Library Woes

Last night I was checking my library account online- something I do on a pretty regular basis since we usually have about 25 items checked out at a time (we're homeschoolers after all) and the late fees can add up in a hurry. I am not usually surprised to see a few 20 cent charges here and there, but I was more than a little shocked to see that I have a new $15 fine for a magazine. That's right- I said $15- for a magazine! Back in September, I am 99.9% sure I returned the magazine in question into the drive up library return drop box. When it first started showing up as late, I emailed the library right away, pleading my innocence. I also stopped by and spoke to a librarian who filled out a claims check on it, and said someone would scour the library to look for the missing magazine. I wondered what would happen if it didn't turn up. I mean, it's a pretty big library, and one little old back issue of National Geographic Kids Magazine could easily get lost or even tossed among all that paper. The librarian wasn't sure the procedure for a lost magazine. It's not like it's a big new hardbound book or something- she said so herself.

Well, I didn't hear about it for over a month, so naturally, I was hoping the problem just went away. Then, out of the blue, I see this whopping fine- $5 for the lost material, and $10 for the “processing fee.” What the heck? I guess that $10 processing fee is for the poor sucker who had to run around unsuccessfully looking for a lost magazine in a multi story building full of paper. But, isn't that what the volunteers are there for? Now, I love my library. We use it all the time; it loans our family a huge portion of our homeschool materials, and I am happy to pay my couple of bucks now and again, but I just find this just a tad bit excessive. They want me to pay $15 for one back issue of a kid's magazine? Give me a break. You can get a 1 year subscription to National Geographic Kids Magazine for $15, which only makes this more frustrating. I like to support having a nice community service like the library, but this just annoys me.

So, I emailed my case again. Apparently, I have to call “the supervisor” on Tuesday. Maybe I should just pay the $15 and get it over with. After all, my family borrows books, videos, and obviously magazines, all year for free. I probably will end up paying it in the end, but in this case, it's the principle. I have to fight injustice and oppression when I see it. I can't just let a government agency get away with bullying and wrongfully over charging. So, Tuesday I'll call “the supervisor” and plead my case. Wednesday, I'll probably be dropping a couple of late books by the library, along with some money to pay for the fines and our $15 lost magazine. I need to get myself off the bad patron list, or they won't let me check anything else out, or even renew what I have now. Oh well, at least it's all for a good cause.

Why Don't Students Like School?

Here's an article from Psychology Today that is sure to ruffle some feathers. Peter Gray tackles the question "Why Don't Students Like School?" Since he is a professor at Boston College, a specialist in developmental and evolutionary psychology, and a textbook author, his opinion probably carries more weight in academic circles than the opinion of a homeschooling parent like myself, but I have a feeling that the educational big whigs aren't going to appreciate the commentary in any case. Gray says the answer is, "well duhhh" that children like freedom, and no matter how fun you try to make it, or how normal it seems to do, or how much it is for their own good, the majority of kids have no choice whatsoever in school.

Now, not all schools are created equal, and I know some kids enjoy their time at their institution, but I guess that is the big difference right there; they want to be there, and would choose to be if they had a choice. I also think that sometimes when people get so used to having their days organized by someone else, that they lose track of what to do with themselves, and fall into the "I'm bored" trap. With all the access that most Americans have to books, games, computers, crafts, and a million other things, it isn't usually a lack of things to do, but a case of lost initiative. In any case, I'd say a whole lotta kids don't have either the desire or the choice about school.

It makes me glad for the big batch of freedom my offspring have in our mostly happy homeschool. They seem to value it too. They like their free time, and the flexibility in what they do with it.

I'll be interested to hear what other people with kids both in and out of traditional school think about it.

