Hey John McCain

Are they crazy???

So I took this Sorting Test for Hogwarts. And you know what it told me? It said that I belong in Hufflepuff! Hufflepuff. ME!?!?!? They're out of their minds. Every test I've ever taken has said that I belong in Gryffindor! I've very Molly-ish and figure if I'm SO much like Molly Weasley and Molly Weasley is Gryffindor then certainly I am to. This whole test has made me doubt my Lion-ness. Hufflepuff. It's not that I'm elitist and think that Gryffindors are best. Some of my favorite characters are from the other houses (Luna - Ravenclaw, Snape - Slytherin, Cedric - Hufflepuff). I've never seen the division of the houses anymore than putting people with other people who have similar attitudes, moods, desires, ambitions and learning styles. And I keep remembering when Harry questioned Dumbledore about why he was in Gryffindor rather than Slytherin and Dumbledore said, "It is our choices, Harry." It's the same advice that he gave Albus Severus. The Sorting Hat takes into consideration our desires.

I'll have to ponder this some more.

Yeah, it's been (mumbly mumble) weeks since I last posted and the first thing I rant about is a Hogwarts Sorting Test. :-)

In other news, summer has hit us with a vengeance. We've had horrid thunderstorms most days and when it isn't raining it feels like it's about to. It's HOT and MUGGY and we've been hibernating like we normally do in the summer. We've been anxiously studying the Presidential elections and volunteering with the Obama campaign. My birthday came and went. It was pleasant and I received a copy of The Other Boleyn Girl on DVD and The Boy and I made Happy Birthday Pancakes (since my oven is currently on the fritz so it had to be pancakes or no cakes). His tenth birthday is just two weeks away and he's going to get to spend it with his friend playing Wii and we will probably go see Wall-e at the movies. I'm quite thankful for Disney being consistent in releasing their summer movie the weekend of my son's birthday. No big summer vacation trips for us this year. With the gas prices, we are pretty much staying home. Tra-la.

An open letter to Senator Hillary Clinton

Dear Senator Clinton,

Stop! Please stop! Stop sounding like a crazy angry perpetually PMS'ed mad woman. When I hear you speak these days you don't sound like you are giving a "Let's win one for the Gipper" speech but more like you are scolding an entire nation full of misogynists. Can't you say anything without sounding snippy, whiny, or angry?

Stop the negative ads against Obama. Obama is not your enemy. Obama is simply running for the same position as you are. Stop telling us how unprepared he is to be president. Stop making innuendos that he is Muslim and standing by the people in your campaign that continue to make racist remarks.

Stop pretending that you have experience just because you were first lady for eight years. I don't want my dentist's wife drilling on my teeth just because she is married to my dentist! Stop trying to make your USO tours look like foreign policy meetings. And please check your date book, because you arrived the day after the borders in Kosovo were opened to refugees, so you couldn't have had an influence in that. You weren't even there!

Stop wasting your money, your energy and your party's time by carrying on this campaign. The numbers truly are against you and it is time for us to be united behind one candidate who can lead the Democratic party to a victory in November. Do you realize that Rush Limbaugh is encouraging Republicans to cross party lines in open primary seats to vote for you because the Republicans know that if it came down between a choice of you or Senator McCain that the majority of this nation would vote for the Republican. Do you really want 4 more years of Republican control of the executive branch? Do you really want 4 more years of nothing getting done? Do you really want 100 more years of war in the Middle East?

Stop, please stop thinking that Senator Obama's supporters are a bunch of Kool-aide drinking radical dunderheads who can't think for themselves and are only caught up in his glamor. I happen to be a well educated woman who has looked at both sides and made a logical and informed decision that Barack Obama has what it takes to turn this country around after the past 8 years of downward spiralling that has happened.

Please, Senator Clinton, it is time to stop. It is time to support Senator Obama and stop tearing him down. He hasn't done that to you. He isn't willing to stoop to your level, so rise to his. Take this moment before the Pennsylvania primary to decide if you want another 4 years of a Republican Presidency because you didn't know when to stop!

