mid-year blues

I don't usually complain about things in general, but I feel a need to do so at the moment. I know some people look at my family and think "gee they got it all together, she's sure a superwoman" but in reality I'm exhausted by it all.

We've been pretty much just unschooling, only doing a little bit of handwriting, math, and language arts sprinkled in when the kids ask to do it. We've had a few runs of the flu this year already, so we've not had the chance to do stuff as much as I would have liked. Every plan I've made for new materials has been scrapped due to money, so I had to take advantage of our Christmas budget to get the girls some stuff for lessons (readers for Melissa, some more read alouds sprinkled among the girls, stuff like that) I'm doubting myself lately with my ability to actually keep doing this, I feel right now like such a failure because Melissa isn't reading hardly at all yet, she won't even try to sound out cvc words any more. She was doing so well in this area too until we had to stop because just trying to talk made her throw up for a week in October. Lydia just keeps wanting more, more, more and I just can't give her any more right now. I keep trying to spread myself thinner and thinner to meet everyone's needs without giving myself the down time that I need so badly, and its just not happening at all right now. Every time something starts going right, I get a huge bump that stops things everywhere else. Like Melissa's reading, it was going so well for a long time and then we all got sick and its like we are right back at square one. She has absolutely no clue any more about how to blend sounds together to read cvc words, and won't even try it again now. I just flat out don't know what to do. I think I may just restart our LA program and see if that helps any. If it does, we'll just keep at that subject through the summer, then take a week or two off before starting the next level to make up for having to restart partway through it. I don't want to do it, but I think I need to do it for her sake.

We're right on target with math though at least, that's one subject Melissa asks for even if she's so sick she can't sit up. I have no concerns about her with math at least.

I mentioned how thin I'm stretched, and I think that stretching is so bad that its got me doubting my own abilities to teach the girls right now. Since October I've been considering enrolling Melissa to start at the start of the new semester at the elementary school down the street, and putting Lydia into the preschool next door to the elementary school. But I can't do that, I can't just hand my girls over to the ps system without even considering the lasting effects of it. We live in a city with a not so great school system, so the local public isn't really an option at all. But I can't feel comfortable with just homeschooling by itself right now, I have so much going on and literally *no* accountability to keep me on track with what we're doing to ensure that we even do anything during the day. I'm considering the Ohio Virtual Academy since it would give us the accountability I need so much, but I don't know if I should to that for this year since I have stuff for the school year this year already. Maybe next school year, but this year I don't think I'll do the OHVA because I don't want to waste the materials I already spent the money on. So I'm going to make a commitment to post here daily starting when we pick up again on January 5th, and I'm going to detail what we did each day. I am GOING to do LA, bible, and math daily, plus at least 2 of the following subjects each day: history, geography, science, art, music, pysical education. That's 6 subjects to pick from daily as our additionals, and if I can't do 2 a day I have problems.