With Grandpa

Xavier must have been 2 or 3 years old when I caught him and grandpa sitting together outside on the porch at our Ham Lake house.  I wish the photos were of better quality because I love these photos.  For me it captures the comfortable and quiet way that my dad could just "hang out" with the kids.  Note: in the background of the 2nd photo is his famous red truck!

Here is another one of my favorite photos of Selena with her grandpa.  This was in 1992 at a vacation resort in Perham, MN.

Selena, the chick whisperer

The chicks are 4 weeks old today and up until yesterday they had been living in our laundry room in large cardboard boxes with heat lamps running from the ceiling. We had to change bedding (newspaper), water and food 2-3 times a day so it got to be quite a mess. (By the way, I would not use newspaper next time as it flattened out the surface and was therefore hard on the chick's feet. i.e. better to provide an uneven surface, like wood chips).

I decided to order chicks at the earliest possible arrival date so that we would have eggs in July and meat in the freezer or on the table by June. We have 50 chicks; 25 Delawares for eggs and 25 red broilers for meat. The Delawares are the friendly birds, especially with Selena who has a calming affect on them.
The light colored chicks are the Delawares. This photo shows them at 2 1/2 weeks. The Delaware is a heritage dual purpose breed. Because of industrial farming these breeds and their genetic hardiness and diversity are in danger of dying out. (See Amercan Livestock Breeds Conservancy ) The turkey poults, Bourbon Reds, that will arrive in April are also considered a heritage breed.
Last week I moved the adult chickens out of the hen house and into a silo lean-to. We only have 8 egg laying hens and one rooster (Cow) left from my Ham Lake flock but they are still providing us with enough eggs. So, yesterday the chicks were removed from the laundry room and put out in the henhouse. Now they have enough space to run and jump around and are already trying to hop up to the roost. Chickens have a natural tendency to try to get up above the ground and roost. I am looking forward to warmer weather when we can let them go outside and run around. There's no better relaxing entertainment.

Selena finishes another year at ARCC

For Selena, Friday marked the end of another semester at Anoka Ramsey Community College (ARCC) and the last year with the PSEO program (Post Secondary Education Option). She has been taking classes for the last 2 years at ARCC and plans to finish her A.A. next year. After that, only she will know... She's had some interest in transferring to a college in Washington called Evergreen because they have an approach more suited to her unschooling background, but also because of the various programs in environmental studies. Please let me know if you are acquainted with other colleges or universities that are more "unschooly".

Some weeks ago I asked her if she was looking forward to the end of the semester and she replied that, "no, not really". This surprised me a LOT since my own experience as both student and teacher has shown the exact opposite. Most people are happy to get outta-there. Anyway, we've talked some about this and, in general, it's the stimulation of getting out and going to class that she likes and will miss during the summer. There are some things that she really enjoys about taking classes (listening to interesting lectures, reading some of the books and writing papers that she's interested in), and then there are other things that she won't miss (doing small group activities, reading textbooks, and doing book reports on online articles). These categories align with the kind of learner that she has always been; listen, read and write.

Well, school is out but learning continues. Selena has a summer reading list that includes "Don Quijote", "Love in the Time of Cholera (Garcia Marquez), and "House of the Spirits" (Isabel Allende). We'll also be starting Spanish on a daily basis, so maybe she'll be able to read these novels in Spanish someday. (When I was a student in Spain my initial goal was to be able to read "Cien Años de Soledad" in the language that it was written.) Also, she'll be studying for her driver's permit, which she can get without a blue card when she's 18, in August.

Well, that's my Selena! She doesn't always offer things that I can blog (brag!) about so I'm grateful that she allowed me to do so this morning and take her picture.

                                             Selena enjoys a good book with Skippy Lu.

Making lefse with Grandma

Grandma and Granddaughter, aren't they beautiful!!With Christmas every year comes our tradition of lefse making with Grandma (my mother, Alice). Fortunately Selena has become very skilled at it and I don't have to worry about doing it myself; I've never been very patient for it.
Working together we made about 100 lefse. Oh, in case you didn't know, lefse is a norwegian flat bread. René used to say that it was kind of like sweet tortillas (not really!)
Selena mixes the lefse dough. This is the part where I usually get impatient and I'm glad that Selena volunteered to do it.

