A New Stage in Life

Being a homeschool mom has been one of my favorite parts of life thus far! To spend endless days with my children, both learning as much as I hope I was teaching. This was to be a blessing I could not have imagined. Years ago, as our son begged to be homeschooled, we debated for months and yes years, whether this is what was best for our children as well as for our family. How would the children do? How well would we get along? Would we drive each other crazy? Would I able to teach them all they needed to learn or even more...all they would wanted to explore? How could Wayne and I take on a task that seemed all absorbing and still be Wayne and Sharon? And then there was the question, "How could we not?" When your children are begging for more, how do you say, "No...you are getting all you need?" We chose to follow our instinct and our children's wishes and began the life of a homeschool family. Yes, it was all absorbing and yes it was just what our family needed! We all learned and thrived from it.

Wayno was working for TeeLee Popcorn at the time and traveling internationally as well as domestically. How would we deal with the responsibility with him off on trips? We calmed our fears and life became exciting and challenging as we settled into our homeschool routine. I spent all my days working with the children, not just helping them with lessons but beginning the slow process of teaching them how to teach themselves and giving them the wings to seek out and find those things they wanted to learn and explore! We spent much time in the van as well, traveling to lessons, soccer, and dance! Wayne was often the one left in the kitchen at the end of the days making sure there was a meal ready to be served as we would arrive home late at night. This was the beginning of our eating dinner most nights between 7 and 9 at night. Something that has continued even after the homeschool years and something that we enjoy as the day is mostly done and we all are then able to join around the table to talk and eat and catch each other up on the daily events! Yes...there were trying times. But all in all, we would not have done it any other way. This was also the same time when our family began a new way of looking at food. We began growing and eating organic produce as well as whole grains. We spent much of our day chopping fruit and veggies and preparing grains as well as baking breads. The children grew a large part of our garden as part of the curriculum and worked hard at companion planting so to lessen the amount of weeding time, etc. We lived, ate, learned, and played as a family and life was fun!

Then came the teen years and high school...should we homeschool or maybe we should experiment with public. The children wondered if they would enjoy having the social life that comes with the public high school agenda. Bry, being the oldest, decided to try it out and Brit followed his lead two years later. Both loved the experience and excelled in all their studies.

Not much later came our decision to move to CA and the children became a part of a larger school with even more demands and a larger social outlet. Slowly, Wayne and I saw less and less of our children. Meal time stayed constant as it was late in the evening and we were often joined by other teens. We would spend endless nights around the table catching up on the day's events, discussing politics, religion, etc.

Then came the time for Bry to move on, and that he did as he headed off to UC Berkeley. What a change! One less person around our table, one empty room in our home. This transition was rocky for all of us. We had hoped to make it through gracefully but this was not to be. We had been together for so long, how could it be a smooth transition? Everybody told me it would get easier. It didn't! I love my family and my time spent with my family. This was not easy and this was not fun! Now, there were fun times. Times when he would call in the middle of the night to have me go over a project with him. The time he came home for his sister at Easter so that she would acknowledge Easter. Brit had become an upper classman and her schedule was busier and her responsibilities were greater. Now, we were losing time with her as well! How would we survive? I had started to work outside the house which helped fill my days and this was a blessing in many ways.

As the year progressed, life calmed. Wayne began to travel a bit more and that has always been good for him. I began to realize I could spend time with girlfriends and still be home in time to have family dinners with Wayne and Brit. I started back at yoga classes which I had not taken in years! We also joined the gym and I went almost daily with my girlfriend. I began taking yoga classes there as well as Pilate's classes and found it was OK to spend time giving to me and not just to my children. This was an odd feeling in the beginning as it had never been this way since we had married. We had always been parents it seemed and this was a whole new look on married life for Wayne and I. I had never left my children as they were growing up and was not sure how it would feel to do such a thing. Also, I had not left Wayne for an extended amount of time. He had always done the traveling, not me. What would it be like to go somewhere without him and leave him at home with the children? I was about to find out...

After Brit and I had a wonderful trip to Portland, I then had a day to do my laundry, pack and be ready for such an adventure. I left for the beach with two girlfriends and the son of one of them.(He is just a munchkin and cannot yet leave mama.) We had decided to all read the Barbara Kingsolver book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle and then spend the week discussing it. We read, we ate, we laughed, we walked the beach and of course we shopped! We stayed in a wonderful home of some friends of ours. We rose without alarms and sipped coffee and discussed life. We ate wonderful foods made by several amazing local restaurants. We had local wine and chocolate in the evenings. We spent hours talking, laughing and discussing our designated book. Each day we spent a bit of our time at the water. Sometimes walking among rocks and tidal pools and other times we spent leisurely time walking beaches and building sandcastles. We became infatuated with some of the local shops and spent hours wandering in and out of them! Life was good and life was filled with pampering and re-energizing ourselves in order to go back to reality and be even better wives and moms than we were before.

I am finding the upside of taking yoga classes and going to the gym. I am finding that spending time with my girlfriends makes me a better mom and wife. I have entered a new stage in life and even though it is different and maybe not one I was truly prepared for, I hope that some day I will be able to look back on these changes and find that even though during the change it did not feel as though I made it with grace, that in the big picture I did succeed to transition with a bit of style. Would I ever choose to not have homeschooled and not have put my all into raising, teaching and learning from my children? No...I am glad we made the choice to homeschool and I am proud of the people my children have become because they pushed their parents to move to the edge and take the risk! I am thankful I have children that have taught me so very much about life!!! I am also thankful to all my girlfriends, nationwide that have been there for me throughout the transitions in life.