Let’s all welcome this week’s Homeschooler of the Week: Trish from A Joyful Heart!

Tell us a little about yourself.
I’m quite honored ~ and thoroughly humbled. I believe on your blog you wrote something to the effect of “I’m just little ol’ me” ~ I feel that way so often! I learn something new about homeschooling almost every single day ~ you’d think after 13 years of homeschooling I’d have it all together and all figured out. Nothing could be further from the truth.

I live in a home full of males, which probably explains a LOT about me! I married my high school sweetheart ~ we have been married for over 18 years. We have 2 teenage sons and a 5-year-old black Lab. I grew up in Montana, and to date I have lived in 9 different states. I’ve been all over the US and Canada, including the Alaska Highway (also known as the Al-Can Highway). A few of my pastimes are knitting, crochet, papercrafts, reading and photography. I love dark chocolate and the smell of pumpkin spice candles.

When and how did you start blogging?
I started blogging about a year and a half ago. It all started because of a dare from my sons. I heard them talking about a friend’s blog one day, and I made the comment that blogging would be a great way for us to keep in touch with our friends and family who are spread out all over the world. The boys laughed at me, told me I was “too old to understand blogging” and then they dared to me try blogging for a month. Of course I accepted their dare, and began my first blog on TypePad. Within a week I had figured out how to put graphics, blinkies, links, photos and all manner of doodads and goodies on my blog, and had written several posts. I’ve stuck with it, and recently moved my blog from TypePad to Blogger. Guess I showed them, huh? LOL ~ call me too old; I don’t think so!

How long have you been homeschooling?
We began homeschooling when our oldest son started kindergarten ~ this is our 13th school year of homeschooling.

Our older son, Patrick, is currently enrolled in a small (about 250 students) high school for academically advanced students. By the time he was in 10th grade I couldn’t keep up with him. The high school he attends offers classes like quantum mechanics, vector mathematics and oracle database (I don’t even know what “oracle databse” means!). It’s the perfect environment for him.

Our younger son, Sawyer, is homeschooling 9th grade this year, and so far I’m managing to keep up with him. Having him home with lots of time for one on one teaching and attention has been an unexpected blessing of the older son being “in school”. Sawyer and I love to challenge each other. I think there are days when I learn far more from him than he learns from me.

Tell us a little about your children.
I have 2 boys who are both teenagers and complete joys to be with; Patrick is 17 and Sawyer is 15. Patrick is very much a first child ~ he is confident, a leader-type of young man, artistic, loves to sing, and is teaching himself to play the guitar. Sawyer is our jokester. He loves to push his brother’s buttons, and he knows exactly which buttons to push and how! He’s very active in our church’s youth ministry, youth choir, and homeschool co-op. Sawyer plays the French horn and has his father’s math brain.

Have either of your boys picked up your love for blogging?
Each of my boys started a blog, but neither of them has stuck with it.

Where do you do most of your homeschooling?
Pretty much wherever we feel like it! Mostly in our home ~ in the living room or at the dining room table. Sawyer prefers to do the majority of his work in his bedroom at his desk. We attend a homeschool co-op once a week, and we also join some friends at their house twice a week for chemistry class.

What is the hardest thing about homeschooling?
For me it’s planning. I’m not a planner ~ I’m more of a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants type of girl. I have found there are certain curricula that have very good teacher’s manuals, and they are a definite blessing.

I noticed y’all are a reading family. Do you have any favorite read-alouds from over the years?
We used Sonlight for years, and of course there are lots and lots of read-aloud books with that curriculum. We do love to read. I think the books we have enjoyed the most though are 2 books we started reading out loud when the boys were very little ~ Horton Hatches the Egg and Tales from the Thicket. They’re fun books to read, especially if you enjoy giving each character their own voice as you read aloud, which I do. It’s probably a little silly, but I still read those books out loud a couple of times a year, just for fun.

What do you love most about homeschooling?
I love that I have been able to spend so much of my boys’ childhood and teenage years with them. I love the freedom homeschooling gives us ~ it’s really quite portable, you know? We have been able to take trips and see things we would have otherwise missed. I love that my husband and I know exactly what it is that our kids are learning. Homeschooling has been the most amazing adventure for us ~ I wouldn’t trade the years we’ve homeschooled for anything in this world.

What is the strangest or funniest thing someone has said to you about homeschooling?
Well, there are the usual questions that I’m sure every homeschooler has faced: what about socialization? aren’t you afraid of sheltering your kids too much? Etc., etc. I guess the strangest questions have been, “Aren’t you afraid your kids will turn out to be geeks, or weird or something?” “Don’t you think you should leave the job of educating to the experts? I mean, what makes you think you’re qualified to teach your children? ” Wow ~ that opened up a really big can of worms!

Another time a friend said to me, “Trish, homeschooling is calling. My phone has NOT rung!”

Where do you usually buy your curriculum and other items?
We have bought curriculum from so many different places and companies I don’t think I can even remember them all! I guess our main curriculum in the past has been Sonlight ~ we’re huge readers. But we’ve never limited ourselves to just one publisher, curriculum or company. This year we’re using Beautiful Feet Books History Guides, Teaching Textbooks (math), and Apologia Science as our main texts. We have other curricula thrown in there as well. We like to buy our curriculum from small, family-owned book companies or from the publisher ~ we’ll buy from the big guys (CBD, Amazon, etc.) if we have to.

What is your favorite piece of advice for a new homeschooler?
I think the most important thing a new homeschooler should know is that there’s no such thing as “the perfect homeschooler”. There are just homeschoolers, and we’re all different from each other. I agree with my friend
about homeschooling being a calling. If God leads you to homeschool, consider it your call and your phone is ringing! Pray, pray, pray ~ about everything. Find a homeschooling mentor, read, research, learn what you need to learn in order to be somewhat knowledgeable, then pray, pray, pray again. It will be tough at times, especially at the beginning, but it will also be one of the most amazing journeys of your life.