It’s Been How Long?

Has it really been 18 months since I blogged?  Sounds right according to my calculations.  So, the tough question is ~ do I really want to start blogging again and what stopped me from blogging in the first place?  If your curious, please feel free to read on.

I’m going to lay it all out there and be completely truthful.  Our family has been through many ups and downs the past 4 years.  We dealt with the death of my dad, the death of my husband’s mom, a job loss, and marriage problems.  I didn’t even realize that certain things were bothering me or causing strains in our home.  Ok, I knew there were problems, but I chose to ignore them.  I know that sometimes as a homeschooler I put undo pressure on myself and I feel like I am the only homeschool mom struggling with marriage problems, etc.  Well, I am a homeschool mom and I struggled with marriage problems and I realize that I am not alone and most importantly God doesn’t want me or anyone else to struggle by ourselves.

Things are getting better and the past year has been full of growth and healing for our entire family. God's grace and guidance have brought changes in our hearts and our household, specifically in our marriage.  God showed me he can repair a marriage.  Marriage is WORK people, hard work and I lost sight of the things that were priorities in my life for a while.  Yes, I promise I will open up about this at another time. 

Another reason for my absence was feeling inadequate and that everyone’s ideas were better than mine.  Please feel free to laugh here.  Anyone who blogs can tell you that you are just seeing snippets into a bloggers daily life and the pictures and words written usually catch the best and most memorable moments.  I know this but, I was still feeling like a less than stellar homeschool mom. 

Lastly, I chose to let blogging take a lot of my time (once again priorities, people) and didn’t plan a specified time for blogging. 

So, has anything changed?  Yep, ME.  I’m happier being just little ole’ me.  I’m more confident in my homeschooling abilities and that God will provide ALL that I need to homeschool my kids.

We have also made some changes, for the better, to how we homeschool.  There has been less crafting and more actual school work going on in our household.  *GASP!*  We still craft, because I am a craft loving momma and it makes me happy, happy, happy,   However, I don’t plan a craft for every book we read or to go along with every subject we are studying.  The biggest and most beneficial change is that both kids are using more of a “boxed” curriculum with lesson plans, which has saved my sanity (more on this when I post about our curriculum for the year).  This frees me up to add some fun things.

So the answer is yes, I am going to blog again.  I really do miss blogging and God has laid it on my heart to open up about some of my struggles.   I started blogging so I could record what we did during the homeschool year (this includes what works and what doesn’t).  Most importantly,  I love to look back at pictures of my kiddos and see how much we have accomplished.  : ) 

~Cindy