Thursday, August 15, 2019

We made it through day one back to school! I dropped Sam off at his school first and as I drove around to exit I cried and prayed that he would have a good day. I then drove a few minutes away to Emma's school, parked, and walked her up to the school. We were a few minutes early before the doors opened and there were like a million people waiting to get in. There was a girl standing in front of us who introduced herself to Emma and this was this girl's first time ever to attend a public school. There were not many parents waiting with their kids, so I left Emma right before the doors opened to let them in. I walked back to my car and just sat and cried for a few minutes. I headed home and Chloe and I dove right into our homeschool lessons. I felt kind of bad for her because I knew the other two would not be doing work on the first day, but there would not need to be all the introductory stuff that goes with the first day of school. I only planned a few things just to ease her into it, but with one student we were finished pretty early. I told her not to get used to that, we would be doing much, much more the rest of the school year. I also realized that my task is going to be a lot harder than I thought 😓. We headed to the store to get a few more school supplies and then I anxiously watched the clock for 3:00 to come. It was finally time to get the other two so we headed out to pick them up. Emma seemed pretty excited about her first day. Things went pretty well for a first day and she ranked it at a 6 or 7. I sent a text to Sam letting him know I was on the way to get him and when asked how his day went he said he would tell me in the car and my stomach did some nervous turns. His morning started kind of rough because he could not fine his first class (which happens to be P.E 😡 but there are like eight gyms in that school). It was really frustrating because we tried to find the room number on the school map over the weekend but it wasn't on there. I emailed the dean about it and he said there would be staff to help kids find their classrooms, but everyone Sam asked didn't know where the room was either. He wasn't late to class, but it was pretty stressful for him. The other part that wasn't so great was the fact he doesn't know anyone. Those of you that know Sam or have ever been around him, he is pretty quiet (unless you really know him). He has a hard time introducing himself or get to know people, but the real struggle is that public school is a whole different story. Sam is unlike any almost 15 year old that I have ever met.He is so wise and the way he sees the world is not like most boys his age. A lot of  teenagers are so annoying (sorry if any teenagers are reading this) with the drama and recklessness they bring with them, and well Sam can't deal with that kind of nonsense. He gave his first day a 6 out of 10, but I know that high school is rough and I am praying that he isn't miserable all year. You see Sam made this sacrifice to switch schools to help me out. We had originally planned to keep him at his private school. The problem, the school is 45 minutes to an hour away from our house which would mean I would be in the car close to 3 hours every day going back and forth. It would also be better for us financially since I am not working, so I am praying (begging) the Lord to honor Samuel for showing honor to me in making the decision to attend the neighborhood school. My prayer all night and all day today has been that the Lord would send Sam a friend that he would connect with and I am asking anyone reading this to please pray for my son in this matter. He doesn't want to be Mr. Popular, but we all need at least one person in our lives we can connect with and have a friendship. I know it has only been one day, but my prayer is that even today he has made a connection with at least one person. I guess I should also clarify why Emma is not being homeschooled since that was the original plan. Our decision to homeschool was actually out of desperation to help Chloe. We kind of hit a wall on how to best help her be successful. My attention this year needs to be on getting Chloe the help that she needs with her education, behavior , and any mental health that needs to be addressed. The bottom line is that Chloe would not be successful  if Emma was around. I also could not adequately push her academically with Chloe needing so much attention. Our prayer is that we can get Chloe evaluated and get the help that we need and it would not be fair to Emma to drag her with us to any appointments.
One of the things I am really looking forward to this year is getting back to cooking and providing home cooked meals for my family. I had a feeling yesterday was going to be a little rough so we had chicken and dumplings to help ease any bad moments of the day. We got up this morning and started day two of this school year. I am anxiously waiting for 3:00 to get here.