Tuesday

Today I finished disk 5 of Total French with Michel Thomas.  Only two disks to go!  I thought I'd show you one of the longer things that I've had to translate lately, complete with me actually doing it.  Please try not to mind my embarrassingly bad accent.  (You know what's not fair?  That I'm the one with the desire, but Baylee, who could honestly take or leave French, has a perfect little accent.  It's really annoying.)  Also, I make two mistakes.  1)  I say "At what time do you want to be here" instead of "at what time are you going to be here" and 2) I say "la diner" instead of "le diner."  Anyway, here it is...

(I guess I should mention that the format for this review portion of the program is that he says it in English, I translate to French, he says it in French so I can see if I was right, and then we do the same thing with the next part.)

Monday

Drew went out on a date yesterday, his second with this girl whose name is Jennifer.  They bummed around Seattle Center, eating Asian food and going up to the top of the Space Needle.

The first time they met, and the first time I happened to see her, was at the season preview show where Drew played this:

She was in the audience and I remember thinking (before I knew anything about her or that she and Drew would date) that she was the most beautiful girl there.   Apparently, when Drew finished his song and went out into the crowd to enjoy the other performances, Jennifer approached him and asked him if he would call her phone because "she lost it."  When he called it, it rang in her purse.  lol  Now she had his number.  She began texting him here and there, and that led to him asking her out a couple times.

In other news, I'm reading a couple books that have to do with France.  One is called French Kids Eat Everything, about a family that moves to France for a year and learns to eat like the French.  I got a couple things out of this book:

1. By French standards we did a really good job, food-wise, raising our kids.   First of all, we scheduled our babies instead of fed them on demand.  I stand by this wholeheartedly to this day as the best, most sanity-saving thing we could've possibly done.  Second, when our kids were younger we had a rule that they could take or leave whatever was served at a meal, but that if they did decide to leave it, then the next opportunity to eat wouldn't come again until the next meal.  This easily created 2 very unpicky eaters in our boys, and 1 only semi-picky eater in our girl.  (She's picky by our standards, but not, probably, by most people's.)  
2. Very limited snacking is good for everyone, even me.  I'm working on it.

The other book I'm reading is called Flirting with French:  How a Language Charmed Me, Seduced Me, and Nearly Broke My Heart.  It's about a man who, as a 50-something year old adult, tries to learn French and has a hard time with it.  I haven't read much yet, but I did get to a part where he and his wife ride around the French countryside on bikes after he's only had a few months of cramming with Rosetta Stone.  It was a bit of a disaster.  I think I know more French right now (mostly because of Michel Thomas) than he did at that point.  Anyway, I'm looking forward to reading the whole thing and seeing his progress.

Saturday

Here's one last picture of our time at the lake yesterday.  If you look closely, you can see Baylee and Rachel sitting out on the floating dock.  If you're a kid (16 and under, I think) you have to pass a swimming test in order to play out there.  The test is to swim nonstop from one marked point to another while a lifeguard watches you, and it's a long way!

So I figured out how to handle it when I get in over my head in French.  I go back to when I didn't feel frustrated and overwhelmed, and then work my way forward again.  Suddenly everything becomes clear and I wonder what my problem was in the first place.  There's probably some sort of good life lesson in that.

Friday

I took Baylee and Rachel to the lake.  It was a beautiful, hot day for it!  To make it even better, after we'd been there for a little while my friend Beth joined us with two of her kids.  It was a really nice time.

(Sorry those pics are both kind of weird.  I took them with my phone, and I couldn't see the screen well at all because the sun was so bright.)

Also today I ran across this cartoon...

My first thought after reading it was that it could also say, "I'm walking abreast of myself."  It would be very different set of drawings, though.

French

Okay, I'll admit it.  A couple days ago I got through a section of a French lesson that made my brain hurt.  I got a little overwhelmed, turned it off, left it off the rest of that day and all day yesterday, and now I'm forcing myself to go back to it.  The lesson has to do with giving or sending 'him/her/it/them" to "him/her/it/them."  The way the French handle that is hard to explain, but it's like they layer the pronouns in front of the verb.  Sigh.  Today I feel too old for this.

