What we eat for lunch + all about my childhood homeschooling
Hi Kristen!
I just read your latest five frugal things and you had leftovers for lunch--I always try to make sure there are leftovers for lunch but I'd love it if you wrote a post on what you have for lunch when you don't. I really enjoy your cooking posts and style--you feed your family as well as you can for a reasonable price.
A lot of lunch ideas seem really complicated and no one has time for that!
Thanks,
Mary
I am so with you there. I always feel like I'm doing well to cook a meal at dinner each day, so the idea of doing anything fancy at lunch is totally not appealing to me.
If there are leftovers, then yep, we try to make a point of eating those so as to avoid food waste.
If there aren't leftovers, then here are some things we eat:
-sandwiches
-homemade yogurt with fruit
-fried eggs
-ramen (if we have some in the house! I buy it for making Japanese Ramen soup, and Sonia loves to eat the extra packages for lunch)
-fresh fruit
-bananas with peanut butter
-a green salad (sometimes I make a salad topped with leftovers, like roasted veggies, cooked protein, ends of a cheese block, etc.)
-smoothie
-microwaved sweet potato, topped with butter and salt
-cucumbers, sliced and sprinkled with salt
Of course, we tend to be home for lunch because we homeschool. So, not everything we eat needs to be packable and we have the freedom to heat or cook things in the microwave/stove/oven.
Mr. FG mostly eats leftovers or salads packed in his lunchbox. And when Joshua and Lisey need to eat lunch at college/tutorial, they generally pack a sandwich, with fruit or maybe crackers & cheese.
Hello Kristen-
I am a total wannabe homeschooler. I like our public school (in fact, I am our PTO's president) but I don't love the lack of individualized education that my kiddos get. I found it fascinating that you were homeschooled growing up. Can you share more of your experience growing up as a homeschooled kid?
-Dana
Sure! My mom started homeschooling my siblings and me back in 1984, when I was in first grade and when homeschooling was very unusual. This makes my experience super different from my own kids' experience.
For instance, in 1984, homeschooling wasn't illegal, exactly, but it also wasn't exactly legal either. Now we've got laws on the books explicitly stating that it's legal to homeschool, which is nice.
Also, when I was growing up, I didn't have a lot of homeschooled peers. There just weren't that many people homeschooling! Now there are so many more homeschooling families, and most people have at least heard of homeschooling. It's not quite as fringe as it used to be.
Another big difference now is that there are far more options for homeschoolers. When I was a kid, there were just a few curricula to choose from and now there are almost too many! Plus now there are a lot of homeschool classes available for extra-curriculars, and there are also plenty of tutorial options for families that want to do more of a hybrid kind of schooling.
I'd say that I was a happy homeschooled kid. I've always been kind of a homebody, so I didn't mind staying home.
And I liked being in charge of my time.
When you're homeschooled, if you work more efficiently, you can get done earlier and have more free time to do whatever you want.
So, that motivated me to work hard, and I had lots of free hours to play with my sister and with my neighbors, play at the park, practice piano, babysit, cook and bake (favorite hobbies of mine), ride my bike, rollerblade, and read.
My mom did some school subjects with us when we were younger, but as we got older, we did most of our work on our own, which is typical of homeschooled kids. Mom is there to answer questions and correct work, but she's not right by your side every moment of your school day.
I feel like my homeschool life prepared me really well for adult life. I did very well on my SATs and when I got into college, I didn't have any trouble integrating into the classroom, and I maintained a 4.0.
I've always done just fine at socializing with people (though I've been asked the, "What about socialization?" question approximately 1123291813759 times. Ha.), I've held down a traditional job, and I've also had several successful self-employed jobs.
Basically, I think I'm pretty normal. 😉
(Oh, and since everyone wonders about prom: there were no homeschool proms in my day, but I did get asked to a private school prom by a guy who played in a piano concerto competition with me.)
I know not everyone has as positive a homeschooling experience as mine, but I really have no complaints about my experience, and I'm grateful my parents chose homeschooling. Had I grown up in a super strict, super conservative homeschool environment, I might feel differently. But I think one reason my experience was positive is that my parents weren't really homeschooling my siblings and me in order to keep us in a bubble or to prevent us from getting sullied by "the world".
That's a topic too huge to explore here, though!
I hope I addressed the things you were curious about, Dana. If I missed something, let me know in the comments and I'll answer there.
