no more homeschool

I am not really happy about this decision.  It just seems like the way the Lord is leading and so many situations give me peace about letting go of our homeschool life.

I have loved doing homeschool for the last 16 years.  Thinking about homeschooling started in my high school days, in which a friend at church homeschooled her children.  I loved to see how their family interacted.  After I married Greg, I brought up the subject of homeschooling.  At first he dismissed the idea because the people he knew that had been homeschooled were so awkward.  Then he met a family that had been homeschooling and he noticed their family life and apparently changed his thoughts on it without really telling me.  So when Jasper was 4 and we experimented with homeschooling preK, I came to the conclusion that Greg was right before and homeschooling is not for me.  Then Jasper turns 5 and I'm thinking I need to enroll him in the public school (we were in Vilonia school district at the time).  About that time, Greg mentions that we shouldn't do that and we should try homeschooling Kindergarten.  

We moved to Conway schools that August that Jasper started Kindergarten and we also had Amethyst who was 8 months old.  There began 13 years of homeschooling and adding Emma and Amethyst and Jace as they reached Kindergarten age.  We tried a few co-ops and homeschool support groups.  We stayed longer with some.  We made tons of friends and family-friends that were not in our church, but were homeschooling along with us.  We did Bible Bees and Geography Bees.  We did dance and baseball and soccer.  We did AWANA and 4H and Brownies.  We did ok on the social spectrum.

Then Greg gets sick and one year later passes away.

That was Jasper's senior year and Emma's sophomore year.  Amethyst was in 7th grade and Jace 4th.  Isaiah hadn't started school grades yet.  We barely get by.  We really had a hard time finishing that year "as you can imagine".  We limped along at the co-op, but I wasn't helpful which I tried to be.   Everywhere were reminders that while all these family-friends of mine still had their daddies and husbands, I did not.  It was just too awkward.  I wasn't my usual happy self and folks backed away from me.  It seems like.  It seems like because I don't remember if homeschool friends did or didn't show up like at my house.  They tried to invite me, but when I went I just felt so out of place so I stopped going.  I don't remember how my kids did with their studies or if they learned anything; I just don't remember.

Then the next school year came around.  Jace would be going into 5th and Isaiah into Kindergarten.  It just so happened that my pastor's wife was a half-day Kindergarten teacher and one of the 5th grade teachers was a friend from before Jasper was even born.  Then, as I'm praying about what to do, someone anonymously offers to sponsor Jace's way at CCS.  He doesn't want to go, though.  He has enjoyed the homeschool life (as we all did) and he's afraid of what the other kids will say to him.  Finally, I just made him go.  

I thought I could continue to homeschool Amethyst and Emma.  Amethyst started to get behind as her 8th grade year progressed.  Emma had a few classes at the co-op and was keeping up fairly well there, but the school work she was supposed to do at home never got done because I wasn't mental available very often.  So we decided that the last year was Emma's second semester of her 10th grade year.  This year she's technically in 11th grade.

The cost to go to CCS is very hard to swallow.  Putting in both girls was really not considered.  Emma begged to be homeschooled, not to be with me, but to continue on the volleyball team.  Why?  I do not know exactly.  She's not their star player or anything and she doesn't hang out with any of the girls there.  So this year, I'm only doing a few things with her and the rest she'll make up at Morrilton.

I had some good discussion with Amethyst about going to public school.  She would start high school, 9th grade, at a school with 8th and 9th graders, so she would be in the older group.  She could do things like JROTC and art and theatre.  She would be gone all day :( and she'd have homework--real homework on a computer.  She was nervous but felt it was the right way to go.  I agreed.  This school change plan was working out. 

 But I wasn't happy about it.  I consistently get emails about homeschool life like deadlines to fill out the NOI and how to do math in 7 easy steps and the best books for a 5th grader to read aloud.  I had to unsubscribe from most of my homeschool email newsletters. When homeschool related news or ads show up anyway, it makes me sad.  That's not my life now.  When church leaders say "We're going to pray for teachers this morning, please stand up if you're a teacher." I can't I'm not I couldn't.  I couldn't do it.  I didn't make it.  I feel like a failure.  What would Greg have thought about my giving up?  Giving up--is that what I did? So I go back and forth as to whether I gave up or I did the best for my kids and that all along this was God's plan.

So Isaiah will never know what kind of teacher I would've been to him, and Jasper and Emma will only know what it is like to graduate as a homeschooler.  Jace is having to face middle school peer pressure earlier than his sisters and brother, but it is all going to be ok. Maybe.  Hopefully.  Lord, help me.

