Happy holidays nearly over

We have had such a lovely holiday.

 Hot, hot, hot NYE.  My beautiful sister set up a paddling pool and sprinkler for the kids at her otherwise-very-cool-20something party.  When Dylan heard he said, "what's a sprinkler?". Poor deprived children of water restrictions.

 Splashing on the path.

 I love this one.  Bathing beauty.

 Sharing an inter-generational interest in fart noises.  Something everyone can enjoy!

Okay 2012.  Show me what you've got.  I'm sceptical, but willing to be convinced.


We made stuff too.  My girls love their craft.

Abi's dinosaurs.

 Evie's...something?  Thing With 1000 Eyes.

Abi holding her girl riding a unicorn.

 She requested a better photo of said girl riding a unicorn.

I have many of these pictures.  Abi likes permanent records.

 Snow girl

 Outoor artistes

And introducing....Toby the dog!

Yes, we are now a family of five.  Eight if you count the guinea pigs and cat.  Which I don't really, to be honest (sorry guys).

Abi has been asking for a dog for a while, and I've always wanted one too, so I'd been browsing the rescue sites occasionally for the last six months or so.  After Christmas, I got more serious and found this little fellow up in Mount Macedon.  DH was not super enthusiastic, but very graciously aquiesced, although I did bulldoze him a bit.  Sorry about that my love.

Isn't he cute?  I think he looks like the fox*, Sir Didimus, from Labyrinth.  He's somewhere between five and seven, and apparently a Maltese/Shitzhu cross.  He's very fluffy in reality, but had a slightly wonky clip at the vet's to keep him cool.

Abi named him Toby after the dog in the Milly-Molly-Mandy books, which we are working our way through, a chapter a night.  She loves them, and so do I.  I have such strong memories of those stories from my own childhood and there is nothing worrying or scary in them at all.  We tried My Naughty Little Sister a while ago, but the whole 'naughty' concept upset my sensitive girl, so they were less successful.

MMM though is perfect.  And now we have our own Toby too.

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So here we are at the end of the holidays.  We still have a week and a half to go, but I am sad.  We have had such fun - lots of playing, watching tv, eating ice cream, seeing friends, library visits, swimming, relaxing in the mornings.  It's going to be hard to switch gears, that's for sure.

*I always thought he was a fox anyway, but apparantly not?  Some kind of small dog, it seems.

What is occupying my brain right now...

is homeschooling.  Well, unschooling/natural learning to be precise.  Even radical unschooling, which challenges all kinds of assumptions and my dearly-held beliefs.

Firstly,  homeschooling.  Why?  Well, Abi still has two more years at her Montessori kindergarten and Evie will start at some stage next year, probably in fourth term (sob, myyyy bbaaaayybeeeee).  The issue arises when Abi finishes and Evie still has two years to go.  What do we do?  I had always planned that they would go on to a Montessori primary environment; we have two semi-nearby, one private and one as part of a state primary school.  We live pretty much right in the middle of both so a 20/25 minute drive either way.

The state one is near the kindergarten so we could have Evie at kinder and Abi at the primary school.  Or, we could swap both to the private school, which has an attached kindergarten.  However, the private school's kindergarten is not as good as the one Abi attends now, and the state primary school stream is not as good as the private one.  Confused?  Yes, me too.

A couple of months ago it occurred to me that another option would be to leave Evie at the kinder we love and homeschool Abi for those two years.  Then we would have the option for them both to go to the private Montessori school or if it was going well, we could just continue to homeschool.  It was like the sun came out when I thought of this.  Homeschooling has always hovered at the back of my mind as an option for lots of reasons, and it seems right for us.  I love the school holidays and I have no doubts about Abi and my ability to learn together in a very natural and spontaneous way all the things she needs and wants to.  I love being with my girls and the thought of being with them for all those hours, days, weeks, months and years that I would otherwise lose is intoxicating.

This is hard to talk about sometimes because I worry people who are making different choices will feel attacked or judged by me.  But I have so many reservations about school as an institution, even though I personally had a mostly positive time there.  But the more I think about it, the more it seems insane that children have to go somewhere 6 hours a day, five days a week, forty weeks a year for 13 years.  13 years!

