Pomp and Circumstances

Well, my oldest has finally graduated.  For anyone who has sent a child out into the world, you know how bittersweet this moment is. I am so incredibly proud of her, and I know she's going to take the world by storm in her own wonderful way.

For those who might be wondering, I did homeschool my oldest through 2nd grade. When we placed her in school (at that time I wanted to try my hand at teaching in the public schools again), she was nearly three grade levels ahead of her peers in reading, and one grade level ahead in math. We did summer bridging activities during each of her school summer vacations until well into middle school, and by the time she was 16, she was taking a college class alongside her high school classes, many of which have been honors and advanced-placement classes.  She did a sport every year except for her last (where she focused more on the math team), and she was heavily involved with the band, doing jazz band, combo band, pep band, and "regular" full band, making it into the district competitions each year and finally making it to the all-state competitions this final year.

Thanks for letting me brag for a moment!  She worked hard, and balanced the work out with fun times with her friends. She has her driver's license and a car as well as a part-time job. She received a few merit scholarships that will leave her with very little college debt when she's done.

If anyone has any doubts that homeschooling can prepare you for life, here you go! Sure, sure, you could make the argument that she only spent 3 years homeschooling full-time, but it gave her a HUGE advantage from the start, and then we kept working with her for several more summers to keep that edge. We stayed active in her education, and I truly feel that homeschooling played a large role in getting her off on an amazing foot.  She was a teenager before we stopped summer work, and by then she had developed such a love of reading that we still found her with her nose in a book regularly.

Thank you for allowing me this moment to beam.  It's her time to shine. I love my "little e" so very much, and want every good thing for her life. xo

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A ferry ride to a local island

As for my other two, they are also doing wonderfully.  Homeschooling has been much more child-led these past couple of months, because we have been getting our home ready to sell. It's been a LOT of work!!! Wow, no one ever told me it would be this much work, or perhaps I convinced myself that it's only a lot of work if you have huge repairs and renovations to do. I didn't realize that a generally-well-kept home would still need so much work to get it ready to sell!

From spackeling and painting (!!!), to small repairs, to cleaning and organizing, it's been nothing short of a miniature nightmare! Ha!  OK, maybe I am exaggerating a bit, but we've been working at this for MONTHS, and still find ourselves with little tasks to do.  Our current task includes taking some of our screens (sliding back door and window screens) to be re-screened (cats and kids got to them over time). It just boggles the mind that really we can't take a day off completely from it. Well, the good news is that it's 99%  ready to go, so we finally just decided to list it without waiting for it to be 100% perfect and figured we'll pick away at the little things as we go.  

So, this huge undertaking of getting the house ready has meant less time and energy for homeschooling in the traditional way that we are typically used to. It's meant a LOT of computer schooling, to be honest. Turtle Diary and Lesson Pathways are just two of the sites we've been utilizing lately, along with Prodigy math (which is one of my son's favorites). I pick anywhere from 1-3 subjects a day and have my son work on these online sites for about 20-30 mins for each subject. We do still listen to Story of the World in the car, along with other audiobooks. The rest of the time, I allow the kids to pick their own activities. My S8 is a big fan of Minecraft and Roblox, so he spends a lot of his computer time playing those. Our D6 has been enjoying different educational games on the ipad.  She still has therapies each week that I drive her to as well.

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So, right now things are a bit of a combination of extremely busy, and yet in limbo. We're waiting for our house to sell....waiting for our overseas plans to finalize....waiting.

I know that this time is important, and also that it is a way that I (personally) am able to really take the time to say goodbye to my homeland.  I will likely miss all of this in some way. On the other hand, I am so filled with excitement and anticipation for what is ahead for us. In a few short months, we'll be in the tropics. We'll be surrounded by a large extended family and a warm circle of friends. We'll have financial comforts we don't really have right now, and a type of security that will really help us charge ahead and have new adventures.

Thank you, to those who may actually read this, for taking the time to peek at our journey. It's had its ups and downs, and certainly this blog has taken on different looks and themes.

Sometimes I want this to be more like a journal for my personal thoughts, and other times to be all about homeschooling, and everything in between. I guess it's perfectly OK for it to be whatever it needs to be in any given moment, I figure.

I've poured my heart out, I've ranted, I've beamed with joy, I've educated, and I've pondered.

Maybe having a small audience has allowed me to just allow whatever needs to come up to come up...since there is no pressure from anyone reading it to have it conform to anything specific.

Thanks for that, Blogger.