Long Time No Blog

It's hard to believe that May is already half over. I haven't been online nearly as much as I used to be... which I guess means I have finally acquired a Real Life, LOL. Homeschooling takes time. We are forever off to a nature center, park or museum, it seems (and my decrepit body is getting even with me, big time!).

Mikro is starting to sound out words and show an interest in learning to read. I keep assuring him that, even when he is able to read, I will still read to him, because it's fun for me, too. This is so exciting! Right now some favorite books are Grasshopper Pie , Saturday Night at the Dinosaur Stomp, Tyrannosaurus Was A Beast, Dinosaur Poems and Dinosaur Babies. I have to dig out his old favorite, Oddhopper Opera, now that it's spring and the bugs are back. He enjoys watching the PBS pre-reading shows, like Between the Lions, Super Why, and Word World. And I just picked up the BOB Books, but I'm not pushing. I'm going to let his interests drive this train.

Speaking of driving... The big news is, I've started driving. (I ***HATE*** to drive. It is an exercise in suppressing terror. But I'm doing it. Because if I'm going to homeschool my kid, I figure it's on me to show him the world, and that's going to be much easier if we have a little more control over our mobility.) So far I'm only driving locally (still haven't been on a highway in 16 years...), but the car is no longer an expensive lawn ornament. It runs well, but it has an unfortunate leak somewhere, so the floorboards are forever wet every time it rains (and this spring, it's been pretty much every other day soaked). So I'm not here as often, and when I am, I'm usually outside, swinging on the porch swing while Mikro runs around like crazy and scares away the wildlife.

I've also discovered that the car makes a pretty good bird blind (my binoculars are a permanent fixture in the car cup holders at this point), and we've been having some interesting guests at the feeders. Mikro has *some* patience for birdwatching, but not nearly enough... I hope he will pick up on my enthusiasm. He does like the idea of feeding living relatives of the dinosaurs...

I'm going to post updates for the past month or so, but they'll be back dated, since my blog and my photo directory (which is in date order) pretty much substitute for my messed up short term memory...