Hi Mom! I hope you were able to grab a soothing blend of aromatic herbs and spices, throw it in a tea ball or bag and let it steep for a bit. Of course a cup of coffee will work too, I just am not much of a coffee drinker myself. Once you grab a cup of something relaxing, send the kids off to play and join me while you can! While your tea is steeping, your coffee is cooling, or your kombucha is brewing, let me tell you a little story. Tell me if you can relate. I had been out of town for a while and when I came back several friends wanted to see me. Of course, I wanted to catch up too. We all had kids around the same age. Our kids had been to birthday parties together and they have had countless playdates together. When one friend started talking to me about getting together several ideas started popping into my head. “Maybe we could meet at a park so the kids can play and we can chat!” or “I’ll invite the whole family over for dinner so while the kids play together we girls can catch up and the husbands can have their time together too!” The weather happened to be nice that week so while I was about to offer an option that included a waterfall, swimming and kayaking my friend abruptly broke into my thought bubble. She began offering her suggestions. “Several of us women get together at the local coffee shop every Monday morning. Could you join us?” When she realized that I would have my kids with me she offered to come over to my house one morning while her kids were in school.
As she listed option after option I simply sat there and listened. It was at this moment that the truth of the matter hit me like a ton of bricks. Our lives were completely different. Our priorities were different. None of her options included the other children or the family as a whole. It merely involved women getting together, without the kids. Of course I would love that and we did end up getting together one evening, alone while our husbands watched the kids. We had a great time of fellowship together and I am thankful for the one-on-one time with a good friend. Yet this whole experience showed me the reality that now that I have taken the plunge and am almost ten years deep into the homeschool experience, I am all in. I chose, ten years ago, to head in one direction and my friends who put their kids in private or public school have gone in another. I have my way of doing things and they have their ways. When our kids were preschoolers, we could all relate. We were all home 24-7 taking care of our little ones and needed each other to lean on. Now, our lives our different. They get a break in the middle of the day. They can talk on the phone without interruption. They can plan coffee dates and even be involved in some type of job, ministry or volunteer work during set hours. Then there are homeschool moms. Our lives are different.
This is why we need each other, homeschool Mom. This is why we need to encourage each other and be encouraged. If you have not joined a local or online homeschooling community then go ahead, take a sip of your drink before it gets too cold and listen up. You are not alone. Let me be the one to tell you if you are not surrounded by like-minded moms that there are thousands like you out there. Thousands of moms have taken the plunge. They have dove in headfirst into homeschooling because they believed that was what they were called to do. They did not worry about the sacrifices that they would have to make. They did not think about the coffee dates that they would have to miss or the hour-long phone calls with friends that would never happen. They did what they felt was best for their family and even when it gets hard they keep on going. So go ahead mom, take another sip, or place your cup on the counter to reheat if you have to go help your son figure out square roots, either way, try to find some time to finish that cup sometime by the end of the day and if you cannot, know that you are not the only one. Somewhere out there, there is a mom waiting to heat up her cup of coffee as well, and she is okay with that.
