It's Finally Here

It's finally here, it's actually here! Having made the decision to homeschool our children when our oldest was only 6 months old, it was a very long wait to actually start doing it, officially atleast.

When Dude was 6 months old, I started to look into some information on homeschooling. I reached out to some friends who had been homeschooled themselves but also is the president of HSLDA Canada. Really, everyone needs a great friend like this :) He passed along some great information and studies about homeschooling. It actually became a fairly easy decision for us! Now, while I completely respect the decisions any of you have made for your children, we just could not knowingly put our children in the public school environment (cue paranoid government rant). Anyways, our decision was arrived at very easily. The only thing that seemed like a con at the time was the whole idea of "socialization", we have since come to view this in an entirely different manner and now realize that socialization is NOT being surrounded by 30 kids the same age as you all day, everyday. But, at the time we thought about what we thought was socialization and Daddy and I realized that all of our friends throughout school and the ones we have remained friends with, were ALL from our church...not school! This was very reassuring to us that we were making the right decisions for our family.

Well, since we arrived at this decision quickly and easily....now what?!?! It was kind of like a wedding and we were in that middle of planning lull. We had made the decision and now just had to wait 4 years!?!?! Oh boy, as a very type A, over-organized, slightly anal person this was a lot to ask!

I have researched, read, studied, read, watched videos, read, etc all about homeschooling in the last 4 years. I also found some homeschooling blogs that I loved and started to follow and slowly build some lessons and worksheets from over the last few years. I researched lessons, and curriculum so much that everything began to just blend together, I knew too much!!! There was sooo much to choose from and unfortunately now I knew about everything that was available. What else was I going to do during the last 4 years of waiting to start homeschooling? I will expand on what we are using and how *I* chose it in my next post.

So, cue Monday September 10th, 2012....OUR FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!!!!
yay! It's here! I can finally put everything I have learned in the last 4 years to good use.

Dude is a Kindergartener!!!

Strawberry is a PreSchooler!!! (really that just means she wants to participate, so I make extra copies for her)

And last but not least Linebacker is in "totschool" (just to include him)

Actually getting started was so exciting and the kids were very receptive and really enjoyed it.

And just a fun picture of what happens a lot around here, at the end of our photo session a royal rumble. And as usual, instigated by the youngest.

For His Glory!