I hesitate to write anything like this because every time I do I think it opens a door for an attack, but I'm going to say it- Our homeschool feels right. It's 2019 and the first time I've put thoughts to this blog this year. As I sit in the mid morning air of a freshly stoked fire with my computer on my lap, coffee in hand, and a sweet curly headed mop on my shoulder, I feel the way it's supposed to feel on good days.
There's been a great process for me, a discovery of who I am in all of this. When I think toward all the times I've had to reinvent myself or build an identity I was comfortable in, it was always something big. I graduated college and had a job I hated counseling people with drug and alcohol addictions. It was meant to get my foot in the door so that they would aid me in paying for further schooling, but that didn't work out. I cried every morning on my way to work and every day coming home. The desperate lives of the people I tried to help broke my heart, but also began to harden it so I knew I had to get out of there. I ended up back in school anyway working on my Master's until my next big adventure started.
I welcomed my soldier home from deployment and jumped quite quickly into married life as an Army Wife. I capitalized those words because it felt like a role at the time to me, a large undertaking. It was something I had to learn. As a civilian being thrust into a new world of uniforms, mandatory fun, required military ids for everything, gobs of acronyms I'll never know, and an undying support for all the many boots on the ground that we take for granted every day, I was learning so much from the military community. I couldn't begin to list it all here, but the point is that I was molded yet again by God uniting me to this man that I married and my identity was new and budding.
Then motherhood happened. Whew! Time for an overhaul, I guess. It nearly broke me as I suspect it almost does for many of us. Depression ate at me for years after being pregnant then nursing pregnant then nursing. Obviously I'm hardly out of that so I don't want to pretend like that's something I don't deal with from time to time, but motherhood is like this fire in front of me now. It's refining.
Because of my personality, people view me as someone who goes with the flow, maybe even the crowd. But I'm not. I take chances when I need to take chances. I'm capable of change, eager to learn, and open to what God calls me to do.
I began to feel the stirring in my life to try homeschooling. It didn't make sense to me. I was the one who could not wait for school to start for the kids, if I could just have the hours of 8-3 to myself- I'd be productive, more connected to my Father, happy. But the invisible hand of God was pushing me in a different direction and in His infinite wisdom He started planting seeds in different areas of my life. It sounded so bizarre to me, against the grain. I don't always jump at against the grain. But scripture after scripture was being spoken into my heart especially ones reminding me that I'm set apart. Our homeschool was founded on that notion. Seeking God is now a huge goal of our school. We thought about what is important and we try to implement it as best we can. My changing identity as mother and teacher is only just beginning. It has been a hard year, but it has been incredibly life-giving, too. I'm grateful for a Heavenly Father who sees the desires in our hearts, who equips us with everything we need, and who blesses us beyond measure despite our undeserving hearts.
For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.
Jeremiah 29:11