Sincerely,
Michelle

Rocks for Barak!

OK, someone at Ravelry posted a link to Logobama where you can create your own Obama logos. Too cool! So Tim, Gothgirl's pet rock, is now a "Rock for Barak" Check it out and make your own logo!

Unschooling Voices #13

Unschooling Voices is an online "'zine" which is found through the Internet on various people's blogs. You can find out more about Unschooling Voices at THIS WEBSITE. I enjoy reading how other families have approached unschooling and incorporated the philosophy of learning all the time into their lives.

This month's topic is on helping your children gain information on a topic without it becoming schooling. From the website: Silvia at Po Moyemuwill be hosting this edition and has submitted this question: What do you do, as an unschooling parent, when your child expresses an interest in a particular topic and you don't know how to help them in a way that doesn't involve lesson plans and curriculum?

First I have to say that neither curriculum nor lesson plans are totally unschooly IF they serve a purpose for what the person is looking for. I've met several unschoolers who actually enjoy curriculum and like schedules. Those things in and of themselves is not a horrible thing. I feel, though, that a lot of it comes depends on parental expectation. If I help my child find the curriculum that s/he needs to accomplish a task s/he has set up for him/herself, then what are
my expectations? I have to trust that my child will learn at the pace that s/he is needing and step in where s/he needs me.

As an example of this, Gothgirl really wants to learn Japanese. Just purchasing various books and curriculum wasn't helping. She would work her way through them and not feel she had gotten anywhere. She asked if she could take a Japanese language class somewhere and I found one for her at the local community college. She thrived on this class for an entire semester and was deemed "the best student" by her sensei. She asked me weekly throughout her class to help her with her homework. I did this quite willingly and gladly. She had a curriculum and she had lesson plans that she had to stick to. However, no one forced her to. It was something that she had craved to learn for so long that she was willing to do the work to gain the knowledge. Had she taken a few classes and decided it wasn't the right fit for her she always had the option of not going back. There was no parental expectation of her finishing the class. There wasn't even any parental expectation of her doing well.

I think it is important to point out here that there is a huge difference between parental expectation and parental hope. While I never expected Gothgirl to complete or do well in the class, I always hoped she would. When you can easily separate those two things in your brain, it will open up a whole new avenue in approaching such things as curriculum and lesson plans.

My children expressed an interest this past fall in learning more about mathematics. Boo loves math and numbers. She sees them as puzzles more than anything. The Boy just likes anything that is interesting. So we headed off to the curriculum fair this fall and found a Math-U-See curriculum that the kids had all been eyeing. It sits mostly in the draw in the living room untouched, but it does come out periodically. On a rainy afternoon when there is nothing to do or when boredom strikes one (or all three) of the kids might pull out the math curriculum and work a few pages or lessons or units. There is no parental expectation for them to finish it or do things in order. Sometimes a concept clicks easily and they move on sometimes it seems confusing and they get stuck. Either way it was their choosing and it is for their leisure. It's something that they all asked for and all use on occasion, but without force or rules or that pesky parental expectation.

I don't know if I could have done this 3 or 4 years ago when we first started our unschooling venture. I don't know that I had enough faith in "the system" to be able to allow my children to freely use a curriculum at their pace. It was something that I came into on my own. I will admit when we first got the math curriculum and it was knew there were daily lessons being done and the kids asked to do it each day. I had a momentary hesitation that I had done something horribly wrong in introducing curriculum with lesson plans and charts into an unschooling home. But as time wore on and the newness factor wore off, it got settled into the same level as the rest of the items in the house. It was there for use when wanted, but not required.

Oh and if you read back through my blog to the first post which talks about "un-unschooling" you will be happy to know we have found a happy medium. I still consider ourselves unschoolers. Radical at that. I've just found more ways of increasing that "more, different" that the kids were looking for.

J is for...

