My "Late" Reader, the Reading Tutor

Betsy has started college* and will soon begin her dream job. Her work-study assignment is (drum roll, please): reading tutor in an elementary school. This is a rich and lovely thing indeed, as this is the girl who was my "late" reader.

I never labeled her "late" -- I am not fond of labels. I did realize that she was learning to read in a way that was very different from how Anne-with-an-e had picked up on it. I realized that God had indeed tricked me into homeschooling and that now I had to actually become a creative teacher. (I realized I needed to deliver a satisfying rant to God before I could get back to business. I delivered the rant.) I worried, I researched, I asked friends.

One day, I heard Betsy label herself. "Anne is the reader. I'm not really the reader in our family." My heart sank. I didn't want any of my children to give up on reading before they'd had a chance to embrace it. I resolved to keep reading aloud to her as often as I could (not that I would ever stop reading aloud....) and I simply kept plugging away, exposing her to various ways of learning, waiting for the quintessential click.

The click came.

Here's a post I wrote a few years ago, about Betsy's reading journey:

On Learning to Read, Part II 
(this post originally ran in 2009):

Last week, I talked about how Anne-with-an-learned to read. I came away from my experience with Anne thinking that "teaching reading" was a snap. The only thing required of me was to read to my child, talk, talk, talk, and point out a few phonetic anomalies.

Then came Betsy. Different child, different brain, different wiring. A brand, new experience. I no longer felt like the SuperMom of Homeschooling. Was I doing something wrong?

No.

Betsy, who is every ounce as sharp as Anne-with-an-e, just processed things differently. Initially, though she loved having me read to her and enjoyed our family read-aloud times as much as Anne did, she was not inclined to watch the page and see what the words looked like. At one point, I noticed that rather than watching the page as I read, as Anne had, Betsy watched me, watched my mouth move as I read. Betsy wanted to hear the story, experience it, be a part of it. She was more auditory and kinesthetic than Anne had been, and so reading came to her in a different way.

With Betsy, I took the more traditional route of phonics rules and reinforcement, but I taught it with games:

• I made simple board games ("Read the word and move ahead three spaces.")

• I printed out Jan Brett's phonogram flashcards and we played charades with them. This was possibly one of the best things we ever did.

• I had her tell me a story -- she narrated it to me orally, I wrote it down, then had her copy it onto pages which she then illustrated. She then read her composition ("Jat's Bat" -- I still remember that the cover she made was decorated with glitter) to me again and again.

• We found Cynthia Rylant's Mr. Putter and Tabby series and Betsy loved it (and so did I.) We read those repeatedly, too, until she was reading them on her own.

This mixed bag of approaches worked, and Betsy began to read, and to love independent reading as much as Anne did. She just had to arrive by a different route, and I had to tune in to what would help her get there.

Today, they are both excellent readers and I don't think anyone would know which of them read "early" and which read "late" (and I'm glad that they didn't have to deal with such labels, which really aren't helpful and can be detrimental.) Though an "early reader" might make things easier on a teacher, the age at which a child reads isn't really important to the child or to her overall journey. She will read when she's ready, and when she's offered the right opportunities to be ready.

~~~~~

Betsy became (and still is) one of the most voracious readers I've ever known. She is also the writer of her own books these days, too. The Jat's Bat legacy lives on. 

~~~~

*Cue the Hyperventilation-of-Disbelief

It's all in the perspective

I got nothing done yesterday.

After having people stay with us for a week (the previously mentioned Grandpa-of-the-digital-camera as well as Grandma, of course) I was all set to whip my house back into order. I had a list (as I am wont to make despite the acceptance of the unpredictable rhythms of my life) and it was a good one:

Laundry
Declutter
Dust and vacuum
Clean bathrooms
Cut out three dozen poster board stars for the American Girl Victory Crowns (to be made today at our Molly meeting)

I did get the first load of laundry started before the "getting nothing done" part of the day began.

You see, Anne had been invited to a movie and birthday party. The problem was, the movie chosen by the birthday girl was not one we would allow Anne to see. I had let the Birthday Party Mom know of our objections and that we'd simply drop Anne off at the party after the rest of them arrived home from the movie. This was going to provide me with an entire day for cleaning before I had to drive any child anywhere.

Then, Wednesday night, we were told that the movie had been switched to something more acceptable. Plans to drop Anne off at 3 p.m. were back on the schedule for the day.

In the meantime, Betsy had been angling for a little something fun out of this arrangement. I let her invite the Birthday Girl's little brother over for playtime during the movie and party. Obstacle: now that the movie had been switched, little brother could go along, and that's what he wanted to do.

So, after getting the laundry started, Birthday Party Mom and I talked again, and it was decided that Betsy could tag along to the movie. When I shared that happy news, she broke into a shaky smile, looking surprised and slightly alarmed. "Hmmm, that's a little odd," I thought, but went on to check my email (and no, that has nothing to do with not getting all my chores done) and who should arrive at my side in tears but Betsy?

It turns out that she was afraid to go to a movie without me. She's never done it before, and new things are sometimes hard for tender-hearted Betsy. So, instead of tackling the shower (and, sadly, I always use steel wool) I sat with Betsy and talked things over with her. We read an online review of the movie, talked about where she'd sit in the theater and that her sister would be there, about what to expect and how she's always felt comfortable playing at this friend's house, as well as other such soothing things.

Then, I embarked on a series of emails with Atticus: Should I go, too, and take Ramona? Would Ramona be ready to sit through an entire movie in a theater? Did Atticus want to come home and go with us (he being the kind of dad who loves to witness things such as a little one's first big screen experience)? Is all of this worth the extra $14 in admission price, or will Betsy be fine without me there?

I got the first load of laundry into the dryer and started a second one. Then, I directed Anne to get ready for the party. (The shower was then occupied, so of course I couldn't clean it.)

After a lovely, long phone conversation with my sister (which had nothing to do with not getting my chores done) I heard from Atticus, who had determined that Betsy would be fine, and should sit with her sister if she needed to, and that her sister should not deny her that kindness, even if it was her friend and her birthday party invitation.

We then had to make sure that Betsy was bathed and ready to go out. The gift still had to be wrapped, and -- amazingly -- I had to settle a couple of squabbles in the midst of these activities.

I also had to help Anne pack (it was a sleepover) and there were some tricky wardrobe choices to be made (sprinklers, hot weather and swimsuits were involved, and which shorts would make the best cover-up over her suit?)

By now it was lunch time and I was immensely tempted to tell the girls to make their own peanut butter sandwiches and eat alone while I vacuumed (if I can call that temptation ... to be "tempted to vacuum" is really an oxymoron.)

But, they said, "Will you read to us?" That was the end of the housework.

I looked at my three gems, miracles every one, and thought of our morning. In the fraction of a second before I said, "Yes, I'll read to you," the goodness of our family life and the events of the last 24 hours flashed through my still-cluttered brain.

It's because we are blessed to be such a close-knit family that things like scrutinizing movie choices, tears over being away from Mommy, and reading whenever (well, almost) they ask for it happen regularly. So, I read from our current Charlotte book and lunch -- rather than feeling frenzied -- was a welcome respite.

