Here are my angels on their first day.
Dakota on the first day of Preschool. This was our 3rd attempt at a picture.
Brianna on her first day of 6th grade.
Cailin on her first day of her 8th grade gap year. She has a goofy smile because of her uncle standing behind me.
Here they are my 2013-2014 class!
You know I still can’t believe how fast time flies. When we started our homeschool journey Cailin was going into 3rd and Brianna was in 1st and little man was just a hope and dream!
Well I hate to say this but the last two weeks of summer for my homeschool kids have sucked!
The weekend before my oldest was to head back to school, my homeschool kids got a really bad cold. So the first week of what was supposed to be fun and HAHA we don’t have school consist of sneezing, coughing, dirty tissues and Mucinex. My poor babies were hit hard. But they were due. Other than a few sniffles here and there, they have been extremely healthy for at least 2 years.
Once they finally got back on their feet which took about a week, it was time for our back to school shopping. No we aren’t shopping for school supplies! We are shopping to stock up the house. I do this at the beginning and end of summer. It was time for a BJ run! At the beginning of summer I took Hubby and 2 kids with me. BIG MISTAKE!! Hubby threw everything in the cart and boom $1000 before coupons! Never again, I tell ya!
This time I had 3 kids and well……….I wasn’t much better……take a look……….
That is my receipt next to my brand new table which is a 108 inches long. My receipt well over half! OOPS! But that’s what happens when you got to stock up the house after going 3 months of non-heavy duty shopping. Plus my table is now full. Yup that’s right there is a total of 8 with 4 being teenagers. Another post coming about that later.
So that being said our not back to school week wasn’t very fun. Hopefully that’s not an omen for the school year.
I know just last week or so I posted that I would have a Pre-k, a middle schooler and a high schooler. After much stress and anxiety (about 5 months worth) on my part, my daughter decided she wasn’t ready. She said there were things she wanted to go over and grasp before she jumped into high school. And I was very relieve! But then stressed again because we start school in 2 weeks.
Are we saying she failed 8th grade? No! My daughter struggled in some minor areas but the majority she passed with flying colors. We are calling it a gap year. Yes all the formal paperwork says 8th grade but to us it is a catch up year. Which we knew she would have an extra year option.
Here in Florida if you turn 5 before September 1, then you start Kindergarten that year. Teachers here hate it! At least all the ones I have come across. If your birthday is after September 1, you don’t start until the following August. Even though my oldest and middle daughter are 2 years apart, school age they are only one grade apart. My middle daughter would be graduating before she is even 18. This will also happen for my son who is born in July.
My hubby and I always knew we would have a year if she felt she needed it. And I am really proud of her making the decision to take it now to prepare more knowing that high school is when it counts. Even though she feels terrible for all the money spent (that’s my frugal girl) on the curriculum for 9th grade. It’s not like it won’t get used next year. Plus my hubby was over the moon. He has had a hard time accepting it. I mean just 2 weeks ago we were talking about it and he said well she doesn’t start high school for another year. He has been in denial over the last few months. So when she asked if she could take her gap year he was quick to answer yes! Poor guy couldn’t handle his little girl growing up.
All in all my daughter may not be going into high school yet, but she showed her maturity level by making a very good decision.
This is my life and the cause of my anxiety. The question of the last 3 months has been how in the heck am I going to homeschool 3 kids at 3 different levels without someone getting left behind or forgotten.
I have a preschooler who needs my attention to learn the basis of learning for the rest of his life. No pressure there!
I have a middle schooler who is severe special needs and is actually on a 3rd grade level.
I have a high schooler who doesn’t need as much guidance but still needs something to make it fun and engaging. Working out of a textbook day in and day out is not going to fly around here.
We are a hands on learning family. So needless to say this next year is going to be a major success or the death of me. Regardless it should make some great blog post.
