Homeschooling how-tos

Today I'm meeting a friend to show her how I homeschool. Without the actual sitting the Bub down and assigning him stuff and waiting around for him to finish. We're meeting at the library, where I will be bringing his curriculum and calendar (where I write in everything that we do, which I feel keeps me accountable), and answer any of said friend's questions.

My friend started her son off in the local public school, which is where the son's best friend from preschool was also going. But then she thought that perhaps there was something better, and enrolled him in the private school we had just pulled Bub from. Like us, she also had problems with the administration, so it seems they won't be continuing there next fall and she's looking into what her options are.

I really love home schooling for the most part. It's so much more flexible and low stress. The only points of stress are: 1) how does Bub learn the foreign languages he wants to learn when we aren't speakers of said languages, and 2) is he getting enough "socialization"? He doesn't seem to want much. In fact, he wants less. Princess, on the other hand, wants more, and I'm trying to find a way to accommodate her needs without driving everyone else (me) insane. I'm not that social. And it's hard, having your kids being of the age where you have to make friends with the kids' parents* so that your kids can socialize.

*This is hard mostly when you find you don't have anything in common with the other kids' parents, or when you find that the relationship is one-sided and you are constantly having to ask for play dates and the other parent doesn't seem to care for your presence, but your kid really, really likes his/her kid (and the kid also seems to like your kid), so you suffer through being the supplicant in the relationship. Or, as one of my other friends put it, I'm the guy in the relationship. That did not make me feel better.

Another gripe on socialization--even when you make friends with the parent and the child, some people are flaky. I have a flaky friend. I don't know what to do. Princess loves her little friend, and the little friend's mother is very friendly and always reciprocates invitations. The problem is that she's flaky and seems to cancel on half of the things we plan. It's annoying. We obviously come from different places, but when I make a commitment to something, be it a play date, a class or whatever, we go unless someone is sick or there's an emergency.  Whereas for my flaky friend, if her husband suddenly decides to come home for lunch, or her mother-in-law wants to see her grandchild, or my flaky friend just doesn't feel like going out, whatever class or play date we've arranged becomes yet another cancellation.

So the friend I'm meeting today I like. She's not flaky. And her kids are the relative corresponding ages of my kids AND her kids are easy going (Bub is not) so if this is something they choose to do, I hope our friends become good homeschooling friends so that we have positive social interactions.