If You Say So....Luke 5:4-7 (NASB)

     I take Tim to the Metro every morning at 5:45 am. We figure that we can save some money on gas and wear and tear on our Suburban if he takes the train to work in the morning. One afternoon I noticed the bag he stuffed all of his important "teacher" papers into as well as a  massive chemistry textbook, his sweater, and his lunch. It was a fairly large black vinyl bag with beige trim on the top. Up near the top zipper was a small tag that read "Enfamil LIPIL."        Hmm....I pondered. Tim is a veteran teacher who has teaching credentials in life and physical sciences. The range of topics he's taught includes, but is not limited to: biology, chemistry, geology, algebra, physics, geometry, health education, and driver's education (I know - that last one's hard to believe but true). He's usually at school earlier than most teachers and leaves later than the rest. He works year round and teaches before the bell rings to signal that class has...

     I've been promoted! Sort of....We finally moved Julia out of her little nursery off our bedroom into the girls room. We managed to cram her crib into their room that already has two bunk beds-  one with a full size bed. Yes, it's a tad crowded (please don't call the fire department!), but it's very workable for now.  --- Mother with a large family and very few bedrooms tip #1 ---Don't have any unnecessary toys, books, or clothes in the bedroom overflowing with kids. I've learned that kids don't need a lot of clothes and  books tend to get strewn all over the floor and ripped apart. This is very, very  bad (given that I have a love affair with books and the utmost respect for most of them). Solution: keep books only on beds and very few of them at that. And toys- oh those things we spend a ridiculous amount of money and time buying, sorting, organizing, and picking up again and again. Same principal applies, however:  the fewer toys, the...

  Okay, so I was looking at some Yelp Reviews and this woman claimed proudly that she was a born and bred native Pasadenan, "born and bred, baby." I thought, Is that a claim to fame? So am I. I  have noticed in my adult life that many people are transplanted to Pasadena from other states or surrounding areas. So few people I know were born in Pasadena and have lived here their whole life. But I have, baby,  I have.      So, what about that? I remember being born at Huntington Memorial Hospital. I remember the squeezing sensation, the bright lights, those rubberized hands on my fuzzy head of hair. Oh, just kidding - I only imagined what it was like. OK - back to reality and out of the Freudian psychoanalytic take on my earliest memories. But really, my earliest memory at around age 2 is featured in this old blog post .             And then we moved to South Pasadena in April of 1973. About a ...

     What can I say? I lay in bed this morning trying to let that fact soak in to my brain. I thought back to the beginning of the year and all the optimism, joy, and relief I had because so many elements of homeschooling all my kids seemed easier than half the kids being at public school while the other half was at home. How did the year go? Well, Tim wanted to put the middle ones, Chloe and Leanne, back in school this next year. He wanted their school work to be more academic. I resisted at first. I thought their school work was sufficient, even quality work. He wants them doing more school work. All righty then.      The next issue was whether to prepare Camille over the summer to apply for Los Angeles County High School for the Arts (LACHSA) in the fall. This would involve costly art lessons to prepare her portfolio for submission. If she was accepted, she would attend high school in fall 2011 at this school a half hour from home on a college...