I stopped by the local vet clinic the other day to pick up a few needles from my neighbor, the vet.  She asked me who watches my children when I come into town?  My anti-homeschool radar sounded and I said well my husband is there....(we live on a ranch so of course he is always there, somewhere).   Then she said no, she meant "Who TEACHES your children when you are in town?"   I thought that was a silly question but I told her they were playing and doing chores.  She gave me a lecture about ....that is what is wrong with homeschooled children.  They are not made to stick to  a schedule and therefore they don't learn what is like to work a job. 

Of course my mind was thinking....what if they are self-employed, ranchers like their father or a stay at home mom like me.   So I pointed out to her that the local school starts at 8:15 and dismisses at 3:43 but they get recesses and spend 5-10 minutes lining up for this and that and taking turns going through lines and wasting oodles of time waiting for everybody to finish so they can move on to the next thing....and that when you homeschool, you get the learning done in much less time.   She continued that it was wrong for me not to have them schooling for 8 set hours a day. 

I wanted to really get into a debate over this but since she is the only vet around that I can get my Rx for the animals from...I can't alienate her...not with the price of gas.

It took me by surprise.  I know it shouldn't have bothered me but it set my guilt-o-meter going sky high thinking about the last two weeks of Oct and first two of November when I was 1000 months pregnant and couldn't "teach" very much...and the next couple of weeks when I was dealing with 4 birthdays, Thanksgiving and a huge winter storm.  Or the fact that almost all of my time was spent with the new baby and the 2 year old who wasn't ready to give up his position as the baby.   I looked at the "schedule" I had set up and felt guilty that we were not on track.   But then my 11 year old came in an told me we need to make a run to the storage because the "done" books were overflowing out of the boxes. 

I may not have taught as many classes as I had planned but I did teach my son the love of reading and the love of learning.  I have spent endless hours at library sales, rural school auctions, used book stores, websites and eBay finding good quality books for him to read.   So what if he is in 5th grade and doesn't know the capitals of the states.   I am 43 years old, the mother of 7 ages 23- 4 months.  I worked as a waitress, went to college, worked at a bank, worked at the State Library, worked in government purchasing, worked in governmental, private and corporate accounting, did outside sales, did phone sales, worked in a hay field, did daycare, and now I do bookkeeping, raise meat goats, lead 4-H, coach soccer, homeschool and other things and I have never once needed to know the capitals of the states since I left elementary school!!!   He is advanced in his reading, English, Latin, History, and Science.  He is right on track on Math and he is responsible, reliable, honest and caring.  He loves Our Lord, his family, his country and all people.  I'd say  he is getting a pretty good education.

This is my first attempt at Blogging so please bear with me and any friendly advice is welcome.

I am the mother of seven, yes, seven children.  All boys except the third to youngest.  They are ages 23, 21, 11, 6, 5, 2, and 4 months.  I am also the grandmother of one beautiful 4 year old girl, Baylie.  My oldest son, Brandon, went to private school for preschool, then public for Kindergarten and first grade.  His preschool teacher happened to do her student teaching at the public school and called me and told me, "No matter what it takes, Jenifer, you have got to get him out of public school, before it is too late.  I can already see a terrible change in him."  With her help, we found a way to put him back in private parochial school where he remained until the end of 8th grade.  My second son attended private parochial schools for two years of preschool and then K thru 1/2 of 6th.  Unfortunately we moved to Nebraska where there was only one very large parochial school which is very liberal so I sent them both to a very small public school.  My oldest, graduated in a class of 7 kids in 2003 and the next graduated in a class of 17 in 2005.   After that experience I will never put the other five children in public school.  I was fortunate that this little school has never had a drug or violence episode, ever.  But, they focused so much on making the child feel good about themselves and expressing their individuality and tolerance...and other politically correct things that their education was put on the back burner.  Also band and sports were far more important than academics.

But my two oldest have a solid foundation in their faith and they were taught the basics and Latin in the parochial schools so they both did well.  My oldest has returned to Alaska and is in the Electrical Union working full time.   My second son is in the U.S. Air Force.  He recently returned from a two year tour in South Korea.  He will remain stateside until August then he will ship out for the Desert.   Please remember him in your prayers.  His name is Kyle.

I sent my third son, Troy, to HeadStart for a little over 2 years.   I stayed and volunteered quite often.  I discovered I liked teaching.  I was an Accountant for the state government and I was an assistant manager at a large grocery store prior to becoming a stay at home mom in 1999.

My experience with homeschooling was limited to my sister who had homeschooled her three children in Alaska and Idaho, where I also lived, and while living in logging camps in Alaska as a child, the high schoolers often had to do "correspondence" since most camps only had a teacher for K-6 or K-8.

I love reading the classics a-loud.  I love discussing history and good literature with my 11 year old.  I have to admit I am not a big fan of science but since he is, he has been developing my interest in it.  I was a 4.0 student so all subjects were easy for me, but that didn't mean I enjoyed them.  I am one of those people who can read something, understand and remember it the first time.

That brings me to my 4th son.  Javin was born with Autism.  He had symptoms from birth on.  I delayed his immunizations for many many months and his symptoms only worsened.  There was no change after any of his immunizations so in his case, it was not caused by immunizations.   I believe it was caused by the chemicals I was breathing and were being absorbed through my skin while I was pregnant.  (more on that theory later).  He had in-home early childhood education and speech for several years and then he went to one year of preschool when he was three at the special education unit.  Then I did the second year of preschool at home and now Kindergarten.  He goes into town for speech once a week.  We are blessed that it is the same speech therapist that used to come to our home.  So far I have really enjoyed teaching him.

My only daughter, Taryn, is a daddy's girl and is my daily cross.   I pray everyday for patience and for guidance in raising her.  Any helpful hints here would be welcomed too!   She is smart, loves to draw, ride horses, pretend, sing and be with the kittens, puppies, baby goats, calves, and colts.   But she is also very strongwilled, stubborn, smart mouthed, too talkative, loud and throws huge fits, which dad gives into.   I always wanted a little girl that was ladylike, spoke softly, loved to brush her hair....(can't tell you when she brushed it last)...wanted to play quietly and learn to be a lady.  She is NOT a tomboy.  She only plays with girly toys.   She loves pretty things, dresses, dishes, hair ribbons and anything pink or purple.   She loves Strawberry Shortcake and Dora.  But truly she is louder than all 5 boys put together.   HELP??!!

Luke is all boy!  We call him our Trail Boss.  He wears his cowboy boots and his hat and loves to ride horses and ride in the tractors.   He especially likes to ride through the fields with me in my Jeep.  Mom drives much faster than Dad.   He is just beginning to talk, which is unusual for my kids expect the Autistic one.  Zeke, the baby is the sweetest, most content baby I have ever seen.  He smiles and giggles and coos.  He really doesn't cry more than a couple of minutes.

We raise cattle, meat goats, chickens, alfalfa, corn, soybeans, rye and prairie hay.   We use horses to round up the cows and drive them.  We use llamas as livestock guardian animals.  We have farm and barn cats to control mice, guineas to control bugs, dogs to control rabbits (Beagles and a Golden Retriever).  We have ducks to make us laugh and a very old housecat and one little dauchsand (sp).

We live in a rural area where homeschooling is not viewed on favorably.  Also, I am not "from here" and this is an extremely close knit community.  So I would love to hear from others with large families, people who live far away from their family, friends and home state, classical and Charlotte Mason homeschoolers, parents of high functioning Autism, goat lover's and people who are trying to live a more natural, homesteading kind of life.