Jack! And that's all the Jacks we've ever known in real life or fictionally. There's always Jack Skelington, a wonderful pioneer in change. Jack McFarland from Will and Grace (or "Just Jack 2000" for those that actually watched the show) There's Jack B Nimble of the candle leaping fame. And Jack Sprat who was the original low carb dieter. Jack and his significant other who had to battle an uphill climb just for water only to suffer a concussion. There is the giant slaying disobedient Jack with his evergrowing beanstalk. We can't forget Jack Jack the delayed super hero who bursts into flames for his babysitter (such a wonderful name that they named him twice!) My friend Jack who was best man at our wedding who owned a wonderfully friendly wolf. And of course we can't leave out Captain Sparrow of the notorious Pirate Court. Most important is my cat Jack who is named for all these Jacks and more!

I is for.....

Illumination! Both that illumination that comes from hours of work with paints, inks, pen and brush and the illumination that comes in those "ah-ha" moments. Illumination comes from the Latin root Lumos and all Harry Potter fans knows that when Harry says, "Lumos" that his wand lights up. Illuminate means to bring light to something. In medieval times works were considered illuminated when light was brought to them through the addition of white and gold work. Gold leaf was finely applied to works of art to make them more beautiful. You can see some of my illuminations (and calligraphy) at my
Medieval Blog.

As homeschoolers we are working to illuminate our children's lives with knowledge and understanding. Hopefully the light will shine on them as it does on the gold leaf on the scrolls we work on and help to make their lives more beautiful.

H is for .......

well, Harry of course. It's been a somewhat Harry week in the news this week. First we get the news that Dumbledore is gay. OK, was anyone
really surprised by that fact? For some reason it just made me smile rather than be in shock. More of an "Oh, yeah, that's it. Oh, OK, let's continue on then shall we?" It makes me like Dumbledore even more (although it does make the Potter Puppet Pal's Dumbledore with nakey time all that much funnier!) There is a funny little article in the LA Times that I got a good chuckle over. 7 clues that Potter's Dumbledore was gay.




And the other Harry story in the news was story of Harry Potter books being banned from a Catholic private school in Boston Story can be read here. The excuse by the priest who made the decision (with no input by parents or other staff) was that the books were filled with sorcery and witchcraft. sigh. I wonder if the Lord of the Rings is also banned at this school. What about Sleeping Beauty? The Chronicles of Narnia? Those stories have sorcery and witchcraft in them. Oh, right, but the Chronicles of Narnia was a metaphor for Jesus and Tolkein was a "good Catholic." And of course in Sleeping Beauty, the witch was BAD, let's not take into consideration that the fairies that saved Aurora's life used their own form of sorcery. Try as I might I have yet to get the lights turned on by saying Lumos. No matter how loud I yell it and point my knitting needles at the switch. And the last time I locked myself outside the door I had to break in the house. Alohamora just didn't do the trick. No one is learning witchcraft from J.K. Rowling's books. If anything they are learning Latin and Greek! Is that such a bad thing?

Tornadoes!

Our town has been battered by tornadoes today. They say it isn't over yet. I was at the public radio station this morning to answer phones (please support your local public radio!) and was coming home enjoying a nice piece of music when the emergency alert came on warning of a tornado that would be passing over my house in 7 minutes. GREAT! I was 3 minutes from the house, ran in and nearly tripped over the kids who were lined up in the hallway (yay for Daddy hearing the radio and springing into action.) We've had four tornado warning already today with more expected through the night.
This is where the tornado started as two, but fortunately combined into one. Twin twisters racing through a town causes SO much more destruction.

You can see some video of the tornados at the Pensacola News Journal website. Now what I want to know is why these people were outside during a tornado warning filming these monsters!?!



Keep safe everyone!

Yay for Al!!!

I didn't get to listen to much news yesterday because I was so busy getting ready for our next SCA event and had a ton of things to do before we leave in a few hours. So this morning I'm laying in bed going through all the things that I still needed to remember and listening to NPR. And they announce that Al Gore won the Nobel Prize for Peace!!! Woo Hoo!!!!!!!! This is such good news for the environment. He's not saying anything new that we haven't heard before, but he's saying it in a way that is getitng to more people and helping to really make a change in this world. There are some days that I am VERY upset that he didn't win the election in 2000, but I am SO glad that he didn't let that setback keep him from doing good things for this world. Yippe for him and the researchers who helped put all this into action!!

