Running and I Have Had a Falling Out

I've long loved to run. I've been very back and forth about it, but the last two years have been good. I've been dedicated, and have kept up running three or four times a week (minus some vacation time and an injury to my heel that slowed me down for a bit). We even picked up a basically free treadmill they were getting rid of here that has made it far easier for me to keep up since I prefer to run during mid-day when I've got kids to keep an eye on. I've lost most of the weight I need to lose (grr at that stubborn belly fat leftover from two pregnancies...), and I'm proud of myself for really sticking with it.

For the last few months, however, I've found myself slogging through every run. I'm watching the miles, slacking off on the speed, anything to get through it. Sometimes I'm only running twice a week because I am that disinterested. Sadly, it seems running just doesn't do it for me.

Maybe it's because I have never done a race. Doing one requires flying to the States, so that's a hassle, plus I have never been confident enough to do one myself. I don't know anyone else here that runs, so there's no partner to keep me going, either. Maybe that's it. Or maybe I've gotten everything out of it that I can right now. I dunno.


The biggest problem with this is I cannot fathom just quitting exercise of any form. I have to find something to take its place, something that I look forward to the way I used to look forward to my run. I am determined that that baby belly is not going to take up permanent residence in my gut. Plus, I'm just happier in general when I exercise regularly.


So, I finally broke down and bought the Zumba Wii 2 game I've been staring at since November. I have had a love for dance pretty much all my life, but have never really done anything with it, much to my sadness. Last summer, while visiting Oliver's family, my sisters-in-law invited me to attend a Zumba class with them. I'd never heard of it before, but figured why not. It was so much fun.

Unfortunately, aside from a brief period when someone with the DVDs "taught" a class here on base, there are no Zumba classes to go to. I always intended to start going when we moved back to the States, but with my running slump, I need something now.

I'm now in my first week of using the game, and I've found it to be a decent substitute. It's not in any way as fun or good as going to a live class, but it's definitely better than watching a DVD (at least for me). As a game, it's actually terrible, because the Wii is not sensitive enough to really know what you are doing. I'm screwing up half the steps, yet getting five stars for my technique just because I happened to shake at the right time (you wear a belt that holds the remote against your hip). I don't care about that, however, since I'm just doing it for the exercise.

I am definitely looking forward to getting the chance to attend a live class again, but hopefully this keeps me moving and shaking enough to not lose ground on my improved body shape.

Changes Are A-comin'....Sometime in the Future!

Just maybe we've got some orders picked out. Oliver is hopeful we will see them in the next couple weeks giving him just enough time to reenlist with a bonus. The biggest complication is whether or not he'll be able to leave here early or not. Time will tell.

The big news for us, though, is that these orders will result in two moves by this time next year. Despite the craziness of that, and my worry that it will be difficult to find a place to live in for the six months or less we will be in the one duty station, I'm excited about this. It gives an opportunity to live somewhere I've always wanted to live, while still being on sea duty (with its extra pay), yet not deploying because they will be in the shipyard for a long overhaul of some sort.

Part of me thinks I'm crazy for saying yes to another shipyard period - by the end of the one we did in Washington, I was so disappointed that the first patrol ended up being only six weeks long! And, no, this had nothing to do with whether or not I wanted Oliver gone. Life really was that bad.

This, though, is not going to be quite the same situation. We'll be in a much better area, with more to do, and a profound improvement in the weather. We'll be making a better decision about whether or not to buy a second car (still don't want to do that, but we might have to so I don't go insane - if there's  a good bus system, though, we'll totally give that route a try), and I'm not going to be pregnant or whacked out by an IUD. Plus, I'll be homeschooling, which will actually enable to me to get out more than if I were just shuttling them around to public school. I'm absurdly excited about that, and have already begun working on putting together a curriculum for them.

So, we're taking a leap of faith here, but I'm hopeful it will work out well. I'm definitely ready to move away from our island home. It's been a very enlightening, interesting couple of years, and I'm really glad we had the option to come, but all the hard things are kind of in my face lately. Sometimes, it's time to move on.

