I’m sitting here at 11 p.m. the night before Mother’s Day. Anthony, age 11, is here with me. He’s sleeping on the couch tonight so we’re talking. I asked him what he thinks about on Mother’s Day in regards to his birth family. As he spoke, I typed word for word [...]
In late August of this year I will be the proud mother of two college students. Two kids on two very different paths…
Destini is eighteen and will graduate Salutatorian of her senior class in a few weeks. She has been accepted to the Business program at the University of Alaska, [...]
When I was a kid in Kasilof, Alaska, there was a honey store about a mile down the road. We’d pedal down there, present our quarter, and get a sample of honey such that I’ve not tasted since. This year, as we move onto our off-grid property and make an attempt at becoming more self [...]
Yesterday was the one year anniversary of Backwoods Mom.
It was just over two years ago when a friend of mine said, “Hey, you should start a blog!” And I said, “A blog? What’s that?” And it took me a while to get going, as I stumbled the path of ignorance, [...]
Tonight Destini played the Ukulele with the Ninilchik High School Choir…which is basically the entire high school, haha…as they sang “Somewhere Over The Rainbow”.
I’ve not yet written about the time when Dan, Destini and Billy spent the night in the woods when the kids were in 7th and 8th grade…but it involves state troopers, a heat-seeking helicopter, a missing canoe and one night of Hell for this mom. And I’m not going to tell it now [...]
After eighteen years of thinking of my children’s education in what turns out to be a totally backwards way…I’m finally figuring it out. And boy, do I feel like I stepped off the bus three stops too late.
It’s not a homeschool versus public school debate, but rather a style of [...]
Thanks to the sun doing some fancy stuff this week, we in the north have been getting quite a show. So it didn’t let a little thing like deflated lungs stop me…I sucked down my Albuterol, chugged Nyquil and headed out.
It’s a sad, sick, twisted world when you have to have your children tested for sexually transmitted diseases…because they come from a place where it’s not only accepted, but considered “just part of their lives” to be sexually abused by family members…strangers…most everyone they have ever come into contact with.
And [...]
With Destini going off to college in the Fall, we’ve been furiously applying for grants and scholarship as if her future depends upon it…because it does. With seven kids in the house, surely several of them will seek further education. And since the earned dollar only goes so far, we were [...]
A few weeks ago my friend, Rhea, brought me a plate of cookies for the kids and said, “Here, they are gluten free…” And I thought what most every other wheat loving person in the world would think… “Oh…um….thanks…I think.”
And then I ate one. Shock is not sufficient a [...]
They have been holding that piece of paper for ten minutes…neither one will let go…
This week I learned to make a bourbon torte from a local chef…last week it was caviar pie and salmon tartar! Read about it tomorrow!
I’m standing in front of the candy rack, neck kinked upwards, staring at the boxes in the top row. I can’t see inside them…they are too tall and I am too small. But I know what’s in there. And I know it’s out [...]
Sometime in the next few months our family of nine intends to move from our 7 bedroom, 3300 square foot house, into a cabin less than half that size. Good luck, you no doubt laughingly say, and we’ll need it. We’ve spent the past six months slowly narrowing down our belongings [...]
My daughter Destini wrote this for a class this year…I thought it was really good so I thought I’d share. Destini is eighteen years old and a senior in high school.
In most cases, “you’re going to have [...]
Our current home is over 3000 square feet ( I know, you are trying to picture us living in the tiny cabin come summer…) and because the cost of heating fuel is upwards of four dollars per gallon here in Alaska, we compensate by burning wood in our wood stove as [...]
As I sit in the Alaska dark, waiting for Spring, I can feel the grit beneath my nails, the sweat across the back of my neck and the ache of my arms after a day in the woods. The course skin of hands, dry and stiff from the leather of my [...]
Whenever I tell people from the lower 48 that I live in Alaska, I inevitably hear the same question:
“Don’t they pay you to live there?”
It’s kind of like saying, “Why the heck would you live in that frozen wasteland? Oh yea…that’s right…they pay you.”
They are referring, of [...]