Now go change out a real lightbulb with a compact flourescent and recycle a plastic container (or two or three).

G is for

Great! And all its connotations. For instance your child comes in from outside with news that she learned out to do a cartwheel. You respond, "GREAT! That's fantastic honey!" OR Your child comes in from outside covered from head to toe in mud, leaves, and grime from jumping in mud puddles. You respond, "GREAT! More laundry to do!" And let us not forget what Mr. Olivander told Harry, "But I think it is clear that we can expect great things from you. After all, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named did great things. Terrible! Yes! But great."

F is for

Feminine. Think of all the females that touch our lives. Our mothers, sisters, aunts, friends, and lovers. Think of their softness and loving touches and then think of their anger and justified revenge. I hate books where the feminine is only the former. She is pale, soft, timid, weak, in need of rescuing.

In the movie "The Princess Bride" (which I like for all parts except Buttercup's inability to defend herself) Buttercup
needs rescuing because she doesn't seem to be able to do it herself. She waits on the boat to be rescued. She relies upon others to save her from danger. She can't even pick up a stick and hit the R.O.U.S. when it is attacking her true love. She can't think enough to escape the castle to go find Wesley. She waits for Wesley to save her. "He will come. I know it."

Counter that princess with Eowyn from Lord of the Rings. She is "grave and thoughful was her glance, as she looked on the king with cool pity in her eyes. Very fair was her face, and her long hair was like a river of gold. Slender and tall she was in her white robe girt with silver, but strong she seemed and stern as steel, a daughter of kings." She was "no man" who was able to defeat Nazgul. Two princesses. Two females. Both beautiful. But with Buttercup her abilities ended with her beauty. With Eowyn she didn't let her beauty limit her abilities.

E is for

Energy! The energy that we expend in doing work and the energy that we consume when we make use of anything that gives off energy! Whether it is a fire or electricity or steam. We use, create and consume energy all the time. We use energy just to breathe. We consume energy to type our blog messages. We create energy in good and bad ways. Nuclear energy is one of those mystifyingly good and bad energies. It is fairly cheap, creates a lot of energy from few materials, but leaves us with waste that is nearly impossible to get rid of in our lifetime. We have yet learned how to deal with our waste and the cost of fusion has yet to be balanced with increased profit output.

D is for

Differences! And the uniqueness in all of us. We are different and I'm so glad. If we were all the same it would be a truly boring world. If everyone looked the same, acted the same, talked the same, smiled the same, and was the same we would just be so boring! Viva la difference!

C

As tempted as I am to say that C is for Cookie (that's good enough for me) I really have to say that C is for communication. It's imperative in this world to be able to communicate with the other people you interact with. Especially with those who you deal with on a daily basis. Be their friends or family or coworkers or even the barista at Starbuck's. There are times where communication is not understood clearly and it can really impact your day. Then there are times when the person you are trying to communicate with has very poor communication skills themselves. They don't listen or comprehend well. You think to yourself, "Does 'no onions' sound anything like 'extra onions'?" Probably not to you. But maybe to the person on the other end of the staticky speaker system at the drive-through who not only is taking your order, but also pouring drinks for the order ahead of you, listening to the sounds of food preparation and the customers in the restaurant as well as worrying about whether her kid got on the bus or if she will get a call in 20 minutes saying that Johnny missed the bus home again and could she please come and get him.

So as you go through your day today, think about the people with whom you communicate. Are you speaking clearly? Do you have their attention. Do they have YOUR attention. Are you letting prejudice get in the way of that communication? Do you already set yourself up to not have effective communication because of your attitude? Breathe. And try to approach each new communication encounter with a fresh voice.