"Lefse dog", Skippy Lu
My Dad and Xavier were goofing around while we were working!

Skippy Lu LOVES grandpa! Do you wonder why?

Grandpa also really enjoys Xavi's music (as do the rest of us.)

Preparing for X-mas at home: Selena gets a kiss from our foster dog, Tara.
Merry dog, Merry Christmas!

Selena learns to iron... and it snowed, por fin!

This morning Selena requested that she learn to iron clothes. My jaw dropped down to the floor and flew up again! I love how my kids continue to surprise me and alter whatever it was that I knew about them. This is the child who used to throw clothes all over the floor of her bedroom and wear them in whatever condition. She used to wear different colored socks to school and refused to wear jeans until she was 14. Now she is becoming neat like her father and "doesn't like wrinkles" in her clothes. Well, no better time like a Sunday to start ironing clothes. I haven't really done it in years but I'm still pretty good at it. I have a repertoire of pitfalls to avoid; like not using starch on dark colored pants, or leaving the iron to cool on the ironing table so that a dog would go by and knock it over right onto the wood floor. So, we set out to iron some shirts and pants. All went very well. We

We have been wondering if we will get a white Christmas this year. Wonder no more, it has come! I still love it! December is the honeymoon period and by February you want a divorce from it, but snow is uplifting after the drabness of November. Incidentally, the photo above is of the chicken house. Our flock has dwindled since the invasion of the weasel. We lost half of the ducks and about 3 chickens in one night (their necks were eaten!) Anyway, winter is hard for them, no doubt about it.

As soon as Xavier saw the snow he was out the door with the dogs. Below: Xavier and Jota.
Xavier made some angels in the snow. Skippy Lu was certainly curious about what he was up to.
On another note, we still have our foster dog, Tara (Mom of the coon house puppies). She has come a long way since we got her; not as timid and afraid. She loves my bed and sleeps with me and Skippy Lu at night. We need to find someone that will allow her to cuddle; she's good at that!

Selena studies for Logic

Spring semester is winding down at Anoka Ramsey Community College (only finals week remains). Selena doesn't have much else to do for classes except to prepare for exams. On Friday evening we sat outside on the patio and enjoyed the sun. I sat out there and ate crackers and cheese while Selena studied Logic. As you can see, she was greatly distracted by the puppies running around and jumping up on our legs and pulling at our pants.
Notice the BIG puppy belly! These puppies can eat SO much food then lay around like little whales digesting the mass. The puppies are now 9 weeks olds and ready to be spayed and neutered... and then on to adoptions.

Well, a dose of puppy love and we're on to studying logic!


Meanwhile, here's Emilia.
Here's Claire. We think that she must be part Pit Bull. She is a very sweet girl.
Emilia
This is Ellis. He is almost completely black.
This is Simon.
More puppies...

Overachievers, Speechs, and a Fixtation on Letters

Author: Selena
Has it been a long time since I wrote in this blog? I suposse it has since the blog seems longer and more drawn out than I remember it. Are you getting tired of us yet? I think I might be getting tired of myself. However, that's not the point I was trying to talk about was it. The title after all starts with "Overachievers" so, I'll get back to that...
At Anoka-Ramsey Community College there is a girl who is in my Reading class, is also PSEO, and if you were viewing her from the angle of academic would be labled "Overachiever". She fascinates me, and you will wonder why. She's obviously very intelligent, makes wonderful connections to the books that we're reading (Jack and Rochelle by Jack and Rochelle Sutin, Edited by Lawrence Sutin), she's outspoken and loud, and knows how to manage time.
In this class sometimes the teacher leads us to a computer center and sets us on a little diversion called "Ultimate Speed Reader" I love this teacher but do not care for this odd program which makes no sense to me (why would I want to read at 750 words a minute like I'm trying to give myself an adreniline rush when reading a book when I could pace through it and enjoy it?) The thing is, you get extra credit for doing these labs and giving yourself adreniline rushes. The girl I have told you about wants to know (quite adamently) how many points she gets for doing the labs. Even the teacher seemed puzzled as to why someone would want to do fill out all these labs and why someone would want to know precisely how many points you get for all of it.
When we did a presentation on the book Jack and Rochelle she wanted to know how many points you got if you volunteered to go on the first day (which I did do but merely for the porpose that I was ready and didn't want to terrify myself by thinking about it for two more days).
When we went into a "smart" room to do our presentations she said that she had a three hour English class on Wednesdays in the same room because that's the only time she could fit it in (three hours? Is is she sucididal?).
Now here's my point, the letter of her grade seems very important. Maybe two years ago this may have made sense to me but now? How can your intelligence which is so wide and vast be determined by one measly letter or number or a few short words the professor writes on your essay? Did Jack or Rochelle get a letter grade for surviving the Nazis and fighting as partisans or living like animals in a Polish forest?

