The CSB

I'm afraid I don't exactly *love* Calvert anymore.  It's been a such a tough beginning (this trimester), as we have pushed on and forward, yet falling ultimately further behind.  I know that things will drastically improve in December when several hours in our schedule will free up, and that is the hope that I am hanging on to - with all I've got.  I feel like a doofus for saying in the past that I wanted to be accountable to somebody, because that would help us stay on a schedule.  Our insane schedule has driven me to drinking (coffee - and tons of it) and constantly updating vast spreadsheets I've made of assignments, due dates, pacing schedule and so forth.

1. I now officially hate being accountable to somebody.  I feel guilty if we take a half hour to ourselves and go to a park, or if I have to run an errand.  We're so behind it feels like every hour has potential to get just 'a little bit more' done, so we have minimal contact with the outside world (doing stuff that is fun, and stuff that we want to do).  I hate to admit that this accountability has been good for us, because we have accomplished more schoolwork already than we accomplished all of last year.  I just don't like losing so much of our freedom.  The freedom to make your own schedule is a big part of what homeschooling is all about.

2.  I am no longer okay with somebody else picking out our curriculum.  In the past week it was suggested in Owen's Kindergarten curriculum that I reread a story about a walk a child takes with fuzzy farm animals no less than 10 times.  10 TIMES.  It was to be reread during each lesson - and discussed ad nauseam - for 5 lessons in a row.  Yes, each rereading used a different approach or covered a different aspect of the story (predicting, color of animals, fur/feathers/scales, sentence structure, blah blah blah)  Owen was ready to poke his eyes out with his big yellow pencil.  Rylan just completed the most horrific math chapter on bar modeling.  She is a whiz with three digit addition with carrying, three digit subtraction with borrowing - done the traditional way, and then they throw this crap at her.  I HATE SINGAPORE. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it.  I've been standing before my schoolbook cases - now covered in dust - looking longingly at the awesome curriculum we had to shelve when Calvert came along.  History of Us, Story of the World, R.E.A.L. Science 4 Kids, Shurley English, All About Spelling, Meet the Masters, Wordly Wise 3000.... so sad.  so so sad.  There just isn't time, and it breaks my heart, because this was good stuff.  I've got to find a way to work it in, or substitute things, or...something.  Something!

I am pretty sure I will not pull the plug here mid-year, but I am undecided if we will continue with Calvert next year.  I constantly sit and fantasize about how I would take what I have learned about scheduling and pacing, and make it work with the curriculum that I want to use.  The other factor is that the kids do love their online class time - and there is no way to replicate that.  What to do, what to do, what to do...  uugh.  Sometimes I don't like being in charge.  Here we are at that stupid crossroads again - what if I make the wrong decision?  What if they fall even further behind?  Am I ruining them by keeping them home?

Homeschooling is not for the faint of heart.  You've got to be strong in your convictions because you will tested.  Constantly.  I am strong in that I want them home.  I could never surrender those Aha! moments of first words, first writing, first reading to another teacher.  Never.  I would never surrender them willingly to the social ladder of the classroom, the chaos of the lunchroom and playground, or the unrelenting schedule of homework, book reports, school functions and so forth.  I want them home so that their day can go at a reasonable pace, so that they can get adequate amounts of sunshine, playtime and downtime, so that they can go long in math and short in writing, or switch it if the mood arises, so that we can Google that question, YouTube that demonstration or build that next creation.  This I am strong in.