Back From Legoland and Other Stuff

We've been back from our trip for a few days now. Wyatt is at school and Oliver back at work. Oscar and I are beginning some more serious reading lessons, and I'm happy to see he seems to be absorbing them.  I do, however, have to deal with some complaining about how "boring" it all is before he will sit down. I'm using computer time as a reward (as in, he gets none until he has his lesson), and when we are doing it, he will ask to do more than I had planned on, so clearly he's enjoying them despite the drama.

Up until now, I've been teaching him rather informally, but we were reaching an impasse with that. So, I picked up the book, "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons". I looked at a lot of reading programs, but finally went with this one because of the good things I read in homeschooling forums plus the cheapness of it compared to the pricey, packaged curriculums that I also looked at. I figured if we didn't like it, I wasn't out of too much money.

We do like it so far, however. I'm going to be skipping through the first set of lessons much faster than one a day because he doesn't need the drilling in letter sounds that a true beginner would, but it does seem to be teaching him how to parse words and begin to sound them out. He was doing some of that spontaneously yesterday afternoon, which was very encouraging to me.

As for Legoland, well, it was in Wyatt's words, "better than Disney World". And for them, I'd tend to agree. The entire park was designed with the 12 and under set in mind. The roller coasters are some of the slowest I've seen, and there were very few rides that Oscar couldn't go on. I was disappointed that the Hero Factory section wasn't built yet, despite being on the map. Our kids are big Hero Factory fans, so that was a real bummer to find that out when we tried to find it.

However, there was plenty of other stuff to keep us busy the two days we were there. Here are a couple highlights:

 At the font gate. It was cold that morning! We had to stop and pick up some warmer stuff to wear on the way. Oscar was completely upset that we were making him wear a coat for the first time in two years. We ended up paying a little more for Lightning McQueen one just so he'd stop freaking out and wear it. Luckily, the second day was warm enough to shed some layers.

 

There Duplo stations where at almost all the rides. Oscar wanted to stop and build at every single one.  We let him do so a few times, but they were all the same and there was a lot of other things to see, so we had to keep him moving sometimes.

 This was by far the fan favorite of the trip. There was an area where you could check out four tires, then go to some bins of LEGO and build your own racer. They had two different types of tracks to race them on. One that had let four or five people line up their cars, press a button for a countdown, then watch them race after the barrier dropped. There was also an extreme, near vertical track that allowed you to test the durability of your vehicle. We spent over two hours here the second day.

 This ball place was so much fun. There were two levels, this upper one with guns you could shoot soft balls down on the people below, and down below there was a giant cannon and this thing that would make the balls pour into the air and rain down on everyone. The balls themselves were pretty nasty, and I was glad there was sanitizer at the entrance, but we all had fun playing in here.

Miniland rocked. Tons and tons of LEGO construction, most of it representing real places. This shuttle was part of the NASA section. They had a countdown, then smoke roared out of the bottom of the shuttle. This was a great place to go for a bit after the park's official closure.

Overall, we had a great time. It was kind of out of the way, and not really that close to Orlando. For us, driving from West Palm, we had to go through orange fields (including a factory that made the air smell like oranges) for not much else, which made the drive rather long and boring. Hopefully, the area will get more built up. There are several hotels right next to Legoland, but most of them are pretty skanky looking. It would have been nicer to stay nearby, but I'm glad we got a much nicer place 15min away.

Waiting Game

I've been in a bit of a slump these last few days. I think I'll call it an "end-of-the-year/probably-moving-in-seven-months-but-don't-know-yet" slump. I still haven't seen those packages I was waiting for. I did end up making a claim with Amazon after the delivery date came and went. They nicely offered to send me replacements for the two boxes that didn't arrive. I had to make separate claims for them, however, and they have so far only sent me one shipment notification for one of the replacements. That was a week ago, so I'm not sure if that means it was never sent, or I just didn't get the email? So, still waiting for something, anything, to show up here.