Still left to do: drop the girls off for the movie, run to the store with Ramona for cookies (for the above-mentioned American Girl club meeting) and milk, linger too long at the store because I said "yes" to Ramona when she requested a visit to the Barbie aisle, get home in time to give Ramona the promised "special Mommy time" while "her girls" were out (we played with her dollhouse) and then back to pick up the girls and have two extra kids come over for supper and playtime (part of Betsy's angling.)

While Betsy's friends were here, I got the three dozen stars cut out, the headbands made (though the sample-Miss-Victory-Crown is not yet assembled) and a note to myself written: Don't forget the cookies, glitter and glue.

It was after 8 p.m. when Atticus drove Betsy's friends home, and we still had to deal with lots of "I miss Anne!" comments from both Betsy and Ramona.

So. I didn't get anything done today.

Oh, yeah ... except two loads of laundry and those stars. And a lot of mothering.

My furniture is dusty, there are crumbs in the living room, clutter on the kitchen counter and the shower still needs to be cleaned, but my kids made it through another day, secure in the knowledge that I love them better than anything.

And that's the best thing to cross off a To-Do list.

Tags: motherhood, family

Betsy Was a Junior ... But Now She's a Senior

Fellow Maud Hart Lovelace fans will get the Betsy-Tacy reference in the post title, but I'm talking about my Betsy (whose blog name, yes, came from said beloved books.)

My Betsy recently had, as she said, her "last first day of school."

My Betsy is a senior.

We launched her senior year the way we always begin our school years -- with Mass and then breakfast out. (I've always gambled that if we start with God, coffee, and pancakes, we can't go too far wrong.)

We had a lovely day of easing into work, discipline, academics, math (which we merely talked about on the first day but did not tackle until today, so as to preserve the loveliness of that God-Coffee-Pancake kind of beginning. I know on an intellectual level that math is one of God's fiercely beautiful inventions, but on an emotional level? I want to kick it to the curb.) We did fun stuff, like buying snappy new journals, going to the library, and taking Ramona to the park. Betsy also joined Ramona and me as we watched a couple of episodes of Liberty's Kids (which, unbelievably, is available for under seven bucks right now. Yes! All 40 episodes. Run. Run and grab it now.)

And I'm savoring it all. Appreciating the gifts of the mundane. Journaling (not just blogging, but journaling, too, which I've missed and let slide since I started blogging.) Reflecting on the fact that after this year, there will be only one child left in this homeschool dynamic, and that child will be in junior high (which hits me anew every time we reuse a book or resource around here and I realize that I don't have to preserve it for anyone coming up after Ramona ... a strange feeling....)

I'm so grateful that we chose to follow this weird, counter-cultural, fulfilling, amazing, odd, winding path. I wonder, sometimes, what our lives would have looked like if our girls had chosen to go to high school. I never get very far with the speculation, though, because this life is the only one I've known, and it's been good. Maybe a schoolish life would have been good, too? I don't know. Possibly, probably. But at this point, what does that matter? Roads diverged, and we took the one that most intrigued. I used to say that we would take homeschooling one year at a time, and we did, but it didn't take long before I realized something about myself, that "knowing how way leads on to way/I doubted if I should ever come back."

I started this post in a Betsy-Tacy frame of mind, detoured past the Revolutionary War, then meandered into Frostian territory, but through it all I've had a picture in my mind of my beautiful, witty, brave, and talented girl, my novelist, my poet, my middle child. It will be a year of many last firsts.

Betsy is a senior.

The Absorption Principle

Yesterday I referred to Elizabeth's post about her preschooler, and the similar (if still vague for me) goal I have for mine: to relish this age, and to not relegate Ramona to the back burner, leaving her to feel that she's merely a tagalong to the activities of "her girls" (as she calls them.)

(An aside: you must visit Elizabeth again today, as she has a wonderful bookmark-worthy post full of delicious -- literally, in some cases -- art ideas. And you get a peek into her art supply shelves.)

One of the things that got me thinking about this was the American Girl club that we participated in last school year. My friend, Linda, Organizer Extraordinaire and Super Craft Mom, started the club as a fun way to survey American History with her daughter, who is Betsy's age. Since I already had some history plans of my own for my girls, I viewed the club as just a fun supplement. We were already familiar with all-things-American-Girl, so instead of re-reading the books before each meeting, I was a bit lackadaisical about it, looking forward mainly to the creative and delightful craft projects with which Linda would wow us.

And, overall, my approach worked out just fine. But I realized something a character or two into the school year. Somewhere after Kaya and before Addy I discovered that while I was familiar with all-things-American-Girl, and Anne was steeped in AG-ishness ... Betsy's familiarity with all the stories? Not so much.

Our first year or two of homeschooling revolved around American history by way of American Girls and pioneers (Laura Ingalls Wilder, and her ancestors Martha and Charlotte, to be exact.) Anne remembers it all, too, as she had immersed herself in all of those series for an extended time. But Betsy? She was four years old the first year we homeschooled. She was five our second year (See? I can teach math.) So, although she loved making butter and yarn dolls and being read to outside under the oak tree, after putting the AG series aside for a few years, she didn't really remember every detail of every book, as Anne did.

And it struck me: I was so focused on homeschooling Anne back then, and I reasoned that whatever Betsy absorbed was just icing on the cake. But here I was, a few years later, expecting that the icing had stuck. But we all know how hungry we get after some sugar. Much of our AG and Little House study had been delightful sugar for Betsy, but now she needed to be fed again, with more substance. And I hadn't been doing it, because I assumed she "already knew all this stuff."

Guilt. Oh, the guilt. So, I wallowed for awhile ... not very long (I think some chocolate may have helped me get over it) and decided that I should be grateful for the wake-up call. How many other things had I assumed Betsy had merely absorbed? In what other areas had I cheated her a bit? Where did I need to play some catch-up?

It was a great wake-up call, and it woke me up to Ramona's age and stage, too. When Ramona was born, I knew that we just needed to find ways to get through the tougher stages to keep our homeschooling plans in place: the sleeplessness of the newborn days, the high-maintenance and mischief of an 18-month-old, and so on. But now ... oh, my goodness ... she's almost four! It's time to think of her as another one who needs her own kind of nourishment.

Not that there's anything wrong with the "they'll absorb so much from the older ones" philosophy. I firmly believe it's true. They can and do learn a lot from their older siblings' studies. I'll continue to include Ramona in read-alouds for the older girls, as I always have and I'll adapt things Anne and Betsy do for Ramona's little hands. But, it's good to be reminded every now and then that some adjustments might be in order, to make sure everyone is getting what she needs.

Sometimes, perhaps the absorption principle (or the "trickle down" as Elizabeth called it) needs to move in reverse: take something that a younger or middle child needs to learn, (or would love to do) and adapt it for the older children, too.

Could just be that Anne and Betsy will be giddy over the prospect of more painting, too.

Understood Betsy

The other day I mentioned that we were reading Understood Betsy by Dorothy Canfield Fisher. I knew absolutely nothing about this book before we started it; somehow, it was not on my radar screen. All I knew was that Lissa and Liz had both recommended it to me (more than once each, I'm sure) and that I trusted them to know what kind of book we love.

We finished it last week, and we all adored it. It was the sort of book that leaves one with that curious mix of satisfaction and mourning: the feeling that you are full and happy, content to have partaken of the feast, but so sad that it's gone, over, consumed and done. Oh, yes, of course you can read it again. And you will. But there's nothing like the first taste of a discovery.

