Today is the first day of school for our youngest daughter, who is homeschooled, and my middle daughter who is in community college.
We have a lot of traditions. On the first day, the kids “ride their bikes to school” with their dad. They leave the house and go to the grocery store a few blocks away where they buy presents for the teacher. I get flowers, apples, and candy bars. :) This year even Sammie got a treat since he is listed as co- teacher. (That’s our dog, for those who don’t know!)
Many years, we have had to work hard to keep our traditions going. This year is no different. We set our first day of school to coincide with middle daughter’s schedule. Afterwards we found out that we need to take my husband’s mother to a dental appointment early in the morning. Daughter was only going to be able to join us because hubby was going to drop her off at school so she wouldn’t have to go super early to find a parking space. So our wake up time got pushed back an hour.
Then I discovered that middle daughter can’t buy her parking sticker today because we failed to get the van inspected – the paperwork was buried. So now we are scheduling an inspection and oil change for the first day of school. ARGH! Fortunately, everything is working out and running smoothly so far, though. Mother-in-law has seen the dentist, hubby dropped off daughter, hubby is dropping off van, I am picking him up soon, then we pick up middle daughter and head to our traditional first day school lunch going out to eat. After that we pick up the van and come home.
ETA: we have three Toyotas. I had the paperwork for the wrong one. The van is just now due for inspection and the car I had the paperwork for was done on time! So we still had to go get that done. Picking it up later! LOL!
Meanwhile at home, youngest and I have finished our Algebra 2 lesson, Biology, and Grammar and we are about to do German. Whew!
This is why I reached for the Queen this morning. With all this activity, however, I wanted to soften it and calm the mood a bit, so I mixed in a teaspoon of Rose Scented. This was perfect. I had only had Carnation Instant Breakfast when I went out to take care of the chickens early this morning, so I treated myself to a Bagel Thins with Nutella with it.
Happy First Day of School, everyone! I am going to miss homeschooling when this is over. My two eldest have graduated and one is now a microbiologist and the other an autism advocate. When youngest graduates, I am going to have to hunt down a toddler to start over again! Maybe grandchildren…..? I need someone that I can read all these lovely books to again!
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What fun traditions, and what a lovely sounding blend! You mentioned this before. I’ll have to try it someday, when I get some of the Queen!
Nice! Yay for family traditions! Yay for being flexible & just going with the flow of the day! I home-schooled for a few years, but ended up having to get a part time job: teaching a harp program in st louis school district, which I did for 13 years, but quit a few years ago. It was hard to put my kids back into the system, as both sons have aspergers, so I bought a house in a much smaller school district, where I could have real communication with the teachers & the classes were small. I’m grateful because although they are both very sensitive & quirky (just like me…I guess the apple really doesn’t roll far from the tree), they both graduated & are both in college. In fact, Drew started back in classes today. Leif starts next week. My oldest dropped out of high school, got her GED, got her associates & is a very happy Paralegal (Estate Planning), the 2nd daughter graduated HS & is a chef. They all march to the beat of their own drum, without a doubt! There’s that apple thing again!
Sounds like a lovely first day of school!
Terri, that is awesome! Sounds like your kids are fun people to be with, and that is one thing I treasure about my kids. They are FUN!
Rosehips: we actually studied rose hips today in Biology!
Haha! Wonderful, couldn’t have planned it better myself.
My mother often talked about homeschooling in an idle sort of way but never committed. She didn’t like the limited education we got in school but I don’t think she ever believed she had the range to do it herself. Honestly, it would have been very interesting and I wish I had the experience (and the time) with her but I understand both sides of the coin, especially in our area which was already rural and isolating. I think her rumblings about home schooling did foster my belief that anyone can learn anything at home or in the world – you don’t necessarily need a classroom and a teacher. All this is just to say I admire that you are doing this for your kids and think it is wonderful (and I am sure a lot of hard work!)
Those are some wonderful traditions and beautiful memories. I sometimes wish I was home schooled, more for the flexibility of working through the material at your own pace. I was forced to stay home for a week and a half when my mother refused to renew a series of my vaccinations and there was an outbreak of measles in the area. I did 2 hours of work a day and came back ahead in every class. I sometimes wondered what we did with the other 4 hours!
I have really enjoyed it, and I think the kids have had the opportunity to do some things they might not have done in public school. The older two were scuba certified while in high school and worked many, many hours volunteering at the state aquarium. They fenced and did photography, hatched box turtles, lizards, snakes, and quail, and we basically took everything that happened to us and studied it! We used to read aloud for hours a day by the fire in winter. Sigh. I have really enjoyed doing this!
How fun, I’m a fencer myself (though I learned after school, having been a school-goer myself.) How great that they had a chance to do all of that!
What a lovely tradition – and a great first day! Cheers!
I love the fact that your family has many traditions; it’ll make for some wonderful memories!
Such a lovely post. And, hopefully you’ll get to relax later in the evening!
Happy New Year!
What fun traditions, and what a lovely sounding blend! You mentioned this before. I’ll have to try it someday, when I get some of the Queen!
Nice! Yay for family traditions! Yay for being flexible & just going with the flow of the day! I home-schooled for a few years, but ended up having to get a part time job: teaching a harp program in st louis school district, which I did for 13 years, but quit a few years ago. It was hard to put my kids back into the system, as both sons have aspergers, so I bought a house in a much smaller school district, where I could have real communication with the teachers & the classes were small. I’m grateful because although they are both very sensitive & quirky (just like me…I guess the apple really doesn’t roll far from the tree), they both graduated & are both in college. In fact, Drew started back in classes today. Leif starts next week. My oldest dropped out of high school, got her GED, got her associates & is a very happy Paralegal (Estate Planning), the 2nd daughter graduated HS & is a chef. They all march to the beat of their own drum, without a doubt! There’s that apple thing again!
Sounds like a lovely first day of school!
Terri, that is awesome! Sounds like your kids are fun people to be with, and that is one thing I treasure about my kids. They are FUN!
Rosehips: we actually studied rose hips today in Biology!
Haha! Wonderful, couldn’t have planned it better myself.
My mother often talked about homeschooling in an idle sort of way but never committed. She didn’t like the limited education we got in school but I don’t think she ever believed she had the range to do it herself. Honestly, it would have been very interesting and I wish I had the experience (and the time) with her but I understand both sides of the coin, especially in our area which was already rural and isolating. I think her rumblings about home schooling did foster my belief that anyone can learn anything at home or in the world – you don’t necessarily need a classroom and a teacher. All this is just to say I admire that you are doing this for your kids and think it is wonderful (and I am sure a lot of hard work!)
Those are some wonderful traditions and beautiful memories. I sometimes wish I was home schooled, more for the flexibility of working through the material at your own pace. I was forced to stay home for a week and a half when my mother refused to renew a series of my vaccinations and there was an outbreak of measles in the area. I did 2 hours of work a day and came back ahead in every class. I sometimes wondered what we did with the other 4 hours!
I have really enjoyed it, and I think the kids have had the opportunity to do some things they might not have done in public school. The older two were scuba certified while in high school and worked many, many hours volunteering at the state aquarium. They fenced and did photography, hatched box turtles, lizards, snakes, and quail, and we basically took everything that happened to us and studied it! We used to read aloud for hours a day by the fire in winter. Sigh. I have really enjoyed doing this!
How fun, I’m a fencer myself (though I learned after school, having been a school-goer myself.) How great that they had a chance to do all of that!
What a lovely tradition – and a great first day! Cheers!
I love the fact that your family has many traditions; it’ll make for some wonderful memories!
Such a lovely post. And, hopefully you’ll get to relax later in the evening!
Happy New Year!