I was remiss in my duties. Every homeschooler has gaps they have to go back and fill in, but this was pretty bad. The Princess, at six years old, could talk to you about ancient Greece or the life of Vivaldi, but she couldn’t tie her own shoes. It was just plain easier to tie them myself than to deal with the major whining that teaching her was going to involve. Bad Mama! All the knowlege in the world won’t do you any good if you are always in traction from tripping over your untied laces. So today we took the plunge.



Sure, it’s not her shoe, it’s mine. And it’s on the wrong foot. (Honest – she knows her right from her left.) But it’s tied, and she did it herself. Now she won’t have to rely on her college roommate to do it.

For Christmas, we got the Bear a Talking Leapfrog. It’s a cross between a Teddy Ruxpin and a Leap Pad. You give it batteries, you plug in a cartridge, seal him back up, and he will talk to your toddler about all sorts of things. The real fun starts when you have to record certain names and phrases to personalize the program on the cartridge to fit your kid. It’s a real trick to get the sound level right so your voice is clear, and doesn’t buzz on playback. Sometimes you have to go over the same prompt a few times to get it right.

One of the cartridges we got for the Bear’s Leap was all about the potty. We’re not getting all hyper about potty training, but he’s been asking about it, so this is just one step. I finally sat down to do the recording for it. Such a joy.

This is why I was a radio journalism major. So I could say “Poop!” over and over. To a frog.

Today thicket dweller is blogging every hour, for 24 hours – sort of. What with actually writing the posts, advising on snow forts, cleaning, spelling, and making peace among her brood, the timeline is getting stretched a bit. But still a fine read.

The real reason she is called thicket dweller? The woman posts like a rabbit.

Here, we have a mother who died so that her baby could live.

“Whenever someone recommended abortion as the only way to escape (death), she would say, ‘It’s as if they’re asking me to kill one of my other two children to save my skin.’ She welcomed Federico as a gift, the husband was quoted as saying.

Here, we have a mother who killed her baby, then killed herself while in police custody.

Police said Ener told them she considered the baby’s case “hopeless.”

Both are being honored by human institutions, for their very different courses of action. Which actions will be honored by the God of those institutions?

The huge signs at every exit scream

BAGGERS WORK FOR TIPS ONLY

As if shopping at the commissary wasn’t an adventure in its own right. Now I have to be Nostradamus at check out. Because you never know until after the tipping has taken place and you are home again how it will be. Will you still have those lovely peaches that were on sale? Or will you have a bruised bag of mush with pits sliding around in it? Will they pack the milk on top of the bread?



And it’s true about the book and the cover thing – it is impossible to tell by appearance how they will pack your food. The teen dude with the spiked hair and Converse has been an expert at egg handling. (I bet he’d sneer and snort if I told him that…) But watch out for the LOP* who seems too fragile to lift the tortillas! I think she does that to my cilantro on purpose…

I don’t mind the tipping. I’ll even tolerate the chit chat all the way out to the van. But, it pets my fur the wrong way to pay for the unknown, especially given past experience. You just know that Ayn Rand would not have stood for this. (And don’t even ask about the option of bagging and carrying it out yourself. The looks you get are usually saved for finding larvae under a rock.) But I’m not an objectivist Russian novelist with principles, I’m hauling two tired kids through the store and my pockets are empty of raisins and Cheerios to bribe them. Time to play bagger bingo.

I’ve got a use for these abused tomatoes… Now if only the perpetrator will hold still long enough for me to take aim…

*Little Old Person

Texas is mulling over a “No Child with a Big Behind” law. While they’re at it, they should also consider requiring the kids to moo and chew cud in order to graduate. If you’re going to treat children like cattle, do it right.

I’ve been tossing this around for a while in my head. (Yes, there is a lot of room for tossing in there, thankyouverymuch…) I want to know if there is a parallel between militant feminist power and over-zealous litigation in our society. It’s possible that I may be stepping on some toes, here. But still.

I was a Women’s Studies minor. I am absolutely in favor of women’s rights, when it means “equal rights” and “keep your hands off my butt.” But somewhere it has twisted into a stick to beat people with. It’s a really counterproductive way to operate, but that’s not the point.

The point is, (and I’m going to paint with a broad brush, so duck if you don’t want to get hit with it), we women tend to pick things apart. I’ve seen it ruin relationships, gay and het. “What did you mean when you said ______?!” is always going on in our psyche. It also happens to be the hallmark of a good lawyer – being able to find the tiniest detail and pick at it until you find something to use. So is the rise of billy club feminism and the rise of litigation connected?

This is just wrong. Yech.

And this is so much wrong wrong wronger.

Next in the news: A septuagenarian gives birth to a healthy, six-pound burger!

This morning I had nursery duty at church, and I took the Bear in with me. He loves the little kitchen in there. He got a cup, put it in the microwave, and started pushing buttons.

I asked him, “You cookin’, baby?” and he turned and replied, in his best Homer Simpson voice,

“Caaaaaah-feeeee.”

TulipGirl put out the word for everyone to post where they blog. This is the usual state of chaos. The only thing different is that there is usually more candy lying around. The squirt bottle is for errant felines. And the Sims 2 game is the reason I’ve gotten nothing done around here since Christmas.