In my last post, I mentioned that, as we read, I was reminded of John Holt and Charlotte Mason. Faith, from Dumb Ox Academy, pointed out that Fisher was a champion of Montessori methods. I'm far less familiar with Montessori than with the others, but all were advocates for children, and all encouraged a certain level of independence in learning. All, too, believed that children were capable little people who simply needed to have their natural desires to learn enthusiastically encouraged.

The first John Holt moment was just a little thing. Nine year old Betsy has been called forward in class to do math:

She hated arithmetic with all her might, and she really didn't understand a thing about it! By long experience she had learned to read her teachers' faces very accurately, and she guessed by their expression whether the answer she gave was the right one. And that was the only way she could tell. You never heard of any other child who did that, did you?

(I love the way the narrator sneaks in the occasional editorial aside.)

I was reminded here of a passage from How Children Fail in which John Holt talks about children faking their way through years of math, purely on their ability to read the teacher's face.

I was also reminded of Holt's observations about how strangely artificial school is, about how children are removed from the real world (and from normal interaction in it) when they are closed up in a school building all day. A passing farmer has stopped to join in the children's tug-o-war game at recess:

Elizabeth Ann was thinking to herself that this was one of the queerest things that had happened to her even in this queer place. Never, why never once, had any grown-up, passing the playground of the big brick building, DREAMED of such a thing as stopping for a minute to play. They never even looked at the children, any more than if they were in another world. In fact she had felt the school was in another world.

This happens when you're homeschooling, too. You become very aware that you are indeed living in something of an alternate world. A couple of weeks ago, my girls and I stopped at the grocery store after horseback riding lessons. The clerk, a very cheerful woman, said, "You must be homeschooled." My girls said that yes, they were, and we'd just come from horseback riding and the clerk said, "Oh! Then you get to enjoy this glorious weather! That's so nice. You know, we don't get to see too many children here during the day."

Back to Betsy's new world: I was reminded of Charlotte Mason in Betsy's teacher, who saw the importance of time spent outside, and who was quite matter-of-fact about Betsy being a person ... not a "student," not a "third-grader" and not a pail to be filled, but a human being who was there to grow and learn.

After the teacher utterly shocks Betsy by placing her at a 7th grade reading level, 2nd grade math level, and 3rd grade spelling, Betsy's mind is spinning:

Elizabeth Ann fell back on the bench with her mouth open. She felt really dizzy. What crazy things the teacher said! She felt as though she was being pulled limb from limb.

"What's the matter?" asked the teacher, seeing her bewildered face.

"Why--why," said Elizabeth Ann, "I don't know what I am at all. If I'm second-grade arithmetic and seventh-grade reading and third-grade spelling, what grade AM I?"

The teacher laughed at the turn of her phrase. "YOU aren't any grade at all, no matter where you are in school. You're just yourself, aren't you? What difference does it make what grade you're in! And what's the use of your reading little baby things too easy for you just because you don't know your multiplication table?"

This is simply too much for Betsy. This is not at all what she's been taught, not at all what she thought an education was all about:

"Well, for goodness' SAKES!" ejaculated Elizabeth Ann, feeling very much as though somebody had stood her suddenly on her head.

"Why, what's the matter?" asked the teacher again.

This time Elizabeth Ann didn't answer, because she herself didn't know what the matter was. But I do, and I'll tell you. The matter was that never before had she known what she was doing in school. She had always thought she was there to pass from one grade to another, and she was ever so startled to get a little glimpse of the fact that she was there to learn how to read and write and cipher and generally use her mind, so she could take care of herself when she came to be grown up. Of course, she didn't really know that till she did come to be grown up, but she had her first dim notion of it in that moment, and it made her feel the way you do when you're learning to skate and somebody pulls away the chair you've been leaning on and says, "Now, go it alone!"

Fisher has a lovely, sly sense of humor, and finishes the first section on school with this:

They ran along to the little building, and there I'm going to leave them, because I think I've told enough about their school for ONE while. It was only a poor, rough, little district school anyway, that no Superintendent of Schools would have looked at for a minute, except to sniff.

And the whole book is every bit as delicious as that.

I won't share every detail we loved, as I don't want to spoil the book for those of you who haven't read it. But know that it's full of surprises and delights, a bit of pathos, a lot of compassion, sincere love and humor.

Dorothy Canfield Fisher had a keen understanding of human nature, knew children terrifically well, and captured a wonderful array of arresting personalities in this all-too-quick-a-read.

Understood Betsy is an altogether enchanting book, and a new family favorite here in our Holt-inspired/Masonish/Montessori-touched/Betsian homeschool. Thanks, Liz and Lissa.

You Find What Works and You Do It, Part III

Part I is here.
Part II is here.

 The next question:

"What do you think you might do differently for Ramona as she enters high school?"

Actually, we're already dealing with differences -- for Betsy, who's a junior this year. (Hey, I'm suddenly reminded of a great book series.)

The main difference is that we'll take greater advantage of early enrollment at the community college than we did with Anne. Now that we've got some experience with that whole thing, we're starting a bit earlier for Betsy.

Another difference is that because Betsy and Anne have always been the best of pals and do so much together, Betsy has been able to do certain things (such as writing and directing a play) earlier than Anne did. There are advantages to being a younger sister!

Other than that, it will be very similar: extensive reading, loads of discussion, writing (Betsy has written three novels, and perpetually has numerous short stories going, but she's decidedly not a fan of essay writing), math, living our faith.

Betsy will, as Anne did, do some prep for the ACT test. If your child knows for certain that she will attend community college before transferring to a four-year institution, the ACT test isn't really a necesssity* -- by the time she transfers, her transcript will do the talking.  We decided to go ahead and have Anne take the test, however, because we didn't want to close doors prematurely, just in case she did decide to apply and/or attend somewhere else. So, the ACT scores were helpful when she applied to Benedictine, and ended up being helpful with a scholarship (though, for community college, COMPASS test scores can also be used on scholarship applications.)

And I have to admit that I'm not yet even thinking about Ramona entering high school.

I'm gonna stay in denial about that one a little longer.

Part IV is here.


* 2018 Update: This varies from college to college. Always look into the requirements of the schools your child is considering. When Anne transferred to a nearby state college, they did not require an ACT score in addition to her community college transcript. By the time Betsy transferred to the same college, an ACT score was a requirement, even if one had an associate's degree from a community college. I don't understand the reasoning behind that requirement, but there you have it.

On Learning to Read: Part II

Last week, I talked about how Anne-with-an-learned to read. I came away from my experience with Anne thinking that "teaching reading" was a snap. The only thing required of me was to read to my child, talk, talk, talk, and point out a few phonetic anomalies.

Then came Betsy. Different child, different brain, different wiring. A brand, new experience. I no longer felt like the SuperMom of Homeschooling. Was I doing something wrong?

No.

Betsy, who is every ounce as sharp as Anne-with-an-e, just processed things differently. Initially, though she loved having me read to her and enjoyed our family read-aloud times as much as Anne did, she was not inclined to watch the page and see what the words looked like. At one point, I noticed that rather than watching the page as I read, as Anne had, Betsy watched me, watched my mouth move as I read. Betsy wanted to hear the story, experience it, be a part of it. She was more auditory and kinesthetic than Anne had been, and so reading came to her in a different way.

With Betsy, I took the more traditional route of phonics rules and reinforcement, but I taught it with games:

• I made simple board games ("Read the word and move ahead three spaces.")

