Homeschooling blogs can be a wonderful thing for ideas and encouragement. But sometimes, they also can be a source of discouragement. Why? Many times you only get to see the" best of the best." You get to see great ideas, projects, crafts, and field trips. You get to hear about curriculum that we are using or looking into buying for next year. What you don't always get to "see" is what goes on in the actual day to day homeschooling. It's kind of like going to a friend's house that knows that you are coming and their house is spotless and their children are always well behaved. It makes you think their house is always clean and their children are always better behaved than yours. There is no such thing as the "perfect" homeschool. And, although I am The Happy Homeschool Mom, not every moment of my homeschool day is happy. Let me give you a little glimpse inside my day today.
Are started out feeling like I was behind because I had to make a special trip to the post office to mail an important letter. When I returned, we started in on our Bible (we are reviewing Who Am I from Apologia.) Not even 5 minutes into the reading I detected an odor. Yep, Emelia needed to be changed. Luckily we were listening to the audio CD and I let the children keep listening while I went into the other room and changed the baby. We started working on our assignment in our Notebooking Journal when my three oldest started being very nasty to each other. I had to stop the lesson and go into a little speech about treating others like we want to be treated and setting an example for the other children (still hoping it sunk in.) Moving on to History. We were working on our timeline and memory cards when my 2 year old decided she was going to have a crying melt down because my 4 year old did not want to play with her, and my 6 year old decided this would be a fun time to practice the keyboard turned up as high as it would go. Next, it took us 15 minutes to locate our Visual Latin DVD. By now it is time for lunch and we still haven't gotten to our current read aloud, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (hopefully will get to that later.)
We are making lunch when I realize I never took any meat out of the freezer for supper (oops, gonna have to come up with plan B.) A little fresh air and time to get Emelia down for her nap during which I need to get the floors swept, dishwasher loaded, and do All About Reading Level 1 with Alex and Anthony (much easier when the baby is sleeping.) She slept 20 minutes! That's all. 20 minutes! Not enough time to get my chores done, and we had lots of help from Emelia during our reading lesson. The next challenge came during Math. Fractions have been causing melt downs from Nick all week long ( I have yet to convince him he will survive learning fractions.) Ug! Mommy needs a time out and was getting ready to send them outside for more fresh air when it started thunder storming! Good thing school is over for the day!
I have to tell you that during moments like these, it is so easy to want to throw up your hands and give up. Especially when the enemy uses these times to whisper in your ear and tell you what a failure you are and that you will never be a successful homeschool mom, and your children will always be bickering. Don't listen! Homeschooling is a calling and whatever God has called us to do, he will equip us for. That does not mean it will always be easy and there are times when we need to be taught just as much as our children. It does mean that we can do it and are never going to have to do it alone.
During all the disorder and chaos of the day, some pretty good things happened too. My 4 year old climbed into my lap and told me he loved me and I was the best mom ever! I got to snuggle up with the little ones this afternoon and read the same book over and over again. I also got to listen to my 8 year old struggling reader read aloud fluently without stumbling! I have the joy of being able to stay at home with my children and watch them learn and grow. That joy is what helps me hold on during all of the crazy moments and chaos of everyday life. That, a lot of prayer, and the knowledge that I am doing the job that God has called me to do.
So don't be discouraged thinking you are the only mom who has bad days or doesn't have it all together. We all have those days, I promise!
Thank you for sharing this, Lisa. It's so easy to share the wonderful things like right now my first grader started reading chapter books and she does all her schoolwork very happily. A few months ago though, this same child was refusing to do her workbooks or listen to our history read-alouds. She wanted to sit in her room all day and play with her toys. Who wants to share about that! Then there is my 11 yo who is struggling with math. After homeschooling for so many years, I know it will get better, but who wants to share that we have a daily struggle where I have to sit with him for an hour and encourage him-and even then we sometimes don't get through the whole thing.
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