Mojave in my Heart

From a not-so childlike beginning in New York City to my child inspired world here and now

Category Archives: Faith


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How We Homeschooled Today: 9th Grade

Most days, like this one begin early for me & a little later for the girls. I’ve always enjoyed the dark, quiet hours. Early morning fits my need for the quiet & reflective space my head desperately desires. Stephen and I enjoy a leisure devotion time, where we read, journal, and talk over coffee, by candlelight no less! It is a truly sparkly and magical way to start the day, though some days there’s more waffling and coffee. Yoga or the gym follows this restorative session and by the time I get home or am finished, the girls have had their breakfast & their own exercise. These days they’re enjoying either the gym or a 30 minute workout video Ada absolutely lots on youtube. Anna, the host, is from Germany. If I could just get them to follow it IN German, we’d have double periods of our foreign language each day!

Poetry recitation began our school time together. Arlene & Ada are both wrapping up their recitations of Poe’s “The Raven.” It is a substantial poem with 108 lines & they’ve worked diligently at it. We’ve done recitations since before they read and it has had wonderful payoff. Their aptitude for memorization or leaning by ear is phenomenal. I have alongside them been working on verses, too, though with far less mastery! We ended with simple movement while reciting our seasonal poems, then jumped right into Algebra. Surprisingly, Algebra has been a real joy. Yes, a joy! It is fun, engaging, and there are discoverable answers! Yay! We spent about an hour on review and practice work today. There are frustrating moments & full on hilarious moments, like the one on repeat where we say things like: when you’re subtracting a negative, 3- (-3) make it a positive. Like, why?!! And why do I seem to forget this ALL THE TIME. Our review builds in many, if not all of the concepts we’ve learned this term, so we’ll do lovely fractions, meaty unit multipliers, tricky word probelms, some geometry (just in case we want to carpet a half circle and rectanle and only have the radius), and simplifying “things” like this:

-3{[(-2-3+7)] [-5]} / (-2)(-1-3)+8

Working beside them allows me to be able to help when there’s a problem, since I really don’t have this type of mathematics knowledge at my fingertips. Also, I help coach through the frustrations with confidence and reducing the pressure. Though their stint at P2P was a success, there was a lot of pressure to do more and a lot and at times, it did really push their math comfort zone. So, there’s been some backtracking on those experiences with the compass point of let’s get it right, feel comfortable doing it, and take our time!

Currently we’re finishing up a massive geology block, so that was next. The better part of the last week was drafting an informative essay on the entire history of geology in Colorado. Meteorite in breadth! This week, & today, editing final draft & finalizing into their main lesson books. Main lesson books are creative and informative “products” of our learning: creative illustrations, design & curriculum-rich recordings of our studies for each block. While the scope of the essay was a massive endeavor, there’s a lot of big brush strokes until we reach the Cretaceous with the Laramie Orogeny (a mountain building event that led to among other amazing rocky structures, the Rocky Mountains). I had wanted to zoom out more and look at Colorado and the region towards the end of this block, but the sequence I wrote up this summer, focusing on on the foundational pieces of geology, consumed us since the start of the school year! We covered: theories of the universe’ start, formation of stars (foundries of Earth’s building blocks), geologic timelines,  plate tectonics, volcanoes, rocks, minerals, mountains, erosion, rivers, and then finally Colorado, with a spotlight focus on Boulder. Arlene finished her essay and wrapped up some artwork of a page entitled: What rock is it? A step by step process we worked on to help determine a type of rock. Lots cuddles with Happy and 2nd AND 3rd “breakfast vittles” were throughly enjoyed during geology today– bonuses of the homeschool life, indeed!

A quick walk, because it has truly been a most amazing and beautiful autumn here in Colorado! The morning is wrapped up with grammar work — squeezed in just before lunch.

We eat lunch late, around 1:15 or 1:30, a tangible rebellion against school lunch at 11 or earlier! Last year we each started our own grammar books: small, sturdy notebooks that include all the rules and examples of our studies that maybe one day could also serve as a reference. Weaving meaning into our work. That’s a driving point in my homeschooling.