B

B is for Bread. I love bread. I love mixing it, watching it rise, smelling it as the yeasts multiply and cause the bread to swell, baking it and having the house fill with that oh so warm and lucious aroma that envelops you like a warm blanket on a cold winter day. Mostly I love eating it. Especially when it is hot out of the oven with real butter. MMmmmm. My grandmother used to make a Honey Whole Wheat Bread that she found on the back of a Gold Medal Flour bag. I wish I could find that recipe again. It made the most wonderful bread. I remember how it was made and in entailed heating the honey and water on the stove until the honey dissolved. Then you had to cool it down some before adding the yeast (so you wouldn't kill it). It made two loaves. My family's favorite bread is my foccaccia. I'll share that with you until I can find my grandmother's bread recipe!

Michelle's Focaccia

1 c. milk at room temp
3T sugar
1 t salt
3 T. butter melted into the milk
2 t. yeast.

Mix the first 4 ingredients and cast the yeast over it while you let it rise start activating. When it gets frothy add 3 cups of flour (or 1-1/2 c. whole wheat flour and 1-1/2 c. plain white flour) and knead it in. Allow to rise then punch down and form into the desired shape. We like it made flat like a traditional focaccia, but when I take it somewhere for a potluck I make it in a loaf. Bake it at 400°F for 20-30 minutes or until it is done.

This is such a nice and simple recipe. You can easily make it into something else. We've added fresh herbs, chopped garlic, cinnamon and sugar (rolled into it with butter for a cinnamony roll cake) and parmesan cheese over the top. If you make it flat rub it with some olive oil and sprinkle with a little salt and punch a few finger holes into it.

Bread is the food that helped us, as a species, to stop being hunter gatherer nomads into cultivators with raised live stock. Wheat allowed us to not have to follow the herds during the winters as we had a food that would last through the winter and feed us. It also gave us the foundation to make beer. Egyptians used to take bread, water and honey and let it ferment and then drink the liquid. Later they realized that they could forgo the bread part and just start with wheat, water yeast and honey and get the same result.

In England there were two bakers guilds. One made white bread and the other dark. Elizabeth I put an end to this by uniting them into the Worshipful Company of Bread Bakers. A guild (or union) that still exists today. Bread has had to be regulated throughout history to keep the poor from staring during times of famine. Interestingly, in the middle ages people believed that white bread was better for you and was thus more expensive. Brown bread was considered less healthy and so less expensive. Today we know the opposite to be true. While our pooor ancestors were eating healthy bread, today's poor tend to eat mostly inexpensive white bread which is less healthy for them.

I did find this bread recipe which is fairly close, but still not exact.:

HONEY - WHOLE WHEAT BREAD

Ingredients :
3 c. Gold Medal whole wheat flour
1/3 c. honey
1/4 c. vegetable oil
1 tbsp. salt
2 pkgs. regular or quick-acting
active dry yeast
2 1/4 c. very warm water (120 to 130
degrees)
3 to 4 c. Gold Medal oat flour blend
Butter or margarine, softened

Preparation :
Mix whole wheat flour, honey, oil, salt, and yeast in large bowl.
Add warm water. Beat on low speed 1 minute, scraping bowl
frequently. Beat on medium speed 1 minute, scraping bowl
frequently. Stir in enough of the oat flour blend, 1 cup at a time,
to make dough easy to handle. Turn dough onto lightly floured
surface; knead about 10 minutes or until smooth and elastic. Place
in bowl sprayed with non-stick cooking spray; spray the top of dough
with non-stick cooking spray. Cover and let rise in warm place 40
to 60 minutes or until double. (Dough is ready when indentation
remains when touched.) Spray 2 loaf pans with nonstick cooking
spray. Punch down dough; divide in half. Flatten each half with
hands or rolling pin into 18 x 9 inch rectangle. Fold crosswise into
thirds, overlapping the two sides. Roll dough up tightly toward
you, beginning at short end. Press with thumbs to seal after each
turn. Press each end with side of hand to seal; fold ends under.
Place loaves, seam side down, in pans. Brush lightly with butter or
margarine; sprinkle with whole wheat flour or crushed rolled oats,
if desired. Let rise 35 to 50 minutes or until double. Move oven
rack to lowest position. Heat oven to 375 degrees. Place loaves on
lowest oven rack. Bake 40 to 45 minutes or until loaves are deep
golden brown and sound hollow when tapped. Remove from pans; cool
on wire rack.