The Ghost in Your Genes

I've watched a bunch of interesting videos lately for my psychology class. The Ghost in Your Genes was this very fascinating, yet mildly alarming video that looked at the things that we inherit, not only from our parents, but our grandparents, and great grand parents. It's not just the color of your hair and eyes either. Scientists are looking at how factors like nutrition deficiencies, exposure to toxins, and even stress of grandparents can be encoded in DNA, and the grandchildren can have repercussions decades later. It's actually a bit scary. In studies with mice, extremely stressful situations produced anxious offspring even three generations later! It was like they were encoded to be little freaked out stresser mice. This does not make me feel very reassured for what kind of things my children will be prone to.


All this makes me think about things like the pesticide DDT which has been illegal in the US for decades, but is still found in soil, animals and even humans who were not even born when it was being sprayed. I wonder what effects will be seen in future generations from the array of drugs and technical interventions now being used in almost every birth in the US. Synthetic hormones, narcotics and antibiotics are used as routine procedures surrounding hospital birth- and there isn't any way to definitively know how these will effect the babies later on other than waiting and seeing. By then it will of course be too late; the damage will have been done. What about the processed foods and chemicals that make up a large portion of the American diet now- how will those effect our grandchildren? There's also the obesity rate, and the immense amount of prescription medications people regularly take these days.

This all leads me toward gloom and doom feelings over the future of our species, and the mess we are getting ourselves into. But, I am making a conscience effort not to be a freak about such things, and rather look at my own life, and see what I can do. Besides, if I am a constant stress case, what will that do to my future grand babies? At least my kids didn't get all the drugs and trauma at their births, and we do try to live a pretty relaxed life and eat good whole food. In general, I am a bit on the skeptical side with a lot of things- I'm not a big fan of waiting to see if the harmfulness of something is proven. I'm more likely to hold off or skip it, but I do need to work on my verbal negativity about the world, or I'll raise little cynics. I'm sure there will be some weird things my kids will inherit anyway, and while this research does make me uncomfortable about all the damage from the past, it also sure makes me glad for my current sheltering habits.

A Quick Few Days in Monterey

We just got back from a great couple of days away. It's just one more thing I love about homeschooling- I can call my mini vacations field trips, and go fun places mid week.


One of my kids has been on an ocean life kick, so I'm trying to facilitate that as much as possible. It works out nicely that I also really like lounging at the beach, so I can incorporate that as well.

We were lucky to get in on one of the Monterey Bay Aquarium's awesome homeschool field trip days. It's an incredibly generous deal- they offer a limited number of free admissions to homeschool families and groups to their facility each year. Of course, you have to sign up months in advance, and we didn't get our first choice of days, but I'm not about to complain about a free deal. We ended up being there for some of the loveliest weather that town has seen all year. It was so sunny, we were actually almost hot, which is a rarity on northern California beaches.

It cooled off quite a bit when the sun went down, which gave us a chance to view some of the monarch butterflies coming in for the night to rest over in their wintering grounds in at the Butterfly Sanctuary in Pacific Grove. The hard core migration of these delicate butterflies is an amazing story in itself.

Bargain hunter that I am, I found a smokin' deal on a room through the TravelZoo Top 20 email newsletter. My ocean life kid was really into helping plan the trip. She figured the mileage and gas cost, mapped out our route, planned a food budget, and packed; all great life skills.

We stayed at the Deer Haven Inn, which is located in a quiet area right across from Asilomar State Beach and within walking distance to some lovely dunes and beaches. There were deer walking down the road, and some of the biggest raccoons I have ever seen came out at night. We got a clean and comfortable room, and the continental breakfast wasn't bad either. The kids thought the push button fireplace was such a cool luxury- especially the kid who just spent a couple of days stacking firewood with is dad.

Monterey Bay Aquarium is just an incredible place. My favorite exhibit is probably the beautiful jellies, but the newest exhibit, the “Secret Lives of Seahorses” is amazing as well.

This amazing creature is not some kind of sea plant- it's a sea dragon- a relative of the sea horse. Pretty cool, huh?

