Recovering

Chocolate party and pie night in the same day . . . recovering now. All naps tomorrow.

The Crowd She Runs With

It is no secret that I adore Evie's friends. She has a standing playdate every Wednesday with a friend we only half-jokingly say she's known since before she was born--her mom and I were pregnant at the same time. I get almost as excited as Evie when her friends come to play.

Another one of her friends is a fellow only child. Her parents are dynamic and creative and all around wonderful folks whom we love spending time with. We didn't meet them until Evie was 5--we are working hard to catch up on lost time.

Anyway, said friend (the only child, not Ms. Wednesday or any other friends previously mentioned in blog posts) called yesterday to ask Evie if she could come over to play. Yup! She was to be dropped off at 1:00 and Scott and I were to return at 3:00 for a surprise party for the friend's parents. Evie's friend had put on their family calendar, weeks ago, on the "November 20th" square, "3:00 Big Surprise!"

The girls must have called each other 5 times yesterday and today. Evie made bottles of smell (various extracts) to put around the house to mask the smell of baking cookies. They cleaned and decorated. We showed up 3:00 in our fanciest duds, accordion music was blasting, there was tea and cake. We had a grand time! Her parents never suspected a thing!

A surprise party for no reason, planned weeks in advance, parents who dress up and giggle--some might say Evie is really lucky, and she is. But really, this is just how she rolls! Nice life!

Whirlwind

To cover all we've done in the past two days would take an epic poem. Speaking of which, we found an old Japanese animated version of the Odyssey to check out tomorrow.

Anyway, we are in full holiday crafting mode these days. Evie is using the sewing machine a lot more and my little unschooling heart thrilled to the sounds of she and a friend in the sewing room today. The friend has a sewing machine but has never used it. She asked Evie to teach her how. Evie responded, "Well, I can show you where a few things go, but like with everything, sewing is something you just have to DO!"


Books on hold, lists being made, cookies baked and frozen, talk about traditions, phone calls, whispers and out and out joy. Evie loves to conduct the Muppets every year--she is already practicing. Her enthusiasm is contagious.

Satisfied

Three glimpses of satisfaction

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Sunday morning I had the opportunity to have two uninterrupted hours of conversation with an old friend. We have known each other since we were 12, she now has four girls and is an awesome mama. She asked interesting and interested questions about what our days look like. How do we homeschool? I gave the broad Venn diagram explanation of the three basic camps of homeschooling--school at home (protecting kids from what they might get at school), eclectic (name says it all), unschooling. I said unschooling is the idea that we live as if the institution "school" did not exist. If that were the case, how would people live? How would people learn? As my friend asked questions and expressed her own fears about *NOT* using the school system I became more and more satisfied with our choice. I really do trust my child. I really do believe that the ups and downs of life provide the richest possible experience.


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After log rolling on Sunday we were hunkered down with the three other girls from Evie's team that were there, all in their early teens. They were doing homework. The more I listened the more furious I became at how disrespectful the school institution is of their time and their intellect. One girl's homework involved solving math problems with a calculator, then turning the calculator upside down and copying down the word made by the upside down numbers. The homework of another girl was copying biology terms from the text into a fill-in-the-blanks worksheet. When that girl asked a question about something she received the answer, "oh, we did that last year so I don't remember it anymore." These are smart, talented interesting girls who go to well-regarded schools! They quickly abandoned their homework when one suggested we all play a game. Suddenly crochet projects came out, we started talking about food and agriculture and cooking. We started laughing and telling jokes. I was so mad that our society is satisfied with sticking kids in a system that wastes their time and dulls their mind. It is not the fault of teachers or specific schools, in fact there are shining examples of folks combating the drudgery. We need to wake up and realize there are other ways. Schooling does not equal education.

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We had rough start to the morning today. I woke up still tired, unable to muster much enthusiasm. I took a walk. Evie read. Then Evie wanted to clean the pantry. Then we found all sorts of grains in the pantry so we ground them in a hand-crank coffee grinder and made bagels. Then I read aloud and Evie started to draw. She drew and drew and drew. Then we had a visit from my parents. Then we ate dinner. Then Scott went to skating. Evie and I did and exercise video. Then we went to the sewing room and worked side by side. I tried to thread the Serger and failed three times. She worked on a project and made lots of mistakes. Then Scott came home and we went to a holiday light show. Then we all got ready for bed. Then we fell asleep around 11:00. Right before bed Evie said, "You know sometimes you have days that are just okay and some days your really satisfied with what you've done? Today I am REALLY satisfied." Thank goodness I didn't try any harder than I did at the beginning of our day, it might not have been very satisfying.

November Nationals

Evie won her division at the November Nationals log rolling tournament today. She also took 3rd in speedroll (how many times you can spin the log in 30 seconds) and 2nd in the Super Series (combines scores from all tournaments for entire year). She had fun as always, the entire Madison team rocked it!

Way to go kiddo!

Perspective

Today our 4H group raked leaves for folks who can no longer get out and do it themselves and who don't have family or friends who offer to do it. Only one of the folks was able to come to the door, we was a veteran in his eighties, working on learning how to use a computer and so appreciative of the task we were doing. So easy for us, so meaningful to him. We didn't meet any of the other folks we raked. I knocked on all the doors, they had been told ahead of time that we were coming, but whether moving was too hard or accepting help was too hard, it really made us all think about the power of relationships.



All day we also waited on news about a friend who was having major brain surgery. The surgery went extremely well, the recovery will be challenging but okay. This family is surrounded by community, thousands of hits on their website, 600 comments on a single post. Facebook, Skype, Twitter and old-fashioned blogging allowed a HUGE group of us to rally around this family throughout the day as we read updated and interacted with the family and each other. This family is one in which once you are a friend, you are a part of their family. Relationships are so powerful.

Sadness

Our sweet Snowman died today. He started doing poorly yesterday, held him for hours yesterday and today. Took him to the vet, euthanasia was the humane choice, Evie held him, we are all exhausted. Rough stuff, this life.