Catchup.

    You'd think that by now, I might have learned something about consistency. No. I refuse to be consistent enough for people to be able to guess my next move. That's why we do things like adopt a little girl with 4 boys of our own and add two dogs to the zoo we call a home.... any who....

    2019 has brought a lot more change than a puppy to the mix. (Although it did actually bring a puppy into the mix- Trevor the Aussiedoodle. He's ridiculous.) This is the year we find ourselves homeschooling our 6th grade son. Insanity. I told myself and many, many others that I was not a teacher. I said that I couldn't do it. But what does a mama do when her son struggles with mean kids and is so smart that normal classes can't keep up with him? He was being so harshly bullied that he broke down and cried at his last doctor's appointment. I was about ready to declare war on all 11 year old boys. I had no other choice. He needs consistency and encouraging words. He needs to know that I love him so dearly. He needs the chance to decide who he is without the world telling him what he needs to be. And by God's sweet grace, his daddy and I both felt peace about it.

   So, this school year we will have one homeschooler, three public schoolers, and one little girl in a tiny private preschool. We really enjoy making things hard- like really hard.
But more importantly, we really love our kids. Isn't that the reason we even care if kids are in school? To make sure they can read, and write, and think through problems? I am going to do that, but I am also so excited to teach him how to cook and read recipes. I want to show him how to enjoy reading hard books that make the world feel different. I want to show him how to fix things, to paint walls, and how to clean a home. He is going to be a man soon enough. This is the start of it all.

  And I will probably hang out with the other people in my house a little bit too.