new year, new plan

I’ve been a little quiet around here lately.


I’ve been sharing our pictures, but holding back on sharing much more than that.  Change is upon us, yet again, and I’d be a fool to try and convince anyone that I’m doing okay with it.



After a four month debut of public school, Isaac is home once again with us.  Ultimately  the decision was simple, although not easy - he endured a lot of bullying, an incredibly disrespectful and constantly disruptive learning environment, as well as making no academic strides.  It no longer made sense to keep him there.




Bringing him home has brought yet another season of change, one that some members of the family have not warmly embraced.  A certain young lady, who insists that he will “ruin everything”, “take girl time away from us”, and is just generally grumpy and mopey.


oh girl…



I get it.  I really really do.  Part of me was mopey and grumpy letting go of the homeschool that we were enjoying so much.  After enduring some really difficult years, this past fall was super sweet and fun and re-sparked my love of teaching my kids.







The time I’ve had with these girls has been so good for all of us, and we will get our season again. 






But now it’s time to pour back into Isaac.  To encourage, to love, to teach, and to nurture.
  




Our days are not yet running smoothly, but that isn’t anything new.  A bit of time will certainly change that.  Emotions are running kind of crazy, especially as the kids get used to new routine, and as Isaac gets used to my expectations once again.







We pretty much started back up where we left off at the end of summer:  Isaac is working through Ancient History, grade level math and Language Arts, and has joined Elaina for Ocean Science.  I’m keeping it really simple right now and focusing on quality of work over quantity, as well as providing ample time for building life skills, personal responsibility, and expressing his creativity. 


I want him to begin to enjoy learning again.


I want him to feel safe and secure.


But mostly I want to enjoy this season with my son!

making the switch

Well…we’ve done it.


Done what I’ve been talking about for months now.  We’ve put our boys into public school. 






This decision, just like the one we made over five years ago to homeschool, did not come easily.  Nor did it come without an agonizingly long process of praying, pros & cons list making, crying, debating, wise-counsel seeking, and wish-washing-in-the-final-choice-making.  I kind of work like that.  Sometimes it really takes me a long time to wrap my brain around a new path, even if it’s staring me down with a flashy red sign blinking, “Hey you!  You dummy…this way!”


Am I preaching to the choir?


We are into our second week now, and while on the surface I am working to embrace the change and look at the positives,  I’m still busy filling myself with all sorts of doubts, worries, and fears.  Did we make the right choice?  Are my kids strong enough to stand firm and choose right from wrong?  Will they get hurt?  Time will be faithful to reveal each of those things to us, I am certain of that.  Bottom line is that for us, it is time to test out the waters.






Aside from the emotional rollercoaster that I keep reloading myself onto, there is another big ticket item that’s been revealed to me through this.  Ultimately, it’s staring me right in the face and is becoming the biggest and hardest thing to let go of….pride.



I will shamefully admit holding a certain amount of pride fullness regarding homeschooling.  I put a lot of work, planning, time, and effort into our homeschooling efforts.  I’ve made curriculum and poured hours into lesson plans.  I’ve planned the perfect thematic units and sacrificed a lot of our family’s resources in order to make it all happen.  And truthfully, I think I was secretly holding onto a self-defined sense of “mommy worth” that’s been dangerously wrapped up in my own performance as a hybrid homeschool-mommy-teacher-goddess.  I know.  Sick, huh?






Another disturbingly frustrating aspect to all of this, is realizing that I have tied my own worth to my kids’ performance and behavior.  Now, I know this is faulty thinking.  It certainly isn’t practical or biblical.  No one but myself has put this expectation on me, and I am working constantly to remind myself where and Who my true worth comes from.  But just for kicks, I’m sharing with you what I mean:  I have given myself over to the task of mothering, a mission that I take very seriously and one that does not necessarily come very naturally to me.  Even still, I want to be good at it.  I can only be considered a good enough mom, and a good enough homeschool mom, if and only if, my kids are educationally excelled, hard working, positive, God centered, family/community focused, physically fit, emotionally stable, interesting, and interested…really the list could go on and on.  If I work hard, give them abundant love, and all the time that homeschooling takes, then the end result will produce a “super child”, a pat on the back for me, and someone to tell me “job well done”.  It’s kind of my educational/parenting formula, if you will, and it looks like this:

 

Excellent Parenting + Love + Time + Child= Job Well Done

 

Before you go trying to tell me just how ridiculous this equation is, allow me to explain how I came to understand that it was just that - complete nonsense.