• I printed out Jan Brett's phonogram flashcards and we played charades with them. This was possibly one of the best things we ever did.

• I had her tell me a story -- she narrated it to me orally, I wrote it down, then had her copy it onto pages which she then illustrated. She then read her composition ("Jat's Bat" -- I still remember that the cover she made was decorated with glitter) to me again and again.

• We found Cynthia Rylant's Mr. Putter and Tabby series and Betsy loved it (and so did I.) We read those repeatedly, too, until she was reading them on her own.

This mixed bag of approaches worked, and Betsy began to read, and to love independent reading as much as Anne did. She just had to arrive by a different route, and I had to tune in to what would help her get there.

Today, they are both excellent readers and I don't think anyone would know which of them read "early" and which read "late" (and I'm glad that they didn't have to deal with such labels, which really aren't helpful and can be detrimental.) Though an "early reader" might make things easier on a teacher, the age at which a child reads isn't really important to the child or to her overall journey. She will read when she's ready, and when she's offered the right opportunities to be ready.

It's the New Bumpoofle-Dee-Dee

I'm reading Hilda van Stockum's The Winged Watchman to Ramona as part of our World War II studies this year. Tonight, we were reading at the kitchen table while Anne and Betsy were doing the dinner dishes. At this point in the story, we're learning more about Hildebrand, a young man, a philosophy student, who is secretly staying with the Verhagen family. Anne and Betsy were listening in.

I had just read a paragraph in which Mr. Verhagen and Hildebrand are having a conversation, and as the two men are agreeing on a point, we learn that

At first he (Father) had thought that such a bookish person could not learn anything so practical (as helping with the windmill), but Hildebrand proved to be quite dexterous and Father was beginning to rely on him.

"Oh," I said, "he's bookish and handy. I wonder if he cooks, too?"

"Hildebrand might be the perfect man!" Betsy said, but I wasn't really listening. I had already moved on to read the next line:

"I know," Father sighed. 

The girls burst out laughing at my/Father's response and when I realized how it sounded I laughed, too.

"And thus," I said, "the grown-up girls' version of Bumpoofle-Dee-Dee is born!"

What's Bumpoofle-Dee-Dee? One of our most enduring family jokes.

It came up when I read The Winged Watchman to Anne and Betsy eight years ago. Here's the post from October, 2006:

~~~~~

While reading The Winged Watchman aloud the other day, Ramona suddenly stopped me and said, "What's a bumpoofle-dee-dee?"

I said, "A what? Where did you hear that, honey?"

"You! You just read it a minute ago."

"I did?"

"Yes. You said Bumpoofle-dee-dee."

Thoroughly confused, I skimmed back over what I'd just read and found this phrase: Some people think electricity is foolproof and easy.

"Oh! Honey, no -- " I corrected, "I said, foolproof and easy. Not bumpoofle-dee-dee."

Anne and Betsy were besides themselves with giggles.

But, oh, it got worse at dinner time. The girls were recounting the misunderstanding to Atticus. Anne said, "Daddy, can I tell you about Bumpoofle-dee-dee?"

"Huh?" said Atticus, understandably foggy after a day of teaching high schoolers. "One poopy baby?"

If I thought the girls had a good giggle at breakfast, it was nothing compared to this laughfest. Anne spit applesauce across the table onto Betsy, and Ramona latched onto the phrase, which she could repeat endlessly, sending her sisters into fits and guffaws.

When everyone finally quieted down, I told the origin of the story to Atticus, but it seemed to have lost its punch. We do, however, have a new family word.

Perhaps we need to add elocution to our curriculum?

~~~~~

And this is Reason #4,987,236 that I love read-alouds!

In Which We Examine the Roles of Anne and Betsy (or, "What's a Blogging Mom to Do?")

Occasionally, people ask if I worry about having more Ramona posts than Anne-and- Betsy posts.

I tell those people, "What I really fear is how much the therapy will cost."

No, not really.

But, here's the thing. When I started this blog in late '05, Anne-with-an-e and Betsy were twelve and nine. Ramona was three. Three-year-olds say a lot of funny things. Bloggable things. Things I can repeat and get away with.  If I'd had a blog when my other girls were that young, their early childhoods would also be recorded in cyberspace, but I wouldn't have those great notebooks full of their sweet and funny sayings. So, there's a bit of a trade-off, eh?

But there's another more important thing at play here. Anne and Betsy are growing up. In the years since I started this blog, they have become young women. And, although we have endless and fascinating conversations about that, most of those conversations don't have a home on my blog. Sure, there's the occasional "I refuse to believe they are teenagers" moment, such as the other day when there were firemen outside the grocery store collecting money for Jerry's Kids. As we headed into the store, one or more of them did a double-take our direction and I realized that I couldn't tell you the last time a fireman looked twice at me.  Firemen look at my daughters (much to Atticus' chagrin, tensed fists and recollection of his Marine Corps days. Hear that, firemen and potential suitors? Their father was a Marine. And he remembers everything about it. But I digress.)

The point is that many conversations at this stage end up feeling more private than bloggable. Even stuff that isn't really, truly, intensely private or earth-shattering, or difficult, or any of that.  It's just ... theirs.  Their lives are theirs, and that's a tricky balance for  a writing mom.  It leaves me evaluating what I want to write about here, and what should remain untouched.  The girls and I talk about all of that. And then together, we move forward through the unknowns of blogging through the teens.

Anne and Betsy constantly amaze me with their brains and their wit and their creativity. And, I probably should write down (or Tweet, God help me) more of the things they say that leave me guffawing and snorting with laughter.  They are two of the most extraordinary people I know.  I love them so much that in certain unguarded, untested moments I think something in my chest is going to erupt or shatter, and then the world (or three or four blog readers) will know that I love Anne and Betsy with the most fierce, unbreakable love possible, a love that couldn't have been explained to me before I became a mother.

A love that knows no categories, labels or blog titles.

A love that doesn't keep track.

It just keeps moving forward.

Why we sometimes don't get anything done around here

Anne: Mom, I told Betsy that Slick is not a wolf.

Me: Huh?

Anne: Her Beanie Baby. It's not a wolf.

Ramona: Clearly, it's a wolf

Anne: No, I think it's a fennec fox. Look at the ears.

Me: Huh? What about the ears?

Betsy: Mom!

Anne: You can tell it's a fennec fox! Just look at it.

Me: Spell "fennec" for me.

Anne: f-e-n-n-e-c

Me: Well ....

Betsy: Mom, it's my Beanie Baby. And I think it's a wolf. I want it to be a wolf.

Ramona: Clearly, it's a wolf.

Me: (sigh)

Anne: Well, foxes have ....

Me: I think we should Google it.

My Brain: Do you really think you should spend time Googling a Beanie Baby?

Me, to My Brain: Yes! It's the only way to stop the madness. We're all too OCD to let go of this.

My Brain: Oh, bother. Go ahead, then. I guess it'll only take a minute.

Me: Betsy, I'm Googling.

Ramona: Clearly, it's a wolf.

Anne: A fennec fox!

[Google Results: Slick is a fox.]

Me: Well, Betsy, it says he's a fox, but if you want him to be a wolf, he can be a wolf.

Ramona: Ooooh, look at how cute that fox is.

Anne: But, Mom -- He's not a wolf. That isn't correct. He's a fox.

