My last little is growing up on me. She has grown into a smart and spunky little girl, and I don’t know where the time has gone. She will start pre-k this year. This will be her first year at our homeschool co-op. She will make friends and lose a little more of her baby face, I’m sure. It’s hard knowing your last little one is getting big, but it’s also so amazing to see it happen. While looking back at the progress of each of our kids through their childhood, I am amazed with each of them.
My heart is proud of the little people they are becoming.
You see, our last little one started off on a very hard road. She was delayed from birth. She was in physical therapy and occupational therapy on and off from six months of age until two years of age. She was diagnosed with autism and a developmental delay. She has fought HARD to be where she is today. She has worn her heart on her sleeve since she was born. She would cry the most pitiful cry every time she heard another child cry — she has always had a heart of gold. Even now, she can’t stand for someone to be upset.
I remember crying and praying years ago to always be able to advocate for my kids and to give them everything I could. Homeschool was scary for me as I wasn’t someone who always planned to homeschool her kids. It kind of fell upon us and I felt so unprepared. The first year was most definitely the hardest. I second-guessed just about every decision I made. I was so hard on myself that I wanted to give up at least once daily, but I kept with it. The kids loved it and then we found our co-op. After that, everything changed. I became more confident in what I was doing and we dove in head-first.
Now, I sit here working on the lesson plans for the upcoming school year. I will have a 6th grader, 5th grader, 2nd grader and one in pre-k. We have come such a long way from our first year homeschooling so many years ago. Our kids are blossoming into amazing, funny and inquisitive kids.
I am still an over-planner; it’s hard to tell myself no when it comes to getting the kids more homeschool supplies. I have learned to follow the kids’ lead in some areas. We work on areas they may be struggling in with more games and learning through fun activities, we try to keep them interested by using themes and topics they love individually. Each of the kids learn in different ways, so much so that I joke that they could have made it a little easier for me and had a little something in common with one another, but I guess this definitely keeps it interesting.
The beauty of homeschool is that it is customizable and you can design it around each child’s needs and wants.
We started out our homeschool journey using an all-in-one type of curriculum; we would buy a grade kit and that is what we did for the year. After a couple years of doing that, we discovered it wasn’t the style for us, so we started to pick and choose from different curricula depending on the subject and we made our own collection for the year. This suits our learning style a lot more and makes it to where I can customize the curriculum for each of the kids.