What ultimately led us down the road to re-evaluate our homeschool choice (more than once), wasn’t that I was not working hard enough.  It wasn’t my educational philosophy, my lesson plans, my eagerness and preparedness to teach, or my organization.  It wasn’t my conviction that homeschooling was right for our family, and it certainly wasn’t a lack of love or time that I was devoting to each of the kids. In fact, if there was one thing I was certain about (insert pride here) it was that I was doing/had done everything in my power to make home education for the Sanchez 4 a raging success.





Only it wasn’t.  There was some piece to the equation that I was missing out on and  I could not for the life of me, figure it out.  No matter what new system or technique I tried, or however we changed our game plan, at the end of each day, week, and month I was still dumbfounded.  Not to mention exhausted, frustrated, and sometimes just down right angry.  We set new boundaries, set consistent expectations, and tried to give a lot of grace.  And it still wasn’t working.





It goes back to my flawed formula.  Of course having a wonderful kid is reward enough, but add to that the way the world will view your child and the obvious brilliance that must be nothing less than parenting at it’s perfection, well, that’s just icing on the cake.  Right? I myself as a young and inexperienced mother, would equate this logic as practically perfect in every way.  Of course now after 10 years of parenting, I see that it fails to incorporate the sinful nature of both the parent and the child, and is innately flawed in it’s genesis.





There is, after all, no practical way for me to parent excellently. And no matter what super power techniques I may or may not physically poses (very few sadly), I actually have very little power over my kids’ will, their choices, and their sin.  I can make life uncomfortable for them, and even boring if need be.  I can love, pray, teach, remind, and encourage.  But stubbornness runs deep around here.  Creative and consistent consequences are no match for a hard headed kid.  And truthfully, that makes homeschooling feel impossible.  I had to come to the realization that keeping all the kids home was just no longer feasible.  And it took me a really long time to come to terms with that.





Does this mean that I have failed?  It sure feels that way.  Did I do my end of the equation to the best of my ability?  I’m still evaluating that daily.  No matter my answers, we certainly can’t keep living in this world where I am forcing a lifestyle that is making everyone miserable, especially one little boy who seems to find himself in a lot of trouble.  That’s not the kind of childhood I would ever dream for any of my kids to have, so it was time to accept that a change was not only needed but completely necessary. 





The trouble with this sort of change is the big adjustment that it is for our family.  It’s hard for me to switch gears, to transform how I feel about education, about childhood, and even about our family time.  One minute I’m relieved to have some of the pressure off and to have a break from the constant conflict, and the next I’m really regretting this change of direction.





Today I’m actually feeling quite sentimental about the boys being gone.  I missed Isaac’s vivacious laughter at breakfast.  (Who knew a kid could always wake up so happy?)  I missed both of them at our big table while the girls colored in their new Calendar Journals, and group story time over PB&J for lunch.  And I’m super sad about all the plans and lessons and opportunities that we had to set aside.  I really wish we could just keep on plugging away, that the bad attitudes and poor motivation to complete work would be fixed.  I still dream that we are able to study what they are each interested in, encourage their special strengths and abilities, and still have time to spare at the end of the day for life.





For now I’m getting back to the basics, at least while it still feels like digesting this newness is burning my throat.  I’m focusing on quality of time instead of quantity of time.  I’m enjoying them for who they are rather than focus on what they’ve done (or haven’t done).  I’m using the opportunity to see if my boys can bloom into children who are eager to learn, responsible to complete assignments, and work hard in all they do.  Those are fundamentals that we have faithfully instilled in them since they were teeny, and now it’s time to branch out and see how it goes.  I'm trying trying trying to let go of my unrealistic expectations on myself, to embrace my kids unique learning curves and distinct personalities, in order to do just one job for them.  To mother them.  And do my best to enjoy it too!