In addition to the beautiful sea life, they had some fun hands on lab stuff, chances to view animal feedings and talk with the scientists, and some interesting presentations. One thing I really appreciate about the homeschool days is the high adult to child ratio. Because they don't schedule school field trips the same days, there aren't ten times as many children as adults. I like children, mind you, but when they've been cooped up too long, and they outnumber the adults by a long shot, their energy and volume can be a bit intense to say the least. It makes it a little hard to concentrate or learn anything, let alone relax and enjoy yourself. It's a whole different experience when almost everyone has their parent there- and a much more pleasant one. We were able to spend the day in peace, marveling at the beauty and diversity in nature.

The trip was quick, but my kids got plenty of time to run around and be crazy on the beach, and my husband got plenty of time to look at boats, and dream of sailing away. It didn't matter that we had to do a whole lotta driving, and wanted to stay another night, but had to rush back, or that the free field trip ended up costing a couple hundred dollars. In the end, we had a great time, learned a bunch, and enjoyed each others' company, and that was the whole point after all.

Happy Halloween!

How could I not love a holiday that is all about dressing up and eating chocolate? I pretty much enjoy any occasion to celebrate, but Halloween definitely ranks as one of my favorites. There just aren't very many occasions where grown ups wearing costumes in public are considered socially acceptable, and I for one appreciate the opportunity.

Being the good mother that I am, I have the chance responsibility to save my children from consuming all that sugar on their own. I do this by raiding the candy stash while they are sleeping, and pretending I have no idea where all the good chocolate has gone. Eating their treats may be slightly tricky of me, but I am doing it out of love, and the reality that I pay their dental bills. Besides, I consider it my commission for years of costume design and assistance.

And in the spirit of the holiday, here are some spooky snacks whipped up by a craftier friend than me.

Happy Halloween Everyone.

It's Almost NaNo Time!

It's almost time for NaNoWriMo! If you aren't familiar with it, November is National Novel Writing Month. It's "thirty days and nights of literary abandon!" NaNoWriMo is a ridiculous name, but a fun thing to try, and the whole family can get involved. Someone, somewhere had the grand idea to challenge aspiring writers around the world to attempt writing a 50,000 word novel in one month. Now it's a big annual to do, and every year, tons of people participate. Obviously, 30 days is not a lot of time to write a book, so you're going for quantity over quality in this case. There's no time to edit, revise, and perfect. It's a mad rush to get out all your crazy ideas as fast as you can. Some people may wonder what's the point? It's not like they have some awesome grand prize, like an all expense paid tropical vacation or anything. I guess the point is just to see if you can do it. There's not a lot of glory, but it's an experience. Maybe, somewhere among the piles of drivel you churn out, you might find a gem that you can use. Chances are, it'll get your creative juices flowing, and I think it will be entertaining.


At first, I considered trying to combine Nano writing somehow into my blog, imagining myself diligently writing and publishing daily. Then, I considered the fact that most of what I write at that speed will probably be complete nonsense, and it probably isn't that great of an idea to publish large quantities of nonsensical writings on the internet under your own name if you plan to continue doing any writing for a living. Hopefully, I'll be able to come up with enough to write about in both places, and blog readers will at least get a semi edited version of my ramblings. I'm not making any promises though.

There's a kids, or "young writers" challenge, too. They can choose their own word count- my daughter and a couple of her friends are aiming for 10,000 words each. There are writing exercises, forums to toss out questions, and kids can connect with other writing buddies for advice and support. It seems like a great way to encourage some creative writing, and I can't wait to see what my daughter comes up with this year. Last year, we all did our own independent versions, and it was amazing to see how motivated they were, and much writing they churned out.
I'm curious, is anyone else up for the challenge this year? Check it out here, and if you try it, let me know how it goes.

Not Everyone Can Write Right

Why is it that whenever I make fun of other people, it always comes back and bites me in the butt? It really takes the fun out of mockery and any form of smugness.