So. Many. Memories! *happy sigh*
Thank you for answering my question! 🙂
My girls are actually starting piano lessons with a home schooled 17 year old in our neighborhood this week. So excited. As with most I've met that don't fall into the "don't want the world to touch my kids" group she is a lovely, well spoken, confident girl.
Part of me really wishes I was homeschooled because I had a really horrible public school experience (long story short, I was the friendless weird kid who was picked on daily for most of my school life and my teachers were universally terrible) but I had two working parents so that wasn't going to happen. My mom did try to get me into a local private school but they couldn't afford the tuition, even after scholarships for being low income. I did really enjoy the one or two days I went there, though.
My daughter is only one and we've heard the local public school is fantastic (Massachusetts does have the best schools in the country, after all) but my wife really wants to homeschool when the time comes. We know a couple people who do and it works for them, but we know others in public school and that worked for them. So we're in a wait and see.
And the nice thing is, it's not like you have to choose for all 12 years right away. You can take things a year at a time and figure out what's right for you each year.
I love your healthy lunch ideas! Our lunches have to be packable for office lunches, so we eat dinner leftovers 90% of the time. It just saves sanity since we're gone from home 10 hours a day. Blah!
Wow, I had no idea homeschooling was in such gray legal territory just a few decades ago! I agree; I think homeschooled kiddos can be just as social as public-school kiddos. It all comes down to a matter of preference.
Mr. Picky Pincher and I will probably opt for a combination of public and Montessori school. I do like that public school exposes you to a lot of different ideas and ways of living (you can get this with homeschooling, too, of course, just in different ways).
At the end of the day, it's a matter of preference. Texas has an extremely stupid standardized test that the kids take each year. Each curricula is built almost entirely off this test, so essentially they're teaching kids how to take a test for 12 years. I had to suffer through it and it was so, so painful. It's issues like these that make me reconsider public school, at least for now. Hopefully they can move away from testing so I don't have to fear public school stamping out creativity and free thought.
The whole teaching to the test thing is really frustrating. I'm sure the teachers hate it, and it's not really ideal for the students either.
I do have my kids take some tests (just for the practice, especially as they get older), and Joshua and Lisey are doing fine on their tests now that they're in standard classrooms. But I definitely haven't had them in a test-heavy environment here at home, largely because tests aren't all that essential when you only have one kid in a grade. Teachers need tests so they can assess students' progress, but I'm already pretty in the loop about what my kids know and don't know.
Kristen, I'm curious how Joshua and Lisey prepare for classes, given that they have a lot of practice in self-teaching from their homeschooling experiences. Is the classroom teaching more of a supplement for them? Do they do all their readings ahead of class and feel like they understand things pretty well before even going to class?
I'd say they approach their classes pretty similarly to the way traditionally-schooled kids do, except that like you said, they do frequently get ahead in the reading so that they're prepared when they get to class or so that they have time to do re-reading.
They also tend to look at asking the teacher/professor for help as kind of a last resort, preferring to try to figure things out on their own first (we've certainly encouraged them to remember that the teachers are there to help if they need them, though!) For example, Lisey had a pretty hard science module last week and she was kind of stuck...but she worked her way thru the study guide three times and then was good to go.
I also notice that when they have assignments that can be turned in at any time during the semester, they tend to get them done ahead of time so that they're not rushing at the end of the semester. I kind of wonder if this is a side effect of having had to be self-motivated over the years...that they don't need a due date in order to get something done. But of course, this is anecdotal evidence and I'm sure it's not the same for every home-schooled kid.
Something else that's typical (in my observation) with homeschooled students who enter a classroom: they take assignments and due dates as non-negotiables, whereas some of their classmates are a bit more lackadaisical about that (some of Joshua's fellow honors English students didn't do the readings. Not even Maus, which is basically a comic book! He was a little like..."Whaaa??")
I'm really thankful that they have been so self-motivated and hard-working in their classes...it makes my mama's heart burst a little bit. 🙂
When I lived in Texas I found a very small Methodist school and I sent one child each year. Kept one child Home. In this way it was easy. The kids got up at time to go to school because one child had to go to school. When holidays hit the teachers were great like valentines they invited the child I had home into the classroom. I have two children very close in age so this worked for me. I loved homeschooling. I taught them phone etiquette and manners and we did all kinds of field trips. I had them each take the Stanford once every four years and this is what worked for me.My children went on to Ivy League Schools and one of them the first job she had was as a receptionist and the boss told me he never saw such business skills in someone so young she is now a Lawyer, the boy is a Physician. Everyone needs to do what is best for themselves and there family.
