The last three weeks have been wonderful without school
and we've had several cool experiences with regards to people just thinking
homeschoooling is "normal", such as at the library on Tuesday. Nothing
dramatic--which is really the point. Yes, I'm aware that there is still
anti-homeschooling sentiment present in the U.S., but there's also
understanding, and I love it. Which makes it all the more ironic that as of
next Monday, we'll be legally homeschooling, but not
practically homeschooling, once classes start...
We spent two weeks in California with my family (parents,
grandparents, three out of four siblings, and various aunts and uncles and
cousins), then came to Montana on Monday for "international orientation". I felt
a little bit like we "cheated" coming for this week, since we didn't need to get
over jet-lag (did that in CA), didn't need our English evaluated (the children
and I speak it natively and my husband perfectly fluently), and have a fair
amount of international and cross-cultural experience, so the seminars this
week didn't really add to our knowledge. But getting to know the other
non-U.S.ians has been great, and the seven-year-old Korean girl next door was
especially happy for our eight-year-old daughter to appear. The language barrier
doesn't appear to be bothering either one of them much, which is wonderful to
watch. The three-year-old Korean girls (twins) don't have any trouble, either,
just chattering away to me and not seeming to mind when I don't understand
(which is always as far as vocabulary goes--but at least most communication is
NOT dependent on language, so we've been doing alright!)
I haven't yet figured out where I'm from (my nametag says
Germany and that's how I feel, but it's not entirely accurate, yet I haven't
lived in the U.S. for so long that it feels weird to say I'm from
California...), but other than that, I'm starting to think I might fit in here
(YWAM) better than any other place I've ever tried. Everyone's different and is
EXPECTED to be--too cool. And I could definitely live with the three meals a day
appearing with no effort or even thought on my part for a VERY long time! The
food is even GOOD, not what I'd expected from American cafeteria style! Even my
husband admits that the food is good, but not getting to cook is probably the
hardest thing for him so far.
Friday nights there's what they call a community meeting,
which turned out to be a lively worship service. There's childcare provided up
to age six, but children are also welcome to stay, which was very refreshing.
After my eight-month-old nursed to sleep, I handed her to my husband and put my
3 3/4-year-old in the sling, where he also fell asleep. Our bedrooms (two
adjoining rooms, one for the children and one for us) are just down the hall, so
going "home" was quick and easy, too. I don't think I'm going to miss having a
car at all.
We walked into town (a little over a mile) today for the
second time, to return the library books we'd gotten on Tuesday (land of free
libraries!) and get some more, then walked back through the woods and had our
picnic in our rooms, since it had rained while we were in the library and it was
getting rather cold. We were planning on going to one of the churches here in
the little town tomorrow, but our oldest daughter spent all afternoon in bed and
had a low fever an hour ago, so we'll have to decide that tomorrow morning. I
like the idea of being able to walk to church, but am also glad that starting
next week we'll have the opportunity of being shuttled to the city on Sundays,
so we are more free in choosing a church than we would have been otherwise.
(This is also the land of very little public transportation, NONE where we are
now, to be exact...)
I suppose that's enough rambling for now. I was thrilled
to finally get wireless hookup this afternoon and be able to type on the German
keyboard again (laptop), but that also means it's now possible to sit in my room
at the computer instead of going to the computer room, when I should probably be
doing other things!
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