Ok, there was a post here that was written normally – and then when I looked online, somehow it had gotten all discombobulated!

Starting over…

I will admit, yesterday I had gotten pretty frustrated with the way things were going. I just felt like I’ve been swimming upstream, dragging Pez behind me, for 4 months. I was tired of the same fight, different day thing we’ve been going through. I sat here googling different options – trying to find SOMETHING affordable for us that wouldn’t mean sending him back to school. What I found was Time4Learning, which is a website that contains an entire homeschool curriculum (which can also be used for summer learning or extra help for kids who need it). It has every grade, and the core subjects, with lesson plans all planned out, and it automatically grades the child’s work! It only costs $19.95/month. Sure – free would be better, but whaddya want? $20 a month is pretty reasonable, if it works.

Yesterday I set up our accounts and got Pez registered, joined the parent forum, and looked into what I needed to do today. All in all, the investment of my time to get him going this morning was less than 2 hours. I’ve sat next to him all morning helping him figure out what he’s doing, but really, he had the navigation figured out in less than 10 minutes. The look and feel of it is nice, and it not only has a wide variety of content, it has a lot of games, so that the kids can spend some time on the “playground” in between subjects. The absolute best part about that is, it limits their “playground” time to 15 minutes. Pez IS a little frustrated with that, because sometimes the games take a little time to load, and it uses up his “play time”.

Our only REAL complaint so far is that we are getting a TON of page load errors, particularly when doing quizzes and tests, that cause Pez to have to start over. It’s REALLY frustrating, but usually you can get back in within a few mintues. I’m hoping this is just some sort of glitch today, becuase if it works this way all the time, it is something that would make me reconsider using their system.

All in all though, Pez seems to like what he’s doing. I’m not frustrated, an figured out what I need to do pretty easily. If we can conquer the page load problem, and if Pez stays interested, we’ll be good. Granted, this is entirely with me sitting right next to him. We’ll see what happens if I get up to do any housework. I did have to disable our web blocker, but hopefully if it becomes a problem, I can find a way around it.

Today I am feeling very much like Professor Umbridge. NO, I am not making Pez write “I will not tell lies.” into the back of his hand, but I do have to keep disciplining him, and it’s just NO FUN.

One of the particular challenges with Pez is keeping him on task. His ADHD makes this a much harder task than you would think. You literally would have to be sitting next to him, staring at his screen and him at all times to keep him on task all day. As you can imagine, with a toddler around and the rest of the household to run, that’s not happening. Prior to this week, it was even harder, as a snafu with our medical spending account left us without his ADHD medication for 2 weeks.

I have been struggling to make progress with his studies even when he IS medicated – so the lack of medication really set us back. The problem is corrected now, but we still struggle.

Two of Pez’s courses are done using the Alpha Omega Switched On Schoolhouse software – so the entire course is done on his laptop. Every morning, he logs in to SOS, and the computer tells him what he needs to work on for the day. Well – he figured out how to skip problems, and was skipping entire assignments. I was just looking at the percentages in the student version, and missed that he was doing this until I had almost 300 problems that I had to individually go through and reassign to him.

Sadly, this version of the software does not have an option to not allow him to skip. Hubs and I both lectured him about the skipping, told him never to do it again, and sat him back down at the computer to fix everything. Hubs even tried sitting next to him last week.

When he said he was done, I logged in and checked. ANOTHER 241 skipped problems.

::sigh::

In addition, we’ve had problems with him getting on the internet and playing games, or bringing up games on his computer to play when he thinks I’m not looking. Frustrating, but I blocked the internet, and figured we were done with the issues.

Yesterday, I told him if he got caught up with everything (which was very doable), we would go see Harry Potter on Friday. I reminded him of that this morning when he started his schoolwork.

Less than an hour later, I caught him playing Solitaire instead of finishing his work.

SO – HP is off the table. I chewed him out. I called Hubs, and made Pez tell Hubs what he was doing. I’m just kind of at a loss, and having to play the enforcer of the rules rather than the fun, exciting teacher is just…a downer.

I’m feeling pretty discouraged at this point, and not sure what to do about him. I really, really felt this was the best option for him, but with the way he abuses it, I just don’t know. I’ve dangled so many golden carrots – playdates with friends, movies, computer time playing games, xbox/wii time, etc….and none of it seems to make a difference with him. I’ve pumped him up for the good things he does…and he still chooses to not do what he’s asked to do. The really frustrating thing is – none of this is HARD for him. He can figure it all out if he chooses to.

I have threatened him with going back to regular school. The therapist told me I had made a mistake in pulling him out of the art/music/gym class he was doing daily when he was having behavior problems there. I didn’t know it at the time, but he had told the therapist he didn’t want to go do them anymore. SO – he acted out and I gave him exactly what he wanted by pulling him out. It’s not a huge jump then to figure out that he thinks, if he just keeps misbehaving, I won’t make him do his schoolwork at home.

I don’t know – I knew this would be a challenge…and I’m not a quitter. I just….didn’t think it would be THIS hard to get him to do such basic things.

