What're You Doing This Weekend?

Ever been to a convention? As a veteran home-school student, there is really only one convention ever worth noting (and no, it's not a Trekkie expo): the Arizona Families for Home Education (AFHE) Home-schooling Convention. And yes, I am not ashamed to say, this was a social highlight of my school days! They actually had a "teen track" of speakers that had a plethora of relevant information and thought-provoking ideas that my friends and I really did enjoy and appreciate (and sometimes still discuss years later). And Rory and I still remember walking in the heat over to the Arizona Center for lunch from the food court (he always got "cool" food and I always ate the plain healthy stuff, of course).

And now, we are preparing to go again. It's been several years (dare I say ten???), but now we are going not as teens, but as parents. Wow. We are going to re-orient ourselves with that subculture of families known as home-schoolers. We are going more to learn what we should be learning and doing before we ask the same of our girl. We are going to start preparing for the daunting, highly overwhelming and we-are-not-one-ounce-qualified-for task of educating a young heart and mind.

Can I tell you how NOT ready we are?!

And yet, there is exitement brewing. Maybe you are like me and there is something attractive in the challenge. Something alluring in following a path not oft taken. Something convicting about doing what you know is right.

This is when I look to our parents. You know, those druggies from the seventies who God hand-plucked out of the mire to turn into diamonds of light comforting and guiding us to Truth? (We are so inviting them to come with us, by the way!) Their complete and total imperfection inspires me a lot right now. And I mean that as the greatest praise. If they can do it (and do a darn good job, I might humbly add--four college grads between them, two summa cum laude, ahem, and two teenagers still enrolled in college), then we can certainly give our best effort and hope, as I so do, to at least give our kids just a bump up, a little better view, the tiniest bit more than we had. And so, perhaps, that is all progress is. Taking all the good, all the glorious, all the raw material and gleaning just one bit more. And opening our eyes just that one degree further. Because we all know how far one degree can take us over years of steady plotting. (You can read more about my heart for home-schooling over here.)

So I don't know what you'll be doing this weekend, but we have plans to hear speakers explain things like:

• Seven Tools for Cultivating Your Child's Potential
• Rebuilding Your Education Paradigm: Teaching for Education Freedomship
• Cultivating Curiosity: Growing Your Little One's Love of Learning (We're both excited to hear the wonderful mother-daughter team leading this one--this is her blog)
  
• Teaching Boys and Other Children Who Would Rather Make Forts All Day (love the title!)
  

And of course, our highlight will be the hour led by Travis Turner, one of our favorite people in the world and the man who....well, who is like a second dad to both of us in so many ways.

There will be so much to do and see and we don't want to wait until we are ready to teach to start learning how. So home-schooling future full of trials and errors and mishaps we can blame on no one but ourselves that we hope somehow by God's grace only inspire and instill love in our children, here we come!

If you're interested, you can check out the convention website here. First-timers with preschool-age children and younger are FREE! And for more home-schooling info, check out this site. (Michael Farris, pictured at the bottom left, is the Keynote Speaker this year at the AFHE Convention and will be talking about parental rights, among other great topics.)