Let's go to home-school.

Deciding to home-school has been, well, the only word I can think to describe it is "liberating".  With the reminders of why home-schooling is best (for our family) just flowing in over the last several month, I can't help but get excited to start the school year.  Part of it is that the build up of excitement was getting intense and at one point I felt like I was screaming inside my head "Can we just start the dang schooling already and stop just talking about it!"  Yes, I'm quite dramatic inside my own head.
Now, this may confuse some of you because, if you are like I was not very long ago, you may be thinking to yourself that if I am homeschooling then surely I could just start whenever I want.  Well, it is true but most of the work that we'll be doing this year is with curriculum used through a program called Classical Conversations.  Yes, I know the name sounds weird, but basically it's taking a classical education approach to teach with the added element of allowing God's word and standards to penetrate each subject.  One thing Classical Conversations has is a structured meeting one day a week called a community.  You may have heard of a co-op, well it's kind of like that.  We will be meeting together every Tuesday (which will be the start of our week), I'll go with Allie into a classroom where a tutor will teach the memory work in front of the classroom (7 kids and their parent).  I'll leave the explanation of memory work for another day.  But what this means for us is that we can't start early because Allie will be learning the same things as the other kids on the same schedule.  There is 2 exceptions to this.  Reading and math are not part of the CC structure.  So earlier this week I decided to go ahead and start math and reading to get us going and maybe a little ahead in those subjects, plus I already had the curriculum so why not.
A couple days in, I realized the math was way too easy (stuff she was doing last year) and the reading was very difficult.  Still we proceeded as normal with schooling because it's the curriculum I have (math was given to me and reading was bought at the curriculum sale for a great price).  Then we happened upon a lesson in reading that basically says we need a book that we don't have in order to complete that lesson, so I get on amazon to get the book and get excited when I find in on kindle as a free book! Wow awesome, right?  NO because it's the revised edition and doesn't line up with the book we have.  ugh.  Then come to find out I'm trying to use a reading curriculum that we need to wait to use until next year.  So we closed up the books, I told her we were done for the day and I spent *too much time looking for low cost curriculum options to help us get through the year (love/hate relationship with pinterest!)
I think you get the point, I was frustrated and feeling a bit defeated.  Last night, I brought up my dilema with a fellow CC sister and within minutes she had led me to resources and even lent me a few items to help.  I am so thankful for her!!
This morning when it came to mind again I was reminded that what God has placed in my lap, the enemy can not take that away! I am not defeated.