A

A letter a day. Kitten has this running on her blog and I liked the idea. So I'm borrowing it. Hope you don't mind Kitten!
A is for Attitude! We all have them. There are good attitudes and bad attitudes. You can have an attitude that makes you look like an understanding and caring person or you can have an attitude that makes you look like an egotistical snob. It's all in how you look at life and look at yourself. It goes beyond the "half empty/half full" glass scenario. It's how you respond to other people as well. You can be completely optimistic, but if you treat others like they aren't worth anything then you only come across with having a bad attitude. Your attitude can effect how you approach problems as well. You can either approach them with an open mind and realize that your problem is just a puzzle that needs working out or you can approach it with a closed mind and fear that the outcome will be negative. Positive attitude generally results in the answer being found, even if it isn't the answer you want. Negative attitudes will almost always generate a negative result.

So have a GOOD Attitude as you face this day!

Your names

Well, everyone else is posting this so I might as well, too.

1. YOUR ROCK STAR NAME: (first pet & current car) - Jonathan Caravan And I play bass thank you very much!

2. YOUR GANGSTA NAME: (favorite ice cream flavor, favorite cookie) - Strawberry Snickerdoodle Oh please, that sounds really Gangsta!

3. YOUR "FLY Guy/Girl" NAME: (first initial of first name, first three letters of your last name) LLei But do I have to dress fly and have this tattooed on my butt?

4. YOUR DETECTIVE NAME: (favorite color, favorite animal) - Blue Horse I can see Get Smart saying that to me on a shoe phone.

5. YOUR SOAP OPERA NAME: (middle name, city where you were born) - Michelle Pensacola I'm not thinking that's very Soap Opera-y

6. YOUR STAR WARS NAME: (the first 3 letters of your last name, first 2 letters of your first) - Leilo = great, my Star Wars name is a Disney character

7. SUPERHERO NAME: (2nd favorite color, favorite drink, put "The") - The Purple Mead? Hmmm, I suppose it is better than The Purple Water

8. NASCAR NAME: (the first names of your grandfathers) - Sigurgir Brunson This isn't getting any better!

9. STRIPPER NAME: (the name of your favorite perfume/cologne, favorite candy) - Haiku Mounds. Now that sounds like a stripper!

10.WITNESS PROTECTION NAME: (mother's & father's middle names) - Teresa Eugene Sounds ordinary enough I suppose.

11. PORN STAR NAME: (the name of your favorite pet and the street you grew up on) - Tina Beatrice. Gosh out of all the names my Porn Star name looks the best.

Japanese, Mr. Owl and Butchering Yards

Japanese

Goth Girl started her Japanese language classes last week. It is a small class (maybe 7 students in all) but I think it will be fun for her. The teacher is a native Japanese speaker, which I think is important in learning a language that is so vastly different from one's own. Learning the syntax, gender, politeness and linguistic idiosyncracies can be difficult when the language you are learning also has a culture that is quite different at well.

I look at politeness as one of the things that is slowly being dropped from the American English language. In Japanese there are several ways in which to say "thank you." There is the utmost in polite, the common polite and the familiar. There was a time when you would find that in our own language, but I'm seeing that slip away when the word "thanks" is used familiarly even with people who are in a position for more formal gratitude.

The funniest thing of Emily's language class is me helping her with her homework and learning the language. As with any language there are peculiarities with the written language and the spoken language. And even transliterated, it still has some odd rules. There is this mysterious "silent u" on the ends of some of the words which makes me ask why the u is there if it is silent and doesn't seem to be effecting the pronunciation of the word. Of course this question comes from one who questions why English isn't written phonetically anyway as it would be SO much easier than our currrent system. (Like why is there a Y in system when it obviously is pronounced sistim?) The world may never know.

Mr. Owl

I keep running into a commercial on TV over the past week which really brings back memories of my childhood. It's the Tootsie Roll Pop commercial with Mr. Owl counting the number of licks to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll Pop. You know "One, Twohoo, Three, CRUNCH. Uh, three." You can see it here if you don't remember or are too young to know
Mr. Owl. It was one of my favorite commercials as a kid. It was cute, simple and effective.

