It was a good run.

Nearly 8 years of homeschool and our oldest is now attending "formal school".
We are thankful for God providing a wonderful Christian school for her to attend, and so far a smooth transition.
Some of my favorite memories of homeschooling through the 8 years with Chloe:
~making super long timelines on butcher block paper
~listening to tons of audiobooks on nearly all car rides in the elementary school years
~making a cleopatra costume
~Eating lunch outdoors at Byerlys!
~Art class with the Westriches
~nature walks at Elm  Creek
~Ending school early to spend a week at the cabin
~Sleeping in late
~Becoming well read by reading to her all those great Sonlight books
~Forcing Jackson to talk to Leela and give her his passport.  That was fun for us, but not so much for him!
~Making the tabernacle and eating Chinese food
~Laughing every day
~Tons of singing and dancing in the kitchen

Most of all, being a part of every day together:  learning to love through the good days, the bad days, the sick days, the sick of school days, the new babies, the new curriculums, the new jobs, the new homes and all the good things that hard challenges can develop in us.

I've loved it and would not have done it differently....but I know it is time for something new and look forward to all that this new chapter will bring to our lives.

New Year, New Spreadsheets!

The downside to being gone for Christmas Break is that there is no time to clean out the homeschool room, the kids' closets, or do a real good washing of the kitchen floor.  Instead, I come home 2 days before I am planning to start teaching and have to empty the rotten veggies from the fridge, unpack the  loads of suitcases and boxes of gifts, grocery shop, and get the kids back onto a schedule that gets them to bed earlier than 11:00 and up earlier than 10:00.  It is a great blessing to travel back to see family for Christmas, but the return trip of driving 18 hours (and riding in the back seat next to the toddler so that sick older son could have my front seat) celebrating New Years Eve in a hotel  trying to make it "fun" for the teenager and other kids, and all that work awaiting for me when I got home (not to mentioned being jacked up on caffine, sugar and nasty McDonalds) isn't the best way to start out a happy new homeschool year. 
And, I tend to be one of those who loves to start out with great expectations, best intentions, and all my duckies neatly in a row. 

But I did get some beautiful color spreadsheets done that display my new and improved schedule for the homeschool day.  Bonus:  I made new school work planning sheets for the kids that are spanky colored and better lay out each days' work. 

So although I started today 2 hours behind schedule and with a headache and a hang-over feeling from fighting off my older son's virus -- the day did happen without too much difficulty.  Adverbs were introduced, Psalms 23  studied, Multiplication taught, the minute hand of the clock practiced, a playdoh bob the builder sculpted, fractions divided by decimals and converted to percents (or something like that) and even had time to watch Pride and Predjudice with the 9th grader.  Somehow, 4 things didn't get done.  This is the perpetual problem of a homeschool mom optimist who has the faulty idea that more can be accomplished in a day than possible.

Which brings me to my favorite New Year's Resolution:  I will stop when I have 75% of my day's work done -- make time to play with the kids -- and then see if there is time left for the rest.  If not, so be it.  No one will die over it!  Like that?  My kids do (and I do too) and I have gotten to the second world in Super Mario Wii !