Luciano Pavarotti he is not.

So far today, my boy has decided to answer everything I ask him, singing in opera. Math questions, spelling words and language skills, so far, all in opera.

At least this tells me he is in a good mood and I will allow him to continue this way even though it is wearing out my very last nerve.

And to my rescue is my yoga class this afternoon. Man, I am SO looking forward to the peace of mind it brings me.

I need a Secret Garden!

I'm feeling really frustrated on this Friday evening. The dogs have been a PITA since we returned from camping on Tuesday. Barking constantly outside and inside, which of course, is a total distraction when it comes to trying to teach Malachy something. I bring them in, they bark to the outside world. Outside, they bark at everything and anything and to come in.

Malachy has also been giving me a hard time this week. Two, large temper tantrums this morning over a simple spelling lesson, caused him to lose the privilege of attending Park Day with his new friends this afternoon. Later on after we were finished with school, he went out to play out back on his swing-set. Through the kitchen window, I saw him spraying the camper with the hose so I called him in. When I went out to check the camper, I found out that he pried open the door and pulled things out (we had just cleaned it thoroughly and winterized it). He sprayed said camper with the garden hose inside some vents, which I still don't know if and how much damage that caused as I'm still waiting for Steve to get home so we can decide if we need to pop up the entire thing. And then the dogs were also "mysteriously" soaking wet when I went out there. It's just been one of those craptastic days where you wished you never got up out of bed in the morning.

The boy has had his dinner and now is confined to his bedroom for the evening. I've had enough of dealing with him today.

This is where it gets really hard to deal with the whole homeschooling bit. I'm with him WAAAAY too much. I have realized that being home all the time, I've become much more inactive. I feel sluggish all the time now. I used to take the dogs for walks through the Coyote Hills. Forcing him to go with me would be worse than having dental surgery without Novocain. I have to depend on availability of the Gym's daycare and their quickly filled reservation limits and short hours to attend my classes. This week, the gym had an "emergency" and wasn't taking any reservations at all. I missed THREE of my classes this week and I'm feeling quite PO'd about it. Steve is gone most evenings until after 7:00, which really puts a damper on my workout plans. And lately I've been so exhausted by then that I just want to wind down and go to bed.

Taking Malachy on errands this week has been quite tiresome as well. He doesn't stop talking. The boy cannot stop asking questions that I can't possibly know the answer of. "What is the largest castle in the world?", "Not sure Malachy, we can google it later". "How many rooms does the Windsor Castle have". "Not sure, Malachy. We can google it later". "How many square feet do you think the Windsor Castle has?". "I'm not sure, Malachy. We can google it later." "How many people live in the Windsor Castle?"."What if someone built a long, long mansion covering the tops of the Fremont Hills? How many rooms would that have?". AaaaAAAaaaah!

Being banned to his room for the night, he's finally quiet, I can still hear Layla barking non-stop at the airplanes coming into Oakland Airport (sorry neighbors) and wanting to come in and I just need some ME time. No kids, no dogs...just want to be alone in my head for a time. Steve won't be home until 7:00 - 7:30 and at this point, I'm already too drained to go work out. What the hell was I thinking? Calgon couldn't even help, unless I wear earplugs and lock the door. (Hmmm...now there's an idea!)

Let's hope Steve remembers to bring home the wine.

Big Sur Academy?

Our first attempt at "off-campus" homeschooling wasn't what I had hoped it would be.

We decided to take a two night camping trip down the California coast to an area called Big Sur, leaving this past Sunday morning. To those of you not familiar with Big Sur, it is truly one of the most spectacular and famous, scenic areas along the entire California coastline. Scary too (especially for those of US who have a fear of heights), as some of the roads wind above the rocky cliffs that drop hundreds of feet straight down to the crashing seashore.

Our departure on Sunday had us driving in pouring rain, the first rain of the fall season. I drove the Jeep which pulls the camper because Steve sits in the back to "help out" our forever, car-sick dog, Chloe (he catches her multiple vomit sessions in a bag, he's gotten really good at the timing). Needless to say (but I will), my nerves were absolutely shot by the time we got there.

We arrived at the campsite by noon and had to set up the tent trailer in the pouring rain, but luckily we were somewhat sheltered under the majestic coastal redwood trees. After we popped it up, cleaned up the mud that soon covered the linoleum floor, we were able to appreciate where we found ourselves. Our site was by far, the best one in the campground, as our door opened up right to the shoreline of the crystal-clear, Big Sur River (large rocky stream). The aroma of the dense, wet forest was everything we were hoping for to calm our busy, city dwelling nervous systems. The rain completely stopped by 2:00 pm, the sun came out and we fired up the grill for lunch.

As we were researching campgrounds, among other great amenities, this campground/resort boasted wifi availability as most campgrounds now offer. I figured that we would do our lessons early in the morning and head out to explore the area in the afternoons. We had brought everything we needed for two days of homeschooling for the boy.

After lunch, Steve walked over to the campground office to get the wireless info. He returned with bad news. The campground itself did NOT have wifi, however the restaurant on the grounds did. Ger-rate! What kid is going to be focused in a restaurant atmosphere? In reality, probably zero to none. And I certainly didn't want to sit in a restaurant and go through his lessons.

Thankfully, I packed a few testing workbooks for literature which didn't need the computer. I brought his math books, so we were able to work off-line and review some of his recent math lessons. I tried to throw a little of science (he's learning "ecosystems" in science) into our river-side play. He read his book each night before bed.

All and all, the actual "homeschooling" was not a complete wash, but only a disappointment as we now need to catch up with some of his skipped lessons over the few days left of this week. All was not lost as I learned my own lesson in the future to ASK if wifi is available at the campsite itself.

