Nikki went back to school today. Back to the old grindstone. :(
The boys and I went to Knott's. The Dragon Swing makes me totally sick and I will NOT ride it again. And I am scared to death watching the boys on the swing. So I'm officially old.
I spent most of my time perfecting the look of my blog and I'm still not happy with it. I do like the quote from the book I'm reading, but I don't like the way it is written there. Hmmm...
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
And the winner is.....
Dad and Nikki! They were way behind last night, but decided to merge and beat us all. By a stroke of luck they got Park Place and Broadway and it was over. Tom was annoyed and swears he will never allow a merger again. But it was fun!
Not much of a report today. Nikki and I got her homework all sorted out and she has a list of what she needs to catch up on. We'll see if we can stay on top of it all. Tomorrow she is going in early to take a make-up test in French.
Tom has a cold and refused to leave his pj's today. He didn't do much of anything all day. He seems fine now, but he is doing his bounce around the room act because he has all this bottled energy. Jake is doing it too.
I got the livingroom vacuum and sort of dusted. I'll finish it tomorrow.
And that is it. Happy Veteran's Day!
Not much of a report today. Nikki and I got her homework all sorted out and she has a list of what she needs to catch up on. We'll see if we can stay on top of it all. Tomorrow she is going in early to take a make-up test in French.
Tom has a cold and refused to leave his pj's today. He didn't do much of anything all day. He seems fine now, but he is doing his bounce around the room act because he has all this bottled energy. Jake is doing it too.
I got the livingroom vacuum and sort of dusted. I'll finish it tomorrow.
And that is it. Happy Veteran's Day!
Monday, November 10, 2008
The Blogging Time!
It is 7:30pm..."The Blogging Time". I try to get the boys in the tub every other day. It isn't that they don't want to bathe, it is just that giving them a bath one right after the other is a pain and I tend to forget bath time until just before bed AND rushing them through a bath is not a pleasant experience. So we came up with taking a bath at 7:30 every other day. The cool part is that I have time to blog! Yay!
Tonight we played Monopoly. It is a "Coca-Cola" Monopoly that I bought about 10 years ago. We didn't finish, of course, and now the game sits on the dinner table waiting for tomorrow. Maybe we can get Dad to come out of his office and play for a bit tomorrow. I'm not sure how long the game will last on the dinner table!
Last night we played our "Pirates of the Carribean" LIFE. We got that a couple years ago for Christmas and only played it once. It was just the boys and I because Dad fell asleep on the couch and Nikki was working on some homework.
Dan and I talked a lot about the boys and their online game addiction. I have to say here that I have the best "unschooling" husband in the world! I don't like these games. There is a lot of very questionable material on there and the Lord only knows where they go on there, searching for new games. I talked about telling them they couldn't do it anymore. Dan said that won't last because they will drive me crazy. I have to admit that I like having more free time because they sit glued to the computer. He said we have to find something more fun to distract them. That night, I went upstairs and started to get out the box of Star Wars guys. I started sorting through them and called Jake to help. He was happy to unglue himself and see what I was up to. Sorting through them, I found that we have quite a few duplicates. I set them up as an army against the dark side! Jake got out several different sized of the Millinium Falcon and we had ourselves a war. Tom heard the commotion and came up to investigate. That is where the fun began. Now there is a army of military men and tanks set up against the Star Wars guys. We put them all over with a clear path through the room so that we didn't have to put them away and played again in the morning.
Now, I have to admit something else. I loved playing with my babies, but playing with my school age guys is a little boring for me. I'm not much into pretending and I tend to get antsy about house work when I'm playing. I tend to see how badly I need to vacuum and dust when I am sitting on the floor setting up the cowboys and indians! But I realize that I need to play with them more if I don't want them to sit and stare at the screen for days.
And now, if you are clear on the unschooling philosophy, you are thinking, "What if that is what they want to do? I'm sure they are getting something they need from the games." And I totally agree. That is the glory of it. If I started playing with the toys and they were more interested in the game, I would have left it at that. But they don't. They really would rather do something else, but play the computer games because they are bored. I really have begun to like playing. They are just so happy!
Tonight we played Monopoly. It is a "Coca-Cola" Monopoly that I bought about 10 years ago. We didn't finish, of course, and now the game sits on the dinner table waiting for tomorrow. Maybe we can get Dad to come out of his office and play for a bit tomorrow. I'm not sure how long the game will last on the dinner table!
Last night we played our "Pirates of the Carribean" LIFE. We got that a couple years ago for Christmas and only played it once. It was just the boys and I because Dad fell asleep on the couch and Nikki was working on some homework.
