Walks and hikes and yard work here, nothing formal.

I am really impressed and grateful. I sent a heartfelt thank you to the student support director. They have suite-style living for seniors only. They don't have an honors dorm but do have chem-free dorm, quiet dorm, and other theme floors eg Russian and other languages. She didn't find anyone she wanted to choose as a roomie for next year so is unfortunately going back into the lottery.

I'm so sorry, but glad you're moving forward. Xdh not being involved or paying support is a crime and so stressful. Great! I'm sure you know this but I'll just say it again: boys in puberty need a lot of food and a lot of exercise. I know there have been threads here or on the chat board asking for easy, inexpensive, nutritious meals and snacks for those years. I remember making 20 refried bean, cheese, salsa burritos for the freezer per week and my boys eating endless jars of peanut butter on endless loaves of bread. Exercise is not optional for that age, they have to sweat every day. Sweating socially is even better if there are kids they like to ride bikes or play sports with. Working with their hands while volunteering such as for church or a community organization is also really helpful for burning off that puberty angst. A couple of clarifying questions: are you totally committed to homeschool or is public school an option? Do they want to stay home? What have you been using for the one entering 11th and can you reuse their 9th materials for the entering ninth? Is there a local co-op or homeschooling community where they could do some of their classes? I'm thinking of the Oak Meadow curricula (secular) which span all the grades and all subjects. They have very clear learning guides, teacher/answer books, and incorporate arts-based activities if desired. You can pay for teacher support from the company or not, and it's fairly easy to find used sets of the grades and individual courses.

Update: she had a really good talk with the head of student support office who was so kind and motherly and smart. They've given her an "emergency" room in a different dorm that they apparently hold in reserve and today she'll meet with residential life to find a room for the remaining 5 weeks. So she feels well supported and heard and I think her panic is receding. Dh is traveling relatively nearby and will swing over there to help her move and stay for a day. She's fiery and fierce but also deeply sensitive and prone to physically incapacitating panic attacks. She called yesterday afternoon with one and we talked while she walked over to the office, it was gone when she emerged. It's so sad to me how many folks here or their children have had similar experiences. Thanks for listening and support, onward to the final weeks of our dc's first years!

I'm sorry to hear that too. Will he attend the one where he is accepted or start over?

Well, Plan B it is. Neither school took anyone off their waitlists this year.

Holding your son, your family, and you in the Light.

I wish she had asked for chem-free housing, for sure.

Thank you. I'm so sorry you had to go through that too.

Dd called me this morning at 3:30, crying hysterically. Her roommate had come in very drunk and ended up on the floor, choking and not breathing. Dd got her up and called campus safety who then called the EMTs. They didn't want to take her to the hospital but my daughter was terrified it would happen again and the girl eventually agreed to go. We just talked for 2 and a half hours and she's calm now, taking a shower. The roommate has been coming in drunk throughout the year but for goodness' sake, it was a Wednesday night, she's 18, her parents are paying north of $80,000 for her to be there doing this? Entitled, immature, irritating, what a waste of resources. How many young people in the world could use the privilege of safety and education that this girl is spending drinking? It's shameful. I have a lot of compassion for people who need help but this is terrible. Why should my traumatized kid now have to be wondering if/when this is going to happen again? She's going to talk to the residential office about getting a single for the rest of the semester but that's very unlikely. I cannot understand why drinking is so tolerated in college. The girl is 18. I appreciate the whole amnesty concept to encourage people to get help if it's needed but not having consequences doesn't help anything. This is a JAWM, I'm sure others disagree but I'm irritated and tired and feeling very protective of my dd.

I did a gentle 2 hour walk/hike today with a friend who has mobility issues. She did just fine, we just went very slowly. Might have been 2 miles but a nice elevation gain and a beautiful view. Then a 30 minute dumbbell video.

I was reading along earnestly but looked at the date when I saw @Selkie's name. @Selkie if you see this, hello!

I took a six mile walk/hike yesterday and worked through a weird hip pain I sometimes get when I'm walking. I started walking slightly differently and it went away. Went up a too-wet trail and had a scary moment on the difficult crux. Ate the last of the snow hiding on the north side of the summit.

Wow! Thank you for these!

I had to drive a lot in the rain yesterday on a pointless errand that I couldn't accomplish, ugh. But today I went for a kayak on the creek which was the highest water I've ever seen there. It was finally sunny and I saw 4 peregrine falcons playing and careening around, plus a kingfisher, a Northern harrier, 24 ducks, and a Canada goose. I've figured out some foods that are working for me and will now do a legs and abs video to get a little more workout time. I missed my kids today so much. I've never kayaked without at least one of them.

This is a really nice post, thank you for sharing it and I hope it all goes peacefully. You are such a loving and accepting sister! Agree with art supplies, love the stationary idea so they can write to you.

I enjoy this probably more than I should:

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I love it in all seasons, including summer when I wear merino socks to keep my feet cool. I can't afford the actual clothing but I do wear base layers as leggings and shirts.

This seems horribly unfair to me and I would be having a very rough time with it, especially that your folks are still alive and have the power to change it. Was this a contract? Or was the intention unwritten?

((@gardenmom5))

I did a total of 40 minutes of videos and took a couple of walks yesterday. Also sorting out my eating.

We did: Ecological communities: they learned to look for and see the flow of energy throughout an ecosystem, how to analyze succession. Dichotomous keys: they learned to use guides and keys for taxonomic classification. Phenology: we keep a permanent Nature! list on our fridge and write what we observe with the date and occasionally weather. We get inspired to look up new things we see but also to look back on previous years to see when those same things arrived or happened. Nature journaling: using a lighted hand lens and good quality colored pencils, they did similar to what they did as kids but with Latin names, ecological significance, and more detail. They learned to key out, draw, and the Latin and common names, ecological significance, and life cycles of the following local phenomena: birds, mammals and skulls, invertebrates, fish (only lightly), trees, winter weeds, forbs, woody shrubs, mushrooms, moss, and lichen (lightly), tracks, ferns, geology, amphibians and vernal pools. We also did some foraging and made tinctures and teas. Some of the books we used: Forest Trees of Maine, Sibley's and Peterson's guides to birds, Newcomb's wildflowers book, Reading The Forested Landscape, Bark: Field Guide to Trees, Nature in Winter, Naturally Curious, A Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady (for inspiration.) Some of these are New England-based but I'm sure you can find specific, relevant books for your location. A couple of good apps: I-naturalist, Merlin. Obviously now there is Picture This and the google version but a) we didn't have those and b) the process of keying by hand and book makes you really look closely at what's in your lens. We had a field bag with binoculars, hand lenses for each person, colored pencils, notebooks, a few books - usually a bird, tree, and forb key - snacks, water, wool socks for the inevitable cold feet, a first aid kit, bags to collect things into. We also had these and a little watercolor set https://www.amazon.com/Coloring-Watercolor-Painting-Powdered-Attractive/dp/B0C2KFZC8B/ref=asc_df_B0C2KFZC8B/? Seasonality is really important to understanding nature so we went to the same places in different seasons to compare and draw.

Congratulations! And best of luck with the onboarding! I'm with you on the no time or money for trainer. I can't imagine joining a gym but I've started doing workout videos for the first time in my life, recommended by a Hive member on the Well-Trained Bodies thread. The ones I'm using are called "fitbymyk" on youtube and I like them. She's quiet, the music isn't terrible, she's not too woo-ey, and the 45 second intervals are perfect for my beginner level. I bought some handheld weights at Goodwill and I am seeing progress!