This year, because of homeschool, we moved our couch in front of our sliding glass door to the deck, and thus…it’s been abandoned until Spring. Unkempt and ignored…it’s built up…and up…and up! I’m a bit worried about the storage room that lies underneath…but at least that will make for good photos when it collapses.
By popular demand…Anthony, age eleven, has finally completed five sketches he would be willing to sell. In print form, of course. And I quote:
“Once they start selling really well, we can raise the price in tiny increments until I am making a lot of money. Then I will split the income up. I’ll give [...]
When Steven and Luke moved in they were already heavily involved in the Native Youth Olympics, and so I threw Anthony into the mix because…let’s face it…it gets him out of the house for four hours a week. This year Robin jumped aboard also and they have been diligently working towards competitions for months now. [...]
As I suck down a pile of peanut butter coated, from scratch, pancakes…drizzled with real maple syrup and chug back a giant mug of cold milk, I peruse the list of challenges I’ve just signed up to follow for the next six weeks.
A health challenge, offered by our local health [...]
A while back I had Billy into the local clinic for a sports physical. The doctor scanned his chart, did some quick work with his stethoscope, and said, “How long has it been since he has seen the heart specialist?”
“A few years,” I said. “They told me [...]
Last year my daughter was assigned to interview a person about their job for school. She asked, “Can I interview my mom?”
“Does she work?” asked the teacher.
Hmmmm…do I work…
For the better part of my adult life I’ve been at home with my kids. [...]
With snow piling up by the foot, not the inch, on these long…dark…January…Alaska days, the number one thing on our minds is “Heat”. Well, actually, Netflix is the number one thing on our minds…but heat is a close second.
About fifteen years ago my mother-in-law, the most self-sufficient, independent, 70-something woman [...]
Anderson Hill, near Ninilchik, Alaska…
In celebration of our first completed week doing our schooling at home…and after all the kids were finished with their work…we hit the sledding hill down the road. Billy built a jump…and it was all ‘downhill’ from there!
Luke…has…no…nerve…endings. He bursts throug [...]
Day one of home schooling six kids brought with it a fair amount of anxiety as I plunged into the unknown with all the doe eyed innocence and organizational skills of a preschooler. I’d been down a similar road before when I took on Anthony for nine weeks of his second [...]
Gave Billy a razor for his three chin hairs…
Watched the kids enjoy the simple things on New Years Eve…
I was about ten years old the first time I went Christmas caroling with the other neighborhood kids. And while in some neighborhoods the houses are door-to-door and kids can walk from yard to yard making joyful noise, in the back country of Alaska, it’s not that easy.
Our houses are [...]
Originally written in May, 2011…re-posting.
A small brush fire near my home last night brought a trooper to my door saying to prepare for the worst…the wind was taking it our direction…be ready to leave without warning. Warning. Wasn’t that what he just gave us?
In February of this year our family grew by two when Steven and Luke came to live with us. Tomorrow morning, the 19th of December, 2011, we welcome them into our family permanently in the Homer, Alaska courthouse.
These guys aren’t complicated kids. They don’t understand the size of the world [...]
As my family announces its intention to home school six of our kids starting in January, we’ve received many responses similar to, “WHAT THE CRAP!? ARE YOU CRAZY?! And while the answer to that question is a resounding, “YES”, there are other reasons behind our decision to home school our kids [...]
In 2004 I graduated with a 3.89 GPA from one of the highest rated private colleges on the west coast. And I did so, while parenting eight children, six of whom had some kind of special need. My final semester I managed 25 credits at two different colleges, picking up [...]
I put in a call to a client a few years back to arrange a trip into the village of Good News Bay, Alaska, where I would assess an adoptive situation and write a report for the courts either approving, or denying, the potential adoptive placement.
The young woman who answered [...]
Because naive parenting leads to unprepared teenagers…
Nobody really looks like that. Stop trying to achieve the impossible.
That eighty dollar pair of jeans looks exactly the same as that thirty dollar pair of jeans.
In ten years you will be nothing like the person you are today. [...]
When I was eight I years old I spent my summer shooting BB’s at everything that moved, and everything that didn’t. When the gun ran dry, I cocked it back, aimed, and blew the crap out of ant hills with the powerful puff of air that came from the tip. [...]
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