the fence

i'm at an exciting and peaceful place in my life.

i am looking forward, into a journey i am about to take. carefully packing my bags. getting prepared. eagerly but patiently anticipating the changes. and for the first time in my parenting life i'm not mourning the passing of time.

i'm the mom of 3 teens (well one is a young adult). all of them growing up so quickly and finding their own unique form of independence. but i'm still in the process of "raising" them...in whatever capacity i'm needed as it changes so frequently as they grow. over the years i've had more than a few occasions of wanting to stop the clock. to just keep them in that moment for a little longer. and i've wanted to stop that clock for myself as well.

but here i am. in my early forties. ready to move forward. no more stopping. no more regretting what i have or have not done. no more feeling like time is running out. or trying to figure out what the frikkin point is to whatever it is i'm doing. having the clearest vision i've ever had about what i want my life to look like in the next few years. readysetgo!!

but wait...

also for the first time, i'm having a vision that doesn't include being a mom. at least not 100% like i'm used to. and i'm okay with this in a way i never would have been before. when the kids were young, fantasies of a life where i'm solely focused on my desires was more about escape and a serious need for a break (that i wouldn't give myself for years and years to come) than it was a true and proper vision.

now? well, it's at a time when gradually working towards a vision of a future where my kids will more than likely be on their own is a reality. it's about taking my head out of the sands of time-stopping and relishing the possibilities. without guilt. because it's still a few years off and i'm just slowly getting ready. i don't want to wait until i'm standing in an empty house wondering where everyone went and what to do now.

i find myself straddling a fence with a foot planted firmly on either side. on one, i'm doing many things i love while still being available for my family, spending time together and enjoying the now. on the other, i'm putting in the foundation of a life that i want when my kids have their own lives apart from me (a journey they each started some time ago).

some days i feel the pull of one foot or the other trying to jump the fence. the foot in the now wanting to hurry over to the side where things are new and full of different experiences. the foot in the future wanting to sneak back to the safety of what is familiar. in the past i might have looked at either of those times and called them fear, weakness...running away. now i know they are part of the journey. part of learning who i am and what i want. not judging or resisting. continuing to move forward with whatever each day needs. and being okay with myself and my life. embracing what is. and doing so with hopeful (instead of terrified) feelings for the future.Share

..tech.no.log.y..

whenever i start having hateful feelings about all of the modern technology that is super distracting to me, all i have to do is wait. just wait a darn minute and something will happen to remind me just how fantastic it really is. like right now, scotty is miles and miles away from me, yet we were chatting and commenting on things together on facebook. you might say, well, there was always the phone…but neither of us has ever ever ever enjoyed talking on the phone. somehow chatting (and yes, sending silly stickers and personal blind typing challenges are a part of that) just works better for us.

and last night while i was watching the movie “on the road”, sadie and silas went in the kitchen to make ramen…and never came out. but i could hear them in there. they weren’t dead. they were laughing and talking…for 2 hours. finally when the movie was almost over i went in and they were sitting on the floor laughing and proceeded to tell me they were snap chatting. with each other (and probably a gazillion other people miles and miles away). and earlier in the day (or maybe it was yesterday) silas finally got an instagram and within minutes he said “i already have 3 followers!” and it was because within minutes sadie was able to tell their friends (who are miles and miles away) about it. and i just stood there and said “you guys have no idea how unbelievably cool it is to live right now” and went on to explain things like long distance phone calls that were limited to 3 minutes and letters that took days. things they’ve heard me wax on about before. but it’s just so endlessly cool! they can tell a friend something in just seconds…and it can be super personal and deep or it can be that they just painted their brother’s fingernails…with pictures!!

so i’ve been on this crazy fence about how i’d like to reduce the technology in my life. but i get these glimpses of perspective and i realize it’s not the technology i need to rid myself of…it’s that i need to manage my time better. and i bet there is a fancy modern technology device somewhere that could help me with that…Share

what do you want to be when you grow up?

