I apologize for my 2 month long hiatus from Blogspot. A lot has been happening over here and it just never seems to end. Some of it good, some of it bad, but I guess that's just how life goes sometimes.
My computer is broken again. This means that I can only blog on days that I can borrow Hubby's computer or get up to the library to use theirs. I can't upload any photos right now, but when I get my computer back, that will be the first thing I do. I have tons of adorable ones that I want to post! Boy am I glad we purchased the extended warranty on my computer! We've had about (if I had to guess) over $1000 worth of repairs including a new motherboard, a new fan and a new moniter. Perhaps that's more than $1000, I don't know. I've also had to have the power cord replaced 4 times already, which I know is $130 a pop. Oh yeah, and I've had the battery replaced once. Whew! All of this, and my computer is only 3 years old! Hubby has the exact same computer I do, and he's never had any of these kinds of problems, which makes me think I got a lemon. Everytime I turn around, something is breaking on my computer. The Geek Squad over at Best Buy can greet us by name now, since we're in there so often for repairs. My extended warranty runs out at the end of this month but, since I have gotten my money's worth 10 times over, I am going to go ahead and renew it. That'll get me to the next $1000 worth of repairs, which I fully anticipate. Maybe then I'll be able to purchase a new laptop to replace my current piece of...um....pie. Lemon pie. Yeah, that's it. :-)
My older daughter Gabby will be going up north to Ohio to stay with an uncle up there for awhile. She isn't doing very well in school here and she is hanging out with a less-than-desirable crowd, so after much deliberation and discussion, we've decided that she will go up there for a bit and we'll see what happens. So, I've been working with a lawyer and the court system to try to make that happen. I'm expecting to hear something this week about when she'll be leaving.
Hubby's grandfather died last week and he made the trip to Oklahoma to go to the funeral. This turned out to be a good trip. Hubby was able to get back in touch with relatives he hasn't seen in many years, which was really good for him. His family is divided...many of family members aren't speaking to many of the other family members. His parents don't speak to us anymore and, up until this funeral, none of them even knew about Annabelle. Hubby wasn't sure where we stood with a lot of these people, so he thought it would be best if we kept the news of Annabelle to ourselves for awhile. Hubby really wanted his parents to come back to us because they love and missed their son, not because of the new baby. However, at the funeral Hubby found out that his parents are actually ENJOYING this fight and are "gleeful" about not being on speaking terms with us. "Gleeful"?? Yes, "gleeful". I guess it's like a power trip for them, I don't know. I can't understand the concept of being happy that I'm no longer speaking to my child. I just don't get it and I don't think I ever will, which is good......because I don't want to get it. I can't even FATHOM the idea of disowning Annabelle! There is absolutely NOTHING she could ever do to make me stop loving her and there is absolutely NOTHING that she could ever do that would make me want to disown her. It breaks my heart to think that they are missing out on their granddaughter's life but then it occurred to me...they wouldn't care anyway. If they don't care enough about their own son to stay in his life, they certainly aren't going to care about their son's daughter. But the rest of the family cares and wants to be involved in Annabelle's life and that makes us very happy. Yes, Hubby went ahead and told his family (with the exception of his parents, whom he didn't see at all while he was over there since they didn't bother showing up for the funeral) about Annabelle and the news of her birth was received with love and acceptance, so all is good. Annabelle's family circle is growing and for that we are grateful. I can't wait to introduce all of them to her. They re going to love her, I just know it!
What a sweet little baby she is! Since it has been 2 months since I've been on here, so much has changed. She is walking like a champ now and into EVERYTHING! She gets into the cabinets and drawers, pulls everything out and just makes an enormous mess! I can't keep her from climbing into the dog's water bowl! Oh but what a joy she is! I simply can't imagine my life without her. I am currently working on "habit training" with her. When she throws things on the floor, I want her to pick them up when she's done. I have no problem with her making a huge mess, but I want her to learn to clean up after herself as well. Part of this is because I am using Charlotte Mason's methods of teaching and training children and she strongly advocates "habit training" at an early age and part of this is because I am just tired of constantly picking up all of Annabelle's huge messes! She makes sooooo many of them and they are soooooo big....ugh! I just really need her help on this one! And she's slowly "getting it". She doesn't pick up everyhting all the time, but she picks up some stuff on a regular basis. She's learning, and that's a start. I am encouraged, especially when she starts clapping when she sees me pick something up and then put it away! That is what I do when she picks something up and puts it away, and I find it absolutely adorable (and encouraging!) when she does it to me. That shows me she understands what is supposed to be done, even if she doesn't always do it.
My little Princess will be turning 15 months old this week and I am planning on taking her out to get her portraits done. I am going to have some Halloween portraits done and am really excited about it. She is going to be a Ladybug Fairy this year and she looks sooooo cute in her little costume! I'm excited! We don't do the whole trick-or-treat thing, but we will be going to the fall Festival at church where Annabelle can participate in little kiddie games and activities, as well as just hang out and play with other children. We will also be taking her to Hubby's workplace, where they do a cubicle-to-cubicle trick-or-treat. I don't let her have candy yet, but it wil be fun to see her going around collecting it.
I found out that my sister and her family will be coming for Thanksgiving this year. That'll be fun! It's really nice to have company over. We don't get many visitors now that we live so far away from the rest of my family. Of course, we didn't get many visitors before either, when we all lived in the same town! Thanksgiving was always a big holiday growing up, though. Relatives from far and wide would show up at our house. Even back then, when I was a child, I knew they were only showing up for the free food. I still enjoyed it, though, because it was the one time of year when I knew I'd get to see everybody. I love family get-togethers, I always have. Life is so short.....why not spend it with those we love the most?!
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Thursday, August 7, 2008
There's Boy George!
Annabelle is such a happy baby.
Sometimes.
She loves to talk (I think that goes with the gender!) and will carry on conversations with herself, as well as anybody else in the room. She babbles and babbles endlessly about things that only *she* understands. She will pick up an object, hold it up in my general direction and ask, "da bi no pi no do?" Of course, I have absolutely no clue what she is saying but the important thing is....she does. She knows exactly what she is saying and that's all that matters because she really had no intention of giving me whatever object it is that she was holding up towards me anyway. I just think it's really cute.
