Vampires and monsters, oh my! I'm so very deep into this Twilight saga that I'm not going to be able to keep up here until it's over.

We have been quite busy this weekend, though mostly with relaxing things happening around home and catching with friends at playdates. I feel like I've spent a lot of time in my car in some ways, but in others, it hasn't been with the harried running that we tend to get into with our regular routine. Ollie made his Hitler Powerpoint presentation for our co-op for a few hours on Saturday night. We read _All the Way Home_, a book I loved more than Ollie did. We also read _Julie's Story_ about Frances's American Girl doll, and it was surprisingly well written and engaging, much more so than I expected. We read a shorter American Girl book about Molly, who we've been following a bit with our WWII class, and Ollie and I read _Missing May_, a Newbery winner that he wasn't crazy about but that I thought was okay. What's up with all these Newbery books about poor, for lack of a better term, "white trash" cobbled together families where the parents have died or abandoned the children and the themes are all about things that are very difficult for most children to relate to: 12 Step programs, quirky kids who are almost supernaturally mature, and this one, which had a heavy component of Spiritualism and seances and mediums, including several play-on-words jokes with the terms. I find myself having to explain lots of elements that the plot hinges heavily upon, even when my children are in the target age range. This was another book that it was fairly hard to imagine a lot of middle-grade or early middle school children truly loving; it was sad and the theme is just more appealing to adults (an older man missing his dead wife; the adjustments of a girl who has experienced loss after loss in her life. Obviously I don't think these are off-limits topics, but this book falls straight into the same category and thematic zone as _Because of Winn-Dixie_ and _The Higher Power of Lucky_, who other Newbery books that all take the same kind of fringes of society and the same all-too-familiar dead parents, dead or leaving guardian characters and place them in a spare atmosphere of soulful searching for place. It's hard to believe these authors didn't all collude in writing, and that the same committee isn't choosing these winners year after year.

Frances has a funky rash over a lot of her body and a wet cough. I don't quite know what to make of it. And she's whiny. Tell me something new. This time it's about wanting a sister. Believe me, I want to give her a little sister at least as much, if not more, than she wants one. And I can relate to her longing for that tiny sibling to take care of, because I wanted that more than anything in the world when I was growing up, and like her I cried tears of non-understanding at why my parents couldn't just find us a baby brother and no, I didn't want to wait until I had a baby of my own (why do you think I started trying to get pregnant at 23?). Couldn't they "just" adopt one? That's where we were tonight. We bumped into an old neighbor who moved away two years ago, and they are in the process of adopting three little girls who are relatives. I know, I know, why can't that happen in my family? And Frances, like me, can't face the reality that there aren't just orphanages right out there in America where a loving family can walk through the door and just go "shopping" and take home a baby or a three year old or a fifteen year old that very same day. She didn't want to hear about home studies, social workers, attorneys, red tape and paperwork, notarizations, not to mention travel, long waits, big and uncertain fees, and potential disappointment. Frankly, I don't want to hear about that stuff, either. That eight year old part of myself still just wants to march on down to that Baby Sale at JC Penney and pick myself up a baby. Or just bump into some goodhearted but pregnant teenager in the Target and have her promise me that baby in her belly because, as Frances put it, "she's not able to take care of it herself." Or that I could drive over to the nearest children's home and find the one with the dark curls especially fetching and instantly go off into our happily ever after. What I ended up with instead was one very angry, frustrated, over-tired, mucousy biological child of mine sobbing loudly in the backseat of my car in outrage that I was denying her this most basic wish while we were stopped in an inexplicable line of traffic for 30 minutes on the way home from gymnastics.

It is so freaking cold. And we're going to an outdoor historical park tomorrow. I'm a little disappointed because the show is going to go on, but it's going to be all indoors, most likely, which means we'll miss some of the experience that this place is so known for. I'm sure they'll do a great job, but still...if it's not going to snow and be gratifying and lovely, I'd rather it just be seasonal or slightly better so that we can get on with life. The Farmer's Almanac lied to me! Well, may not entirely...it has been a hard winter, but mostly because it has had a lot of cold days without the prize of some cozy snow days.

Yes, Virginia

...you can make your Pinewood Derby car yourself! And we did it. The cars looked awesome. Ollie's is the "Area 51 Hybrid," a camouflaged Prius that he spray painted on the front lawn of the Science Museum this afternoon and then hid in a doughnut box behind the wheels of the van. Walter made the "Platyprius," another Prius-like vehicle with a platypus nose cut to a brush on the front. We registered them both for the race, and both had a little extra weight added once we were there, but we're prepared for tomorrow morning.

We ended up going to the Science Museum with some friends this afternoon, and I lost track of time and made Frances late to her ballet practice.