While I had some formal instruction in grammar, in junior high, I remember nothing from those years. In 2001, I had to revisit grammar intenseLY as preparation for my M.A. teacher exam in Massachusetts. During that pedagogical episode, I crammed & soon forgot, thus, this grammar notebook is an attempt to learn sincerely and reference easily, all that we master! In addition to the parts of a sentence and a deep look at verbs: states of being verbs, linking, intransitive, transitive, and verb complements, oh my what fun, we have covered phrases and clauses. Today, we practiced grammar analysis (parts of sentence and speech) of classic literature sentences. We love these exercises, though they can be trying some days! Today’s lines were from Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice:

“I can guess the subject of your reverie.”

Pro. v. v. adj. n. prep. adj. n.

subj. —–AVP—— DO

Lunch was leisure and lovely. We sat around the coffee table on meditation cushions, shooing Happy frequently, eating and casually talking about the day and upcoming events. Halloween is on the mind, as well as our upcoming celebration of All Soul’s. The girls are going to dress up as dead prom queens. I’m going to be a character of Edward Gorey’s, familiar to many from PBS’ Masterpiece introduction. Stephen, a skeleton? We’re still working on his costume as we are having a hard time getting a tailcoat suit to match my period/style piece.

Why do we homeschool? This is a question frequently asked and rarely answered to the depth that its answer resides in me nor truly deserves. One small & somewhat cheeky answer is to eat our meals together, with lots of time & space. Mealtime is anchor point in our day: an opportunity to share gratitudes, eat mindfully, & sink into the simplicity of life. We nourish ourselves with food and presence. There’s a whole lot more answer to the “big question” but it really is a lifestyle choice, a thread that weaves our days. We step back from focusing on the endgame and live the process of learning and growing. There’s lots of talk about life being a journey, that we have to enjoy the ride, de-emphasize the destination, but not a whole lot of areas in our life that actually model this.

Reading aloud Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving bookended our school day. We try reading this story every autumn and have had great fidelity this season! There was an interesting conversation about Irving’s language and storytelling versus Jane Austen’s. Both, writers of the English language on different continents were born in the late 18th century. Surprisingly, the folksy, gothic, Sleepy Hollow nudged past P&P, despite its lack of romance! Arlene really focused on Irving’s precise writing (but she said, he doesn’t sacrifice great vocabulary) and lack of amorphous (& lengthy) dialogue. Ada emphasized Sleepy Hollow’s superb plot compared to P&P, which she said wasn’t very compelling. It was amusing & heartwarming to listen & participate in this conversation for a variety of reasons. One, there was astonishment, since last year Jane Austen was all the rave and I had to keep quiet on the matter. I don’t particularly care for Austen’s novels.

We were a little short on transition time after this talk, so they hustled to get the bus for German class. LOVE that they can hop on public transit! They’re taking one class at Boulder High this semester and it has been nothing but smooth sailing. I spent my hour prepping dinner & reading a little of Ron Chernow’s biography on Grant. The late afternoon/evening was a bit of a jigsaw puzzle/relay race with Stephen tutoring, the one car, youth group’s vibe night, and the amazing gift of tickets to see a British a-capella group, Apollo5 in Denver. Managed to coordinate all the pieces for the evening with Stephen and I arriving on time despite the rain, heavy traffic & stress.

our own little “skyscraper box canyon” downtown Denver

The singing was soul-searing (in the best way imaginable) and hypnotic. The first few pieces, from their latest album, Haven, were Renaissance in origin & absolute perfection. Between the girls chorale performances and a few shows we’ve ventured to over the last couple years, I’ve discovered a real passion for a-capella, especially the vintage material!