My latest slice of humble pie started with the classes I've been taking online through my local community college. They've really made me feel secure about our family homeschooling for the long haul. This isn't because I am suddenly feeling more well educated and capable of teaching than I was a few months ago. Although I am certainly learning some interesting things, and enjoying the process, what has boosted my confidence is seeing first hand the wide variety of abilities from people who have had a typical education. To think that we can probably accomplish something in this range is not really all that intimidating, at all. A person can graduate high school, and probably even pass college classes with really bad spelling and grammar. Lots of people don't follow written instructions, or work within timelines well. While these skills would certainly be helpful to them, and they will hopefully be attaining them in college, there are plenty of people over the age of 18 who never learned them in traditional schools. While I'm definitely shooting for my offspring to be equipped to be academically competitive before they reach college, if there is an area that they struggle in, they surely won't be the only ones.

As homeschoolers, we always get the question, “How long are you planning on homeschooling? What about high school?” People act like it's rocket science or something that we should be terrified to even consider attempting. I feel like if I really learned anything while I was in high school, I should be somewhat capable of passing it on to my kids. Actually, there are plenty of things I learned in high school that I don't want to pass on to my kids, but that's another story. There's always the “What about chemistry?” type of questions too- as if most people really need to know chemistry in everyday life- as if most people who took chemistry didn't forget all of it within a year anyway. I think if my kids want or need chemistry, or any other class I am not “qualified” to teach, that is what the local college is for.

Back to my humble moment... when I started noticing chronic errors in other college students' work- errors that my 6th grader was able to find, and correct- I got a bit cocky, and may have even made a few jokes about it (being the cynical and sarcastic person that I am, it is hard for me not to joke about things.) Well, within a very short time, I found myself making embarrassing typos in public forums. They were all mistakes that I could glaringly see were wrong after I hit “enter,” but had missed in my hurry to go on with my life. I did this on multiple occasions too; I actually considered that I might be losing my mind, getting some form of early dementia in my 30's. Then, I realized that it was probably just one of life's little lessons teaching me humility. I am just hoping I won't have 5,000,000 more public typos here to reinforce the lesson. So, in order to not jinx myself any further, I want to be clear that I'm not making fun of anyone here. I'm just noting that the idea that everyone comes away from their formal (and in many cases forced) education with the same abilities and knowledge is false. Maybe most of them were exposed to similar ideas, but what they absorbed and retained varies a great deal.

As my husband pointed out, writing is not everyone's strong point, and it doesn't need to be. I agree completely. I may be good at spotting other people's typos, but I am painfully remedial when it comes to mechanical things. In real life, the ability to fix a broken car or washer might actually be more useful than the ability to spell well. In the end, everyone has their own gifts. I am just very glad that my kids have the opportunity and time to explore and develop their own strengths, as well as their weaknesses, on their own timeline. They can bloom into what they are meant to be, when they are ready, and that is something to be grateful for.

Even the Cat is Coughing Up Science Lessons

Since I've been on my current science theme, I am seeing science lessons everywhere on our little farm. Just this afternoon, we had a gross little piece of science shoot out all over my daughter's favorite blanket. It was one of those fascinating in a disgusting way kind of things, and I guess it was technically more of a chunky pile than a piece. Our dear CatCat was lounging in her usual foot of the bed spot when she began out of the blue gagging. Well, my daughter picked up the cat to put it out, since it seemed on the verge of vomiting and all. The cat stopped retching, and daughter put her back on the bed. Immediately, Miss Meow Purr hacked up a smelly mess. Of course these things never hit just one blanket- it skimmed several. As I'm sure you can imagine, even a splash of cat vomit goes a long way, so everything has to be washed. On the way to the washer, we accidentally dropped some of the mess, and spread the joy even further. This was when we saw the interesting part. CatCat apparently swallowed a baby lizard- whole! The poor thing was only a few inches long, and was perfectly intact, except the missing tail. Well, we scooped it up and took it outside to check it out. After we poked around to get the cat hairball off of it, we discovered the little lizard had a beautiful blue patch on it's throat, a lovely pattern in its' scales, and tiny, perfect little fingers and toes. I considered bringing back in and looking at it under the microscope, but the whole mess smelled too bad for that.

