St. Andrew’s Home School

Well, the original plan was to begin school on August 18th. It turned out I wasn’t really ready for that. I got behind on my prep work first with the temporary loss of my computer. I knew I could catch up with my own work if I put myself into high gear and worked double time in the evenings. But when I miscarried I just couldn’t face some days without a fog in my head. It is still so hard to explain what that is like, to hurt so badly yet to be so numb to everything else. (more on that journey here)

When I realized I did not have enough of my preparation together to start anyway (with me playing ketchup at night) I decided to take on a design job. I worked fast and furious during the week of the 18th to get the bulk of the work done so that all I had to do later was the final details as my clients decided what they wanted here or there. It turned out to be a very good decision as we needed the money for some unexpected expenses that arose. It felt really good to be able to take care of those things instead of worrying about how we would handle it. The only down fall of it was that the money I make on design is the money we want to use for Christmas and birthdays since those things can not be factored in to our regular budget - we just can not make enough of a savings dent in the regular income to allow for those things. I’ve been using my ad revenue on my personal blog to allow us some fun money and money for swaps and contests. By doing those things, more readers come by generating more hits and views thereby generating more ad revenue. I want to make it clear that I do not write for the money. I write because I want to write and because I enjoy writing. I enjoy the interaction with my readers as well.

I am thinking about putting up some ads on this site as well. I get over a thousand hits a month on our homeshcool blog. The files I put up to share got over 303 views and around 269 downloads. Did you see how many comments I got? Thank you faithful friends whose mothers taught you to be show appreciation. I’m finding more and more that on these homeschool blogs there is a large population that is all about “getting what I can for free.” I love free too. Who doesn’t? I figure if I’m going to share what we do for free, and I will continue to do so, and I’m not going to get thanks for it then I will just take advantage of the others and get some ad revenue out it. So enough about that.

Back to my original point - to begin again.

Since we didn’t start school on the 18th I had it in the back of my mind to start on the 25th. I had flirted with the idea all along about starting school on Tuesday, September 2nd, the day after Labor Day. We usually prefer to start school in mid-August so we can hit it hard at the beginning and take it a little slower around the Advent and Christmas seasons, hit it hard again in January and then enjoy the Spring a bit since we all usually have Spring Fever anyway. Last Saturday brought us two with fever and stuffy heads. By Monday there were five of us feeling yick with summer colds (wha??). It just didn’t seem worth fighting. So the decision was made - the day after Labor Day it is.

Tuesday - we begin no matter what. But guess what? We are fully expecting to be without power sometime Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday. Why you ask? One word: Gustav. Since we are in North Louisiana I don’t expect to get much, but being in a small town like ours means that when the wind blows even on a clear day we go without power for a few hours. Three years ago when Katrina hit and threw some storms and tornadoes our way from the spin off we went without power for two days. It will all depend on where G makes landfall. Of course we are praying very hard that where ever G lands lives will be spared and homes will still be standing.

I made sure we had plenty of batteries and flashlights on hand; we will be approaching school Tuesday borrowing the Postal Services motto: “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.”¹