Everyone told me my kids would be way behind my kids were way ahead on everything. Everyone said my kids would not be able to get along they do better than average by far.
I even had one teacher tell me my boy would never learn to read the week after he tested on a Stanford test that he was reading 3 grade 9 month level and he was in first grade. This teacher told him he just memorized the books.In the end do what feels right and enjoy your children they grow up way too fast. Mine are almost 40 so believe me I know.
Having taught and lived in Texas for many years, I can say this isn't exactly accurate. There are state standards that the teachers are required to teach. The test assesses those standards. Ergo, while the teachers are "teaching to the test", that is because the test assesses the standards they should be teaching. It sounds like you had a different experience, but I can state that not all districts spend their entire time "teaching to the test". When I taught, I spent time teaching test taking strategies that were not strictly for the TAKS test (or whatever it's called now). Instead, they were general test taking strategies that could also apply to the SAT, ACT, and really any assessment. I know this isn't exactly on topic of Kristen's post, but as a public school teacher in Texas, I wanted to pipe in here for some clarification.
When I was home with my very small kids, lunches were sandwiches, salad or soup most days, because it took very little time or effort to make it. I sometimes had leftovers, but most of them went into my husband's lunch box, as he worked long days and had no place to get food, as he worked out in the woods, so it was carry it with him or go hungry.
I was a public school student, and I knew no one personally who was homeschooled, but I knew some kids had to be, because they were physically or mentally challenged, and public schools at that time, at least in our area and I suspect most areas, had no accommodation for disabilities. We had the book "Karen" at our house, written by Marie Killilea, in which she told how disabled children at that time were simply left out of public education and had to get private teachers, be taught by parents, or left ignorant. That book, which I read in grade school, really opened my eyes. It's old now, but well worth reading.
If I may ask, if your parents' reasons for homeschooling didn't have to do with keeping you away from unwholesome influences (if I'm understanding correctly), what was their reason? We have two kids and we do plan to homeschool them both. One reason is that it is less costly than a private school, but the second reason is definitely, definitely (!) to minimize the negative peer pressure they would undoubtedly encounter in a public school (not that there aren't any negative influences in private religious schools, but I'm certain there is more of it in public schools. I went to a private school my entire life, my husband went to public, and our comparative experiences will vouch for this view). I don't want them to be in a "bubble;" we will definitely ensure they are well-socialized and have lots of opportunities for healthy friendships and extracurricular pursuits (my oldest daughter, a four year old, has already taken dance lessons outside the home as well as summer day camp), but I do feel that homeschooling will help us to minimize unwholesome peer pressure to the best of our ability. I'm just interested in your feedback on this. 🙂
Yeah, I'd say this is pretty similar to my parents' perspective. I know they wanted to let us avoid negative peer pressure, especially when we were very young, but it's not as though they wanted to keep us in an isolated bubble or were homeschooling out of fear.
To "avoid negative peer pressure." I by no means oppose to home schooling,but when you make that comment that is where I just want to scream. Peer pressure starts very early in a child's life and they need to know and learn how to deal with it early on. With the guidance of their parents and teachers kids are able to to overcome negative peer pressure. My daughter who turned 13 today was bullied in kindergarten and throughout her grade school years. Lots of negative kids with negative behavior. We dealt with it and helped her work out ways in which to not be stepped on. Was is heart breaking yes. But let me say that b/c of early life experiences she has fared extremely well now in middle school. I tell her all the time that this is what life is all about and we learn to deal with it early on to make it easier and each twist and turn in life gets more complicated.
I can't speak for all home-schooling parents, but for myself and Mr. FG, it's not that we don't ever want our children exposed to hard things or to peer pressure. We just feel like we'd rather have them learn to deal with peer pressure when they are a little bit older and stronger, rather than when they are younger. We recognize this is not the only way to handle it, but it's what we've chosen for our kids.
I'm so sorry that your daughter had to deal with bullying...it makes me so sad when kid aren't kind to each other. It sounds like you've done a great job of helping your daughter navigate the waters of peer pressure, so kudos to you.
Laurie's experience sounds like a more extreme version of my own.
My daughter is an only child and a natural follower. She is by nature sensitive, more innocent than her peers, and althoigh she is friendly and not shy, she is quiet.
