2022

2021 was not the greatest year, but luckily 2022 was much better. It feels like we didn't do anything this year but that may be the after effects of having such a wild 2021. In fact, a lot happened. We took everything at a pace that felt right.

We went to Mississippi and Texas for about a month in the winter. We went to our first Mardi Gras parade (actually a week before Mardi Gras and it was a more family friendly, though still pretty wild, parade in Bay St. Louis and Waveland, MS). We learned to fly a trick kite on the beach in Galveston and went on a swamp boat tour in Louisiana. We saw the massive Saturn V rocket that was never launched at a cool science center just off the I-10. We did a mini adventure into New Orleans to walk around some public gardens and go to Cafe du Monde for beignets. The highlight for me was seeing the mounds at Poverty Point in Louisiana. 

We taught classes at our homeschool co-op....poetry, a comic fan club, and circuits. The kids took lots of classes and made tons of friends. Laurel has been learning all sorts of fiber arts and how to cook things on the campfire. She did a yoga class and even led a demonstration at the end of the semester. Marko enjoyed his first acting and improv class and has asked for more of those. Max loved every class he took, but especially music theory and graphic novels. 

M ran a trail ultra. He ended up going to the race solo...it was important for him to get back out there, but hard for the rest of us to imagine being there while he ran. He had a decent race and felt pretty good, but it ended up being his only ultra this year. He did do a lot of running with his friends early in the morning, and started going out with the running club that meets down the street, and even ran with me and the kids! He headed up an aid station at Rachel Carson and the kids loved helping him out with that. We even took one of our out-of-town visitors up to help at the aid station for a while! I think we'll get out to more races in different ways in the next few years, because it's something I really miss.

Probably the best thing we did this year was bike the C&O Towpath and Great Allegheny Passage from Washington DC to Pittsburgh. Looking back, I bought the train tickets in mid-July for a September 1 departure. Very daring. Our first rides with the kids were only 2 or 3 miles! They constantly swerved into each other and complained about needing snacks. We just kept taking them on longer and longer day rides and got some 20+ mile days in before leaving. I think we were successful in completing the ride because we gave ourselves a very generous itinerary of 10 days to do 350ish miles, which gave us plenty of time to take breaks and ride slow. The rain was epic and the conditions on the towpath were pretty gnarly. There were two challenging detours. It could have been terrible, but it actually felt fun almost the entire time. They now have excellent trail manners and an amazing boost of confidence in their abilities to try new things. I think we'll be doing more self-propelled adventuring in 2023.

Homeschooling is going really well. This is our fourth school year doing it and I think we finally figured out our style. Lots of self-directed learning with a healthy dose of road-schooling and family adventuring, and a sprinkling of Core Knowledge and Brave Writer activities each month. I keep a master list of goals for each of us that are based on what the kids want to learn, the state standards, classes or trips or volunteer opportunities that are on our calendar already and any other things I think are really important to focus on. (And by "master list" I mean I have a piece of 8x10 notebook paper for each person with ideas scribbled on it. Not very flashy, but it works.) Each month I meet with the kids 1:1 to decide what they want to work on and what resources they need. Around the 25th of each month, we meet again to see what they accomplished vs what they need to finish up or push to the next month and we also make decisions at that time about what to revise or even abandon. All fall, we ended up deciding to just carry on with our study of colonial America, which was fine with me and led to a much richer and more nuanced understanding. Anything they want to save gets filed in the portfolio folder or we take a picture of it, and we shred everything else and put it in the compost. This is my favorite part...I love decluttering. It helps my brain think more clearly. I work with each kid individually on "school days" but a lot of their learning is very independent, spontaneous and with each other or with friends. For instance I just went downstairs and the boys have wired up the Makey Makey to some grapefruits and are using them to control a video game. Laurel was working on a painting to fulfill her Girl Scout Tree badge. We watch a lot of documentaries and visit museums as a group and Marko and Max tend to play a lot of games together. Each week they take turns going up to help my mom babysit their cousin, and we also go regularly to take M's mom on an outing to the library. 

Life is good and we are looking forward to carrying on in 2023. 

Holiday Time

Today we had the "Share Fair" for our homeschool co-op. This semester, M and I taught 3 classes...one on circuits, one on poetry and one on comics (inspired by Cat Kid Comic Club). When we put out the work to display today, I realized how proud I was of what they had all learned...everyone a little different and a different amount. Most of the kids came by with a family member or friends to show off their work. Lots of additional kids were interested in our circuits, which all had variable noises and lights. We boxed up the class materials into kits they could take home. 

The last few months have been a little bit of a struggle for me. I feel like the kids are on very different levels in all subjects. There's only three of them, but I feel like I have a lot of strands going on in my head at all times! I decided not to teach any classes in the spring term and volunteer in another way with the co-op because the kids still want to go. I also think I need to introduce a little more structure for each of my kids at home. The year started off a little crazy because M's dad was sick almost the whole month of August and then we went on a 2 week bicycle ride right after that. It was much less crazy than the previous year, so I didn't really think much about it at the time, but we ended up having to be really flexible for a while with a lot of "school on the go." 

We've been doing a deep dive into American history for a while and I'm ready to move on to some science. I have a feeling that most of our  I'm trying to rekindle my crochet skills and work on a coursera on UX design. We have a few field trips planned including a return to Galveston Island. I also want to set up better project space around the house to encourage the kids to work on stuff, and finally call the piano tuner. 

The holidays are upon us, and I'm feeling pretty chill about it. We have a good amount of social outings to see our friends and family, but also plenty of time to be together at home.