Delay Before Starting

What a month! It's been pretty crazy here. So I'll try to do a quick update on my life.

The job interview actually went incredibly well. They ended up offering me a job. Luckily, I had plenty of time to think it over, because the recruiter and I kept missing each other and she was on vacation a few days. The offer was very flattering, and I almost accepted. But then I realized I would only be accepting it for selfish reasons. I liked the idea of building what they wanted built. And I liked the idea of the huge promotion and raise it would mean for me. But it would put us back to being a two-income family always stressed out with a messy house and who-knows-what for dinner. And I know I would never, ever, ever be happy that way. So I said no. I think I passed the first big test of my resolve.

We've spent the past month with my husband out of the country for two seperate weeks.

I got a huge sinus infection that left me pretty much useless and miserable. I decided to use the time I have now, finally, to take care of mysels a little bit and get my wisdom teeth pulled -- I suspect they might be partly behind my frequent sinus infections. I mean, they really had to go -- shortly after my 30th birthday, one of them partly erupted, but then got stuck. It was a happy little breeding ground for infection (and when it was removed, yes in fact, there was an infection going on). I was trying to wait until the baby was weaned, but she's proving to be at least as stubborn as my son, and with a sinus infection and no backup from my husband while he was out of the country, I just didn't have the energy to do it. So I had the teeth removed while I was awake (no sedation for me!). Ouch.

I've also developed a charming thing called "dry socket". Apparently the healing of one of the pulled teeth is going a bit wonky, and I have exposed, inflamed bone and nerves. It should delay healing and it hurts incredibly bad.

But! And here's the good news.

We finally informed the daycare we're pulling the kids -- they require 30 days notice, and this way, I'll have the chance to rest and finish healing up. Hopefuly, I can get the house in order, and plan plan plan!

I read "What Your Kindergartener Keeds To Know" -- I think it might be a nice place to start. I'm really interested in a reading-intensive program. My son loves being read to, and will only do workbooks (or even coloring books!) on the occasional once or twice a month that it strikes his fancy.

I've also (in my fun recovery time) read all of The Well Trained Mind. I think I'll be using a lot of their ideas. Once again, it's very reading based, and history based, which excites me. I want my son (and daughter!) to nderstand history, because most peopel today do not. I think it was the weakest part of my own education, and I constantly feel like my parents got a much better education in that sense than I did. They were classically trained, in catholic parochial schools. I'm not sure I'll stick with the schedule that the Wise's recommend though. I don't think I could wait until he's 9 to do physics experiments, and if he's anything like me, he's going to blow through some subjects (like math) much faster.

We already did one lesson from "Teach your child to read in 100 easy lessons". I'm not sure if it will work, but we'll see. I think this will help him simply because he is a perfectionist, and I think he doesn't try reading because he hates to be wrong. We made a sticker/stamp chart to fill in after each assignment. We'll see if this works. I'm hopeful, but honestly I give it maybe a 50% chance. If my son ends up not enjoying it, we'll put it aside for later.

I'm skipping the writing exercises in that book. I have a Kumon workbook for writing if he ever cares to try, but mostly I'm doing stealth teaching of his writing. He play hangman -- he makes up fake words by randomly filling in letters while I guess, then I have to pronounce whatever weird word he makes up. His letters are getting much better, and he's getting really good at drawing stick figures. ;) I have a lot of work that his daycare did to undo. They have them writing, but never taught them the correct way to write the letters, so he's always starting at the bottom and pushing up (for example). I'm hoping the Kumon book will help him learn the right order, when he's ready. Right now, that sort of "help" will just discourage him and make him feel bad, I think. He really does not like to feel wrong, and his daycare set him up to fail by not teaching him to write letters properly. I wish they'd just left it alone!

Other steps I'm taking include:
* Playing classical music from time to time. This house has the most amazing surround sound speakers connected to the sterio/CD player/receiver, placed around a room with a hardwood floor. The sound is just incredible!
* Playing games like Uno and chess. He can't get through a game of Chutes and Ladders, but he loves Uno and chess!
* Reading, reading, reading! He loves the Magic Treehosue books, which is hopefully getting him to begin to get used to different places and peroids of history. Next time I"m at the library, I'm going to look for good kids versions of myths. He loves drama!
* He is hopelessly obsessed with the TV, so I'm trying to record some things that might actually teach him something. I recorded a show called Modern Marvels this week, specifically the episode about knives, swords and axes. I think it was a hit. ;) He's always had a need for massive amounts of input, and what with me being sick, the husband out of town, and an asthmatic baby, well... I can't always provide all the input he needs. I don't think TVs are evil and I do believe in recreation that isn't always about learning.... but I do think he's gone overboard recently. I also put the old shows Voyagers in the Netflix queue. More history! ;)

In other news, I'm trying to find a way to make money. DH doesn't make enough alone to pay all the bills. I'm still on vacation at work until Friday (yes, I really had six weeks of vacation stored up... I wonder how I got so burnt out? ;D) and after that we have money saved up for a rainy day. But that won't last forever, so I'm going to try to make small business web pages and do freelance writing. I have *no* idea where I will find the time or energy for that, though!

It would help if my son was a decent sleeper. Or my daughter was. Or my husband was. Or I was. My daughter has allergies and asthma, and if I or she eat a tiny bit on onion, she has gas pains all night. So lately, we've been up with her. A lot. You wouldn't believe how impossible it is to avoid onions, unless you cook absolutely everything from scratch. Which I did do for a while, but ever since we moved (and I've been miserably in pain) it just hsan't happened. I still haven't even found all the boxes with kitchen pots and pans yet!

Anyway, sorry its been a month, but that's my update! 30 days to clean up, heal up, start a business, and get ready for a whole new life, with my kids by my side.