Cindy's Life as She Knows It

This has been a week of visits and gatherings and I have spent time with people who have made me feel better about myself and who have allowed me to breath, relax and take time off from my very busy schedule. On Tuesday, my sister Debbie, whom I haven't seen for more than an hour in six months, came over with her grandson and we hung out for the day, ordering Chinese for lunch and chatting on the deck.  She watched my granddaughter while I went with my oldest to see her 20 week sonogram and then when I returned, we went to dinner with my niece and my sister's best friend and both of my niece's children.  We had crabs, a crab pretzel and bread pudding.  The conversation was excellent.  The food great and the chance to just relate to other women, priceless. On Wednesday, my co-op had their end of year picnic at the park across from my house.  As always, the children played really well together, leaving us moms to chat about our lives and to plan for our next c...

Everybody has them....strengths and weaknesses.  I know I sure do.  I think it's really important to embrace them; to know when the sky is the limit and when you have limitations. God put me on this Earth for a reason and I felt the calling early on.  I love children.  I love to teach and I love to learn.  My "talent", as it were, is to raise and educate children in many capaciities.  I have been a mom since the age of nineteen and have spread my children out so that I have had a child under 10 in our home almost every year since 1985.  I have done childcare in my home for not only my own children, but for nieces, nephews, cousins, grandchildren and friends.  I have worked in daycare settings, been a nanny, worked in private preschool settings and in public elementary school settings.  I have been a team mom, a coach, a cooperative educator, a home educator.  I have been a Girl Scout leader and a Boy Scout leader.  Whatever it is ...

Today we had our 7-8 Pirates game first and then our 8U Chargers game following.  We got to baseball at 9 for practice and the kids were eager to play and in a great mood.  They played "off the hook", catching fly balls and making plays at the plate.  All of them did well, including Dakota, who had an excellent game. We left there and came back to have lunch with Keri and Brian David.  Brian and Dakota left for football first while I had an interview with a mom who is interested in me watching her daughter part time.  I got to football well before the game and, even though the other team was bigger and better, I felt our boys played really well.  They had alot of energy and except for the normal few, played like a team.  Dakota made huge progress today, actually being aggressive in his ball playing and making a tackle on his own.  I was super proud of him. Now we are home for the rest of the weekend.  He has his friend, Bryce, over for a ...

So we are down to the last three Mondays of second grade.  Today we went to a new homeschool group to experience their Lego Lab and maybe a make a few new friends.  Dakota liked the building and the boys there and the moms were very welcoming and easy to talk to for me.  Natalie terrorized the place, but no one seemed to mind and I did my best to keep her from getting into things.  I am considering joining the group so we can take part in some of their events and classes, but haven't quite made up my mind. When we got home, Dakota ate lunch and got started on his school work.  It's always harder to get him to focus in the afternoon and today was no different.  He started reading his Star Wars book on his own and then came out to do his morning work.  We took a spelling pre-test and he did the workbook pages that went along with that and then did his math.  Afterward, we opened our new Weather Station Magic School Bus Kit to get us started on the...

This week we had a good Monday and Tuesday, but Dakota ended up getting sick somewhere in the middle of the night/early morning on Wednesday and couldn't sleep, cried constantly, threw up once and was just miserable.  He was up early, slept for a few hours, managed to eat lunch and felt better.  I thought Thursday would get us on track because we now have a goal to finish our lessons and our texts by May 31, our last review day.  He got up sluggish, however, threw up again and then cried some more.  Back to bed he went to rest for the day and I didn't see much improvement in his energy level until late in the evening.  I decided to cancel a scheduled field trip to Frederick for Friday because I wasn't sure of his health and we also missed two days of school and I knew we needed to get things caught up.  I spent the afternoon with my granddaughter on our deck under cloudless blue skies and then while one daughter kept the kids, the other daughter and I wen...