A Glimpse at May 2021

I pretty much know that I'm blogging into thin air these days {feel free to send me a note if any of you blog readers is still around}, but it's been fun trying to get caught back up to speed for our family records.    May was a very full month of getting ready for our move across the country and some other big and small things.   Here are a few of the highlights...

--In the course of going through things and packing up our belongings, I came across some awesome old pictures.  Here are a couple of my favorites....

Me in college with my Larsen cousins (the ones that named their rat after me)

Look how cute and  little my kiddos were!   This must have been winter 2000/2001.  

--When we came to Utah to hunt for the perfect house for us, we ended up taking a hike up to Horsetail Falls.   The trailhead for it is about 2 miles away from our new house and we'd never hiked it before, so we were excited to explore our future stomping grounds!  There was still snow on the ground and though we were very much still flatlanders and the elevation change (about 1600 feet) knocked our socks off, we enjoyed the hike and the scenery.    (MAY 1st)

--When we got back to Pennsylvania, we made sure to hike our favorite trails as often as we could, because we knew we'd miss them once we were gone.  The Schuylkill Canal Towpath was within a 5 minute drive from our home and it was one of our very favorites.  Lined with trees and  sandwiched between the Schuylkill Canal and the Schuylkill River,  there were always ducks and other wildlife along the trail.   Plus the scenery was peaceful and idyllic!  

Though the trail starts right in the middle of Phoenixville, the path was generally quiet and little traveled.  It  was often my first choice when we were deciding where to hike and I definitely miss it now that we're gone!   

--You can read all about it here, but we drove down to Tennessee for the LDSHE East Homeschool Conference and for a graduation ceremony for Adam.  

--Since AnnaLisa knew our time on the East Coast was short, she came up for another visit...something we've missed since moving away from Virginia!  It was great to spend time with her again!

--What can I say?   I mentioned previously that Pennsylvania was a hard place for us to live.  Not only was our church community spread out significantly more than our church community in Virginia, but most of our time was spent during COVID, which pretty much sucked.   Everything shut down instantly in PA.  There was no church, the kids' classes and activities all got canceled, and being the new people meant we didn't have our tribe yet.   We were very lonely.   After a year there we found ourselves needing to move houses again....smack in the middle of COVID.    At that point we knew we likely weren't going to be in PA long-term, so we tried hard to stay in the same ward.   Fortunately for us, that plan didn't work.   While we never did find our tribe in the first ward we were in (which was technically the 2nd Ward), we found instant connections in the second ward, which were exactly what we needed for our lonely hearts.  We unknowingly rented a house down the street from the Richards' family.  We didn't know them before we moved in, but their sweet family brought us so much joy during our year in Phoenixville!  

Weirdly enough, they were moving to Utah too...only a few weeks before us, so we spent as much time as we could with them before they moved!  

Little Emmaline won all of her hearts and I miss her cute smiles and happy conversations. 

--PACKING! This was our main occupation for the month of May!  Glen was working remotely and the rest of us packed, packed, and packed some more...and I resorted to caffeine and silliness more than once!     

--Our ward in Virginia had some great traditions for graduating seniors. As the end of the school year approached I asked our ward in Pennsylvania what they did and when they said, "nothing," I decided that we would just drive Adam to Virginia to participate with the Vienna Ward.   At this point, we knew we were moving and I had no desire to rock any boats, so I was happy with this plan.   Too bad me asking planted a seed and they wanted to hear all about it.  Next thing I knew, I was in charge of planning the first ever Senior Roast for the VF1st Ward!  

It was a lot of work in the middle of moving, but it was a smashing success!  Of the seven graduating seniors, I had only met three of them (including Adam) and all of them came except one! 

It was a fun way to honor the seniors and I heard nothing but great reports from the seniors and their parents.  A lot of them hadn't set foot at a church activity in a couple years and I loved meeting them for the first time. The best part was that the reports were so good that I think it may be a new tradition there.  The Bishop and youth leaders all said that they hoped to do in future years now.  

The snuggies were a gift for each of the seniors to remind them of the warmth of God's love for each of them and that they had a ward family cheering them on. 

 Here are Adam and Ellie with their good friend, Kennedy. 

--Ellie got her COVID vaccine!    She's under 18, so she had to get a different version than the rest of us, but she's good to go on her overseas trip this summer now!   In case you're wondering, yes, she's totally  magnetic now. 😆

--Here is Glen's ministering buddy, Don.   They spent a lot of time together in the couple months before we moved.  

--So we didn't need to go to Virginia for the Senior Roast, but Mormon Prom was another story.  They weren't doing ANYTHING of the sort in Pennsylvania and I was so sad to think that Adam would graduate from high school without ever having the experience of a formal dance or prom.  We happily drove down for the occasion and lent all the help we could in the short time we were there for!   

It was an absolutely lovely event and I was so happy that Adam was able to be a part of it! 

