How's it going?

We’re now two months into the whole homeschooling thing and this is a question we get a lot. My answer (most days) is “we love it!” As I anticipated (and occasionally feared), there are times when my patience runs low and days when the kids would really rather not do school. But more often than not we enjoy our time together, enjoy learning, and enjoy the freedom of making our own schedule. So far Alyssa’s favorite part is getting to sleep in. Where I once had to drag her out of bed each morning to rush her out the door for school, she now usually sleeps later than her traditional start time. Of course this sleepy mama doesn’t mind that change of pace either! Instead of dinner as a family, we eat breakfast together. Rather than playing, reading and wrestling with daddy in the evening, we enjoy him in the morning. School doesn’t start until after he leaves, around 11. Not normal, I know, but it works for us! The hour-and-a-half I would have to spend in the car picking up and dropping off, we spend doing school together instead. Actually sitting down, teaching, and planning takes even less time than I had anticipated. We’ve fallen in love with the library, and I think I might enjoy reading together even more than they do. Parker is learning to read on his own – something I initially thought would intimidate me but has proven quite intuitive. Alyssa who once hated math now often wants to do only math. I’d like to think it’s my incredible teaching ability, but I have a feeling it has a lot to do with the fact that I let her use real money =). But mostly I feel like I have my life back. And my kids back. I love having them around, and love getting to teach and learn on our own schedule. Homeschool progress report month two: I’ll give it an A!