Random

Today is turning out to be an "I don't wanna" day.  I don't wanna do any of my extra housework;* I don't wanna work on French; I don't wanna run errands.  So...lazy afternoon, coming right up!  (Well, I'll probably still do French.)

---------------------------------------------

Drew recently came up to me and said:

"I'm playing a game that's kind of like Sim City, but it's set in a post-apocalyptic era.  I'm an overseer in charge of a group of people, and it's my job to make sure they survive.  I'm a pro.  Well...I mean...the first time I played they all died of starvation.  The second time they all died of radiation poisoning.  But this time my people love me!  They say things like, 'I'm writing a song about our overseer.  What rhymes with 'great'?"

----------------------------------------------  

Every time the academic adviser for South Ridge Christian Academy calls me from Ohio, she forgets all about the time zone difference.  Twice now she's woken me out of a dead sleep, once at 5AM and once at 7AM.  She should be thankful I'm Dutch.    

---------------------------------------------- 

Baylee had her first rehearsal for her new summer show last night.  I almost hate to admit this, but she's doing AC/DC this season.  AC/DC's music is on the simple side, so the show has a ton of younger kids in it.  I'm talking less than 10 years old.  In fact, it has so many of them that the director decided that every older kid would be paired with a younger one in a buddy system.  Baylee got paired with the loudest, wildest one of all, a little girl named Xiola.

----------------------------------------------

*There are things I do every day, but then I usually do one or two extras as well.  Like I might change sheets or dust a room or clean the shower tiles...stuff that doesn't need to be done daily.

This and That

The other day these two filled up a ton of balloons, so that the little kids in the neighborhood could have a fun water fight with them.  I caught them in a moment of laughter.

Last night I had a dream that the rapture happened and the Tribulation was starting, and I was left behind and was hiding in a closet.  Weirdly, though, a lot of the characters from Anne of Green Gables figured into it somehow.   Anne wasn't all that nice, to be honest.

Doesn't he look like he died out there?  That's wishful thinking not true, of course.  He just loves to sleep in patches of sunshine.

Happy Birthday, Zach

We celebrated Zach's 20th birthday yesterday!  He let me get a couple pictures, so you can see how he looks now that he's not a teen anymore, and what he looks like with his new, straight, invisalign-less smile!

PS:  Zach's teeth were never that bad to begin with, but to give you a comparison, this was his smile before the invisaligns...

Sunday

 Happy Father's Day!  Mike is going to celebrate by going on a long bike ride with his friend Dan, who owns R&E Bikes.

-------------------------------------------------------

Today Zach and Drew were watching Bizarre Foods together, and I walked in just long enough to see a bit of the show and be a part of this little snippet of conversation...

Zach:  They get the milk straight from the horse's udder.

Me:  I don't think it's called an udder if it's a horse.

Zach:  Teat, then.

Drew:  Horses' milk is the sweetest milk you could ever taste.  It's just that it goes sour quickly, so you have to use it right away.

Zach:  Ah.

Me:  I'll pass.

------------------------------------------------------

A neighborhood game of 4-square yesterday afternoon...

--------------------------------------------------------

Listen to what Michel had us do in the lesson I just finished.  This is from somewhere in the 4th or 5th hour of his teaching...

And I could do it!

Saturday

Mike and I had such a nice afternoon yesterday celebrating our 22nd anniversary.  We ended up walking around the Greenwood area of Seattle until we found a likely place to eat, which turned out to be a tiny Middle Eastern restaurant with a sign outside that said the food tastes like it was cooked by a fussy Egyptian mother.  Well, how could we resist that?  We went in, sat at a narrow table right up against the front window, and enjoyed delicious food while talking together and people watching.  Mike took this picture of me while we were there...

 
Afterward we walked a bit more until we came to a coffeehouse, and that's where we had dessert.

All in all it was a wonderful time.  I love low-key dates.