With our final free IMAX tickets, we saw "The Alps," which is now my favorite of the IMAX movies I've seen ("The Grand Canyon" is a very close second). The footage was incredible, the story a little much (I had a hard time believing that climbing the north face of the Eiger really did cleanse all the pain of his father's death), and I learned basic cultural literacy type information about the Alps, as did the kids (name two peaks in the Alps; tell me some countries the Alps go through; what rocks form the Alps? Do people really live there and how do they cross from place to place?). But it was by far the most barfilicious IMAX movie I've ever seen. They're all kind of bad, but this one took the cake for nauseating sweeping camera moves and balance-off-kiltering twists and turns and pans. I had to close my eyes about fifteen times just to keep from losing my lunch. And I had skipped lunch. And I had taken Dramamine, as I always do before these films....

At home we have done a lot of reading. Tonight was a night of finishing. We read the last three pages of _Belle Prater's Boy_, the book we had been listening to in the car and whose final CD skipped and then went dead in the last three minutes of the novel. We finished _The Midwife's Apprentice_, a great little book that we had started yesterday (part of the magic library of books to be sold that I'm keeping). And then we read a novella by Gary Paulsen called _Nightjohn_. This would be one of those instances where pre-reading a book to share with children would have been a good idea. Oops. It is a book written from the point of view of a slave with a wicked, sadistic master. A new slave comes and begins to teach her to read and write, and the beatings begin. Kerry asked me, "So, was it graphic?" Let's just say that would be an understatement. I was torn between feeling like I was going to deeply disturb Ollie and scar him for life (Walter had been listening, but thank goodness fell asleep about halfway through, so he only heard half of the horrific descriptions of torture) and feeling like it is an important story to tell. It is fiction, but based on some people's reality somewhere, and it puts into perspective why so many people were weeping at Barack Obama's inauguration, why this moment has touched the hearts of so many and has been inspiring. Since we're heading to a Civil War battlefield on Tuesday and since we live in the heart of the Confederacy and see those little rebel flags on trucks and homes every single day, I figured it doesn't hurt to hear yet again some more of the story. But really, I hope that he'll be okay....

To cleanse our minds a bit after that intensity, I let him stay up later than I should have and we started a new book, _All the Way Home_ by Patricia Riley Giff. She's currently one of my favorite writers, and we've loved all of her books. This one is set in 1941 and has gotten off to a slow and maybe intentionally confusing start. It is the story of a girl who has had polio who has been adopted by her former nurse and a boy who is staying with that nurse, who is a friend of his mother's, while his parents both find work because they have lost their farm and are in financial distress. Against this, I believe World War II is going to start. So it is a good fit with the topic we've chosen for our first co-op class, which is World War II. The boys are focusing more on generals, leaders, countries, and causes of war, where the girls are focusing more on life on the home front and daily life at home. This is yet another book filling in some of the narrative of children who lived at that time, so why not stay on a roll with this theme.

It has me wanting to find some more books about polio to read to him. I think it was _In the Shadow of Polio_ that was so moving for me--just well-written and frightening and personal. I wish every single day that I could talk with my Mom again about what her life was like when she was young. It's hard to believe that I never did, but I guess we just don't always think of those things when we still have the time to do it, and the next thing you know, it's too late. I want to know so many things--where she was in the hospital and exactly how long and what her treatments were and whether they hurt and whether she was ever in an iron lung and what relationships she made with the other patients and what her life was like after her recovery. Could her parents come see her whenever they wanted? Did she have breathing problems? Did other children around her die? And then there are just general questions about the 1930s and 40s. How did the Depression appear through her eyes? Where was her family living? What kinds of things did they have? What was she doing when Pearl Harbor was bombed? Does she remember ration stamps? Did she collect war stamps? Did her family buy war bonds? Did she collect newspapers or tin foil or scrap metal? Her brother joined the Navy when he was 16. Was she worried about him every single day? Did her parents show their stress and concern to her? Did they hang a blue star flag in their window? Did anyone she know die? Did any of her friends' brothers die? How did she get her news? Did she go to serialized movies every week? Did her family have a victory garden? I am positively devastated that I know nothing about my own family and my own mother. My children are positively dying to hear this stuff from her. And I have no one who would know. I think of my Grandma and Grandpa, who also never talked about any of these things. Compared to my life so far, what difficulties they endured as parents. First a son who dropped out of high school to go fight in the Pacific and then never returned to live at home (he married a woman he met in California after his ship returned to the States and before he was discharged), and then their daughter contracts polio weeks before her college graduation. Both of these are parental nightmares. And there was such silence about them in our family! Maybe not intentional, but it's amazing that these things never or almost never came up. I suppose it was a different generation, not so prone to talking about their anxiety, things kept hushed a bit more, emotions held close to themselves. To anyone who might be reading this: ask your questions now! Carpe diem! Gather your rosebuds while ye may! Don't sit around wondering, get those stories and histories! Because one day you'll turn around and your entire family might be dead and your opportunity will be forever lost!