i love how conversations amble along…you start in one place and end up down the street in a completely different neighborhood. yesterday, silas and i had a conversation like that. we were in the car on the way home from the orthodontist and somehow we started talking about moving, i think because scotty is finishing school this year and there was some brief discussion the night before about “what if we had to move away if he got a job somewhere else, etc.” he asked why people always want to move to new york (i had mentioned something about how when i was young i thought i would move to new york and be a fashion designer…you can stop laughing now!). so i told him how a lot of specific culture (entertainment, culinary, etc.) is concentrated in particular areas and if what you love and want to pursue is in one of these places you are likely going to want to go there. like hollywood and new york, they have opportunities that are different than other places. maybe. it really depends on a lot of variables. he asked where you would move if you wanted to study bugs, specifically preying mantises. i said it would depend on if you wanted to study on your own or go to school. in the former you would probably get loads of books and go to a place that had a particularly high concentration of preying mantises, maybe find a mentor to work with/for. in the latter you would want to find a school that had resources and curriculum that appealed to you and maybe that had a very specific and specialized focus on what you wanted to learn. oh i also said at the beginning of the conversation “if you wanted to be an epidemiologist…” and we both were like, wait no that’s not right, that’s skin…and then simultaneously we said “entomologist!!”  so there’s that. he said he read that you don’t even get considered for a job as an entomologist unless you have a master’s degree.

then i asked him if he ever thought about these kinds of things, like if he wanted to study something specific one day or even go to school for something. he said he thought about studying bugs (that’s when i said, oh that’s why you knew that about the master’s degree! and he said yeah…). but he said he might just study them as a hobby. and i proceeded to tell him the image that studying bugs as a hobby brought to my mind (it had to do with buggy ickiness and basements and possibly baldness…don’t tell anyone i said that!). and he thought it was horrible and said he didn’t want to be bald OR have a basement…ever. and that he would never even live in a house with a basement. if a house had a basement he would say no thanks. also attics. no attics. no places in a house where you don’t go very often and are dark. and i said you could tell the realtor you would take the house but they had to fill in the basement with cement. and he said no it would just still BE THERE. okaaaay, moving right along…i asked what about garages and he said garages were okay. (i did not say anything about how bugs are mostly in dark places where people don’t go very often).

i think about this stuff a lot…my kids’ interests, their passions. and the question kids get a lot…what do you want to be when you grow up??  i don’t ask that one often. i am really so much more interested in what makes them excited right now. i don’t always ask that one either, but i am always paying attention for signs of it. i think asking “what do you want to be/do?” is often a stumbling block. i’ve seen eyes go blank and sometimes even fear and then shrugs. but ask a kid what they are excited about RIGHT NOW…that gets way more enthusiastic responses. they know the answer to that one. the other is just too far away for some kids to even contemplate. and why should they? there are far more important things they can be thinking about and spending their time doing. right now, the possibilities, discoveries and wonders are endless.

i believe that if kids are let alone enough to explore and supported enough to further their interests that they will come to ask themselves that deeply profound set of questions: “what do i want to do…what do i love doing…what will i become…who will i become…who am i right now??” and that is a far greater thing than any other, to be able to ask yourself these questions and have the space in which to find your very own answers.Share

my teen partners

i made a joke earlier today that watching any series on netflix was a full-time job. and it’s true. but it got me thinking about the many different “jobs” i have had over the years under the single title of “mom.”

this year all three of the kids are turning milestone ages: 13, 16, and 18. my mind has been on this a lot lately. i’m reminded of when they were all 5 and under and people would ask what it was like to have 3 young children. i would often describe it as having 3 very different jobs with 3 different bosses. each child having unique needs and how you have to learn how to meet each of those needs, that you cannot parent all children the same. even how you show love to each child can be different depending on the child’s personality, emotional needs and receptive ability. 

it took me a few years to realize that while that may have been how i described it, it wasn’t necessarily how i experienced it. i found better words for it as the kids got older. i found that i didn’t really see my children as bosses but as partners. i knew early on that i was seeing the world through each of their individual lenses and experiencing right along with them and facilitating when needed. but that depth was always hard for me to describe to people.

now that they are all in their teens (well almost, sadie being still 12…but really she has been a teen since she was 3) i still feel like we have a beautiful partnership and i continue to experience new things through them.

i remember people warning me that i would have 3 teenagers one day (gasp!) and that i told them right away how much i looked forward to that day. it is here and it is awesome…actually even better than i thought it might be. i was right, but i still had no idea.

