We are just about to finish another year. This new year will bring our family some milestones. One major milestone is that my daughter will graduate from high school. My daughter will graduate from high school! That sounds so strange to say. I will be done schooling one of my children. Ack. Where did the time go? I was never going to homeschool my kids. Now I am going to see one of them graduate from our homeschool.

Did I do everything I was supposed to do? Did I teach her everything she needed to know? Probably not. There was the one spelling book we never finished. We only read one work of Shakespeare. She doesn’t drive yet. People ask us what she will do next year. We tell them she’ll probably attend the junior college down the street. Some people think that’s a great idea. Others look at me horrified, like I’ve committed the unpardonable sin. I shrug my shoulders. I’m not out to please people. It never works. Too much work to make everyone happy. But I do want to look back at this homeschool journey. Why homeschool? Why did the Lord call me to homeschool my kids?

I think it was about me. Don’t we think everything is about us? But seriously, I think God called me to homeschool because He wanted to work on me. When we become Christians, we all begin a work, a journey with the Lord. He refines us, molds us into His image. Homeschooling does that to a person. We are on our own in this journey. There is no one to trust, but God. There is no one to turn to, but God. Homeschooling pushes us to our knees. It’s all on our shoulders. We get scared: are we going to do it right? (Whatever THAT means?) Are we going to screw up our kids? Are they going to be normal? Why am I doing this?

I remember when I first started out. My daughter wasn’t taking to reading very well. I began to panic. Everyone else I knew that had children the same age, were all bragging to me how their kids were reading Shakespeare and how they were these proteges and Harvard was calling them already and blah, blah, blah. Okay, I’m exaggerating, but you get the picture. Well my daughter wasn’t taking to reading at all. I could tell she really struggled. She looked at me and I could see the light was out in her eyes. I really begun to panic. I was out on a limb with this whole homeschool gig and I couldn’t prove my muster. It was all on me and it looked like I was failing. I talked to a good friend of mine. She told me that kids all learn to read in their good time. It’s nothing on me as her teacher, it just happens when they’re ready. She WILL learn to read. That helped for a little bit, but I could still tell my daughter just wasn’t making it. The Harvard moms were getting to me and I began to panic again. I didn’t want to fail. I went to the bathroom and cried. And then I cried out to the Lord and asked Him what to do. When I was done blubbering to the Lord I opened my eyes and noticed the Sonlight Curriculum catalog on the floor. I picked it up. I turned it over. There, on the back page, of the catalog was a full page ad for this book on how to help kids read. The ad asked the question if your student was struggling to read, this would help. Wow! It was like God read my mind!!! I immediately ordered the book. I couldn’t wait for the book to come in. I tore open the package when it arrived and I began to read it like I was on a sinking ship and I need directions for the life raft. Like I was starving and this was my first meal. Like I was…(Ok, you get the picture). The book, in case you need help, was called Reading Reflex.

Well the book gave me really simple activities to show my daughter how the process of reading worked. It told me I needed to tear the words apart and sound them out to her individually and then it would be her job to push them together. I couldn’t wait. She was doing something on the couch and I caught her in mid play. I told her we were going to play a game. I had her attention, so I went for it. I separated out the word, “frog.” She pushed the sounds together and said, “frog.” Eureka! I struck gold. I was excited and she looked amused that she had excited me! She was willing to try it again. I separated more words for her. She pushed them back together. She immediately understood. I could see the light turn on in her eyes. We did it! We did more exercises the book recommended. She responded well to them! She was going to learn to read! I wasn’t a failure! I could face my doubters about homeschooling with my head held high. Thank you Lord!

And that’s why it’s about us. God always wants us in that place where we are broken, and scared. He loves a contrite heart. I could tell you more stories about me failing at homeschooling and then crying out to the Lord. And I probably will. But as I think of this new year coming, I think I’m in a good place with the Lord: needy, broken, scared and always looking for help. And God is right there for me. It’s where He wants me.

I was never going to homeschool my kids. Nope. Not ever! I never considered it, would never consider it. I actually had strong opinions about NOT homeschooling. I thought the very idea of homeschooling was wacky. I went to the public school and turned out perfectly fine, thank you very much. I was a product of the public school system, so I was on their team regarding education. I came out unscathed, or did I?

