{"id":8973,"date":"2015-09-08T12:55:02","date_gmt":"2015-09-08T16:55:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beyondmommying.com\/blog\/?p=8973"},"modified":"2015-09-08T15:52:03","modified_gmt":"2015-09-08T19:52:03","slug":"i-envy-you-traditional-schoolers-but-only-a-little","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beyondmommying.com\/blog\/2015\/09\/08\/i-envy-you-traditional-schoolers-but-only-a-little\/","title":{"rendered":"I Envy You, Traditional Schoolers (but only a little)"},"content":{"rendered":"

I see you out there, all over the internet, sending your kids off to their first days of the school year.\u00a0 Your perfectly dressed children, holding cute little signs.<\/p>\n

I see their perfect little bento lunch boxes and their adorable first days’ “getting to know you” projects.<\/p>\n

I see your joy as you fill your days with whatever you want.\u00a0 Enjoying the quiet with a cup of coffee, the ease of maintaining a tidy house (for at least a few hours), the chance to actually get stuff done! \u00a0I see your freedom, the chance to do what you want, when you want;\u00a0the endless possibilities of a childless day.<\/p>\n

And I envy you.\u00a0 I long for those quiet moments, that house that stays tidy for longer than a hot second, the ability to start and<\/em> finish something.\u00a0 I can’t remember what that freedom feels like and can’t even fathom what the possibilities might be if I had it!<\/p>\n

But then I see the end of day pictures of your exhausted and disheveled children.\u00a0 I already see the complaining about car lines and ridiculous school policies.\u00a0 And I know the homework is coming and the daily struggle that will become.<\/p>\n

And I remember, I remember all of it.<\/p>\n

I remember when our first day of school pictures looked like this:<\/p>\n

\"SONY<\/a><\/p>\n

Instead of this:<\/p>\n

\"Homeschool\"<\/a><\/p>\n

And homework caused this:<\/p>\n

\"SONY<\/a><\/p>\n

I remember the waking up early; the rushing to make a balanced lunch<\/a>\u00a0at the last minute; the walking to<\/a> and from school with two little ones in tow; the exhaustion and lack of time to play<\/a>.<\/p>\n

And I remember why we chose to homeschool<\/a>,\u00a0the struggle<\/a> was very real.<\/p>\n

And while I envy your empty days and endless possibilities for “me time” as I look around at my cold cup of coffee, disheveled house<\/a> and never ending to-do list of “I wishes,” I too see the endless possibilities.<\/p>\n

I am glad\u00a0that we came\u00a0to the decision to homeschool<\/a> from a place of experience with traditional schooling. \u00a0I’m thankful that homeschooling is possible for our family. \u00a0And I am overjoyed that it is\u00a0working<\/em><\/a> for our family.<\/p>\n

So while I may not get the quiet time you do and my house is very well lived in. \u00a0And while I may never accomplish everything I wish I could or have enough “me time,” I revel in the possibilities of a child-filled home. \u00a0Because for us, “me time” is trumped by “we time” and we’re all better off for it as\u00a0we spend our days laughing with one another, learning together and loving each other.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I see you out there, all over the internet, sending your kids off to their first days of the school year.\u00a0 Your perfectly dressed children, holding cute little signs. I see their perfect little bento lunch boxes and their adorable first days’ “getting to know you” projects. I see your joy as you fill your […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5559,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,5,284],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8973","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-a-mommys-life","category-mommy-time","category-the-home-school-zone"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beyondmommying.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8973","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beyondmommying.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beyondmommying.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beyondmommying.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beyondmommying.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8973"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.beyondmommying.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8973\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9003,"href":"https:\/\/www.beyondmommying.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8973\/revisions\/9003"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beyondmommying.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5559"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beyondmommying.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beyondmommying.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beyondmommying.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}