Do the Beastie Boys count as School?

One day I showed funny clips of As You Like It to our kids after reading the Lamb's version. It was culture at its height, they understood it, it was poetic, it was beauty in motion set in a Japanese backdrop of holistic transformation...

Then that night my husband whipped out a couple Beastie Boys videos (appropriate ones). Now I love the Beastie Boys as much as the next person (appropriate ones) and yet  I found myself prompting the kids "remember the Shakespeare we saw today?" " all the world's a stage" "are you getting ...any... of this?".

The Field Trips Log

How we remember the amazing places we get to experience together.
Ideally, within 24 hours of a fieldtrip we sit down write about it.
Each person will record:

•  their name
• date
• where we went
• maybe a picture drawn or cut out from brochure
• what they experiences with their 5 senses ("I smelled mischief in the school group there that day...I tasted lunch as my children brought insects to me....I felt Henry run into me 100 times... ")
• what they liked ("I liked...)

 I may write for them to copy (Y1), write for them (PreK), or patiently allow them to phone it in (Y3). 30min is about right time wise, with time just after to take turns reading theirs for everyone to hear. Ticket stubs or brochure maps go in a clear plastic sleeve (finally a place for it all!), and each person's page goes behind with 3 holes punched.

Cloth Diaperer Comes Clean

My best kept secret (Okay, one of them) is that I use cloth diapers. They just aren't that popular here and will still get you not sideways looks--but blatant stares and questions on your sanity, and I already get that for homeschooling.
 People who use them do it because they are money saving (they save me maybe $400 a year now), or environmentally friendly. I like both reasons, but they're also prettier, and I'm a tad nostalgic.

I'd always wanted to use cloth, but the timing wasn't right. Then when my most recent baby was a few months old a great friend traded me all her diapers and covers for a painting, appropriately, I felt, of two Hebrew midwives I had done in acrylic. It was a mutually blissful and beneficial exchange.

But I had one other challenge--Mr. Owl who, contrary to all other owls, has an excellent sense of smell. As it turned out, by the time I resurfaced the idea I was able to tell him Canary had  in them for a month now--with no noticeable smell. There you have it folks--even I can do it.

Here is what I do:

• I use them Monday-Friday and disposables at night and on weekends.

 

• I wash them Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.

 

• I have Motherease brand for covers and diapers and love them.

 

• I use fuller cut pants for cloth diapers and  trendy slim ones for disponsible.

 

So this is the first time I have an almost 2y/o and I'm not chomping at the bit to shrink my carbon footprint by potty training. It's worked pretty well for me.

 Except that one time.
When my mom and sister came to visit.
I braced myself for their nagging about me not recycling--because it always comes. My mother, whose carbon footprint competes respectfully with someones from the 15th century. My sister who is an Environmental Studies major in the Pacific Northwest. So when they gave me the look I would throw my hands up and say "Hey-I use cloth diapers--don't give me that!" And that was keeping me afloat until I stumbled and it came out "Hey-I wear cloth diapers!--don't..." Then any credit I'd built for my good name was lost in a pile of snorts and guffaws. That's at me, not with me--we're talking family here.

Book finds

Selecting a Reader by Ted Kooser

... she will thumb

over my poems, then put the book back

up on its shelf. She will say to herself,

"For that kind of money, I can get

my raincoat cleaned." And she will.

I remember this poem from college. It sits in my mind as perfectly as a bookspine on its shelf...

 I went to the Salt Lake City Book Sale, and event on par with Record Day for my husband, and Christmas for my kids. This bi-annual event was even better this time thanks to the labeled shelves and smaller crowds--thank you Friends of SLCL and....rain? I find it totally worth the $12 membership that gets you in the first day for a couple of reasons; it's less crowded (narrow aisles + people + boxes and bags full + shopping carts! are you kidding! who let those in!?), you get first pick before ALL the teachers get there on a mission to beef up their classroom libraries, and I find I am more selective when hardbacks are $2 as opposed to $1--steep prices, I know, but I only have so many shelves and this aids discretion I would otherwise toss out the window.

 I won't bore you with the details of my printed pulp prizes, but I did score a tabbed collegiate dictionary. Apparently, none of the words my children want to write with anymore are to be found in the 3 Children's Dictionaries  we have and the desire to spell a word correctly can't be sustained long enough to search my non-tabbed editon. I aslo found Bullfinch's Mythology (all 3!), and another Complete Works of Shakespeare--arranged chronologically. Oh yes. Good for next year when we are no longer reading Lamb's children's version, but Shakespeare's actual language. I was pleased to mark off several  Ambleside freereads and even a biography of Sir Isaac Newton. Good times, oh yes, good times.

Things I love about Nature Study

• Learning about the seasons of life

Two winters ago, when walking by the pond a mother with us pointed out to her boys "see the little tadpoles in the water!" to which then 7 y/o Abigail matter-of-factly corrected "those are minnows, there are no tadpoles till spring".  (Isn't that the sole purpose of blogs, to establish an unparalleled platform for parental bragging? no?)

• Learning proper names of things

When Bowery Bird was 2 and at church, a friend related how the teacher showed a picture of a bird and was talking about how "We are thankful for birds". Little Bowery Bird said "That's not a bird, that's a Robin".

• Getting to know of the world around us

Sitting with my 3 children among the trees and watching 2 robins harass a squirrel near their nest for 20 min or more--poor squirrel not knowing which way to go!

• Discovering the awe of things on their own

Observing Kingfisher and Mockingbird reverently sneak up on a White-faced Ibis (that was actually brown), and begging me to come see.

• Getting our vegetables in

(I can tell you it doesn't happen at dinner...).Seeing Bowery Bird forage for food and enjoy the wild whatever-she-is-eating (she usually knows-I don't).