 I am trying to be patient about it. This is, after all, only the second issue I've had with something missing in the mail (and the first one had some real doubt as to if it was sent at all), and also the first issue I've ever had with Amazon, the company we use far more than any other here. So, I'm gritting my teeth and checking the mail every day. Hopefully, something shows up eventually.

On a brighter note, Christmas was fun. As usual, it's been exceptionally quiet around here. Anyone that can get out tends to do so. I kind of like that about this time of year. (Although, to be honest, if you just visited here, you'd probably think it was absurdly quiet all the time.)

We gave our boys lots of books and LEGO sets, so our house has been a mess of LEGO bricks the last few days. I typically enjoy building their sets and try to get to them first so I can do that, but by the end of the day, I was actually a little tired of it. I'm sure I'll get over that, though.

The funniest thing that happened was when Wyatt opened his gift his grandparents and aunt sent. It turns out they sent the exact same gift we still had for him under the tree: the big space shuttle set from LEGO. We looked at each other in shock, then let him open ours anyway. This was the thing he'd wanted most, and he didn't seem to care at all that he'd received two of them. He actually thought it was rather cool.

I did try to convince him that we should return ours so we can get him something else he might want, but he wasn't interested. I put it aside, anyway, so I could try to change his mind about it. Then, the next morning, while we were still sleeping, he pulled it out, opened it, and built the rocket himself. So, now we have plenty of spare parts, and if his brother wants to play, no fighting.

This situation does illustrate why I always tell people to get our kids LEGO when they ask. Because even if it's  a repeat, our kids don't mind having two, and you can always build something else with the pieces.

Now that Christmas is over, we're all waiting for the big event - our trip to Legoland. We also rented Dolphin Tale to watch on Christmas Eve, and realized at the end that the dolphin with the missing tail, Winter, is actually at an aquarium about an hour and a half away from there. So, we're going to go visit her after our time at the part. I'm kind of excited about this.

Now, if only my stuff would come in the mail...

P.S. I'd like to thank Amazon for providing all the free wrapping paper. And the guys who packed all our stuff to move us here. Seriously, who needs to buy fancy paper when you are swimming in free paper that can be easily drawn on? Because it's not as if the kids care in the least what the paper looks like. They only want to see what's inside!

Boxes in the Mail - MIA

Mail here is rather maddening odd at times. I can typically order something online, and it will arrive the next week after I receive the shipping notification. Unike most military addresses, ours has a much shorter route to take. It goes to Florida, then is sent to somewhere (I really have no idea where, and I'd love to know) where it gets put on our plane whenever possible and sent over.

This system works for the most part. Tracking packages, which most places don't do anyway because it's the USPS (still don't really understand why not), doesn't always help me much when I'm trying to figure out when it will get here. I can see it's made it to Florida, but then it can be any number of days before it makes it on the plane.

The biggest problem happens when there is a large load of mail. The things that don't fit get left behind for the next trip. Except, the next trip doesn't prioritize the mail that got left behind. I don't know how they decide what goes, but it happens sometimes that a package will get pushed aside and will sit there for a long time before it finally goes.

I'm dealing with a situation like that right now, and it's driving me crazy. I ordered four boxes to sort they boys' LEGO bricks over two weeks ago. Amazon broke the order into three shipments (there were a couple other things included in the order), one of which went out a couple days after the first two. As of today, I've received the last box that was shipped, plus everything that we've ordered since, including a book I ordered last weekend that came in this morning.

I totally get that it's Christmas and there's a ton of mail, but I find it weird that my fairly light packages are still not here, yet the 35 pound boxes of wheat and flour did. I wish there was some place to call, but there isn't. All I can do is sit here and wait, as patiently as I can manage.

I really hope they get here soon, though. I was really hoping to get it all done before the Christmas influx of new LEGO sets. Sigh...