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oh yeah...that other question

i said before that i had a couple questions...then never got to the other one.

we went on a beach trip in october with a bunch of other unschoolers. it just happened to be in isle of palms, near charleston where we used to live. sooo, we got to meet up with a few friends from there (but unfortunately not everyone we would've liked to). my friend, tracy, asked me one night how i went from being a person who rarely liked to leave her apartment to this new person who now travels all over the place going and doing all sorts of things. good question!

one of the reasons we didn't do a lot back then was because we only had one car. and whenever i did keep the car i was so exhausted from the drive to drop scotty off that i often didn't feel like doing anything anymore (it was a long drive). but i realized later that even when scotty got his jeep, i still didn't want to go anywhere too much. it was a habit to just stay home. it was easier. i used to have such a hard time being social.

anyway...so how did i get from there to here?? short answer...my kids. specifically...silas. long answer...well, you might've heard it already but hear it is anyways...

last year, after we first moved into this house, we went for a walk in our neighborhood and discovered a school with an awesome playground. we played awhile and then walked around the school, looking in the windows and talking about it. on the way home silas mentioned that he might want to try going to school sometime. it was surprising and unexpected...so i asked him why he thought he might like to do that. he said there were some other things he'd like to learn (he never really elaborated on that) but mostly he'd like to have more friends. i told him we'd have to think about it and talk about it some more, that our life didn't really fit into the school schedule but we would have to just see what we could do.

in that moment, i realized i could probably be doing more. we were already getting together with friends a few times a month but he was obviously needing more. we talked about the impression of school that's given in some tv programs...that it's a fun place to hang out with your friends and talk and have a good time. i told him that those weren't very realistic depictions of school, about how we were always told "you're not here to socialize" (which is the one thing that runs through my mind...and makes me laugh...whenever the "socialization" question comes up about homeschooling). i realized he was missing the convenience they had when we lived in the apartment in charleston of having friends around everyday and that moving was a big adjustment with having to make new friends again and that getting together with new friends was going to be harder since we are spread out a bit.

he never really brought it up again, he said he was just sort of thinking out loud and hadn't really firmly decided that was something he wanted to do. but it did push me to become more involved with the friends we were making here. we had already signed up for the live and learn conference at this point so it was definitely something we were looking forward to. in fact, it was the one thing samuel brought up when silas was talking about school, he said "you won't be able to go to the conference!!!" but we had no idea how much it would change our lives.

in the meantime, like i said, i made more of an effort to get together with friends. but it was definitely L&L that made the difference. we met so many people, made so many real connections. and the rest is history. we started getting together for more casual gatherings. going to house concerts at the lovejoy's. and there was also ARGH, which we had been to the previous year when it was in its infancy. then we met even more people at the one that followed the L&L conference last year.

i don't know how i came out of my shell. i know that i was still in throw up mode as we pulled into the parking lot for the conference. big group of mostly strangers. oh fuck!! anxiety and panic set in. but i got through it. i learned a lot about myself that week. and the kids had an amazing time. it just turned a light on inside for all of us.

my point is...to answer tracy's question...i had to do some work, go outside of my comfort zone, meet new people and all that, because i wanted to give my kids a bigger, better experience. not that i think what their lives looked like before was bad or not good enough. but it definitely can always be better...most anything can be. and somewhere along the way i started having a good time, no longer feeling like puking, and really opening myself up to the experience and letting people in, and reaching out.

well, i have realized something else. this is just a rambling bunch of twisting and turning making no sense sentences that go in circles.

i don't even feel like editing it. and that's saying something for me!

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summing up summer

forgive me father for i have sinned...it has been almost 2 months since my last blog post.

the last day i blogged about was LND which was july 24th!!! holy crap!!

the next day we just sort of hung out at our house, and the day after that too...

saturday, july 25th starts out on the porch...

and then inside for some bananagrams!!

sunday, july 26th...porch time again

some random elbow licking

a little peek-a-boo

and snacks for the ride home

i can find no evidence of the existence of monday. but i'm pretty sure scotty went for a ride and then we went out by ourselves for the afternoon and ate lunch at atlanta bread company.

tuesday, july 28th...sofh picnic day at the nolichucky river!!! had an awesome time with new and old friends alike!!

jana and puppy

isn't it gorgeous!?

loverly mamas

creepy spider!!!

wednesday, july 29th...we met up with jana to check out the paint supplies at artopia. samuel got a few things and then the kids and i went to DQ for a quick treat before we headed out to rock creek again...to paint jana's bus!!! i had never used spray paint like this before...i am NOT a graffiti artist. i really loved the montana paint though!!

all these pix were taken by sadie

afterwards we all went to pizza hut and ate...cuz we were super hungry!! painting and dancing and talking and laughing make for a big appetite.

