Real Life Homeschooling #9

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Today for our 9th Real Life Homeschooling post, we are blessed to have Stacie guest posting for us! Stacie blogs at No Idle Bread and would love to have you visit her there as well!

The Illusion:

I wake in the mornings and have a leisurely cup of coffee while I look over the morning newspaper or work on my blog. Once I have my baby fed, he peacefully sits in his infant swing and my toddler happily munches on a snack while I prepare breakfast. Meanwhile, my older children are up (without me asking, of course) and are getting ready for the day. They obediently do their chores, without complaint and then we all come together to eat.

Once we’re finished and the table is cleared and looking pristine as usual, we begin homeschooling. My children sit perfectly still in their seats, and quietly await my instructions. As I proceed according to my pre-scheduled lesson plans (which we always follow), my children set to work diligently. Each child’s area remains neat at all times and I never have a problem with them losing focus or interest in their studies. I am patient and calm and everything runs smoothly. For example, the baby never cries and my toddler never whines, and of course they both take naps at the same time during school . . . .

NOT!!!!

Of course, this has never been the way my day works. At all. Ever. In life.

The Reality:

I just had “Baby J” (our 5th) 8 weeks ago.

So, instead of schooling in our “stand alone” school room as usual,

we are schooling at the kitchen table for now. . .

with laundry to be folded, dishes to be put away, one child distracted by the camera,

and cluttered things all around.

And, yes, that is an Easter basket in the center of our table, thank you very much! LOL

While we do have our good days, and some very wonderful days, we are not perfect. For some odd reason, people think I have super powers because I am at home(*gasp*) raising and teaching all 5 (*huge gasp*) of my children everyday and I actually enjoy it. I’ve been told that my children must be angels or that I must have a lot of patience to homeschool–or, I get that “you-must-be-crazy” look.

While I am committed to homeschooling as a way of life, it is just that: Life. The truth is it gets messy, it’s hard some times, there are bad days and rough moments. I get stressed out and become overwhelmed. Some times my kids don’t listen, the babies cry at the same time, the dogs won’t stop barking, lunch is an hour late and I feel like we’ve only completed one Math lesson all day.

My toddler “JD” (17 mo.) sitting on his blanket playing/sorting pom-poms and popsicle sticks during school.

He sat here quietly for all of 3-4 minutes before he was off doing something else!

The Beauty:

The beauty is that it doesn’t rain all the time. The beauty is that God’s grace is abundant. I have come to realize that God never will call me to do something that He won’t equip me to do (including homeschooling). But, in order to equip me, He has shown me that I must lean on Him to do what He’s asked me to do.

And so, I accept. I accept the “job” of homeschooling mom. I accept that my days won’t always go as planned. But most of all, I accept that ever-flowing, always available grace God gives. And that, my friends, is where my “super powers” come from.

Sweet “Baby J”

This homeschool mom {and so many others like me} don’t have our acts together. We aren’t as patient with our kids as we need to be, we don’t have the organizational skills of Martha Stewart. In fact, most days my husband comes home and I tell him that I just can’t do this another day.

And most of all, we are in desperate need of His new mercies…every day, every morning…every single moment.

Click over to read all of the Real Life Homeschooling series.

Guest Posters wanted: the response to this post has been so great. ya’ll are great. 🙂 SO, I’m going to open up this series for GUEST POSTERS!! If you are a homeschooler and want to contribute your own “real like homeschooling” post, please email me with your post! I would like to have a picture to go with it. And if you have a blog, I will link back to you! 🙂 If you want to “grab” the picture in the top of this post, I will let you know when your post will go live and you can use this graphic as a teaser and point people here to read! I really think these will be encouraging to all of us as homeschooling mamas! I hope to share one post per week on this series!!

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