In the car, we're listening to _Ella Enchanted_, which Ollie is really liking and which I can't keep my mind on to save my life. I tell you, I just can't abide novel-length stories about fairies, gnomes, elves, sorcerors, and the like. My brain goes numb and I stop paying attention. And I don't do audio books particularly well under any circumstances. What's funny is that Ollie is now thinking that this is the book he might like to pick for book club when his turn comes in about two months. I can see the looks on the other boys' faces now.... A book about a girl with a magic curse put upon her at birth. A book about a girl! I find it absolutely endearing. I'm really proud that he is so open to all books, regardless of what they might be typed by others. It reminds me that we need to get back to the Little House series. I think we're on Farmer Boy, which isn't most people's favorite.

And drumroll please...today Ollie finished Saxon 5/4! It is a banner day. We need to celebrate with a cake or something. I am proud and excited about all we have accomplished this year and how we were able to make a daily habit out of doing small amounts of schoolwork. All kinds of things used to throw us off, but now that our whole mindset has changed, we get our work done every single day, with very, very, very few exceptions, and somehow it is shoehorned in even when there's a lot of other stuff going on. For example, today. We watched a friend's children for most of the morning, and then we made plans to go to the museum with them after lunch, but between them leaving and lunchtime, we got our minimal everything done, and then we were free to have a fun-directed day from then on. There's hope yet for other changes I'd like to see happen!

Tomorrow is the Pinewood Derby, that potentially exasperating cultural phenomenon for young Cub Scouts that they cannot exactly do by themselves. I admit to not really understanding this event. Once upon a time, I suspect that boys used to labor for several weeks to make their perfect pine car, one that involved hours of coping, sanding, shaping, and painting. If our pack is any evidence of current trends, and I believe it is, this task has now been handed over to adult males, if it's done at all, with a range of results from completely square, barely painted bus to powder-coated, professionally sprayed engineering feats.

If the truth be told, my problem is that we didn't make it to any of the "Cubstruction" dates our den had this year. The first one was still within that magic zone of the New Year's holiday weekend. The second was the day of Legend of the Poinsettia. The third was last weekend, and the boys went to the river for the weekend with some friends. This meant that the task of creating a car was up to us. Cubstruction is a euphemism for these freezing cold sessions in some zealous adult male scout leader's garage where paper templates for car shapes are set out, young boys choose one and trace it onto their piece of wood, and then they get in line to have their shape cut by a $500 power-tool. When it is handed back to them, they go stand in another line to hand "their" car routed on the bottom by another male seeking to announce his manhood, and then they move to a zone where, and I kid you not here...someone is melting lead fishing weights and pouring the molten lead into the routed strip in the bottom of the car. Then they move to another line, where the car is placed on an inexpensive specialty scale, and a lengthy process of back and forth between a Dremel or other grinder and the scale to get the car within a tenth of an ounce range of the accepted limit. Yes, boys are standing around while lead, a substance proven to cause reproductive and intellectual damage by ingestion in its airborne form, is ground all over a garage and where sanding is spewing it into the air. My Christmas lights all have warnings about how the state of California acknowledges these wires contain lead, a substance known to cause brain damage, and I need to wash my hands after handling them. I am still receiving daily alarmist emails telling me that every bookstore in the company is about to go out of business because every book and toy in America is going to be imminently incinerated lest it contain lead in the printing of its cover. But the Boys Scouts of America melt it, pour it, sand it, grind it, and then hand it in a touchable form right to 6-12 year old boys so that they can fondle their adult-made pinewood derby car and admire it for posterity.

But I digress. I bucked the system. Last night, I did help with their Pinewood Derby cars. We started with a coping saw. A dull coping saw. A dangerously dull coping saw. I did much of the sawing for them because it was difficult, because we didn't have a bench with a vise that was working properly, and because the blade was indeed dangerously dull and not cutting well and a hazard to all who used it. But we marked off places to cut, I got the cuts started, and they helped. Then we all hacked at some of those cut areas with a hammer when the going got really tough (say, when the blade had no teeth left...). Then I pulled out the Dremel and we tried a lot of different attachments, determining that we preferred the barrels of sandpaper, the lower the grit the better. They ground and sanded and shaped their cars for about an hour. They practiced putting different attachments in the tool, learning the cardinal lesson that the most important thing to do it unplug before sticking your hand in the chuck. Our cars don't look like they were made by an engineering post-graduate, but they do look pretty darn awesome.