And she has a sense of humor. She will babble something like, "ri ca mi in ap ba no ti." And then laugh. I'm convinced she just told herself a joke. She understands what she just said, even if nobody else did. And what she said was funny.
Sometimes Hubby & Gabby will swear up and down that Annabelle actually said something "real", something intelligible. Something like, "could you please pass the potatoes?" OK, I just made that last one up, but what Hubby "heard" Annabelle say the other day was not too far from that.
"There's Boy George!"
Yes, this is what Hubby is *so sure* Annabelle said. "There's Boy George!" Hmmm, I wonder where or how she could have picked that sentence up. Normally, children will repeat what they hear but I can't for the life of me, imagine where or how Annabelle could have heard this sentence (in order to repeat it.) No Hubby, I'm sorry....that is probably NOT what Annabelle said, as much as you'd like to think it was. I don't think he believes me and I think, deep down, he is convinced she really did say it. Next thing you know, Hubby will swear he hears Annabelle singing, "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?"
Annabelle is starting to walk for longer periods of time, on steadier feet. She has realized that if she proceeds slowly, instead of trying to speed walk across the living room like she normally does, that she can stay upright longer. It is so neat to see her steady herself, then take slow and deliberate steps towards her goal (usually my cell phone or the remote control.) She is trying soooooooo hard and I just know that she will be sprinting around the house in no time, terrorizing the animals and wreaking all kinds of havoc...but that's just one more adventure that I am truly looking forward to.
Annabelle is getting so good at walking now:
And she loves to play with Mommy's cell phone:
Annabelle is getting pretty good at understanding some of my simple commands like "close it" (she is allowed to play with my cell phone as long as she keeps it closed...I don't want any accidental '911' calls!) and, of course, "no" (when she sticks her fingers in the fireplace.) The other day, however, she seemed to understand me better than I thought she did. I gave her an ice cube to suck on. It was inside a little mesh bag so that there was no way she could choke on it, yet I still wanted her to sit down with it anyway, instead of crawling all around, dragging this ice cube all over the carpet and then sticking it back in her mouth. I sat her down on the floor several times and she kept getting up each time. I would tell her, "sit down please" over and over again and she kept getting up. Finally, I just let her crawl around since that's what she obviously wanted to do and I was tired of fighting her on this one. Then I looked over and saw what it was she was trying to do. It appears that Annabelle *was* indeed willing to sit down, just not on the floor. Now, how creative is that?!?
Sometimes.
She loves to talk (I think that goes with the gender!) and will carry on conversations with herself, as well as anybody else in the room. She babbles and babbles endlessly about things that only *she* understands. She will pick up an object, hold it up in my general direction and ask, "da bi no pi no do?" Of course, I have absolutely no clue what she is saying but the important thing is....she does. She knows exactly what she is saying and that's all that matters because she really had no intention of giving me whatever object it is that she was holding up towards me anyway. I just think it's really cute.
And she has a sense of humor. She will babble something like, "ri ca mi in ap ba no ti." And then laugh. I'm convinced she just told herself a joke. She understands what she just said, even if nobody else did. And what she said was funny.
Sometimes Hubby & Gabby will swear up and down that Annabelle actually said something "real", something intelligible. Something like, "could you please pass the potatoes?" OK, I just made that last one up, but what Hubby "heard" Annabelle say the other day was not too far from that.
"There's Boy George!"
Yes, this is what Hubby is *so sure* Annabelle said. "There's Boy George!" Hmmm, I wonder where or how she could have picked that sentence up. Normally, children will repeat what they hear but I can't for the life of me, imagine where or how Annabelle could have heard this sentence (in order to repeat it.) No Hubby, I'm sorry....that is probably NOT what Annabelle said, as much as you'd like to think it was. I don't think he believes me and I think, deep down, he is convinced she really did say it. Next thing you know, Hubby will swear he hears Annabelle singing, "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?"
Annabelle is starting to walk for longer periods of time, on steadier feet. She has realized that if she proceeds slowly, instead of trying to speed walk across the living room like she normally does, that she can stay upright longer. It is so neat to see her steady herself, then take slow and deliberate steps towards her goal (usually my cell phone or the remote control.) She is trying soooooooo hard and I just know that she will be sprinting around the house in no time, terrorizing the animals and wreaking all kinds of havoc...but that's just one more adventure that I am truly looking forward to.
Annabelle is getting so good at walking now:
And she loves to play with Mommy's cell phone:
Annabelle is getting pretty good at understanding some of my simple commands like "close it" (she is allowed to play with my cell phone as long as she keeps it closed...I don't want any accidental '911' calls!) and, of course, "no" (when she sticks her fingers in the fireplace.) The other day, however, she seemed to understand me better than I thought she did. I gave her an ice cube to suck on. It was inside a little mesh bag so that there was no way she could choke on it, yet I still wanted her to sit down with it anyway, instead of crawling all around, dragging this ice cube all over the carpet and then sticking it back in her mouth. I sat her down on the floor several times and she kept getting up each time. I would tell her, "sit down please" over and over again and she kept getting up. Finally, I just let her crawl around since that's what she obviously wanted to do and I was tired of fighting her on this one. Then I looked over and saw what it was she was trying to do. It appears that Annabelle *was* indeed willing to sit down, just not on the floor. Now, how creative is that?!?
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
Poetic Justice?
I'm a little hesitant to use such a title for this particular entry but, under the circumstances, I think it might actually be appropriate.