Butchering the yard

This weekend was spent butchering our backyard. One might say that we were recovering it. After 2 years of major neglect, we finally started pulling things out. We uncovered a ton of space that had previously been taken over by a HUGE azalea bush. We thought it was a bunch of azaleas but when we finally managed to cut back down to the main trunk (and yes; this "bush" was so big it had a trunk!) we found that it was truly just one giant monster. We found about 64 sq. ft of "lost" yard under there. Next weekend I want to take out the azaleas (azalea?) that are (is) growing under the one lone pine left in the back yard. It is mostly dead anyway and has enveloped a few other plants along its way. The yard looks much better now and we found (buried under the azalea) a bunch of hostas which are going to look really nice now that they have a bit more breathing room. I'm going to work on a plan this winter on what to plant as far as local plant varieties that need little care and tending and at the same time won't overtake the yard.

I really do like our yard for the most part. Much of it is fairly self maintaining, especially along one side where under the oaks are just tons of hostas and fern growing. We go through and trim the few plants that do get a bit wild like the holly and whack at the heather that is growing out into the walk way. I like the idea of a yard that I can putter in, but if I neglect it for a week (or a month) or two won't take over the entire neighborhood. I still want to leave the "buffer" between me and the people behind us. I like my little bit of seclusion that it affords me. I may trim it down a bit and take out a few things that annoy me, but I like that I've got this buffer between me and the perfectly manicured treeless ick behind me.

9-11

I refrained from posting yesterday. It was one of those truly surreal days for us. It was the 6th anniversary of the most tragic day in our modern US history, but also the 6th anniversary of our venture into homeschooling. Yep, it all began the morning of September 11, 2001 around 8am. One could take it as a "sign" that homeschooling wasn't the right thing, but by the end of that day I knew it was.

We were getting The Dad ready for work and Boo ready for kindergarden (she was still enrolled at this point - and actually did finish the year out) when the news came on. I was busy and concentrating on all the important things I needed to do. Iron shirts and school uniforms, find shoes, pack lunches, important things. And then suddenly they weren't all that important. Suddenly the world slowed down drastically and we just stood and stared as the second plane flew into WTC. We were stunned and scared. It took us a few minutes to snap back into the reality of our day. The things that needed to be done. Clothes still needed ironing, shoes found, lunches packed, time schedules met.

We made a quick agreement that we would go through our day like normal. We wouldn't let terrorists stop us from our regular routine. We would go to work, to school, to swim class, have dinner and Girl Scouts. Although in hindsight, had I known that the teacher would have the TV tuned to CNN ALL DAY in her class (so she would know what was happening) and had known that she would utter the words, "Bad Arabs" in Boo's class (which had a young Arab boy in the class) I would have not sent her to school. That would have been the day she began her homeschool years as well.

Our scout troop shared a space at a church and only one other child showed up, so we elected to go into the church where they were having a service. It was eery to feel like we were suddenly unsafe. It was unsettling to not hear airplanes fly over our house for nearly a week (we lived along one of the landing patterns for the airport). It was nerve wracking trying to explain to our children why some people would do this.

It still is nerve wracking. It still doesn't make sense. I still can't wrap my brain around that kind of violence. And then yesterday on NPR I found words which made me realize that what happened that day truly wasn't a religious jihad. It was on their "All Things Considered Show" and they interviewed a young Imam who sees the 9-11 activities and other killing violences as a direct contradiction to the Koran From the chapter of Isra, verse 33 "We are not permitted to kill. Killing is not right. And whoever kills somebody intentionally, his reward is hellfire." Wow! You can hear the broadcast by going to NPR's website.

It reminds me of the Christian commandments where it says, "Thou shalt not kill." It doesn't say, "Though shalt not kill except...." It blountly says, "Though shalt not kill." This message is repeated in almost every religion and in almost every creed. Killing is wrong. It's simply put in all varying religions. Which makes me wonder why killings continue.