Selena is accepted at Anoka Ramsey Community College (ARCC)

Last week we were elated to receive an acceptance letter from ARCC for Selena to attend in the fall as a Post Secondary Education student. The Post Secondary Education Option (PSEO) is a Minnesota program for High School students to take college courses while they are still in High School. The meaty side of this option is that the state pays for all of the classes and books for a maximum of 2 years.

In order to gain acceptance to ARCC for the program as a homeschooler she had to score higher than 68th percentile on a standardized test, such as the CAT. Last year, as an 8th grader, she scored a 63. Also, in order to get into the program THIS YEAR she would have to jump a grade (to 10th grade). The program only involves students in 10th-12th grades. Also, she had to take a placement test for any core courses that she takes at ARCC.

It was late February when Selena decided that she wanted to try some college classes. We took a month to prepare for the placement tests. She had excellent scores for the verbal and reading sections. We were not surprised either that she did not do so well in Math. So, she would be able to take Freshman English but would have to improve in Math in order to take college classes.

The next step was to prepare for the 10th grade CAT (California Achievement Test) that she would take in mid-May. She worked hard during these months studying in all areas for the test. We listened to many podcasts from various Universities. Our favorites were the history and geography courses. Also, she worked incredibly hard on math. I ordered math lessons on DVD from Netflix.com and she continued working in her Saxon Math books.

Finally, she and Xavier took the CAT in May and we received her score a couple weeks later, just in time to send in her application to ARCC. Her score was 87 percentile. She improved 15 percentile points in Math since last year. We were SO happy, we were jumping up and down in the kitchen!

For 2 and a half years Selena has not been in school, she hasn't followed a curriculum nor studied any Math or grammar or anything else. Everything that she has learned she has done on her own and by following her own interests.
It's AWESOME!

Introduction by Selena

Good Morning Lizards and Slugs, this is Selena, daughter of this cyberspace family that you have stumbled upon. While I fully wake up I am typing this, waiting for my maternal section of the parental unit to get me coffee which is why this post seems slightly, well.... insane.

So now I will introduce you to my world. Later on you will meet the maternal section of my family unit in which I mentioned earlier, presumably in later posts, she is the one that mixs together food to put in our darling little stomachs, cleans house to get us from wasting away in our own flith, and spoils all the little critters that live with us, to which I will introduce you later. But be not fooled! Mother Dearest can not only trounce you in a game of puzzles but she can wrestle a 150 pound Great Dane into submission (Jota, our dog).

Next we meet, René, paternal unit of the Jara household. René works very hard as a professor of Latin American Literature at the University of Minnesota. René deals with other professors all the time and is famously patient (at least with us) and sweet.

Then there is Xavier, my younger brother in the Jara Family, who enjoys a number of musical intruments (banjo, guitar, and violin) and loves to play a number of video games (of which I like to play "Kirby", a fluffy pink, floating ball). He is also the one that keeps our mangy mongrels consistently amused and tired most of the time.

Me? No... there's no way I could make an accurate character assesment of myself, I'll leave that up to whoever wishes to write about me.

Till next time Lizzies and Sluggies,
Selena