Microsoft Student

I have been using this product as part of a reviewing process and I have been nothing but impressed!

I am also quite aware that even after using this product for almost a month, we have only tapped the surface of it's capabilities. Microsoft Student is a mammoth resource base. The only limitation we have found is one that lies in our personal computer system--we have an older version of Microsoft Word and in order to access and utilize some of the features, you need Microsoft Office XP or later. With that being said, here are some of the cool features we have taken for a ride:

Math Tutorials w/ step by step explanations on solving problems w/decimals, fractions and positive/negative numbers--there's more but these are the ones we used for the level my children are at in the subject. The instructions are clear and MS offers a scientific calculator for computing answers as well!

Foreign Language Tools offer help w/Spanish, German, Italian and French--all with additional web resources.

There are tools for presentations, reports, tables, charts, graphs, etc., that act as templates for students to arrange their information and tutorial side bars explaining the purpose of the organization.

MS offers Encarta exploration by subject, educational games for reinforcement of skills learned and many, many web links for further learning on various subjects.

We have truly only just begun to understand the capabilities of this product, which is designed to meet the student where they are and grow with them through the years.

Early riser

So I went to bed early and this is what it gets me? I was in bed unusually early, around 10:00 and probably asleep by 11:00. Then, I wake--wide awake--at 3:00 and have been up ever since. Sure, I tossed and turned for about 2 hours 45 minutes trying to return to my slumber but to no avail.

I realized that I might as well embrace my internal, disrupted sleep clock and rise from bed. I washed all the fruit in our fridge so it's ready to eat when the kids want a snack, diced an orange, an apple and some grapes for a morning fruit salad and wrapped organic sausage w/cheese and onions in a spinach tortilla--yum. Drank a huge glass of water, stretched with some yoga postures and now I blog until time to leave for my yoga class.

It's been a great morning and it's only 7:45! I rarely see this hour unless it's against my will. Hopefully, I have enough fuel to continue at this pace but something tells me a nap is in my very near future!

One foot in front of the other?

The kids and I are drinking evening coffee--they are making origami fiddles in the den and I'm writing in the kitchen, my favorite room in the house sometimes. I accomplished a good deal today. We had a quick breakfast, made our way to the downtown library and checked out some cool books and DVD's and then headed to the Farmer's Market where I bought: a butternut squash, 4 onions, 4 avocados and 3 bell-peppers, ALL for only $8.00. I was pleased with myself.

We had a very late lunch of grilled quesadillas topped with a black bean soup that I prepared with canned tomatoes (pureed), onions, bell-peppers, powdered cayenne pepper, black pepper, red wine vinegar, olive oil and salt. It was so yum! We ate so late, I'm not sure that we'll be ready for dinner anytime soon.

While I was cooking, the kids partner read an article at Science News for Kids on the science of happiness and we discussed the article w/questions listed on the website--it was interesting and kind of a cool way to do two things at one time, cooking and homeschooling.

I'm on call tonight which prevents me from going too deep into any one project, feel like I have to be ready at a moment's notice and, I guess, I do. I suppose there is a lot I could do, especially because I'm not actually leaving the house but it's a mind thing.

I've retired to the bedroom and asked to be left alone--I'm in a funk, kind of tired and feeling an overall sense of 'blah'. My thesis is hanging over my head seriously. If I could just jumpstart myself and my work, I'd be on my way but it's the jumping part that eludes me. I'm seriously uninspired and it's effecting other areas of my life. For instance, I will not read a good book because I feel like I should be reading material related to my thesis. I put 4 news books on my xmas wish list in hopes that I can shake this impediment.

I just need to do it, I know. I get that but I'm so not interested anymore.

What if...

What if we were so fed-up with the atrocities in Sudan, particularly Darfur, that we stopped where we were, stopped what we were doing and forced our government's hand, forced them from inaction? What if?

Could something of that magnitude really be arranged? Would we stop long enough? Could we stop? And if not, why?

My beautiful life...

Had a nice day today. Was called out twice for assault victims and felt really good about the role I played there--didn't feel pressure or anxiety when my pager went off. That's usually the case when I get breaks in between my shifts or have a light load of cases--I have more to give and give it freely.

Went to the grocery store on my way home and bought odds and ends that were looked over when I was shopping for thanksgiving. Realized that we have only 20 dollars to last until next payday--12 days from now. Hopefully, I will babysit tomorrow--love to see the toddler I watch and could definitely use the money.

