I've just been informed that it is officially

Christmas eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve eve.

good to know.

Post-Thanksgiving, and thinking about Christmas.

Our 2 Thanksgiving celebrations were nice. We enjoyed good food and good company. I got to hold my beautiful new niece and get her to sleep. I know I keep saying she's beautiful, but I am totally not exaggerating. She is. I had to work Thanksgiving, but my boss let me split the shift and work in the morning, then go have lunch and then come back in the afternoon. It worked out well for the hospital too, because I typed all the priority work in the morning that there was, and then left and when I came back there was more priority work and I got that done too. I've found that I really don't mind work as much on the weekends and holidays when it is quiet in there. I don't like it when everyone's around. I guess I've been at home too long. I am absolutely not interested in getting involved in office politics or office gossip. I just want to get it done and come home.

I'm finally trying to get started on Christmas shopping. I ventured out yesterday on Black Friday for just a little while. I went to the local Wal-mart in the late afternoon to see if they still had any of the $10.00 trivial pursuit games for a gift I need by Monday, but they didn't so I got something else. While I was gone, the kids got started on putting the tree up and decorating for Christmas. I tried listening to Christmas music in the van to try and put me in the spirit, but it's not there yet. No excitement. I may be able to be happy about the season once I get the monumental list knocked down some, but right now, it just seems like one more thing I need to do.

All of the kids lists contain a bunch of video games and to me, buying those things is just a chore. I'd rather buy them art supplies and cool toys and things like that, but that's not what they've asked for, for the most part. I do get to help my Mom and Dad with their shopping and I think Mom and Dad will be doing their shopping at Rainbow Resource this year because we got their Christmas catalog and it has tons of cool things in it. I was just reading a blog a few minutes ago that said that Christmas is a great opportunity for parents to buy things that will encourage our children's gifts and talents and I think that's true. All of my kids are artistic so I may get Grandma and Granddaddy to get them a bunch of art supplies this year.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Frustrated.

I've tried to post a bunch of pictures and it's not working. It's frustrating. Otherwise today is okay. I don't have to work. I'm going to be making some sweet potato pies and getting the house in order a little bit. (I guess) The kids are doing school (kind of) and I've been trying to think of Christmas ideas, looking a little at the Black Friday ads and wondering how in the world we are going to pull it off this year. Every year it seems to be harder? The kids are getting older and their tastes get more expensive and it's hard to figure out what to get them and everyone else. I can see why older people just give money. Maybe my kids would like a gift card this year?

Off.

I'm off today and tomorrow. I'm still trying to get used to my job and to be honest, I've been a bit crabby. I come home from work exhausted and wondering if I should've taken this job. I'm working very hard. Yesterday though, I started using the built in keyboard tray which is adjustable in many different ways and I did okay with the back pain. It was better. I hesitate to say that because it was better the first day with my new chair and then horrible again the next, so who knows? I'm going to try and enjoy these 2 days I have off. I've got a list of 14 things I need to get done (some of them can wait a while) and I may see how many of those I can cross off the list. We may go to the library today. I have a ton of things I need to request the library to get for me, either on interlibrary loan or for them to purchase. I've gotten to the point that I always ask the library first before buying a book. We also need to do school today. Even though my work schedule makes it weird, we still need to get it done. The temptation is when I'm off to go places all day and not do school. We do have mold growing in our petri dishes though and we need to look at it under the microscope, do the rest of our science, language arts/art, novel way and geography. I'd like to hurry up and get it done though so we can go to town this afternoon. The library is calling to me. I need my book fix.

Why is it?

That during the middle of the night when I get up to go to the bathroom, I can think of about 10 blog post ideas, but in the cold light of morning, nothing? 

Let's see.  Hmm.  I was thinking about the dogs and how they want to go out if I get up in the middle of the night and if I don't immediately let him out,  Max will pace with his toenails going click, click, click, click on the floor until someone lets him out.  (like, for example, me.)  They want to go out about 25 to 30 times a day.  It drives us all kind of crazy but we'd rather err on the side of letting them out than having them have an accident in the house.  We'd install a doggie door, but we'd have cats in day and night and several of us are allergic to cats.  Living where we live, we'd probably also have possums, raccoons and skunks in the house.  Not good.  So we live with it.  In.  Out.  In. Out.  In.  Out.  Who let them out last time?  Does anyone love the dogs enough to let them back in?  (We all do, we just don't want to get up.)  Whose turn is it? 




This picture of them is last year, during the big snow.