So, we’re talking about homeschooling the rest of them. ALL five kids. Yeah, so BonBon isn’t really even to preschool learning yet, but she kind of is, which means it would be all 5.

What made us think this? Well, we’ve always been leery of the things that go on at school like kids showing up with guns, the gang fights, etc. Today, there were two “fire evacuations” back to back, which is unusual. For one of the evacuations, they kept them outside for over a half hour, which is VERY odd. So it left us asking the question – what if we homeschooled all of them.

So here are my considerations:
1) Con – Cheesecake is a Junior. I can’t give her the diversity of classes she takes at school, including college-credit classes.
2) Con – I can’t offer ANY of them beyond grade school the diversity of classes they would get in school
3) Pro – they love the other homeschool kids at church, and would enjoy being a part of that group
4.) both Pro and Con – I would be aware more of what they are and are not learning. Right now, one of our kids isn’t doing homework at home, and when we went to school, found out said kid was kind of disrespecting their teachers, and reading leisure books in class when they should have been paying attention.
5.) Con – it would be very hard to come up with curriculum materials ($$)
6.) Con – I might lose my mind
7.) Big Pro – I know they’d be safe all day, I know what influences they would have, etc
8.) Con – Am I just being too overprotective?
9.) Having ALL of them on the same educational path, schedule, etc would simplify things around the house. not sure if this is a pro or con. Pro, I think…

So I don’t know.

That’s my really rough, 10 minutes worth of thoughts on the entire thing.

I’m frustrated, I can’t get a post written these last couple of days.

I start writing, and then one of eight bajillion things going on around the house gets in the way, and I lose my momentum, and it’s gone.

I wanted to write about how, when I was out driving yesterday, I was listening to the dj on K-LOVE talking about how being a Christian is about having a relationship with Christ – not about rules, or good works, or following some archaic methodology for how to get to heaven. And the thing is – they have to have been saying that my whole life, you know? Why didn’t I hear it, or really GET it, until last year? Why did I waste all that time? Why did it take so long, not only to find my own way, but to start showing my kids the right way?

I had another post written on how much I appreciate all the pastors’ wives in my life…from the ones at church, to my sister-in-law’s mom, and my cousin’s wife. They all give so much of themselves – they sacrifice time with their husbands, and sadly are the subject of a lot of judgement from other people merely because of who they are married to…and it’s not an easy job! But that post didn’t get finished either.

Homeschooling went great Monday and Tuesday. Yesterday? CRASH and BURN. I found out last night, after Pez had gone to bed, that he never took his ADHD meds, and this child, without them, is unable to focus on ANYTHING. I thought he was taking them when I told him to, but obviously, I need to be better about supervising him actually taking the pill. He literally accomplished NOTHING yesterday, so today we start over and try to move ahead. Sadly, I think he’s going to have to do some work on Saturday to get back on track.

Family Morning Devotions? We’re still doing them, but we’re going to have to change things up a little. Since Lemon Drop started conditioning for Swimming, she is going to school 3 days a week at 6 AM. Hubs is getting up to take her, and since he has something one other day each week at 6:30, he decided he’s just going to get up every day at 5 and go in early.

From an FMD perspective, it’s kind of crushed things. We’re still doing them, but we’re doing FAMILY morning devotions with only half our family! I think we’re going to start doing them at dinner instead, which will only be a problem on Wednesdays when we have church to get to. Either way – it’s not dead and gone. WE’re still doing it. The kids still nearly sleep through it, but we’re doing it.

From a family perspective, it seems like we’ve been a little more disconnected the last few days. I don’t know why – with Hubs coming home earlier from work, we end up being together for more of the evening, but he’s been going to bed early, while I still have to stay up with the kids, so we’re missing that time we used to spend talking before we went to sleep each night. We have always spent so much time with each other that when we don’t, we really start to feel like something is wrong! SO we’re going to try and find ways to fix that.

AAAAAAnd…now BonBon is demanding bubbles, so that’s all I’m going to get written today!

Ok, it may not have appeared that way to you, but my blog has been toast for about a week.  Our host did some sort of maintenance, and ended up blocking our internet provider, so I haven’t been able to get to my blog, or my email, since then.  Obviously, my life doesn’t end if I can’t blog – but of course I kept having things I really wanted to blog about, but couldn’t.  Do you think I can remember a single one of those things now?  No.

SO…I’m back amongst the blogging, and in the midst of a flurry of activity around our household.

Scouts starts up again tomorrow night, and Hubs has joined the steering committee (which I was already on in multiple roles), so we are both going to be busy with that.  School starts for the oldest 3 on either Wednesday or Thursday (they have different schedules), so we’ve got last minute stuff for that.  I’m still pulling the curriculum together for Pez, and gearing up for homeschooling.  MOPS is starting up,  so I’ve got planning meetings for that, and on top of it, we’re starting a whole new “family schedule” which will include a devotional time for the whole family every morning before the kids and hubs go off to school. 

Whew.

I know it’s not that much.  I’ve juggled more than this for years.  For some reason, though – it just all feels kind of overwhelming. 