thursday, july 30th the kids and i went to atlanta bread company for lunch and then the library and then off to ren's house to play some more with jana and her boys and eat and talk and laugh and paint toenails.

friday, july 31st we met up with ren and jana in jonesborough for MOTS. jana got a t-shirt for coming the farthest (from california).

saturday, august 1st, karina and taylor came over for the day to hang out. we went grocery shopping and frightened all the innocent people with our craziness!!

sunday was a redbox movie night...journey to the center of the earth and watchmen.

monday was going to be a blueberry picking day with ren and family...but they were all picked clean (glad i called before we left). so we made it another river day and met up with jana and family again. afterwards, scotty joined us all (minus ren and jalen who had other plans) at el torito's for supper. yum!

tuesday, august 4th was my sister's 40th birthday. she lives in knoxville so we all (my parents and my other sisters and their families) drove there to surprise her. it was an amazing surprise that was all planned by her daughter. when we all walked in, my sister just cried. it was really beautiful to be there in that moment when she needed us most.

thursday, august 6th was hangout day with sofh at carver park. we did some planning while the kids played on the playground and inside (i think they were playing a lot of chess that day). i went home with 4 extra kids, sierra, jalen, karina, and taylor. i'm so blessed!! i did not have to actually birth all of the children i wanted to have (i think i had wanted 5 or 6) and yet i have them!

friday, august 7th...FIRST FRIDAY!! alice, rachel, and jake came up from asheville to go with us. also, deanna, ren, jana, jess, & barb were all there...hope i didn't leave anyone out!! as usual, there was art, music, and dancing!! AND some amazing fresh donuts being fried and glazed right on the spot...these things were HUGE and only 1.50 each. i keep hoping they'll come back again!! the boys found pleasure in going around to the bars asking for diet water and getting kicked out. oh those wacky unschoolers!!

saturday, august 8th...we had a big sleepover with iris, audrey, and nesta!! us mommas finally got it worked out after promising them for awhile. silas and nesta stayed up ALL NIGHT!! the girls made some cool shirts that sierra had showed sadie how to make!!

sunday, august 9th...i finished up a painting that had been sitting undone for years!

silas finally went to bed for awhile to get some rest as we had a trip planned for later to go to rocky mount for the blacksmithing demonstration. he did not want to get up and so we almost didn't go but then he got up and we met with deanna and doug to drop off the kids before heading to the demo.

the girls sporting their new outfits!!

the kids were hungry so we hit pal's on the way to rocky mount. always hot and delicious!!

one of the blacksmithers in action

silas had been wanting to learn more about blacksmithing and this was our first attempt at getting him some exposure to it. he was so tired and it was so hot that it was hard for him to enjoy it fully. maybe another time. still, he seemed pretty glad we went. we finished up our giant pal's teas so we could get ourselves awake and ready to go to my sister's house at 5 o'clock for my nephew's 14th birthday celebration!!

video gaming

some tickling

hanging out

playing the settlers of catan

monday, august 10th was scotty's day off so we walked around downtown, ate at unique treasures for lunch and then went to artopia for some art supplies. later we went to verizon for hours and hours and hours to get our 2 year free phone upgrade and a new line for scotty. we had planned to head home for supper but at this point we were tired and neither of us felt like cooking so we went to the mall food court!! then we hit the redbox and picked up a couple movies for later: coraline and the day the earth stood still.

tuesday was another movie day with 17 again and gigantic

wednesday i worked in the garden a bit...but realized just how much i FAILED at it this year. still learning so much!!

thursday, august 13th...DAIRY QUEEN MIRACLE TREAT DAY, we met up at DQ with ren, jess, deanna, barb, and jana and their families to support the children's miracle network by buying blizzards. oh the hard things we do!! it was also tyler's birthday!!

friday, wes came by to show samuel his new guitar.

saturday, august 15th we went to the mall to pick out some video games for my nephew's 11th birthday and then ate at petro's in the food court...yum...gas...yum. we get the vegetarian chili on our taco salad. sometimes they accidentally give you the meat chili so the kids usually ask me to check it because i know what meat looks like and what tvp looks like. samuel said that he didn't care if he got meat because even though he didn't want to eat meat, he would rather eat it because he knew that if he took it back it would just get thrown away and that was just too wasteful and also wasted of part of that animal's life. wow. i didn't know he felt that way. i think that's a pretty awesome way to look at it. i have no pictures of the birthday party but i do have this one that i took earlier that day:

my kids are weird

saturday, august 16th...asheville time again!! we headed to the wechgelaer's house for a little hanging out, games, talking, lauging and eating...and some downtown action. it was also jess' birthday!!!

