7 Quick Takes Friday

...and I do mean quick!  I have 15 minutes before I need to be available for bedtimes.  Plus, there is thunder. Who knows if I will have internet in 15 minutes. :)

~1~
Rose, Skye, and Batty just finished two weeks of art camp at the local public school.  I felt silly driving them down the block, but it was SO HOT and besides, I had to check them out at the end of the day (the school has had safety problems).  They all had a good time.  Skye made a friend who will be in her class in August (more on that in a minute). THIS IS HUGE.  Sorry for shouting, but it is, for so many reasons.  I am so, so thankful.

~2~
Some of you know, we have decided to put Skye, Jane, Batty, and Jeffrey into our church's school this coming August.  You know that saying, it takes a village? Well, I tried very hard to find my village in the homeschooling community and failed miserably.  I just *could not* do all this alone anymore. And by "all this" I mean much more than schooling.  So an arm and a leg and my firstborn later, and we have our village (you did wonder why we weren't sending Rose to school, right? LOL).   I am both excited and terrified.

~3~
Speaking of #2, I keep thinking I'm no longer going to be a homeschooler, but that isn't true. I will still have a high schooler home, one with learning needs, at that.  I will probably be doing more teaching/helping than many homeschoolers who have one, average, child.  But the reduction in homeschooling workload is so much that I feel like what is left is almost non-existent. Kind of like in baseball when the batters swing around four bats before stepping up to the plate, in order to feel like their one bat is weightless.  I feel like I just put down four bats, LOL.

~4~
Or I *will*, when we get through these summer work packets. Oh my word.  Apparently our school is ahead of the math program we have been using. We have some work to do. Plus two book reports for each kid over 4th grade.  Unfortunately we signed up late so have many weeks less than the other children to accomplish the same work.   At least it prepares them a little for the increased workload I expect from this school.

~5~
My oldest two have discovered Pinterest. I think my 7th grader has pinned 2,000 pins in the last week! :)  She has many board going for inspiration for her stories.  I love this peak into their psyches, seeing what they pin. I feel like I know them better now.   I know people bemoan technology as being "anti-personal-interaction" but I find that as an introvert, I get to interact much MORE with people this way and learn thing about them that I wouldn't just listening to their small talk at a function. It works for me.

~6~
I draw the line at phones for my 8 year old. She is very aware of what other people are doing, and she came home from art camp asking for a phone because "all the other kids in her group" had one.  Maybe they did, but....no.  You'll live, kid.

~7~
Dh and I are enjoying the series Once Upon a Time, even though every five minutes there is something that reminds me of my adoption baggage.  We are soon going to run out of episodes!  I don't know what to watch next.  We seem to pick a series, watch one every night until we exhaust the seasons, and then pick another show!  Our favorites have been LOST, Lie to Me, Once Upon a Time, Friday Night Lights, of course Downton Abbey....hmmm, I think I'm forgetting some.  I liked Merlin, I don't think dh really did, so we stopped after one season.

Time for the kids to get to bed and for me to watch Once Upon a Time!  For more 7QT, visit Jen at Conversion Diary!

(ETA:  Hey, I got that "like" thing to work at the bottom of the posts. I was fooling around with that months ago and it never showed up. Now it shows up and I don't have time to take it off or change it...I want to at least "make it work for me" instead of just being a "like" button.  Ignore it if you want, use it if you dare, LOL!  I love Sarah's use of it as a "nodding quietly" button.  Peaceful and loving.)