Me: It doesn't matter. He belongs to Betsy. He can be whatever she wants him to be.

Ramona: Clearly, he's a fox.

Bits and Pieces of Our Days (In Which Betsy Turns 18, Dons a Cap and Gown, and Her Godfather Gets the Flu)

Last week felt a little frantic.

* Monday: 

We needed to drive to Omaha for Betsy's graduation rehearsal. (Yes, we already celebrated her graduation with the big party, but we also like to participate in a ceremony with the regional Catholic homeschool group.) The only problem was that we still had two vehicles with broken windshields, blah, blah, blah. (I'm tired of talking about the hail storm and you're probably tired of hearing about it, right? But some of it figures into this story, so I'll try not to bore you.)

We did have at our disposal The Clunker, also known as the girls' car.  It's old and it sometimes seems a little rickety, but it runs. And it has a windshield! And it ran us to Omaha for the rehearsal without breaking down. Hurray! We spent a little time chatting with Jack, my kids' godfather, who was slated to be the master of ceremonies at Friday night's graduation. We then grabbed some dinner and drove home. The Clunker made it home, too! Hurray!

We got home, went to pick up the van, and lo and behold, it had a shiny new windshield and a new back passenger window. Hurray!

* Tuesday: 

Lovely live interview with the lovely Roxane Salonen on Real Presence radio. I love talking with Roxane -- I think she must rank somewhere in the top five sweetest people in the world.

Then -- another windshield fixed. Bam! Take that, hail. Safelite is my new hero. Anne and Betsy thought the guy who came to the house looked like Charlie Pace but I didn't notice anything like that. I was just in awe that -- once they actually made it to the house, several days after the storm because they've been so swamped -- those guys could slap a new windshield in so fast.

* Wednesday 

Betsy turned 18! Betsy turned 18?! Betsy turned 18. She really did. We celebrated. There was much chocolate.

* Wednesday and Thursday

Eye appointments for everyone! Ramona is getting glasses! They are purple! They are worthy of all these exclamation points!

Also? Clean the house! I must clean the house! Friends coming for dinner Thursday night!

I think there was water park stuff in there somewhere, too.

* Thursday 

Lovely, quick interview with the crew at Spirit Catholic Radio. Can you believe that Jen Brown had never heard of anyone screeching, "Jesus, I trust in Thee!"? I know, right?

Friends came over for dinner. Friends who then moved away on Saturday. My friends always move. This has been happening for longer than I care to think about. Anyway.... we had a great evening, with beautiful friends whom I will miss so much.

* Late Thursday Night 

Heaved a heavy sigh.

* Friday 

Graduation!

Our dented van with its incongruously beautiful new windshield spirited us to Omaha for the big graduation Mass and ceremony. I hadn't had time to bake anything for the reception so I picked up some of those sugar wafer cookie thingies that are full of artificial colors and flavors. You know the things I mean? Not real food. They were inhaled. Remind me to never bake for an event again. This stuff works.

On the downside, someone who ate no cookies that night was Jack. Jack, you see, along with his entire family, was too busy having stomach flu to venture out of the house.

Jack is better now, but it goes without saying that he did not emcee the ceremony. Poor Jack and poor Jack's entire family, and poor us, because we did not get to see any of them.

* Saturday 

A book store.
Trader Joe's.
Headed home.

* Sunday 

Happy Father's Day to Atticus! We took him out for a Reuben sandwich (we tried a new place, and the Reuben was only so-so) and a couple of beers and we all laughed a lot over dinner and generally felt grateful and happy to be together. He told me later that despite the so-so sandwich, the company was excellent and it was one of the best Father's Days he's ever had.

* This week? 

I plan to recover from last week.

TV and Movie Talk

Last month, we got rid of cable TV in order to save a little money, so now we watch stuff past its prime via Netflix or Hulu. This is working extremely well (and thanks to my friend Beth for telling me about Roku, too) since we don't mind watching stuff a day or two later (or years later, in some cases.)

There are two situations in my life that make me want to turn to TV:

1. The end of a long day. Dare I say this is many days? Not always, and much more often on the weekends. But, at the end of a long or stressful day I like to curl up next to Atticus and watch something we both really enjoy. Add a glass of red wine. Perfect mix.

2. Working out. I have this thing called a Fitness Flyer (although I always forget its name and refer to it as the "Flexible Flyer" which leads Atticus to tease me about going sledding) which I bought from the Magical Mrs. M. for $15. It's the best $15 I ever spent, though I didn't fully appreciate that until this past Lent, when I added 45-minute workouts to my life. In the past, I couldn't get beyond the 20-30 minute mark on the Flyer without some pain in my back. This Lent, I pushed through the pain and extended the workouts to 45 minutes, many more times per week, and I got beyond the pain-in-the-back. Who knew that actually strengthening those back muscles would do the trick?

Anyway, while I'm working out/sledding, I watch something. Preferably, a show that will make me pine for the next episode, so that I'll be motivated to work out again.

Here's what I am/we are watching these days:

TV:
Awake 
Atticus and I watch this one together. I'm a Jason Isaacs fan, so it had me at " ... starring Jason Isaacs"  but I love the premise and so far love the execution. The last two episodes slowed down a bit for me, though, and I'm not sure they can sustain what they've started, but I'm enjoying watching it unfold.

Once Upon a Time
Anne-with-an-e, Betsy, me. Anne and I were late to this one, though.  To catch up with Betsy, I watched an episode a day, during workouts. I loved what Haley said the other day about it. I agree with her, but mostly come out on the awesome side and have a lot of fun with it.

Friday Night Lights
Atticus and me. (Why, yes, we are always late to every party ... how did you know? I'm years behind on Lost, too, but more about that in a minute.) The football! (That is not a cheerleading kind of exclamation point.) The obsessions! The bad choices! More bad choices! Pathos, pathos everywhere, and not a clear head in sight!

After the first few episodes, I turned to Atticus and said, "I can't decide if I like it or if it makes me want to kill myself."

We watched the entire first season, but I may be done with it. It's just so exhausting to watch that many people wreck their lives. Still, I kinda want to find out what happens with Landry ...


Lost
Watched by me, during workouts and by Anne and Betsy whenever they can get their hands on a laptop computer. Couldn't get Atticus to watch it with me when it was on, and I still can't get him interested. I'm hooked. Anne and Betsy are almost a whole season ahead of me.

So don't tell me anything. Even though I kinda know where it's going because I read too many blogs and have too many friends who watched it for six years.


Movies:

Atticus and I have recently watched:

The Trip:  Funny (especially the dueling Michael Caine voices), touching, thoughtful ... surprised me.

Midnight in Paris: Roger Ebert said, "This film is sort of a daydream for American lit majors." I couldn't have said it better. Perfect date night movie for Atticus and me. How often can you say, "Hemingway had me laughing out loud!" I loved this movie. Pass the popcorn.

Bright Star: Atticus and I watched this several months ago, and Anne and Betsy watched it very recently. John Keats, the love of his life, pining, death ... A different kind of perfect date night movie. Lovely. Jane Campion makes everything waft as in a celestial dream.

To Serve Them All My Days
This was one of the first shows Atticus and I ever watched together, back when we were dating oh-so-many years ago. A few months back, we watched it again and though it's now rather dated, it's really lovely, and funny and poignant and I loved it as much as I did the first time around.