I took Gabby down to her school this morning to pick up a copy of her schedule and possibly meet some of her teachers, if she had any new ones this year. Because her school is so small, most of the students already know all the teachers, even if they've never had a class with that particular teacher. As it turns out, Gabby will be taking *two* science and *two* math classes this year, along with Spanish 2, American History, Interior Design, Parenting, and some sort of ACT Prep class that appears to be "worked in between" two of her classes. Personally, I am very happy with this schedule...for the most part. What this schedule shows me, is that Gabby was wrong about the school converting elective credtis into core credits. She failed two semesters of science and wasn't even phased by this because she was so sure that the school was going to turn one of her electives into a science credit, making it irrelevent whether she passed science or not. Apparently, the school would rather she take science over again, which she is. I am not happy at the fact that she failed science last year, but I *am* happy with the fact that she will still need to learn that science. She will be in the same "Physical Science" class that she was last year, with the same teacher, and most of the students in that class will be freshmen. Gabby is now a sophomore. She is also in remedial math (again!) like she was last year because she repeatedly scores low on her standardized tests. I am unable to help her in math, and she refuses to let her father help her, so instead she just does poorly on the tests and gets stuck in another remedial class. Her lack of motivation is incredible. And speaking of a lack of motivation, this will be the first official year that she will be allowed to legally drop out of school. She has complained to me enough times about how much she hates school in general. Combine that with the fact that she hates her particular school, has difficulty making and keeping friends, swears all her teachers are "out to get" her, and has actually "joked" about dropping out before....it's enough to make a mother nervous. Gabby is very athletic and enjoys basketball a great deal. However, all of the athletic classes were omitted from her schedule this year. Why? Because she has to make up too many core classes so basketball doesn't fit into her schedule this year. Gabby is extremely upset but, and here is where the poetic justice comes in, she had this coming to her when she decided that school was not important enough to take seriously. She is no longer allowed to participate in her favorite activity because she was so confident that the school would just allow her to coast through without passing science or, evidently, math. I had been trying to tell her that something bad was going to happen to her one day because of her lack of effort. She chose to ignore my advice because, well, what do I know about high school? After all, I was only required to take each class only once, so I guess that doesn't qualify me as an expert in the field. Perhaps if I'd had to repeat multiple subjects like she is having to do, then maybe she'd take me more seriously. Then again, perhaps it's just her age. Being sixteen years old, doesn't that mean she already knows everything? But wait.....if she already knows everything, perhaps I actually have a genius, a child prodigy, on my hands and I just don't realize it yet! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!
I took Gabby down to her school this morning to pick up a copy of her schedule and possibly meet some of her teachers, if she had any new ones this year. Because her school is so small, most of the students already know all the teachers, even if they've never had a class with that particular teacher. As it turns out, Gabby will be taking *two* science and *two* math classes this year, along with Spanish 2, American History, Interior Design, Parenting, and some sort of ACT Prep class that appears to be "worked in between" two of her classes. Personally, I am very happy with this schedule...for the most part. What this schedule shows me, is that Gabby was wrong about the school converting elective credtis into core credits. She failed two semesters of science and wasn't even phased by this because she was so sure that the school was going to turn one of her electives into a science credit, making it irrelevent whether she passed science or not. Apparently, the school would rather she take science over again, which she is. I am not happy at the fact that she failed science last year, but I *am* happy with the fact that she will still need to learn that science. She will be in the same "Physical Science" class that she was last year, with the same teacher, and most of the students in that class will be freshmen. Gabby is now a sophomore. She is also in remedial math (again!) like she was last year because she repeatedly scores low on her standardized tests. I am unable to help her in math, and she refuses to let her father help her, so instead she just does poorly on the tests and gets stuck in another remedial class. Her lack of motivation is incredible. And speaking of a lack of motivation, this will be the first official year that she will be allowed to legally drop out of school. She has complained to me enough times about how much she hates school in general. Combine that with the fact that she hates her particular school, has difficulty making and keeping friends, swears all her teachers are "out to get" her, and has actually "joked" about dropping out before....it's enough to make a mother nervous. Gabby is very athletic and enjoys basketball a great deal. However, all of the athletic classes were omitted from her schedule this year. Why? Because she has to make up too many core classes so basketball doesn't fit into her schedule this year. Gabby is extremely upset but, and here is where the poetic justice comes in, she had this coming to her when she decided that school was not important enough to take seriously. She is no longer allowed to participate in her favorite activity because she was so confident that the school would just allow her to coast through without passing science or, evidently, math. I had been trying to tell her that something bad was going to happen to her one day because of her lack of effort. She chose to ignore my advice because, well, what do I know about high school? After all, I was only required to take each class only once, so I guess that doesn't qualify me as an expert in the field. Perhaps if I'd had to repeat multiple subjects like she is having to do, then maybe she'd take me more seriously. Then again, perhaps it's just her age. Being sixteen years old, doesn't that mean she already knows everything? But wait.....if she already knows everything, perhaps I actually have a genius, a child prodigy, on my hands and I just don't realize it yet! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
The Verdict is In.........
I haven't posted any entries on this topic yet, so I guess I'll have to explain it from the beginning.
Gabby attends a small "country" high school, located pretty much in the middle of several hundred acres of chicken farms. Technically, we are in the bigger city school district, but I have chosen NOT to put Gabby in the big high school. I know my daughter.....she will get lost in the system and fall between the cracks. The district we live in has a high school that is overflowing with students. It is way too crowded (they only allow 3 foreign exchange students a year there because there is no room for them, and NOBODY who lives outside the district is ever allowed to transfer in!) These teachers are the 2nd or 3rd highest paid in the state (the highest paid teachers are the ones in the district right next to ours!) I'm sure the education is not bad (for a public school), but I just don't like the fact that the classrooms have something like a 35-to-1 student-to-teacher ratio. I want my daughter in a small school, where teachers can give her more one-on-one attention.
Flash forward to Gabby's little "country" high school: It seems her school had a bookkeeper who was, ummmmmmm, not too good with numbers. OK, she was good with numbers when it came to writing her own paycheck, but not when it came to writing anybody else's. Or when it came time to pay the bills. Or when it came time to deposit any money in the bank account. Yes, it seems this bookkeeper was depositing school funds into her own bank account instead of the school's account. It also seems that she gave herself an undocumented raise. This "raise" came out of everybody else's paychecks, a couple of dollars here and there. At last count, this bookkeeper managed to pocket $41,000 of the school's and other teachers' money before anybody noticed.