What's funny is that Walter and Ollie ended up arguing repeatedly about the copyright on their designs. Ollie decided that he was going to make a Pinewood Prius, with an Area 51 theme. We chopped the nose off the front, and he Dremeled it to give it that podular curve. While we were hacking off the front of Walter's car, we noticed that we could leave on a piece and it would look like a duck-billed platypus, so his car became The Platyprius. Ollie's kind of mad--he has the hybrid, and he wants a corner on that market. Walter thinks its a free country.

They painted them, and that was its own adventure. Nothing quite beats spray paint, so that's what we did. We put down cardboard boxes on the garage floor and they got to work. The fumes were overpowering. There was mayhem, there was panic, there were complaints of nausea. I think we'll buy some paint today at Ben Franklin.

I need to take them out to buy some weights for the bottom of the car. I'm hoping for a metal other than lead. I'm hoping for safety.

I feel like I've fallen off this writing wagon. I've been doing some other writing lately, but that doesn't help over here.

Tonight was the Member-Guest tournament at Hilary's club. I prefer to put the outcome this way: "We won one, and we lost one." Tonight we lost 6-3,6-1, which doesn't feel so good. I felt like I played so-so. Sometimes when you lose, you know that you gave it your all and there were many great points and you were just outdone by someone who has more of her life to devote to this fine sport. And sometimes you just wish that you worked out more during the winter. I felt like I came out roaring a bit, but then it...dulled. By the end of the first set, it felt like we were on a greased slide headed down fast. I wasn't entirely embarrassed by how I played, but I can tell that there's quite a bit of work to be done to get tuned up for the spring. Perhaps I'll give Ken a call and try to squeeze into this clinic at MTC that starts at 8:30 p.m. Lord knows I'm still awake and alive at that hour!

Tomorrow Hokie goes to the vet. I'm worried. I'm worried that the news won't be good about him. He's an old man. He'll be 15 next month, and he is showing it. He has fatty tumors, including a very enormous one sticking out of his side. His paw was bleeding yesterday for some reason (probably just bumping something while it was bitter cold and his skin was dry). He's sticking his feet in his ears and then licking them and rubbing his eyes and then eating the eye boogers. And he's itchy. Poor thing. I have no idea how to get his lumpy, decrepit, achy body into the car. Last time we did it, about 7 months ago, involved a creative challenge of piling up trumpet cases and computer boxes.

I probably shouldn't admit this here, but we have been enjoying the portable library that has arrived at my house. I am helping with the Used Curriculum Fair for the upcoming VaHomeschoolers conference in May, and I'm starting to get donations of items. Specifically, I picked up about 10 boxes of books from someone this week, and I've peeked inside, and there are some real winners. We are quite enjoying them, which maybe isn't what were supposed to be doing--I think we just supposed to be "storing." But nonetheless, I feel like we've been given a treasure chest. They've enjoyed some Marmaduke (I used to love this!) and Peanuts comics. Rutledge is especially fond of a very 80's and very British book about a birthday party where a clown comes and the children play games (non-fiction book). Ollie has read two Boxcar Children books from the boxes in the past two days. I read aloud a fabulous book called _Don't You Know There's a War On_, which correlates well with what I'm doing with the girls in our now-weekly group class (see, I'm not using the C word) on Mondays. The girls are listening to the American Girl book about Molly, the girl on the home front during World War II who worries about her father who is in England, has to eat rationed foods, and goes to a very orderly 1940s school where patriotism and obedience reign supreme. The same material covered in that book is what makes up the story of Avi's book, more aimed at boys. It was probably one of Ollie's favorite books ever. He thinks he might choose it for book club. And it was very endearing--about having a wild crush on a teacher (to the point of kind of stalking her!), about a special friendship during an intense time, and generally about the many emotions of growing up in a war time. Today we read _The Midwife's Apprentice_, a book that I really love. We're really enjoying that one, too, about failure, names, self-worth, learning, and identity. And before that, we finished up _The Secret of Laurel Oaks_, which was decent. It wasn't life-altering, and I still have trouble with books where supernatural things happen or with ghosts or vampires or what have you, but this had a historical element that added some interest and stimulation. Still, it was hard for me to identify well with some of the characters, and it moved a little slowly.

