We made the cut . . . again!

Today was a stressful day at work. Ford was making another 10% cut in salaried workers in January, and today was rumored to be "the day" at our location. By lunchtime we knew that we were both still employed, and with a mixture of relief and disappointment, we returned to our desks. Since the house isn't even up for sale yet, it's best that we continue to work a while longer, but it's not the same place it was 20 years ago.

With that behind us (at least for a few months!), we can get back to planning our summer travels. We just made a reservation at the Platte River Campground at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore (http://www.nps.gov/). One of Michigan's finest areas! It's a national park campground with only one loop of reservable electric sites, so difficult to get into - especially in July! We managed to get a site, though, and so do some friends of ours. We're planning a tubing trip on the river. It's a shallow, easy river for canoeing or tubing, and ends up at the beach on Lake Michigan. We're looking forward to it! We're looking at the River Ridge RV Resort, north of Grand Rapids (http://www.michcampgrounds.com/riverridgervresort/index.php), for an August trip. It looks like a really nice RV resort with lots of activities for the kids. That just leaves Labor Day weekend to figure out . . . still working on that one.

Nicolas survived his midterm exams, and is glad to have them behind him! This week is "Catholic Schools Week", and full of fun & games, not many classes; it's a nice break before they get back into the swing of things. We have parent-teacher conferences this week, so we'll see how he did on the tests then. I wonder if I'll have to have conferences with Tom once we start homeschooling? lol . . .

I've been researching homeschool options. It seems like there are several ways to go. There's traditional curriculums, with books, workborks, etc.. Another option is online or CD based curriculums, and then there's actual online schools - completely internet based, with online teacher support and chat-based classroom discussion groups. This last option looks pretty interesting to me. No books and workbooks to lug around in the RV, and the interactive aspect of it would go over well with Nicolas, I think. It also lends more to him being responsible for his progress, which is good at the high school level, I think. I'm still researching, so any suggestions/comments are welcome!