We're also late on mortgage--almost a month late. I feel like such a schmuck right now--paid the cable/internet/phone, paid the electric/water, paid car insurance but opted out of mortgage. My reasoning was: late on one or late on three? Not the wisest plan but my plan nonetheless. In all honesty, I would freak out without my phone and internet and I know that mortgage will be paid...eventually. Certainly before a foreclosure.

Later in the day, had the kids draft their x-mas lists for various grandparents--after which, realized that their wants and desires are met and there's really nothing left for us to do. We've talked about taking a family trip anyway (in lieu of an elaborate giftfest) and the kids are totally on board with that idea. Maybe Savannah, Key West, the mountains somewhere--they really want to go back to D.C. and I would totally love that but we need to check pricing first.

I have to fight the demons in my head--those demons of consumption--to get past my feelings of not providing enough or at all for my children on this holiday of mandated giving. It's like a wave on the ocean--you're frolicking in the water and you see the frothy beast in the distance coming closer than you could ever run-in-water to escape it and then, it's barreled over you and you're as helpless as the shell fragments in the sandy sediment below as you're all tumbled around before you finally fight to find top from bottom in order to orient your body again.

I don't want to be tumbled with every other consumer--fight the system, man. It also stems from being poor but forced abstention can still be admirable.

Was able to talk to a friend who is growing into more of a friend everyday--we're in the early phase but I adore her and her children.

My children are watching a PBS special, Celtic Woman--they are singing holiday music. My children love their music, we've watched another special of theirs and my children were excited to find this on cable tonight. It sounds divine in the distance.

Guess I will sign off tonight and read to my little ones--we are reading a Julie Andrews novel right now: The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles, so I'm happily anticipating our reading time.

Now this is what I'm talking about

So yesterday was a bust as far as being mindful of all the goodness I have in my life, but, today was much better.

Top ten thanks:

1. Nieces and nephew stayed last night, played ALL day and are staying tonight as well.

2. Yoga to open my body, center my spirit and quiet my mind.

3. Yogurt and fruit for dinner...because I can.

4. Homemade hot chocolate (100% cocoa and sugar) with a chocolate kiss stirred in and red sprinkles on top of the frothy milk...for the kids of course!

5. Wireless internet because I love to surf around.

6. Conversations with my sister.

7. Hugs from my children...and their cousins today!

8. A clean kitchen--hell, a clean house, despite all the children!

9. National Lampoon's Xmas Vacation coming on TBS tonight...good times

10.A tent set up on the futon for the kiddos to "camp" in.

11.And just because I like to know I have more to be thankful for than just 10, clear sinuses, good health and wonderful family.

12.How could I forget? NO consumerism today--I purposefully did not allow myself to purchase a single thing on this day of consumption and corporate greed.

Last night made me think...

...so today, I have tried to be mindful of my err. My nieces and nephews stayed the night last night w/my mom and I just asked my brother if I could have the kids through tonight as well. With my kids being homeschooled and my nieces and nephews in traditional school, our families are on different schedules. Not to mention the fact that my brother has married and is divided between two families now and they live 45 minutes away now, instead of 15. I love my family and love that we are as close as we are, physically and emotionally.

I feel very protective of that bond and work very hard to keep the connection because of what I know can happen if I don't. I rarely talk to my aunt or two uncles--it's been one year since I had a phone conversation with my aunt and years since I've seen or talked to my uncles. I have no relationship with my maternal cousins and little to no relationship with my paternal cousins--we played together as children, just as mine are now but I think I can safely say that my children have a special closeness with their cousins that I never had with mine, despite ALL of our childhood time together.

They are outside now playing freeze dance--my daughter is playing Ella's Christmas CD and the others will dance and lip sync until the music is turned off--then, FREEZE! It's cute. They're having fun and building memories. Which, is all we really have possession of in this world--the memories we build, keep and share along the way.

Speaking of memories, my grandmother shared her own with us yesterday before Thanksgiving lunch. Her paternal grandmother was a Cherokee Indian and traveled the Trail of Tears--I was awe struck! I was immediately honored to have had this woman, my great-great grandmother, survive the treachery of the white man, live above the abuse of rights and surely bodies and still create a life for herself and her family that would eventually lead to ours, mine. She became a cornerstone of what I know and who I love.

