A Window Into Our Homeschool

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Once upon a time, I was a frazzled, worried, weeping homeschooling mama — so frazzled and worried and weeping that we did what would be unthinkable to me now. We quit homeschooling — for two whole years. I regret it. I grieve the loss of those two years. We would never make that decision again, but in my frazzled, worried, weeping state, we made it.

When we quit, I only remember one homeschooling mother talking to me about our decision. I didn’t feel encouraged after that conversation; I felt guilty. While I regret missing out on those two years, I am grateful now that I can understand exactly how frazzled, worried, weeping homeschooling mamas feel. Now you know one reason this blog is so very important to me and why I praise God for the opportunity to encourage you. I don’t want any of you ever to feel as alone, discouraged, and helpless as I did.

When we came out of our wilderness into our second homeschooling beginning, we made pretty much a 180º turn-around. Gone was the pressure. Gone was the need to conform to my ideas of what school was. Gone was the need to look just right to the people who might be judging us.

In our hearts we decided: This is for God. This is for eternity. This is for everything that really matters.

In Mary Evelyn’s book Katy’s Box, she tells our family’s story in fast motion. She takes what it took our family a long time to learn and turns those hard-learned lessons into a story of the first year of the homeschooling adventure of the Porter family.

You long-time readers know that I rarely directly encourage a purchase in this blog, but I do hope you will read Katy’s Box aloud to your children and I do hope you and your children will watch this wonderful video Mary Evelyn made that tells the backstory of her story. Hers is a powerful story from the perspective of a current homeschooling mama who remembers her own frazzled, worried, weeping homeschool mama. I know that I am sorry that I didn’t have a book like this when I was frazzled, worried, and weeping. It just might have given me those two years back. It is our family’s prayer that Katy’s Box helps many a mama to keep on keeping on while laying aside the guilt and fear and to reach forward in peace, tranquility, and joy.

Not that I have already obtained it
or have already become perfect,
but I press on so that I may lay hold of that
for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus.
Brethren, I do not regard myself
as having laid hold of it yet;
but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind
and reaching forward to what lies ahead,
I press on toward the goal for the prize
of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 3:12-14

You and your children will also enjoy the trailer to Katy’s Box, if you haven’t watched it already. Please share these messages — this post, the trailer, and Mary Evelyn’s story — with anyone you know who is struggling to keep going or with anyone you know who would love to homeschool if only she believed she could.

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