Loss tonight. Carol Beth and I had our combo match a few days early because many of us will be at the beach this weekend, and we lost badly in the first set and then lost the second set, a big comeback, in a 8-6 tie-break. Call it heartbreak, if you will. I was playing slowly and languidly, taking my cues from the weather. It was sticky when we arrived, then overcast with menacing black clouds overhead, then solidly windy, then an owl flew by, and finally it cooled, with some wetness to the air. When we arrived back in Woodlake, it was raining. Better luck next time.

Hilary and her gang we back. We got on the subject of how homeschoolers always talk shop. It's true. It's our life. Or maybe no one else wants to hear that part of our life, so we have no choice but to chatter to each other about it. Heather was there as well, and we were talking about how much work it is--the constant reassessing, second-guessing, the processing of new information every time we bump into someone else we know who starts talking shop. Are we doing enough? Should we be doing what they are doing? Like tennis, it's largely a confidence game. You can't do it all. You just can't. You just need to keep your eyes on your own ball and determine that maybe it'll be a short match and maybe it will go on into three sets sometimes, but you're going to come out of this where you want to be.

So today I was, in this vein, looking through someone's blog and found myself spending too much time on a website with language arts curricula for "gifted elementary students." I'm wondering if this would be interesting to Walter. Ollie would likely find it rather cheesy, but I do like the grammar and the poetry books, which seem to be manageable but at the same time substantive. That's kind of the benchmark for what I seek now: easy to engage with and not too time-consuming, cuts to the chase, covers the material I need covered without a lot of excess. Now how to come up with $100 or so. Good thing Kerry has that contract renewal for his second job.

I'm actually feeling really good about the fall, at least for the twins. I have picked up a lot of material at the used curriculum fairs so far, and I think we'll make real progress. Here's what I have:

Math: Saxon 6/5, and I'm still waiting to find a Math-U-See Delta or Epsilon
Language arts: Easy Grammar Systems, both the full deal and Daily Grams; a Classical roots program;
Latin: Latina Christiana through a class we're taking at RES
History/Reading: Sonlight Alt-4, which is the combined 3-4 American history list
Critical Thinking: Building Thinking Skills from The Critical Thinking Company. This should be a nice fun diversion.
Science: LifePak science books. I need a second set.

Great news. CAT scores came back this week, and Frances only missed two on the entire test (should have been none, but couldn't get to her slow down or review what she marked). She was in the 98th percentile for reading and similar for math (don't have it right on hand). The twins both were in the 99th percentile in their overall composite score for the test. Yahoo! Now I'm waiting on the IOWA scores and the CogAt to come back. I'm wondering if Bob Jones is withholding things until I pay for the test books I got mustard and water on.