Now What?

Kris and I are finished with language study!  Woohoo!  Well, "official" language study that is.  My language study buddies accuse me of spending my time eating bon bons and watching Indonesian soap operas all day now.  Thanks guys.  In addition to those gripping "sinetron" episodes, we are also getting ready for our big move.  Did you see the countdown over there on the right side of the page? Yup, the countdown is on.

This week Kris is attending a training so he is gone all week.  He is on a steep learning curve, but is loving it.  I am the sole captain of the ship this week which, I have discovered, is much easier now that the kids are older.  My only problem so far is keeping enough food around to fill up three boys' bellies.  Don't they ever tire of eating?  Today I am going to the grocery store to load up.

So this week while Kris is gone, I have dedicated my time to preparing for homeschooling next year.  Nope, folks, I have never homeschooled before.  Well, I did homeschool A while we were in the States for 7 months, but that was it.  This time I will be diving in with all three boys at once.  Grades 7, 5 and 3.  I am a research junkie, so I cannot be accused of not researching the topic enough.  In fact, several years ago I thought we'd be moving to the middle of the desert (that's a long story for any of you who don't know our history) and that I would be homeschooling.  I did TONS of research back then.  So I am not starting at square one in the information department.  At any rate, here's what I've done to get myself prepared:

1.  HOURS of research online, asking friends, perusing catalogs and lots of prayer for wisdom.
2.  Hours of changing my mind on curriculum and going back to #1 again.
3.  Finally choosing a curriculum (well, several) and ordering ALOT of material.
4.  Asking my parents to bring all that "ALOT"ness from #3 when they came last month (thanks Mom and Dad!)
5.  Receiving the material, getting all giddy with excitement, stamping the books with my handy dandy new "homeschool material" stamp, then repacking alot of it into boxes to be shipped to our new home in a few months.
6.  Figuring out how I am going to organize myself once school gets started.  That included a general "plan of action" and I even made my own Excel spreadsheet that calculates the grades for all subjects by 6 week periods and then puts the final grade on a seperate "report card" sheet.  I know, I'm a nerd.
7.  I think I am ready.  You know why I did all of this so early?  Well, our schedule is insanely crazy between now and August and I wasn't sure I'd have time for preparation before it is time for school to start.  I like to be prepared.  Now I am.

The other things we need to do in the next couple of months is to get our paperwork in order (visa to stay here), pack up our belongings (and weed through all the stuff we've collected since we moved here last year), and find a house to move into in July.  I suspect Kris will be spending much of his time studying and getting up to speed on what he needs to know for his new assignment.  He is excited about it, so this is definitely not "drudgery" for him.

So that's it in a nutshell.  That's what we are doing when we aren't eating bon bons and watching soaps! :)