We're getting ready for school around here. The public schools start August 10th, while the private schools and most homeschools start around the same time. Classes, workshops, field trips, co-ops, sports and so much more are possibilities on the calendar that I am overwhelmed with choices.
It's easy to be busy. I want to say "yes" to all of it, and feel left out if I don't. But if we're too busy, I know, we won't have time for school days like this:
School days like this are at the heart of all I most want the children to learn: to love family, to enjoy each other, to care for nature, to see God in His creation.
These are the days that make me want to weep for joy. I get goosebumps when I think back on them. They make me smile. There is something so right about taking a child out into nature for science class. Instead of seeing a bug in a photograph in a science textbook, this child gets to observe it firsthand while drawing it.
When we run willy-nilly all over town to this and that class, we find ourselves "too busy" for nature, too scattered to be together, and too tired to be kind. The balance, for me, is deciding which classes are so valuable that they are worth missing moments like this.
