SHEs Organized

Posted: **Fri Sep 28, 2012 10:30 am**

DeeClutter wrote:What are dumpers and/or nipper vacation, LynLee? Have some ideas but thought I'd get right from the source.

dumpers are waves that break in a way that is dangerous. The large wave curls in the shallows then crashes down as it breaks - with the potientian to toss people around and has been known to break necks. Lifesavers/ lifeguard put up the yellow flag for caution as a warning - and made an announcement as low tide approached. The lifesavers are volunteers. lifeguards are paid by council.
Nippers is for kids - like junior lifesavers. they learn about surf and water safety, first aid (Ithink) play sand and water sports for starters. there are lifeguards and life savers at city beach at the lagoons at Brisbane city Southbank (not far from dd's) and the dgks were enrolled in vacation programs a couple of holiday times. Of course its just still water at city beach. Yesterday dgd was running at southbank during her 6am swimming club training with an inner city pvt girls school. (dd enrolled her there to help strengthen her arm after she had broken it - and it turned out she was good at it. - also does circus as another activity - needed her arm strength to go back to circus)

Glad Kathryn is really on the mend - and off to a flying start. Glad you were able to keep moving as much as you could. I know someone who has mostly done bed rest for 9 months. That does not make life easy for herself. Nor does being 3X my size.

my friday
yoga. few groceries - milk fish and yoghurt and cashews
appointment - efpost card wouldn't pay up so went to bank. My money was ok. ty. Pd water bill, then back to pay for appointment. Seems like pdocs banking doobie reader 's bank was down.
rang dm
walk
dinner
dishes.
watched movies. late to bed again.
Good night all.

Posted: **Fri Sep 28, 2012 10:49 am**

What is knackered? An English term [I think.] pic. shows a cat asleep in his food dish I still don't get it.

I 'm up I slept in today. Surprised that I slept well last night got some unsettling news see J & C thread. H. has left for work He was on call but they needed him after all.

I need to get going on my walk the guy up the road is doing a patio pour today and I want to watch and see if h. is doing that one!

I need to mow and paint a bit on the chicken run. Still no action with eggs.

Posted: **Fri Sep 28, 2012 10:59 am**

Scattered: look for a PM from me.

I've been messing around on the boards this morning. Must get some cereal in me and get moving on the writing for the Silent Auction.

Posted: **Fri Sep 28, 2012 11:00 am**

Good morning!

It will turn into Errand Day for me though it wasn't intended. I'll have to pick dd up after school, hit a Subway and travel to get to her fitting a couple towns over. I've spent more of the morning than I wanted trying to find a closer place and that's not happening, so I have gotten directions and feel pretty confident for the drive. HRH has changed plans so he can be here.

Also have a prescription to pick up at pharmacy 1.

Also two potential deliveries - a gift we bought for dstepson and the upholstery guy is possibly already traveling in this direction, not sure.

Beyond that, I must call a dcousin. Also a DPC.

helia, in the paragraph above that I had mentioned that Londoners who live in areas where rats have taken over from mice wish they had the mice back. So I was saying I meant no offence against rats, who are very nice pets individually.

Homework issues - they are universal and I think everybody has to fight it sometimes. I think children/teens realize that they are unique as members of the family whose "work" follows them home. Everyone else gets "off" but they never really do. You truly could make a case it isn't fair, but without having the student do some work in the home, the parent would be so out of the loop, which would be bad news. Still, this is an area in which the poor parent has to turn into "the bad guy". I have often found myself saying (wailing?) like Charlie Brown: "I wasn't the one who assigned this! It's not my faaauult!"

With dd I find myself caught between the child rightly begging for "break" time after school and her Daddy, who rightly thinks if the homework doesn't get done early it might not get done at all. So I have to balance between those priorities and sense the moment the break has to be over, so that she can produce completed homework when her Daddy asks. During all this, if a certain week's homework gets intense, her room turns into an episode of Hoarders Junior, her laundry's not getting done, etc. I have plenty of respect for educators, but I think sometimes schools don't realize that teens have life responsibilities like anyone else. If there are 8 hours of school then 3 hours of homework, the child's life responsibilities will end up falling to others, or going by the wayside, like anyone putting in 55-hour workweeks but needing the average teen's 9 to 10 hours sleep.

Posted: **Fri Sep 28, 2012 11:23 am**

Got the previous done with enough time to spare to... open the box and activate the phone online. So I have a phone number, but I haven't tried the phone yet.

Comforting, commiserating words, Harriet. In my case, I'm the one who wants dd to get straight to work so it gets done, while DH is the one who thinks she needs a break. I'd be more than happy to give her a break if she weren't in the "give her an inch, she takes a mile" category in that department. Nor does it help when DH takes them to the library for a half-hour that stretches into an hour and a half, which he's done at least twice since the beginning of the school year. I empathize with dd's struggle to stay on task and desire to do something "fun," but I haven't found a balance that allows her to do that and still get her work done. Thing is, this school has much less homework than their former school, and they have a study-hall period a couple of times a week.

Nancy, "knackered" = bushed, beat, done in, worn out, wrung out, all in, tuckered out, exhausted! (Mystery's Thesaurus at your service!

)

Pleasant dreams, Lynlee! Tomorrow, you must tell us if "circus" is like a circus with clowns and acrobats and such, or something that we North Americans would think of as some sort of "circuit." DH's school does have a circus club, with kids who do juggling, acrobatics, and magic -- one certainly needs arm strength there!

OK, next up:
• excavate the dining table (again! -- it's a daily process)
• tidy the couch & coffee table
• check the playroom
• flip the wash (if it's ready by then)
• then play with the phone some more!