Where I am weak is how to go about it.  There is no ONE way - yes, I know that.  But our way over the past few years hasn't worked very well.  I'm weak in the execution of it all.  I'm weak in multi-tasking, delegating, time management - and with four kids that is a big liability.  My weak side has been winning lately.  First, I sabotaged our schedule by allowing Jordan and Rylan to do an activity that was clearly in conflict with school.  It has created a huge, huge problem, in fact.  I didn't factor in the time expense, the $$ cost to participate, the shuttling kids back and forth, the group snack headache and $$$$...  These are all things that I loathe about activities like this.  For Jordan, the reward does not even come close to the pain.  In fact, there has been damage done to relationships because he is so unhappy with his group.  For Rylan, the reward has been mostly worth it.  She has learned some new skills, made a new friend and looks forward to participating.  I am just too quick to agree to things.  I really need to sit down and work out the cost analysis before saying 'yes'.  I am also not managing our time very well.  Hours slip by without much to show for it, as I spend the time doing silly things like looking for lost items, going back to the store for forgotten things, shuttling kids back and forth to stuff, and making spreadsheets about how I should be spending my time.

All of this weakness has led to some not-so-good-things.  First of all, more than once I have woken in a cold sweat - certain that I forgot to pick up a kid from somewhere.  I have even got up, and gone to the kids' rooms to do a headcount to make sure everyone was accounted for.  There is just way too much picking up/dropping off going on, and every day is a different routine.  I check the calendar about 20 times a day because I am constantly afraid I am forgetting to do something or that I am late for something.  Panic attacks.  Daily, if not hourly panic attacks.  I panic about the schedule, the schoolwork, the house repairs, the towering stack of unopened mail (what is in there?), my knee rehab, two upcoming road trips... my heart races, my chest hurts and I think I am having a heart attack multiple times a day.  No joke.  There is also the crushing depression.  It's back, and with a vengeance.  I can't get anything done.  I am so overwhelmed, I can't care about the unopened mail, the unbalanced checkbook, the unfinished compositions, the dirty house, the child that is still having multiple 'accidents' a day, or even writing on here very much.  I don't have a clue about where to start.  I went to my doctor a few weeks back to ask for help, and I am back on an antidepressant.  This time I am trying out Prozac.  It is too low of a dose in my opinion, but it is a step in the right direction, and we'll up the dose next refill.  There has been some improvement, but the panic attacks have not stopped.  :(  I also think about where I was a year ago, vs. now.  I've gained nearly all of my weight back, due to lack of exercise because of my knee, and way more comfort/stress eating than I care to admit.  I know that the daily walking/running I was doing last year played a big part in keeping the depression at bay, and that I am soooo close to getting the all-clear to start walking daily, at least.

I think that this fall has just been particularly hard.  It's been a whole slew of a lot of little things that added all together made up the perfect clusterfuck stress bomb.  Let's just call that the CSB.  The new school 'thing', the hailstorm and the subsequent house and car repairs and the constant - daily! - meetings and phone calls with insurance agents, contractors, subs, shopping excursions and actual repair work, the knee surgery/rehab and the 30+ doctor appointments I've had since July, the insane activity schedule and so on, and so on, and so on...  I can't wait for December.  Even though Nutcracker craziness will be a part of the first half of December, that's okay.  We've actually really been enjoying that, for some reason that escapes me right now.

Contractors are a whole other breed...

I am not new to dealing with contractors.  Back in 2003 I purchased my first home, a brand new build.  They broke ground in October 2002, and I moved in in March of that next year.  Since the house was just a few blocks away from my job, I visited the site almost every damn day.  Things went wrong almost immediately.  The foundation was dug and poured, and when I went to look, it made no sense to me at all.  I cocked my head from side to side and walked around the entire property several times before I realized that they had flipped the entire plan.  When you sit and look at house plans for hours and hours, trying to picture the layout, the views from windows and the light that will come in and so forth, you get used to the way you have looked at it.  To have the entire thing flipped meant that all of a sudden I had to add windows where there weren't windows before because now I had a serious lack of natural lighting issue and so forth.  It went downhill from there, for the miscommunication was rampant.  I remember those times, and so now, as we are getting the house fixed up from the storm in June, it is coming back to haunt me.