In kindergarten and first grade she had a best friend she was almost obsessed with. They adored each other, but the friend would use the friendship in negative ways (give me the purple crayon or you aren't my best friend anymore). We encouraged kiddo to shrug it off and also taught her strageties for making more friends so she felt more comfortable saying no to one. She grew a lot more socially confident.
This year she has many friends, but one of the new ones is bossy and sometimes manipulative (the week before her birthday New Friend announced only 2 friends would stay the night and she would pick whoever was nicest to her in school). Kiddo handled this like a pro, opting out of the 'conpetition' and telling her friend the behavior was not very kind. So proud.
I would say, for my only child paticularly, she has learned a lot of social skills from school and gained a lot of confidence in interacting with peers.
Oh! I want to add she ended up being one of the 2 girls invited to that sleepover, which was another nice life lesson for her. 🙂
Something my two small sons and I really enjoy for lunch (if there's no leftovers) is quesadillas. So fast and also easy to add odds and ends of ingredients that need to be used up.
Thanks for sharing your homeschooling experience! It is an encouragement, for sure! Loved the pics, too!
Both of these are questions that I have wanted to ask you myself! I enjoyed reading your experiences as a homeschool student. Homeschooling is something that I want to do so badly with our daughter (once she reaches the age), however my husband and I both work full time. One income is not doable for us, and I enjoy my job. I know there are homeschool co-ops, however all of the co-ops in my area are strictly Christian. Not that I'm against that by any means, I would just rather be the person exposing my child to religion (ALL types of religion) and having some sort of control over the lessons she is taught in the moral arena. So, I'm between a rock and a hard place. Hopefully with some careful and tedious planning, we can make it work!
Thank you for sharing your story. I was happily public schooled and my kids are/will be as well. Although I do understand the appeal and have considered homeschooling my kids.
I'm a historian, so I can't help but throw out there the fact that public schooling, and schooling on a mass scale in general, is a very recent invention. As recently as pre-Civil War most people who received an education got it at home. Mom or a governess taught young women and a tutor taught young men. In America even in Colonial times most people were literate thanks to parents who taught them around the fire at night. Our idea that becoming a successful adult requires spending all day in a classroom is about as "true" as our idea that children must be raised in the suburbs (also a very recent invention) or they will turn into social deviants.
You do you I say!
So true. But not a lot of people seem to realize that, which makes them a bit skeptical of the idea that you can get properly educated at home, or that you can be a healthy member of society without going to school.
History is so helpful. 😉
Thanks for all the detailed information on homeschooling! I have always been shocked/amazed at how time efficient home schooling and one-on-one instruction can be versus the classroom. I work in a hospital with kids, and many of them will receive only 1 hour a day of "school instruction", and they rarely fall behind their peers who are going to school for 8 hours a day!
We haven't decided what type of schooling we will do for our 2-year-old, but the ability to have more time to focus on non-academic studies or activities is one of the most appealing aspects of homeschooling to me!
When Mr. FG was a kid, he got mono and had a tutor for a few months while he recovered and his experience was the same as what you described...he got his work done in a much shorter time than he would have at school.
Thank you so much for answering my question! I was surprised! I was also wondering what the reasons for your parents gave as their motivation to start homeschooling you. Especially as it was not very common at that time.
Well, my parents had been sending us to a private Christian school up to that point (I was in kindergarten and my older brother was in second grade). They were starting to think about how much it was going to cost to send all four of us over the years (we have two younger siblings as well), so they began thinking about alternatives. Also, my parents tell me that I was a crabby, cranky mess my kindergarten year, which may have influenced them a bit too. Ha.
I think one of my mom's friends introduced the idea to her and kind of talked her into it. I know my mom was pretty enamored with the flexible scheduling and the extra free time for us to play/go on field trips, travel, etc. I don't think it was so much that she thought we couldn't get educated in a more formal setting; it was more that homeschooling offered some opportunities that she wanted to take advantage of for us and for our family.
Girl, you are rocking those jeans! LOL
You know it. 😉
I, too, am curious about your parents reasons for homeschooling. My job brings me in direct contact with lots of homeschooling families and I have serious reservations about why some are doing it. Several are doing it because of their religious beliefs, others to avoid the negative influences or perceived inadequacies of the public school system, but I also know of some who do it because they don't trust the government. I've been impressed by the high standards of most, but appalled by a few, particularly the mother who is homeschooling four boys and never heard of the Renaissance!