As for me, be still my heart. I am madly in love with Edward Cullen. I feel 17 again. I think I simply miss that crazy in love feeling where your heart nearly stops every time you look at or touch the other person. And this book has it in spades. I know it's not necessarily the deepest book and others have accused that it is "beneath me," whatever that means. But seriously, I think it is a well-written book that sweeps the reader away. The fact that I'm not looking at page numbers, something I *always* do while reading, is a giveaway to me that something is being done right. I am on the second book of the series now, and I'd rather be doing that than writing this (why don't you do it, then, Nancy?). I have to say that the Twilight series is entirely what I don't like in books--it's about vampires, for one. Not that there's anything wrong with that, I just typically cannot get into books about things that aren't real (or that I haven't seen...who knows, maybe they are real) or people or animals with supernatural powers (the fast flight, the mind reading, the ESP) or where there's a lot of new terminology or jargon. And I don't like books in series in general. And I don't like books that are too long (like 2100 pages of books about vampires...). But for some reason, and while I am bristling some when it gets a little too "fantasyish" for me, this one has sucked me in. Believe me, I've tried lots of sci-fi and fantasy books, and I never get very far. I know that the whole vampire thing is essential to the plot, but really, the only thing that would make these books better as romances would be to just have everyone be really human. I guess I'd say that I read to better understand the human condition, and for whatever reason, non-human things or non-earthly things in a book tend to undermine that for me. Anyway, Edward can kiss me with his ice-cold lips any day.

Tomorrow is the spelling bee. I'm going to attempt to be a Homeschooler Who Bucks The System by doing what parents of brilliant homeschoolers almost never do: trying to put my 5th grade children in the 2nd-3rd grade category. Trust me, their spelling skills are right there. This may make some people feel that I'm trying to give my guys an unfair advantage, but believe me when I say, this is only putting them into a situation where they'll be able to have a crack at participating in a competition. I hope all goes well.

We have generally been laying low with the cold weather. School is on a roll. Ollie will finish Saxon 5/4 Friday, and his next book should be here for Monday. He is very excited. This is the final big push on reducing fractions, least common denominator, least common multiple, improper fractions, and adding fractions with like and unlike denominators. Then its smooth sailing for a few weeks as 6/5 reviews the past few books for several weeks. Ollie is beside himself knowing that very soon, his math will only take about 10 minutes a day. I'm just going to let it go, happy that he's really happy about math now. Overall, though, I think things are going well. They both eagerly start their work as soon as they get up in the mornings, even getting themselves up earlier so they can get a leg up on it. Much of the time they have done ther independent schoolwork by 10 a.m., which leaves the rest of the day for going out or their own pursuits.

Last week we went to Pocahontas State Park for an Outdoor Skills class series that will be happening twice a month through winter and spring. We used to do a Roots and Shoots class there and went through many sequences of offerings through the park, so it is nice to be back. Frances, to my surprise, is probably the one enjoying it the most, even though I didn't sign her up. This coming week I'm going to do my best to allow her to stay the whole time, instead of having her leave with Rutledge and me. The first week they talked about the CCC, the history of the park, and ways of making observations. Next week will include a longer hike and more focused topic. Some of my fondest homeschooling memories so far are of children climbing all over the fence at Pocahontas or chasing each other in the woods with big sticks or sitting around the campfire there.

Tuesday we will be going to Pamplin Historical Park, which is a Civil War living museum. The program sounds fantastic and fits well with what we have been studying this year in history. We haven't totally made it to the Civil War in our chronological progression, though we had some interludes when we went to the Museum of the Confederacy in the fall and when we read some of our Sonlight books out of order. We just read _The Red Badge of Courage_ last week, so that also gave them a little extra background.

Yesterday we spent the early part of the day watching the inauguration coverage and talking about past presidents, large crowds, security, and who all those people were who got to be up at the podium (especially Aretha Franklin). It was very, very moving. I repeatedly find myself teary-eyed not only when I'm watching the actual event itself (over and over and over...it was on incessantly for the rest of the day), but when I hear reports on NPR or hear people talking about how much this moment means to them. It truly does feel momentous to me and a proof that democracy does work. We had read quite a bit on the NPR website and some other resources linked from the Illinois Association for Gifted Children website (not sure why I suddenly got this email, but whatever...) about things like the oath of office and where it came from and then various "firsts" that happened over the years at inaugurations (first photographed, first in Washington, DC, first made a movie of, first using a Catholic Bible, etc.), and then we have been reading a short book on fascinating stories about things that have happened in the White House and some back issues of Cobblestone Magazine about the birth of political parties and about the office of the President. I wish we somehow could have been closer. I kind of wish I had a more thrilling and perhaps memorable "Where Were You When..." story to tell. But we were holed up at home on an ice-cold day, drinking our hot chocolate, I had just been to the dentist, and we were crowded onto the ottoman watching Barack Obama repeat back the oath and all the fanfare surrounding it. I know I was far more into this than the kids, especially than Walter and Frances, but hopefully they will have some mental snapshot of the moment.

