Homeschooling phenom #shoutouts #thejumpoff
I am so excited. I figured out how to home educate my children so they are happy to learn and I am happy to teach. Took me three years and a slow start but I have chiseled out enough time to read articles and books and watch blogs from the best. I downloaded planners created my own discover someone was selling a copy of a planner I had been making by hand since high school which I found hilarious. But I am not a hater. I never tried so I can’t be mad the success was not mine. I don’t have to do the work to digitize my planner so win in my book.
I am not a writer. I am not the best when it comes to the are of grammar. I am sure you get what I am saying. So thanks to some very smart woman like Charlotte Mason, pam barnhill and the creator of the design-your-homeschool.com I was guided in the right direction to get my homeschool in gear. I found my focus and truest desire for my boys down on paper and in order. Thanks to accountable kids, I organized family meetings and discussed with my children what it is they wanted to learn and how they wanted to learn it. Thanks to andrea Mills for cementing in my mind I don’t want a Christian based curriculum and that church at home is OK. Andrea helped me organize so much almost every thing really when it comes to motivating and keeping my boys on track. Thank you just see Trish for pointing me in Andreas direction, and entertaining me along the way. Trish also helped me realize I like the idea of a virtual coop and that I can’t be a curriculum junkie. There are so many good curriculums out there but no one is perfect and I could go broke trying to catch them all as if they were Pokémon. But like any addiction I had to learn how to say no.
I have to back track because I can’t say enough about Andrea Mills. I want o cry when I think about how beautifully she runs her home and how similar we are. Even though she uses a Christian based curriculum I know where her heart is and she made home schooling easy by using the curriculum she was familiar with and MADE IT HER OWN! She inspired me to take the Calvert curriculum I already have and make it work. I even took inspiration from the A.C.E. Star chart and made my SAGE chart. Pure gold.
The fly lady helped me to get my house in order one zone at a time instead of trying to kill myself cleaning the entire house in one day. Easy is a godsend with it charts and stickers and stamps. I want to scream I am so happy. My house isn’t perfect but I can walk around and not trip over toys. I can find my clothes. (Yes, my clothes got lost, it was bad).
Shout out to buildyourlibrary.com for being another kindred spirt in the curriculum and family dynamic realm and providing a super pre history curriculum source. And a wonderful addition to my little passport subscription and not making story of the world blah, she introduced me to elemental science. I would die with out it and their podcast. I have a new good reads friend and knowledge of the Sea homeschooling group and the Ohio Waterpark gathering for homeschoolers. Not directly to the Waterpark gathering but while I was looking for information on S.E.A. groups in Ohio.
Thanks to books by the foot, woodenbooks, forgotten books, teachingchildrenphilosopy.com and uua.org for providing me with collection of worthwhile books my children will cherish for generations and to fill my library to the brim. Thank you hoopla and overdrive and kindle unlimited because I don’t have room for all the books I want right now and some of the ones I checked out before I bought turned out to be duds so thanks for saving me money.
I know I might be forgetting a few right now who have transformed me into a homeschooling phenom, fired up and ready to be a juggernaut educating my two boys to be the next leaders of the world. Truth, beauty and goodness are my goals. Confident, strong willed men my vision so clear, of my children blossoming out of the fertilizer of my first few (failed attempts, from my point of view, the boys none the wiser) years of home education. I know I have the tools I need to bring those goals and my vision to fruition. I am on a mission and I have my garden plan ready. The soil is rich, I have the drive and desire to tend it fully, through blood, sweat, and tears. There is no stopping me. Welcome to #thejumpoff this is something I can’t help but be passionate about and I want to share it all. This is the day I vow to blog once a week. With a special report every 260 days. One for homeschool portfolio sake and two to share with my children and inspire others for real who don’t want to waste three years like I did to get it right for the love of their children. When you decide to homeschool it is a serious undertaking and when you don’t have a clear vision, mission or plan of attack, money time and energy get wasted. You doubt yourself, give up, and regret too much. Life is too short for any regret.
I have had this blog for many years I wanted to help victims of abuse but I never identified as a victim and felt I was making people feel ashamed or I was being preachy. Then I wanted to blog about my real estate business. My heart was no longer in making money. I got tired of the long hours and just wanted to be with my children. Thinking of Katy Perry, yes we are all chained to the rhythm, but I am not running on a hamster wheel anymore. I am free. I hope I can inspire others to be free sooner rather than later.