horrid; it’s all gold and shiny, and looks absolutely unliveable. But she takes them to her upstairs sitting room and says...are you ready for this?...”this room looks exotic, like a mirage took place here”. Okay then Mariah, a mirage “took place”? Um, no. I don’t think so. Learn to speak the language and please try to understand the meanings of the things coming out of your mouth. Ugh.

Anyway, one of my absolute favorite episodes was when they visited Moby’s apartment. It was just so normal, no outrageous stuff, no glittering gold crap. And my most favorite part? When he took them to his bookcase, and added that he’s never seen a book or anything on most episodes of Cribs. He’s right. None of these artists seem to have anything inside their heads. They all have big TV’s and cars and “stuff”, but nothing more. Nothing to show they’re even trying to grow spiritually. Well, that’s because they’re not. I think most celebrities are very young souls. It’s sad really, that so many people look up to these “artists” and they really have nothing to offer but songs; most of which are just odes to their odious lifestyles.

But I digress. It’s nothing new that I don’t like what Hollywood, and our culture as a whole, values and places importance on, but this show just takes the cake. I could try to be less judgemental and assume that not every episode is as bad as the Mariah Carey one, the Nellie one, the Missy Elliott one. Or I could just become a Hollywood interior decorator and put together these tacky houses for millions of dollars.

We’ve scheduled our first homeschooling assessment. It’s only a week and a half away. I’m very nervous.
In case you’re not familiar with homeschooling, this is the end of the year assessment where we sit down with a certified teacher and she reviews Gage’s “portfolio” of work for the year. She then tells us if it’s satisfactory or not and off we go. Sounds harmless enough, eh? Sounds like it should be easy, right?
But this is the first one we’ve ever done. So I have no idea what to expect or what to take. I don’t know what is going to come out of Gage’s mouth when she asks him what he’s been up to this year. I’m just nervous.
I’m ultra disorganized. To be honest, I don’t have a portfolio. I have papers stuffed into cabinets here and there and I’ve yet to pull it all together to see where we are. We tend to unschool, which means we follow Gage’s lead in our educational pursuits. He likes trains, so we get lots of train books (reading, spelling) and go to various places to ride trains (history, geography) and we let him play with software that lets him set up train systems and run them (cognitive abilities)...heck we even try to work trains into math (remember those story problems where train A leaves Boston at 10:00 a.m. travelling at 50 mph and...?). So we don’t use any one curriculum or have a set of workbooks we can take with us to show what we’ve been doing.

A part of me feels such pressure to put on a good show. But that’s not the point of this whole thing. The POINT is that we’re letting Gage be the master of his destiny, we’re letting him choose the path of his education. We’re getting to be involved, we’re getting to see those lightbulb moments (and the lightbulb blowing out and sparking and catching the whole house on fire moments...er..those not so great moments). We’re not homeschooling to show someone else what we’re capable of, we’re homeschooling so that Gage can discover what he’s capable of. So I need to stop worrying. I’m sure it will be fine. I’m sure it will...