LEGO Ideas Book Update

So Wyatt's birthday is over and done with. We've had time to play with the LEGO Ideas Book a bit, and I'm happy to say it's been popular around here. The models depicted are of a huge variety, from tiny to fairly large (yet nothing that's so over the top you better have a basement full of bricks to build it). There aren't any instructions, but some of the models have different views that allow you to figure out easily how to build them. The rest is all about sparking your imagination.

I think the boys' favorite has centered on the spaceship section, which has a few pages of mini-ships to look at. They spent this last weekend building their own fleet of mini-ships. Here's a pic of Oscar continuing the work this afternoon while Wyatt is at school:

Incidentally, I am planning a post on our latest LEGO organization method, some of which you can see here. I'm still waiting for the other boxes to come in the mail so I can finish the sorting work, but I'm excited to finally get it set up in a way that will make it fun for all of us to build. At the moment, I hate it when they ask for help because it means spending hours digging through the pile to find the right bricks (and has anyone noticed how freaking loud LEGO bricks are when they hit against each other? I always feel a little deaf afterwards). After going through three or four different systems to this point, I think we may have finally found one that will last for a long time. We will see...

Vitacost Ten Dollar Coupon Code

I picked up a code off someone else's blog that gives you a ten dollar coupon off an order at Vitacost. com.  I'm getting desperate to find somewhere else I can order the peanut butter we like. The only kind I can get here are the standard brands, but we've been eating natural peanut butter (basically, just peanuts) for years. It's impossible to go back! I used to get it through Tropical Traditions, but they've been out for months. The only other site I've used, Nutsonline (which is an awesome company, by the way), has a pretty steep shipping charge for FPOs, so I'd prefer to do something else.

Enter Vitacost, a site I've admittedly never heard of. The coupon is good no matter what order size, and shipping is only 5 bucks (even for us far-flung sorts), so I think it's worth the risk. I ordered four jars, which with the coupon and including shipping, will end up costing twenty bucks. That's actually what I pay for it normally, but these jar sizes are four ounces larger. So, yay!

Hopefully, they don't take too long to get here. We're down to our last jar, and it's less than half full. Eek! I definitely put this off too long.

Here's my link for a coupon. If you use it, I get another coupon, too, so obviously I'd love it if you did!

LEGO Creator Creating

After only three years of life with LEGO, we've amassed an impressive collection. The boys now have sets from about six different themes, plus a bunch of miscellaneous bricks to work from. I'm rather impressed at some of the stuff I've seen them build. Oscar, who is only four, built both of these this past week:

 This one is a police station, complete with jail cell and storage rack. Unfortunately, I couldn't get a good angle on it, but it looked pretty good in person.

This one is an airplane with twin engines.

Wyatt has started to not only stare at all the pictures in the latest LEGO catalog, but to attempt to build some of the things he sees there. As a result, I picked up a copy of The LEGO Ideas Book for his birthday this month. It's supposed to be over 200 pages of LEGO creations, split into themes throughout the book. Considering how much they love the catalogs, I imagine it will get a lot of look value, but I'm also hoping it will inspire more building. (I just may get down there and come up with a few myself.)

I think out of all the sets we've tried out, Creator is my favorite. We only have two of them at the moment, a Log Cabin and 3-in-1 helicopter/boat, but they are both getting another set each for Christmas. The best part about Creator sets is that they use mostly standard bricks, with only the occasional special brick. That means they are more adaptable, and gives us more play value overall.

Trying to find something new to do yesterday with Oscar, I thought about this and wondered if we could use the directions you can find on the LEGO site for one of the Creator sets and build it ourselves. So, we went to the site and looked through the instruction list. We built a mini-dump truck together (unfortunately, I forgot to get a pic of it, but here is the original if you are curious what it looks like). Oliver helped us come up with a solution to the fender piece we don't seem to have, and we had to use some other colors, but it came out looking pretty good.

