I love the tangents that our homeschool day can take.

Today, my first-grader and I were reading Bread and Jam for Frances, when she decided that she needed to have a "Frances" lunch.

That ended up meaning bread and jam (of course), milk--in a thermos jar--, peaches, and poached eggs.

Now, I haven't poached an egg in years, if ever. But out came the cookbook, and the older children joined in. We all ended up learning how to poach eggs, and my egg-hating son even ended up pulling a "Frances" and deciding that it was "really only scrambled eggs" that he didn't like that much...poached eggs were fine, thank you.

Fast forward to this afternoon as I'm driving the mom taxi to chess club and indoor soccer practice. Cued by an NPR recap, my son asked, "Mom, what exactly was United Flight 93?".

I found myself tearing up as I gave the best explanation I could. We talked about how the people aboard knew that they were going to die, and how brave they were to make sure others wouldn't die as well.

I don't know if a year from now, or even ten years from now, my children will remember the literature we read today, the piano pieces that they practiced, the history, the algebra, or the spelling. I do hope they remember poaching eggs and singing silly songs in the kitchen and sharing our hearts on what could have been yet another ho-hum shuttle to afternoon activities.

I know I will remember.