Easier?

I think I shocked a bunch of people earlier today when I said that homeschooling was easier than public schooling.  Another mom was talking about how I must have so much patience, that she couldn't possibly homeschool her kids, etc. and I said, without really thinking about it, "oh it's so much easier."  True, some concepts are hard and sometimes my husband and I are really searching around for a way to explain something (usually math), but overall I do think it's easier.  Let's see if I can explain it.

First of all, we don't have to follow anyone else's schedule and get up earlier than we'd like.  I read the other day that one reason kids are getting obese in this country is that they don't get enough sleep.  Our kids get to sleep later and I think that's good for them.  Of course, theoretically, we could go to bed earlier, but that's one of the  areas of parenting  that I'm horrible at.  My kids are experts at avoiding going to bed at night for "just one more minute".  If they were in school, I'd have to fight that battle harder.

Secondly, there's homework.  By the time my oldest son was in 5th grade at the public school, he would sometimes have 3 hours of homework a night.  A lot of it was stuff that he already knew, but he just had to keep repeating it and repeating it.  I found it harder and harder to force him to do it when I knew that there really was no reason to.  He already knew the material so what was the point?  Other times, we would struggle with difficult concepts that he had been explained at school but hadn't "gotten".  That part is about the same as we run across those difficult concepts in our homeschool, but we can realize right away that he doesn't understand instead of finding out that he's been behind for several weeks or months and now is failing.   Sometimes I'll realize that he doesn't have the background he needs to do his Algebra work and I'll have him do a couple of weeks of background work, something he missed originally, until he understands that and then he's back into the Algebra textbook. 

The point is that it is a personalized education.  We spend as much or as little time as the child needs on the concept and then we move on.  If we need more background studies, we do those.  If we need to just jump ahead a chapter because they already know it, we can. 

I'll have to explain this to everyone I was talking to this morning so that they can realize why I think that homeschool is easier.  I don't want them to think that we're not doing the work, that we're just sitting around eating bon bons or something and our kids aren't learning.  They are.  It's just such a more efficient method of education than educating a large group. 

 

So many things to do ...

I really need to get in gear. I had planned to paint the kitchen this fall. I need to BEGIN my Christmas shopping. (I can't believe how close it is getting!). I'm trying to start a homeschooled teen network for my older son to find some kids he can get together with and play video games and hang out. Although our homeschool group is wonderful, the next oldest kids to him are the large group of 12-year-old girls. I've got to get Christmas pictures of the kids done and cards made. I'm supposed to be making myself an appointment with an allergist to address my food allergies, but I think that's going to have to wait until after the new year if I go at all. I don't know. I did START the Christmas list last night, something I usually do in October or so, but that's as far as I've gotten. I'm feeling kind of overwhelmed at the moment. I know, I need to make a list and start checking things off.

A really long list.




Speaking of Christmas, I'm going to put in a plug for my store. I have a store on Cafepress where I sell gifts for grandparents. I also have some items that aren't grandparent related, but fun. Here's the link.

( ) insert clever title.

I am starting this blog entry this morning with very little idea what I will blog about. It is my second day off in a row and I'm really enjoying that fact. I have to go in to work again tomorrow. School went okay yesterday and we got quite a bit of work done on the plot outlines for the novels. It's amazing working with them on these. I'm trying to facilitate their writing, help them write without really giving them any of my ideas because I want this to be their work, not mine. I enjoy watching how their minds work and how imaginative that they are. It's cool. In science news, we're trying to grow some bread mold in petri dishes on the windowsill. I think anyone who came to our house would be able to tell we homeschool; there are microscopes, petri dishes, science kits, time lines, posters about animal kingdoms, and of course homeschool schedules and checklists hanging on the wall. We have found that we need to hang them on the wall or we will lose them, especially youngest son. He can lose 5 to 6 lists a week.

Today we will be focusing on school and housework. Hopefully we'll get the first draft outlines for the novels done, some mold will grow in our petri dishes and we'll have a good day of learning and start the weekend with a relatively clean house. Can you all believe how quickly the end of November is coming? It's almost Thanksgiving!  We went skating with the homeschool group last night and we moms sat around and worked on planning the Christmas parties, one for the kids and one for the Moms.  :-0

It worked.

The chair worked to help my back feel better! Yay! I was not in pain when I came home for the first time. Now that I've settled in somewhat I am kind of appreciating the separation of work and home. I've started reading Knit Together by Debbie Macomber and in it, she's talking about how she was writing at home and couldn't wait until her writing could help fund an office so she could separate her work life and and her home life. It's interesting to hear about someone else who felt the same way I did. I still don't enjoy the job exactly, but it is getting better.