And my last little tidbit is that I am challenging myself to be gluten free until my birthday, in about 6 weeks. More on that later. But it is proceeding about as one would be expecting it to at this point--mistakes and slipups, but lots of learning about how life doesn't have to be totally upside down for this to become a new normal way of eating. There is life beyond xanthan gum and 7 different flours for every recipe. I'm sucking down an Amy's Lentil Soup as I write this, so I'm not feeling particularly deprived at the moment.

I'm doing something pretty dumb right now and taking a migraine pill that is going to make me feel like total crap for an hour or so while it is helping my stupid migraine feel better. I don't do hormones or weather changes well.

Here's what Nancy is obsessing about these days: Alzheimer's Disease. I'm terrified that I have Early Onset Alzheimer's. I'd love to have my doctor test me for the genetic markers. And I also don't want to look like a total freako hypochondriac!

Yes, I just read _Still Alice_, one of the most moving books I've read in a long, long time. In fact, I did something that I've never done before. I stayed up late finishing the book, and at 1:15 a.m., I turned it over, went to page 1, and started immediately reading it again. I wanted to look at those early signs and how she crafted the novel's flow, and it's just amazing. She is an incredibly gifted writer. And the book is kind of affirmatively terrifying.

I think the real root of my worry is that I don't know if my mother had some form of recognizable dementia with a name. It's one of those things where family denial and other health problems took the focus off this, and my mother's complete refusal to cooperate with any kind of diagnostics has left just a big question mark. She would repeat things, ask questions over and over, and her life was so simplified and tight that there wasn't much room for her to make noticeable mistakes. For the last 8 years or so of her life, her physical problems with weak arm muscles and post-polio syndrome left her unable to do the cooking. She didn't work outside the home or have volunteer responsibilities. My Dad was an accountant and paid the bills, especially as more bill-paying went online. And other issues could have clouded a diagnosis--possible depression (who wouldn't be depressed knowing they had a degenerative syndrome that was just going to leave them weaker and weaker and that there was little to nothing they could do about it?), not enough activity in her life. Nonetheless, I wondered then and I wonder now. And my recent spate of higher-profile forgetfulness that is remarkable to me has me a little rattled. So it's not quite that this book has made me panic like a medical student seeing herself in every pathology, but that I chose this book because it's a topic that has been on my mind.

I'm still not through Twilight. Every time I sit down to read it, I end up doing something else: wasting time on that time-wasting emetophobia forum, reading emails, reading something else, writing here, writing somewhere else. I meant to read for a few hours tonight, but I ended up doing all of the above. I don't know why.

Frances had her first gymnastics mock meet tonight. It was very exciting. She has so much work to do! She has missed quite a bit of practice in recent weeks because of the holidays falling such that Level 3's missed more than any other level and because she had ballet rehearsals and shows. Wednesday at practice she looked so inattentive and clueless and I felt like her coach wasn't doing much correcting, and I got worried that she had hit her ceiling--she was no longer a promising gymnast, but had reached the level where she would max out. I was concerned that they had given up on her and had accepted that she was going to be left behind when her class moves up over the summer, so the coaches had stopped actively working with her. As a reality check, and rather than wallow in our speculation, we talked with her coach. I guess we were a bit off. The news was the same as always. Yes, Frances is inattentive. Yes, Frances will get more mature with time. But they still are saying that she is the most talented athlete they've seen come through their doors in quite some time and that she has incredible potential for this sport. I suppose if only we could get her to actually care about putting some effort and concentration into it some day!

In the meet, she got lost a bit in some of her longer routines. But overall, she looked competent, especially on bars and vault, her best events. I have videos that I'll try to upload and post tomorrow. Now she is at a birthday slumber party for one of her best friends. Add in that we went to Inflation Nation today, and it was a banner day altogether.

The boys are also gone. They left for the river house with Marty and Peter this afternoon and probably won't be back until Sunday. They left with nothing more than the shirts on their backs, so it will be a minimalist weekend for them. I would say it's almost lonely with only Rutledge here, but I'm enjoying the silence (especially with the migraine...).