There are definitely some homeschooling families who are not educating their kids to a high enough standard, that is true. I can't and won't defend that.
But by the same token, I'd venture to guess that there are also some public schools out there that are also not educating their kids to a high enough standard.
I think the exceptions are not enough to indict either system, though.
As a whole, homeschooled students/graduates tend to perform at least as well as their public-schooled peers and they tend to transition to college just as well as their peers (though perhaps that may not be the case for the no-Renaissance family you mentioned!)
USA today article on the topic: http://college.usatoday.com/2012/02/18/do-home-schoolers-do-better-in-college-than-traditional-students/
One from CBS: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/can-homeschoolers-do-well-in-college/
I commented about my parents' reason in response to some other comments up above...so I'm not ignoring your question! 🙂 And my reasons for homeschooling are here: https://www.thefrugalgirl.com/2012/03/why-i-homeschool-my-children/
What I've observed about homeschooling is that homeschooled kids exhibit a wider range of education than regular (???) schooled kids. Home schoolers are more likely to be either better or worse educated than the norm. To put it differently, the standard deviation is bigger.
I like to use "traditionally-educated", altho that has flaws too because it's a pretty recent tradition to educate kids in an all-day school!
On topic: On average, homeschooled kids are at least at the level of their traditionally-schooled counterparts (and generally they score higher on standardized tests like the ACT). So while there are some homeschooled kids who are poorly educated, they must be an exception, or homeschooled kids would not be averaging higher than traditionally-schooled kids.
Unless, I suppose, there are some off-the-charts geniuses in these stats that are throwing everything off (there are those geography-bee winning kids...hmm.)
I hope I don't sound defensive. It's just that I frequently hear people point out a homeschooling family doing poor work in order to discredit homeschooling as a system, while at the same time completely ignoring that poorly educated children can emerge from a traditional school setting as well.
I figure that if homeschooled children are, on average, scoring just as well on tests as other kids, and are doing just as well in college as other kids, then we probably don't need to spend a lot of time worrying that homeschoolers are releasing masses of uneducated kids into the world. 🙂
(Though of course, I would never, ever condone lackadaisical homeschooling! We work hard at school here at my house, and I expect a lot out of my kids.)
I appreciate your perspective on homeschooling, FG. Very eye-opening.
WilliamB's point is consistent with my (very limited) observations on homeschooling families. And, as I think FG suggests, as a statistical matter two groups can have the same average (mean), and very different standard deviations. I would expect that because public schools are more, well, standardized, the standard deviation would be smaller than with homeschooling, where there is probably more variation in "teacher" (i.e., parent) goals and abilities. If you are doing homeschool well, your kids may have *really* good outcomes!
It is also my suspicion (again, just based on a few observations) that well-schooled homeschooled kids may have highly develops particular skills or interests that are less common in public school kids, because homeschool gives them more freedom to explore unique interests. My kids are in an very diverse in every sense public school (very important to us). But we as a society can benefit from some folks having the unique or specialized skills homeschooling can foster! There are always going to be cases where child protective services should intervene (e.g., the hopefully few instances where people "homeschool" to hide abuse). But it is unfair to stigmatize or penalize the families who do a great job! FG, I would love to hear your thoughts on what level of oversight (if any) there should be on homeschooling.
Again, while we have chosen differently for our family, I really admire your dedication to doing homeschooling well, and appreciate your thoughtful discussions on the topic.
I went to public and private schools including university for 19 years... I can tell you nothing about the renaissance... and spell check definitely spelled it for me;) We all have gaps in our knowledge, but it doesn't generally reflect our intelligence or education, rather our individual strengths and interests. I have observed that homeschooled kids are judged more harshly for it. My son's teacher saw some gaps in his learning or maybe just a reluctance to preform when he went into public school from homeschooling in the fourth grade. She told us that she assessed him at a 2-3 grade level. This has not been our observation and had a private assessment done from a tutoring school. They put him in the enrichment level and rather two grades ahead. They informed us that he did not need tutoring... which we knew. What we did not know was how harshly others would judge our children. I don't need to know anything about the Renaissance to successfully educate my children, I hold the accumulation of knowledge in my pocket like most of us and google is happy to help me out. There isn't much we can't learn about in 2017 🙂 I know your point was more to do with the well rounded aspect of a complete education and while I agree some children at home are slipping through the cracks, just as many are there in the public system.
