My Summer Begins

Well, looks like we're going to be really busy at the end of next February, so I'll need to get a lot of homeschooling done over the summer. Unfortunately in Missouri, the school year officially BEGINS July 1 and ends June 30, whether you homeschool or not. You have to get 1000 hours in between July 1 and June 30. The older kids in public school were out in the middle of May. They start again in August.

So over the summer, I'm going to be homeschooling the Elf (almost 7!!) especially, but also the other children. We took about a week off and it was very hard. Elf does NOT know what to do with himself without a routine. He got very crabby etc. by the end of the week. That's autism for ya. But good that he has decided that his "routine" includes school. Imagine how difficult life would be if it did not...

I haven't figured out what to do with G (12) yet. He is behind in about everything but also has a lot of problems that I'm not sure how to address. It might be a bit insulting to him to be reading from the same readers and doing the same exercises as the Elf, but I noticed that last year in public school he was learning some of the SAME spelling words that Elf is learning. (G is in special ed., Elf is not.) He likes books on planes and vehicles, so we might be taking trips to the library.

The Emperor (5) is starting to write things phonetically with plenty of capital letters. But you can kind of understand what he is telling you through his writing. He likes math very much, but it is impossible to do well with that subject if his number writing is so illegible. We are working on a lot of tracing and cutting work which is not strictly academic, but that I'm hoping will translate into better writing and understandability. He is starting to do double-digit addition without the carrying, but it's hard to line those numbers up without good fine motor control.

Patrick (13) is discovering that Mom is mean and really wants him to actually study in "summer school" here. He hasn't complained too badly about it. He had the choice of public school summer school, or mom teaching him at home. He is really learning though, through a Bob Jones Spanish textbook I bought new (it moves FAST! We are stuck pretty much in the first chapter) and some fourth and fifth-grade LIFEPACS I got used from a friend. Patrick is not at a fourth or fifth grade level, but these LIFEPACS teach the same subject from a Christian perspective, or in the case of English, entirely different literature. I'm thinking he can get through a whole fourth grade year over the summer and the half year I have in fifth-grade English.

As an aside, actually I don't have as much problem with the English literature in public schools for Patrick now that he is in the smartie class. They read the "classics" which contain some objectionable material (think Gulliver's Travels), but I know what is in the stuff he is reading and it has some literary value and may translate well into his college years. The junk he was reading before about Joanie getting bullied in the inner-city and let's talk about feelings did *not* in my opinion. Then again it's been a while since I've been to college LOL!

I'm also looking online in hopes of getting more FRUGAL with my food budget. I can't cut out the zillion-dollar prescription bill each week, or the gas D uses to commute, but I can turn the lights out in the rooms we're not using and force everyone to eat noodles instead of expensive frozen microwave stuff most nights. I have *no* clue how to start, but I'm beginning to look at the general prices of items. That means fewer steaks and meats, and more pastas. I don't know how to use frozen vegetables but I think that might be a better option actually once you figure in time chopping and rinsing when you buy fresh.

I will also really need to hit the garage sales this summer sometime to look for a few key items. If I can find another playpen for a good price used, that's way better than the $100 plus I would spend new.