Author - Suzanne Broadhurst

Beginning its upward climb as a simple stalk straining it’s way out of Florida soil, my tree was at risk from day one.

I was counseled to rip it out of the ground when my precious planted-by-the-wind sapling reached the two foot mark.

“That’s a weed.” Labeled, at such a young age.

“It’s not a weed,” I insisted. (Some would say, pouted.)

I didn’t see it as a weed. I saw it as a gift from God. And somehow I saw it grow [in my imagination] into a big beautiful tree, albeit of unknown scientific nomenclature.

The talk of it being a weed continued, but my persistence in letting it grow did also.

I remember hearing such talk about my children when they were about two feet high, too:  “They are growing like weeds. Pull ’em out of your house and put ’em in school.”

Nope not me, I resolved. They may be growing like weeds, but they aren’t weeds. They are my children and I’m going to care for them myself. With God’s help. Right where they were planted by Him. In my home. In my heart. So there, Hurrah. And Hallelujah.

And so it was with my Weed Tree. I didn’t pull it. I let it grow. And it did.

And they did.

And now they are all three of them, two children and a nearly 30-foot tree, gifts from God, abounding, colorful, and bright spots in my life.

[insert a Jane Austen creation’s snooty voice]
“Weeds?! I should say not.”

(Just don’t look at the rest of my backyard!)

Fluttering by for now,

Firsts are tough.  Remember your first step?  Your first kiss?  Your first baby?  Your first curriculum purchase?  All tough, in their own way.

I think it’s the expectations.  We have such high hopes – or our parents do when it comes to that first step.  We want it to be a momentous occasion, we want it to be picture-perfect and website-worthy !

And then we take that first.  Everyone cheers!  Then we step again:  applause!  Then we run around the house and the adults give a new directive:  Will you please sit still!

Expectations are like that.  We get our hopes so high that when the firsts become thirty-firsts, it gets a bit old, so we need a little motivation to keep going, or to help us up off the carpet when the first step didn’t go as smoothly as we’d so very much hoped.  I can’t count how many times I’ve needed some encouragement to keep homeschool stepping.

Having experienced the birth of one child, I wanted another one right away.  It was a very good first step.  God blessed with a second, nineteen months after the first.  I wanted another 19 months after that, and another, and another.  But we don’t always get what we want.

Just look at my homeschool curriculum wish list.  It continues to grow, but so do my children.  I have less than two years left in the adventure of home education, but twenty years of curriculum on my wanna-use list.  I’m gonna have to find some other kiddos to edu-guide, since my children are not interested in relearning grammar just because mama found a new curriculum.

For now, I’m enjoying this second approach to homeschool graduation.  The first graduated well in 2011 and is enjoying his first round of college education, thankfully just ’round the corner from home.  My second, still in the homeschool oven, is browning nicely as her third year of high school heat gets turned up

If this is your first time to this blog, I hope that it is like the first day of a new year:  It’s a good start, but there are many more days to come!

As for my sign off, I feel compelled to add a note of family history to this very first entry:  My big brother, 13 years my senior, taught me many of the words I use today.  Hecalopter (an aircraft with twirly blades on top) and flutterby (a delicate-winged insect) being two of his, and hence my, favorites.

So, it is in his memory that I will be (most of the time)  …

Fluttering by for now,*

Suzanne
* That just sounds better than “Hecalopting for now …”