What was so interesting to me, with all the inaccuracies surrounding the original harvest feast/peace giving feast/thanks giving feast between the puritans and original inhabitants of the "New World", I, a white, privileged person of mixed descent, met my own original inhabitant that day--if only her spirit, our two worlds blended into a clarity of heritage--a clearer understanding of where I come from, who I owe my life to and how intimately connected we are as human inhabitants of this earth.

Thank you my Cherokee great-great grandmother, I love you and your legacy.

Giving Thanks...

Today was a good day. Very nice, very fulfilling. The only thing I did not get to do was have some quality time w/my little bits because I was SO busy in the kitchen. I don't like that--it defeats the purpose.

I'm preparing, preparing, rushing, twirling around--for what? Presentation? Give me a freakin' break.

My grandmother came w/her husband, my mom was over, my brother and his daughter--later, his wife, his other daughter, her son and of course, my fam. Loved having all my fam here--most of them, but now I feel very unfulfilled. Like I missed out on something.

Truth is...I did.

The whole point for me, I missed the whole point.

So, for missing this earlier, I say this now:

I am thankful for my children and their health, their smiles, their hugs and our relationship.

I am thankful for my partner who loves me and takes care of me.

I am thankful for having the chance to be home w/my children, to teach them, to learn from them and to walk this road.

I am thankful for family, for my mom being right here in our city--for her love and support.

I am thankful for my health

I am thankful for everything else that I cannot call to mind right now...

Tomorrow, I will enjoy the day as I should have today. We will talk to each other, we will share what we are thankful for, we will eat yummy, healthy food because it nourishes our bodies NOT because a day has been designated for over-indulgence.

Tomorrow, the day after Thanksgiving, a day heralded for it's mass consumerism--classic over-indulgence--we will resist the urge, the temptation, to blindly consume beyond our limits and we will instead, focus on what we have and what it brings to us.

Today was a good day because I realized what I do not want to repeat. I am thankful for mindfulness.

The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles

This book is my new bible and I must share it's pearls of wisdom:

"It has taken several million years for the human brain as we know it today to develop. Now all we have to do is learn to use it properly."

This book was written by Julie Andrews Edwards in 1974 and any book that seeks to expand the minds of children, shatter the boundaries of imagination, is aces in my mind.

I am only 4 chapters in but we were hanging on the words man, even re-reading to fully grasp the weight and beauty of what was written.

To master or not to master...

So I'm two years out of the Masters program (Sociology) and still no thesis. Data is collected, partially analyzed--as much as anyone can "analyze" qualitative interview data, I play along to get by--but that is where the thesis hit the wall.

Dare I entertain the idea of NOT doing this. Committing to an unfinished degree, bucking the proverbial system, giving the finger to the higher education machine and moving forward in relative peace with my decision?

Ya know. I might just do that, if I didn't have $50,000 in student loans to payoff because of that higher education machine.

I think I'd be an idiot if I dropped the ball now, but how do you fall back in line with something you're not sure you believe in anymore?

Damn self-growth and evolution--there's a different reflection in that mirror now.

Smell and Taste Return: A Good Day Overall

I tasted most of what I ate today, still not 100% but any change from *no* smell and *no* taste is an improvement for me and one I celebrate.

I was on call yesterday and last night but NO call-outs. I enjoyed uninterrupted time with my family and myself, it was cool. We cleaned and put the last of the x-mas boxes away as we have FINALLY completed our decorations for the season--YAY!

We played a couple of family games and my partner and I drank our new yummy tea--Bigelow's Pumpkin Spice, it's so tasty. Think I'll make some right now...okay, the water's boiling.

Today, the kids and I accomplished some of their lessons--watched a cool documentary entitled: "Becoming Human" which can be found at www.becominghuman.org and it's FREE. It was a great scholarly piece on human evolution and it is delivered in clips so that you can consume as much or as little as you like--additionally, each clip has exhibit links with more information tidbits pertaining to the material in the clip.

I practiced yoga for the first time in *FIVE* days and for the first time since we created a meditation alter for me in our bedroom--it was very cool to move this post-sickness body and to open my chest with breath. It was an exhilarating practice, made more so by the alter at the front of my yoga space--so chi!

Now I am taking the time to blog some thoughts/reflections and waiting on my tea to steep--does life get any better than this?

