This Homeschool Mother's Journal {Spring}

Playing catch up!  

In my life this {spring}…

I am:
  • Content. God has me right where I am for a reason and I am choosing to be content. 
  • Finding ways to bring sunshine, color, and light to our home. In fact, we made a little of our own sunshine in our front window. 
  • Clearing out junk and making better use of our space. 
I started running again. I did a mile a day until my feet started hurting. Then I discovered barefoot running, read Born to Run (good read except for the profanity and evolution), bought my first pair of barefoot running shoes (Merrell Barefoot Pace Glove) and am still retraining my feet. I am jogging in place on a mini trampoline and am no where near ready to run on pavement. (I've not run since writing this and my feet still hurt).

Boys are: 
Playing spring soccer, waiting out spring snow storms and playing make up games, training with an English soccer coach and working at the Y. This is always our busiest season.

We were sick for several weeks on and off again this year from Feb. to March. It was worse this year than others and we have had a cold spring with lots of snow. But, now that May is here, spring finally came with it and I am reveling at the transformation.

Malachi turned 8 and we had a science party! I wasn't feeling well, but we are always sick on his birthday, so I made it happen and it was a lot of fun. (Pics are on both my IG accounts).

Jordan turned 17?!

I am journaling daily in an app called Day One. I don't miss my family blog, or even my 2nd attempt to keep up a second blog, but am sharing on Instagram to make up for it. :)

In our homeschool this {season}…

I got all my planning done for the coming year for the youngest 5 and started getting ahead on the read-alouds for our next core with Mali and Elli.

Dylan is (hallelujah) plugging along in Core F and we can see the light at the end of the tunnel! It was hard to get into and I didn't feel like we were doing it justice. . . until I looked at what we have done compared to what we have not and then I didn't feel so bad. Sonlight is a lot of reading! Even Sonlight will tell you that you don't have to do everything in the manual. And Dylan, my 7th grader, does not love to read and that can be a problem when you choose a literature based curriculum! Even so, he is a very good reader, so I let him choose one book per country, in addition to the reading he does out of the World Book Encyclopedia (which surprisingly, he doesn't mind). He has done great with his Eastern Hemisphere Notebook and the research required for it ~ which has made this core for us. We are now on week 33, our last week in Africa. So we have 4 weeks of school left to cover the Pacific Islands, New Zealand, and Australia. It feels so good to be almost done! I feel better about dropping some books for Core F so we can be done and get a head start on Core G, which I am really looking forward to! Giving myself permission to drop books feels better than just not doing them or being behind. (We finished in May!)

I think I made the right choice splitting my middle school boys. Nathan, my 8th grader, rocked his core and finished Core H + Pre-Algebra 2 months ago. He is now plugging away on Physical Science (doubling up on lessons), started Algebra 1, and is doing some recreational reading. Nathan loves to read, so it would have been difficult to share a core and he was more than capable of doing Core H read-alouds as readers.

Jordan loved Core 100. He will tell you it was a lot of reading, but he enjoyed most of it. He has a short list of books that he didn't think was worth his time, but he read every book that I assigned in his core.  He is in the home stretch and should finish in a week or two.

I don't think I did too many cores this year, in fact I am adding a core this coming year! But, I do plan to combine more next year and do more audio books and not be afraid to drop a book that doesn't work or that we don't enjoy.

We are sticking with Sonlight! Not that I won't ditch books that aren't a good fit for our family, or add or change things... but Sonlight as a whole works for us. I like that it is a literature rich curriculum. I like that the readers are scheduled and include parent notes/study guide. I like most of the history.  I don't like all of Sonlight's selections - many don't work for us, but they have more that do. The best advice I can give if you are considering Sonlight is read 27 Reasons NOT to Buy Sonlight first to see if any of those are a reason for you. Some of them ARE for me, but we work around it and I screen books for questionable content and resolve that no curriculum is perfect.

Helpful homeschooling tips or advice to share…

I plan to get ahead on upcoming core read-alouds for our summer reading. I always feel better when I am a little ahead of the game.

I am inspired by…

When Your Homeschooled Child Doesn't Like to Read
Working with a Bright & Occasionally Very Motivated High Schooler: Tips & Strategies!
About Mama's Screen Time. . .

Places we’re going and people we’re seeing…

We had a family stay with us for a week last month and it was so fun!

What’s working/not working for us…

The weather is warming up! I'm pretty sure I am solar powered. Definitely Son-powered. ;-)

Questions/thoughts I have…

How do I make sure each child's needs are met when one child is more needy than the others?

Things I’m working on…

I made a Smash book! with memorabilia and photos from my teen years. I do plan to eventually blog about it on a project blog that I started.  I haven't touched my Project Life, but will once school is out.

I’m reading…

Through the Bible - in Proverbs, using the You Version audio Bible on my iPhone.

I’m cooking…

I'm really slacking in the meal department on day-to-day cooking. Beans~n~tillas is a classic stand-by. Today, I made a taco salad! (Funny, because I actually did make one again today - as in the day of posting this.)

I’m praying…

about Jordan's senior year. I have our curriculum ordered and/or finalized for next year for everyone but him. I am thinking I should do remedial stuff with him (like Algebra and writing) and have him study for the ACT/SAT, along with American Government and Economics, and not do a Sonlight Core or Lit., but I haven't decided yet.

A picture to share. . . 

Sweet notes from my family - from each one. ♥



And that's where I left off. I have updates on Bo coming - picking up where I left off. And I'd like to share a book we rowed this spring. And I have lots to share about our summer and what we have been up to. . . another time!

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