Joke's on me
I was a little surprised to come here this morning and find eight comments on what was supposed to be my DRAFT. Oh man, that kills me. I'm still getting the hang of Squarespace, and when I clicked 'save,' it automatically published. I have to unclick. Deselect. Whatever.
(Note to Rae: Unclick, unclick!)
But now you can see approximately how far I can get in my thoughts before being interrupted.
The super exciting thing? Might not seem so super exciting now that there is so much suspense.
I wanted to tell you about a little homeschooling breakthrough that I had with Kid A. He's always been the tricky one to figure out. And it's not so easy to find things that he enthuses over. One battle that we've had is over creative writing, which I have chosen to leave alone, because I really don't want to force it. He just sits with pencil in hand and a black piece of paper in front of him and claims to loathe it. Until I figured out that the problem is with writing by hand. And I have this ideal of the kids really learning in a tactile way first, before using the computer, but I realized that 1) his penmanship is great and 2) this question is about creativity, not vehicle of creativity. So we set up a profile on the computer for him, opened up a word document, and did some brainstorming about the story he would write.
And he typed his story's first sentence:
Tim was eating breakfast when the phone rang.
And I realized, Oh! I have a writer on my hands. A natural one. I mean, people long for exquisite first sentences like that. It places us and leads us into the story, all in one. I commented on it, and Kid A said, "I read a lot, so I know what a first sentence should be like."
Since then he hasn't stopped working on it, every spare minute he can get. It's mostly dialogue, which is admirable in itself, with breaks for description and action. I mean, it feels a bit like what I've been doing for the last three years with my novel.
Homeschooling for me is about finding ways to bring out that avid learner, the kid who wants to excel because they really just need to learn this, or they want to get this project done. Discovering that Kid A loves to write is like finding a treasure chest. I can teach grammar and spelling through it, because he really wants to know. He told me yesterday that the good thing about going to sleep is that you get so many new ideas about what to put in your story. Did I mention that it's beautiful to see him so enthusiastic about something?
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I was also going to include some beach photos yesterday. Everyone gathers on the beach for sunset everyday in this little part of the world.
Some people juggle. For example, my Superstar Husband.
And the YaYa Sister often makes some work of art. This time she made a wall to the sea, and people joined her to help.
It was funny to watch people come up to the three inch wall and then walk around, rather than stepping over.
When it was finished, the tide came up and lapped at its edge.
And lastly!
Yesterday it came to my attention that some dear soul nominated me as a favorite mom blogger at Babble.
However, to my chagrin, only one person clicked on 'like.' So I am currently number 509 on the list, with one like. Therefore, if you would like to pour some balm on my self-confidence, you can go on over and find me and click 'like' and I will be ever grateful.
(That's 'click', not 'unclick'.)