THINK
Parenting and Shame
Tuesday Topic: Coping With Rejection by Peers
So, How Was It?
Mother’s Day for the Brokenhearted
Home: Moving Forward
Anger is Powerful, Sorrow is Terrifying
$100 Shell Card Giveaway and Saving Money at the Pump
Sunday Gratitude
This week’s Tuesday Topic comes from Carmen who writes the blog, Country Blessings. She asked,
We have adopted 4 children privately, the oldest was 3 when we adopted him, but now we are in the process of adopting a waiting child from our state. So most likely they will be older and possibly in school already. We have homeschooled our children in the past but currently have them enrolled in the public school.
Remember waiting for the school bus as a child? I didn’t imagine I would repeat that in my life, but it has become a sweet point of connection with Honeybee. Whenever possible, I walk to the end of the driveway and wait with her. It’s a brief moment when I can give her my attention. As the bus slows to a stop on the highway, I walk to the mailbox and hug her as she leaves for the day – usually telling her I’m going to give her a big kiss or embarrass her in some other way as the other students look on.
Dimples is grieving and it breaks my heart. Yesterday, as I cooked dinner, she began to talk about her upcoming birthday and what she wants for dinner. I mentioned that we should find out if she can bring birthday treats for her class at her new school, to which she replied that she was going to take treats to her “real school” and “real friends.” When I explained that would not be possible, the grief hit her afresh.
I’ve been asking myself why the decision to transfer Dimples to a new school has been so hard for me. I had such a strong emotional response and I know it is wrapped up in all kinds of things, but as I cried and talked it through with Russ, it became clear to me that this represents a letting go of the appearance that we are “almost okay.”
Yesterday brought a big change to our lives. Dimples has been struggling under the pressure of her current school. She is intellectually capable of doing the work, but the homework pressure was resulting in significant challenges at home. We came to the conclusion that while we love her school, we had to consider the needs of the entire family and do what we could to calm the household down.
Four days without a computer makes for poor blogging, but good family time. We ended our summer with one of our favorite family events, REACH Camp.
Our school year is up and running, and three days in, it feels pretty good. Dimples was happy to get back to school early Monday morning. Wednesday morning, Ladybug and Honeybee joined the “back to school” party.
Honeybee is riding the bus, a new experience for us, so we walked together to the bottom of the driveway and waited. The bus stopped on the highway and the driver motioned for her to cross in front of the stopped traffic.
At four-thirty this morning I was up with lots on my mind. Torn between writing, reading, and tackling the far overdue project of taking last year’s school books off the shelves and replacing them with books for this year, I chose the latter. I hate to admit that I had not yet done it, but it’s true. This is what our table looked like by 6:00 AM.
Once again, school is going to be different this year. Prior to the adoption of our children, we had exclusively homeschooled and it was a significant part of our family culture.
I shared this picture on my One Thankful Mom Facebook page yesterday, and I had to share it again, along with the amazing learning experience we had.
The kids headed out at low tide for a long walk on the beach while Russ and I stayed at the house and enjoyed the extra quiet – checking on them with binoculars from time to time. When they reached the water’s edge and turned to head back in, we quickly went out with a backpack of juice boxes, snacks, and sunscreen. The next couple of hours were spent wandering the beach together, visiting with my cousin and her family, and collecting pretty shells.
Thank you all for your prayers and comments. I am deeply grateful for this loving community that surrounds my blog and my family. Today is a day for waiting – for calls to be returned, emails to be answered, and God to give us direction. In the meantime, Dimples is at day camp for one more day. We haven’t figured out the weekend yet…
This morning, while the kids were still sleeping, I filled out paperwork for Honeybee’s new school.