In completely other news, here are two recent pictures of Baylee and Rachel. Baylee's at that age now where sometimes she looks like a teenager, and sometimes she looks like a kid.  It's a bit jangling.

 

Last night I sat down, determined to fight my way through this tricky part of French...and I did it!  First I spent an hour reviewing, then I listened to all of disk three while taking notes.  (According to Michel, I broke one of the "ground rules" by doing that.  He doesn't want you to take any notes or do anything extra.  Oh well.)  Anyway, now I have a much firmer grasp of French verbs. 

Friday

Awhile back I decided to put French away until summer, when I would have more time to devote to it.  Well, it's summer, and a few days ago I picked it back up again.  If you remember, I joined the kids and took (and finished!) high school French 1 using the Learnables program this school year, but I wanted to add something that has more of a speaking emphasis, so I started doing Michel Thomas' Total French.  That's the one I've started up again.  I'm so enjoying it.  Michel Thomas is like a grandfather that you love, but that you sort of fear at the same time.  He's nice and really smart, but he can also be impatient and gruff.  (Not to me, of course, as I'm not really there, but to the other two students who are with him.  I've felt sorry for the woman a few different times now.)  Anyway, I've finished two CDs and I'm on the third.  We're going into more detail about verbs now, and for the first time I feel a bit lost.  I'm just going to keep listening over and over until it clicks.

PS:  I discovered that there's a review CD.  It has Michel saying things in English, which you're to say back in French.  Then he says them in French and you can see if you were right.  In using it I've been absolutely amazed at what I know.  I can say very long sentences.  This program is incredible.

Today is Mike and my 22nd anniversary!  In a little while we're going downtown to bum around together.  I can't wait.

Wednesday

Just for clarification:

Johann Sebastian Bach...

Sebastian Bach...

The difference is slight, but it's there.

Today was our first day of summer!!!  Yay!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Although, to be honest, it was fairly uneventful.  I cleaned the inside of the fridge (and the rest of the house).   Right now it's noisy around here because Drew has a drummer friend over and they're jamming.

Lately I've been totally hooked on the Anne of Green Gables series.  (I'm talking about the books, not the PBS show.)  So far I've read Anne of Green Gables, Anne of Avonlea, Anne of the Island, and now I'm on Anne of Windy Poplars.  I love them.  I'm so into them that when Mike leaves for work at around 4:30am, I often kiss him goodbye and then stay up for an hour or two to read more.


PS:  Is it just me or does Johann Sebastian Bach have really pudgy, overly-smooth hands?  I can almost feel his soft, clammy handshake.

This and That

Sunset in Seattle, taken from high up in a parking garage the other night...

 -----------------------------------------------

That moment you get into a disagreement with your daughter over whether or not the...umm...Always brand product you bought is the right kind, and you end it with, "It's fine!  Period!" and the entire argument disintegrates into helpless giggles.  #win

------------------------------------------------

This is our last day of school!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Drew has one last English test, and then we'll have a nice summer vacation before Drew starts his senior year and Baylee becomes a freshman.  I've got their curricula all planned out, and some of it will be new, but I'm not anywhere near ready to talk about it yet.  That'll wait until August when I'm not burned out to a crisp.
-------------------------------------------------

I forgot to post this picture yesterday.  It's the end of the show, when all the kids were coming out onto the stage and the audience was clapping for them.

The guy in the black hat on the left, Michael, was the director, and the tall guy with the long blonde hair, Robbie, was the assistant director.  Both of them were incredibly kind and motivating.  Directors come in all flavors.  Some have a tough love style, some are a bit too nice, some are all business, and some are on the mean side.  Michael and Robbie seemed to be able to find a really good balance between encouragement and high standards.

PS:  I may be the only person here who has ever heard of the 80's band Skid Row or watched Gilmore Girls, where he was a recurring guest star, and if that's the case, then never mind, you won't get it, but doesn't Robbie look like Sebastian Bach???

Sebastian Bach...

source

Roots Rock Show!

