I'm not a big fan of any the major holidays. I don't really enjoy Christmas much or Halloween or any of those. Nope, I like the smaller, less celebrated holidays. For example, I get really excited about Earth Day. Just ask my kids. I like to plan family Earth Day activities or Fall Equinox parties or May Day fieldtrips. Some of that is just the tree hugger in me. I can't help but love anything that celebrates nature.

But I also love Martin Luther King Jr. day. I really love a holiday that celebrates a man, a movement, that changed the world using nonviolence and peaceful protest! A holiday that not only remembers a great man, but reminds us of how far we've come as a nation, inspires us to keep fighting for what is right and encourages us to do better, be better human beings.

Again, just ask my kids. They asked me if we were going to take the day off from school in honor of the holiday. As homeschoolers we don't always take the same days off as the public schoolers so they knew there was a chance we would still have school even if the rest of the neighborhood didn't.

I really had to fight the temptation to have school just so I could make it a MLK day. You know, decorate the schoolroom, have thought-provoking discussions (did you know Ronald Reagan strongly opposed and threatened to veto honoring Martin Luther King jr with a holiday?) We could read books about him, watch MLK videos on Youtube, etc... But that sounds boring (well, sort of...)

So no school but we're still going to celebrate in other ways. Barack Obama has asked Americans to commemorate it with a day of service. So we'll see what we can do to answer that call. I love that idea.