Lifelines

Rhyse officially kicked off our soccer insanity this evening and he was ready to play!

I wasn’t sure my camera and I were going to make it as just as soon as I loaded everyone up in the car (Charlie and Rhyse left earlier), it started to sprinkle.
By now you know good and well how I feel about rain so compound that by the word “newborn” and that was my take on the game tonight.
I went though, hoping that the field they were on was close to a totally illegal parking place (so what, I HAVE A NEWBORN, um, officer sir) and I majorly lucked out because there’s only like two and they were playing on one of them!
(And I didn’t even get busted by the po-lice! Good day!)

Things were a bit nutty for me on the sidelines as my Littles were in ornery mode.
I had one eye on Rhyse, one eye on those rascals, and my ears open for Charlie (this helps me hear what Rhyse is doing while I’m preoccupied with chasing the small ones down).

Wouldn’t you just friggin’ know that right about the time Greer and Creux hit WWF (play fighting) mode and I got up to pull them apart (what IS it with them???), I heard an erupture of cheering and looked up to see Rhyse with both fists in the air, having scored the second and winning goal for his team.

As I was walking back to my blanket, positively FUMING, several moms said, “There it was, Angi! Did you see that, Angi?”

No, ANGI didn’t see sh*t because she was bent over her little people doing that scary-harrassing-whisper/yell-through-gritted-teeth thing to them, threatening to yank the car seats from the car and strap their wee tushies (okay, fine, I said “butts” and I said it MEAN) into them and sit them on the sideline “like THAT, in front of EVERYONE!”

It wasn’t my finest parenting moment but COME ON!
GRRRRR.

Rhyse was in fine form and Charlie’s whole team looked terrific on the field!
It should be a great season!
(Mainly because I have vowed to use a sitter for the rest of Rhyse’s games. The Littles can drive someone else crazy for sixty VERY LONG minutes.)

This was Luxe’s first game.
Our little cheerleader was falling down on the job.
She was not impressed.

But me, I was!
I love watching Rhyse on the field.
Strong, smart, fast, determined.

And look who’s waaaaaay over there in Littles-Free Land!
(Doesn’t he look lonely? Like maybe he needs a kid? Or TWO?)

Luxe was really not very impressed, did I say that already?

Check out that yawn!
Is that not the Best Yawn Ever?
(And don’t you think she’s getting porky? Maybe hitting the boob too much? ;))

This was not his goal photo.
I mentioned that I missed that whole thing, yes?
And this shot did not go in.

But I’d like to pretend that it did.
It just makes me feel better!

Geeeeee, look who’s suddenly behaving so nicely!
Wonder why… (Scary-harassing-whisper/yell-through-gritted-teeth is a HIGHLY effective “I’m a bad a$$ Mama” tool. Have one in my bag of tricks at the ready, every day.)

Doesn’t she look eerily like Charlie in this photo?

He makes that face all the time.
ALL. THE. TIME.
And I’m starting to realize that it’s a GRIMACE.
(Like who could imagine ever grimacing in THIS household where you need earplugs to nap? Surely not him…)

Congrats on a great opening game, you two!

(And Charlie, thanks for stepping up and coaching Rhyse’s team. I know you didn’t want to and I know you know that I didn’t want you to but I’m glad you did it. You are both in your elements out there and things are the way they should be. But if I leap in the car and drive for days in one direction without looking back, you know why ;))

Well, not only has Luxe settled into a routine(ish) lifestyle, so have the rest of us!
All of my kids are busy here doing some form of schoolwork during the live-long day.
The Littles have done so many cute crafts lately–I just don’t have the time to share them.

Chas is doing wonderfully–making eighth grade seem like fifth.
I’m not terribly impressed with this year’s curriculum as either it’s too simple or else he’s brilliant.
He’s flies through the coursework in a mere two hours and it’s supposed to take him at least five.
Right now we’re working ahead a little bit, doing more than one day’s worth as our co-op begins next week and we’ll lose our Thursdays at Home.
Not only that but we’ll pick up homeschool gym, math tutoring, an art class and several scheduled field trips so it’s probably a good thing that’s it’s easy for him right now.

