…I will be a homeschooling mama! Well, I guess I already am, but we’ll officially be starting on September 5 (yes, I know that is Labor Day, but we aren’t doing anything for the weekend so why not start?). I can hardly believe that my first baby girl will be learning to read soon...wow!
So, why did we choose to homeschool? Several reasons…I will list a few:
1. Because we can incorporate God and Scripture into everything we do, all day long. I think that is so important…to give our kids a strong spiritual foundation…the most important thing, really.
2. So we can choose our own curriculum and choose NOT to do certain topics if we so choose.
3. To keep our girls under our care a majority of the time. (I don’t know about any of you, but I can hardly stand the thought of someone else taking care of my kids for the majority of the day). To be able to monitor the influences around them in a much better way.
4. The schools here haven’t done very well on their state testing in recent years.
5. Most importantly, we have prayed about this and know God has led us in this direction (I know this isn’t for everyone, but it is for us!).
6. We can work at our own pace.
I am actually pretty excited about getting started. And just today Liberty and Leila were both asking if we could start tomorrow! They are excited, too. (I ordered Leila an awesome preschool workbook because I know she will want to do school work when Liberty does).
We are starting out Liberty with ABC’s with ACE and Christi. The first part of the year we will do that and Word Building Paces to work on reading. I found the instructor manuals on ebay for a steal and then ordered the paces from the Christian Book Distributor website. I love how the program and the paces include a Bible story and verse every day. Everything points back to God and you just cannot get that in public school.
For the second half of the year I plan to get the English, Science and Social Studies paces from ACE. I will also do Math with her, but I haven’t yet decided if I will use Saxon or Math Mammoth.
I have some good friends here who also homeschool, and I have gotten lots of great advice from them. And we will also be a part of a local Christian homeschool group that does field trips, holiday parties, science fairs, and even year books. Our first meeting for that is September 1. There is a lot of support here, and for that I am thankful.
For those who are concerned about the socialization of my kids (and really, that isn’t the most important matter, I don’t think), if you know me, you know we are involved in things here and have made a lot of friends. We do story time at the library every week, along with a group called Mommy Matters. We are involved in a local church. And we have play dates with our friends often. I think my kids get plenty of socialization : ).
Anyway…I am so excited about all of this, but I am also really nervous and would so appreciate your prayers as we embark on this endeavor.
And here are a few recent pics of the kiddos just for fun:
Libbs with her new haircut (she decided to cut her own hair, so I had to chop off a bunch to fix it up).
Leila, playing in the rain.
Nadia and Leila with painted nails.
Leila and Libbs. The girls love to play on this window seat!
Blessings to you!
this is the blanket I made for my sister-in-law’s baby…she doesn’t know it yet, though, and I’m pretty certain she doesn’t read this blog, haha. The blanket is in the mail, so she’ll soon know.
this is the yarn I’m using to make our baby (a BOY!), Jethro. I’m never good at photographing my yarn and showing the color just right…it’s Knit Pick’s Swish Worsted yarn in “Dublin.” 
Libbs & Leila doing some schoolwork
