We took the day off from academics today, so that we could prep for my youngest son’s birthday party.  The kids read and worked on some math pages independently, but otherwise, they were helping me. We were supposed to have celebrated at a local farm last week,  but that had to be cancelled because the birthday boy ran a 104 degree temperature for a couple of days.  We had to change the date to today with the hopes of meeting again at the farm.  Once again, plans had to be changed because of poor weather conditions.  So, I spent part of yesterday afternoon throwing his party together because we were to meet at our house instead.  The details went like this:

-Ran to Wal-mart (ugh) and bought Batman Legos sets for attendees.  The sets served as both the main entertainment (built during the party by each child), and they were also their take-home gifts.

-Bought Pillsbury Pizza dough, rolled out individual circles, cooked those this morning, and the kids made their own pizzas at the party. This activity also served as entertainment. (Working with that pizza dough was quite an experience for me.  The initial pizza crusts were huge and looked like pizza biscuits-lots of trial and error with this for me!)

-Printed out Batman and Monster High dolls coloring pages.  Each child colored a page upon arrival.  I took their coloring pages, stuck them to colored construction paper, and lamented them for take-home place-mats.

-Ran to the grocery store this afternoon as I was concerned the home-made pizzas might taste disgusting, so I purchased back-up hot dogs, fruit trays, humus and pita chips. Also served ice cream in waffle cones for dessert.  We never sang “Happy Birthday”.  It was a bit of a circus the whole time, but still good fun.

So, that’s how I throw a kid party together, and now I remember why I usually choose to celebrate outside of our home.  The prep work and cleaning is exhausting-all worth it in the long run, though, to watch the kids enjoy themselves.

I did enjoy an interesting conversation with a young mom of one of the attendees.  I was discussing homeschooling with her, and she quickly asked me when I’d be putting the kids into public school.  She was lovely to talk with, but I could tell she didn’t really understand my world of teaching the kids at home. I always enjoy these types of conversations. They make me smile a little on the inside.  I explained that we just take it one day at a time, really, and I’m always re-evaluating how we’re all doing.  Of course, if you ask me today, then my answer is I plan to homeschool all they way through high school.  She asked me why I chose to homeschool as she looked at me with the bewildered gaze and side-bent head.  What she doesn’t really know is that I could have talked for hours on the subject. I’m not sure that she really wanted an in-depth discussion on the many flaws of our American education system, so I just said that it was for reasons of flexibility and an individualized approach to education. She seemed okay with that answer, so we moved on in the conversation. Love those dialogues!

Now, back to reality and academics tomorrow.  I’ve no idea what’s going on in the world so I need to get plugged in. I should see if  the NSA is monitoring my homeschool blog:)