Homeschooling Realities and Frustrations

Life has changed so much over the past year. I never imagined homeschooling this year, but here I am doing it. I've learned a lot of the past few weeks and I'm still in the process of changing our curriculum or parts of it. It seems I chose the wrong one for my boys and I'm finding that they learn in different ways to boot which means I teach them separately instead of together. Right now I'm focusing on Clayton since he is in 1st grade and Eli can technically wait another year. Eli is very anti-school at the moment which is OK because he is still learning it's just through play type activities that are fun and not worksheet related. I've found that I'm not much into worksheets either I mean can you get much more boring that drawing a line from one picture to another. Learning should be fun and I hope to make it fun for my boys.

I have so many people asking what curriculum we are using and so many times I feel like I'm getting the "your ruining your child" look when I tell them. It's usually the ones who are in their first year of homeschooling who give me that look, others who have been doing it longer seem to understand. I hate being judged though, maybe I'm taking it wrong, maybe they are just trying to understand. I guess we all have an idea of what school should be and mine is very different from theirs.

I would love to meet some people in the same boat as me though. Someone who has very active boys and a toddler who wants your undivided attention 24/7, someone who works part-time from their home and needs to work in the afternoon so school must be done in the morning. School must be done in the morning also because by the afternoon the boys have checked out...they function better in the morning as do I. Someone who can relate to being a first time homeschooling mom who wonders if she is making a mistake or if she's doing this right. Someone who doesn't have perfect kids who will sit and read to themselves all day. Someone who LETS their children watch Sponge Bob and play video games in the afternoon.

I'm so sick of hearing about these perfect children who read War and Peace for FUN summer reading and who don't watch any TV and do everything they are told to do. Come on people...GET REAL!!! Do these children really exists? Do the parents just want you to think they are perfect, what good is that to anybody? I need real life people. I guess I'm just different I like to tell it how it is and homeschooling is hard but I know I can do it and will do it and my boys may not be perfect but they will succeed in life. After all they say the most successful people were strong willed children and that was me and is now my boys.

Stress

Stress is the number 1 cause of my pain. I have RA and Fibromyalgia and stress in my life makes it worse. This week has been the worst for stress. My grandma collapsed at my house this week and was in the hospital until yesterday. She is now staying with us until Saturday and then will probably come back on Monday because she shouldn't be left alone for any length of time. I love her and love having her with us, it's just created more stress for me than usual. I think I just need to learn some new ways to deal with the stress so that it does not affect me physically. So, what do I do? What can I do to de-stress?

Pondering Thoughts

I'm really feeling as if I'm missing something in my life right now. I'm always so busy with my boys that I'm missing my walk with God. I spend little time with him these days and even my prayer life is beginning to dwindle. I know that I need to make the time to sit down and read the bible and to journal more but time gets away from me and by the end of the day all I want to do is sleep. I think I need to find a devotional that will help me get back on track something that will inspire me to come back to it each day and fill me with the encouragement that I need to get through the day.

I've become very complacent with my health these days too. I had been trying to diet and exercise but I keep coming up against obstacles that are making me think "what's the point". My RA got bad and made it difficult to do most anything, that started getting better and I tore a muscle in my calf that leaves me unable to exercise for 6-8 weeks. I finally get the gumption to start something new and feel good about myself and life throws a wrench in the wheel to destroy my ability to continue.

I know that it is my own lack of self confidence and will power to be able to do this and that is why I think I need to work on my spiritual life. Get back to the basics and that is what I need to do get my life back to where it needs to be, but how do I get there, where do I begin and how do I start.