Dan and I talked a lot about the boys and their online game addiction. I have to say here that I have the best "unschooling" husband in the world! I don't like these games. There is a lot of very questionable material on there and the Lord only knows where they go on there, searching for new games. I talked about telling them they couldn't do it anymore. Dan said that won't last because they will drive me crazy. I have to admit that I like having more free time because they sit glued to the computer. He said we have to find something more fun to distract them. That night, I went upstairs and started to get out the box of Star Wars guys. I started sorting through them and called Jake to help. He was happy to unglue himself and see what I was up to. Sorting through them, I found that we have quite a few duplicates. I set them up as an army against the dark side! Jake got out several different sized of the Millinium Falcon and we had ourselves a war. Tom heard the commotion and came up to investigate. That is where the fun began. Now there is a army of military men and tanks set up against the Star Wars guys. We put them all over with a clear path through the room so that we didn't have to put them away and played again in the morning.
Now, I have to admit something else. I loved playing with my babies, but playing with my school age guys is a little boring for me. I'm not much into pretending and I tend to get antsy about house work when I'm playing. I tend to see how badly I need to vacuum and dust when I am sitting on the floor setting up the cowboys and indians! But I realize that I need to play with them more if I don't want them to sit and stare at the screen for days.
And now, if you are clear on the unschooling philosophy, you are thinking, "What if that is what they want to do? I'm sure they are getting something they need from the games." And I totally agree. That is the glory of it. If I started playing with the toys and they were more interested in the game, I would have left it at that. But they don't. They really would rather do something else, but play the computer games because they are bored. I really have begun to like playing. They are just so happy!
Friday, November 7, 2008
My Poor Nikki!
We went to the doctor again today. The guy had to drain it and it was extremely painful for her. She was very brave. It was just about the most disgusting wound I have ever seen. Seriously! It looks like a bullet wound. You know those scenes in old war movies where they have to dig a bullet out of someone? That was the scene! Except Nikki had nothing to bite on and she didn't even get a shot of whiskey! After it was all cleaned out and dressed, the nurse came in and gave her a huge antibiotic shot in the thigh. THAT was when she screamed out loud! It was pretty darn terrible. We have to bring her back on Monday afternoon to recheck it. The school won't let her back to class until a doctor clears it.
Our camping trip had to be cancelled due to Nikki's injury. The boys are going to go tomorrow and spend one night there with Dad. Dan rescheduled his vacation days for the two days before Thanksgiving and we are going to go all together then instead. I'm kinda glad because I didn't really want to bring the dogs with us, especially the little one. Grandma is flying out to see Ken tomorrow morning, so we would have had to take the dogs with us. I had nightmares last night about Kiara getting mauled by coyotes!
Our camping trip had to be cancelled due to Nikki's injury. The boys are going to go tomorrow and spend one night there with Dad. Dan rescheduled his vacation days for the two days before Thanksgiving and we are going to go all together then instead. I'm kinda glad because I didn't really want to bring the dogs with us, especially the little one. Grandma is flying out to see Ken tomorrow morning, so we would have had to take the dogs with us. I had nightmares last night about Kiara getting mauled by coyotes!
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Update Update Update
Well this week has turned out to be a barrel of monkeys! Poor Nikki complained of a itchy bug bite on Monday and I put some neosporen on it and a bandaid. On Wednesday, she went to the school nurse because it was bleeding. The nurse said it looked like a staph infection and they had already had a few cases of it this year. You gotta love public schools. Anyway, Dan took her to the doctor on the way home from school and he gave her some antibiotics and told her how to take care of it. She came in limping from that. She is home from school again today and tomorrow. She can't go back to school until a doctor clears it. I worry about her and the stress of trying to catch up. I wish we could just ditch the whole going in to school thing. But sadly, that is not an option right now. We are going back to the doctor tomorrow to have them look at it. It is pretty darn gross, that is for sure.
The boys have been seriously addicted to "addictinggames.com" the past couple weeks. I've been pretty concerned about tearing them away from the computer but then I realized that it may just be up to me to take their attention away from it for awhile. I thinking this because I tend to get really stuck on those games as well and when I do, I try to force myself to do something else, get out of the house, clean, anything. Once I'm away from it for a bit, I don't feel the pull to sit down at the computer as badly. I'm hoping this will help them as well. If were a game on the Wii or some other thing, I wouldn't be so worried about it. These games are on the internet and are serious time stealers. I know it because I play them too. Besides, there are all kinds of very strange things on those sites, mostly ads and inappropriate stuff for kids.
My Mom came to visit us for the afternoon. That was fun. We went out to have lunch at the new Shakey's down the street. It is a pretty nice restaurant. I forgot how good Shakey's pizza is. :) The kids liked it, even Nik came along. They played some video games and Jake charmed the girl at the counter to give him a toy that cost more than the tickets he won. It was pretty cute to watch from afar.
