The summer is slipping away. . .

My life is about to tumble into chaos. What am I doing to myself? I have writers cramp from signing up six kids for school. You would think that the The Luddite School District would have us able to sign up online, but that is not the case. The Luddite School District has us doing everything on paper. I asked if they had string and cans set up at the middle school or if they were up to rotary dials yet and they were not impressed with my sense of humour.

I took Cloud in (8th grade) to sign up and one of the narcs was razzing her, “I see a young lady who wants classes in fashion?” Cloud said, “I can learn that on my own. What I want are some good math and science classes.”

He laughed and said he could get her some hard teachers and she blinked at him and said, “I just want someone who can teach science and math.”

Guy is going in to 6th grade. He’s quite happy about it. He has wanted to be an FBI agent but finally realized that with his speech impairments and reading problems that it won’t happen, so he is shifting gears toward being a mechanic or a carpenter. I told him that this is great, that he can build his own home and live happily. “Chicks dig a man who can fix a bathroom door!” He blushed! He is so cute.

I am getting Basil, Dmitri and Mudd into a language immersion school up the road from me. With Mudd in kindergarten and Calamity Jane at a different school that I am on the board at, I'll have four sets of times to get kids to school. I think we’ll be going to bed at 21:00. I don’t know when I will write for pay. The language immersion will be hard at first. The boys did not learn any of their language over the summer, and they are expected to be reading books that kids in a particular country read at their ages. It’s OK that they didn’t—none of the other kids were doing much, either. They will be doing study groups and working their asses off this year. In a way it is good that I don’t have a lot of money because all they will have time for is school anyway. It will be a challenge. Families have to put in time at the school, four hours each month. Cloud has been putting in the Crumpet hours there—she enjoys going in and helping with the work crews of parents and older siblings, even though she is too old to attend.

Starshine is hilarious. I love the age of 4. I loved the age of 4 with all my kids. (She'll will be 4 next month.) The other day after church I decided to go on a walk instead of going straight home after coffee hour. (Actually, Mudd and I had gone for a walk during church—The Lake beckoned next door! Mr. Crumpet glared at us after a long absence and we tried to sneak n’ slosh back in, both of us with wet shoes! Oops!) As we walked around the back roads in the area, we found the Alaskan equivalent of wild raspberries, watermelon berries, red currants. . . Starshine kept saying, “Look! Nature’s gifts!” Yes, she gets it from me. Then of course she is clingy-- they go through a few phases of clinging as they go from babyhood to 5 years (my mom says “babyhood to 30 years.”) At several points, I got too far away from her and she said, “Mother! You get over here this minute! I have a hand that is free and that needs to be held!” One hand was on her hip, the other hand and pointed index finger were making my wrist gesture of, “Get over here now!”

We were playing Go Fish last night and she is learning her numbers. She knows them, sorta. She has little cards with fish on them and on one, there is a zero. I asked her what number was there and she said, “Four.” We had been saying each number and counting the fish and I said, “Starshine! There are no fish in here! Where do you see four fish?” She explained to me that they were hiding and that she had a very silly story about the mommy fish wanting to make them eat dinner but how they wanted to play hide and seek outside for “just a half hour more!”

Oh-- with church. I don't go often. In the summer, my personal time alone to clean, write, paint, muse alone, is non existent so my husband takes the kids to church. I go more often in the winter, but I still need my down time. I went to make sure that I saw our priest before he leaves in two weeks for more school. I told him why i don't go. He got on me, "Oh, you mustn't take for granted the blood and body of Christ!" (Communion.) I don't even feel a connection to my church, I don't feel like I belong, and he said that? With seven kids still st home, he thinks that I take church for granted? Does he know how little time I have alone?!! So annoying. I felt more cut off from this church than ever when he said that. Mental note to self: claim that I am on my menstrual cycle all the time so I don't go, then he'll do the guy thing, "Oh! Mmmm. We miss ya." Some women don't go while on their cycles.

Basil was very funny last week. I tried a new tactic on getting the kids to clean their rooms and pick up after themselves. Some Ph.D. from Quebec said that parents need to make doing a job it’s own reward and to instill in the kids how good we feel when doing something like picking up clutter. I asked him to take care of the kitchen while I did something else and, following male role model's ways, he told a younger child to do it. I got upset with him and told him to do it. He didn’t as he got preoccupied with the laptop. I went in ten minutes later and he said, “Why should I deprive you of the satisfaction and good feeling this brings you?” He was cracking up then and apologized and did it!