It's been a while...

Last week was rough. Missed like every appointment I had scheduled and if I didn't miss it, I was late. We were eating out or otherwise not eating real dinner most of the week too. I started out well, logging my food in the Lose It! app and eating carrots and shit, but it went downhill from there. I've been hella tired too. Luckily, it was spring break, so I didn't get behind in any classes. Troy made this boxed Alfredo thing that was not too great last night.
Tonight, we made chili as a family. Lilah helped me cut up the celery and onions, hub cooked the ground turkey, I spiced it up and Lilah dumped in all the canned items. Delish!

To Homeschool or Not To Homeschool...

Since Lilah's birthday falls funny on the calendar, she will be almost 6 before she is able to go to kindergarten. Considering how smart she is, I fell like she should not have to wait this long. The hub and I talked about homeschooling her for preschool so she can test in and get into kindergarten with other kids her age. This was a while back and we had just got her back in daycare so it was, in my mind, something far off. She's doing awesome at the CDC and I love her teachers and the interaction she gets with the other kids in the class. Sure, theres the down side of some kids being bullies or the occasional bit of exclusionary play for whatever reason, but overall I am happy and think its doing her more good than bad.

Fast forward to now. Troy sent me a text today asking if I was still planning on homeschooling Lilah. He then said that if I was, he thinks her last month at the CDC should be May. I was sort of taken aback at this. She hasn't even been there a year, why would I take her out now? Then I realized why he said May. We are planning on going back home for a long vacation in June and if I'm not mistaken, we will probably have to pay while we are gone to hold her spot. That tacks on another $300 to the vaca budget, which is lame. Not that we wouldn't be spending it if we weren't on vacation, but... You get the idea. If I homeschool her in order to get her into kindergarten a year early, when she is almost five, I will have to start this fall, when she is almost four. Yikes, my kid is almost four! I guess I just didn't realize it was that imminent. 

So I found a website I like and printed out a bunch of information. The website Time4Learning was suggested on that website for curriculum and also recommended by my friend Jenni, who is homeschooling her daughter as well, but for other reasons. I need to talk to the school district here and see what the rules are and what kind of testing she would need in order to be able to attend kindergarten when I want her to as well. If I can just keep her at the CDC and work with her here and there on our time and have her test anyway, I would like that the most. 

I've even contemplated applying at the CDC, which I believe would get me even cheaper rates if not free, or maybe volunteering. I have the sub job already, and it's nice and everything, but if I homeschool, I won't be able to do it anyway. At the CDC, I'd be around younger kids, which I am fond of. Little kids like me too, always have. 

If I don't keep her in the CDC, I could search for a part time preschool program somewhere to balance out the mommy time. Now that she is mostly potty trained, it's a lot easier to find something. There is one at the gymnastics place downtown that is $200 per month, three days a week, from either 8:30-11:30am or 12-3pm. (They should trade me preschool for website work...) I also know a few gals on base here doing the in home daycare thing and could probably work out a part time or as needed schedule with them given they have the openings. One elementary school has a Pre-K program as far as I can tell from the district website, despite a directory site saying all the elementary schools offer it. There are a bunch of "private" schools, all of which, of course, are church-y. There are a few others that are the local drop in places, and a few that are just "private" preschools with no religious affiliation I can tell; Falls Junior Academy, Discoveryland and the Montessori school. 

Part of this is also that recurring back and forth desire to spend more or less time with her. It was all the time with her when she was born, then I started working again, then hub left and it was just us. I took her out of daycare before we moved here and it carried on in the first few months we were here. When there was an opening at the CDC, I had just gotten the sub position so it seemed logical to put her back in daycare otherwise I wouldn't be able to work. I'm not working as much as I originally planned and, as I mentioned before, sucking at school. Now there's the nagging feeling in the back of my head that I should spend more time with her again, especially with all this homeschool talk.

I love that little bug so much and I just want good things for her. I want her to be smart, successful and have the opportunities to do whatever she wants. I want to be there for her, but not be all up in her business. I want to be a good momma, but how to go about that best right now is somewhat unclear.

Fat Tuesday!

The original plan was to go out for dinner this evening, but there was only this one expensive place doing a buffet and this Cajun place that's not very good but would surely be packed. So I did some recipe hunting and did my own Mardi Gras dinner! I made a king cake, chicken étouffée, corn fritters and we are mixing up cheap hurricanes with Hawaiian punch and rum. Happy Mardi Gras!

About damn time...

I googled the croup crap Lilah is supposed to have and it said that if the fever comes back after it's been gone for 24 hours, another call to the doc is in order. We went to the walk in clinic over by the hospital and the lady listened to her and said that it sounded like she'd been coughing her head off and that it sounded kinda gross in one of her lungs. Gross in the lung is doctor speak for bronchitis. They put in a prescription for Zithromax, which is apparently the uber antibiotic. It's cherry flavored, so I gotta give them props for that. She will probably have to stay home again tomorrow, but by Monday she should be fine. She just coughed up some snotty lemonade grossness. *cringe* Words cannot describe how much I love my husband for being the cleaner of gross things. I can handle blood, but anything else is like ewie.

Lunch Report

The Healthy Choice Mediterranean lemon garlic chicken and shrimp was significantly more bland than I would have liked. Not very lemony or garlicy either. I finally made some tea and I've been using my Splenda with fiber in it instead of sugar. Now I'm sending hub to the store for Indian food fixins, Italian soup stuff and beer. No, we aren't partying, I just need to make some bread!

Also, Lilah is sick still. She didn't have a fever yesterday, but was rockin' 103 this morning again. My poor bug! 

Would you rather get up early or sleep late?

Omg pillows... Now as soon as Lilah learns to fend for herself in the morning this will be a reality...

Ask me anything

Who's the smartest person you know?

Probably a tie between my dad and my daughter, proportionately by age of course... ;)

Ask me anything