Books in 2017

Scarlet by S. Lawhead
Tuck by S. Lawhead
Legacy by James Mitchener
Accidental Tourist by Anne Tayler
The Little Prince by Antoine de St.Exupery
The Undistracted Widow by Carol Cornish
Blue Highways by William Least Heat-Moon
You Came Too by Robert Frost
Exploring Revelation by Philips
Martin Luther by Booth
Unfinished Tales by JRR Tolkien
The Last Thirteen by James Phelon
Children in the Light by Harold Myra
The Shining Face by Harold Myra
Intentional Walk by Rob Rains

Blue Highways

I finished reading Blue Highways. I found that I truly love travel books. They make me want to hit the road.
This particular book had me following the author (William Least Heat-Moon) around the US in an RV-like van. He went east from Missouri to the Atlantic Ocean, then south and through Texas all the way to the Pacific Ocean in Oregon/Washington and along the Northern states all the way to Maine and NY, NJ, etc and back West to Missouri.
My thoughts about his writing style focus on his extensive vocabulary and his extraordinary descriptions. Really good. I appreciated the lack of going after girls and the basic modesty he embraced. I noticed that the author himself rarely used profanity, even if the characters he came across in his travels did.
I also noticed the author and, mentioned in the afterword, his editor, considered themselves atheists, but only mentioned religion if it mattered to a character he met. My favorite was a monk he met in
Georgia. He had this to say:

"His answers were coming slowly. 'I try to take desires and memories of companionship--destructive ones--and let them run their course.  Wait it out.  Don't panic  That's when the emptiness is intense.' 'Is that it?'
'That's the beginning.  Then I turn the pain of absence into an offering to God.  Sometimes that's all I have to offer.'
'You mean what you've given up?'
'Does it seem like I'm giving nothing?' "

This quote, this person he met, really encouraged me.  Overall I enjoyed this book.

Be Yourself

So once in middle school some friends told me to "Be Yourself".
Apparently, I was a different person at school and away from school.  Ever since then, I always wonder why is that even a saying.  Sad, serious, silly, or studious are descriptions for different people right? They can also be descriptions of the same person.
My teen wondered out loud "How can I be myself?"  She's right.  How would a young person even know what that is--they are themselves.  They can be no other.  They are still trying to figure out who they are, what they like, what is good and what is not.
Sure, I will be myself whether I'm a sad at the moment or a typically sad person.  Label me "sad".
Normally I'm a silly person, but what about the days I am not in the mood--you know what I mean.  However, maybe I feel more comfortable acting silly when I'm nervous.  That is being myself, but it is not appropriate.
When I am myself, which is pretty much always, I can be described differently in different circumstances.  Like my personality or don't like it--I don't care.  Maybe that's where you are supposed to be for others to stop just saying "Be Yourself."

casualty

Were you a casualty of war?
Or a sure sign of victory?
Were you called home for His sake
Or were you called home for mine?

Will your absence be felt always?
Or will new growth fill the holes?
Should I attempt to rake up the pieces
Or let them lie until they become soil?

My plan was to keep walking
But being still is recommended.
Somehow in my mind I can both
Go to You while You come to me.

Mountain biking in the snow

I am so thrilled that I got to spend the afternoon on my mountain bike 🚲 riding Ender's Fault Trail North Loop. I have yet to get past the first uphill. Today I did the whole thing except for two tiny short cuts to catch up with my friends. Mountain biking is an activity I've been wishing to be involved in for some time. Greg at one time had bought us both hybrids which was good for him because he mostly enjoyed riding his bike as a means of transportation with the occasional off-road trip. When Emma needed a bike, I gave mine to her and set my heart on a mountain bike. I'm so glad I did. Today makes 3 official trails that I've completed (at least mostly).
1) Fern Hollow at White Oak Stae Park was my first.
2) Mt Nebo Bench Trail was 2nd
3) Ender's Fault at Woolly Hollow today

I'm so thankful I was able to go today. Thankful for my sweet girls who played with Isaiah while I was gone. Thankful for friends who invited me so I wouldn't have to go at alone. Thankful for another friend and her boy who waited up for me so I wouldn't feel so bad about not keeping up. Thankful I didn't get hurt. Thankful that it was so beautiful today in the snow.

Memorize

Hide the Holy Word in your heart.
When you get old, It will not depart.
You can remember what you memorize
Long after your family grows in size.

Those very precious words will come back
Just like pulling the groceries from the sack.
The Lord will show you where they fit
And you won't need to worry how they sit.

Be sure to wear that belt of truth
And don't let it get too loose.
It is the start of your spiritual armor
To protect, defend, and so much more.