Two days ago I had the worse scare of my life. I felt like the safe sanctuary of my country life had been compromised. I was talking on the phone to my mom, when Brianna came running out of her room terrified. I mean completely terrified to the bone and yelling there is a guy with a gun. So I jump up and run to her bedroom window. And I see this strange guy casually walking with a gun hoisted on his shoulder between my front yard and my neighbors. I immediately tell my mom I got to go there’s a guy with a gun. The last thing I heard my mom say as I was hanging up was call the cops.
Now let me give some background. My mom lives 30-45 minutes away. My husband’s workshop is in my backyard. And him and my 2 oldest daughters were out there working.
So I try to call my hubby’s cell and got no answer. I told Brianna to watch her brother and lock the doors and I ran full force across my yard, shoes flying off to get to the shop. I yell there is a guy with a gun. My hubby yells WHAT?! Then I turn and realize my kids weren’t there. I yelled where are the kids. And we take off out of the shop to see them casually walking across the yard. We both yell get in the house~ there’s a gun. We all are running full force. Before any of us called 911 or my hubby grabbed his guns. He looks out the window and sees he is pumping it because it is a BB gun. We were all completely freaked out. But relieved!
Apparently he is our new neighbors boyfriend. And he was chasing their ducks because they were hungry or bored. I don’t know and I don’t care. That is just not what you want to be doing in a neighborhood in this day and age.
Now in the meantime, my mom has practically had a heart attack because she never got to the point of our conversation of where my hubby was that day in our shop or installing a job at a house somewhere. So she called my brother who has moved in with me, asking where he was and where was his brother in law and what was happening. He is flipping out and called me while driving. Which is awful because he has had his license for less than a month. I explain to him what happened and how we are fine.
I then called my mom and explained to her. And we both praised Brianna because even though it wasn’t a real gun, it was the right thing to do to warn us and get an adult. And that you can never be too careful. Then I realized that that 5 minutes knocked about 20 years off my life! And then I felt sad because this is the reality of the world that my children are growing up in. Shootings everywhere~ theaters, shopping malls and even our sacred schools.
But thank god it’s not in my neighborhood. I will take crazies with BB guns anyday. Well maybe not. I don’t think my heart can take it.
I feel like I have a lot of missed opportunities when it comes to my kids. And sometimes (ok A LOT of times) I think if I was more organized then I wouldn’t miss them so much. I feel like we miss out on a lot of the fun aspects of homeschooling because I am so focus on finishing the books and saying we did it. I am definitely missing out on things with my son because of being so focused on the girls and not having a plan of attack. Sometimes he will ask to do school and then I have to scramble. And to me that sucks! I feel like it is half ass done then.
I also feel like if I was more organized then we could do the experiments and the art that my kids thrive on. We could take the field trips that they drive me crazy about.
For example, this past Monday I thought I was having oral surgery done. And I had nothing planned for the kids to work on while I was recovering. I had barely any menu planned that wasn’t microwavable and processed. I felt terrible. Luckily the surgery didn’t happen and I am feel to live about my life without stitches in my mouth and with yummy solid food in my belly. But then yesterday, reality hit that I have no meal plan, no grocery list made, no homeschool plan, coupons from the last month that needs organizing and a huge TO DO pile that has deadlines.
So I am determined to get more organized this year (what’s left of it). I want to make my life easier. I want to have time to myself because right now all I do is cook, clean and try to get organize. I have no hobby or anything for me. And I realized that I need that, no crave that me time.
First things first, the present task at hand. We have to eat, so bring on the meal plan. I usually try to make a months worth of menus but decided a week was good considering everything going on.
Then grocery list!
Homeschool plan is very vague and non detailed but gives me an idea of what to accomplish so done there.
Work on coupons with the kids.
And I want my To Do list done by Friday.
So that leaves the weekend open to think of more ways to organize and make my world simpler.
I have the best baby brother in the world. He truly is like one of my kids to me. I was 13 when he was born and I just took over as a little momma hen from the moment he arrived. I taught him to show respect to adults. I also taught him that out of everyone I am the one to fear when misbehaving because I am the one who expects the most from him. I just knew he was destined for greatness and I pushed him to show that.