Today, we'll be working on homeschooling, doing Learning to write the Novel Way, Learning English though Art and our 2 science curriculums (curricula?). Our geography study has went by the wayside lately. I haven't wanted to do it. I may make myself do it today or I may officially postpone it until after the holidays. I haven't decided yet. It's nice to just be able to devote most of the day to homeschooling, instead of having to work too.

Now I want to share something I thought was amusing last night. My daughter and I were having one of those conversations where she says "What are you going to get me for Christmas?" and I answer all kinds of crazy things. I don't know why she enjoys this, but she does. So it goes like this.

What are you going to get me for Christmas?
Pork chops.

What are you going to get me for Christmas?
Socks.

What are you going to get me for Christmas?
Toothpicks.

At which point my youngest son interupted and said "Hey, if you get toothpicks for Christmas, can I have them?" He was totally serious. He'd love to have a box of toothpicks to play with. LoL.

Wednesday.

I've got to work today. My chair has arrived, but I'm not sure if I can put it together and my husband is sleeping so I'm not sure if I'll get to use it tonight. I can't do laundry because our laundry room is still a construction zone because of the hot water heater repairs still going on. It's in a temporarily fixed condition right now, until next weekend when my husband can work on it again, so I can take a shower but I have no idea what I'm going to wear. I also have no idea what I'm going to take to eat because we don't have any bread for sandwiches. I'm getting my morning list done and then I'd better get to work on assembling my chair, finding something to wear and finding something to eat. I don't want to have to visit the vending machines.

Update:
After I typed the first part of this post, my daughter found a loaf of bread. I don't know if my husband brought it home or if my teen had it stashed in his room, but whatever, I'll have a nice sandwich for work. There's a microwave and fridge there, so I could cook something, but I want something simple and quick so I can go out and walk since that worked so well for me the other day. Also, my wonderful kids are assembling my chair. They begged to do it and they seem to be doing a good job. They have enough experience helping their Dad do things I guess. Anyway, it looks like I'll be heading off to work in reasonably good shape. I hope it goes well today. The kids will be on their own for a while today while their nocturnal dad gets some sleep, (not home alone, just doing their lists on their own and hopefully, quietly.)

I hope you've enjoyed this little glimpse into the logistics of a dual income homeschooling home. Homeschooling with both parents working can be done, but some days are more difficult than others. It is definitely worth the effort to have them home. There is no question in my mind about that. I am going to switch my work days to the weekend and cut this midweek one out because it seems to be the most difficult one to manage. Wish me luck today that my chair is comfortable. It felt good in the store, but that's not a real test. Tonight's 7 hours will be the real test.

Hopefully

I will be able to adjust to my new lifestyle of working outside the home and won't do TOO much whining here or in real life. I need to change my blog header so that it no longer says "work at home". I'll get to that one of these days. I worked last night, 7 hours, and I did okay with it. At one point, I was getting tired and sore and stiff and sleepy and I took my lunch break then and ate a sandwich and then took about a 10 minute walk outside in the cold. That woke me up and helped with the stiffness too and I was able to get it done. I also worked up my courage to call the IT help desk and request that a word expander be installed on my computer. Hopefully they will be able to do that for me. That will help a lot. I ordered a new chair and that should come in the next couple of days. Little by little, I'm getting things together.

Today though, the focus is school. I've got to get busy on my new list which includes cleaning and exercising, because if I don't do my list, the kids get the day off. Just a sneaky way to get myself to do the things I need to do but don't want to ...

I've been tagged for 7 random facts about me.

1. I once wrote a book, a romance novel, and sent it to a publisher but it wasn't published. (It wasn't very good.) I may someday write a homeschool book.
2. I love to vacation and love to plan vacations. I plan a lot more than I ever go on.
3. I am cold natured and have a little heater behind my desk to keep me warm. In the summer, I go outside and sit in the sun to get warm. (We have central air and it's cold in the house.)
4. I like chocolate. (I bet that's surprising to everyone).
5. I have a group of friends, most of whom I've never met, that I have been emailing with for 11 years next month, ever since I found out I was pregnant with my youngest.
6. I have been a member of the Flylady group for several years. This has helped with decluttering, but it's an ongoing process with all the packrats I live with.
7. I love to read and hate to be without a book as I am now.

