The School Year is Coming

......September will be here before we know it and I know many homeschooling parents, including myself, are starting their lesson planning and choosing their curriculum now.  If you have been homeschooling for years you probably have a system or publisher that you trust and use year after year. For us newbies, our research goes on. It is not easy to find secular homeschooling curriculum just right for our children. Especially when those children all have individual needs, like ASD. I would be lying if I said I wasn't nervous, because I am. This year will be a glorious year to test my abilities as both a special needs mother and homeschooler. This year we are expecting our new baby at the beginning of the school year and in general life has been crazy. I find myself spending several hours over coffee in the morning and in the evening after the kids go to sleep planning details and trying to find new resources that will help get me through these first few months. This year we will be schooling Kindergarten and 9th grade. So, high school begins and it is DAUNTING to say the least. I am trying to be meticulous about every single hour and every day making sure we get all of what we need to in, when in the end...I have no idea how things are going to go. The success of high school is going to heavily rely on our 9th grader...who has ODD and ADHD. So, naturally I am concerned. Then, add on the ASD toddler and the ASD Kindergartner and the ASD 12yr old, and the newborn.
     The main purpose of this blog is to show a little glimpse into my life. I like to write, I like to organize, I like to do all sorts of things I don't really have time for. But, to also show that homeschooling with multiple children with special needs IS possible. I found myself feeling like I was on a dark road looking for answers. I was looking to parents who had home-schooled 5-10 normal functioning children and I'd find myself saying 'but...but...' often. I expect great things out of all my children, I set the bar high and we help them achieve success - but it doesn't happen in the most typical of way. I love homeschooling because I am able to tailor it to our children's needs. Z will be in kindergarten but will be doing a lot of 1st grade work. Hes a bit lax in reading so, we start in K for that, but math - totally on 1st grade level.  We have been working with R on being able to do 8th-9th grade math, he struggles a lot with it but we are working hard on getting him there and making it easy to understand. Pulling him out of school was good for him because we were able to pull him away from the multiple ways to do math method and just stick to the traditional methods that have been working for years and years. Some days I wonder, though, was pulling him right for me, for our family? We are going to give it another year though - now that we know we are dealing with ODD, we can adjust our lifestyle accordingly because we know the school system wasn't the best for him and he wasn't thriving and in the end - he is our child and I refuse to give up easily on him.
    So what's next? I want you to know that I am a busy mother, I curse, I have a drink here and there. I am a secular based homeschooling parent who just wants to raise little humans with special needs into big humans who are successful and not jerks. I am a judgement free zone, you do you and I will do me. I may plan on posting on Friday and it may not get done until Sunday but know that I am trying. I have been working on creating my own worksheets for my children and plan on posting and sharing here, sharing curriculum choices, life with special needs, frustrations and successes, projects, portfolio ideas and more. I plan on posting throughout the year how we actually got things done between all the craziness. It'll be a wonderful thing to look back on later for me too. I have two kindergartners following Z, and we do not plan on stopping anytime soon - so buckle up and enjoy my bumpy ride with me (was that odd to say? probably yes).


5 kids, 6 pets, 1 lovely husband and a whole lot of life happening. I look forward to sharing with you.

And no, we don't have chickens....(yet).

~B