that time of year again!!

every year at this time i start to panic and totally freak out. ugh!! summer is my time off. i had high hopes as usual-of getting liam all caught up in math and spelling during the summer months-and the days slip by-and my good intentions float down the river. i want to kick and scream when school starts again while i watch other parents do a jig as they sent their kids off to school. i want to take a year off and say "lets unschool-and do nothing but what you want to do" -forget standards, forget testing, forget all the bullshit!!!! but i return every year with my tail between my legs and follow the rules. i hate rules. you see we belong to a homeschool charter. we homeschool-but since we are governed by the public school system we have guidelines to follow and monthly meetings with educational specialists to hand in samples of work- but jeez-can't we start until after labor day?????

but then i remember all the cool stuff our school does-all the field trips and neat classes they offer. such as the mural painting class last year. all the students in Lew Toll's art class participated in a group mural for the outside of our school building. they presented it on the last day-very awesome! here's a pic. when i remember these things i put on my big girl panties, pull myself together, get busy and realize i'm doing the right thing. we started this past monday.

yesterday i had the great idea of trying to school and dye at the same time. i had been soaking many skeins of drab grey yarn-yes, i too had a grey phase!!!! how much grey yarn does one need? i decided to over- dye them-i wanted a variegated purple heather -i mixed 4 different shades of purple-this was gonna be awesome. kill 2 birds with one stone. i don't know what i was thinking-i didn't cover the kitchen table, i didn't move the bills or liam. i thought i could just squeeze in there and do a quick job and stick them in the sun. well, to make a long dramatic story short-i had dye everywhere, it was running onto the floor, Blue was trying to lick it up, dye all over books, dye on the bills, i forgot my gloves again and i had total purple hands-i'm yelling at the kids for help-"get the puppy! he's drinking the dye! get me some towels! GET THE PUPPY, move the books!!! GET THE PUPPY!!" well, my grand idea turned into all my colors mixing into one-i got pissy and put the yarn in ziplocs and into a black trash bag-and threw it out the back door-and didn't look at it till this morning when i rinsed. well, i must say- it's quite pretty. sorry no pics yet. grey rocks when you get mad at it!

it's back to being broiling hot-little "blue" doesn't even want to got outside to pee-making house training an adventure. we don't have a.c.-so it's not like our house is cool-we broil inside too.look his ears are starting to stand up!!! a couple weeks ago we went to union flat campground liam became obsessed with building "ducks" on the north fork of the yuba river.Blue can sleep anywhere!! very tired river pup!i have all this sun and heat and no undyed roving-boo hoo! supposed to be even hotter tomorrow!