Now flash forward 18 years, he is a senior and has his whole life ahead of him with a bright future. He is learning to drive and be an adult and everything that means.
About a month and a half ago, my mom called around 5pm. Which was unusual and I knew something was wrong. First thing out of her mouth was Brandon and 2 of his friends had been in a car accident and he was driving. She sounded calm but I was an instant mess and I was driving at the time. Thank god for my back country roads with no traffic! Not trusting anything my mom says sometimes, I was yelling is he ok. Do you physically see him in front of you and he is ok? Then she was like Oh my god, the cars are totaled. And I am trying to judge how fast I can make it from my little city to the big city at quitting time. But she assured me that he was ok. So luckily I was 5 minutes from home when this phone call came in. I was shaking and had a ton of questions.
So a couple hours later, I needed to hear from him that he was okay. And I was overjoyed when I heard his voice on the other line. I even had my cousin go check on him the next day since they both go to the same school.
Needless to say, Brandon was very worried about the other driver and took responsibility like a man. He worried about the financial aspects of it since my brother decided a 2012 Lexus was the perfect match for his 2000 Chevy Malibu. Would he owe on what his insurance didn’t cover? But listening to him fret over real world stuff made me both proud and heartbroken.
Proud because I feel like he is the man I wanted and knew he could and would become. And heartbroken because I don’t have that smarty pants little baby brother who thought it would be fun to run into a wall to see what a fly felt like.
Graduation will be in a month and then he is off to boot camp for the National Guard for about 9 months. 9 very long months without my first baby boy!
For Christmas, Hubby got the family tickets to Monser Jam. As many of you know I was fighting some kind of depression/anxiety so the idea of going out into a HUGE crowd was a little nerve racking. But I got to say that I think this was a massive turning point. But more on that later. On to the fun….
Lucky for us, Hubby got some amazing seats. We were covered over head in case any Florida snow (rain) popped up and had a view of everything. Plus we were by the really nice food stands and the really nice bathrooms. Which was wonderful because with 4 kids, I think I spent 75% of the time in there.
So I had all these wonderful, light hearted and funny posts on how our life has been the last month or so. And I will still post those this week. But I really need to vent and get this off of my chest!
Anyone who reads all my post knows I am a huge fan of the blog Rockstar Ronan. I honestly fell in awe of everything Maya is doing to help bring awareness and keep Ronan’s death from being in vain. I have voted, I have begged on my facebook pages for votes, I have bought T-shirts and bracelets. I have to admit I became a little bit obsessed.
But never did I imagine that last week my oldest daughter would be reading to me, from her facebook page, that one of her good friends has Neuroblastoma!
Here is what happened. Two weeks ago she said she heard through the grapevine that he had a tumor in his lungs. Then the next day it was lung cancer. But nothing was confirmed by him so I didn’t give it much thought. Plus they go to different high schools so who knows what is going on.
Then last week she was reading to me from the kitchen while I am in the living room and all I heard was Neuroblastoma. Let’s say I have never moved that fast before at night after the lil one has gone to bed. I kept calm and I didn’t tell her that is what Ronan had. She always questioned my shirts and bracelets and I briefly tell her but not in detail. But I just didn’t know what to say. I was in shock!
I never imagined it would be that close to my family. I mean this boy is a really good friend of my daughters; they even tried the whole dating thing but it was too awkward.
I don’t want to be the bearer of bad news and be like there is no cure or he will probably die. But I don’t want to ignore it and pretend it will go away. I have always tried to shelter my kids from hurt and pain. Probably the worse thing for me to do but I tried to make everything stress-free. They will get enough of that when they enter the world.
But now I am not sure what to do……..
These last couple of years have been full of death…
A grandpa, a cousin, our pediatrician (like family), a family friend (just last month) and now possibly an innocent teenager who hasn’t lived his life to his fullest.
How cruel this world can be!
Christmas Collage! Scroll over pictures for captions.
Growing a Large Family 