7 QTs

1.  Having homeschooled my kids for over 12 years, I've studied my share of science.  Over and over again!  Well this year with Jake in school and the 5th grade science fair looming on the horizon right after Christmas break, I finally have to admit to people outside of my own home, that while I think I'm pretty smart, I cannot for the life of me figure out which is the dependent variable and which is the independent variable in a science experiment.  I just don't get it.  I can even use my last year's knowledge of chemistry to have some vague idea about things we didn't include in Jake's balloon, baking soda, vinegar experiment, like how many moles of each substance we used, and that we could have experimented farther to see which substance, the baking soda or the vinegar, was the limiting reactant in the experiment (I had to ask Jonathan was about the term 'limiting reactant', but I knew the idea of it), but to figure out if the air in the balloon or the vinegar or the baking soda is dependent or independent, is beyond the scope of my knowledge.

2. On the subject of homeschooling vs being a public school mom, I can comfortably say that I am a really good homeschooling mom, but I'm still learning the ropes when it comes to being a school mom.  It took me a couple days at the beginning of the year to follow the drop/off pick up procedure rules, specifically not getting out of line and passing the other cars.  This week I had one job (well for the whole year so far, I've only had this one job), it involved providing yoohoo for Jake's class's craft day on Wednesday.  #1 I've never purchased yoohoo (this is no way implies that we don't consume large quantities of junk, just not yoohoo).  In the second place, I actually thought I was supposed to bring it for today (Friday) for the other "fun day" this week.  Thirdly, I was also supposed to get the next door neighbor to also provide yoohoo for the same day.  I mentioned it to her once weeks ago and never got further than that.  On the way home from Disney (see great homeschooling mom, Jake skipped school that day) on Tuesday after receiving the reminder text that the yoohoo was due the next morning, I stopped at a super Target in a big fancy plaza... no yoohoo, I even asked.  I immediately texted the mom in charge of this, she's a good school mom.  She was on her way to Publix and offered to pick up all the yoohoo (the 20 I was supposed to provide and the 20 I was supposed to get the neighbor to provide) (his class isn't that big, I guess it was for the whole fifth grade) (oh and good news, someone else brought water bottles so my own kid, actually got a drink too) (again, Jake is the king of junk food and has spent a small fortune in the cafeteria on chocolate milk this year, but he is as much afraid of yoohoo as I am) (in spite of the fact that the bubble boy's father drives a yoohoo truck) (Seinfeld reference).  Needless to say, I failed in my one job as a school mom.  I did immediately send Jake and Jonathan to the good school mom's house with the $$$ to pay for the yoohoo though (she had already left it on our doorstep, even before we got home).

3. Jake and Madi had a Christmas tour performance at a camp for terminally ill children a couple weeks ago.  One of the theatre moms made a comment that we don't appreciate how lucky we are that our kids are healthy.  I've been thinking about that a lot lately (well more or less for the last 18 years).  I really really do appreciate that my kids and my husband are healthy!  Most of them have almost died at one time or another, or in Jonathan's case three different times.  Generally my kids are healthy (Jake the junk food king has never been on antibiotics in his life, not just because we've refused them, but he's actually never had anything that needed them), but starting out parenting with a kid in ICU with undetectable bloodsugar, a stroke at 3 days old, and possible brain damage, affects the way you look at your kids forever.  I appreciate health every second!

4.  I think I might update the 'about me' section of my blog.  I'm slowly preparing for an influx of readers, who knows maybe in the coming year I'll have a post that garners five comments!!

5.  I just googled the word garner to make sure I used it right!

6.  Speaking of words, I think I just realized that antidote and anecdote are two different words.

antidote...

1

:  a remedy to counteract the effects of poison

2

:  something that relieves, prevents, or counteracts antidote

to boredom>
anecdote...

a short and amusing or interesting story about a real incident or person.

"told anecdotes about his job"

 

 

7.  How about some pictures?  Christmas tour performances, and St Patrick's St Nicholas breakfast (where we provided Christmas presents for 150 kids,  filled over 200 bags to hand out to homeless people, and made Christmas cards for people in nursing homes).

For more quick takes, visit Jen.