My husband and I waited a long time to have kids. My first pregnancy was a late miscarriage. That was five years into our marriage. We waited 3 more years to try and get pregnant again. When I did get pregnant I was happily working as an Academic Advisor for a public school. My husband was working at a private school as a math/science teacher. I found out I was pregnant a month after my husband lost his job at a private school. Not because of anything he had done, but because the principal/owner of the school left town with what little money the school had and never paid his teachers their last paycheck (but that’s a whole other story). Fortunately, my husband found employment with an alternative tutor school.

My husband got another full-time public school job teaching job 2 and 1/2 months before our child was born. While I was pregnant, I didn’t think I was going to stay home with my child. I was going to be a working mother. I wondered what women who stayed home did with their kids all day. I thought it must be incredibly boring. I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to stay home with a baby ALL DAY. I was fairly certain…I was going to be a working mom…somewhat certain…okay, maybe there was a voice in my head whispering to me about staying home with my kid.

I know you’ve heard umpteen times about how a mother falls in love with her baby when it’s born, and how it changed their life, and they were never the same again, and how they never knew love like this before…and…I’ll spare you most of the details. However, I was one of those mothers. It did change me. I couldn’t picture myself going back to work and missing out on all that babyness I was enjoying. I was afraid to stay home with my baby, but I also enjoyed it immensely. I wasn’t afraid of the staying home part, I was afraid of who I would be. I was afraid I would lose my identity. I wouldn’t be an Academic Advisor, I would be a mom. I wouldn’t get paid anymore. If people asked me what I did for a living, I would only be able to say, “I’m a mom…” My public school feminist indoctrination told me this wasn’t okay. I was torn.

As I was adjusting to this new stay at home lifestyle, I was meeting new people: moms with babies like mine, moms with preschoolers, and wait for it…MOMS WHO HOMESCHOOLED their kids. That’s right, I actually met HOMESCHOOL moms. They weren’t who I thought they’d be. They sounded like normal people. They walked and talked like me. They laughed at funny things. Their kids seemed normal too…wait, I take that back. Their kids weren’t quite normal. This one family had a 13 year old girl. She WASN’T like the typical girls I was used to working with in the public school. She looked me in the eye when I spoke to her. She seemed to enjoy talking to me, me…a full on grown up. She smiled a lot. She laughed a lot. She talked about how she didn’t understand the point of Algebra, but not in a disrespectful, rude way. I was fascinated by her. I verified this fact, “So you are homeschooled?” She smiled and said, “Yes.” I asked, “Do you like being homeschooled?” She smiled again, “Yes,” she said. We were having a conversation, me and this homeschooled girl. Though I had worked in the public school system with middle school kids, I don’t ever recall actually having a full on conversation with any of the students. I usually got one word answers to my questions and this sense they really didn’t want to be around me. This girl seemed to enjoy talking to me, me, an adult. I asked her if she’d been homeschooled all of her life and she said yes. This girl was genuinely happy, respectful, intelligent, and out going. Whoa! I thought. I like this girl…and she’s HOMESCHOOLED. That can’t be right. She was dismantling my homeschool prejustice.

After meeting this girl, I went home questioning homeschooling. This homeschool family were really nice people. This homeschool girl was happy, polite, awake, and interesting. I wanted my kids to be happy, polite, awake, and interesting. What was happening to me? I couldn’t actually be thinking I might be possibly…no, I couldn’t. Could I? Was I considering homeschooling as a possibility for my own kids? HOLY COWS! I might homeschool my kids. Ack! I don’t want to be a homeschooler. I didn’t want to be one of THOSE people. I didn’t want to wear the denim jumper. I wasn’t going to grow my hair long and never wear mascara again. I didn’t want to grind my own wheat and milk my own cows. I…I…I…I think I might have to consider homeschooling my kids. My daughter was eighteen months old when I made the decision to homeschool. She has been homeschooled all of her life, as well as her little brother. I have yet to wear a denim jumper or grow out my hair. I still wear mascara. My son did try and milk a cow once when this farm thing came to town and they let the kids take a turn. And 3/4 of my family are gluten intolerant, so the whole wheat grinding is out.