Ollie and I finished listening to _Belle Prater's Boy_ on CD--it's been our car book for about a week. It was really good, and Ollie enjoyed it because it dealt with some darker themes: death of a parent, suicide, an unsolved mystery. It went above Walter's emotional head, which is fine. I'm still always testing my character-age theory, and the characters in this book were 12, which is older than my listeners, so I really still feel that yeah, two more years and this would have been an even more effective book, and 2 more years and it might be of interest to Walter. We are also nearly finished with _The Secret of Laurel Oaks_ as a read-aloud. It's been a somewhat long book, but very interesting. It's based very closely on the story of one of the most haunted houses in America, but the names have been changed, and more characters added. It's a ghost/horror type story set in Louisiana in a mansion where a mother and her two daughters were poisoned, seemingly by one of their slaves, but we're not sure yet which one (or if any) did it or exactly why. This is also a book that really is aimed more at young adults, and as such, there are some themes that are either a little too mature for my kids as readers and that would simply be better understood and appreciated by young adults, which is really who this novel is aimed at (it should be shelved in YA and not Juvenile, as it was). The book alternates between chapters happening in the present with the family staying at this mansion while their parents are at an academic conference and 160 backs, when a wealthy family lived there with their slaves. The owner of the house routinely raped/molested the one young slave girl, and this would be my primary reservation about recommending this book to tweens--at best, they might not even understand the language and get what's going on, but at worst, it could be disturbing. And the plot does hinge a bit on this fact. Ollie is enjoying the history wrapped into the mystery story as well as the eeriness of the voodoo and ghosts.

New audio-book: _Ella Enchanted_. Next read-aloud: _All the Way Home_ by Patricia Riley Giff. My next book for myself: _Riding in Cars with Boys_.

We're also plugging away at _History of Us_ at about 2 chapters a day right now. I'd like to get closer to the Civil War before they go to Pamplin, but I just don't see that happening. I'm going to just rest assured that they know quite a bit already and not fast-track our basic history sequence here. Right now we're on the presidency of John Adams, the Napoleanic Wars, and the birth of American political parties.

The new math book is on the way for Ollie. I'm starting to get a little itchy about him not being on track to finish Saxon 6/5 before the end of the year. At a lesson a day, Walter is going to be fine, and we'll make a decision about what comes next after that. But for Ollie, he'd have to double up some or continue a bit into the summer, something I don't see happening. I should just let it go--we homeschool so that we can work at our own pace and not have to feel "accelerated" or be somewhere arbitrary because of the calendar or rest of the class. But there's something about finished up a year's work all tidy-like that just plain appeals to me.

Curtain!

It's over. Another Poinsettia season. Our second, but probably not our last, at least I hope not.

We all have a big decision on our plates. Frances has indicated, when we asked, that she would prefer to drop out of gymnastics and do unlimited dance classes. This would mean that she could take ballet and flamenco, ballroom and capoiera, Zumba and yoga. There are so many possibilities! And it's not that far, and it costs less. Not quite as bloody as gymnastics, at least I don't think (her one dance instructor now, who also was a gymnast and a coach, describes gymnastics as a "bloody, brutal sport" where "the only thing sparkly about it is the leotard."). Simplified. But me, the mother, the one who isn't the one on the mats, is not ready to let go. I know, it seems like a no brainer. Cheaper. More time-efficient. She unequivocably wants dance. But what about the wisdom of staying with something for an extended period? What about the possible things she hasn't explored yet? What is she is losing some big opportunity to shine in something that is perfect for someone with her body shape and size? What if I'm pushing her too much because of my own "issues?"

Kerry's parents came up today to see the show, and her friend Lainey was there, too. It was all very exciting. Frances lives in the moment, and she's the type of person who savors every minute of it and wants to repeat it forever. She kept saying that she wants them to perform this show every day, seemingly indefinitely. I'm not so sure about that for the long term, but this is an outstanding outlet for someone with Frances's energy level. When she was in NC for the school performance, when the one hour show was over, she asked the director, "Is that all? But I didn't even sweat!" And that's the motto of Frances.

Another picture-less post, I think.

Today was the big day, the Virgin Mary day. I had the Virgin's eye view of everything, including pounding feet dangerously close to me and my Jesus and whose underwear was peeking out of their leotards as they were rolling across the floor in costume. It was an amazing experience, though. The house was packed for the sold-out performance, and the show this year is phenomenal. I'm not saying this because my daughter believes herself to be the star of this show or because of my own divinity in it--it's a mind-blowing, expectation-exceeding celebration of the power of dance. I exaggerate very little when I say that when you see this show, you will laugh, you'll cry, you'll find yourself bopping in your seat and reassessing whether you're too old to take up salsa or ballet or jazz. You will sing Andrea Bocelli for weeks. The Company there makes dance look both breathtakingly athletic (a fact that I'll admit has often been lost on me in other dance performances I've seen...) and accessibly doable. This is just really accessible dance...it draws you in. I wish I could spread this gospel to everyone I know!