Then somebody noticed.
Somebody alerted somebody else, who alerted somebody else.....until an audit was ordered.
Then an announcement is made: The high school is in serious fiscal distress and may need to be shut down.
The bookkeeper quickly resigned. Then the superintendant was suspended until further notice. After all the investigations and audits and everything else was done and over with, the bookkeeper was arrested on criminal charges and the superintendant was fired. As I later found out, this bookkeeper just happened to be the mother of Gabby's ex-boyfriend.
So for several weeks, we had no idea what was going to happen with Gabby's school. Would it stay open or would it shut down? If it shuts down, where will Gabby go to school? If it stays open, will the quality of education be affected? The questions were endless as we tried to figure out what was going to happen. We found out that the school had a debt of close to $600,000 and it needed at least $300,000 to remain open. They received an anonymous donation of $100,000 to help towards the debt. The kids held fundraisers. The principal begged to the best of his ability. Meetings were held. Donations were solicited. The final meeting was held on July 31. This meeting would be the final meeting before a decision was made as to whether or not our school would stay open. And now the verdict is in.
The state has stepped in and agreed to have mercy on the district. They will keep our school open for at least one more year, but no guarantees after that. The state will take over and run everything. Certain "middleman" positions have been eliminated and the school leaders report directly to the state, instead of certain boardmembers like they used to. Most of the sports programs will be eliminated, in an effort to save money. Two of the four teachers who quit will be replaced, but the other two will not be. Gabby is a little bit upset. She wanted the school to close down because she wants to start attending a bigger high school. What she doesn't realize is that now I have plenty time to look for another small, possibly a private school for next year, in the event that her school is required to close its doors permanently. I like where she's at right now. I like her high school, for the most part. All things considered, it is the best place for her right now. I guess I need to start working on a back-up plan, though, because a lot can happen in a year.
Gabby attends a small "country" high school, located pretty much in the middle of several hundred acres of chicken farms. Technically, we are in the bigger city school district, but I have chosen NOT to put Gabby in the big high school. I know my daughter.....she will get lost in the system and fall between the cracks. The district we live in has a high school that is overflowing with students. It is way too crowded (they only allow 3 foreign exchange students a year there because there is no room for them, and NOBODY who lives outside the district is ever allowed to transfer in!) These teachers are the 2nd or 3rd highest paid in the state (the highest paid teachers are the ones in the district right next to ours!) I'm sure the education is not bad (for a public school), but I just don't like the fact that the classrooms have something like a 35-to-1 student-to-teacher ratio. I want my daughter in a small school, where teachers can give her more one-on-one attention.
Flash forward to Gabby's little "country" high school: It seems her school had a bookkeeper who was, ummmmmmm, not too good with numbers. OK, she was good with numbers when it came to writing her own paycheck, but not when it came to writing anybody else's. Or when it came time to pay the bills. Or when it came time to deposit any money in the bank account. Yes, it seems this bookkeeper was depositing school funds into her own bank account instead of the school's account. It also seems that she gave herself an undocumented raise. This "raise" came out of everybody else's paychecks, a couple of dollars here and there. At last count, this bookkeeper managed to pocket $41,000 of the school's and other teachers' money before anybody noticed.
Then somebody noticed.
Somebody alerted somebody else, who alerted somebody else.....until an audit was ordered.
Then an announcement is made: The high school is in serious fiscal distress and may need to be shut down.
The bookkeeper quickly resigned. Then the superintendant was suspended until further notice. After all the investigations and audits and everything else was done and over with, the bookkeeper was arrested on criminal charges and the superintendant was fired. As I later found out, this bookkeeper just happened to be the mother of Gabby's ex-boyfriend.
So for several weeks, we had no idea what was going to happen with Gabby's school. Would it stay open or would it shut down? If it shuts down, where will Gabby go to school? If it stays open, will the quality of education be affected? The questions were endless as we tried to figure out what was going to happen. We found out that the school had a debt of close to $600,000 and it needed at least $300,000 to remain open. They received an anonymous donation of $100,000 to help towards the debt. The kids held fundraisers. The principal begged to the best of his ability. Meetings were held. Donations were solicited. The final meeting was held on July 31. This meeting would be the final meeting before a decision was made as to whether or not our school would stay open. And now the verdict is in.
The state has stepped in and agreed to have mercy on the district. They will keep our school open for at least one more year, but no guarantees after that. The state will take over and run everything. Certain "middleman" positions have been eliminated and the school leaders report directly to the state, instead of certain boardmembers like they used to. Most of the sports programs will be eliminated, in an effort to save money. Two of the four teachers who quit will be replaced, but the other two will not be. Gabby is a little bit upset. She wanted the school to close down because she wants to start attending a bigger high school. What she doesn't realize is that now I have plenty time to look for another small, possibly a private school for next year, in the event that her school is required to close its doors permanently. I like where she's at right now. I like her high school, for the most part. All things considered, it is the best place for her right now. I guess I need to start working on a back-up plan, though, because a lot can happen in a year.
Sunday, August 3, 2008
I'd Like a Bowl of Insanity with Some Heatstroke on the Side, Please.
Currently reading: "Im Reich der Wurzelfee" ("In the Kingdom of the Root Fairies"...a traditional German fairy tale)
Well, this past Saturday, Hubby and I thought it would be a good idea to take the girls to the (Tulsa) zoo. Normally this would have been a good idea. Kids like zoos, right? Animals are cute, right? Hell is cool and breezy, right? We were all really excited about this trip (it's a 2.5 hour car ride to Tulsa from where we live, so we made a day trip of it...unfortunately this is the closest zoo to where we live.)
Note to self: When planning our next trip to the zoo, make sure the temperature isn't going to be 101°!!!
