Tomorrow (Friday) at noon (CST) I’ll be talking about the post-homeschool empty nest and also about preparing our children for the new economy with Vivienne McNeny, the Sociable Homeschooler. Listen live HERE.
Empty Nests and Much More
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Homeschool Encouragement, Every Single Week for Eight Years and Counting
One balmy spring day in 1984, my husband and I found ourselves in an auditorium at Wheaton College listening to Dr. Raymond and Dorothy Moore talk about this radical idea called homeschooling.
We weren’t homeschoolers yet; in fact, our only child was just six months old. But being surrounded by all these others in the audience who weren’t sending their kids to school gave us hope that this wasn’t such a crazy idea and that we might someday be homeschoolers ourselves.
As it turned out, we had four children and never sent any to school (until two of them went to college). One constant throughout our child-rearing years was the encouragement we got from being around other homeschooling families.
After the Internet took over the world and blogging became a way for people to share their lives and interests, the Cate family decided to help fellow homeschoolers share their lives with each other, and they started the Carnival of Homeschooling.
Since then, there’s been a weekly collection of homeschool-related blog posts from a variety of bloggers for our information and pleasure. We homeschoolers certainly owe a debt of gratitude to the Cates.
Of course, as with all good things, there is a potential negative to surfing the blogs of homeschoolers you’ll find in the Carnival of Homeschooling. Take care not to compare yourself, your family or your activities with those you read about. There’s nothing wrong with picking up a new idea here and there, but when you start making comparisons with others, you risk disillusionment and burnout. And ultimately, doing so is a waste of time, because homeschooling is a very individual journey. Each family is unique; every single combination of teaching parent and homeschooled child is unique, too.
So it won’t do to make comparisons. Instead, just enjoy the camaraderie of your fellow homeschoolers as we did that day so many years ago when we heard the Moores speak. It will remind you that you’re not alone.
(Do check out the Carnival of Homeschooling archives. Though some of the blogs no longer exist, there’s still a wealth of information there.)
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Living with Interruptions
Recently Steve Brown wrote about interruptions.
Boy, do I know about interruptions. Thirty years of raising and homeschooling kids has meant that I’m often interrupted. And while it doesn’t happen nearly as much now that we only have one offspring still living at home, the fact is that the others sometimes call just as I’m in the middle of something I had hoped to finish.
As moms, we learn early on that our kids will often interrupt us at the worst times. And if they don’t interrupt us for a while, we also learn that something’s up and we need to check and see why things are so quiet, right?
But most of the time, the interruptions are relentless. Even if you just helped one of your kids, they’ll turn up with a new request five minutes later. I used to say that I hadn’t had an uninterrupted thought since 1983, and I wasn’t kidding, really. As a result, I don’t have anywhere near the attention span I had in college, where I could spend hours in the library stacks doing historical research. Now I’m lucky to stick with a book for an hour.
How do we handle so many interruptions without blowing up? Steve Brown’s advice is not what you might expect. After giving the example of Jesus being interrupted on his way to the home of a man with a dying daughter by a woman who needed His healing touch, he says:
1) “…the Bible is full of interruptions from Genesis to Revelation…and all of them are under the guidance of a sovereign God who “works all things according to the counsel of his will” (Ephesians 1:11), writing the story of redemption and a monument to his glory.”
2) “God’s ways are circuitous and whatever you think God is doing, He probably isn’t. That means the trick is to “go with the flow” of what God has ordained. Nothing is an interruption…at least to God who planned it.”
Whoa! So when I got irritated with one of my kids when they interrupted me, I was really getting irritated with God? Yikes…good thing He’s a forgiving God. 🙂
Then there’s the kicker:
3) “But there is more than just recognizing the God we worship is a God of interruptions. We must also learn to set aside the irritation and be thankful for the interruption. Paul wrote that we are to “give thanks always and for everything” (Ephesians 5:20). It’s a radical and counterintuitive thought.”
Yes, it is! That said, I wish I’d heard his advice years ago, when I was deep in the middle of active motherhood and felt like I couldn’t get a thing crossed off my to-do list because of all the interruptions. Clearly God was organizing my days, not me! I just didn’t see it at the time.