And Ellie too for that matter.  She wasn't old enough to officially attend, but she was thrilled to hang out with her friends and help serve food!

It was a great night for the teens...

and we hung out with the Palmers.  

All in all, it was a welcome reprieve from all the packing to spend time with old friends and to let Adam have a quintessential experience of high school.  

--At the end of the month we headed back to Utah to officially buy our house.  The day we got there we ended up rushing my dad to the hospital with sepsis.  He and my mom had just returned home from their mission and he was quite ill with an infection that settled into his bloodstream.   Thankfully he got to the hospital quickly, because it was a serious infection that took several days of hospitalization to recover from.  

Here he is after coming home...

In the meantime (between driving my mom to and from the hospital and visiting dad when we could), we tried to squeeze in some time at the LDSHE West Homeschool Conference as well.  It was our first time attending the West version and though it wasn't the same experience as being amongst "our people" in the East, it was still great to meet people and be inspired.  The kids had a great time making new friends and spending time with some East Coast friends that had come as well.  

We also enjoyed hanging out with Spence and his new pup, Kiwi. 

It was a full month that started in Utah, then brought us back to Pennsylvania, down to Tennessee for LDSHE and Adam's graduation, back to PA for packing and  life stuff, down to Virginia for prom, back to Pennsylvania  for more packing, then back to Utah with a hospital stay.    I'd like to say that next month calms down a bit, but it was just as crazy...

Thoughts on Homeschooling, LDSHE, and Adam's Graduation

Adam was in 5th grade when I started homeschooling him {and Ellie}.  I had no idea when we started how it would go or whether we'd keep it up for very long.  All I knew is that I felt strongly that it was the right thing to do and ultimately it ended up being a day by day, week by week, year by year endeavor.   The fact that we kept it up for 8 years was as much a surprise to me as it was to anyone else watching us from the sidelines.  

One of the most common comments I get when people find out we're a homeschooling family is that they could never homeschool their kids, because their kids are too social for that.     I'll tell you that no statement about homeschooling makes me madder.   There seems to be this prevailing notion that homeschooling families sit around the house all day, learning in a vacuum, and hiding out from the world.   Reality couldn't be further from the truth.   My kids are just as social as yours and  their learning is hands-on, individualized,  and engaging.  They interact with people of all ages (rather than only with the artificial age-group settings of school) and honestly, I often feel more like an educational manager, than a teacher most of the time.   My kids each learn very differently than each other and my job has been to find the resources they need to succeed.   

I share all this with you to preface my next statement.   

The last two years of homeschooling were by far our hardest.   Not only did we move away from our beloved homeschooling community in Virginia and start homeschooling in one of the most stringent homeschooling states in the country, but we also got shorted by COVID just like everyone else.   I think a lot of people assumed that we had it easier than them, because of the aforementioned misconceptions about what homeschooling is actually like.   But...just like everyone else...our school year got absolutely decimated.   All our in-person stuff either got canceled or moved to zoom.   All their activities ended prematurely.  AND, because we were new in a state without a lot of homeschoolers or LDS kids,  they didn't have an established group of friends to create a pod with.  We were suddenly living the homeschooling life that people think we live all the time and it was literally about as lonely as lonely gets.   To be completely honest, it was extremely difficult  for all of us, but especially for my very social kids.  

Thank goodness we  had each other.  

We all struggled, but in the process we all grew closer together and made it through.   And, in the middle of all that, Adam got into BYU. 

So, when LDSHE (a homeschooling conference for LDS parents/teens) rolled around this year (in May), we knew we had to find a way to be there.   Because of COVID, they'd moved it from a convention center in Virginia to an outdoor venue in Tennessee...which made it a 9-hour drive for us.   No matter.  We needed to see our tribe again and we needed to properly celebrate Adam's graduation!  

 After two years of isolation and being surrounded by masked strangers, it was a truly emotional experience to be there.   I cried to see my kids have face-to-face (without masks) interaction with people who knew them and loved them!  I ate up every conversation I had with old friends and I just relished being surrounded by people who got me!   No more explaining myself, trying to justify my life decisions, or trying to find my niche among people who really didn't seem to like me all that much (a story for another post).   

Being there was exactly the healing salve we were all craving.   

Pennsylvania was fully locked down until the day we moved away at the end of June, so this little reprieve in May was EXACTLY what we all needed.    

In addition to being schoolmates for the last 8 years, Adam and Ellie are also close friends.  

We did it!!! 

It was so fun to see Adam spend time with his fellow graduates and friends from our homeschooling co-op in Virginia.

Here are a few more pictures from the conference....

His graduation was as validating for me, as a homeschooling parent, as it was for him, a homeschooling student.   It really was a day to celebrate for all of us!  

On the way home, we stopped at New River Gorge National Park...

We went on a hike and soaked in the glorious views...

 

It was a wonderful way to end a wonderful few days!   And then it was time to get back home to packing and moving again.