When Wyatt got home, he wanted to get in on it, so he picked out a set to try. I tried to steer him to the mini-models, but he wanted something more impressive. I wasn't sure he'd get all that far with it because it was so involved, but Oliver sat down with him and managed to crank it out with a few modifications. It was a riot of colors, so I sat down with it this morning and substituted pieces until it looks mostly red and black. Here's our end result:

 The wheels fold up inside the plane, which is kind of awesome.

Here's the link to the original set to compare. It took a few hours to piece out and build, and I'm really surprised we had so many of the right type of pieces. Clearly, the five pounds of miscellaneous LEGO I bought off Ebay a few years ago has worked in our favor (we also raided some of their sets - I got some of the red stuff from their Lego City Fire Boat).

Yeah, Lego wins at our house, more than any toy by far.

Visitor from the Great Outdoors

We had a visitor recently. The four legged variety. I opened the door to go outside one evening to find him clinging to the outer door at about eye level. I called the boys over so they could get a good look at him.

Yep, we had a frog on our door. It was about the size of my thumb. Our outer door is a little warped and doesn't close securely, so it was easy enough for him to get inside. Whether he'd find his way back out, however, was a question, so I nudged him to the outside of the door so he would hopefully find his way back home.

Sunny Saturday

Okay, this post is a little behind. This actually happened last Sunday, but I have only now convinced myself to sit down and write this post.

Anyway, now that I have that out of the way! One of the rather cool things about living here is that sometimes we get to see the helicopters carry torpedoes overhead. They pick them up in the water after visiting submarines fire them on the range. It's a rather fun thing to see, and I've wanted to a get a picture of it. For the life me, though, I haven't succeeded. Every time, I've either not had my camera or it's been inaccessible - like the time we had just gotten back from a trip to the States and got off the bus just in time to see a helicopter land with one on the helicopter pad right behind us (I just could not get it out of my bag fast enough, grrr).

That all changed last Sunday, however. I saw a chopper take off with an empty basket while letting the boys jump around on rocks outside the dining hall where we'd just gotten done with breakfast. I rushed them home, then convinced them to go to the playground because I knew it would have to fly overhead on the return trip.

We were there for quite some time, longer than I thought we'd have to be, and I'd gotten up to tell them it was time to go when I finally saw it coming in, torpedo dangling below. I took a series of pics, and this is one of my favorites:

Oh, and just to be clear that living here, we've learned to make our own fun, I feel the need to share the following:

This is what the boys did while I was waiting for the chopper to pass overhead. There is a small skatepark to the side of the playground. I have yet to see a single person use it for its intended purpose, but the kids here have found all sorts of ways to amuse themselves on it. My boys like to bring a handful of their Hot Wheels cars with us whenever we go. They race them up and down it, and will send them shooting off the back end. Here, Oscar is climbing up the side to retrieve on that didn't make it down.

I am most impressed, however, with what some of the older kids came up with later that afternoon. They wet it down with a hose, slicked it up with shampoo, and turned it into a waterslide. (You can't really see in this picture, but there is a higher ramp right next to this one.) The place was swarming with kids for several hours, Wyatt included. It was a great way to spend a sunny afternoon.

Letter "B"

We did the letter "B" today. The craft was one I found online, a bear bag puppet. I was absolutely sure I had some bags a friend had sent from Japan a few months ago. We don't have any real need of lunch bags here, so I stowed them somewhere with the idea that we could use them for crafting or some other future need.

However, for the life of me, I can't find them anymore. I'd already told Oscar we were going to do this, so I really needed to produce something. I decided against going to the store to look for a pack of lunch bags, partly because I didn't want to spend money on it, but also because the chances of actually finding some were rather slim.

Enter innovation! We get a lot of brown paper here. Amazon seems to pack most things in boxes with wads of brown paper in them. Since we frequent them more than most due to their FPO shipping policies, we are regularly swimming in the stuff. I decided to just make a paper bag.

