Decade & A Half

Fifteen years ago today, Chandler Brice Brewer took his first breath.  

I was there. 

He was tiny (I was not).

Debuting as a featherweight at 5 lbs 14ozs and 18 in long, his current 150lb, 5'9" frame is proof that apparently pizza and macaroni DO count as vegetables after all. 

We are blessed with our 'ChanMan' and enjoy getting to know the young man he is becoming. 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHANDLER!

Aletheia First Day Fall Term

Our Fall Term started last week.

We rearranged our classroom.

Started with coffee, of course... 

Rye insisted she wanted "real" coffee in her cup...

... I think she liked it. 

First Period: Individual Grade Photos

FISHER KAI

Fisher is in Jr. High now

6th-ish Grade

LOGAN ALEECE

 Logan is finishing Jr. High

8th-ish Grade

CHANDLER BRICE:

Chandler is a Freshman (& not very fond of having his photo taken) 

2nd Period: Group Photo

 AFTER SEVERAL ROUGH DRAFTS...

ALETHEIA FIRST DAY FALL TERM 2014-2015

 3rd Period: Group Work 

  A peek into one of our favorite classes: Rubber Pencil 101

(and a video about Earthquakes) 

Pre-3 runs simultaneously in the same room: 

Weather gal :

Fidgets have been added to each desk space~ a listening aid, believe it or not: 

A Book Butterfly:

Riley in her "Music Appreciation" tent..a.k.a. naptime:

She now says "I hate music appreciation!" 

There were many other things not pictured, like a lesson on Earthquakes,  LoF Decimals & Percents, LoF English, 100 Essays: Essay #1: The First Day of School, Lunch & Break Time, Books Aloud and more. 

We ended the day with cookies.

In an ideal world, maybe they would have been homemade cookies. That was the original plan, too, make a special treat to close out the day.

But, homeschooling (amongst other things) has taught me that we do not live in an ideal world and sometimes, one must wing it.

The Lady In My Tree

Our FaceBook friend Mitch often posts poetic pictures of  the "Old Lady" tree near his home. And, it is a beautiful, old lady tree.

See?

Mr. Mitch is an interesting fellow and I often want to do and be and think and see in step with him. 

So, imagine my delight when I discovered  that we have an Old Lady Tree too...

See? 

Okay, so she's a bit of a hag. 

I surely wouldn't eat any apples from this tree. Mainly because it isn't an apple tree, but also because 'she' looks like the witch from Snow White, whose specialty was the Drowsy Apple. 

See? 

I have friends standing by - ready to call the right folks and administer the right meds for me if the lady in my tree turns out to be from another Disney franchise: 

If I hear it speak, I am to repeat:"A tree may speak to me, but only metaphorically." 

(...and so help me, if you ever find me running around in a buckskin dress...talking to the trees... wrap me up in my loooong sleeve pajamas please...) 

YULEE

David Levy Yulee was the the first Jewish member of the United States Senate. He was a sharp business man, serving as president of several companies. While living in Fernandina with his family, David Yulee founded the Florida Railroad Company and became known as the Father of Florida Railroads.

 Yulee served as a member of the Confederate Congress where his passionate speeches in support of Confederate causes  gained him another nickname: "Florida Fire Eater" .  These passions also gained him a 9 month imprisonment @ Fort Pulaski. 

He was granted pardon and has since been named a "Great Floridian" 

THE NCHE NICHE

I recently joined a local band of rowdy homeschooling mommas. Okay, so we aren't really rowdy. We're all rather reserved actually... unless you hit our hot topic or favorite curriculum  buttons... then we may have opinions to share... or mildly suggest. But, rowdy or no, we are banded together birds o' feather

(who like to maintain our autonomous natures, thank you kindly.)

 The important thing is we are 'banded together' - something I had let go of for awhile

 (Sometimes my 'autonomous' overflows and I forget that I'm not an island adrift nor The Lone Ranger.)

It is nice to be back in community with like-minded yet completely unique folks again.

It has been a little while since we were last plugged in with a group. 

{Here's one time. This was another.} 

Between my overflowing autonomy and busy, bustling every day life, it just didn't seem like we had the time. But alas, as is usually the case-some of the best things are things we MAKE TIME  for. 