Man, was it HOT! Normally the heat doesn't bother me (I grew up in South Florida, so what's a little sunshine?!? No big deal....) but I just couldn't handle the heat at all. The family wasn't faring too well either. As we later found out, the animals aren't too crazy about the heat either. Most of them were in their dens (or lairs or caves, etc.) and weren't even visible to those of us who trekked around in the heat, hoping to catch a glimpse of ferocious carnivores and adorable fluffy things. We saw a few animals: elephants, sea lions, flamingos, just to name a few. After awhile, we knew we weren't going to be able to stay much longer. It was just TOO darned hot. We stopped for lunch, just to take a break and get out of the heat. We shelled out half of what we came with just for lunch. After lunch, we decided to hit the children's petting zoo, then head on out towards home. Annabelle didn't seem to mind the heat too much, but then again she was in an airy stroller with an oversized umbrella providing abundant shade. The rest of us were in the direct line of fire of the sun's rays, so it wasn't quite as comfortable for us as it was for her.
The petting zoo was o.k., but nothing special. The goats were the only animals out, so we missed out on the sheep. The goats were sweet, though. Annabelle was more interested in playing in the dirt than she was in petting any animals. We only stayed for a few minutes before leaving to go home. Before leaving, we stopped for a restroom break so I could change Annabelle's diaper. When I took out everything that I needed, I realized that her diaper ointment was completely melted. It was in her diaper bag, underneath the stroller (which was underneath a large umbrella), yet it was still completely melted. Now THAT'S hot!
Here are a few pictures from our trip. Most of the animals were in hiding, so I didn't get too many good shots.
The flamingos were one of the prettiest exhibits. Plenty of pink birds, all enjoying the sunshine instead of hiding from it:
Gabby tries to copy the movement of the penguin:
Annabelle takes a peek at the meerkat:
Annabelle totally ignores the goat:
My three monkeys:
Well, this past Saturday, Hubby and I thought it would be a good idea to take the girls to the (Tulsa) zoo. Normally this would have been a good idea. Kids like zoos, right? Animals are cute, right? Hell is cool and breezy, right? We were all really excited about this trip (it's a 2.5 hour car ride to Tulsa from where we live, so we made a day trip of it...unfortunately this is the closest zoo to where we live.)
Note to self: When planning our next trip to the zoo, make sure the temperature isn't going to be 101°!!!
Man, was it HOT! Normally the heat doesn't bother me (I grew up in South Florida, so what's a little sunshine?!? No big deal....) but I just couldn't handle the heat at all. The family wasn't faring too well either. As we later found out, the animals aren't too crazy about the heat either. Most of them were in their dens (or lairs or caves, etc.) and weren't even visible to those of us who trekked around in the heat, hoping to catch a glimpse of ferocious carnivores and adorable fluffy things. We saw a few animals: elephants, sea lions, flamingos, just to name a few. After awhile, we knew we weren't going to be able to stay much longer. It was just TOO darned hot. We stopped for lunch, just to take a break and get out of the heat. We shelled out half of what we came with just for lunch. After lunch, we decided to hit the children's petting zoo, then head on out towards home. Annabelle didn't seem to mind the heat too much, but then again she was in an airy stroller with an oversized umbrella providing abundant shade. The rest of us were in the direct line of fire of the sun's rays, so it wasn't quite as comfortable for us as it was for her.
The petting zoo was o.k., but nothing special. The goats were the only animals out, so we missed out on the sheep. The goats were sweet, though. Annabelle was more interested in playing in the dirt than she was in petting any animals. We only stayed for a few minutes before leaving to go home. Before leaving, we stopped for a restroom break so I could change Annabelle's diaper. When I took out everything that I needed, I realized that her diaper ointment was completely melted. It was in her diaper bag, underneath the stroller (which was underneath a large umbrella), yet it was still completely melted. Now THAT'S hot!
Here are a few pictures from our trip. Most of the animals were in hiding, so I didn't get too many good shots.
The flamingos were one of the prettiest exhibits. Plenty of pink birds, all enjoying the sunshine instead of hiding from it:
Gabby tries to copy the movement of the penguin:
Annabelle takes a peek at the meerkat:
Annabelle totally ignores the goat:
My three monkeys:
Friday, July 25, 2008
Home Sweet Homeschool
One of my Blogger friends (Mommy Belle) has asked me to write an entry on why we have decided to homeschool Annabelle. This was actually something that Hubby and I decided to do long before Annabelle was born. For us, the decision to homeschool was a direct result of some of the things that we saw happening in the public school sector with our older daughter. I was, and still am, dismayed at what I see in Gabby's public high school and what I have seen in her previous (public) middle school. I realize that no one system is perfect....nor can one shoe fit everybody who tries it on. But for me, and Hubby agrees, the things that we have seen and experienced at Gabby's school are simply unacceptable. Unfotunately, Gabby is so rooted in the system that I believe taking her out would be detrimental to her. Homeschooling only works if the student benefits from the experience. I don't believe Gabby would.....but I do believe Annabelle would. I've never homeschooled a child before, so I guess Annabelle is going to be my "lab rat" so to speak.