Now, I'm just waiting for Tom to get out of the tub. We are going to hit the hay a little early tonight. I'm tired and so is Dan. He likes to read to the boys before bed, but lately he has been too tired to read much at all.
The boys have been seriously addicted to "addictinggames.com" the past couple weeks. I've been pretty concerned about tearing them away from the computer but then I realized that it may just be up to me to take their attention away from it for awhile. I thinking this because I tend to get really stuck on those games as well and when I do, I try to force myself to do something else, get out of the house, clean, anything. Once I'm away from it for a bit, I don't feel the pull to sit down at the computer as badly. I'm hoping this will help them as well. If were a game on the Wii or some other thing, I wouldn't be so worried about it. These games are on the internet and are serious time stealers. I know it because I play them too. Besides, there are all kinds of very strange things on those sites, mostly ads and inappropriate stuff for kids.
My Mom came to visit us for the afternoon. That was fun. We went out to have lunch at the new Shakey's down the street. It is a pretty nice restaurant. I forgot how good Shakey's pizza is. :) The kids liked it, even Nik came along. They played some video games and Jake charmed the girl at the counter to give him a toy that cost more than the tickets he won. It was pretty cute to watch from afar.
Now, I'm just waiting for Tom to get out of the tub. We are going to hit the hay a little early tonight. I'm tired and so is Dan. He likes to read to the boys before bed, but lately he has been too tired to read much at all.
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
An Attempt at Serious Writing
First of all, I haven't watched the news since this morning. I came in and told my husband and MIL that I was going to take the whole pill in the morning instead of be tortured bit by bit all day today. So far I am unaware of how the election has panned out but I have my feelings on what will happen.
My thoughts on this whole Proposition 8 Marriage bill? Well, why don't we just abolish state sanctified rituals of marriage and allow whoever wishes to enter into a civil union do so? Marriage is a religious ritual, isn't it? And since we have the separation of church and state thing, which is a whole other post in itself, why is any type of marriage sactified by the state? It really doesn't matter anyway if your religion doesn't forbid it. There are many things that are perfectly legal that are against my own religion and many more for others. I believe that the state needs some sort of record of civil unions for statistics, insurance, and other legal matters, but marriage is a whole other thing. If you want to be married by a particular organization, then you have to follow the rules of that organization. Marriage is only a religious ritual and changes with each religion and through each age. What does it matter (legally) who you are married to? It also has nothing to do with sex. There are many heterosexual couples who don't have sex anymore for whatevery reason. It has to do with a pair of humans raising children to adulthood and taking care of each other throughout there lives. Personally, I would like to see more couples staying together for life, whether they are same sex or not. I would like to see more people keep whatever family they have together not just for the sake of the children they have but their grandchildren, great-grandchildren, daughter and son-in-laws, too.
And now we move on to taxes. Hmmm, where to start.
If we take $1 from everyone for taxes, everyone has an equal stake in what our state or country uses that money for. But the poor man is hit harder by losing his dollar than the rich man and I think everyone agrees that isn't right.
If we take more from the rich than we do from the poor, like we do now, then the rich man has less and less incentive to work and earn the more we take. The government has less and less income each year. And the poor man has an equal vote in what the government pays for and buys. The poor man has no monetary stake in what he votes for. He may vote for things that may be nice but not necessary since he isn't the one who will pay for it. It is essentially taxation without representation for the rich since they are far fewer than the poor, forcing him to pay for services that the poor decide they need.
If we take the same percentage from everyone who earns a living, and allow only those who are earning some kind of living to vote, then we are giving everyone a equal stake in what services out government renders. The poor voter really thinks about the services he is voting for since the more services the government gives, the higher the percentage of taxes come from his paycheck.
As a final note to this, there are fixes for the situation that our country sits in right now. The only problem is that no politician is going to risk his career on fixing them. The fixes need an educated public that will understand and vote on that understanding instead of personal needs and emotional attachment. Our government has taken decent education away from its people and replaced it with trivial information that cannot help them be productive citizens. It has been so long since the schools have taught real economics, history, and politics that few people have the background to understand what is happening. I bet that politicians do understand. I bet that they have read the history of civilisations. I bet the fully comprehend the differences between democratic, republic, communistic, and socialistic governments. It is just that the general public does not and the politicians just don't want to lose their jobs by doing what is right instead of what is popular.
