Boy, when we moved to New Mexico I knew we were going to go through changes.  What I didn't expect was how many!!  We have a new home, a new church, new neighbors, a new town to learn, new friends to make, a new base to learn, new rules for homeschooling, and the last one I didn't see coming and didn't want to happen was.....sending our son back to public school!!  I had fully intended on homeschooling him through his HS years, I read a lot of books on the subject, including the one I reviewed on my site, etc, and was ready to begin 9th grade.  Unfortunately, that's not what happened. 

My son had begun having issues of being at home with his little sister (4th grade) and myself all the time.  He was dearly needing more peer interaction--he said.  Unfortunately the homeschool group we were involved with in South Carolina was mainly younger children.  We moved here and I was so thrilled to see some kids on our street that homeschooled and were my son's age.  I was also in the process of finding an older group for him to get involved with. That was good enough for him for awhile, but then he started getting an attitude with us about how horrible it was to be home ALL day with just us.....he began to HATE homeschooling....he begun to get an attitude with ME when I would try to help him...I am sure some of you can relate....

Anyway, one day, a week before the schools started here, we had a major blow out.  He thought if he went to public high school it would be a bed of roses....he would do so well in school, because he didn't have to be around us all the time, be distracted by his sister in school, etc, plus a lot of other things....Anyway, my hubby got really fed up with the disrespectfulness and attitude and thought--let's teach him a lesson.  If he thinks public high school would be SO much better, let him see for himself.  So we went down and enrolled him...then we sat down and told him our expectations.  We actually drew up a contract for our son to sign-- conditions....grades, attitude, homework, chores, etc....all high expectations with the condition we could bring him home at any time and would if he didn't tote the line.  He agreed to everything, thinking it would be great.  Was this a good decision on our part?  I really don't know still....but it was the decision we made at the time.  I have prayed every day since that God would protect him each day at school.  I'll close this entry since it's so long and continue this story in another.  I'd love to hear anyone's thoughts on this, especially if someone else has gone through a similar situation.