Wow, these four amazing kids completed an entire year of online school. Turns out it is really hard in a lot of ways to teach yourself from a computer, keep your motivation up, keep turning in excellent work, without the benefit of study groups, in-person enthusiasm and variety, and still end with stellar grades and high praise from online teachers. It IS pretty great to sleep in every day, work from your bed, and have a personal tutor (MOM) at your right hand to help you. We did something I never thought we would do... "Home school" was a phrase I felt repeating itself in my brain one year ago, and despite all my misgivings, we essentially did a modified version of home schooling! We did it! I am so freakishly proud of us all.
To celebrate an excellent year, Kyle and I wanted to do something special... I heard of this website where you can rent someone's backyard swimming pool, and I thought THAT SOUNDS SO FUN considering they haven't swam in a pool for over a year, and we are still being super careful with COVID. So I had been researching pools, and sadly discovered Portland doesn't have very many in their system, and all the dates were booked up for the near future. Bummer. I had ended that week on a low point, with several things just hitting me very hard, and I sat lamenting to Kyle the difficulties late one Friday night. I told him "I really wanted this pool idea to work out, but there are no dates"... In order to explain this pool app, I pulled up my favorite #1 choice pool (it had a slide! hot tub! waterfall! pool toys! amazing patio! saltwater!) and showed him the lack of open dates... BUT WAIT, when what to my wondering eyes should appear... a two hour window miraculously opened on the evening of our last day of school... it was a Christmas-in-June miracle, straight from the hand of Jesus to a weary family who have experienced many disappointments in the last several months. I cannot describe how quickly I booked that pool, but let's just say in the twinkling of an eye, it was booked.
It was SO fun, and I know our trials have made a joyous occasion like this one even better. We had to overcome a kid with a stomach virus earlier in the week, federal jury duty, and pouring down rain. But when the day arrived, the clouds parted and we all got to share in our joy. Thank you Jesus!!