First of all, let me say that State Farm is the best insurance company ever.  Ever.  EVER.  After much squabbling back and forth about replacing several windows, they sent out another adjuster a week and a half ago to look over the place again.  Our claim estimate jumped from $13K to $24K to account for more paint, a new garage door and some other things.  The adjuster was very courteous and absolutely thorough, and has a fully operational bullshit meter.  It appears that the windows subcontractor was pushing up numbers a bit, but on the other hand, the gouges left behind from numerous golf ball-sized hail that peppered all over the house, meant that one coat of paint was not going to do the job.  I mean really, the previous agent submitted for ONE coat of paint on *most* of the house.  That's ridiculous.  It pays to complain loudly sometimes.

We picked out a new garage door, and also decided to go ahead and replace the front door and both of our back doors - those will be on our own dime and labor.  (thank you honey!)  We made our color choices and style choices, and I submitted a flurry of paperwork to the HOA last Friday for approval.  I am competing with about 80% of our neighborhood for the coveted HOA signatures.

Monday (of this past week): I finally had the line item insurance paperwork in hand to show the contractor so that he knew exactly what the insurance company was going to cover, and so we could draw up a new contract for the work to be done and how much we would pay.  He came over that afternoon and I showed him the garage door that we had picked out and he placed a call to the garage door sub.  They responded later that afternoon with a 'yes, we can do that' and it would be ready in two weeks.  Remember that.  Two weeks.  Meanwhile, we went through the rest of the list and the contractor reminded me that I needed to get a check from the insurance company. Asap.  (vermin)

Tuesday: phone call from contractor:
C: Have I called you yet today about your garage door?
Me: (what now?....)  Uh...no?
C: Oh, well they have it ready to install, and can be there tomorrow between 10 and noon.
Me: (shock and more than mild irritation) Ummm... let me look at the calendar.. (several complications), Yeah... I guess that will work.

I think about a total of 18 hours had passed since the "two weeks" statement and the "they will show up tomorrow" statement.  Now, I know that most people have the opposite problem.  They pay for work and it never gets done.  I have a different problem.  I know my contractor has a cell.  I know that all of the subs have a cell.  But nobody EVER CALLS to set up a time to come by - they just show up.  They seem to think that I am always at home, and that we never leave the house to do things, and that we never need advanced notice for anything.

People in the contracting business, hear me out.  IT IS FLAT OUT RUDE.  okay?

So I got on the phone and moved the violin lesson, arranged a ride for somebody else, told Dean we needed to clear out the garage that evening, and then freaked out because I had nothing from the HOA.  They had the paperwork for all of one business day so far, and that's only if they had picked it up from the HOA office.  As luck would have it, that Friday before I had received a nice phone call from one of the ladies on the HOA board to let me know that I had verbal approval on the paint color choices, and that the paperwork would be on its way soon, as soon as it was signed off at their next meeting.  So, with her number in hand, I called to plead my case that my contractor was messing with me and that the garage door was being installed tomorrow instead of two weeks from now and I needed approval for that.  She was very sympathetic and understanding.  Those HOA people need Christmas cards this year because our entire neighborhood has worked them overtime in the past couple of months.

Wednesday: right at 11:58 a.m., the garage guys showed up and installed the door over the next three hours.  All irritation aside, it looks beautiful and totally changes the entire look of the house.  I won't show pics until all the work is done.  I received a call from the insurance guy, wanting to know if I had a signed contract with the contractor in hand.  (I did)  He will be by the next day to get a copy.

Thursday: Insurance guy shows up at appointed time, inspects the new door, takes the contract and gives me a substantial check.  I may have trouble getting it cashed since it is large and I have to get two different banks' signatures on it as well.  This could take some time.  I call the contractor later to tell him I have the check and let him know that I will work on it beginning Monday, to get it endorsed by a bunch of different people, as this takes time, and I don't want to do it on Friday because it is Halloween, and that doesn't sound like fun.  Halloween is supposed to be about fun - not spending the day in the car going from bank to bank.

Friday:  Contractor shows up, unannounced, looks at the new garage door and then the real intention of his visit is clear:
C:  Do you have a check ready for me yet?

I seriously want to go impale myself on a pitchfork.  I would make a nice yard decoration for this Halloween evening.