And I’m hoping that someday, I can figure out how to deal with life without boarding the analytical emotional rollercoaster that zooms through my brain and my heart every time our family encounters change.


Hey, a mom can hope right? 

(Want to read my other thoughts on mothering?  Click here)

the birth of a bad attitude

We’ve been living with some really gritty moods around here.


I can’t say really that it’s one person over another who is struggling the most.  We’ve all been a bit on edge.



Of course it is easy to see how the mood travels through the family, like some kind of virulent bug eating away at our ability to be happy and enjoy our summer together:





Enter the preschooler, who once again, is up in the middle of the night. She’s just decided that sleeping is just so very boring and wouldn’t mommy and daddy like to read her a book.  Or give her a back rub.  Or even watch a little TV.  And so both she and momma and daddy are tired the next day.  Now tiredness in itself, is not a reason to be crabby.  Usually.  Caffeine and breakfast go a long way to restoring both mom and dad.  But…


Since the preschooler is tired from her late night romp-about, she isn’t very tolerant of her bossy older sister.  Instead she nags and screams and looks for fights.  Finally older sister takes the bait, and lashes out in some way.  Maybe a push, maybe a broken toy, but something big enough to send her off to tattle for the fourteenth time of the morning. 


Enter tired momma half-heartedly ready to referee.  Again.  And she sides with the little one, since after all, the older one should really know better.  This of course is perceived as inhumanly unfair, and stomping, screaming, and door-slamming are sure to follow.  A little time in her room where she plots and plans and schemes, possibly even packs a suitcase in case running away should become an appealing option. 


I feel a mutiny underway…




Enter the ten year old.  Who instead of completing his schoolwork, has been sneakily sifting through the playroom, looking for long lost toys, and effectually postponing his much dreaded long division assignment.  Just yesterday he located a silver sandal, and this morning has recovered a golden chain.


Now tired momma is starting to get suspicious, since after all, she was not indeed born yesterday.  Certainly these things are not just sitting around, he is actively looking for them!  Ten year old is at once questioned, and strongly encouraged NOT to lie, and reminded thus of the consequences should he be found guilty of lying to his mother.  Reluctantly, he confesses to “mostly doing school work and a little looking in the playroom.”


Humph!  Tired momma is starting to become cranky momma.  “Get your school work done!” is said more than a half dozen times in two hours.




Enter the nine year old.  Nine year old who has been bickering with older sister all morning.  Who had to eat breakfast alone outside because he could not stop himself from being mean.  And who is now complaining about doing chores.  Again.  And who, in his infinite nine year old wisdom, is acting mediator in another of the girls fight, which is breaking out right now.


Yes.  Really another fight.  This one involves hair pulling and scratching, and tired, nearly cranky momma is more than a little hesitant to get involved.  Probably because of the aforementioned hair pulling and scratching.  Finally after shoes start flying through the air, mom swoops in with her head ducked, spanks the squirming four year old bottom, and puts her in the bedroom for a much needed “time-out”.  “Feel free to come out when you are ready to be sweet” is muttered behind clenched teeth while,  “Go ahead and try throwing shoes in my house again!” is running through the brain.




Now it’s time for business.  The real deal.  Enter dad.


Mom has to call dad.  Because if she doesn’t, someone is going to get thrown out a window.  Tired nearly cranky momma has crossed over into a new realm: I’ve had it up to here! momma.  What mom really wants to do is pour herself a glass of wine and lock herself in the laundry room.  It is, after all, the only room on the main floor with a lock on it.


Somehow, someway, Dad always seems to get things back under control.  He calms down mom and gently reminds her that she doesn’t want to go to prison for throwing her children out the window.  And someday, this will just be another funny memory we have of raising our kids.  We may even get to use it when our kids are grown and raising their own brood of trouble makers.  We’ll be laughing it up then, he says.