Haven, Apollo5

Par for the course was some LOVE peppermint chocolate back at home. We heard all about vibe night and how amazing Sprite REALLY is, as well as Arlene’s first place WIN for her Halloween costume!!! She won two free trips to winter camp with youth group in February!! Way to go Arlene!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Center Presbyterian, Denver


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mirabai block – 16th century hindu mystic

Following John Muir, we dove deeply into the world of India. This block surpassed my expectations,  primarily in the tangental ways we explored the subject. What did we do in addition to learning the life story of Mirabai? We:

  • visited the art museum in Denver several more times
  • listened to beautiful classical Indian music daily
  • learned parts of an Indian folk dance (dandiya raas)
  • cooked up a lot of new Indian food and therefore visited our local Indian grocer often
  • read tales of Hindu gods, learned their epics from the Mahabharata 
  • went to a dance performance in Denver that showed the merging of modern with classical Indian dance
  • drew beautiful maps of India showing cities and states, rivers and mountains as well as spectacular information such as the origin of Indian spices and indigenous animals
  • recited classical Indian poetry
  • practiced yoga together, learned about mudras, asanas, and chanting

We had a blast TOGETHER.  When you, as a teacher tap into personal interests, the possibilities are truly endless. Having incredibly open-minded children also helps! A friend of mine from Boston, who was originally from India said to me once: “You were definitely an Indian in a past life.” I smile thinking about her comment. Laugh when I think about how incredible diving into this subject was– without much planning, but an intuitive flow.  Somewhere during this epic block I glanced at the “academic calendar” & I got a little worried given that there was just SO much we wanted to do, to cover and yet, here we were leisurely bathing in the history and culture of India –without a thought of moving on.  Their level of excitement was palpable. “Can we learn Sanskrit?” Or, “I would love to learn more about other Indian people when we finish. Maybe Ghandi?”

The Mirabai block was a HUGE success. Using resources from my friend’s curriculum, I told the girls stories of Mirabai and then we a) re-inacted them together b) drew pictures c) wrote out summaries to form a book by the block’s end. I was not as satisfied with these summaries as I was with the John Muir materials. However, I can appreciate the research challenges– the biographical information is scant on this 16th century mystic who went behind her “defined destiny” in life to follow God, her own intuition, love, and joy. She broke with tradition of caste, of gender and like John Muir listened deeply, consciously to what she knew was true and right. These are the role models worthy of our time. John Muir fearlessly heard the mountains calling him and he journeyed onward. Mirabai heard Krishna’s flute and she shone like the sun– sharing with others her love and joy. As a homeschooling family, we do have a lot of influence on our children. However, peers, current day culture, media are there. The more I thoughtfully select content to enrich our learning, whether it is part of our lessons or leisure, the greater positive impact I have.

Once again, I’ve been reminded that I need to listen to my inner voice. It is always there, if I listen closely. I told the girls I could not take on Ghandi next since it will take a few weeks to research. The biographies on him are hefty. I did say though that we could stay in India, relatively speaking.

Yes, so THIS is why I homeschool. To LIVE together and to LOVE learning.

Click on the first photo to view each.

We have continued to bake sourdough bread every few days. Arlene and I had fun taking pictures of scenes from around our home and those are included below. It has taken time to call here, HOME. Like anything in life, it is about coming to a place of acceptance  and living with gratitude w/ what one has rather than what one doesn’t have. We don’t have a yard, but an incredibly enlightened city to live in! We do have a patio 🙂 Gorgeous mountains out our door, & public transportation. No large scale gardens like in NC, but we do have community gardening and somehow we were offered the largest plot! I had not ever envisioned living back in a city and while this isn’t NYC, our home is smaller and on a busy road. We live very close to our neighbors.  It is quite urban! A couple of these “scenes” have brought me immense joy and peace. This is our home. Now.

Continuing with the theme of reading fiction on the topic we are studying, I’m reading one of the most incredible books I have ever read!  It is called Sea of Poppies by  Amitav Ghosh. It is not a light read by any stretch of the imagination. It is layered and rich with varied language and history.

