Homeschool College Expectation vs Reality

Your boy (O&O) has jokes, but launching him to college has probably been one of our most challenging seasons as parents.

We had full confidence in his academic abilities, sense of responsibility and social skills but we felt so many conflicting emotions in watching him spread his wings.

Bottom line is that we really enjoy his presence.

I have spent so many years asking O&O to turn his music down, and to stop drumming his beats on my walls. Those crooked paintings and wall hangings were such a big deal to me at the time. Can I tell you that I missed all of that?

The differences don't stop there. Every family member has a role to play and when one member shifts, we all shift and renegotiate our roles. Change is necessary and we adapt, but a certain level of grieving is inevitable. Interestingly, O&O didn't need to go very far for the change to be felt. Though his college campus is relatively close, by not being in our home functioning in his familiar role we have become a new Mocha Family. We're thrilled for him, we miss him and will forever treasure the memories we've made homeschooling him.

Comments

Please leave that baby's hair alone!

I'll never forget the first time I saw Mocha Girl One (HmG) . She was an emergency c-section, and had to spend several days in NICU. She was born four days past her estimated due date and looked huge in her incubator. I imagined her to be especially delicate and feminine. I couldn't wait to frill her up, and more importantly to do her hair ! The only reason she wasn't sporting a barrette the day we took her home from the hospital, was because the one I brought to match her lacey outfit, slid right out. Mocha Girl One's baby hair was silky straight and fine. As the weeks rolled by, it became wavier until she had a lovely curly fro. I washed it all the time . I brushed it several times a day . I tried snap clips, and moved to velcro barrets when the clips slid out. I bought a different head band for every outfit. Meanwhile her curls continued to wind tighter and tighter. I kept everything in a pretty box, dubbed the hair bin . I was really frustrated at not b...

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Trader Joe's Castille Soap Discontinued!

There's some controversy about the use of castille soap as a shampoo. For example, popular YouTuber Kim , of KimmayTube tested the ph of Bronner's Castille Soap and found it to be much higher than the recommended range for hair (between 4 and 5). You can watch her explain her findings. She also did an informative series fraught with good visuals on understanding the effects of ph on hair. That said, I've been using diluted castille soap successfully for YEARS, but I've never tried Bronner's Castille Soap. I had a bottle of Trader Joe's Castille Soap . Turns out Trader Joe's formula includes Aloe Vera --which has an acidic ph---probably bringing down the overall ph of the product--perhaps balancing it for hair. The manufacturer recommends it's use as a shampoo right on the bottle's label. I did not get a chance to personally test the ph of my bottle, because by the time I noticed Aloe as an ingredient of my castille soap, the bottle was empty...

Cherish My Daughter

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