Sense of smell...

Do you ever really think about it? It's not something I give much thought--except when I light incense for my yoga practice or burn oil when the house is clean so that I can have an explosion of the senses.

But for the last week, I have been without my sense of smell thereby my sense of taste as well. The taste I can almost handle--tolerate, rather but my smell?

Today I have had intermittent periods of smell--especially after a good nose blow--and I gave each period heightened awareness, a tribute to smell, if you will. First, I noticed the oil I burned--vanilla spice with a splash of candied citrus...hmmm. Then, the shampoo I used in the shower and the citrus body wash--ahhhh. From there, the herbal lotion I used on my freshly shaved legs.

All of this got me thinking about what I was missing in my sense of smell--the sweet smell of my children, which can be musty depending on how far out from a shower they are, nonetheless, I know their smell and I depend on it. The smell of my tea or my coffee, the smell of the outside, the smell of the food that I prepare for my family. These are sweet smells that conjure feelings of contentment and joy.

But my smell also acts as a warning for me--when I'm driving down the road with outside air flowing into my car, sometimes, my sense of smell alerts me that I am taking in a heavy flow of fumes from the cars around me so I ventilate the car quickly and close the vents. On a lighter note, my smell also tells me that dinner might be overcooking or that a diaper needs to be changed--when I was babysitting today, I had to rely on my children's noses when it was time for a poop scoop.

I miss you smell--the yellow has almost run it's course and I anticipate a fragrant romance.

My day today, sinus infection and all

I dragged my ass out of bed this morning to make my little guy's PE class--8:00 is early for me and even earlier when my snot runs yellow and my head's in a fog. I suppose I could have spared the grossness there but I've become very comfortable with my snot over the last few days and, well, there I am.

The fog is lifting from this snot-fest but I'm still blah and needing rest. The kids and I had a good day in spite of how I felt. We ate a yummy lunch--harvest soup (yellow squash, potatoes, garlic and onions in chicken broth w/seasonings) it was yum. I took a power nap as they watched a video on South America--a power nap that left me with no power. Then we picked up a toddler I was babysitting from her daycare and made a coffee and grocery store run. It was fun trucking around with a toddler--I miss that coziness. The coziness of walking around the store w/a little bit tucked in the cart--it's like drifting in your own orbit, the two of you.

Came home and played on my wireless internet--yay! Did some odds and ends, made an okay dinner and piddled around.

Now I'm tired--think I'll turn in.

Night.

Wireless

Hell yea. I'm wireless baby. Just happened tonight.

The kids were playing webkinz from different rooms, together.

Now I sit on the sofa writing on my blog with the TV on and my partner sleeping soundly beside me.

Sweet.

Untitled

There is no right way to start this--no proper title. Just a mother who lost her way for a moment, a day. I can't explain the hopelessness, the desperation, that consumed me this day, yesterday. This day when I had to will my legs to move, my face to smile, my voice to speak, my lungs to breathe, my lips to kiss and my arms to embrace. I was emotionally desolate. I had nothing to give.

The collapse of my patience and tolerance was foreboding--the moment had come and I had no will left to will against it. I said it--I half screamed-half cried it. "I could leave you both right now and not look back"

I could not talk after that for fear of what else I might say--what other soul-crushing purges I was capable of. I went to my bed and leaned into the warmth of the blankets and cried. I gathered my things to leave for the grocery and cried. I walked to the car, one heavy foot in front of the heavy other. I sat in the car and cried. I wanted to speak to them, to tell them I loved them, to tell them I could never leave them really but I was lost in a wilderness of despair. As I sat in my car, I thought about leaving--not physically driving to another place intentionally abandoning my children but I nursed the idea of what it might feel like as if to remind my head how much my heart needed them.

I pulled out of the drive, knowing that they were inside wondering when I was coming back and why I didn't say good-bye.

As I drove to the grocery, I prayed that I would not be killed in some freak driving accident that would leave my children scarred for the better part of their lives because the last words they heard me speak were in anger and the last image was me walking out the door, cold and stone faced--a shadow of the person and mom I usually am.

It was more of the same at the grocery--forced movements, head and eyes down, not daring contact with anyone.

Back at home, the fog was lifting and because I had arrived back home safely and still alive, I wanted them to know right away that they were my loves--the centers of my world because I want them there.

We talked and they understood with the compassion of children's hearts.