***

Finally, I have to mention that Anne and Betsy recently watched Tootsie. Now they know why Atticus and I have said the following things for years (things which previously baffled them):

"Quick, quick, like little bunnies!"

"You were a tomato! A tomato doesn't have logic! It can't move!"

"You've got a Howard Johnson's thing going."

"It is for the money, isn't it? It's not so you can wear these little outfits?"

***

Disclaimer: Some of the above have varying levels of language and violence that might be offensive to some, so be sure to check them out for yourself before deciding what's appropriate for you, your kids, etc.

Bits and Pieces of Our Days (and Birthdays!)

Last week the girls had the opportunity to participate in a Missoula Children's Theater production. This terrific traveling troupe comes to town every year, but we never seem to have an entire week open to make it work. And an entire week is needed indeed: auditions take place on Monday, the kids rehearse all week, and then present two shows on Saturday. Whew!

Betsy played a wild boar (a Rodney Dangerfield sort of comedian boar) and Anne-with-an-e was a sarcastic billy goat. Poor Betsy got sick Friday night, but an antihistamine, some Tylenol and a little caffeine got her through two performances on Saturday. Today she happily collapsed into a heap for most of the day.

*****

I still have not blogged anything about The Next Food Network Star, much to Anne-with-an-e's annoyance.  Sigh. I have been admittedly remiss. I'm sorry, Anne.

Our whole family watches together every week (we're geeky fun that way) and we make predictions about who will stay, who will go, and who is dull and ridiculous. I must humbly admit that I'm usually right. (Although tonight I was wrong, mistakenly thinking that Serena wouldn't make the cut.) I can't say any of us were sad to see Brianna go -- she wasn't popular around here after she stomped on Serena's foot. And the girls were happy to finally see Cute-Brad-Who-Needs-To-Smile rise to the top.

But -- I'm sorry, Anne, I have to digress -- I still have the same complaint I have every year. If the Food Network really wanted to find the next great TV cooking instructor, wouldn't they ask people to demonstrate their strengths instead of putting them through these silly paces? Don't worry, Anne -- I still have a lot of fun watching with you. I simply cannot tell a lie. Food Network is irritating me with the ever-increasing manufactured drama here. The show is, perhaps, a new and more terrifying kind of Hunger Game.

*****

Betsy turned 14 this summer. It is simply not possible to believe the joy that this girl has brought into our lives for the last fourteen years. Betsy radiates joy and love. That sounds like a cliche, but it's oh-so-true. She once prompted a friend of mine to say, "I want to have a Betsy!"

Happy birthday, my sweetheart, my child.

*****

Ramona turns eight this month.

Eight.

Ramona is turning eight. She was three when I started this blog. This was my first Ramona post:

What a Princess Eats

Our three-year-old, affectionately known as Ramona around here, was trying on princess dress-up clothes this morning. I interrupted, in that irritating way mothers do, to ask if she would like some string cheese (aka "cheese sticks" in RamonaSpeak.)

"No," said Ramona. "Princesses don't eat cheese sticks. Princesses only eat brownies. Did you know that?"

I didn't know that. Hmmm . . . there happens to be a pan of brownies sitting on our stove top at this very moment. Coincidence? Or Divine Providence? Perhaps just a princess's sovereign right.

And, one of my favorite early Ramona quotes, from a couple of months later:

Ramona just turned to me, a pencil mark on her cheek, and said, "Recently, I crossed myself out."

Eight, dear readers. But still quotable. The other day, she found an old tape measure -- slightly worse for the wear, as a bit of the end was torn off.


"Hey!" she said. "This is great! I just found 59 inches of fun!"

Poetry Friday: On Turning Ten with Billy Collins

I've been thinking about my children this week.

"Oh, (snort!) really, Karen? There's a new one. How novel! How original!"

Oh, stop.

Granted, I talk about them a lot. As if, you know, they're my life or something. Weeeell, yeah.

Not that "they're my life" in the way I used to scorn, the way I used to think would be a total abdication of my Self and a complete submersion of anything that was truly "me," truly "other," truly important. I used to think that women who ordered their worlds around their children were lost and sad. But now that I have these three incredible human beings in my life, I see that I was lost and sad before they were a part of it. They have enriched my life beyond measure, and that's a pretty good reason to order my world around them for the eighteen or so years I'll get to have them. And when they're gone, my world will not fall apart, as I used to think worlds did for stay-at-home mothers with empty nests. No, I will not suddenly find that I submerged my identity for their sake. No, I will be richer -- I will have a different, and better identity -- for having spent time with them. And I'll be grateful for lives well-lived. Theirs and mine.

What started this whole train of thought?

It might have started with Ramona and Betsy, a couple of days ago. I was sitting on my bed, writing. Ramona came, tentatively, into the room, with a stricken look on her face. Tears were imminent.

"What's the matter, sweetie?" I asked, as she climbed onto the bed and curled up next to me.

She looked mournfully into my eyes and then bravely shared her sorrow: "Betsy doesn't believe in fairies anymore!" she blurted out, and began to sob.

Oh, my. That is a blow for one so young. Her own sister, too. How did this happen?

It must have been that time I looked away for ten minutes. And when I looked back, my Betsy had been growing up. So. Betsy has banished fairies from her life. That's bound to happen sometime after the age of ten, I suppose. And Betsy's nearly a couple of years past that marker. But, I miss my nine-year-olds of days gone by. I now have two former nine-year-olds, and I miss the magic of that age, you know? The charmed existence of one who is intoxicated by a world ripe with imagined possibilities and enchanted creatures around every corner.

And so, when I found this poem, a few tears welled up. Billy Collins doesn't usually make me do that. He usually makes me laugh, or want to buy him a cup of coffee, or run to Atticus and say, "Listen to this one!" But, upon reading "On Turning Ten" I just wanted to hold my children and heal all the wounds that will come their way.

About this poem, Billy Collins said:

that he’s never written the perfect poem. But there’s one, “On Turning Ten,” that comes the closest to being perfect.
...
“I wrote this as a comic satire on the habit of poets to take themselves very seriously on their birthdays when those birthdays can be divided by ten,” says Collins.

“There are a lot of poems written about being 30 and 40 and 50. And I thought let's have fun with this and write a poem about turning ten.”
...
“But as I wrote the poem, the poem kind of got away from me,” adds Collins. “And I started to get into the kind of seriousness of this young 10- year-old dealing with mortality for the first time.”

(Read the whole article and interview here.)

from On Turning Ten:

You tell me it is too early to be looking back,
but that is because you have forgotten
the perfect simplicity of being one
and the beautiful complexity introduced by two.
But I can lie on my bed and remember every digit.
At four I was an Arabian wizard.
I could make myself invisible
by drinking a glass of milk a certain way.
At seven I was a soldier, at nine a prince.
...
It seems only yesterday I used to believe
There was nothing under my skin but light.
If you cut me I would shine.

(Read the whole poem here, at Billy-Collins.com)

The poem still works on that delightful satirical level. I love it for that. And I love it for what it became, too. (And I love anyone who gives children credit for being real human beings rather than just messy little creatures who need to grow up.)

And, just as I smile and sympathetically nod at the boy in this poem, I can both laugh and cry at Ramona's sorrow over a sister who no longer believes in fairies. It's sweetly amusing, but that doesn't mean it isn't lamentable. It is.

It is.