Baylee had her first show last night and it was wonderful!  First of all, it was in a new venue that the school has never played at before, called The Triple Door.  It's a very fancy dinner theater downtown, where instead of seats there are tiers of booths.  Everyone got to eat a really nice meal, and then the show started.  The stage and sound and lights were incredible, and...well...it was just classy.  Luckily this was the perfect show for such a venue, as it was mild, fun, old fashioned rock-and-roll, done well.  Oh, and the place was sold out!

We were so proud of Baylee.  She got out there and did her thing, and she looked calm and capable (and cute).  Being a drummer is a little bit scary, I think, because you have to start almost every song.  That means you set the tempo.  She did fine, though.

Before we left...

Danny and Zach waiting for the doors to open...

Drew and Patty enjoying dinner before the show...

The stage and about half of the seating area.

Baylee on stage...

This song was my favorite.

One of the older boys, Drew's friend Emmitt, helped Baylee out on this one by moving the congas up to where they were supposed to be.  lol  Oops.  Baylee said that all those older kids in the show were very kind to her.

And here are a couple more snippets...

Weekend

We're having such a crazy weekend.  Yesterday was the "I Heart the 80's" show, which Drew helped with.  He was a guest in "Welcome Home," by King Diamond, but he also helped with "Jump" and "Push it to the Limit."  It was a somewhat fun time.  To be honest, it was really long and really hot.  The venue, Hard Rock Cafe, was also very...meh.  It was clean and nice, but the set up was weird.  Oh well.

As usual, we had to get Drew there early, so Mike and I messed around downtown.  Oh!  We saw a fight break out between two men.  A real fight.  It was scary and violent and bloody.  (I didn't get any pictures, which means I officially failed the internet.)  The great thing was that the Seattle police were there almost immediately.  I have no idea how they did that, except that they must have a huge presence in the Pioneer Square area, which was where we were.

Mike and I ate at this fun little disgustingly dirty fish market.  The food was delicious.

Now today we're gearing up for Baylee's first show!  Also, it's Zach's 20th birthday!  We're going to celebrate him next weekend, when we'll have lots of time.  I'll just say now, though, that I can't believe I have a 20 year old.  How did that happen???

One of Those Weeks

Man, we've got the crud over here.  Mike has been sick for 3 or 4 days with a low-grade fever, aches, and chills.  He even took a couple days off of work, which he rarely does.  Now Drew just came to me and said that he doesn't feel right.  The problem with Drew being sick is that he has a performance tomorrow.  He's a guest in the "I Heart the 80's" show, as he was asked to come in and do the lead guitar part for one of their songs.  Is it bad that I gave him sympathy, but told him that pretty much no matter what he's still got to be on stage tomorrow?  I said we'll fill him with meds and prop him up if we need to.  Also, as all this is happening, Mike is being tested for sleep apnea.  (I'm positively sure he's got it and has had it for many years.  I sleep next to the guy.  I know.)  They start out with home testing, so he was all hooked up to tubes and stuff last night.  Calgon.

Oh yeah, and yesterday my email was hacked and pretty much every person in my life was sent a letter, supposedly from me, saying that my family was on vacation in the Philippines when we were attacked and robbed at gunpoint.  "I" was asking for money to help us get back home.  Starting at around 11am or so my phone began to ring and my email started to buzz.  Everyone in the world, it felt like, wanted to let me know that this scam had happened.  (They all realized it was fake right away.  Well, except for one friend, who said she cried over it.  Sigh.)  I think I've got it all squared away now, except that my email is officially broken somehow.  I changed the password and messed with the privacy settings, and now it doesn't receive any mail whatsoever.  (I'm a regular computer genius!)  I'm going to need to make a new one, I guess.  It's probably time anyway.  I've had the same e-mail address for about 10 years.


PS:  Now if we ever are attacked at gunpoint in Manila, and I need people to "help me with a loan of $2,500 or whatever amount they can spare right now," nobody is going to believe me.  



