Mariposa Academy Homeschool

First, let me say that this blog might go through some changes really soon. I’m not so sure I like Textpattern after all. Or maybe it’s just that I’m not a programmer, and I really should be using a blog hosting service that does everything for me, instead of blog software that requires some knowledge of html and textile and css and Maude knows what else. In any case, it might change soon.

I am so exhausted. I woke up late, and the kids are still sleeping. We have been going to bed later and later lately. It has to stop. Tomorrow morning Zeke has speech therapy, which means we have to wake up super-early. Getting us all ready and out the door is going to be hell on wheels.

This exhaustion, though, is not much worse than my default state of being. I am usually tired. I plod along with barely enough energy to get through each day. Part of it, I’m sure, is the fact that our sleep situation has been less than ideal for the past few months. Both kids are sleeping in their own bed, but what usually happens is that I fall asleep in there with them when we are snuggling at bedtime. So there we are, three of us squished into a twin bed with wooden rails along its length. I often have an elbow in my face or a head on my arm, and I wake up with a stiff neck and knots in muscles I didn’t know I had.

Part of it is trying to get around Charlotte without driving, which means that on any given day I push a hard-to-maneuver double
stroller laden with 60 pounds o’ kid and all our bags for a mile or more.

But a lot of it, I know, is that I don’t exercise (the walking doesn’t count because I am not really getting my heart rate up. I am more just plodding along), I don’t drink enough water, and I don’t eat as well as I should.

I have been looking into different diets. Even though I wish I could just love my body the way it is, and I hate falling prey to the fat-phobia I’ve fought against for so long, I really do want to lose some weight. I feel very self-conscious of my big flabby belly that makes me look like I’m four months pregnant and makes it hard to find clothes that fit. I also want to be healthier and have more energy. And really, I am 36 years old and I need to take better care of myself. I never used to think about my mortality much. Cancer and other health crises happened to people much older than myself. Lately, though, I am seeing more and more people my age dealing with cancer, heart attacks, extremely high cholesterol, and other issues. I owe it to myself and my family to do what I can to avoid such problems.

A Mediterranean diet seems to be my best choice. It’s easy to adapt to vegetarianism, and it looks delicious, so I’m more likely to stick with it. It is a balanced, healthy diet, not a fad. And it involves drinking wine! What could be better?

Last night I bought lots of fresh veggies like broccoli, mushrooms, and tomatoes; some whole grain pasta; real sheep’s milk feta; goat cheese; Kashi pilaf; lowfat Greek yogurt; olives; and nuts. It all looks so good!! When was the last time you opened your fridge and stood there drooling over your diet food?

I’m also going to look into ways to work exercise into my life. It occurs to me that we are right near the YMCA twice a week when we go to Zeke’s speech therapy. Sometimes we even use the Y playground. I’m going to see what kind of childcare they have and how much membership costs. Maybe I can go work out twice a week after speech therapy.

See these sweaters?

I made them. Llani’s is the second sweater I’ve knitted, and Zekey’s is the third. I really like the way Zekey’s came out. Llani’s sweater isn’t bad for my second sweater ever, but I can definitely see the mess-ups. But with Zekey’s I did better, and I even managed to turn a mistake on the neckline into a cute little sailorish collar, which I just love.

I used the Incredible, Custom-Fit Raglan pattern for both of them.

Right now I am working on this capelet/shrug for myself.

I am enjoying a rare moment of peace upon waking up. The kids have been going to bed later and later, and waking up later and later, which generally sucks. But the one good thing is that this morning I am up before Zekey and can drink my coffee without listening to whining and without jumping up and down like a whack-a-mole fulfilling his requests.

Tomorrow we have to get up super-early because Zeke has speech therapy. He had two sessions, which went very well, and then the public schools closed for spring break so we missed three sessions.

His therapist seems very experienced, and she was able to create a rapport with him right away. With my shy little boy, that’s positively astounding. He enjoys therapy and works hard on his articulation during the sessions. I just wish I could get him to work on it at home, too.

Zeke has been super-interested in his letters, and points out letters on signs wherever we are. Whenever he draws, he writes some letters. If he has a piece of string, he will form it into a letter. Even if he is eating spaghetti, he’ll form a piece of spaghetti into a letter. He loves tracing, too, so I’ve been printing out handwriting worksheets for him.

And you know what else my big boy is doing? He’s learning to use the potty! He hates being wet and has started holding it in rather than pee in his pull-up, so we are working on him realizing he has to go before he actually pees, and getting to the potty on time. He spends about half his time in underwear and half in pull-ups. He is actually sleeping in underwear, because he almost never wets at night– I just have to convince him to use the potty as soon as he wakes up. He is so proud of himself.

Llani has been obsessed with Charlotte’s Web and The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. Actually, both kids are, but Llani especially. She watches the movies all the time, she listens to the books, and whenever we’re in the bookstore she finds the picture book adaptations of CW and reads those.

The new CW movie, by the way, is awful. The book has so much humor, and the movie takes all that brilliance out and replaces it with the animals trading insults and an invented subplot involving the slapstick antics of two crows. It really talks down to the audience. It’s as though the producers didn’t trust kids to get the humor of the book. Also, there is narration interspersed throughout the movie, but it’s not the text of the book. It’s written specifically for the movie. It is pointless and annoying.

I much prefer the cartoon version we picked up at the drugstore for six bucks.