Posted: **Fri Sep 28, 2012 11:40 am**

I am reading your post and seeking an answer to the homework situation. Even in PreK, homework is an issue! Yesterday after school we visited my DParents which takes more than an hour, prepared supper, and worked on project outside while LO played. I forgot about LO homework until 30 minutes before his bath time. Eeeek!

I remember reading about Helia DD (i think it was) studying ahead. I remember thinking how smart and organized she was to be pro-active with her studies. With that example in mind...... I am thinking about establishing a daily 30 minute time slot for school work. There is an empty time slot one hour after LO gets out of school. We use the hour after school to do physical things (we usually go to the park and play/walk after I pick him up from school). Hum....why didn't I think of this before? Thinking outloud.....If LO has homework we will do it during that time slot, if not then we will spend the 30 minutes doing fun type reviews of his studies. Plus another 30 minutes for playing hands-on educational type games. That would give him a total of 1 hour set aside each day to spend on homework if needed. Having fun games mixed in with the homework will hopefully make it a time LO will look forward to. Trying to embed the thought and the attitude that learning time and homework are often FUN.

3:00 pm - pick LO up from school
3:00 - 4:00 - play/walk outside when weather permits.
4:00 - 4:30 - homework/study review
4:30 - 5:00 - education board games
5;00 - supper
5:30 - 7:30 - free time (LO usually chooses to play outside during about 90% of this time). This time slot is also when his swim lessons are held.
7:30 - bathtime & pj's
8:00 - bedtime

Posted: **Fri Sep 28, 2012 11:41 am**

Good morning! My a.m. routine is done and I have been to WW and the bank. My weight is down another .6 lbs. I'm happy for the general direction. I've taken care of some emails too. Dfriend J in NY now - the one whose dh was originally tutoring me and then pointed me toward UM Hebrew classes which his advisor teaches; J and family were in one of our small groups, as well as moms group and book club; I saw her in NJ this past summer too - is coming through town in November! Yay! It would be fun to see her! And another friend from all those groups who moved away the year before dfriend J did, whose dh was in similar program as J's dh, may be coming through at the same time!

Harriet, I must have been really tired last night.

I swear I read that paragraph a couple times!!

Homework ramblings - probably more than you want to know. Certainly more than I thought I was going to write. . . Um, I guess I'm a slacker parent when it comes to my kids' homework. I actually have no idea what the girls (and ds when he was at home ) have due on a daily basis. I couldn't tell you what they're doing specifically in a class unless they have told me, which they do from time to time. And we don't hound them about hw either; they usually have a good start before dinner. I have no idea when they start. They are quite competitive in nature and maintain stellar grades, so that is probably part of it. Dd16 did wait until the last minute on an art project this week (the mosaic), and we told her she should have started earlier. A bit frustrating though, b/c in the end the teacher liked hers better than anyone else's in the class, so that sort of took the wind out of our arguments. BUT, that habit will come back to bite her eventually, and she will have to learn the hard way. . . . We do try to run through our week as a family every Sunday evening, and we ask the girls what exams/quizzes/big assignments they have on which days. I am proud of myself b/c I DO know dd14 has 3 quizzes today - World History, Latin, and English. The girls can never say it's not fair that they have homework and we don't -- b/c dh works every evening, actually every minute he can. He has more homework than they do! I'm trying to study Hebrew in the evenings, though my brain does get fuzzy in the evenings - as I demonstrated last night. . . .

LOL! Also, the girls have a lot of extracurriculars going on and they know they need to fit hw and studies around those activities; dd16 has something after school every day of the week, except for Thursdays. And we have our dinner crew over Thursday evenings. She is more likely than dd14 to be careless with studies, but not to the point where it will affect her GPA. Still, she knows that if she does poorly (by dh's and my definition of poorly) on an exam or quiz or big assignment, we will cut into her activities. Dd14 is not as busy as dd16 yet - yet. She just has an oboe lesson on Tuesdays (1 hour plus transport time) and youth group Wed. evenings. However, if she sticks to her decision to do synchro. swimming team, she will go to practices 4? evenings a week for 2.5 hours each, starting in a couple months. That may be a scheduling challenge. The girls monitor themselves and their hw load and their activities a bit; for example, last week, dd14 did not go to youth group b/c of homework.

OK, I'm off to get some lunch, have some devo. time. I'll leave in about 40 minutes to go to the high school. I may just hang out in the library until it is time to pick up dd16.

Posted: **Fri Sep 28, 2012 11:45 am**

Pray for fog to lift - we're driving in pea soup!

Edited to say: Thank you!!! 1/2 hour later - fog almost gone!!!

Posted: **Fri Sep 28, 2012 12:09 pm**

Hello dear ladies,

Another sunny day here.

Okay was wondering if LO's Father's Text were good or bad?

Work day here. Did my exercises. Will be getting ready and walking out the door.

Great day to all!

Posted: **Fri Sep 28, 2012 12:19 pm**

Got the previous done. Phone is charging; I'm still trying to figure out how it works. Apparently, I'm too dumb to use a smartphone!

Next up:
• figure out dinner
• make lunch
• fiddle with phone while having lunch

Also while having lunch, noodle on this weekend's agenda. The only firm items are dd's hockey game late tomorrow afternoon, DH's buddy's annual clambake thereafter, and Mass Sunday morning (must go to the 10AM service, as I am reading & DH is helping with Communion). Oh, and the girls have a birthday party to go to Sunday afternoon. Hmm... this "free" weekend is filling up fast, even before the possibilities of helping score/run the clock at the tournament at our local rink this weekend or taking the girls to the My Little Pony convention in town (I kid you not!) or whether or not DD has practice Sunday evening!

Sending sunny thoughts MT's way!

Waving to Sadie as she breezes through!

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