Before deciding to homeschool my daughter, I had to sit down and figure out what it was, exactly, that I wanted for her. What kind of person do I want her to become? What kind of education do I want her to have? By thinking through these things, I had to ask myself an entirely different set of questions as well: by being in a public school, will Annabelle be able to make friends with people who have the same values that we do? Will she be able to stand up to peer pressure and say "no" when her friends try to talk her into doing something that she knows she shouldn't? How big will her classes be and will her teacher be able to give Annabelle any individual attention if she really needs it? What happens if the school runs low on money...will the quality of her education suffer for that? Will Annabelle be taught certain "moral values" that I feel should not be taught in a public school? What if something really bad happens at school...will Annabelle feel comfortable enough talking to me about it? What kinds of books will she have access to in the library? I don't know the answers to any of these questions and, quite honestly, I don't like that. I don't like not knowing what will be happening in my daughter's classroom. I don't like not knowing what she may (or may not!) be learning in school. I don't like having so little control over her education. As it is right now, Gabby brings home books from her school library that are so full of sex and underage drinking that it actually makes me blush to read some of this stuff! And I won't even get into the foul language that these books contain! Why can't she bring home some of the classics? What's wrong with Mark Twain or the Bronte Sisters? What about some of the translated classics of Tolstoy or Cervantes? Well, the main problem is that these timeless classics are not available on my daughter's library shelves. Why aren't they available? Because the shelves are too full of the "Gossip Girl" series and other individual books that tout the benefits of sleeping with your best friend's boyfriend (as long as he's cute!) To counter this disturbing pattern of trashy novel reading, I have offered Gabby some of the books from my bookcase, in an effort to expose her to a little bit of literary culture (and class!) What do you suppose happens when a 15 year old girl, who has been reading nothing but "fast food" literature for so long, finally gets her nose into a more "classic" novel like "Rebecca" (Daphne du Maurier)? Well, what happens is that the 15 year old girl simply doesn't have the ability to understand it. Gabby has been reading these morally bankrupt novels containing watered down vocabulary for so long now, that she simply is not able to understand anything else. "Rebecca" is not a difficult book to understand, but it contains no foul language. This means those places where the foul language would have been now contain actual multi-syllabic words, some of which Gabby has never heard before. This would be a perfect opportunity for some vocabulary enrichment......but, well, I guess that's too much work. Gossip Girls is easier. All these years of Gabby doing book reports, I honestly thought she was reading the same kinds of books I read when I was in (public) school. I never realized what she was actually reading since many of these books stay in her backpack or her bedroom. I guess I just assumed she was reading something intelligent, not realizing that nothing intelligent was available. Now Gabby is so hooked on this garbage that she refuses to read anything else. I don't want to go through this with another daughter.
When Gabby was in the 6th grade, I remember her bringing home a book called "Stone Soup". For those who don't know, this is actually a 3rd grade book. I confronted Gabby about this and told her that I would not allow her, a sixth grader, to write a book report on a 3rd grade book. She informed me that she had no choice, that this was the book her teacher had given her and told her to write about. After questioning Gabby further, I found out that they had been tested that day, and that Gabby tested at a 3rd grade reading level. When I found this out, I requested a conference with her teacher. At the conference, I informed the teacher that I was aware of the reading test that Gabby took, and that she tested at a 3rd grade level. However, I did not want Gabby reading 3rd grade books for her book reports. I Wanted her to read something on her level, or at the very least, one level higher (4th grade) so that she could improve her reading and get caught up as soon as possible. Long story short, the teacher would not work with me and would not help me. She told me that Gabby was reading at a 3rd grade level, and she would not be allowed to check out anything but 3rd grade books. Well, if a 6th grade reads nothing but 3rd grade books, she will never improve her reading skills. That afternoon, I put Gabby on a reading schedule. We started with 4th grade books, mostly Nancy Drew, and slowly worked our way up to 6th grade ones. She read 40 minutes every day and, in the course of one school year, brought her reading level up from a 3rd grade one to a 6th grade one. It took my intervention to do it, and I received absolutely no support from her teacher. I thought teachers and parents were supposed to work together for the good of the student?! What happens when the teacher is uncooperative?
What happens when the teacher's hands are tied and she CAN'T help her students? Gabby got in trouble in class one day and was disciplined, along with two other students, for mouthing off to the teacher. Her punishment was sentences. She had to write 50 sentences indicating that it was wrong to mouth off and she wouldn't do it again. I don't remember the exact sentence that she had to repeatedly write, but it wasn't an obnoxiously long one. She came home and wrote them and I checked every single one of them. The punishment fit the crime, and I had no problem with her writing these sentences. The next day, when she came home from school, I asked her if she turned her sentences in to the teacher. Yes, she did, however...........one of the other students wrote 7 sentences before deciding it was a stupid punishment and stopped writing them. The other student complained to his mother and his mother called the teacher and told the teacher that her son didn't want to write the sentences and, therefore, would not be turning his in. So what happened to Gabby's sentences? Evidently the teacher felt it was unfair to punish only one of the students when all 3 were guilty, so Gabby got 50 extra credit points for her sentences. Yes, my daughter received extra credit for mouthing off to her teacher! I was furious.
These are just a few of the scenarios that I have had to deal with. I won't even mention the teacher who asked the students to bring in a DVD from home so they could watch it in class the next day. Why were they watching a DVD? Because the teacher didn't feel like making up a lesson plan for the following day.
Gabby failed science this year, which means she will need to take science in her senior year, when all her friends have an elective class instead. Gabby tells me that she, in fact, will NOT need to take science in her senior year because the school will simply take one of her current elective classes and turn it into a science credit. Now, a friend of mine (who happens to be a school teacher) says this can't be done....that Gabby will definitely need to take a science class in her senior year. Gabby, however, is absolutely insistant that this is how it works and that she will NOT need to take a science class in her senior year. So, in all fairness, I will need to look into this one, but to be honest with you....and I know this is going to sound terrible.....but Gabby is not creative enough to make this kind of stuff up. So she had to have heard this from someone else or known someone who had this done to them. Gabby isn't simply making this up, though, she got this information from somewhere.
I remember a couple of years ago when Gabby was having trouble in her math class. Now, math has never been a good subject for me. In fact, math was a potential career killer for me when, as a 16 year old, I decided I wanted to be a pharmacist when I grew up. Well, I couldn't pass the "advanced" math classes (they were far more difficult than the basic math classes I was in!) that I needed to get into the chemistry classes that I needed to be a science major. Sooooooo, I learned early on that a career as a pharmacist was probably not going to be in my future. Anyway, Gabby was not doing well in school and needed help in math. Fortunately, hubby is pretty good in math and could take over at this point, but I remember Gabby telling me that she had asked the teacher to explain how to do these particular math problems. Well, why didn't the teacher explain how to do them? Because there were too many students asking too many questions and the teacher didn't have time to answer everybody's questions. So some students didn't get their questions answered. Now, what happens to the student who doesn't have a parent who can help them with math? Math is not easy for everyone.....and is downright problematic for many (clearing throat here), but this can easily happen in any subject - foreign languages are a prime example. Foreign languages, like math, are either no problem at all for a person or they are a major thorn in your side. Most people don't have a "middle of the road" opinion of either one of these subjects...you either love them or you hate them. You either love math and have no problem computing numbers or, like me, you fear that you will be forever bouncing checks because you are consistantly miscalculating how much money you really have left in your checking account. The same is true with foreign languages...you either love it and can spew out verb declensions like a native speaker or you inwardly fear that you might accidently call somebody a hairy porkchop because you can't remember how to ask where the bathrooms are in French. Well, what happens when the teacher can't help you?