I'd love to homeschool my child when she gets a bit older. I'm not as much worried about her socialization as I am my own . . will I miss spending hours a day in the company of adults? My maternity leave wasn't really long enough for me to miss it, but considering years at home is more difficult to imagine. And I think I remember you mentioning that your husband works or worked unusual hours; how did you fit in schoolwork (and the everyday volume of children at home) without waking him?
Mercifully, he never had to work a true overnight shift, so he's never needed to do a lot of sleeping during the day. Mostly his odd shifts involved going to bed really early and getting up really early, or working a late late shift.
So, it wasn't crazy challenging to work our school schedule around his work schedule. Probably the hardest thing was when he worked 2pm-10pm. We at our big meal of the day at noon, so in the mornings I would spend some time making our "dinner", and then after lunch, he left for work and then we started in on our school. That made our school day feel like it was going really late because it started so late!
Right now, he has flex hours, so things are easier than they've been in years.
As always, eye-opening and thoughtful -- truly not defensive at all. As a public school special ed teacher, I had a lot of misconceptions re: homeschooling but the calm, factual explanations here have always made sense and I'm thankful to challenge my knee-jerk assumptions. And the history lesson is spot on. So odd to think it was not exactly legal even in your very recent youth. 😉
And frankly, too many public school students are failed by the system -- not acceptable! We do need to broach these issues head-on and ensure that all school systems do their job and that there truly IS a choice for all America students. I am nervous about some of the current political appointments and do hope that we respect this triumvirate of home, private, and public schooling, and provide the required supports for each.
Quick note -- again, I am in severe special ed-- and was humbled (and kind of thrilled) to meet a home-schooling mom who, after raising up her "typical" birth-children, adopted and fostered 4 children with severe special needs. All under the age of 10, I believe, including 2 beautiful boys with Down syndrome, and 2 slightly older girls. This amazing person pulled one of the boys out of another special day class and home-schooled him. Guess what? She taught him to read, to speak, to share, to play -- he's a great kid! Although she loved his pre-school, she didn't feel that he was getting the individualized attention he needed.
Spec. ed teachers spend a lot of time training to handle kids with special needs, but this amazing mom just stepped up and made it work better for her son -- I'm not sure we could have met her standards for individualized attention in a 10 student class. So, yes, I have great respect for (and can learn from) home-schooling families. Thanks for letting me yammer on!
Oh, loved all the pix 🙂
Quick addendum -- must shout out to all the excellent & hardworking teachers I know personally in my fine district and beyond, who manage to get the highest scores in the Valley, etc.. No slights intended! But -- some of the big, failing urban systems need triage. The same-old is not working . . . thanks
My children attended and my husband and I volunteered in what would probably be considered a challenged "urban" district, the issue is rarely quality of teachers. They had Awesome ones, but instead the social and economic issues affecting many students' families. The district had one of the highest transiency rates in our area. It is really difficult for a child to keep up when they are frequently moving or have other instabilities in their home life. Students who stayed in the district were successful. This is where the whole growth v proficiency comes to play. Also, it is not a teacher's job to solve social and economic problems.
Oh, I agree about the teachers. There are so many really great people doing really great work in very challenging environments. Kudos to them!
Amy, I so agree about the quality of teachers. My daughter also attended a large "urban" school district and there were fabulous teachers and programs! Didn't mean to blanketly dis big systems, but sometimes the very size mitigates against positive change -- things can become entrenched in layers of bureaucracy, even with the best of intentions. My concern is with systems that could use some tinkering rather than with individual teachers (most of whom really were great).
And agreed, teachers and schools cannot be expected to compensate for every social and economic problem -- just teaching the basics is challenging enough. Thanks for your comments!
I dunno, Kristen, I think your 90's jeans might be so uncool they're cool again! Check out Malia Obama: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4181386/Malia-Obama-heads-work-internship.html
I've come to terms with the fact that the flared jeans I like are the new mom jeans. I AM a mom, so there. 🙂
Oh man! I almost think I like my jeans better than those. Ha.
I am sure most home-schooled kids do very well. Unfortunately working in the public school system I saw the problems with the failures.. Kids performing 2 or more grade levels below where they should be. It takes a lot of hard work for these
students to catch up & most of the parents could not be bothered.
Oh yes, I'm not surprised that in your position, you see all the people who were not doing a good job. On the upside, I guess it's good they realized it and are now sending their kids in to be properly educated.
I promise we're not all like that, though! Most of us aren't. 🙂