I need to start making lists for myself again.  I’ve gotten out of the habit, but if this homeschooling thing is going to work, I need to get myself back in the organizational saddle!

You know, they always say “it’s the little things in life that make it worth living”.   I don’t know who “they” are, but I get it.  The times when my husband stops to pick up chocolate covered strawberries on his way home, just because he knows it will make my day, the way Pez can get BonBon to laugh uproariously by making silly faces and noise, or the times when my kids just come over and give me a hug for no reason in particular…those are the small things that just make life awesome.

The bad thing is, it’s also the little things that can trip you up.

This week, and last week, and the week before, the thing that has tripped me up is the inability to find our 3-hole punch.  Seriously.  I decided a couple of weeks ago that I was really going to get on the ball again.  (hahaha!)  I printed off household management documents (menu planning, organizing, goal setting), and got all geared up to fill them out and put them in a binder.  (Ren’s sister would refer to this as a CONTROL JOURNAL.  Because I am a reformed “control freak”, I can’t call it that.  So we’ll just call it my little household binder.  MLHB for short.)  I was all motivated.  I was thinking of everything I wanted to write down, all my goals, all my menu plans…it was going to be AWESOME!

No 3-hole punch.

No way to put all my little organizational papers into MLHB!

Instead, all the paperwork has just been sitting here, unloved and not filled out, hanging like a cloud over my head.  It has also been cluttering up my dining room as it sits in the stack of unloved papers I don’t know what to do with.  Intellectually, I REALIZE that I can still fill everything out.   I could probably even get rid of a lot of the rest of “unloved papers” if I would get on the ball with this.

The lack of my 3-hole punch has paralyzed me!

I realized, thinking about it, that there are a lot of times in life when I let the little things get in the way of me accomplishing everything I set out to do.  Whether it’s housework piling up, Bible reading, praying, or even working on my relationship with my husband…there are far too many times when I have let something small get in the way of handling what really needs to be done.

We officially made the decision to homeschool Pez.  I’ve got the paperwork filled out, I just need to make some copies, get some things notarized, and send it off.  Making this change is going to require an overhaul of how we do almost everything around our house on a day-to-day basis.  It means a new schedule, new organizational requirements as I have to keep records of our homeschooling, and it means I need to take care of all those things I let slide far too often that will get in the way of me focusing on educating.

I just have to stop letting the 3-hole punch be the sucker punch to our success.

(Seriously, I could have saved myself all that hassle for $9???  Which I could actually get for free since I have Max Perks credit? There are moments when I am actually not terribly bright.  Shhhhh…don’t tell my husband.)

For over a year now, I’ve felt that, when it comes time for BonBon to start school, I will homeschool her.  I’m not sure why – it’s just something that has come up so many times that I feel like it’s what I’m being led to do.  I have no fear of that – I have three years before I really have to worry about anything other than the basic preschool letters and numbers and all that.  Our church is hugely supportive of homeschooling, and I know the homeschool network is very strong in our area.  So logically, I know this is not going to be a problem.  I have support on every side (that matters) in this area.

Last night, Hubs dropped a bit of a bomb on me.  He thinks I should homeschool our 9 year old, Pez. 

::commence vapor lock::

That would mean I would have to have my ducks in a row in the next month.  That would mean that I have to know all the forms that have to be filed with the appropriate people, all the curriculum options I would have to explore and make a choice on, that I would have to figure out HOW to connect with this network of people out there who could help me do it.

Here’s the catch:  Pez has ADHD.   Pez has ADHD in a MASSIVE, MAJOR way.  He really is a brilliant kid, and I’m not just saying that because I’m his (step)mama.  He’s tested into the high ability learner program in the public school system, which isn’t that easy to do.  He loves math and science, as long as he is medicated.

Without his medication, Pez can’t even make it through a simple addition math sheet on his own.  His attention disorder is so severe, it is the exasperation of everyone he lives with, and most of the teachers he’s had for the last 5 years.   To top that off, when he isn’t medicated, or when his medication wears off, he also has an attitude that goes along with it that is not all that endearing.  All of that aside, he’s one of the most adorable kids you’ll ever find.  He’s just incredibly stinkin’ cute. 

This leaves me with a decision to make.  We think that part of the problem he has in school is that he just isn’t challenged enough.  He isn’t interested in a lot of what goes on there, and to some extent, when he’s medicated, he gets annoyed by the other kids not being able to understand things as quickly as he does.  Class sizes in our school district are 20-25, so he’s 1 in the throng, and he can’t have the individualized attention I could give him at home. 

On the other hand, at home he doesn’t get the social interaction that he needs in order to shut down his “bully” tendencies.  It also doesn’t escape my thinking that if I am home schooling him, it’s ALL PEZ ALL THE TIME – I won’t ever have a break. 

So I’m not sure what to do.  I’m not really worried about my ABILITY to teach him – I think I could handle that pretty easily.  There also wouldn’t be the disconnect that we have frequently with the grade school in terms of Zachary not bringing home his papers, or the teacher not communicating when there’s a problem. 

I know what my husband wants, and I do see the logic in it.

I’m just not quite positive I have that much patience! 

Oi.