I'm not going to post up a big tutorial because, well, I really don't have much to share. I just cut out something, trimmed it, folded it, and taped it up. It more or less looked like a paper bag, and it satisfied my youngest.

Here's our paper bag bear:

I folded it down like a lunch bag, so it opens at the mouth. I didn't make the top big enough, so it's kind of squished in the face, but, hey, it's a bear!

I told Oscar he could color the body if he wanted, so he asked me to draw a shirt and an "orange badge like a post office guy". I drew this, not really knowing what he wanted, and he told me it looked like a police officer badge.

Oh, well. Bags, I can whip up. Drawings? Not so much.

Waffles For Lunch

I once had a waffle maker. It was a pretty standard, non-stick, electric affair and worked fine. Then, a pin came out of one of the hinges. I couldn't see a way to fix it, so I just kept using it like that. When we moved overseas, we had to do some pretty heavy triage, and anything broken beyond repair that wasn't used much didn't make the cut. That included the waffle maker.


The thing is, though, my kids love waffles. I'm not industrious enough to indulge their love of them very often, but it was nice to be able to make them, especially since I detest the frozen kind and refuse to buy them. Since we moved here two years ago, the only waffles we've had are at the chow hall, where the quality is on par with the ones you can get at a free breakfast in a hotel (something we've had extensive experience with, heh - the best one was the place we stayed where they had watered down the waffle batter so much it that when it cooked, it turned into strings of cooked batter - it kind of looked like spaghetti when it was done).

So, I've trolled the internet occasionally looking for one I could like. I was hoping to find one that allowed you to pull the plates out to wash (the biggest reason I rarely used our waffle iron before), and had this one in my Amazon cart for months. It's pricey, though, so I hadn't been able to talk myself into buying it.

And, there's the issue of the non-stick stuff. I'm not sure whether it's killing us all or not, as some people claim, but I hate the stuff because it doesn't last. I've gotten rid of all the pans I once had, and use a combination of stainless, glass, and cast iron. I ran across something not long ago that mentioned a cast iron waffle maker, something I didn't even realize existed.

A couple weeks ago, I finally broke down and bought a Rome waffle maker. In all honestly, I could have probably found a better made one on Ebay (old stuff is always made better!), but when I couldn't really find anything as cheap as the one I got, once I factored in the shipping costs, I just decided to get it new. I'd maybe do it differently next time, but since I don't expect this one to ever break down on me, that may never happen.

Anyway, after a not-so-enjoyable cleaning (unseasoned cast iron is shipped with a wax coating that has to come off first - it's a pain to do) and seasoning (I did it twice to be sure), we had waffles for lunch today. I had made a hasty promise to the boys that we would do so, then I looked in my Bittman cookbook and realized the yeast waffles I wanted to try needed to sit overnight. Yeah, this was at about 1000 today...

Wyatt got indignant when I tried to push it off, so I caved and used a baking powder version from the same book. Here are our results:

I'd read that sticking on the batch is common, but apparently I'd done a good enough job seasoning it beforehand because I didn't have any problems. I did brush it with butter between waffles, though, just to be sure. I didn't want it to flow out the sides because there was nowhere for it to go but underneath the burner, so I put very little batter on the pan at first. This is actually my last waffle, and the closest it got to filling the iron. Surprisingly, you can put a lot more batter on these than it looks like. The waffles are also a lot fluffier than I thought they would be considering the thickness of the iron. I sort of thought we'd end up making pancakes with depressions in them, but that was totally not the case.

I think we found a winner. Cast iron takes a little more work to take care of (and you must preheat or you are doomed!), but the results are awesome. I've heard good waffles described as "crispy, with a creaminess inside", yet this was the first time I realized what the heck that meant. And my boys? They went through the first three waffles before they let me eat one. (They are also quite excited that we can take this camping with us; for some reason, waffles on a camping trip sounds like a seriously awesome thing to them.)