After listening to Gabby's horror stories about what goes on in her school, it just seemed like homeschooling Annabelle was the best choice for us. Now, I will say this: if there were a private school in the area that fit every single one of my "demands" (including location, cost, classmates, class size, quality of teachers and educational materials, curriculum, etc.) then I would be very happy sending Annabelle to that private school. However, I can't control the other students' behavior in Annabelle's class. Nor can I control how many students are in her class or what she will learn. It's just too "iffy" for me and (I'm repeating myself here, I know) because of what I see and hear in Gabby's school, I really have no desire to put Annabelle through any of that. In all honesty, I really don't think Gabby is happy at school. She says she is, and I believe that she probably really does think that she is, but I'm just not seeing it. There's a look in her eyes, a tone in her voice....a mother picks up on these things....that tells me she's not happy there. I also know she wouldn't be happy if I were to homeschool her, either. Her social life is way too important to her and I don't want her to end up resenting me because I pulled her out of public school. It's a tough call to make. If Gabby is going to be unhappy either way, then I feel it is just best to leave her where she is. No sense putting me through hell if it isn't going to make a difference to her one way or the other.
Well, this is just the beginning of the list. I could go on and on (like I haven't already!) with the reasons why we are homeschooling, but everytime I start a list like this I only come up with more reasons to write down. I have already got a homeschooling blog up and running (no entries in it yet, but it's at least up!) I am keeping this blog for my benefit....so I have a record of what Annabelle is learning and if she is progressing the way I think she should, etc. Obviously she is too young right now for any type of schooling, but I am going to start logging all the books I read to her and note her preferences....again, for my own personal knowledge. However, I will be making this blog public (as soon as I start writing in it!) so that the friends and family members who have shown curiosity toward my decision to homeschool can see how it's going for us. This blog will continue to be the main line of communication with my friends. :-)
Before deciding to homeschool my daughter, I had to sit down and figure out what it was, exactly, that I wanted for her. What kind of person do I want her to become? What kind of education do I want her to have? By thinking through these things, I had to ask myself an entirely different set of questions as well: by being in a public school, will Annabelle be able to make friends with people who have the same values that we do? Will she be able to stand up to peer pressure and say "no" when her friends try to talk her into doing something that she knows she shouldn't? How big will her classes be and will her teacher be able to give Annabelle any individual attention if she really needs it? What happens if the school runs low on money...will the quality of her education suffer for that? Will Annabelle be taught certain "moral values" that I feel should not be taught in a public school? What if something really bad happens at school...will Annabelle feel comfortable enough talking to me about it? What kinds of books will she have access to in the library? I don't know the answers to any of these questions and, quite honestly, I don't like that. I don't like not knowing what will be happening in my daughter's classroom. I don't like not knowing what she may (or may not!) be learning in school. I don't like having so little control over her education. As it is right now, Gabby brings home books from her school library that are so full of sex and underage drinking that it actually makes me blush to read some of this stuff! And I won't even get into the foul language that these books contain! Why can't she bring home some of the classics? What's wrong with Mark Twain or the Bronte Sisters? What about some of the translated classics of Tolstoy or Cervantes? Well, the main problem is that these timeless classics are not available on my daughter's library shelves. Why aren't they available? Because the shelves are too full of the "Gossip Girl" series and other individual books that tout the benefits of sleeping with your best friend's boyfriend (as long as he's cute!) To counter this disturbing pattern of trashy novel reading, I have offered Gabby some of the books from my bookcase, in an effort to expose her to a little bit of literary culture (and class!) What do you suppose happens when a 15 year old girl, who has been reading nothing but "fast food" literature for so long, finally gets her nose into a more "classic" novel like "Rebecca" (Daphne du Maurier)? Well, what happens is that the 15 year old girl simply doesn't have the ability to understand it. Gabby has been reading these morally bankrupt novels containing watered down vocabulary for so long now, that she simply is not able to understand anything else. "Rebecca" is not a difficult book to understand, but it contains no foul language. This means those places where the foul language would have been now contain actual multi-syllabic words, some of which Gabby has never heard before. This would be a perfect opportunity for some vocabulary enrichment......but, well, I guess that's too much work. Gossip Girls is easier. All these years of Gabby doing book reports, I honestly thought she was reading the same kinds of books I read when I was in (public) school. I never realized what she was actually reading since many of these books stay in her backpack or her bedroom. I guess I just assumed she was reading something intelligent, not realizing that nothing intelligent was available. Now Gabby is so hooked on this garbage that she refuses to read anything else. I don't want to go through this with another daughter.
When Gabby was in the 6th grade, I remember her bringing home a book called "Stone Soup". For those who don't know, this is actually a 3rd grade book. I confronted Gabby about this and told her that I would not allow her, a sixth grader, to write a book report on a 3rd grade book. She informed me that she had no choice, that this was the book her teacher had given her and told her to write about. After questioning Gabby further, I found out that they had been tested that day, and that Gabby tested at a 3rd grade reading level. When I found this out, I requested a conference with her teacher. At the conference, I informed the teacher that I was aware of the reading test that Gabby took, and that she tested at a 3rd grade level. However, I did not want Gabby reading 3rd grade books for her book reports. I Wanted her to read something on her level, or at the very least, one level higher (4th grade) so that she could improve her reading and get caught up as soon as possible. Long story short, the teacher would not work with me and would not help me. She told me that Gabby was reading at a 3rd grade level, and she would not be allowed to check out anything but 3rd grade books. Well, if a 6th grade reads nothing but 3rd grade books, she will never improve her reading skills. That afternoon, I put Gabby on a reading schedule. We started with 4th grade books, mostly Nancy Drew, and slowly worked our way up to 6th grade ones. She read 40 minutes every day and, in the course of one school year, brought her reading level up from a 3rd grade one to a 6th grade one. It took my intervention to do it, and I received absolutely no support from her teacher. I thought teachers and parents were supposed to work together for the good of the student?! What happens when the teacher is uncooperative?
