Too Much to Write About

I will attempt to catch you up on our recent happenings. I can hardly believe I didn't write one blog post during October, but I did have a lot going on. This post will give you some of the goings-on, while keeping it a brief summary.

• Brooke started speech therapy at the local public school. It was a major pain getting her set up. In fact, it simply cements my belief in homeschool. I cannot believe the disorganization and hassles that went on just getting her started, and I am not exaggerating. In fact, today, when I took her over to the school for her scheduled session, (and it's a solid 17 min. drive one way), they made us wait 25 min. before they finally told me (after I asked them again, where the teacher was!), that she was sick today. She was sick yest. and called in again today. Hello!! Why didn't anybody call to tell me? We had to turn around and drive home with no session for our efforts. So, though it's a royal pain in the neck, we're going faithfully 2 times a week for 20 min. a session. Our drive time almost doubles her treatment time.
  
• I have been attending a women's seminar at church. It's about every 3 weeks. It is by a well-recognized local homeschool leader in our community, actually, and the meetings are very good. I've been to 4 meetings now, and there is one or two left. They have been very inspiring, and are helping me to think about how I can be a more Excellent Woman, able to influence and nurture my family for the good.
  
• The economy is hurting our construction related business pretty badly. This has been a major stressor. Trying to figure out what to do to help, I have sought part-time work that won't require me to put the kids into school. Also, hubby has a hard time getting home at a "set" time since he's running our business in town. He can't simply punch a clock and leave stuff for the next day. I had 2 solid job possibilities, but they both fell through.
  
• Another option for making some money, and certainly hubby's idea was selling stuff on ebay. I got it all set up, and sold 3 things, but the time involved, and the hassles of not getting paid, then the fees for listing the stuff, cement my distaste for the value of making any appreciable money on ebay. If it works for you, I tip my hat to you.
• Quilting--I have been quilting. I've finished 2 quilts since my MIL's quilt, and have 2 more half done, with one more started. I'll show you pictures in separate blog posts soon. Not only have I been quilting, but I've got 2 neighbors hooked as well. They are quilting away, and bring me their quilts to show me. It's neat to see them so excited about it, and it's neat to have some quilting friends to share with. My one neighbor L hadn't used a sewing machine since 7th grade in home-ec. She's about 7 yrs. older than me, so it's been a long time. But I love to see her having so much fun with it.
• Our homeschooling endeavors are going pretty well, though. We are finding much more consistency and less resistance this year. It's kind of nice to see the kids growing up in a lot of areas. Are they perfect kids? Certainly not. But we see progress in certain areas. This has not been easy either, when our school time has been cut into so much with the speech therapy.
• And finally, we have been very involved in following politics and the economy. It's pretty comical to see our kids "talk" politics and issues with people they meet when we go into town to run our errands. Even the little one can tell you what she thinks about what's been going on. All three of them are full of opinions. : )
  

Well, it doesn't look like much when I put it all down on "paper".