Like French Pressed coffee and homemade Croissants. 

Worth every second. 

This group is one of those things, and we are looking forward to making time for our new NCHE family . 

After the first few meet ups, I was so anxious to get to hobknobbing with our new found friends, I created a Facebook group so that we could congregate and well... hobknob. 

(Hobknobbing is a top secret homeschooling thing...for initiates only) 

I can show you the group, but I cannot let you in unless you are a NCHE initiate...because we're hobknobbing in there. And we like our privacy. 

(If you are a local homeschooling family in need of a group you can join HERE. Then come over to Facebook, perform the *secret door knock and we will teach you hobknobbing.)

Having the constant presence of the group via Facebook should also help me to interrupt much less at Mrs. Janie's house. But I best not make any big promises... I think of so many things that need to be shared when I get around real life people... and homeschooling folks at that! I'm just not sure I can keep it all to myself--even if I try. 

Aside from the happy proof of socialization that yammering on about our wonderful new group provides, I'm also making this entry to save a sample of the group's 'interim logo'. I couldn't find one on our website, so I created a quick one for the time being.

Because,  you know.... I tend  to logo the people I love ;) 

Well, I really should be going now. These lessons won't plan themselves... oh! and it looks like there's a new message in the Facebook group.

(Ha!- not really...but I'm sure the struggle to balance priorities is 'only a day away')

((HaHA! As if I have ANY idea how to balance priorities...I really like to sound as if I have it all together, don't I?))

Come on back another day, when we will talk about Mrs. Janie and The Matriarchs, a very important alpha-flock of homeschooling birds who teach us how to keep our wits & feathers as we tend our modest nests and  nudge our fledglings along.

*There is no secret knock, we just check the member roster

VIRGE FLVS Literary Magazine

Two of Logan's photographs were featured in the Spring 2014 Edition of the FLVS literary magazine VIRGE. They can be found on pages 62 and 65.

"UNBOUND" FLVS '12-'13 Yearbook

Chandler and Logan were featured in the 2012-2013 Florida Virtual School Yearbook with their answers to the theme question: "What does the phrase Cherish Today, Challenge Tomorrow mean to you?"



Chandler: "Take each day as it comes and be ready for the challenges of tomorrow." 



Logan: " I think the phrase Cherish Today, Challenge Tomorrow means that you should seek out what you want to do with your life and to challenge yourself to achieve the goals you have set." 



They can be found on page 5.

Merge

I recently finished merging all of the old blogs that I could find (and that I still remember the passwords for). This after a period of ducking into my shell... I can be very 'turtle-like', I know. Sometimes I'm okay with all the world seeing all the warts, other times I try to disappear for all I'm worth.

As I merged the blogs, I enjoyed reading the old entries. Many memories and  moments were brought back to mind- some of it good and some of it slightly embarrassing... I have been too many versions of me.



One Two Three...Count the Me's ... SeventySix...NinetyNine...One Thousand



I have a terrible memory. If there isn't a picture or journal entry about it, it never happened or at least, not that I can recall.



 Reading back over small, conversational details in some of the older entries had a shrinking effect. My eleven year old was suddenly four again, trying to fly like Peter Pan.  Years disappeared and in their place the taste of sweet sadness, for the kids they have been, for getting to be there with them but not getting to stay forever.



They won't, you know.



Stay forever.



Steadily they've been moving forward to Time's too fast two step- growing feathers, stretching wings... getting ready more each day to soar away.



As I have been digging through the bones of yesteryear (humming Randy Travis, no lie) through the many versions of me, I realize that I won't either.



Stay this "me" forever.



And I reckon that's a comforting thing, overall. 

As challenging as it can be to read back through my really bad writing and naïveté without hitting 'unpublish'- I believe it is a small attemp by me, to live authentically. 

I recently said to a friend- after a lengthy email- thanks for letting me 'write' and I know I didn't mean, I think I write cleverly but rather, I appreciate the space to 'think' through some things and try to assign them words. 

Most of my recent blogging has become a bit scrapbook-ish...a lot of show and tell. The older blogging was more 'writing', however badly - in that thinking space kind of way.