I remember in year 10 saying to a friend that I thought we could have learned everything we had learned at high school so far in one and a half years.  I was being generous.  I have since read that it takes around 1 and a half hours per day to cover the actual curriculum.  The rest of the school day is about behaviour management, assemblies, waiting around for everyone to catch up and just waiting.   When I look back at school, I remember lunchtime and the seemingly endless hours of sitting in class, waiting for it to be over.   Sometimes I was interested in the class, but that was pretty rare.

School suits parents and society because it gives children somewhere to go, a place that will keep them safe and occupied (although I could put quotation marks around those words) and out of the real life lived by adults.

School is not real life.  It is a fake, manufactured social world that all too often seems to bring out the worst in people.  I don't want my girls bullied, periodically ostracised, ridiculed for learning, dumbing themselves down, learning to victimise others, putting up with years of boredom or being forced to memorise and learn things they aren't interested in and won't need to use.  

There are other things too, but I'm out of time.  It's a big subject and a big decision.    I'm becoming more and more sure that it's the right one for us though.

39 weeks

Today I am 39 weeks pregnant. I remarked to DH this morning that that means there is an actual big baby inside me right now, bigger than Abi when she was born. It's a bit of a weird thought; there's my baby and I don't even know him/her yet. But there he/she is, right there under my skin only centremetres away.

I still feel okay. My pelvic instability is still hanging around and has kind of moved to the front now so it is making rolling over in bed, not to mention heaving myself off Abi's futon, really difficult. I'm sure I've got the old pregnant waddle too and I think maybe the baby has dropped, although not engaged as I can feel the head moving around if I push gently on it. I've become pretty good at the old belly 'palps' since one of the midwives showed me how to find the head during an appointment.

Yesterday was a big day for Abi and I. First we went to my work Christmas party in the morning which was a very nice way to finish the year. Then Abi fell asleep for 10 minutes in the car on the way home and I couldn't transfer her into bed without her waking up, so that was it in the nap department. Bit of a problem because we had our meeting with her kinder teacher yesterday and I wanted her to be in good form.

As it turned out, it was fine. She didn't do anything crazy like talk to her new teacher, but she did make eye contact, wave goodbye and look extremely interested in all the wonderful Montessori activities displayed on the shelves. I know this teacher and school well and I have complete faith in both of them. Very, very sound philosophically and she has been teaching at the same school for 15 years. The school itself is a renovated original little primary school, so it is really charming with lots of light and lovely wooden floors.

DH came too and he loved the centre which I was glad about as he hadn't been there before. We both think she'll do really well there once she settles in, which may take a while. She definitely finds it harder to separate from me than DH, which is something I'm sure I've created - sometimes I think I've built a bit of a negative dynamic between us. DH was shocked when I said that and he thinks it's just that she prefers me to any other person, so if the option's there... Don't know if I entirely agree, but it was lovely of him to reassure me.

I have had quite a few worries about her separating from me at kinder and I spoke to her teacher about it all who reminded me that most separation anxiety stuff will be coming from me, not her. Of course, I totally know that when it's about other people's children, but not mine, obviously! My child is a delicate and unique flower and cannot be treated like other children, dammnit!

So the teacher said that I had to feel completely comfortable and trusting of her and to know that she would take care of Abi, and that Abi would be absolutely fine. I felt so much better after this talk and going to the centre and seeing how quickly Abi relaxed there. I'm sure I"ll still struggle a bit, but I need to trust my girl and know that it is a safe and wonderful place for her in my heart as well as my head.

Anyway, she's not starting until the end of February, so we've got a couple of months yet. I'm really going to miss her, sniff. She'll only be staying for half an hour for the first week anyway and gradually working up to the five full mornings, so I guess the baby and I will just be going for a quick walk around the block or something before going to pick her up. I won't have too much time to pine.

She was very thrilled that she got to pick out a special kinder hat. I was surprised, she picked the one that I thought was the most boring - a navy blue legionnaires cap with the kinder logo on the front. She looks extremely adorable in it though; a real kinder girl. She wanted to wear it today but I told her it was special for kinder, and we hung it up on the hook together.

My house is messy. I should be cleaning it up. I miss my cleaner.

I am also sending love and healing vibes to my beautiful internet friend Averil who just had a baby under less-than-optimal circumstances. Kisses to you and your gorgeous new little one, sweetie.