June 12, 2009
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On Tenterhooks
I’m sure you’ve all been on pins and needles waiting to hear the final part of yesterday’s post. (Wait. She posted yesterday? What was it? Something exciting? Ummm….) Yes, I was going to tell you all the mundane EXCITING things which will be happening over the next few days.
Excitement #1–A Thursday night with nothing to do! Yes, this was technically last night (although with the miracle of future posting, it’s really tonight). TGD and I had a movie lined up and a whole lotta nothing. And chicken that’s been marinating for two days and a grill. Mmmmm.
Excitement #2–I get to go to a wedding on Friday. One of my former AP students (and now friend) is getting married. I’m road tripping with AbbyB. TGD will hold down the fort at home. I hope I don’t forget to take along the wedding present, $ and a copy of Created to Be His Helpmeet by Debi Pearl, which ought to be required reading for wives.
Excitement #3–Little Miss heads to Camp Kanesatake on Sunday. The theme is Days of Knights, and this week is designed especially for homeschoolers (as regular school doesn’t let out until Wednesday) and counts as a week’s worth of unit study. 5 down, 175 to go…
Excitement #4–TGD heads to VA for his last week of taping Algebra I lectures for The Teaching Company. All went really well last week, and he and they are hoping for equal success this week. I got a vicarious thrill when he timed his 30 minute lectures down to the second. Plus, another guy who was also there taping borrowed one of TGD’s ties. Handsome and talented, my man!
Excitement #5–Gockle, Wit, and I will go to VA on Monday to pick up Robin, a friend of the boys, who will be spending two weeks with us. He’s the son of our Cambridge pastor. (Yes, he’s flying from England, just him.) We’ll prop Robin’s jet-lagged body up and drag him around DC for a few days before heading home.
Excitement #6–There are only two more excitements to list! Huzzah!
Excitement #7–The kids are having a big party on the Friday after school to muck about and burn homework. We shamelessly stole the idea from our neighbors. Plus, my mom gave me some fireworks which we plan to set off. Fire. Fireworks. Frisbee. Food. It’s enough to warm a teenage boy’s heart.
Excitement the final–Camping! Hooray! Camping at Prince Galliztin with a whole bunch of families is to happen soon. I’ve been looking forward to it for months. But, it just now occurred to me that I should have been praying for good weather. With the monsoon season we’ve had of late, it’s a valid request. I’ll get to debut my new Lands’ End swimsuit–very Mom-ish.
What excitements have you blathering on?P.S.–Proud Parent says, “My boys’ Ultimate Frisbee team won the championship at State High this week. Go, DiscConnected!”
Comments (16)
Sounds pretty exciting if you ask me. I am really looking forward to our camping time as well! And what was that about Land’s End?!?!
Now if the Pens can pull off Game 7 of tonight’s Stanley Cup Finals, I will be truly pumped!
Hello Mrs. Mary,
You made your site simple yet elegant. The pictures are a nice touch. I see that you have a wide variety of interests and observations here!
I like to write articles about Jehovah God on my site to help people to really get to know Him and His plans for us, especially in these troubled times. 13 Therefore thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Behold, my servants shall eat, but ye shall be hungry; behold, my servants shall drink, but ye shall be thirsty; behold, my servants shall rejoice, but ye shall be put to shame; 14 behold, my servants shall sing for joy of heart, but ye shall cry for sorrow of heart, and shall wail for vexation of spirit. (Isaiah 65:13-14) (ASV)
You mean other people in this world besides me forget to take wedding presents? That is so encouraging! I even once forgot to buy one until we were walking into the reception! Thank goodness for online shopping and direct shipping, because the couple lived clear across the country.
Burning homework–that’s a good idea! My kids have occasionally made little burnt offerings of a completed workbook in the fireplace, but an end-of-the-year campfire is kind of a cool idea. I have a feeling my kids would find that motivating.
Hey! Been a long time. Who’s getting married? Anyone I know?