 

Almost Done

I know I said we'd be finished with the school year by this time, but...eh.  When we thought about it, we realized that there's not much sense in killing ourselves in order to be done so much earlier than the public schools.  So we paced ourselves, and now we're finishing pretty much exactly at the same time as the school across the street.

Today I looked at one of the bookcases in Baylee's room, and I realized that one whole shelf is taken up with books she's read this year.  It's crazy how many books she's gone through!  I mean, I knew it was a lot, but I had no idea it was that much, because I bought the books in 9-week increments.  Anyway, I took everything off the shelf and stacked it all up, and here it is...

That's everything (not including the Bible itself and selections from a few textbook spines) for Bible, history, and reading for her 8th grade year.

Here's what she hasn't finished yet, so now it's summer reading...

Challenge

The difference between me and Mike when it comes to dieting is this:  When Mike jumps onboard he's well and truly in it for the long haul.  He tracks his calories every day and just doesn't waver.  By contrast, when I diet the smallest thing often makes me fall off the wagon, and once I'm off I'm likely to stay off for a week or more.  I just sit there under the wagon surrounded by candy wrappers.  Anyway, I was talking to Mike about this yesterday, and it occurred to me that it might be a good idea to challenge myself to stay completely on-track for a certain, specified length of time.  I could even give myself a prize if I make it.  Doesn't that sound kind of fun?  Sooooo, long story short, I came up with...[drum roll]...

100 Days of Abstinence

(grin)

It means that for the next 100 days...and you guys can be my witnesses...I'm going to stay totally on-plan with no cheating.  Day 1 is half over.  So far, so good.

    

Tuesday

Because I was talking about patience the other day...

 

They were watching the movie Sharknado together.

In case you're wondering, Zach is done with his invisaligns and his teeth are beautiful!  I'm waiting to take a picture, though, because I'd really like him to get a haircut first.  Speaking of Zach, his boss went out of town all of last week, and Zach held down the fort and kept the shop running.  I'm really proud of him.

Here's the last video I'll post from the MJ vs Prince show.  I think it's cute because at one point Miranda grabs Drew's arm and moves him forward.  Miranda and Drew have sung/played together so many times over these last couple years that they're sort of at the "old married couple" stage.  In other words, they work well together, but they have moments when they bug the crud out of each other.   lol 

Michael Jackson vs Prince Show

Yesterday was the Michael Jackson vs. Prince show.  We had to get Drew to the venue (Nectar, my favorite one) early for a sound check and stuff, so Mike, Baylee, Patty, and I bummed around the Fremont area of Seattle for awhile.

Fremont Farmer's Market

Enjoying the sunshine with the Fremont Bridge in the background

This cool elderly woman was busking in the farmer's market.  She told me to mention that her name is Mariide Widmann and her music is free on the internet.

The advertisement

There was a HUGE crowd!  It was pretty much wall-to-wall people both on the floor and in the balcony.

My favorite song that Drew was in was Michael Jackson's "Beat It."  Everybody did a good job...the tiny little girl on keyboard was a riot.  She had enough energy for about three kids...and Drew nailed his solo at the 2:45 mark.

"Thriller" was a good one, too.  Drew played the bass and you can hear him clearly.

 Drew got to start off "When Doves Cry," by Prince.

Saturday

Here's Baylee and her friend Lily, who played one of the "hot box girls" in the middle school play we saw last night, Guys and Dolls.  Actually, it was called Guys and Dolls Jr., which I think means they shortened it and possibly took out some bad parts.  The kids did a good job and it was fun, but if I was in charge of any middle school drama program I'd stick to well-loved classics like Peter Pan and The Sound of Music.  That's just me, though.

Well, today is mostly about driving kids around.  Drew is going to help at a fundraiser that has an open invitation to bring your instrument and "jam," and then later Baylee and Drew are going downtown to see one of the SoR shows.  It's one that neither of them are in, called Herstory of Rock.  It's about girl rock bands.

