It's become increasingly obvious that my communication skills are atrocious. I'm absolutely terrible at keeping in touch with people. Embarrassingly so. I never write letters, I forget to answer emails, and I have a phobia about the phone (There. I said it. It's ridiculous and illogical and yet paralyzing. I've been trying very hard to overcome this crazy fear, but so far, no dice.) I've known for years that keeping in touch with people is essential and should be easy. But when my lack of communication skills manifests itself in my kids' inability to keep a long-distance relationship going, I know it's time to ACT.

So, I'm setting into motion a new tradition: one day each week for correspondence. Phone, paper, or computer... it doesn't matter. As long as each one of us reaches out to the people in our lives -- or those who used to be there until they didn't hear from us for ages.

The boys will be thrilled.

Aengus has his good buddy James over tonight, finally. We've been trying to get these guys together for ages, so I'm glad us moms finally got our schedules to mesh. The boys are currently playing YuGiOh (computation, strategy). They played a little Black Hawk Down and Star Wars Battlefront earlier, and I think the plan is to play them again, well into the night.

But first, Noah and I are watching The Commitments. I love this movie!

We've been doing some nature studies lately: Aengus hunted frogs with his friends the other day, and Bear caught a baby bunny last night and gnawed on it for a while. Gross as it was, we were at least able to discuss the circle of life. Those teachable moments are priceless unschooling opportunities!

We also set up our new-to-us basketball hoop, which the boys officially love. {P.E.} Noah and Jason finally fixed the fence that Noah accidentally ran into over a month ago. {life skills, carpentry} Aengus started taking his CAT test -- so far, so good -- and Noah starts his today. We watched Deadliest Catch (together!) last night {social studies, economics}, and Aengus caught some Survive This this morning. {life skills, nature studies}

Yesterday was Jason's birthday, too, so we sat at the table to eat and had birthday cake. And as his gift to dad, Noah let Jason have the TV for the evening (as my gift, I didn't complain when J woke me up this morning, all naked and snuggly).

Yeah, we live large around here.

We've been having a string of impromptu sleepovers here: Friday night, Noah had a friend over (so did I, but she only stayed until the wine ran out), Aengus stayed at his buddies' house yesterday, and now Noah has another friend over tonight. And yet I can't manage to work a planned sleepover into our schedule! Go figure. Being spontaneous is one of my favorite parts of home education, though.

The downside to all this socialization is that Aengus and I haven't had time to read Twilight for a few days. Up side: I had plenty of time to read the rest of the Sookie Stackhouse series for myself.

At our friends' yard sale yesterday, we scored a basketball net; the boys are psyched about this. Aengus also got himself a few toy weapons and an acoustic guitar (full size). He's asked Noah for lessons, and I think they've negotiated a deal they're both happy with. I'm excited to see Aengus into music, of course, and it makes my heart sing to see the boys not only get along but actually work together. But my instincts tell me Aengus is really a drummer, so my hopes of getting him a drumset for his birthday remain. I'm perfectly willing to have it be a group gift, if anyone cares to pitch in.

Noah's birthday is first, though, so I need to focus on that for now. He's easy, though, and (relatively) cheap. I think this may be the first time in ten years that I've been able to say that! And it's not because Noah's requests have gotten cheaper, but because Aengus's have gotten more expensive. Whaddyagonnado?

Noah's got another sleepover tomorrow, and Aengus has two more this week, but once we get back into our groove, we'll be doing some quick reading and math reviews. Then the kids take their annual test, and I can almost forget about the school for another year. Yay!!!