I hate conflict. It scares me to death, and my instinct is to shutdown and go into hiding rather than confront it. I know that this is unhealthy and that it affects my marriage in a negative way which in turn affects my children, so I’ve been diligently working on my fear this past year. This presentation by Julien Saunders is pretty good if you too need a little boost to help you embrace conflict, especially today as we deal with our country’s current moral issues with systemic racism.
From what my AA friends have shared with me, the first step to recovery is acknowledging that there is a problem. We’re all aware that implicit bias is pervasive and affects our decisions unconsciously. You can learn more about it here at OSU and then take a Harvard research based test here as you start your journey to help heal our country.
This week I had to have the difficult conversation about racism with my kids. My eldest noticed that for the past few days my phone has been alerting me about L.A.’s mandated curfew and he wanted to know why. So I explained as best as I could during our short car ride. My hopes is that my message will sink in a bit deeper with a bit of time and that they will ask questions. In the meantime, I’ve been looking at books that would help me foster discussions about racism with my kids. I found this comprehensive book list for children and I feel like The Week Junior would be another great way to get your kids interested in current events.
My friend, Michelle, is extremely passionate about birding. She and her partner spend their vacations (she’s a teacher and he’s retired) traveling all over the country to count birds, and for the past couple of years they have been flying down to Australia to do the same. Recently, I asked Michelle what apps she recommended for beginner birders like us (my two youngest kids are always pointing out birds and I don’t always know what kind they are.) She introduced us to eBird to log our bird counts and Merlin Bird to help us with identification. Since quarantine, we’ve only been doing backyard birding, but hope to actually get out and do a bird walk soon.
I’ve been attempting to get my house back in order. I feel like I’m constantly cooking and cleaning, which means I have less time to focus on my kids when they need help with school work or want a push on the swing. Clean Mama has been a great help and I love her monthly calendar downloads to remind you of your routines. The kids have been getting into it as well, which is AWESOME!
We live on the West Coast just a couple miles from the beach, and currently it is overcast or what we here call June Gloom. Sadly, I don’t think we’ll be able to catch tonight’s Strawberry Moon, but hopefully you’ll have a better chance!
My two oldest kids have been requesting I teach them how to cook, and I know it’s because of all the cooking shows we’ve been binge watching. {Sigh} I was really hoping to wait on this for a couple more years. You see, cooking is my therapy along with gardening, and I value my alone time when doing them. So I’ve made a deal with the kids that I would teach them separately and only one meal a week. I feel like that’s a good compromise.
I love shopping, but I do not love having a ton of stuff in the house OR less money in the bank account. Before I had my third child, I used to sell vintage clothes online as a side hustle. I’m still doing this, but in a much smaller scale (mainly just getting rid of inventory since I no longer want to use our guest room as storage.) Anyway, I just read this article about starting a personal shopping business and it has peaked my interest. Most homeschoolers like us are living on just one income, so what do you do to help supplement that income?
