Welcome Summer

Our official first year of homeschooling has come to an end and WE SURVIVED and even THRIVED (with the occasional meltdown or two or three)!!!!  This year was such a huge learning experience for me.  I don't think I would even recognize the me that was walking the earth exactly one year ago.

We learned alot, but since I already posted about most of what we did that was exciting, I won't bore you with the details again!!  But I am super excited to share with you what we are doing next year!!   I even made a super fun daily schedule that we are going to try really hard to stick to.  This year I think that was our biggest struggle, finding a schedule that we liked.  If it were too rigid, I ended up feeling defeated and behind.  If it were too unstructured we ended up not doing science or history.  I think I have come up with something somewhere in the middle.  Most importantly, I think, is that I have learned that we have to start before 9.  I really want the girls to each have some independent time to work {and for me to do some housework} and it just doesn't happen if we start school later than 8:00 or 8:30.  There just isn't enough time.  So for the upcoming year we will definitely start school at 8:00.  That will take some getting used to, so for the summer I am going to slowly move up ALL OF OUR bedtimes to prepare us for some early rising in the fall!!

Here is our tentative schedule for the 2011-2012 school year...

Hopefully this one will stick!!!  Last year we just seemed to go round and round with schedules!!  Im finishing up my curriculum selections and getting getting ready to start buying!! I will let yall know what I pick as soon as its all decided!!!

And as promised, my new obsession post is up next!!!!

What I have been doing...

These last few months have been like a whirlwind to our family.  While trying to finish this year of school and making sure that we have mastered everything we need to for next year, I experienced on of the most painful situations of my life.  Very suddenly my grandmother, and one of my closest friends, passed away.  Sure, she was 81 years old, yes she had just had hip replacement surgery and we knew that she wasn't recovering super fast, okay she had lost all of her spunk....but just dying...not something that I ever gave a second thought to.  We talked every day.  We had lunch once a week.  My girls and her were working on their Presidential Dollar collections and had completed the state quarter collection earlier in the year.  She had her dress bought and ready to wear to my cousin's wedding in April.

But she didn't make it to her wedding.

She died 2 weeks before.

With the dress hanging in her closet and Avon on her kitchen table to be delivered.

My Maw Maw and I at my sisters wedding shower last summer.

So while you may be thinking this post is super depressing and thinking that you need to "x" out right now, I encourage you to hear me out.

Everyone has heard the old saying "We aren't guaranteed tomorrow."  I have said those exact words to my girls a million times.  But the truth is, we really aren't.  The prince of this world would like us to believe that we are going to be guaranteed tomorrow, but that is just because he lies to us and deceives us.  The reality is that when we live like we are guaranteed tomorrow we aren't living at all.  Instead we are just floating along on this planet taking up space.

Nothing matters really (we can do it tomorrow)

Nobody is important enough (we can call them tomorrow)

And we miss the whole point.  Things really do matter.  People really are important enough.  And the blessing I have received from that is that the Lord allowed my maw maw to be one of those people who was important enough to me.  One of those things that did matter to me.  She was my friend and so I wanted to talk to her, I wanted to go to lunch with her.

And so I have no regrets.

What a peace that is.

But what about others in my life???

Could I say the same???

I have learned to live like I am not guaranteed tomorrow because I AM NOT.  As cliched as that sounds, until you really have a grip on it, you just aren't living.

Which leads me to the second thing I have learned.

I better get up and get to living before its too late.  Because if we aren't guaranteed tomorrow, then tomorrow may be too late.

I have so many things DAILY that I convince myself can wait until tomorrow.  Well, if tomorrow is too late, how will those things get done.

After my maw maw's death I just sat {truly just sat} in a state of disbelief, shock, with a mild case of "checked out" syndrome.  It is like nothing was real.  I even called her at 11:00 the night before her funeral to "read to her the eulogy that I had been asked to give at her funeral." SERIOUSLY I DID!!!  Oh, how I wanted to talk to her and make sure it was okay with her.  She would have been such a huge help to me when I was trying to decide exactly what to say.  When her answering machine picked up something just clicked inside of me and I HAVE NEVER BEEN THE SAME!!

I cannot wait until tomorrow.

Tomorrow may not come.

So some things must change for me.

And here they are...

While blogging is fun and I have made some great friendships, I can't blog every day.  It is keeping me from living.  Instead of living, I am watching everyone else live.  Huh???

I love my kids and must start helping them build a life.  Learning to knit, reading good books, baking bread on their own, gardening.  These are all things that I love to do and that they love to do, but that we don't make enough time for.  Its much easier for me to leave them upstairs playing and go tend the garden or bake a loaf of bread.  But they need those memories with me. Because what if tomorrow doesn't come for me...or what if it doesn't come for them?

I must live what I believe, day in and day out, in season and out of season.  And by that I mean that my life must reflect Christ.  I must shine my light.  I must show myself approved because I want to hear "Well done good and faithful servant."  Even if I may hear it tomorrow.

Will I keep blogging? Absolutely.

Has my life changed forever?  You better believe it.

So that is what I have been doing over the last couple of months.  We are now beginning the process of going through her house and dividing up things that she wanted us to have.  It is not fun, but the smell of that house is just the best smell in the world and any chance I have to breathe in her sweet existence I will take!!

I love you all dearly, and hope that I haven't bored you to tears!!!

Kellye

p.s. Do I think it is coincidental that I began reading Ann Voskamp's 1000 Gifts right before my grandmother's death?  Absolutely not a chance.  Because if the God that created this universe sees fit to wake me up this morning, isn't everything then from today a gift?  You better believe it is.

Its time to start living.

New and Improved

Okay, so I am back and have FINALLY updated my page from Christmas!!!  My little blogging hiatus was nice, but I missed posting the happenings over here!!  So for all 3 of you who are still hanging around and visiting this ghost town, thank you and I am glad to see you again!!

Soon I will be posting my latest obsession and our curriculum for the 2011-2012 school year!!

Oooh la la!!!