Back to School

I'm pretty proud of my three kids, and today is no exception. After eight years of homeschooling, we decided to make a change this year, and all three reluctantly posed for their very first first day of school photo before I brought them to their new educational headquarters this morning. We've loved homeschooling for many reasons. It's provided us with the flexibility to make their education fit our lifestyle, our schedules and their individual needs and personalities. I've loved being able to learn with them, and I can tell you that history, science, math and language arts are much more interesting the second, third and fourth time around! I've joked that I have taken fourth grade math four times now!

Although homeschooling was a good fit for us for many years, and I've been an advocate of it, encouraging my friends (No mom thinks they have the patience to homeschool!) and being involved with other local homeschool families, last year we started talking about sending the kids to school. As a full time artist, I really feel much of the time like I'm distracted, working on several projects at once while family life whirls around me, and so with school hours now available, I'll be better able to schedule my day so I can be more present wherever I am. I'm excited about that!

As for the kids, they weren't eager to transition to school at first. The girls didn't have any friends at the school, and all three love our homeschool schedule which wraps up bookwork by noon each day, with independent projects and play in the afternoons. We chose a small private school, as we thought smaller class sizes would make the adjustment a little smoother. As we talked about sports teams, meeting new friends and working with passionate, engaged teachers, they started to get excited about the idea, and in just a few hours I'll be hearing how day one went down, and discussing strategies for making this school year fun, meaningful and memorable.