Despite Sweet Pea not having to much fun at the beach yesterday, we decided to venture out again today to see if he would warm up to it a little. I decided to let him play naked because that is something he loves to do at home. He still wouldn’t get off the towel or try the water, but he did play and talk to us from the towel. I feel like we are taking little steps towards getting him used to the beach. Maybe by the end of the week he will feel comfortable enough to get in the water. Keep your fingers crossed!

Sweet Pea and I are on vacation with my family in Perdido Bay, AL. We are staying in a house that is right off they bay and the beach is only 30 minutes away! We sit on the porch as much as possible to enjoy the breeze and the view. Here is the view from the house:

Yesterday we took Sweet Pea to the beach for the first time. He wasn’t too sure about things. I put him down on the sand and he immediately wanted to be picked up.

He didn’t even want to try to get in the water!

So I laid a towel on the sand and he did not move the enitre time we were there!

Hopefully in the next couple of days he will warm up to the beach and have a little fun.

Yesterday I took Sweet Pea to story time at our local library. He had a blast! The half hour was filled with puppets, fun stories, stickers, and lots of soft books that the kids could feel. He giggled and smiled the whole time. I loved watching his face because it was filled with excitement and wonder. But I have to say the best part of the whole thing was the end.

As we were leaving the story-time-lady brought out a bubble gun and started shooting bubbles at all the kids. I have never done bubbles with Sweet Pea before because I figured that he would get bored with them pretty quickly. Man was I wrong! He screamed with delight and followed the lady all over the room begging for more bubbles to be shot his way. She obliged him and he giggled and laughed.

This experience caused me to head right over to the dollar store and buy some bubbles for our house. If I could recreate this moment then I was going to! So I brought out the bubbles this morning and was not disappointed. He chased them all over the room. He had his little pointer finger sticking out the whole time chasing and popping the bubbles. When he got bored of popping them with his finger he opened his mouth and started chasing them with his mouth. We had so much fun that I will bring them out again tomorrow. Who would think that little bubbles could be so much fun?

This one was cool too.

So far it has been fairly easy to do chores with Sweet Pea around. When I needed to do the dishes I just plopped him in is high chair and let him eat a snack while I scrubbed dirty pots and plates. If I needed to vacuum, no problem! I would just strap him to my body with my awesome Moby wrap and go about my business.

As he has gotten older doing stuff around the house has become more of a challenge. Now when I want to unload the dishwasher he wants to take out the dishes and hand them to me so I can put them away. This is not such a bad thing, since it teaches him early on that yes, he does have to contribute something to this household.  The problem arises when I want to load the dishwasher. The dishes are coming out just as fast as I put them in! And unfortunately I can no longer trick him by just putting him in the high chair -  he wails because all he knows is that I get to play with one of his favorite things and he’s left out.

Vacuuming is much harder too. As soon as I have the vacuum cleaner plugged up he rushes over to me and insists on pushing the vacuum too. Oh and the dryer! He loves taking wet clothes and putting them in the dryer. Of course if I’m not fast enough in handing him the wet clothes from the washer, the ones from the dryer get taken out again and thrown on the floor!

This new desire to help has certainly added some comedy to my day, and frustration. I just have to keep telling myself that it may get done slower, but at least it gets done.  By letting him help me and not pushing him away because it is easier for me, he learns that I want and need his help.

There has been a lot of hype lately about whether or not parents should be able to home school their children. In the August issue of Parenting magazine there’s a poll, called “Mom Debate”.  This month’s question was: “Is homeschooling good for kids?”  Only 38% said yes. A whopping 62% say that homeschooling is not good for kids. The reasoning against home schooling is ridiculous.  Here were some of the reasons:

“Kids must be exposed to other children so they can develop the social skills they need. And kids have to get a break from the house!”

“Many parents don’t have the knowledge or expertise necessary to properly educate their children. it can be done, but it’s very hard.”

The first quote just makes me laugh. Does this mom think that all kids that are home schooled are shut in the house all day forced to speak to no one but mom and other siblings and do their school work by candlelight? I know many home schooled children that have better social skills that than those of their public school peers. This could be for a number of reasons. There are many home school groups out there where kids can get together with other kids their own age to play and learn. Also, many parents who home school have the opportunity to take their children to places like nursing homes therefore making their children better able to talk to adults. I always just smile and shake my head when I hear people say that home schooled kids can’t develop social skills. This shows a great deal of ignorance about homeschooling.