So, we got online to see if lizard eating could be hazardous for a cat, and it looks like it's possible. I went back outside to see if I could get another look at the lizard, in order to identify it, but I can't find it now. I am thinking that my #1 chicken, Miss Puffy Cheeks, may have cleaned it up for me. Well, Google gave me about 12 million sites on cats vomiting lizards, most of which had no connection to anything remotely official, so I'm not exactly sure of the credibility of the information. Heck, any goofball blogger, like me, can post things on the internet. In any case, the cat seems fine now though, and is recuperating outside, so we won't be rushing to the vet to check for lizard toxicology. I am just hoping chickens are immune to lizard toxins.

More Challenging Science Fun

My science pick for this week is the Kids Science Challenge. We are so glad it is back for it's second year! It's a fun and inspiring contest to get kids in grades 2-6 thinking about science. It breaks down into a few chosen areas of science where kids can submit an idea or experiment to real scientists in that field, and possibly meet the scientists and win cool prizes. This years chosen areas are sports on mars, bio inspired design and detective science. The website has games and projects to get you in the mood; but be warned, there is a loud and rather overstimulating musical lizard intro that comes blaring at you on the home page. You might want to reduce the volume there, but once you get past that, there is lots more to enjoy.

Last year, both of my kids enjoyed brainstorming ideas and experimenting with outcomes. My son entered an idea in skateboard technology, and my daughter submitted her idea on water quality and conservation. She was a finalist and won a really cool digital microscope, along with some science kits and activity books. The microscope has given us hours of marveling at the beauty of ordinary objects magnified. We've been looking at just about everything under this thing- bugs, leaves, flowers, rocks, our skin (warning- magnifying wrinkles is not good for parental self esteem) and there's a constant "wow" or "eeeeew" going with it. We had read that butterflies have spiral tube tongues, but to see one in real life was just amazing. In many cases though, magnification leaves us repelling in disgust- a scab on a child's knee for example is really gross at 40 times it's normal size. Either way, we are continually fascinated by the natural world.

Of course winning fabulous prizes is always a bonus, but we enjoyed this fun contest in and of itself. We'll definitely be spending some time on it again this year. Enjoy!

Science Fun

I am a firm believer that education should not be boring. Kids start off life wanting to learn, and in an effort to keep that spark alive rather than smothering it with formalities, I spend a lot of time researching (goofing off on the internet, browsing library shelves, crafty catalogs etc.) finding cool things to enhance our homeschooling journey. It keeps it fun and interesting for both my kids and me, which is, after all, why we are doing this.

In the spirit of creativity and learning fun, I'm going be posting links to some of the many wonderful resources and awesome goodies that our family enjoys. I'm starting off with science, since there are so very many free and cool tools available online. Science is an experiment waiting to happen just as much as it is a series of formulas. My first pick is "The Happy Scientist."

I think everybody should be familiar with this guy- he is great! He's like a semi mad, but happy scientist who is really good at explaining things. The guy can even make boiling water interesting. He regularly sends out really fun and facinating science experiments, photos and videos, many of them FREE! If you love the free stuff, you can join for a very small fee, and have access to lots more science goodies. You can also follow him on Facebook!

We've tried a number of his experiments with mostly successful results. He has a great way of explaining concepts and making them understandable, without sounding like he is dumbing them down. (We really appreciate this) The kids love the videos, especially the bloopers- seeing professional adults mess up on camera is endlessly amusing for them. Although we don't check them every day, we check out several of his Science Photos each week. They always capture some amazing part of our natural world, and he poses a question about each one. After exhausting our ideas, we can check his explanations, which almost always lead us to some interesting new bit of knowledge.

This is so much more fun than a textbook.