More Fragments

I have an entry in this week's Carnival of Homeschooling - it's the Nutcracker post from a few days ago. I entered the Carnival with this post specifically because 1) we continue to think through this education business and 2) I liked the lesson I learned from the whole episode, sometimes the kids will take an interest in something I would never have imagined. This is something I need to remember as we think about our next steps.


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You may have noticed the ticker on the right-hand margin counting the numbers of pre-approved credit offers we've received since the end of November. Seriously, there were maybe three or four arriving every day and it was all so ridiculous that I felt the numbers needed to be documented somehow. Of course, within days of posting the arriving offers slowed markedly and I almost took the counter down. I needn't have worried, for their once again filling our mailbox to astonishing levels. Yesterday brought another three. At least we received more Christmas cards than that, or I might have been depressed.


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Thank you for the help and advice regarding our bus driver's gift. I am going with the gift card and note, as originally planned. I do not know why this caused so much angst for me, other than I guess I need to have at least one gift-related freak-out every year or it just isn't Christmas.

Usually the freak-outs are related to my mother, my father or Brainiac. My sisters are fairly easy to buy for (and I'm not just saying that because one of them reads here) - they have a wide variety of interests and don't fuss about bigness or smallness or whatever. I have given my sisters all kind of things, from silly to sentimental, from thrifted to spendy and by and large I think I've done o.k.

Shopping for my mom is hard because she's an world-class shopper of the highest, black-belt order and usually buys herself what see wants almost immediately upon seeing it ("If I wait for a sale, it'll be gone!" is her frequent refrain). Selecting gifts for my dad can be hard because most of the things he'd really enjoy I can't afford (like really old Scotch, vintage golf clubs, greens fees at some fancy-pants club). And Brainiac wants only one thing badly - a pilot's license - but I just can't seem to come up with the many hundreds of dollars monthly that such an endeavor requires. Besides, a pilot's license is kind of like a naked Barbie - pointless and no fun without the further investment of capital in things like actually flying planes/clothes and Dreamhouse.

But this year everyone except the bus drive was covered nicely so I guess my freak-out needed reassignment. And now there's no freak-out at all.