The second quote can also be said about teachers in public schools. Many just read straight out of the book and then give the pre-made test questions. Unfortunately I suffered through a few of those in my public school days. I thought I was just unlucky, until recently.

I have been majoring in education for the past few years and I have to admit that each time I step onto the university campus and into the classroom I am more and more sure that I NEVER want my children in the public school system. All around me are women who say they want to be teachers, yet they can’t string a proper sentence together! Once we were doing an exercise in partners and my partner was convinced that a hexagon had five sides. Sometimes I wonder how these people even make it to upper level college courses.

Right now I am taking an online Health and Nutrition class. Each week we are to write a paragraph about the topic the professor gives. A soon to be teacher in upper level college courses would be able to write a good paragraph, right? Last week we were to research immunizations and argue whether or not we thought the public school should require them for admission. I am not going to address the vaccination issue with you right now (that will come in a later post), but I am going to show you some of the responses these soon to be teachers gave (try not to look at the vaccine info – I am more looking at sentence structure and grammar).

“you make lots of good points
I can tell you believe in what you are saying
I do believe in parents rights but I think this is important to do”

“I believe all chldren should have to get immunizations
the risk are so much higher of gettig the dieases than the conquences some parents feel might happen.
All you have to do is turn on the television and see all the children that are dying in the other countries because they did not get the protection.”

So the assignment was to write a paragraph to defend your position. Do those look like paragraphs to you? There is no structure and there is no research. These answers were obviously rushed. I for one do not want my kids to be taught sentence structure, spelling, and paragraphs by the people who wrote the above “paragraphs”.  While there are some really good teachers out there they seem to be few and far between. Even from my public school days I can only remember two teachers that really stand out as far as nurturing my love for learning.

I want my children to grow up knowing that learning is fun and exciting. If the public school system happens to be able to do that for them then that is where they will go. But chances are it will be full of teachers that are tired and pass out lots of worksheets and focus on standardized tests. That is not the learning environment that I would like my child to be raised in. I want to see his eyes light up when he learns something new or figures out a hard problem. These days, as kids go through public school it seems like there eyes start out lit up but grow dimmer as the years go by.

If we are so convinced that public school is the place for our kids then we need to take a serious look at who we are letting become teachers and how the children are being taught. Too many parents put their kids on a bus every morning and wouldn’t be able to tell you what they are going to be doing that day or their teacher’s names.

All I can say is if things do not change, my kids will be homeschooled.

About six months ago my mom and I decided to start taking Sweet Pea to visit a nursing home. It has been such a great experience so far because we get to bring a little sunshine to people that are cooped up all day long with no visitors. Over the course of that time we have formed a special relationship with two of the lady residents and one of the male residents. Since Sweet Pea was only seven months old when we started visiting these three wonderful people have been able to watch him grow and learn. They enjoy it just as much as we do!

Mr. L always begins our visit by doing exercise moves with little Sweet Pea. Sometimes Sweet Pea does the little exercise and sometimes he just grins at Mr. L.

Mrs. H can’t get out of bed but the second we enter her room she focuses in on Sweet Pea and makes him smile by calling him Charlie Brown and being very animated.

Mrs. N gets teary eyed just about every time we see her and exclaims that Sweet Pea is the highlight of her week.

Each week I am reminded that there are people outside our bubble that are hurting and need a friend. I hope that by bringing Sweet Pea to visit these wonderful people each week he will grow up to be a compassionate person who shares God’s grace with everybody.

Today was the first day ever that I can honestly say Sweet Pea woke up on the wrong side of the crib. Oh sure we have always had our fussy moments and times of the day where we both just need a nap. But today was awful. Sweet Pea is growing up into a little boy and with that comes walking, running, jumping, and cranky pants. He didn’t want to eat breakfast. Then he broke down because the toast didn’t pop out of the toaster fast enough. Then he broke down because he wanted his water and not his milk. Then he didn’t want to play with any of his toys. It was just one of those days.

Now he is snuggled upstairs in his crib and I am curled up with a book. And that is how I will remain until sleep claims me.