Hurricane Creek

 

Terrifying.  Really.

 I think I will use this one as my Christmas card photo this year!

 The first mile was easy, the second was a long and steep climb up out of the canyon, Ben and I were nearly dead.  I weighed 2 pounds less when I got home and I think it was ALL blood sucked out by the clouds of rabid mosquitoes!

 Ben just fits under the ledge that-according to Jake-nearly took Jake's left eye out.

 Matt in a shaft of light.

These mushrooms make me feel a little smutty for putting them in a blog with pics of my children. 

Jake slid and cracked his ankle and knee and hobbled out to the top.  He seems okay now, but I was a little worried!
In all we did 3 miles with a 300 foot gain and loss of elevation and also 900,000 mosquitoes were out. That was miserable!  I am still glad we got out, the weather is really getting better for outdoor adventures!

A Random Week

This may get long, so bear with me.  I thought I would follow myself for a random week and then again in a few weeks when I try some changes.

Each day I take:
2 cinnamon
2 kelp
Vitamin D
B complex
Flax Oil

Monday
12 oz chocolate almond milk
1/4 cup raw nuts
protein bar

 Lunch: carrots, green grapes, plums, pluots and kiwi

 Dinner: Cucumber-Tomato Salad

Bowl of Spanish rice
One corn and one flour tortilla with a mix of
black beans, garbanzo beans, corn, guacamole, sour cream, artichoke and garlic salsa and Veggie Shreds faux cheese

4 20 oz bottles of water (from the tap in a reusable bottle) with lemon juice
1 12 oz diet soda



Exercise for Monday:
Yoga, crunches (40), arm curls while watching a movie and jumping rope in 4 60-second bursts.
Also general house cleaning-it was a sweeping heavy day.
Did not walk-raining.

Tuesday:
1/2 avocado
2 servings SF caramel crispies
2 packs of oatmeal (Revolution)
2 servings of pasta-no topping
1 bowl of saffron rice
1 pluot
1 green apple

Exercise for Tuesday:
10 minutes of arm curls
5 rounds of jumping for 60 second bursts
Walked 5 miles, it rained the last bit.

Wednesday:
Read a thing that said what you do first in a day sets up your priorities and the Universe will align your day accordingly. 
So, I talked to Matt a while, did some stretching, took care of my skin, walked around with the dogs and got some air and took out all the trash and opened some windows.  Sent some recovery and healing vibes to John Taylor Gatto who tops my list as Man I Most Admire and who recently had a severe stroke.

1/4 cup nuts
1 bowl cereal
1 cheese/tomato/lettuce sandwich on white
2 servings potato chips
1 slice cheesecake
1 strawberry
1 serving grapes
a few dill pickles
1 small slice of birthday cake
1/2 avacado
2 servings of stick pretzels
2 glasses of diet soda
3 glasses of water

Exercise:
talking (ha!)
walked 4.5 miles carrying 3 pound weights in each hand
30 crunches

Thursday:
It's Hobbit Day!
1 banana
1 kiwi
1 plum
1/2 cup crushed pineapple
1/4 cup Mandarin oranges
1/2 Granny Smith apple
2 servings apple-peach oatmeal
1 chocolate chip cookie (I would have had more, but I only had 3 left in a bag I found while cleaning, so don't think I am amazing for resisting-though I did not buy more at the grocery later, so maybe a little credit for effort.)
cucumber-tomato salad
quinoa with rice
black beans
garbanzo beans
avocado slices
sour cream
veggie shreds
corn tortilla

Exercise:
cleaned house, which counts.  Cleaned out the fridge, organized the pantries, swept and mopped the kitchen and did 5 loads of laundry all before 10.  I was sweating!
30 crunches

Friday:
The whole day was a bust as far as food, from the veggie burger I had for breakfast (at 11) to the Krispy Kreme doughnut for lunch followed by snack stuff at MNO, including a slice of homemade raisin bread that thought had a yogurt spread to go with it, so I dabbed it all over the top and sat down to discover-butter.  I probably did not eat 2,000 calories all day, but it was ALL crap.

No exercise other than walking around at the field trip, which was a tour of the dam.