What happens when the teacher's hands are tied and she CAN'T help her students? Gabby got in trouble in class one day and was disciplined, along with two other students, for mouthing off to the teacher. Her punishment was sentences. She had to write 50 sentences indicating that it was wrong to mouth off and she wouldn't do it again. I don't remember the exact sentence that she had to repeatedly write, but it wasn't an obnoxiously long one. She came home and wrote them and I checked every single one of them. The punishment fit the crime, and I had no problem with her writing these sentences. The next day, when she came home from school, I asked her if she turned her sentences in to the teacher. Yes, she did, however...........one of the other students wrote 7 sentences before deciding it was a stupid punishment and stopped writing them. The other student complained to his mother and his mother called the teacher and told the teacher that her son didn't want to write the sentences and, therefore, would not be turning his in. So what happened to Gabby's sentences? Evidently the teacher felt it was unfair to punish only one of the students when all 3 were guilty, so Gabby got 50 extra credit points for her sentences. Yes, my daughter received extra credit for mouthing off to her teacher! I was furious.
These are just a few of the scenarios that I have had to deal with. I won't even mention the teacher who asked the students to bring in a DVD from home so they could watch it in class the next day. Why were they watching a DVD? Because the teacher didn't feel like making up a lesson plan for the following day.
Gabby failed science this year, which means she will need to take science in her senior year, when all her friends have an elective class instead. Gabby tells me that she, in fact, will NOT need to take science in her senior year because the school will simply take one of her current elective classes and turn it into a science credit. Now, a friend of mine (who happens to be a school teacher) says this can't be done....that Gabby will definitely need to take a science class in her senior year. Gabby, however, is absolutely insistant that this is how it works and that she will NOT need to take a science class in her senior year. So, in all fairness, I will need to look into this one, but to be honest with you....and I know this is going to sound terrible.....but Gabby is not creative enough to make this kind of stuff up. So she had to have heard this from someone else or known someone who had this done to them. Gabby isn't simply making this up, though, she got this information from somewhere.
I remember a couple of years ago when Gabby was having trouble in her math class. Now, math has never been a good subject for me. In fact, math was a potential career killer for me when, as a 16 year old, I decided I wanted to be a pharmacist when I grew up. Well, I couldn't pass the "advanced" math classes (they were far more difficult than the basic math classes I was in!) that I needed to get into the chemistry classes that I needed to be a science major. Sooooooo, I learned early on that a career as a pharmacist was probably not going to be in my future. Anyway, Gabby was not doing well in school and needed help in math. Fortunately, hubby is pretty good in math and could take over at this point, but I remember Gabby telling me that she had asked the teacher to explain how to do these particular math problems. Well, why didn't the teacher explain how to do them? Because there were too many students asking too many questions and the teacher didn't have time to answer everybody's questions. So some students didn't get their questions answered. Now, what happens to the student who doesn't have a parent who can help them with math? Math is not easy for everyone.....and is downright problematic for many (clearing throat here), but this can easily happen in any subject - foreign languages are a prime example. Foreign languages, like math, are either no problem at all for a person or they are a major thorn in your side. Most people don't have a "middle of the road" opinion of either one of these subjects...you either love them or you hate them. You either love math and have no problem computing numbers or, like me, you fear that you will be forever bouncing checks because you are consistantly miscalculating how much money you really have left in your checking account. The same is true with foreign languages...you either love it and can spew out verb declensions like a native speaker or you inwardly fear that you might accidently call somebody a hairy porkchop because you can't remember how to ask where the bathrooms are in French. Well, what happens when the teacher can't help you?
After listening to Gabby's horror stories about what goes on in her school, it just seemed like homeschooling Annabelle was the best choice for us. Now, I will say this: if there were a private school in the area that fit every single one of my "demands" (including location, cost, classmates, class size, quality of teachers and educational materials, curriculum, etc.) then I would be very happy sending Annabelle to that private school. However, I can't control the other students' behavior in Annabelle's class. Nor can I control how many students are in her class or what she will learn. It's just too "iffy" for me and (I'm repeating myself here, I know) because of what I see and hear in Gabby's school, I really have no desire to put Annabelle through any of that. In all honesty, I really don't think Gabby is happy at school. She says she is, and I believe that she probably really does think that she is, but I'm just not seeing it. There's a look in her eyes, a tone in her voice....a mother picks up on these things....that tells me she's not happy there. I also know she wouldn't be happy if I were to homeschool her, either. Her social life is way too important to her and I don't want her to end up resenting me because I pulled her out of public school. It's a tough call to make. If Gabby is going to be unhappy either way, then I feel it is just best to leave her where she is. No sense putting me through hell if it isn't going to make a difference to her one way or the other.
Well, this is just the beginning of the list. I could go on and on (like I haven't already!) with the reasons why we are homeschooling, but everytime I start a list like this I only come up with more reasons to write down. I have already got a homeschooling blog up and running (no entries in it yet, but it's at least up!) I am keeping this blog for my benefit....so I have a record of what Annabelle is learning and if she is progressing the way I think she should, etc. Obviously she is too young right now for any type of schooling, but I am going to start logging all the books I read to her and note her preferences....again, for my own personal knowledge. However, I will be making this blog public (as soon as I start writing in it!) so that the friends and family members who have shown curiosity toward my decision to homeschool can see how it's going for us. This blog will continue to be the main line of communication with my friends. :-)
Thursday, July 24, 2008
Her First Steps!
I finally got it!! She started this yesterday, but because of the darned 3 second delay from when I push the shutter down to when the camera actually snaps the picture, I was unable to get any pictures of Annabelle walking. Her she is, though, in all her glory as she proudly marches across the living room! I'm so proud of her!
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