Wednesday, August 21, 2013

School is Around the Corner

Summer School ended yesterday.

It was good. Very good. I saw progress in both children and especially James.


I also noticed Missy went off happy in the morning and came home exhausted and cranky at 12:30. Sometimes she all out blew her top within 5 minutes of being home. One day she raged most of the afternoon from the time the bus dropped her off until bedtime. Literally, she beat her brother up and screamed at him all the walk home from the bus stop and when she got here she plain threw herself on the ground and raged f.o.r.e.v.e.r. During the school year she came home cranky and threw tantrums a lot and I thought that was just how it is. Having had a summer break where she was a lot more even keel (we had our moments, don't get me wrong) throughout the day and WAY less all.out.tantrums and tiredness it was striking to note how exhausting school is for her. Or Stressful. Or something. Which is it anyway? Here we go with the detective thing again. Where's my trench-coat and magnifying glass? Does it say anything to you that I can have her lay down after a half a day of school and she will sleep for two hours?

School begins next week on Wednesday.


Both kids are signed up for 3rd grade. After all our discussion on whether to retain them or not, we are back to moving on. For James it is the best. It is what it is for Missy. She will always be a special ed kid and there isn't anything I can do to make that different for her. It's frustrating to her, but it is her reality. She was really not happy with the idea of going back to second grade. In her words, "They don't want me there again!" lol Someone told me that Missy's new teacher was originally a special ed teacher, so this may be a good fit. My plan is to help James keep up with the class whatever it takes. Next year I plan on homeschooling him.


Christina is gearing up for her first ever "going to school" experience. We've gone school shopping already, and college doesn't start until the end of September. She's that geared up. She's our youngest starting running start yet. She's 15  until the end of October.


Brianna has had an interesting summer that has been all over the map with regards to her future plans. She had planned to take this year off and go into education next fall. Becoming a teacher is no longer on the ticket and really, she hasn't nailed anything concrete down as to what she wants to do. We are okay with that. We would rather she was absolutely sure and that it wouldn't be a waste of valuable time. We want her to be lead by God. We also want her to be able to contribute to society and support herself if she needed to. She has so many talents and gifts, her interests are varied and interesting. From Photography to agriculture, to special needs kids, she has ability and drive and indeed, maybe college isn't a must.  She is going to Oklahoma to do a "crash course" in media production with her friend Aubrey. Aubrey works at Full Plate Living (what used to be Lifestyle of America) in their media department. She has the go ahead to bring Brianna into the studio and teach her the ropes. They have a new project in the works and Brianna will get to see it pretty much from start to finish. Also, Aubrey's family has a market garden. Better Together Farm. They are planting fall crops and Bri will get to learn their ways and methods. I'm kind of excited about that. She has been running our tomato patch and enjoys that. She will then be home mid November and fly off to GYC in Florida and from there go to Tanzania for six months as a student missionary. The plan thus far is to have her working in the elementary school at my brother's project.



Vanessa has been working hard, hard as a CNA. She went for her certification test and thought she failed it. She was reapplying when her certification arrived in the mail. It took us the rest of the day to convince her that she was indeed certified and it wasn't some mistake. She will continue her job and work part time while she goes to nursing school. NURSING SCHOOL LOOMS ahead. Already, she found out she will miss out on GYC, and other big parts of her life. For 20 months nursing school will be it. She's even sure her friends will think she's no longer much of a friend.

Everybody is asking what I am going to do with my free time. :-) For the first time in 15 years I don't have a homeschooler in the house.


3 comments:

Preacherstribe said...

What are you going to do with your free time? What free time? Brother. You ain't done yet. Loved the blog.

Anonymous said...

Ha! I have a feeling I will be able to relate to Vanessa's lack of "friend time"! Maybe we can study together a little, at least :). As for Bri...all I can say is I'm going to miss her a LOT.

schnitzelbank said...

Brianna might want to look into fxphd (online classes). My husband is in the field and has taught a few classes with them (don't worry, he doesn't get a cut of this, just honest promotion). It's self-paced, not for credit, but looked at positively by employers, if you build your portfolio.