For the week-no weight change.  I had hoped for a loss, but not after Friday's fiasco.  Saturday-right back at it, eating better. Mostly fruit, I made hummus and added avocado for dinner-we were watching movies that night.  We did some window frame repairs on the house.  Sunday, I had blended fruit for breakfast, we hiked 3 miles with some serious elevation changes, blended fruit and veggie juice for lunch and spaghetti squash on the grill for dinner, no sauce.

Dam, Doughnuts and MNO with UFO's

 

We got to be the first field trip to Wilson Lock and Dam since 9-11!
Here the barges are at the bottom of the lock, 100 feet down!

 

In order to fit, the boat has to unhook and slide up next to the barges.

 The gates shut, they are 115 feet high and there's 18 feet of water under that.

 

It takes about 20 minutes for the lock to fill with 50,000,000 gallons of water.
The valves are 15 feet by 19 feet.

 One the water levels are balanced, the upper gate is lowered and the barge is pushed on out.  It takes about half an hour all total to enter and then get going again.
Private citizens do not have to pay to use the lock systems.

 There it goes!  The captain came out and tooted at us and waved like the Queen in a parade.  We all cheered and waved back.

 

I did an eye enhance thing on Ben and turned him into Benjamin, the 7th Cullen.  LOL

 

After the dam, we went to Krispy Kreme.  It turns out, it was my own personal last visit.  After eating whole foods for the last few weeks, the sugar and processed food made me really ill.  Even the kids were hoping for a stomach bug so they could throw up.  The doughnuts were not bad, just SO freaking sweet.

 Yum!  Oh, they look so good!!

 

Jake was enthralled by this on the way home.  A house of games.  Even though it was obviously out of business!

We also had Mom's Night Out last night.  It was an Unfinished Object Night, I resized pics and worked on a document that needed proofing and chatted.  I bought Cosmo, but in a group of 12 Christian homeschooling moms, the topic of things to try in the closet never really came up.  *sigh*  And there were photos, too.

2.5 years

away from graduating my first child. 

We went over some things yesterday, I was trying to get a feel for where he is mentally and also academically.  Khan Academy has helped about a billion percent.  I know 100% is max, but it does not seem like enough.  I am REALLY not good with math.  Matt had said he would take over in high school, but he has not made a single effort to help.  I am SO glad to have Khan, Jake is zipping right on through Algebra.  He said last night he was going to go back 3 lessons and watch them again before bed because the new video had a concept that threw him and he wanted a review.  *sigh*  I am SO happy to hear him say things like that.  Sunday night, he came in with a math problem written out and wanted me to check it.  : )  I have tried to stay out of the way and only provide support, but it's HARD coming from my background as teacher's kid to just abandon the system and forge ahead, nudging my children out in front and not really knowing how it will all turn out.

Jake's gotten into the science part of Khan as well.  The other day he explained how heart attacks worked when I was wondering what an infarction was.  We are going to pull out the GED test Thursday for him to take, he did well last year-maybe could have passed it other than the writing.  We have been working on that a little via e-mails.  He sends me essays and such, I flesh them out and show him what they are looking for.  I know he'd like to get his GED sooner rather than later.  Then there's the SAT...I swear, for an unschooled kid, there sure are a lot of tests to get into college.

I know we still have time, that 18 is not The End, that he can take more time or he can change his mind and go a different route.  Compared to where he was at 2.5 years ago-the difference is vast.  Still, there are moments when I panic, when I know that I don't KNOW how it will turn out, that I have essentially bucked the system that was no good for *me* and in doing so, have gambled my children.  I am reliant on each kid to pull their own weight and follow their own interests and fill in the blanks with knowledge and experience of their own choosing, some I help with, most they go about independently-more so now that they are a little older.

I always start down this road to panic, or just to worry, and about the second bend, I am rewarded with some definitive proof that they really ARE learning, that they are picking up the basics and immersing themselves in interests that are nothing I would have chosen for them.  That's the point, I think.  That they make their own choices all of their lives, that they don't wait for someone to tell them-they go and make their own decisions.  I just hope the biggest decision in their lives-the one I made for them-the decision to unschool-was a good one.

Hmmmm

visited 29 states (58%)

Well, at least the states I have yet to visit are all clumped together in 3 sections, plus the dangling bits that are Alaska and Hawaii. I could get the lower 48 knocked out in 3 road trips...