Major changes in our family

I've sat down to write this post about 100 times, but kept waiting until I had more details. I'll go ahead and write what I know for now and can fill in more as the days go by.

First of all, we put the kids in public school a few weeks ago. I'm sure that's probably a major shock to many and may seem kind of sudden. It's really not. We talked about this a lot over the past year when John was sick and we travelled back and forth so much for his medical treatment in the city. (We were living 5 hours away from a city in the middle of the mountains in Mexico.) When we came back to the States, we discussed it, yet love home schooling, so started that again this year.

John ended up finding out on August 28th that he would be having surgery to remove his entire colon 4 days later, Sept. 1st! So much for starting school that week as we had planned. Then he came home and it was chaos--- dr. appointments, visiting nurses, caring for him, etc. -- all while trying to get our school work done. It finally settled and we did get going, but trust me, it was so "weird" feeling. We just couldn't get a good routine down and all sorts of things. I knew John would be going back for another surgery around the first of November and it would be crazy again. There were many other factors that played into this and I won't go into them all right now, but the chaos was kind of the straw that broke the camel's back. : )

I told John that I really felt that we needed to put them in school right now. Because of the travel last year and our move mid-year, and the inconsistency that resulted (we had an amazing start and then it just got so messed up by transition), I saw some things I really wanted to hit hard this year but knew it was going to be impossible since it looked like we were having a repeat of last year. I knew the kids needed more discipline in their work and deadlines and more writing assignments and ..... you get the idea. It's hard to explain, but I just knew that would not happen here until at least 2nd semester. And by then it would be 1-1/2 school years of transition and would be hard to get going again. I was being pulled in several directions and it wasn't really fair to them or to me.

And then there was just "something" that made me feel that we needed to put them in now. I couldn't pinpoint it, but just felt like the timing was now. Well, we took the kids out to the school and got them enrolled and started and then 2 days later found out that my mom has a really aggressive form of breast cancer. (I'll post on that after this post.) I am so thankful that we did put the kids in school. I am freed up a bit (haha--- more on that later, too!) and can help her without feeling guilty for all of the things hanging over my head that I know I need to do but am not doing any of them well. (I'm sure you've been there before!)

So, I really feel good about having them in school right now. I know we were supposed to for this season in life. Now, that's not to say that it doesn't make me a little sad and that I feel that they will get the "best" education there. But, for now, I think they are supposed to be there. Meg is a little bored because she is way ahead of the game in 1st grade, but overall she likes it. The others love going. I have already seen the discipline coming back into their studies and really feel that they needed this as much as I did right now.

We love home schooling and have fabulous material. As a matter of fact, they ask to do some of it at home still. But transition can take its toll and sometimes we just have to look at the season of life we're in and make radical adjustments accordingly. We've always taken it one year at a time and tried to follow God's leading. I don't feel guilty at all and it actually feels like a burden has been lifted. Not that "school" was a burden, but we moved in, had surgery, tried to start school.......all of this in just a month's time--on top of the crazy last year of non-stop transition. It was getting crazy and I knew it would be that way until at least the end of the year. Now when they come home at night, I can focus on them and do homework with them (yes, kind of feels like we're still home schooling with the amount of homework--lol) but I don't feel bad about them not getting the attention or lessons that they need.

On top of that, we were given fabulous teachers!!! Several of them are christians and they have been so wonderful to us. That really helped ease my mind a lot.

The high school gave Ike credit for everything and even put him in honors classes. None of our kids had to be tested--- they looked at their work and trusted us on their levels and put them where we said they were. The kids are doing well at grade level, so it's good. ( I will admit though--- I had the most stressful weekend of my LIFE when I was pulling together records and transcripts and samples of work. I don't want to relive that one!!! )