I am, however, interested in pushing him a bit to wrap up some of his courses quickly so I can test drive OHVA’s high school classes.
(Once he completes the 8th grade stuff, they ship out the next level.)
I’ve heard that the flexibility that I love so much goes right out the window and I’m not too keen on that.
(Therefore I am as yet undecided where Chas will charter “school” from next year.)

I’ve also heard that “learning coaches” (that’s me) are pretty well removed from the picture at the 9th grade level, as they don’t even receive teacher handbooks (with lesson plans and workbook keys). They want the kids to turn to their online teachers for questions and assignments which is just sort of silly to me.
We’re here, why not use us???
(Carla? When you come over, I need to pick your brain on this matter. Remind me. Because my brain has already been picked clean and I tend to forget everything right now. Like emailing you back and firming up a date. Just come over. Say, “You took forever getting back to me so here I am!” I’ll be delighted, I swear.)

On the flip side, I am very pleased with the bump up in Rhyse’s third grade stuff.
There seems to be a big change from the K-2 curriculums and 3rd.
Rhyse struggles a bit with schoolwork so this is a hard adjustment for him but it’s what he needs.
I sat with him today during a 28 question math checkpoint and watched him snap his fingers and wiggle in his seat and make monkey sounds, all while calculating (correctly) math problems, mentally borrowing digits here and carrying over digits there.

This makes me crazy, by the way.

I do not learn this way personally and neither does Chas so it’s a bit strange to watch all of the energy that Rhyse has play itself out in the chair at the computer, while he’s figuring out the perimeter of a football field.
I watch him jump and scoot and boogie all over the place and though he’s doing all of this, he is intent on the question on the screen and eventually he’ll pick up the mouse, move it over the page and click the right answer, then resume snapping his fingers and wiggling to the music that only he hears.

W-E-I-R-D.
Yet strangely productive.
Who knew?

Third grade is a bit more online which is actually quite nice. We were in a class connect today with three teachers and 138 students, able to use the online whiteboard and microphone.
Up until this point, Rhyse has largely been doing mostly offline bookwork so this is a nice change of pace.
He likes the graphics and the games and they do a really wonderful job of making learning “fun.”
However, if he has to spell “difficult” or “presidents” again, I think he will combust.
And I think I will, too.

So here’s a glimpse of a regular old school day over here (minus the chaos–I take photos when things are under control mostly :))

His first class connect of the year:

Third grade? YIKES! Last I checked, we were wrapping up kindy for him.

(And don’t even get me started on Chas. You know what I’ll say..”Where did it all go? Time is a THIEF! I blinked and he turned into a man-child. WAAAAAAH!”)

I think Rhyse thinks the teachers can also see him because I can’t otherwise explain why he’s writing sentences after they asked him to.
He should be rolling around on the floor and whining like he does when I ask him to do it.
Harumph!

Look who else attended the third grade yesterday!

She wasn’t exactly bowled over with excitement, was she?

And Em was here helping me with the Littles.
I didn’t have a formal craft for them so I rummaged up some stickers (from a safari unit study that I never got around to this summer) and some printables.

All was well in this house.
All was QUIET!!!

There’s never a dull moment with Rhyse around.
The kid is half-boy, half-monkey.
Seriously.
I need to get some footage of him climbing the light pole in front of our house and dinging the top.
If he grows up and joins the circus after all of the (beeper beeping!!!!) time I’ve put in homeschooling him, I swear to you, I will hunt. him. down.

We’ve been doing a lot of hands-on stuff around here lately.
I haven’t had much time to blog it because those things usually take a bit more time than just throwing up a few photos and snarky comments but we’ve been busy.
And it has a trickle down effect, I think.