My thoughts on this whole Proposition 8 Marriage bill? Well, why don't we just abolish state sanctified rituals of marriage and allow whoever wishes to enter into a civil union do so? Marriage is a religious ritual, isn't it? And since we have the separation of church and state thing, which is a whole other post in itself, why is any type of marriage sactified by the state? It really doesn't matter anyway if your religion doesn't forbid it. There are many things that are perfectly legal that are against my own religion and many more for others. I believe that the state needs some sort of record of civil unions for statistics, insurance, and other legal matters, but marriage is a whole other thing. If you want to be married by a particular organization, then you have to follow the rules of that organization. Marriage is only a religious ritual and changes with each religion and through each age. What does it matter (legally) who you are married to? It also has nothing to do with sex. There are many heterosexual couples who don't have sex anymore for whatevery reason. It has to do with a pair of humans raising children to adulthood and taking care of each other throughout there lives. Personally, I would like to see more couples staying together for life, whether they are same sex or not. I would like to see more people keep whatever family they have together not just for the sake of the children they have but their grandchildren, great-grandchildren, daughter and son-in-laws, too.
And now we move on to taxes. Hmmm, where to start.
If we take $1 from everyone for taxes, everyone has an equal stake in what our state or country uses that money for. But the poor man is hit harder by losing his dollar than the rich man and I think everyone agrees that isn't right.
If we take more from the rich than we do from the poor, like we do now, then the rich man has less and less incentive to work and earn the more we take. The government has less and less income each year. And the poor man has an equal vote in what the government pays for and buys. The poor man has no monetary stake in what he votes for. He may vote for things that may be nice but not necessary since he isn't the one who will pay for it. It is essentially taxation without representation for the rich since they are far fewer than the poor, forcing him to pay for services that the poor decide they need.
If we take the same percentage from everyone who earns a living, and allow only those who are earning some kind of living to vote, then we are giving everyone a equal stake in what services out government renders. The poor voter really thinks about the services he is voting for since the more services the government gives, the higher the percentage of taxes come from his paycheck.
As a final note to this, there are fixes for the situation that our country sits in right now. The only problem is that no politician is going to risk his career on fixing them. The fixes need an educated public that will understand and vote on that understanding instead of personal needs and emotional attachment. Our government has taken decent education away from its people and replaced it with trivial information that cannot help them be productive citizens. It has been so long since the schools have taught real economics, history, and politics that few people have the background to understand what is happening. I bet that politicians do understand. I bet that they have read the history of civilisations. I bet the fully comprehend the differences between democratic, republic, communistic, and socialistic governments. It is just that the general public does not and the politicians just don't want to lose their jobs by doing what is right instead of what is popular.
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Halloween Hangover
Halloween is special here. It is the one time a year that we meet all our neighbors. We have an excuse to come to people's door all over the neighborhood. I love sitting on our front porch and handing out candy to all the kids. The come in the cutest costumes, especially the little ones. I love the new Mom's with the babies trick or treating. I did that when Tom was new! He was only 3 weeks old the first time we went trick or treating. I got lots of good candy! :)
Nikki was at school all day and then Dan dropped her off at a friends party on the way home. The boys and I carved pumpkins and decorated the front porch. I decorate for Fall at the beginning of October and then put up the Halloween spooks for the night and take down again the next day. This week, three complete strangers walked by and stopped to tell me that my decorations were so nice and they loved seeing them. It was as if God was trying to tell me to be happy with what I have. Sometimes I can be pretty ungrateful. :( Last night, several people told us that they look forward to trick or treating at our house every year. Ahh!!! How sweet! Next year we have to have more candy. And Dan says he is going to buy little copies of the Constitution to hand out. I think handing out some homeschooling cards would be cool too! ;)
Anyway, the kids had a great time. Nikki really enjoyed her party. The boys said that it was the best Halloween ever! I think we did well. Next year, some of my family and friends need to join us. Pizza, trick or treating, harassing the neighbors, what could be better?!
Nikki was at school all day and then Dan dropped her off at a friends party on the way home. The boys and I carved pumpkins and decorated the front porch. I decorate for Fall at the beginning of October and then put up the Halloween spooks for the night and take down again the next day. This week, three complete strangers walked by and stopped to tell me that my decorations were so nice and they loved seeing them. It was as if God was trying to tell me to be happy with what I have. Sometimes I can be pretty ungrateful. :( Last night, several people told us that they look forward to trick or treating at our house every year. Ahh!!! How sweet! Next year we have to have more candy. And Dan says he is going to buy little copies of the Constitution to hand out. I think handing out some homeschooling cards would be cool too! ;)
Anyway, the kids had a great time. Nikki really enjoyed her party. The boys said that it was the best Halloween ever! I think we did well. Next year, some of my family and friends need to join us. Pizza, trick or treating, harassing the neighbors, what could be better?!
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