sadie and sierra learn how to use the serger and make some really cool stuff

some gaming

talking and hanging in the kitchen

samuel using his powers to stack oranges

success!

a little twister

and computer time...probably watching funny youtube videos!!

crash time!!

the next day we went downtown to walk around and soak up those amazing asheville vibes!! we ate at the delicious mellow mushroom which is coming to our very own jc real soon!!! we also went to true blue art store where i found the most amazing caran d' ache oil pastels, which i wrote about somewhere in this post.

this is for tyler!!! your very own building!!!

what an amazing mural...so much color and shape and yumminess...hey, we match it!!!

a very cool tall bike!! we talked to the guy who made it, he was pretty cool too!!

you can imagine my excitement when i saw these amazing paintings!!!

and this amazing sign!!! asheville has the best galleries!

samuel took a picture of this flyer

snack time at malaprop's

some dancing outside the bookstore

jalen in the red wagon! his poor little foot was too sore for walking!

music outside the bookstore

rested up for a few days and then on wednesday i started working on a piece using my new oil pastels!!

thursday, august 20th...sofh at carver...i have no memory of this day!! was this the day the kids played in the creek all day or was that the next park day?? oh my!!

friday, august 21st...headed to georgia to spend the weekend with the traaseths!! it was the last weekend of the monet exhibit at the high museum in atlanta and they invited us to join them.

kyra showing samuel how to play a song

that big ball is super fun!!!

well, as it turned out only 4 of us went to the museum, everyone else hung out back at the house.

sadie's first ride on the metro!!

there was some really awesome artwork in the tunnels of the metro (actually i think it's called something else???)

atlanta has some really really really tall buildings! we took a wrong turn coming out of the metro but it was worth it because there was a beautiful park and these amazing buildings!!

sadie and monet

sadie and abbi sitting on a chair/table wood sculpture thingy

i took this before the guy told me there was no digital photgraphy allowed, but...

you can take pictures with a camera phone. little did he know that my camera phone would take a better picture!!

more art in the tunnels

waiting for the train

talking on the phone with scotty...i couldn't hear anything!!

again with the mural art

doing some wowing together...i think

rock band??

monday, august 24th...on the way home, i had to stop at this overlook. it's the tallulah gorge!!

do not puke, do not puke, do not puke

we got home around supper time AND scotty was home so we went out to barberito's and ate out on the patio in the almost rain. it was a good ending to our weekend.

tuesday, august 25th...one night of rest and it was time for the picnic day with sofh at the splashpad in kinsport. i was really happy to see so many people show up!! what an awesome place! jc needs one of these...there are rumors that carver will put one in next year!! when the kids were all done with the park, we went to hobby lobby...which is like michael's but with more home decor stuff. i found an awesome quilting magazine that really inspired me...so i had to get it. i've since been working on painted and quilted fabric. more on that later. then the kids and i went to the thrift store. and then home to rest...FINALLY!!

the scariest park equipment ever!!!!

see, they come with warnings! remember how they took out all the "old" equipment because it wasn't safe???

silas and colin have a "pee" war

mmmm that new baby smell

and then there's lots of gratuitous water splashing...just for you ren!!

just us IRLS!

thursday, i took my sewing machine in to be repaired...determined to do this cool quilting thing!! worked on several pieces and then it was off to ren's house for imagination tribe!!

friday was a quiet day, it was also my parents' anniversary and my niece's birthday. we got redbox movies that were supposed to be comedies but really they were not! sunshine cleaning and adventureland.

saturday we went to the library and then to ruby tuesday's where samuel bumped the overhanging lamp shade and it fell down onto our table. it was not securely anchored. only damage was spilled water. but still, i want a free something or other. oh well. then lots of shopping for groceries and such.

sunday i finally picked one of our watermelon. okay, it actually sort of got pulled up accidentally, but it was good, and sweet and had a nice texture. i went to a drawing session with a live model at the tattoo/art gallery downtown. it was a huge reminder that i need to brush up on my figure drawing. later, we got some chips and redbox movies, i love you, man and labor pains.

monday, august 31st...was scotty's day off, we went for a walk and then to jason's deli for supper.

well that's all i can remember of august. september shouldn't be too hard to remember, right???

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