A Sick Day

Don't expect anything prophetic today. Nothing incredibly deep or enlightened, instructional, comic, or inspirational. My bones feel like rubber, my eyelids like lead, and my throat like the dry underbelly of a dust-grubbing pig.

I am sick.

It was inevitable. Several very late nights with early alarm clocks and jam-packed days is a sure recipe for immuno-dysfunction. I'm there.

We all slept in until 9:30am today. My son was the first one out of bed. A very, very rare event indeed. My daughter made me breakfast (a buttery fried egg atop a wheat bagel) and hot tea. Then we all snuggled on the couch under fluffy warm blankets reading our books. Oh, joyous moment of a home schooled family's day.

Today, mostly because I was exhausted, I didn't continually pull out their planners to see how we were coming on projects. Asher stayed in his jammies until 4:00pm when I insisted he dress if he wanted to go out front and play. Cady dressed to the hilt, as usual. I donned my sweats and warm sweater, fuzzy Crocs, no makeup and purple slipper-socks.

Yeah, I'm sexy. Don't be jealous, girl.

When I sat down to write this I was thinking that we hadn't accomplished anything real today. But upon evaluation, I realize we did!

Cady wanted to make a Key Lime Pie (one of daddy's favorites). We happened to have all the ingredients, so I told her, "Go ahead. You and Asher. Not me." They made a delicious pie all by themselves. They pretended they were on a cooking show, and I watched! It was hilarious! They decided they wanted to make an actual cooking show video to put on Asher's blog. The one that I practically have to beat him into submission to write... but that's another story. (For those who don't know me, the sarcasm factor in that "beating" comment is about 99.6%!)

Then they practiced their archery and juggling sticks, which they made yesterday evening as a project for the Medieval Study. Asher initiated the Mock Meade making, and it was also delicious. The honey-saturated orangey nutmegish drink really soothed my throat, too!

Cady used fabric markers to make a t-shirt for our four-year-old neighbor boy's birthday. She also made a great card and wrote notes all over it for him. This was probably enough writing for her today, because she wrote FIVE letters yesterday all in proper letter format!

We read aloud two Canterbury Tales, and the kids practiced their parts for their respective plays. They ended the afternoon with their hands deep in dough for pizza and trenchers (the crispy bread used as a substitute for a plate in the Middle Ages). The pizza was delicious.

This paints a really rosy picture of today... and let's just say, it smelled like roses even if there were parts of the day that felt like thorns. I had to utitize my newest tool: If you aren't listening to my words, I won't speak! The kids had to miss their scouting groups as a consequence for refusing to do their work yesterday. Tears ensued... becuase they "forgot" about that. Tough. There's no more bending, and they will do their work next week if they want to go to class. There were definitely thorns in the rose garden.

I will tell you, however, that the absence of the screen-magetism has been a godsend. Since the kids have realized I am QUITE serious about the "one hour total screen time" limit, they no longer whine or have fits about it. They actually don't really even go to the screens. Asher used to run to the computer first thing in the morning, but he doesn't do that any more. Instead he found an old wooden boat that he built a long time ago and painted it! He read a book and played with the dog.

My kids are more pleasant when we are all unplugged. I like pleasant... energetic... time-consuming... arguing... fun... belly-laughing... game-inventing... growing and learning... unplugged kids!

More on my recent reads, "The Plug-in Drug" and "How to Unspoil Your Children" in tomorrow's blog! I am really excited to be the parent I want to be so my children can be all they want to be!