Letter "S"

Today we did the letter "S". I'd originally planned on moving through the alphabet in order, but I'm teaching Oscar to read using the Bob books. The first book focuses on the short "A" sound, and "S" is one of the consonants used. Oscar can read that one confidently, so we moved on to book number two today.

I had planned on a starfish craft, but right after I told him what we were going to learn today, he asked if we were going to do a submarine project. (Clearly, submarines have a solid place in our lives.) So, I sat him down with the starfish, a fairly easy gluing project, while I rushed to find something we could related to submarines.

This is what we ended up with:

I traced a submarine onto some construction paper, had him color it in, then cut it out (that trailing piece of paper is because he had drawn a diver and got mad when I cut it off, so I reattached it). I then cut some portholes and taped tissue paper to the back to allow light to come through them. It's kind of tough to tell because of our filthy window. I tried to clean it a bit before we hung his project up, but to do it for real requires removing the screen and standing on a ladder outside because our trailer is up on blocks. Yeah, since we have less than a year left, I'm pretty unmotivated to go to all that trouble. Clearly, the previous occupant felt the same way.

Wyatt came home and immediately wanted to do one, too, so now we have two of them hanging up.


*You can find better instructions here, at an awesome blog I can tell I will be mining for further ideas as we go.

Doing School At Home

We've finally decided once and for all that Wyatt will be homeschooled next year. Oscar isn't technically old enough to start next year, but since he's already beginning to read, I think we may just consider next year his kindergarten year.

My plan as of now is to use K12, assuming we get stationed in a state that provides it for free. That means that while I'll be doing most of the teaching, the books and planning will be handed to me. It does, however, follow the school year, which is a bit of a complication. Apparently, it takes at least a month to get registered, and you have to live in the state before you can do that. Since we are not sure when we are leaving here (could easily be as late as October), and I'm determined not to break up the family any earlier than necessary, it leaves us with a bit of a problem when it comes to school. We can start school the next semester, in January, but that runs the risk of having Wyatt fall behind.

So, I've had to start to seriously consider other options. (Something I really have to do, anyway, because we might not end up moving to a state that supports K12, and I'm not prepared to pay 5 grand per kid to do it.) I am really not the most dedicated, on top of things sort of person. I'm great with a schedule that has been imposed on me (I actually loved filling up my calendar in college with all my deadlines and tests - it was a big game to work my way through it all), but not so good at imposing one on myself. Clearly, that has to change if we are going to homeschool.

I decided that this year, when nothing is so intense or important, is probably the best way to start. Oscar walks up to me every day after Wyatt goes to school and asks, "What are we going to do today while Wyatt is gone?" That has typically meant I then sit down with him and build LEGO or or do a few puzzles.

This past weekend, however, I spent some time putting together some ideas. I've decided to turn our days into letter themed days. Oscar already knows most of his letters and their sounds from listening to us teach his brother, but I'd like to reinforce them and find out which ones he isn't so good at. Also, focusing on a letter has helped a lot in keeping things together.

Monday and Tuesday were "A" days. We made an ant eater and an ant hill complete with painted on ants:

I was a little surprised that he spent almost a half hour carefully coloring in the ant eater parts. Wyatt really didn't like coloring in anything when he was the same age, so I had thought he'd just breeze through it with a few scribbles. (In case you are curious where I got the template, you can find it here, along with plenty of other fun ideas for teaching letters.)

We also did a little handwriting, which I hadn't planned on introducing, but after I told him we were going to learn about the letter "A", he immediately started asking me how it goes as he attempted to draw it on a nearby piece of paper. I figured we'd go with it as long as he was interested, so I printed out some letter tracing pages and did that the second day.

The best thing about this is that Oscar is so very proud to show his dad and brother what he did at "school" while they were gone. Watching that, I am kicking myself for not doing this earlier. He told me today that he
"does school at home, right Mommy?" I answered, "Yes, you do.", already envisioning how things would go when both of them are home.

I'm getting excited about this. I've always loved teaching, but it's even more rewarding when it's your own kids doing the learning. This homeschooling thing seems like it just may end up being a good fit for our lifestyle in more ways than one.

