2 Reasons Why I didn’t take pictures…
2 Reasons Why I didn’t take pictures
I’ve never been great at remembering to take pictures. Since having an iphone it has gotten considerably easier but I still don’t take as many pictures as I should. So back when we first started homeschooling I had a compact Nikon camera. Don’t laugh, it was cool then! However, capturing moments that happened in milliseconds wasn’t realistic, especially since it took several seconds to turn on and then another several seconds to focus and by then the moment had passed into tomorrow.
Like I mentioned in my previous blog post, we often felt like fugitives for the first several years. When we would run errands during school hours my kids were always questioned as to why they weren’t in school. When we confessed we were homeschoolers it apparently became the job of the employees of said stores to make sure I was doing my job correctly by virtuously quizzing my kids on various math concepts. So to avoid said interrogations, we did our very best not to go out before all the school kids got home from school. It often felt like I really had nothing new to take a picture of, I mean, we were just doing school. Pictures of our school days, the kinds of curriculum we used, what the online videos looked like, what reading time looked like, what books we read, what projects we created, just seemed dull and mundane to keep record of. Now I understand why I should have done that!
Of course a big reason why I didn’t take pictures was because of fear. When we first started homeschooling we lived in Arizona so we didn’t have to provide the school district with any proof of progress at all. So you would think that I would not have been so fearful. But once fear gets a hold, no matter how small, it does funny things, don’t you agree? I kept a paper trail so I could “prove” they had done the work if we ever needed to do that. But pictures? No pictures. I didn’t want people to know what we were doing in case they thought we were doing it wrong. Lots of people didn’t “agree” with what we were doing so I certainly didn’t want to give them digital proof that we were reading the wrong books, or my kid’s handwriting wasn’t perfect enough or their art projects weren’t up to snuff. The goal was to keep our heads down and stay out of the limelight.
BIG MISTAKE! Now as I’m helping other moms navigate their homeschool journey I don’t have any progress pictures to share. However, I do have the paperwork, the books, the workbooks, the flashcards, the curriculum we never used. I have it all. I kept it for proof, as an insurance policy so to speak. Now, it’s 12 years of memories and it's beautiful.
When we started homeschooling I had no idea how large of a movement I was joining. It wasn’t until I went to my first homeschool convention that I started to grasp that I was not alone.
This homeschool journey is a wild ride. I felt alone and isolated our first few years and I don’t want you to feel like that!
So, send me an email and tell me how you conquered fear today. For me, I conquered my fear today by sharing with you how fearful I was and how that fear cost me physical representations of my memories. I no longer live in fear and it’s freeing!
You don’t have to share your pictures with the world if you don’t want to. But take the pictures, cherish the memories. Time passes faster than we expect.
Your friend in action and faith,
Karena
P.S. If you need help conquering your fear, grab a copy of my Free E-book, Road to Homeschool.
