JUICY

Your Hair Should Be Orange

Expressive, deep, and one of a kind.You pull off "weird" well - hardly anyone notices.

What's" Your Funky Inner Hair Color?

Okay, I Admit It, I LOVE Spongebob!

When people dismiss television, and cartoons especially, as a mindless waste of time, I can't help but feel sorry for them. I think how much joyful bonding they could be having with their children. I think of all the laughs they could be having, if they just let themselves, if they just allowed themselves the 'unproductive' time to just sit and watch, they would be pleasantly surprised. I think the biggest surprise for some would be how much can be learned from cartoons.

My favorite cartoon for the last few years has been Spongebob Squarepants. Our family has enjoyed so many laughs and learned so many things from watching that show, that it would be hard to list them all, but I'll give you just I few examples why I think Spongebob is so awesome.

The character of Spongebob is like an eternal optimist. He rarely gets discouraged, but when he does his other emotions are just as huge as his happiness. He has passion for life! He approaches everything with enthusiasm. Even at his job as a frycook, Spongebob strives to be the absolute best he can be, and he takes satisfaction in a job well done. He is truly happy with the simple things in life, like friendship and bubbles. Numerous episodes show his disregard of money. Spongebob is a generous and loyal friend, kind to everyone, even the 'evil' Plankton. He is able to see the good in everyone, and often brings out the good in everyone, whether they like it or not (like Squidward).

If all my kids learned from watching Spongebob was how to be enthusiastic, optimistic, kind, loyal, generous, or a conscientious employee, that would be pretty good! BUT, they learn so much more. There is the content of each storyline, with the references to things in real life that we discuss that add even more depth to the value of this cartoon. Just today, they were quoting one of the characters, Patrick, saying, "The inner machinations of my mind are an enigma." Quite a mouthful, huh? Of course, I couldn't let that go by without talking to them about it, and after the discussion, the humor was appreciated even more by them. (After saying this, the cartoon shows a carton of milk spilling on a table inside Patrick's head. )

One of my daughter's friends told me that there was talk at her school about trying to have Spongebob banned! I want to cry when I hear talk of banning anything in this day and age, but this cartoon? I couldn't imagine why. When I asked the girl, she said it had something to do with an episode where he ripped his pants. Well, I've seen the offending episode numerous times, and the moral is "Be yourself if you want people to like you." Spongebob got a laugh the first few times he ripped his pants, so he kept playing practical jokes until he went too far and everyone had enough. At the end, he sings a corny song realizing his error, and everything is all better. How that is offensive is beyond me.

What offends me, quite frankly, is the look I get from some people when I tell them I love Spongebob. I want to tell them to just grow up, I mean loosen up, I mean wise up, I mean --- just watch it, maybe you'll like it.

Betcha Can't Guess What This Is!

Betcha Can't Guess What This Is!

No, it's not a clementine crate painted white, lined with a dish towel, holding an empty oreo tray, filled with broken comb teeth that are floating in water! Good try, though. It's Angelica and Joseph's "baby pet fish". It's a little hard to tell from the picture whose side is whose, but there is an "A" on one side and a "J" on the other, just to keep 'em straight.

I am constantly amazed at how my children turn the ordinary things in our lives into props for their imaginary worlds. Anything and everything has a potential use for them, therefore, I have to look very carefully at everything around our house before I even think about picking it up or throwing it out. My older son's stray paintball was given a carefully crafted toilet paper nest, and surprisingly a few days later it had BB babies! Tiny cut scraps of paper that were obviously leftovers, were not. They were money, or food for horses, or snow (once they were mixed with water and put in the freezer).

I enjoy and celebrate that my children have such creative abilities. I also think that the amount of free time and access to things that they are allowed, fosters their creativeness. We have had friends over whose parents won't let them build forts with all the blankets and the kitchen table, who have their kids do "crafts" at school because they don't want the mess at home, and who don't let their kids play in the rain. Their lives are all about order, and schedules,and control. They are not free to create.

I pray that my children will always keep their creativity, and the joy they receive from creating.

40% nORMAL?!

That's what the results of the quiz said. I guess that's pretty good. Isn't it?

I mean, for a woman who stays at home with her children full-time and doesn't work outside the home, who is a practicing catholic married to her high school sweetheart, who keeps her children out of school and lets them direct their own lives.......I am surprised I scored any points for normality. <:o

HOW NORMAL ARE YOU?

You are 40% Normal

While some of your behavior is quite normal......Other things you do are downright strange. You've got a little of your freak going on, but you mostly keep your weirdness to yourself.

How Normal Are You?

SO I NEVER FORGET.....

I am so grateful for my life, for being able to use my body to walk and swim and jump and dance and sing and climb stairs and sooooooo much more.

I am grateful for the gift of faith which has carried me through difficult times and given me the courage to change and grow.

I am grateful for my husband, whose devotion to our children matches my own. I am grateful that he is willing to work hard and yet knows how to play. I am grateful for all that he has added to my life, all that I have learned from him, and for the opportunity I have had to be there for him.

I am grateful for my children, without whom I cannot even imagine what I would be doing now. I am grateful that I am able to live and learn alongside them everyday, and for who I am becoming by being their mother.

I am grateful that my children are alive and healthy today.

I am grateful that I live in my own home, where I feel relatively safe, and I can sleep each night without fear of losing my life or belongings.

I am grateful that all our basic needs are met as a family, so that we are able to share with others.

I am grateful to have friends whom I know I could call in an emergency.

I am grateful that our family has made it safely through 3 major hurricanes in the last 2 years!

I'm grateful for my past, even the bad stuff, because all of it led me to where I am today.

I am grateful for having worked in the field of occupational therapy. I was fortunate to work with so many amazing people, who showed me that every life is valuable, no matter how compromised it may appear.

I am grateful for having worked with Hope, who survived a botched abortion.

I am grateful that I haven't "arrived" yet. I am glad to still be on a journey, still learning and growing.

LET FREEDOM RING

"No human right, except the right to life itself, is more fundamental than this. A person's freedom of learning is part of his freedom of thought, even more basic than his freedom of speech. If we take from someone his right to decide what he will be curious about, we destroy his freedom of thought. We say, in effect, you must think not about what interests and concerns you, but about what interests and concerns us.
We might call this the right of curiosity, the right to ask whatever questions are most important to us. As adults, we assume that we have the right to decide what does or does not interest us, what we will look into and what we will leave alone. We take this right largely for granted, cannot imagine that it might be taken away from us. Indeed, as far as I know, it has never been written into any body of law. Even the writers of our Constitution did not mention it. They thought it was enough to guarantee citizens the freedom of speech and the freedom to spread their ideas as widely as they wished and could. It did not occur to them that even the most tyrannical government would try to control people's minds, what they thought and knew. That idea would come later, under the benevolent guise of compulsory universal education."
excerpt from John Holt's "Escape From Childhood"

The 4th of July has become an increasingly significant holiday to me. I have come to recognize and appreciate more fully with each passing year how much freedom we really have in our lives, and how precious it is. This day is one in which I am filled with gratitude for the all the freedoms that most Americans are celebrating, but even more so, I am grateful for the freedom I am able to offer my children.

As unschoolers, my children have more freedom than most children their ages, freedom to pursue their own interests. Their time is not dominated by school. They truly are free to think and learn in the most natural and efficient way possible, as a by product of all their delight-driven activities. The wonderful bonus for an unschooling parent is that I get to be witness to, participate in, or provide the catalyst for all this fun, AND I get to learn right along with them!

God Bless America!