The camper is now being packed away for the winter months. This will give up ample time to find THE perfect spot that will allow us to cover all we need to school-wise and still have the experience of being cuddled by the glorious arms of Mother Nature.

What? Aren't the banks and Post Office closed?

Well today had an interesting start. For weeks now, I've had on Malachy's calendar that today was a school holiday (Columbus Day). Steve's daughter spent the weekend with us and had no school today as well, although she lives in a different city. However, a neighbor whose children go to the local school here, told Steve that there was school in Fremont. I thought that was strange.

Upon awakening this morning, I decided to log into Malachy's online school just to double check. The school was logging attendance. I shot off a quick email to his teacher to see if today was a school day or a holiday. She informed me that it was indeed a school day. I looked back at the scheduled days off and noticed that it's 11/11 that he has off, not today which happens to be 10/11. Gerrrr-ate! Now to break the news to my boy who was still lounging around in bed, watching an iCarly repeat.

After a brief bout of verbal disappointment (fancy way of saying he threw a little tantrum), he had his breakfast and we settled in at his desk to begin the day. I figured I would keep it easy today since I am the one that initially screwed up.

We went through his French class, spelling class and math. We also did his language arts. Then we took a break, had some Halloween costume shopping to do (fun, fun!) and enjoyed a rare lunch out to celebrate his ten star days. We came home, put away the shopping bags and are finishing up on the last of his classes today.

In the end, not too bad of a day, both school and personal. Phew! That was a close call!

My gratitude to you.

Because of my last, desperate-sounding post, I received a tremendous amount of support and I am so grateful for the lift it gave me. I wrote the post Tuesday morning and by Wednesday, because of the kind words and helpful advice I received, I felt so much better. So thank you to all of you who continue to support me on this crazy journey of mine to help educate my precious boy.

Today, being Thursday, is usually our "cram-in" day. I like to push a little harder on Thursdays so we can ease up on things for our Friday Park Day. Yesterday and today have been moving so easily because Malachy has had such a great attitude. It's barely one o'clock and we're almost done for the day.

What I'm finding out, is that it's not going to be perfect every day or every week. I just need to hang in there, take a break if I need to, and know that it WILL get better. (BREATHE!) Yet during my good days, I have to know that there is a very good chance that it will not be the same tomorrow. And I suppose, all in all, it's the way life goes.

Namaste.

Where's the escape hatch?

Irritability is setting in.

Malachy's friend from his previous school, Montana, had a birthday party over the weekend. It was the first time I saw the moms of some of his little friends from that school in a very long time (months and months). It was such a nice visit and made me realize how much I miss seeing them and sharing laughter. In the past, Montana's mom Susan and I shared Room Mom duties in kindergarten and saw each other twice a day for three years. During the summer months, we'd all get together once a week for a park day. Susan moved away last December and we have only been together once since. Life gets in the way.

So here I am, feeling more than a bit isolated and my plate is so full of responsibilities that I can't just abandon. I'm so involved with teaching Malachy, but all my regular chores are starting to pile up. Literally. The dogs are annoying me with their constant barking at everything. The cat is incessantly meowing in the garage (time to go out!). Malachy's need to do cartwheels every five minutes right alongside me is driving me batty. He talks to me in his made up-language or is constantly giving me facts about rollercoasters. I just don't want to deal with any of this today but I know I have made the choice and can't back out of it. There are times I just want to run away (Bonnie fantasy) and be free of everything.

Today is one of those days where I'm wondering "WHAT WAS I THINKING?". I am losing my individuality a little more each day.

Winter is an etching, spring a watercolor, summer an oil painting and autumn a mosaic of them all. - Stanley Horowitz

Last week was one hot week for the San Francisco Bay area and beyond! All summer long, we experienced one of the coolest and breeziest summers on record which was a big disappointment for me as I love summer heat. And because of the unseasonably brisk weather, we decided to drain the pool a week ago. Go figure!

On Monday, the local temps hit over 90 degrees. Tuesday, it hit 101, Wednesday it was still 100. Thursday cooled down to about 95 and by Friday, it was down to 80 degrees. All over the Bay Area records were broken.

Like a lot of people living so close to the San Francisco Bay, we don't have air conditioning in our two story house. Downstairs, the thermostat read 85 degrees every day last week. Although we have ceiling fans and regular oscillating fans (ooOOOOoooh!), we baked. I would get up early and prepare the house to keep it as cool as possible through the day. My effort was not obvious, until you stepped outside and felt as if you walked straight into a burning oven. 85 degrees was definitely more tolerable than one might realize.

And as you might imagine, extreme heat is not conducive to learning. No amount of popsicles or iced lemonade drinks rescued us. I had a brilliant idea and decided to see if we could work in the Main library downtown. Upon driving there, we realized that everyone in the city must have been thinking the same thing, because there was not one parking space available in the entire lot! Bummer! So we stopped, got a smoothie and came back home. The dogs were happy to see us return because they too could then escape the torturous heat and come inside.

We worked through our most important subjects in the mornings, took long breaks during the hottest parts of the day and then as the evening began, we'd catch up with the rest. One of the very best assets of homeschooling is that we set our own schedules. Even still, this wasn't one of the easiest weeks to homeschool.

And as I remember the famous quote, "Patience is a Virtue", I am reminded again how important it is to have an abundance of patience during these stressful times. Gratefully, the notorious San Francisco fog once again graciously rolled in from the ocean, over the hills and through the sweltering cities persuading everyone that, no we weren't dreaming, Autumn really did arrive last week.