@englishwestern -
It HAS been a long time! How are you? I’d love to hear all about what’s going on in your world. Seriously. Do tell, please.
Do you remember Julia Streit, that tall, pretty blonde from AP the year before (or maybe 2 before) you? She came to some parties. Granted, you didn’t come to that many parties, though. She was the one who got married. It was a wonderful ceremony and all. I was so glad I got to go. Daniel Peck and Carrie Kroeker get married on July 25th. Rachel is the flower girl, and I’m guest book. I’m so excited for them!
This is a lot of excitement for one post. I think it’s wonderful that you will be in DC with the boys’ friend when I enter this comment. We used to have fires as social events around here a lot more when we had four teens at home. One girl came and burned memoriabilia of a boyfriend. Never heard of the homework burning but I can relate.
We LOVED Teaching Company videos when we were homeschooling. We used the Algebra series and quite a few others. I feel excited just knowing the wife of one of the teachers
I feel a wee bit intrigued about your company from England. It reminds me of a book I read about a girl who travels from England to the US during WWII and stays with an American family.
How exciting! I was particularly fond of #5, but I also wanted to mention that when you said “Fire. Fireworks. Frisbee. Food.” You forgot to mention “Friday.” I’m sure that’s part of a boy’s dream too. Have fun with camp, camping, homework burning (nice stealing of ideas), touring, and everything else on the list. Oh… and the Ultimate Frisbee team name is great… whoever came up with it should know that. Exciting things… I got to dress up as a dragonfly AND I finished reading Good Omens (Terry Pratchett/Niel Gaiman) for the second time!
Ooh, the Days of Knights theme sounds wonderful. My husband met a man in armor when he was a kid and the “knight” told Steve that he went to night school…steve thought he meant KNIGHT school and it became his goal. Another thought sparked by this theme: I did a Lo-o-o-ng unit on the Arthurian Legend when I taught 12th Grade British Lit. A sub unit was the code of chivalry…all based on Christian values. It was a valid way to bring Christian values into the public school because it was totally literature-based.
That sounds like a very special wedding you’re attending.
Enjoy the DC touring! Be sure to hit the Folger and look at armor! If you go to Shirlington to eat, I highly recommend Aladdin’s. It’s very affordable and very healthy Lebanese food…with normal enough stuff to appeal to the non-adventurous eaters.
As for me, I guess the biggest excitements are my upcoming writers conference to help find a literary agent, and our 4th of July plans to go visit my brother and his wife and 2 little boys. We just saw them over the weekend for the first time in nearly a year…they came to see us…and I was blathering with excitement about that for ages. Talk about delightful kids and wonderful adult friendships. My parents love that their children are friends.
Burning homework? Sounds like fun! lol
Our excitement? We’re in the process of buying a used travel trailer– it sleeps 10! I’m extremely tired of tearing down & setting up the pop-up after all these years….. And of course, SCHOOL IS DONE!
Wow, you’re pretty busy. Isn’t summer wonderful?
I’d heard about Daniel and Carrie. Don’t think I ever met Julia. I’ll shoot you an email this weekend – at the moment, I have to go wash my dishesh
@englishwestern -
I shall look forward to it.
Thanks for the comment, I came here to see if you had posted a new entry. I didn’t say so before but I do like the idea of burning homework. I hope you kept a sample. Do you keep samples of all their work/papers? Quintus just cleaned out his room and his chem lab book went into the trash where I pulled it out. (It has a lot of unused graph paper, the written pages are way beyond me at this point) Quintus was also in an Ultimate Frisbee team that won at college. He thinks it should be an Olympic sport. I am so frisbee challenged I’m just glad I can get them to fly in the general direction of the catcher and far enough they don’t land before they get there. It is amazing what they can do.
@mamaglop -
Oh, boy, YES! I have to keep samples. I have to put an entire portfolio of work together for each child, a log of days, etc. Then, this is reviewed by a certified teacher and then has to be turned into the school district.
Did you get my message? I sent it through xanga rather than an email.