I try to keep the house quiet while the boys are learning.
TRY is the operative word :)
But since it’s still so very nice outside (I never knew 87 could feel so BALMY), I shoo the small ones out with whichever older boy isn’t having the whip cracked at him.

Yesterday morning, it was Rhyse.
He took the Littles for me and set up his very own craft time with them which I found to be tremendously sweet.

And they all enjoyed “free crafting” with him so much.
(I do try to find this time for them too but usually I have a goal in mind when sitting down with the Littles.)

I’m lucky to have these big kids around.
I really don’t know what I would do without them.

Thanks, Rhyse, for all your help yesterday!

(And here’s Chas, who was NOT happily crafting. He was rather unhappily picking apart “Why The Caged Bird Sings” and answering written questions in regards to it. Try as he might, he could not get to the fun being had with the glue sticks and googley eyes.)

One of the biggest benefits to being a baby in a large family is this: someone always wants to hold you.
Remember last night, when I was blogging and said she was sitting in her bouncy seat and maybe if my profile was interesting enough then I’d get five to fifteen minutes of blog time?

Well, THIS happened before I even hit “post” on that piece:

And this morning, I laid her on the couch so that I could do a super quick kitchen tidy and within seconds, she was scooped up.

He held her for an hour and a half while I cleaned and then schooled the Littles for a bit.
Clearly he has the right touch–he put her to sleep.

It’s good to be a baby around here.

(If you can deal with the insanity, that is!)

I just love this one of him.

Jenny, when you check in show this to Colin!

Colin, we found a friend of yours swimming in the deep end of the pool! Rhyse fished him out and kept him in a cup for the night though you KNOW he wanted to keep him for good!

We set him free so maybe he’ll be back to welcome you home soon :)

Anyway, thought you’d enjoy knowing that the local wildlife is enjoying your pool now that all of the neighborhood kids aren’t!

Neither of these two should have been up at 11:00–but they were!

And it ended up being a sweet thing because I was able to find some quiet time for Rhyse to spend with Luxe.
I’ve been really mindful of not letting all of the kids storm her at once though I hate shooing them off.
But finding a few minutes of “alone time” is so much better.

Plus, I was able to eat a bowl of cereal.

(You don’t realize that eating is a luxury, do you? Well, here I am to remind you that it is :))

I mentioned before that I received a little Netbook for my birthday.
Love this thing.
Am currently in my bed, snoozing babe in my arms, playing around with Google.

Actually, I was snooping for the baby sling I MUST HAVE and wouldn’t you know the b*tch is like backordered until the next coming of Christ.
I can’t find it ANYWHERE.
Which makes me want it more.
And so I’ve brought in the Big Dogs.
Meaning, I’ve sent Charlie an email labled, “Find it, pleeeeeeeease” and if he can’t then I’m all set to rob someone of their Moby Wrap in Autumn Blossom.

(And if anyone now Googles that, finds one, falls in love with it like I have, and manages to get it before I do, you’re dead. I mean that sincerely. Will totally blame my hormones but I NEED that wrap.)

WAY off-topic here.

After 25 minutes of searching for above mentioned fabulous yet elusive wrap (it’s really okay–I like the chase), I remembered that Rhyse asked me a question today and I wasn’t sure of the answer. I told him we’d look it up when we got home but then I forgot.
Lucky for him, I was still dorking around with Google.

Here was his question:

“Mom, do eyeballs grow?”

My first inclination was to say that they didn’t.
But then I sort of couldn’t imagine that they didn’t grow at all, not even a little bit.

So I poked around and found not only that they DO grow but also came across a neat site for kids who need to know this type of stuff.
There’s a place where you can type in your random question and it’ll spit out an answer.

I tried this with my long-time favorite inquiry (also by Rhyse, when we was maybe four-ish), “Mommy, why did God make you a grown-up?”

I said it was probably a mistake.
And the damn search engine didn’t know, either.

Well, clearly it has its limitations but it’s something I’ll bookmark and use in the future.

Maybe eventually it’ll figure out why I’m in charge of this place.