Our Final Halloween in the Bahamas

Well, this was our last Halloween here. This year found us experiencing some of the cloud bursts common to life here. Halfway through our trick or treating, Oliver had to run home for an umbrella when it started to rain on us. It wasn't a huge deal because it wasn't more than a shower and the night was warm, but it was still nice to have the umbrella. By the time we got home, the rain was gone and we were all feeling a little soggy.

Still, it was great fun as usual. Here are the boys sporting their costumes:

And no, this is not the best picture. The camera kept fogging up on me because of all the moisture in the, so I couldn't give it enough time to get a good focus. I just wiped and snapped and hoped for the best.

I'm not gonna lie, I'm pretty darn proud of Wyatt's costume. He had asked to be an Army guy about a month ago, but when I went online to see what a costume would cost me, I couldn't find anything decent for much less than fifty bucks. It sure changes things when you can't go to a store and search for stuff.

So, in light of that problem, and because there was no freaking way I was going to spend fifty bucks on a costume for him, I convinced him that it would be pretty cool if he went as a submariner. The utilities were replaced by the cammies a year or so ago, so I knew it would be no big deal if I cut one down and used all the patches.

I really haven't sewn much more than patches and small mending jobs for, um, twenty years now? So, I was a little scared I wouldn't be able to pull it off. However, my mother did a good job teaching me when I was a teenager how to sew, and much of it stuck with me. I liked sewing, but not the rules of patterns, and remember always asking her at every step (especially ironing -for some reason, I really hated ironing seams) if I could just skip that. Unsurprisingly, I only  managed one full project, a sun dress I wore once because I outgrew it right after as it had taken me so long to finish it. I did make a lot of doll clothes, however, and made my own patterns so I had some experience that helped a bit here.

Since real clothing is different, however, I found a few tutorials online that showed me how to make patterns for both shirt and pants (since there isn't a fabric store to buy a pattern, either). I also looked at a blog that had clear instructions on how to cut down a man's shirt into a boy's. So, that spared me buttonholes and hemming on the bottom, but I had to figure out the collar since I wanted one that looked like the original and that isn't what she had done with hers. I had to do it twice, including cutting a second one, and it still isn't completely right, but it was close enough. I also made sure to iron all those seams, and, yes, it really is important to do that.

I learned a lot along the way, including how to use self-fabric as interfacing as I couldn't, once again, run to the store for that. I recycled buttons, belt loops, and some elastic I pulled out of an old pair of pants that were too worn out to pass on to anyone else. The only real cost in all of this was some thread.

I used all the old patches (the name one is blacked out in this pic, in case you are wondering why it looks a little weird), and we finished the costume out with Oliver's old command cap, some collar devices (wouldn't be worn normally, but it helped keep it down and made it look more military), one of Oliver's uniform belts, and a dog tag. The Navy guys we ran into during trick or treating all recognized it right off, which made it all the better.

As for Oscar, his was kind of a remake from one Wyatt wore back in Washington. He really wanted to be a firefighter, so we pulled out the rain gear I'd bought for Wyatt in WA (it's a fleece lined coat, so way too warm to wear here - we mostly just get wet when it rains and it's no big deal), used the pieces of a firefighter set we'd bought for Wyatt for that Halloween and they still play with, and then Oliver got creative and fashioned a fire extinguisher out of cardboard, the top of a spray bottle, tinfoil, and some printed off pictures to put on the side. He carried that instead of his pumpkin this year for treats. Sadly, this picture doesn't do it justice.

(I found it completely hilarious that after the kids kept calling it a "fire hydrant", we ran into an adult who immediately proclaimed it the same thing.)

While I don't know if I'll get get so involved in costume making again, I know we'll keep on creating costumes. It was so much more fun than just picking something and ordering it, which is what I did last year (although Oliver did build a train out of cardboard and our wagon for Oscar's get up).