Also today I need to go grocery shopping to fill our Mother Hubbard's cupboards.  Here's something they don't tell you about having three teens in the house at the same time:  Food disappears.  It's like...you know that scene in Little House on the Prairie where locusts arrive in a cloud that blacks out the sun, then they descend upon the land and eat everything down to a nub?   That's my life right now.

Friday

Did I ever tell you that I grew up* in a town that had a motto?  It was "Where nature smiles for seven miles."  It was written on the welcome sign and everything.  Poll:  Is that a good motto or is it kind of dorky?

Another couple weeks and we'll be completely done with this season of SoR.  This season was very challenging, mostly because Drew was at the school just shy of 13 hours a week (4 3-hour rehearsals and a 45-minute lesson) , plus he sometimes had house band gigs.   Besides his stuff, we were at the SoR two more times during the week for Baylee (once for her lesson and once for her rehearsal).  Anyway!  It was crazy and I'm extremely glad that we're scaling way back this summer.  Each kid will have lessons and be in one show.  Easy.

Tonight Baylee and I are going to see her friend Lily perform in a middle school production of Guys and Dolls.  It should be fun.

I wrote a whole paragraph about the Duggar scandal, but I erased it.  I'm not going into it.  I will say, though, that I've never liked their show for one simple reason:  Jim Bob gives me flop sweats.  He SO awkward that I just can't watch the guy.  I'm probably the only Christian homeschooling mom in the entire world who feels this way, but there it is.



*Well...not really.  Actually, we moved there the summer before my freshman year of high school, so I only lived there full-time for 4 year.  My family, however, is still there to this day.

Thursday

Last night I made crockpot white chicken chili and it was delicious.  Everyone liked it, even Baylee.  (She's our resident picky eater.  Only recently...I'm talking within the last month or so...has she gotten to a point where she doesn't have to ask for her McDonald's burger to be made with "only ketchup.")   Here's the recipe.

Yesterday I was quizzing Baylee on her science when we came across the word "meteoroidal."  Is it just me or is that word sort of gross?  The problem is that hemorrhoids have just ruined the English language for all other words containing the "roid" sound.

Back in the late 1990's and early 2000's one of my favorite shows on TV was something called the Eco-Challenge.  It was a filmed adventure race, in which teams of 4 would travel over 300 miles in about a week or so, and on the way they'd be running, kayaking, mountain climbing, hiking, horseback riding, etc.  It was awesome!  It hasn't been on the air for a decade or more, but the other day I found whole seasons of it on YouTube.  So that's where I've been the last few days:  glued to it.  So far I've watched Eco-Challenge Fiji and British Colombia, and now I'm on Morocco.

One of the other SoR moms sent me this picture of something Drew was in several months ago. There were big screens at this place, which would show what was happening on the stage. It was cool.

Today on Facebook I got into a conversation about homeschooling, and as usual somebody brought up patience.  Lots of people truly believe that homeschoolers have more patience than they do.  In fact, I'd say that 99% of the time when someone finds out I homeschool, the first thing they say is, "Oh, I don't have the patience for that."  Here's the thing:  I promise you that I'm no more long-suffering than the next mom.  What I am is organized.  I'm on top of what's going on while we're schooling, and because of that our plans and attitudes don't usually spiral.  That's not patience; that's crowd control.

Tool Show

Yesterday was the Tool show, which was an advanced show.  That means the students had to be advanced to be in it, and they had to have permission from both the director and their own teachers.  To be honest, Tool has such incredibly difficult music (stuff like time signatures you didn't even know existed) that nobody was sure these kids could pull it off.  Zeke even said that the teachers from other Schools of Rock around the country told him it couldn't be done.  All that said...

The show was awesome!  I heard through the grapevine that the people who work at the Crocodile, the venue where they were last night, said it was one of the best shows they've ever had come play there.  And that includes the professionals!

Anyway, I'm proud of all those kids.  They put in a lot of blood, sweat, and tears.

Here's a little bit of one of the songs Drew was in.

PS:  When Drew turns around and walks to the back of the stage, it's because he's playing right next to an amp back there in order to get feedback.  That's what made that high note.

PPS:  This video sounds the best played loud!