Out of control child

My oldest son is driving me over the edge today. First off this morning he decided to try in Pee in his pull-up when it was off of him and ended up peeing on the carpet. He is 5 years old, he knows better than that and it was not the way to start off our day. Then after I get back from an appointment I walk in to find him throwing a fit because Grandpa had told him he couldn't do something. I warn him to calm down or he will have to go to his room after the warning he still continued so I sent him to his room. Grandpa had to carry him up to his room and then Clayton proceeded to kick and hit the door and scream at the top of his lungs. So if followed up there and gave him an attitude adjustment across his butt and told him he had to stay in his room for an hour. After that I gave him lunch and then he began fighting with his brother Eli. Everything Eli had or was doing Clayton had to have so he was taking it away from him. After a number of times outs he finally left Eli alone but then he started abusing the cat.

It is taking every ounce of my being to keep myself from screaming at the top of my lungs at him. I don't understand where this behavior is coming from this is not like him and why all of a sudden is he acting out like this? No matter what the reason is it still does not excuse his behavior.

I guess all I can do is pray that God will give me the patience and strength to get through the rest of the day.

Fighting Boys

OK I know summer has just started, but my boys are already driving me nuts. It's really all this fighting. They fight over everything even the throw pillows on the couch. I think they just have to have something to fight over. Why is that? I'm an only child so I don't know what it's like to have a sibling so it hard for me to understand why they want to fight with each other.

I try separating them and giving them different activities but they they fight over which one they want to do and if I give them the same thing to do the fight over something else. What do I do how do I get them to stop fighting and get along with each other?

It Is Well With My Soul

I love that old hymn "It Is Well With My Soul" I had forgotten about it until this past December when I heard Jennifer Rothschild speak at a women's breakfast. She talked about how God gave her that song right after she had learned that she was going blind. It was a song she never learned to play but it was the first song that came to her when she arrived home from the doctors office. It gave her a sense of peace that everything would be OK and that God was in control and he would never leave her. I've really held on to that song since then, it's helped me get through the past 4 months and I'm sure it will be there for me in the years to come. It helps me to know that no matter what happens or comes my way God is always there. We've had some very scary moments just recently and even through those times I prayed earnestly to God to get us through. You know God has always answered my prayers, sometimes it's been a "No" response but usually after that "No" I see that He had another plan that was better than my own.

I feel very blessed to be able to see God working in my life. I couldn't always see him even though he was there. I think I had to learn to look for him. It took time for me to learn that the events happening in my life were all part of God's plan for me and now for my family.

Here is an example... We applied to get our son Clayton into the lab school at ISU, we had heard some things about our home school that made us uneasy so we thought we would try and get him into another school. Well, we got a rejection letter last week. I had prayed and prayed that we would get in, but it didn't happen. So we started looking at private schools, and we found one that we really like however it's going to cost more than we have right now to send him so we decided to pray about it. Is there anything we can cut out of our budget to help with the cost or should I get a part-time job? These and many more questions are in our thoughts and prayers. This afternoon my husband had lunch with some friends who work for a different company in town and they told him that there company is hiring people in his field and they are willing to pay anything for someone with experience. I'm talking more than we imagined we would have in the next 10 years. We are still praying about this, but it could be an answer to our prayers. We would be able to afford the private school and possibly move to a new house next year. It's a big step and we need to weigh all our options, but I think God is placing this before us for a reason now it's time for us to act upon it.

So Many Things

I have got so many things on my mind and I'm not to sure what to do or how to handle everything.
Here is a list:
Eli's upcoming surgery
My RA and deciding a treatment plan
What diet is best and can I really stick to it
Should I take a vitamin supplement
What will the Medications do to me
Choosing a School for Clayton
Will he get into Metcalf
Do we send him to public school or find a private school
Do we home school
Should we move so we can be in a different school
We have so much work to do on this house before we can sell it
Fix Clayton and Eli's bedrooms
Paint the fence
Fix the basement
Fix the playroom walls
MOPS - can we move to a new location and what will my role be
I feel like a horrible friend sometimes because I haven't kept in touch with my friends like I should be.
My mom worries a lot and I do my best to let things go, but sometimes I feel like I'm being bombarded and I hate worrying. I know that God will take care of me I just need to know that I'm on the right path.