Wounds will come. Children will know them as such long before they can articulate why it hurts so much. And so I will continue to order my world around these lovely people -- fairy believers and fairy scoffers both -- to help salve wounds, share laughter and, with grace and help, remind them that one day we'll reach that place where, truly, no matter what, every day, when we are cut, we will shine.

**********
Sarah at Just Another Day of Catholic Pondering is hosting the Poetry Friday roundup today.

Our First Days of School

Recently (oh, was that really back on August 21st?) I mentioned that we'd be getting back to school after Labor Day. We did indeed start and it's been pronounced "Good!" by those in the know (that would be Ramona.)

First Day of School:

Went to Mass. Lovely, quiet, daily Mass. Lovely, quiet way to start and fortify our day.

Went to breakfast (though I would argue that Ramona's #1 choice -- a McGriddle at MacDonald's -- is not, in actuality, food).

Music lessons for Betsy and Ramona. We are the scum at the bottom of the barrel when it comes to keeping up with instruments over the summer. When there is no routine -- when no one named Mom is writing on Whiteboard Central in the kitchen, "Practice Today!" -- it doesn't seem to happen. Apparently, I am completely to blame. But, they're getting back up to speed quickly, and all is well and all will be well.

Math for everyone! Because we love it so much! Oh, wait. No. That's not the reason.
(Fact: I have five posts labeled "Math" on this blog. And one of them is a rerun.)

The park. Because it was a gorgeous day. Because it's fall. Because that means I'm coming back to life after wilting like old lettuce for months.

A spelling book! Because Ramona likes to challenge me.

Writing. Because we love it so much! And this time that's true!
(Fact: I have 133 posts labeled "Writing", "Blogging", or "Writing With the Kids." And those are just the ones I remembered to label.)

We're starting our Writing Groups up again. Ramona meets with hers at a friend's house, and I host one here for the teens. This year's a little different, though. For the past three years, Writing Group has been "my girls" -- Anne-with-an-e, Betsy, and their two best friends. So, we can be as girly as we want to be, and Betsy can write as many Jane Austen-y romance-y subplots as she likes, and these four such-best-friends-you-can-barely-tell-them-apart can write stories that include every inside joke they've ever split their sides over.

But this year, Anne and her best friend are busy with college classes, and meeting with us during the week doesn't work. Ack! What are we to do?

It happens that there are now two teen boys who are also interested in coming to Writing Group, so the dynamic has changed. Everyone has agreed not to laugh at anyone else's idea of good writing, whether that idea includes true love or things blowing up real good.

Days since the first day have included: 

The Prairie Thief read-aloud (which can be accomplished only when both Anne and Betsy are home and free to listen because they've made it clear they'll kill me if we read Lissa's new book without them.)

A visit to the library to hear a Laura Ingalls Wilder Chautauqua. Will probably do a separate post about it.

Betsy is reading Quiet, and a Sherlock Holmes book. (And doing math! Because she loves it so much! Just keep saying it, Karen....)

Some Books We Read in 2016

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, Rachel Joyce
A Man Called Ove, Fredrik Backman
Betsy was a Junior, Maud Hart Lovelace 
The Pretend Wife, Bridget Asher
Essentialism, Greg McKeown
In This House of Brede, Rumer Godden
Yes, Please, Amy Poehler
Bossy Pants, Tina Fey
Little Men, Louisa May Alcott
Jo's Boys, Louisa May Alcott
Driving Hungry, Layne Mosler 
Between Shades of Gray, Ruta Sepetys
Still Life, Louise Penny
One Plus One, JoJo Moyes
Prisoner B-3087, Alan Gratz
Why Not Me? Mindy Kaling
Betsy and Joe, Maud Hart Lovelace
The Power of Vulnerability,  Brene Brown (Audible)
What Alice Forgot, Liane Moriarty
A Canticle for Leibowitz, Walter Miller, Jr.
Hannah Coulter, Wendell Berry
Nest, Esther Erhlich
The Madwoman Upstairs, Catherine Lowell
Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, Jack Thorne
The Awakening of Miss Prim, Natalia San Martin Fenollera
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, J.K. Rowling
Betsy and the Great World, Maud Hart Lovelace
The Light Between Oceans, M.L. Stedman
Far From the Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
My Name is Lucy Barton, Elizabeth Strout
Betsy's Wedding, Maud Hart Lovelace
The One in a Million Boy, Monica Wood
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, Annie Barrows and Mary Ann Shaffer 
Crosstalk, Connie Willis
Lab Girl, Hope Jahren
A Circle of Quiet, Madeleine L'Engle
84 Charing Cross Road, Helene Hanff 
The Curious Charms of Arthur Pepper, Phaedra Patrick

Two NaNoWriMo novels -- Betsy wrote one in July and one in November

Books I read with Ramona:

The Titan's Curse
Battle of the Labyrinth
The Last Olympian (all three are part of Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson series)
The Pushcart War, Jean Merrill
The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupery
The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Perilous Journey, Trenton Lee Stewart
Return to Gone Away, Elizabeth Enright 
The Candymakers and the Great Chocolate Chase, Wendy Mass
Jane of Lantern Hill, L.M. Montgomery
The Rise and Fall of Mount Majestic, Jennifer Trafton
The Curious World of Calpurnia Tate, Jacqueline Kelly
From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, E.L. Konigsburg
The Shadow of the Bear, Regina Doman
Black as Night, Regina Doman

~~~~~

Top three picks? (No, don't make me pick! Okay, I will): 

In This House of Brede
Hannah Coulter
Far From the Madding Crowd

Book I'm really glad I read but will probably never read again?

A Canticle for Leibowitz

Books that filled me with happiness when I needed it: 

All things Maud Hart Lovelace and L.M. Montgomery

Books I finished, but that disappointed me the most: 

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child 
The Awakening of Miss Prim 

Books I didn't finish, for a variety of reasons: 

Lab Girl (actually a really good memoir, I just wasn't in the mood for memoir. I plan to return to it.)

My Name is Lucy Barton (I felt I was reading an entirely different book than the one I'd heard described by others as lovely. Maybe it was just my frame of mind at the time? I don't know.)

Favorite read-aloud with Ramona:
Jane of Lantern Hill
The Curious World of Calpurnia Tate

~~~~~

What were your top three books of 2016? 

Photo credit: FreeImages.com

Homeschooling Just One

That's what I'm doing this year for the first time ever.

Yeah, sure, in a way I had just one "student" when we first started homeschooling. Anne-with-an-e was seven years old, Betsy just four. Anne was (I'm sorry, sweetie) my experimental student. I tried out different methods on her, tinkered with ideas, approaches, math curricula.  But Betsy was always there, soaking in the atmosphere, listening to the books, playing with the manipulatives, eating the cookies. I never felt that I was homeschooling only one daughter -- we were living a homeschooling life together.

But, now that my older daughters are out in the world, taking classes from other people, I am finally, truly, homeschooling just one child. Anne and Betsy don't need me, which is really great in its way. There's real fulfillment in knowing that my daughters were well prepared for the stage of life they're living now. And, there's relief in knowing that their academic work is their business. (I couldn't answer a Chemistry question if you paid me in chocolate and coffee. Truly, Anne's Chemistry homework is a mystery to me on a par with the Trinity. Intricacies unseen, combinations that produce whole new entities ... it boggles my mind. If it isn't explained on a Jesse Pinkman level, I don't understand it.)

