Fresh Year, New Start, Back to Blogging!

What a year we had last year!  It was good in so many ways, but also challenging.  Challenging enough that I felt the need to back off the blogging, and focus on my kiddos, our family, and our homeschooling journey.

I don't want to call it a bad homeschool year.  The boys learned a lot, we made many discoveries, and had a lot of fun.  We took some classes, went on awesome field trips, and continued making educational strides.  Despite the good, it was still a year of some soul-searching and homeschool growing pains. 

We started the year with things all planned out.  The school room was painted, decorated, curriculum ordered (My Father's World, Exploring Countries and Cultures), and everything very planned and scheduled.  I quickly discovered that MFW was NOT going to be a good fit for my kiddos now that they had advanced into the multi-year curriculum (3rd-8th grade), and after about the first week, my planned, organized, prayed over year was falling apart at the seams.  Not the best way to start a new year, to say the least.

We never really recovered, and the "bad fit" seemed to spread into every curriculum choice we had made.  We had a "wondering" year, where nothing really seemed to go as planned, and we spent the year meandering through different curricula and educational philosophies.  In the end, though, it all worked out for the best.  God, once again, knew what he was doing, and was guiding me in the direction I need to go.  I grew so much last year, as did the boys, and having a year like we did, allowed me the confidence to go out on my own a lot more.  We will probably never go back to the all-in-one curriculum, and I am much more able to recognize what my kiddos need, enjoy, and how they learn.

Another thing I realized is that I miss blogging our adventures!  I don't think I'm the best blogger in the world, I'm way too sporadic, I forget to proofread and edit on occasion, and I'm usually pretty far behind.  BUT, I really enjoy looking back and seeing the highlight reel!  So, here we go again!  My next post will be our plan for next year.  We are using so many different choices and pulling from many different places.  I am excited for September!  I'm going to sign off with some pictures from our last school year.  It really was a GREAT year in so many ways.