Living Unabridged

It's been a busy couple of weeks (or really, month), which I suspect you can tell because of the lack of new blog posts. Sorry about that. I aspire to be the kind of blogger who has posts scheduled out for weeks in advance but I'm not there yet. (Obviously)

I was feeling bad that we haven't officially started school yet until I started thinking about all the things we did with our kids this week.

• We spent several hours on Monday exploring The Great Smoky Mountains National Park, including hiking a trail and going wading. (Educational because: epic nature study, physical education, development of wonder)
• We spent several more hours on Monday at a museum in Cherokee, North Carolina on the Eastern Branch Cherokee Reservation. (Educational because: History, Geography, Cultural)
• We enjoyed the Ripley's Aquarium at Gatlinburg on Tuesday. (Education because: marine life is what my elementary age students are studying in Science this year.) We got to pet the crabs and stingrays, too.
• We watched a free Shakespeare in the Park Friday night. (Educational because: Shakespeare. 'Nough said.) This year's play was Romeo and Juliet. Our three oldest really enjoyed it. The younger three were there and looked cute. (Some of the younger folks were a lot more interested in pulling up grass than in the play. Oh well. My hope is that they will grow up hearing these great plays so often they'll never be intimidated by them.)

So, rather than say we haven't started school yet, I'll say we front-loaded our schedule with field trips. Works for us. (Because really, Time is the most valuable gift homeschooling gives our family.)

Despite being away from home, I did save some links to share:

Learning

• I Am, I Can, I Ought, I Will, OR: The Work of Homeschooling by Brandy Vencel at Afterthoughts. Such good stuff here, including another endorsement of my friend Dawn's new ebook on Charlotte Mason's Motto.
• It's Not About School from Happiness is Here. YES.
• Homeschooling With Depression: The Hardest Part of Shawna's Homeschool Year at Simple Homeschool. I love this series from Simple Homeschool. (Although I've identified with so many of the posts I wonder which one really is the "hardest part" of my homeschool life.)
• 10 Ways to Start Easy This Homeschool Year by Kara at Quill and Camera. #8 made me laugh but it's also great advice.

Living

• In Defense of Motherhood: Pass the Swords by Misty Krasawski at The Better Mom. Loved this.
• 4 Truths to Remember When I Worry for My Child by Rachel Wojo at The Better Mom. Surely every mom deals with this at one point or another. These are helpful reminders.
• The Everyday Question of Motherhood from Grace Covers Me. Simple, but not easy.
• Stop Trying to "Fix" Your Friends by Ashley Abramson at Relevant. This line actually encouraged me: "As we get older, community gets harder." The rest of the post is good too but sometimes it's nice to know that this whole friendship / community thing isn't just hard for me.

Loving

• This is What Bad Parenting Looks Like by Cheryl Magness at The Federalist. (See also Lenore Skenazy: The Dangers of Social Media: Child Predator Social Experiment) Yes, I had many friends on FB sharing this video. I'm thankful I also have a few friends pointing out that this is not what good parenting looks like. I love how FB helps us stay in touch with far away friends but I'm becoming increasingly less tolerant of click-bait fear-mongering like this. STOP SHARING THIS STUFF. THIS IS NOT HELPING. [/capsy]
• Nothing is More Conservative Than Birthright Citizenship by Robert Tracinski. I'm annoyed but certain political realities in our country too, but changing the constitution is a big deal.
• Questions Every Planned Parenthood Supporter Should Have to Answer by David Harsanyi at The Federalist. Not my favorite thing to talk about, but I'm so tired of this double standard and the fact that many media outlets don't even pretend to be impartial on the subject.
• Ashley Madison and Who You Are Online by Tim Challies. We were talking with our oldest daughter about this Ashley Madison scandal this week. "Did people really think no one would find out about this?" She asked. "If they did, they're really dumb. Nothing online is a secret." (Proud mom moment right there because I think she gets it!)

There are no posts from Living Unabridged to share this week, but here's photo evidence that we were in the mountains (or at least in the woods) earlier this week:

That skeptical look on Daughter #2's face is because she was afraid of bears. She was reading up on how to handle it if you encounter a bear in the Smokies and she told us, "We have to be sure to make a lot of noise."

As you can see from the picture, making a lot of noise is really not a problem with a crew this big. I'm guessing any bear with even half a brain knew to keep well out of our way.

What caught your eye this week?