Monday, December 26, 2011

FINALLY! A new semester!  

I cannot tell you how excited I am to put this fall semester behind us and move forward with some real progress.  This has been by far the WORST four months of homeschooling ever. Truly...it has not gone at all as planned.  I stopped even opening my planner as it was nothing but a huge depressing disappointment to see how behind we are. 

We never did get off to a great start.  It just felt off and weird.  Exhaustion started mid-September (and we quickly discovered why), my brain stopped working through October, we started a business in November, and then well....the holidays.  Not to forget the fact that I was sick with a cold for the first three weeks of December AND my husband works out of town during the week.  I'm too embarrassed to tell you how much work we did (or more correctly, didn't) accomplish in all that time.

Thankfully it isn't a huge deal since we can make our own schedule.  I had actually been planning on carrying through summer 2012 to get caught up, and then just realized (yesterday) that there will be a teeny tiny bundle of new love in our home by then.  And to be honest, I'm not great at multi-tasking during the first couple of months. ha!

That means we have roughly 3 1/2 months to be as productive as possible....starting tomorrow, after a doctor's visit and shopping.  The boys' Christmas gift cards and cash are burning a hole in their pockets.  I'm all for getting that out of the way before diving back in.  BUT we will at least work our way through the three R's by tomorrow evening.  Then it's a full-scale attack on those school books until Baby says it's time for a break.

Even though we're getting back to our FULL schedule, we're mostly going to concentrate on math and science for the littles.  Nathan is my main concern as he will start 9th grade next fall so I definitely want him up to speed before then and phonics for Gabriel is another priority.  I figure if we get a little behind on history or grammar with the younger two and since both of those are done orally, they can easily be caught up during quiet nursing times this summer.  I'm actually looking forward to it. :)

I'm so excited about getting back to a REAL schedule.  My energy is coming back and I definitely want to take advantage of that.  I know it won't be long before exhaustion creeps back in.

So here's to a super productive, fun-filled, educational next few months!!!