Ok.  That’s right.  You got this momma.  Make some sandwiches, finish another load of laundry, and get those kids down for a nice long nap.  We’ll go out for dinner and everything is going to be ok.  You can even have that glass of wine and won’t have to lock yourself in any room to enjoy it.


And you better get to sleep early tonight…



Because you just never know what craziness you will have to repeat tomorrow!

 


*Just to be clear, no child of mine will ever be thrown out a window. 

the surprising parts of motherhood

There isn’t much these days, that shocks me when it comes to parenting.


My four creative kids have seen to that. 






They’ve been the undoing of my naïve ideas, you know the ones we all have before our children are born.  The ones that are usually proud, arrogant statements flung out as proclamations of how things will be for us and our offspring.  As if great motherhood results from a mathematical formula where I add X and Y and produce a natural and simple result of Z.  Sure, it’ll be hard work, and I may lose a night or two of sleep.  But what could be so hard about raising kids?  It’s not rocket science or anything.






I’d like to go back and shake that woman I used to be.  Knock a little sense in her.  Prepare her for what’s coming.  Not that she’d listen.  After all, proud and arrogant were her nicknames…


There are some things, no matter how open minded or prepared you may believe you are, that a mom just can’t anticipate.  A new mom may understand she has a lot of poopy diapers in her future and less money in her bank account.  But nothing quite prepares her for the overwhelming fatigue she will face until she is smack in the middle of experiencing it.





I was no different and had to learn to roll with the ebbs and flows like any other new parent.  I could manage the mounds of dirty laundry, the piles of poopy diapers, and the late nights with little sleep. I mastered a routine, cooked and pureed baby food, and learned how to live on a much tighter budget.





But nothing could prepare me for the real surprises of motherhood.  The ones that shock you into cardiac arrest and cause wells of screaming to choke your throat.  Basically turn you into that mom who loses her cool and yells at her kids.  Like when your child pours kitty litter down the sink. Or pees in the corner of Big O Tires. Or drinks a bottle of children’s ibuprofen. Or steals candy from the store.





There are of course those times that your kid uses a certain four letter word.  Or lies about drinking syrup straight from the bottle and then re-filling it with water.  Or pulls the fire alarm at Qdoba in the middle of the lunch hour rush.


I struggled when one of my kids repotted a plant in the heat vent.  And lost Saul’s wedding band.  And when another helped herself to chocolate syrup and “accidentally” poured it all over the carpet.  Don’t even get me started on the time the whole tube of toothpaste was squeezed out onto the counter. Or the new bottle of shampoo that was poured out in it’s entirety for one huge mega bubble bath. How about the time the bills got ripped into teeny tiny pieces? Or the KY jelly was smeared on my brand new duvet, or the permanent marker was used to doodle on the baby because she was “boring looking”. 






Can you imagine my shock and surprise when I found poop under a child’s bed that was put there for safe keeping?  Or when a certain red-finger-stained little boy tried to convince me he’d just had a bloody nose, and was not the one who had hidden a container of cherry Kool Aide under the bathroom sink for snacking on.  Or the three year old who said her daddy let her empty his shaving cream to decorate her walls with.  And the kid who “cleaned” the floor with popcorn oil and garlic salt, now that was something…









I really could go on and on.  But I won’t. 



Don’t hear me wrong - I love being a mom!





These kids are pretty amazing and I am so blessed by each of them.  I love watching them learn and being part of what makes them who they are.  They are all so different and wonderfully smart, creative people.





I’m certain now that God has given me these amazingly creative kids purely for His entertainment.  Either that or I am paying my dues for being a naughty kid myself. 



As if…







If nothing else, they will become fodder for a book.  Besides, what’s a life lived without funny stories? 






In the meantime, while I wait for the next escapade to unfold, you may find me sitting next to a naïve pregnant woman, listening her chatter on and on about how easy this mothering thing is going to be.



I think that’ll be the perfect time to tell her about the real surprises of motherhood.