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12 days, exactly

12 days ago we were suppose to leave for an epic drive and visit to North Carolina.

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Our first trip back east since we moved here. It was going to be the first time seeing the new home of Stephens parent’s. We were going to hug and play with our family and friends, walk our old stomping ground, eat at Elmo’s and visit with Tweedy (our last surviving hen). 12 days ago was Christmas. We spent weeks preparing for the trip, practical considerations to emotional ones. The plan was to leave in the wee hours (4:00 am) of the 26th of December and make it to NC by the evening of the 27th– in those 34 hours, driving the necessary 24 hours.

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We planned a special, low-key morning for Christmas, followed by an afternoon at home, early fondue dinner and squeezed in there, cooking, cleaning, and packing of the car. We were greeted with happy voices that morning- excited to share that Santa indeed had left something for our dog! We did have a special, low-key, beautiful morning on the 25th. A&A admired Santa’s wrapping, choice of bows, and arrangement of gifts. We had a simple breakfast and then opened gifts together, savoring it carefully. Last year we celebrated the 12 days of Christmas (beginning on Christmas and ending on the eve of the Epiphany or King’s Day) where we found a gift each of 12 days. I loved celebrating the holiday over the nearly 2 weeks. Each day was special without the buildup (for anyone) or bust. We maintained a spirit of reverence and magic those days and while the trade-off for North Carolina was worth it, it was change.

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As Christmas day progressed, so did the snow. We were aware of it, but in full denial. Like one of the girls’ books where the child is elated over the snowflakes and everyone around him says, oh, it won’t stick, it’ll melt, just a snowflake, etc. we too were in denial. We were busy I will say to our defense, but one would think after multiple trips to the car, packing and rearranging that it would have dawned on us sooner. It didn’t though. We all went to bed at 8 and fully expected to drive east at 4 am.

It was not in the plan. While we initially made the decision rather tentatively– let’s see how the weather evolves, I think we knew in our hearts it was not going to happen. Nonetheless, we would wait it out and see. Waiting it out, however, didn’t yield a different decision. Weather and roads looked bad across Colorado and Kansas. We were so utterly torn about going, staying, flying, flying later, waiting another day, staying a shorter amount of time?!?! We felt resonance with JB’s singing:

“I don’t wanna go, I don’t wanna stay, I don’t wanna go, I don’t wanna stay, I don’t know what I wanna do now. (Widespread Panic covering The Meter’s song  “Ain’t No Use” 

It took days to rebound, find our groove again. We joked that we should have been taking a lesson from the girls’ example. While they did have some unusual emotional moments, by and large they threw themselves into the present! The present was full of snow, so that meant climbing up hills and rolling in it, making snow people, sitting on fresh snow to see one’s snow pant pattern, sledding and so on.

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Without plan nor agenda, the days provided an opportunity for us to just be. A little formless, but fully enriching.  We continued our 12 days celebration with a star of spirals and nightly readings. We knit together, girls on straight needles now and Stephen, too! We had leisure dinners and snow-filled outings. I got to yoga in the morning or out for a gorgeous run (below)!

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It was different than a vacation, different than going away…it felt “timeless” without start and end, a permeable beginning and end. Arlene even lost her first tooth!

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Our light continued to guide us, but to our center(s), as individuals and a family. We honed in on some of the inner and outer work we’ve all desired, maybe even needed, at home. I’ve been grateful for the larger life we have come to encompass this year in Colorado, but I’ve also longed for less. I’ve learned a lot this year about myself–balancing and trying to better live my priorities and this week and a half unexpectedly bestowed time to fully bask in that searching while on our journey.

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There was hiking, sledding and game playing. New Year’s Eve fun with a homemade candle holder and more games.