I was tagged by The Bishop's Wife.


I don't want to choose, so if you want to participate, you're tagged!

Trying to adjust.

I need to stay at my new job and give it a chance. My old job has already hired someone to replace me (Yes, I checked!) and so I need to focus on the good things about my job and try and get used to it. It's not horrible. The main bad thing is that chair and so I'm going to either bring my old one from home or get a new one. I need to do that today before my long shift tomorrow. I found out yesterday that we have access to a coffee pot, fridge and microwave so I can bring lunches. There's a walking track so when the weather is good, I can go outside and walk. There are paid days off, health insurance, life insurance and retirement benefits, even though it's only part time. I'm going to try and stop whining about it now.

At home, we're working on replacing the water heater and the subfloor underneath the water heater where the old water heater leaked, which also involves a thorough clean and sort of our laundry/mud/storage room. Lots of fun for the whole family.

I'm also going to work on writing new schedules to reflect my new work situation, so that we can do things together on the days I'm off and on the days I work, they can do their independent work. I've been planning to do it for days and putting it off, but today I really need to do it since we really need to start it tomorrow.

It's Friday.

I've got to work today. Since I missed a couple of hours for the funeral the other day, I have 9 more hours to get in this week and so I'm dividing it between 2 days and doing 4 1/2 today and 4 1/2 tomorrow. I guess. I can't say I have ANY enthusiasm for it at all. Also, my boss told me Wednesday that I'm the one who has to work Thanksgiving. Fortunately, the office closes on Christmas so at least I won't have to work that day. All of this plus the fact that at the interview they told me I'd be at the top of the pay range and then at orientation, I found out that I wasn't at the top, but more towards the bottom of the pay range for transcription, has made my old job seem better and better. I'm trying to remember why I applied for this job in the first place, lack of work on some days, lots of weekend work, self-discipline issues ... they all seem kind of trivial now.

I guess we'll get school done before I go. This job thing has been all I can think about lately, although we did do some school this week, it wasn't up to par. I did get my oldest to take a practice test for CLEP yesterday. He needs to study some more for that one but it's good to know before he goes into it. I'm going to print out some lesson plans from this site. Clep Prep and see if we can't get him better prepared to do the next one.

Okay.

Work went okay last night. I'm getting the hang of the computer system a little bit. I put a post-it note on the monitor so that I can remember which weird key to use for each function. Let's see, is it F12 or the right arrow key, shift F1 or control F1? Eventually I might get pretty good at it. I switched torture devices chairs 3 times last night. The boss said that it was okay for me to bring in my own chair so I might do that. I hate to give it up at home though. (I'm sitting in it right now you know, so my blogging might be affected.:-)

I'm still missing my freedom and I'm going to have to call in tomorrow because of the funeral, but I can work Friday instead or just go in late. That's the part I don't like, the part of having to call and let everyone know what my plans are, no longer being free to set my own schedule. I'm spoiled, I know it. My husband says that all I did was complain about my old job and now I'm complaining about my new one but hey, I whine about other things too, not just my job. The truth is, I'm burned out on being an MT and I want to do something else.

We've got the funeral home visitation today but maybe we'll get school done first. The youngest has got a bad cold and I don't know about taking him tonight, so I'll have to think about that.

Monday.

Okay, Monday is no longer my favorite day. :-) Today is my first time working a full shift. It's going to be hard to type for that long, in that chair. I may need to take 5 or 6 more pillows. ;-) I have a list of things to ask my supervisor about, including breaks, lunch, bringing my own chair and word expanders. I still don't know if this is going to work out. I miss being home. I miss my freedom and flexibility.

I guess we'll get started on school before I have to leave.

In other news, my husband's grandmother passed away yesterday, so be thinking of him and the rest of his family this week, especially his grandfather.

A day off.

I'm off today, my first Saturday off in a long time. Probably my last Saturday off in a long time too as I've signed up to work Monday, Wednesday and Saturday at my new job. I'll make a bit more money on Saturdays with the weekend differential pay and I honestly don't mind. As for the pain of sitting there, I did better yesterday. I took a gel wrist rest that my husband had that is attached to a little platform and I was able to shove the little platform part underneath the keyboard and use it, so that worked. I also took my daughter's little gel back support pillow and that helped my back and shoulders, although after sitting there for 4 hours, I was stiff and very tired. I'm getting the hang of the crazy computer system at least enough to do a little transcription. I've still got a lot of studying to do. One of the hospital's independent contractors came in yesterday on her own time to explain some of it to me and helped me a LOT, bless her heart. I'm also going to search the internet for tips. I've found something on a MT discussion group that said that the word expander I use at home is compatible with the system they have at the hospital so I am going to try and get my supervisor to let me try it. I think I might be able to cope with it.

