Surprising things and other stuff

Pete and I have been noticing how the stress level in the house has gone down since starting HSing in Sept. I figured the kids' stress would go down but not the whole family's. The days are just so much more relaxed. No fights to get the homework done between 4-5 pm--just when my energy and patience drops for the day-- sooner if there was an activity that night. No rushing home for the 3pm pick up and desperately trying to get the household stuff done before 3pm. No teacher conferences, Thursday folders or reams of paper to wade through. It's nice.

Pete's also a lot more involved in our activities. He can't go to all of them but I feel like he's more aware of everything we're up to and it has made dinnertime more chatty and fun too.

Katie is already expressing the desire to HS next year. Another surprise. I thought she would be the one missing her friends at school but neither of them mentions it much. Yesterday I was getting all twisted up because they don't seem to have any particular "best friends" or kids they see every day. Then, later in the day, I remembered that by 8th grade I was not friends with a single person I had been friends with in grade school. So I don't really know what I'm worrying about.

But those are the kinds of stresses HSing has brought to me, all the worries about what I am or am not supplying in a given second. Hopefully these stresses will pass the more times I look back and notice that things aren't such a big deal over the long haul. It turns out that Katie did learn how to count out change, playdates are being made, science is getting done, etc, etc, etc.

Did get the bad news that their closest neighborhood friends may be moving. This has happened to them over and over again and it's very tough on them. It's not certain yet, so we'll wait and see.

Find myself being harder on them than I'd like to be. Zack knocked over a can of varnish on the lawn last week and I really ripped into him about it. I'd rather mention it once and then let it go but I brought it up over and over again and I think I ended overshadowing the activity of painting the swing set. An accident isn't worth ruining an entire experience over. Signs that I need to get more sleep and plan less too.

Live and learn--literally!