Today we are blessed to have a guest post from my long-time online friend, Debbie, who blogs at The Architect and the Artist!

The Ultimate Goal

I never intended to homeschool.  I was working in a local high school as a Spanish teacher when my two boys were born, but a dear friend gushed about the beauty of homeschooling and for about eleven years now that is what we have been doing.

You would think being a former high school teacher that I would have it all together.  You would think that I would love every minute of it.  You would think I would have no nagging worries in the back of my head now that my boys are in Jr. and Sr. High.  I mean, I have done this before, with hundreds of kids in my public school teaching days. I have worked with Jr. and Sr. high kids for about 20 years in some capacity or another.  You would think I would have this mastered.  But you would be wrong.

I LOVE to teach.  I LOVE homeschooling.  But it has also been filled with struggles.

First of all, I am a former perfectionist gone bad.  I used to be really organized.  But nowadays, I struggle with the homeschooling clutter.  I really need to clean some books and supplies out.  Some day I will get it all weeded out…

 

{piles of cluttered books}

I don’t struggle with planning.  I love to plan out our year!  However, it is the follow through that I lack.  My boys are rather self-sufficient in their schooling (I will explain in a bit why), but I fail miserably in following up and checking their work after they are done.  So that means that sometimes I don’t realize that they haven’t followed through all the way on an assignment or they haven’t completed the assignment at all because they forgot.  I keep telling myself each year that I will make a better effort to check their work.  It is my goal this coming year, too, but I know that I am going to have to give myself grace in that area.  I get overwhelmed and then don’t follow through.

{A pile of planning}

My boys are mostly self-sufficient because when it comes right down to it we have no choice.  I homeschool them in the morning and then three to four afternoons a week my house becomes a revolving door with people coming in and out.  You see, I give private and small group Spanish lessons to kids (mostly, homeschoolers) to make ends meet.  So my boys have had to learn to be a bit more self-sufficient and to help more around the house so that I can work. My biggest issue with having to work is that I am not available for my boys in the afternoon.  Extracurricular activities have been a challenge to get to.  I have had to rely on other homeschool moms, but in the near future my oldest will be able to do some of the driving.  I am looking forward to that! But I struggle with the guilt of not being able to do it all for them.

I struggle with doing it all because I can’t do it all.  Something gets lost along the way.  Between homeschooling, teaching Spanish, and maintaining a household, things fall through the cracks.  I do try to circumvent this problem by doing most of my planning for homeschooling and Spanish lessons in the summer and by filling my freezer with meals so I don’t have to cook each night.  We also don’t do school in the summer.  I just need a break.

I have struggled with tremendous anxiety of whether or not I am giving my boys all that they need to make it in life.  This year has been a tough one in my personal life, but through the heartache God has been showing me that I should have only one goal in regards to homeschooling my boys…

It isn’t about making them math geniuses.   (I am lucky if I can add with the aid of my fingers.  Ask my husband.  This is NOT an exaggeration!)

It isn’t about making sure they master every subject.

It isn’t about perfectly written papers.

It isn’t about neatly organized notebooks.

For me it is teaching them through my own life what it means to love God and treat others in such a way that we honor and love them.  If they don’t understand geometry proofs perfectly, the concept of direct object pronouns, or the full conjugation of the Spanish verb “tener”, I am ok with that.  I repeat…I want them to love God and people.  End of story.

That doesn’t mean though that we are going to throw all the schooling out the window and not worry about it.  We will still push through and strive to do our best, but in the end homeschooling will be a success if they follow hard after God  loving others along the way. It will be a success if I can give myself and my boys the grace that nothing was perfect when it came to our homeschooling years.  But then again, isn’t that life?  There is no perfection…just a mess in the making that with prayer and hope will become a beautiful thing.

 

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.