Melia, who was Jesus, is 6 months old, and Oh My Jesus, was it divine to hold a baby for almost two hours! She was perfect for the first act--googly and gurgly and captivated by the lights and activity in front of her, if a bit, um, sweetly popcorn smelling with her breastfed-baby poop in her diaper. She spent most of the time fooling around with a small spoon with a purple rubbery cover over the bowl and at our most visible moment, waving around a Tweety-Bird rattle, something I doubt the original Jesus did. But I think this is okay, since yesterday's Mary was chewing gum through the show. The job of the Virgin Mary in this show is to sit. People dance raucously in front of her (making it a very real question whether Mary is permitted to kind of rock out with them, since it's hard to not feel the beat, or whether Mary is supposed to behave as if in a stable in Bethlehem 2,008 years ago). She could make eye contact with the audience at times. She could peek toward the wings to see if the baby's father was still there. She could gaze in love for 2 hours at her baby, which is truthfully what I'd be doing if I just gave birth to this 6 month old in my arms.... I did a combination, sometimes bopping a bit to the music, sometimes watching the dancers and smiling, gently stroking the head of my baby, and trying to keep my "newborn" quiet and calm. Melia, for her part, let out some happy shrieks, cried a little and had to be replaced with a fake baby for 30 minutes before being returned to me as a "gift" from one of the members of the procession, and then was able to take her bow in the front of all of the other performers. I don't think she questioned too much where her attention should have been up there.

A Frances-ism:

* (we're driving in the car, just the two of us) "How do you think that God was created?" I try to craft some answer, taking into account that maybe she's not looking for deep theology or wanting something too complicated, about how He just kind of "Was", he wasn't created. And she interrupted saying, "You know what I think? I think it was probably like in Barbie Mariposa, when there's this sprinkling of all this glitter and swirling sparkles and then there was the fairy. I think that's the way God was created."

We ate the grossest gummi soda bottles today. Absolutely foul. Who comes up with this stuff?! On the plus side, I had a real moment of pride in Frances. I was at the self checkout and couldn't find the scan code for bulk candy on the computer there, so I asked Frances to run over to where the candy bins were and see if she could find a four-digit number on them and tell it to me. I expected nothing. Truly. And she did it! It bothers Walter and Ollie to no end that she still basically gets to unschool, but here's some proof that maturation happens all by itself.

Ollie and Walter both read their book club books for this month, Key to the Kingdom by Garth Nix. I don't like the name Garth Nix--it sounds like the name of an author that would just not appeal to me, and I know that probably the only thing worse than judging a book by its cover is judging a book by its author's name (whose last name is Nix, though?). But they both seemed to like the book. And I'm proud of them for reading it with some pressure in 2.5 days, when I know it wasn't a book that they were originally very excited about. Before that, Ollie had just finished _The Ghost's Grave_ by Peg Kehret and two days before that, _The Prince and the Pauper_, a book that he seems to have absolutely loved. Funny comment: "I think that Mark Twain is a really good author and everyone should read books by him." It must have been the way that he said it that struck me as funny, because it had a tone that suggested he didn't know that yes, this is a wildly popular writer and has been for a little while.... Tonight I started reading _Red Badge of Courage_ aloud. We had listened to it on CD a little while back, and they didn't want to finish it, even though it's pretty short. But they're getting into the Great Illustrated Classics version. It's a timely choice because they are going to Pamplin Historical Park at the end of the month for a program on the Civil War. I'm wondering how it's going to compare to Gary Paulsen's Civil War book for Ollie--also on the mixed feelings of a very young person who finds himself in a tough and frightening circumstance. Independently, Ollie is rereading the Book of Three. I'm not much of a re-reader myself, but both Ollie and Walter do quite a lot of it. Chalk it up as many different kinds of readers, I suppose. Walter's still on his Great Illustrated Classics binge--6 new ones for Christmas.

Final thoughts on New Years' Resolution: No need to achieve all of them (or start to do it) on January 1st. It's fine to start working on a resolution at any point, right?! So mine is to curb, if not end, what I refer to as "spillover." That unpleasant phenomenon that you are probably familiar with if you've read this blog over the past few months: where the vessel that is my brain and schedule-manager simply overfills and starts pouring stuff out of the top. I don't feel, like many do, that the hole is out the bottom. It honestly feels to me like responsibilities just can no longer fit and off they go. So anyway, I intend to wear a watch, to carry my calendar constantly, consolidate to simply one calendar and not a print one, one on the computer, and "I'll check in my email when I need a reminder", and never, never succumb to that uniquely non-employed occurrence of totally losing track of what day of the week it is. Commit to less. Prioritize more. Ask questions when I have them. Hide it better if I screw up. Carry more in my car at all times to hedge. And did I mention obsessing about my physical calendar more? Add this to my "No Fines in 2009" library resolution, and it just may be a Whole New Nancy!