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We took on bills, health insurance, graduate school paperwork, etc. We reorganized parts of the house, decluttered (yes!) and began tackling the monstrosity of photos on our computer. The girls played and played — without interruption! They’re like actors on a stage– setting up a new scene and immersing themselves in its storyline 100%. We had vet clinics, thrift shops (with basically everything in the living room price tagged), courier services (lots and lots of deliveries to neighbors) and so on. There was time, too to hear what they needed and time for Stephen and I to pause and discuss how we want to proceed. There’s always change and some days it is more obvious than others. Their need to exert their will, to talk things out, to be listened to, to be guided through difficult moments. Lastly, a homeschooling issue that had been percolating within me for months came to fruition– do less. Our short morning lesson will devolve and we will take on a more meandering morning. Playing together more after circle and greater time to get into our handwork, more painting, lots of baking, more singing and so forth. I want to play with them more and and trust the rest will come in time.

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In Quakerism, one believes there is God in everyone, light within that we can attune ourselves to hearing and understanding. I didn’t understand what our time staying here in Colorado was going to be about, nor what I should make it BE about, but I did know that once we made our decision to stay, it was about being in the present.  Over the first few days past Christmas it was clear that although we faced some real obstacles, disappointments and a major change in our “direction” we were still guided and moving forward.

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Now, on the 12th day of Christmas, the eve of the Epiphany, I can’t help but laugh at the synchronicity. Our 12 days has led us to a simpler pace, clearer vision and a more grounded footing than before.


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Arriving Here in Colorado

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2 cars, 2 children, 1 aging dog, all the “stuff” we couldn’t fit in the pods, 1700 miles, a few days, speeding ticket, a hundred year storm (during which we lost our temporary tag), an unexpected stay in Colby, Kansas (loved the old downtown), a flood, missing pods… OH, we’re here!

With the recent move I’ve had thoughts of reviving my writing and posting here more. This part of our “journey” that  began years ago with dreamy talks of moving “west”, took root late July. Returning from our beautiful trip to Texas, we were inspired– the world IS still our oyster! While home felt as wonderful as ever, we were confused and challenged with immediate decisions which even a nice vacation could not make go away. The decisions were beginning to overwhelm us. I felt trapped and increasingly depressed about the situation. I tempered those feelings of despair with the reality that our life was extremely fortunate– we had a wonderful life! We were healthy, we had a wonderful home, a job, supportive family and friends. Maybe we just couldn’t have it all! Yet, it certainly was an inner conflict on a level rarely experienced.  I had a resolute position on what I believed I should be doing with my life…I should be with the girls right now.  Not pursuing that option would stand in contrast to one of my firmest beliefs.  Well doubt comes dancing about and settles in– second-guessing follows.  I was in a constant loop of indecision. Was I going to return to teaching in the fall? Would the girls go to preschool? Increasingly I felt as if I were having to make decisions that I really didn’t want to make, but had to make…

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When doors really began to close, freedom descended! Initially of course I felt sick when those doors closed, no exaggeration. However, I also felt liberated–like well, now WE HAVE to come up with other plans! The future started to take shape even before we had firm plans. We talked all into the night every night, about so many things. We let the dust settle and many of our priorities remained crystal clear. We wanted to explore the homeschooling option more thoroughly and make our decision for the right reasons. We wanted to improve the job situation, the educational climate we lived in, we wanted to remain strong role models for the girls– to continue to live our dreams, to immerse ourselves in a place with more outdoor opportunities and mountains, maybe? Now we were really dreaming!

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Stephen and I came together only by incredible leaps of faith. We began to see the signs just a step or two ahead of us very clearly and started making the plans and taking the very exciting yet incredibly stressful steps to put it into action. We sold the house, Stephen found a job, we reduced our belongings, found a new home for the feathered girls, said goodbye to family and friends. I do miss Durham in countless ways. I miss my first real “home” and think of it often. I lived there longest of any house! I miss friends and family, but I also feel so right where we are right now.

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One small piece of wisdom that has evolved in these months is that when you take control of your life, you’re far more equipped to handle the obstacles, the disappointments and dramas, because certainly this has not been a bowl of cherries, but I’ve really never been happier.

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