Hopefully, once I get settled, I'll be able to think about homeschooling again. I haven't spared it much thought this week at all. My husband did school with the kids 3 days this week and the other 2 days we took off. I did look at our attendance records yesterday and it looks like we are on target to get about 90 days done by Christmas, which is half of the days we need this year and it sounds good to be halfway done at Christmas. We never did find any protozoa in our protozoa sample thing so we may have to try again. My husband and kids cleaned all our "science experiments" out of the fridge this week so we can't look at those ... :-) We'll find something to look at and get back into our studies, maybe Tuesday? I'm going to have to re-write their schedules (AGAIN!) to reflect the days I work so they can do more independent work on the days I'm gone and more together work on the days I'm here. I wish I didn't have to work a job and could just homeschool, but that's not possible.

Rough week.

I'm still having a rough week. New job. Difficult decisions. No sleep. Stomach flu. Needless to say we did not do school yesterday and today's not looking good either unless my husband takes over. I've got a doctor's appointment and work today.

Bad day.

I had a bad day today. First I learned the outcome of the election when I got up this morning. Then I went to work. Today was my first day actually doing transcription and I had to sit in that really uncomfortable chair and try to type. The desk is a board attached to the wall and is not adjustable and not wide enough for the PC, the keyboard and my gel wrist rest so even though I took it I couldn't use it. The result was that after 4 hours of typing I was in PAIN. Arm pain. Shoulder pain. Back pain. Leg pain. I'm not sure how or if I can continue. Also, the computer system that they use is horrible. For some reason, it just has random keys for functions, like the right arrow key is to enter a document and F12 is to exit it. (???) Who thought this up? There's not a very good spell checker and no word expander. I realize it's only the first day of typing. I AM planning to go back tomorrow. I just thought a lot today about my old job, the one I quit technically last Sunday, but they haven't removed their program for my computer ...

The kids are very much not happy with me working. The youngest was sad about it from the beginning and he really doesn't like it now. Both of the older 2 said today "I really don't like your new job." The only thing they like about is my cool stretchy nametag holder. They hate me being gone and coming home dead tired.

Maybe this was a mistake?

I have a new niece!

She's very beautiful. We got to see pictures this morning.

Good day.

I started my new job today. There are 2 days of orientation at the beginning. This first one went really well. This hospital really treats their employees well and I think I'm really going to like working there. Of course, I haven't gotten into my department yet and I'm not sure how the atmosphere is going to be there. I hope my co-workers are a bunch of upbeat people who have a good time at work while getting a lot done. That would be ideal. Hopefully I'll like it and be able to stay there for a long time.

While I was gone, my family cleaned my house including thoroughly cleaning out the fridge. That was a really nice surprise. Now I'm going to expect that every day. :-)

Another one.

The kids were playing charades this morning. Actually they started to play one of their crazy wrestling fighting games, but I said, 'here, play charades instead." and gave them some charades cards we got at Target a long time ago. They played for about an hour, laughing a lot. One of the times it was my daughter's turn, she was trying to get the boys to say "collar" and pointed to her neck. My older son said "neck" and my younger son said "thyroid". Hey, how many 10 year olds know where their thryoid gland is? He's a funny kid.

A couple of quotes.

I forget about 3/4 of them, but here are 2 I remember.

Thursday, we went to Walmart and they were putting up their Christmas banners, the day before halloween. My son said it's like the 2 holidays are blending now, it's Chrismaween. He loves to put words together.

Then on the trip home, he was slumping over in his seat. For some reason, my daughter wanted him to sit up. She kept saying "sit up! sit up!" and he wouldn't. Finally, she made a fist at him but it was too dark in the van for him to see it. She said "sit up or else". He said "I can't even see what you are threatening me with!".

I really hate my job.

This is my next to last day working for this particular company doing medical transcription. I start the new job on Monday. Unfortunately, my new job also is going to include medical transcription. I've been doing this for 14 years now and it has gotten so boring, I can hardly stand it. I am hopeful that the new job will be more interesting, with the addition of different work types. Now I only do discharge summaries and consultation notes and there I will do a lot more work types including surgeries and emergency department notes. Maybe that will help. If not, I'm going to have to find something else to do for a living!