And that leads me to the present, in which I am homeschooling only one daughter. Over the summer, I wondered about how this year would proceed: What would it be like for the two of us to be on our own? Would we get bored with each other? Would we feel as if we were rattling around the house, waiting for others to join us? Or would we dig in, full of anticipation and excitement, ready to tackle hundreds of projects and take on every academic challenge?

The answer is (as it always seems to for me) in the middle. Yes, we miss Anne and Betsy, but Ramona and I have settled into The New Normal and we are loving it. There's a delightful balance to our days. There are outside activities (a weekly art class, another monthly art class, piano lessons, choir), as well as group activities that we both participate in (her writing group, swimming weekly with other homeschoolers.) And then there are the treasured days when we don't have to leave the house -- we tackle math, read aloud, read aloud, read aloud, write, read poetry, participate in NaNoWriMo, watch Food Network together, make carrot cake, learn about extracting DNA from saliva (hmmm, was it deliberate that I followed up the food references to the saliva reference?), create art, and crafts, and minions.

Sometimes we can even plan activities or outings that work with Anne and Betsy's schedules as we did last Friday when we made a last-minute plan to see Big Hero 6 together (review from Ramona coming soon), or getting to daily Mass together.

Yes, I'm homeschooling just one. But it's a rich, full life.

And we love it.

Ramona, at the end of summer. 

Liberty and Justice for All?

Betsy: Mom, we have a problem with Ramona.

Me: What is it?

Betsy: She thinks all Austrians are bad.

Me: What? Why?

Betsy: Because Hitler was Austrian. Now she thinks all Austrians are bad.

Me: (uproarious laughter)

Betsy: Mom! This is not funny! She's prejudiced!

Me: (getting hold of myself) Okay, okay. I'll talk to her.

Betsy: Thank you. Now we can go back to playing Ann Estelle.

Bits and Pieces of Our Days

* When I last did a Bits & Pieces post, my kitchen counter was messy. A percentage of the messiness was the huge project in which Anne-with-an-e and Betsy were immersed. Their play -- a musical performed by the parish youth choir and written/directed by Anne and Betsy and their two best friends, Sarah and Mary -- came off beautifully last weekend.

The week leading up to it featured last-minute costume runs, and some final T-shirt prep:

We also ran around town to a couple of different radio stations so that Betsy and one of the stars of the show could participate in interviews. Much fun.

Performance day arrived on Sunday. The choir was in top form, we had a great, big crowd, a terrific pre-show (a magician who still has me scratching my head over his Houdini thing), and lots of pizza, good company, and chatting afterward. If I do say so myself, "Bible Bound: The Ultimate Journey" was a musical of Biblical proportions. I'm so proud of my girls (and my other two girls, Sarah and Mary) for taking on this project. We're so blessed to have an amazing liturgy director who had faith in the girls when he asked them to take this production on.

* We've also been busy getting the girls ready for a big pilgrimage. They took off today and we now have a rather quiet household. Ramona and I have a few Mommy-Daughter projects planned since she has me all to herself for a few days. Are Barbies in my future? Maybe I can just talk her into a long walk and then ply her with chocolate.

* Anne-with-an-e is loving her community college Spanish class. She's not used to this thing called "homework" but she loves learning the language. Ramona, however, still can't get used to the phrase, "Anne's at school, remember?"

* Pizza Fondue was recently a hit here. I highly recommend it for a quick and tasty meal.

* Recently the subject of Daniel Radcliffe came up. Both Betsy and Anne think he's exceedingly adorable but Betsy pointed out that she could never truly love someone who doesn't love cake.  I think I'm raising them right.

It Was One of Those Days

Last week I had one of those days. Nothing horrible, just a day.

Betsy's asthma was flaring up, after a cold, for the first time in ... what? A year? Eighteen months? I went to call in a refill on her inhaler, but realized the prescription had expired. (That will happen, I guess, when one seems free of asthma for many moons.) So I called the doctor to see if he would phone in a new prescription, just to get her over this hump. The nurse said she would call me back only if there was a problem, and she thought I could plan on picking up the prescription in a few hours.

I moved on. I wanted to print out a couple of notes for an interview I'd be doing the following day. We'd just had the modem replaced the day before and suddenly the wireless printer didn't want to communicate with the new modem. Their temperamental little spat was not amusing. I tried to get them to make up, but the printer would have none of it. I couldn't print a thing, and Anne asked me why I kept yelling futile commands at the printer.

After lunch, (on break from Printer Battle Royale) I called the pharmacy just to make sure the prescription was ready to be picked up. I thought I'd run out quickly, grab it, come home, work out. Then I could enter the electronic war zone again while endorphins were coursing through my body and I felt supremely patient and in command of my forces.

The pharmacy had no record of the prescription being called in.

After heaving a sigh that was probably heard in southern Florida, I called the doctor's office again. I gave the long, plaintive version of Betsy's history. I pleaded with the nurse to relay to the doctor that it was imperative for them to believe that Betsy knows what she needs today. (Because she just does, that's all.) The nurse said she would talk to the doctor and see what was up.

While I was waiting for the doctor's office to call back, I ... I don't know what I did. I didn't work out, I know that. Because I was, you know, waiting.

The doctor's office finally called back, and I was told we could get the inhaler renewal called in and then was given a stern admonition that Betsy must be seen.

I needed to throw something on the table for dinner, so I did. I have no idea what we ate. I then embarked on another quick (I hoped, ridiculously) battle with the printer, but I didn't make any headway. I retreated. I needed to go pick up the inhaler, so I headed out to do that, thinking I'd make it quicker by going through the drive-through at the pharmacy. I sent my credit card through the ever-so-convenient pneumatic tube. But the poor girl at the other end of the transmission got a confused look on her face. Even over the Skype-y screen that we were talking on, I knew something was wrong.

"You ...  didn't send your payment through ... did you?" she asked, brow furrowed.

"Yes."

"Hmmm. It ... ummm...."

I could tell that she didn't know how to tell me this.

"It ... didn't make it."

Yes, people, pneumatic tubes sometimes gobble up credit cards.

Just because they can.

This had never happened to the nice lady at the pharmacy. It wasn't her fault. I knew that. I paid with another card. The pharmacy lady "heard something fall" at her end of the tube. She and I both got rather excited to know that my credit card was not eaten, but was simply in hiding. I got Betsy's inhaler, the lady explained that they'd get the maintenance guys into the store in the morning, and they'd dig my card out. I drove home, expecting to hit a deer.

(I didn't.)

It was one of those days. Frustration. Tears of frustration. Just one of those days.

I did battle awhile longer with the printer when I got home, finally Googled a hack to get the machines talking again, rejoiced when it worked, printed out some notes, reviewed them, and finally flopped in to bed.

Did you know that there's really no point to this post other than to share the day? And to remind myself (and others), I guess, that we all have days like this. Sometimes it's a mood, sometimes it's hormones, sometimes it's because everything really is going wrong and we're reminded that maybe Murphy's Law isn't just an expression.

I tell my daughters this kind of stuff regularly. When someone's had a rotten day, and someone is in tears, or someone is feeling ultra-stressed, I remind them: This is life. It's full of bad days, good cries, and new starts on the morrow.

It was just a day. The next day was better. Most days are better.

After one of those days, it's just nice to say that out loud and know that it's true.