Happy New Year! I hope your new year has had a good start. Despite all the distressing news I read in the media, I am hopeful that 2020 will be a good year. I hope it will contain more good than bad. I believe that no matter how misguided some people may be, deep down everyone wants to live a peaceful life that is in harmony with others. I hope that this desire will eventually lead people to see what actions are most helpful to the world, and they will carry out those actions. I hope this even if I don’t always feel it’s possible.

Thinking of actions that are most helpful to the world, I sometimes feel helpless that I can’t do more. My time and mental energy is strapped. And, yet, I feel I’m doing something very important. I’m raising two children, and not only this, I’m homeschooling them. I’m trying to give them a wide view of the world — not a narrow one! I tell them about all kinds of different people, cultures, beliefs, and ideas. I will keep telling them about these things, and hopefully, when they are finished with their homeschooling, they will continue to learn on their own. Above everything, I try to teach them that learning never stops. We should never assume that we have the answers to everything.

My action in this world is an investment in the future. I can only hope that my boys will be compassionate, giving and kind-hearted people. I don’t expect them to be famous or passionate activists, though maybe they will be. They can be whoever they want to be. But I do expect them to be kind to everyone they meet. I expect them to at least not be blinded about other people’s suffering. I expect them to care about the Earth and its future because that is how you care about the future inhabitants of Earth, including your great-grandchildren.

We can’t all make big, grand gestures, but that’s okay. I think all the small actions, the small stones, ripple out farther than we can possibly know. I hope that my blog is a small stone. I hope all the time and effort I put into homeschooling is a much bigger stone.

Speaking of my blog, you may have noticed that for this past year, I have mostly written monthly updates vs. “how to homeschool” posts. I think this is a natural progression as my boys get older, but also, the old format doesn’t seem necessary anymore. That’s because this blog contains years worth of elementary homeschool posts, and I think that’s more than enough information to help people on their homeschool journey.

I’ve enjoyed writing it all, and I’ve especially enjoyed the rare comments and emails I get telling me that my posts are helpful. As I go forward with middle school and high school, however, I’m going to move my exclusively homeschool content to MY STORE in form of pdf resources. And, yes, I’m going to sell the information for a small amount of money. While I love writing and sharing, and I would do it free forever, if I could, we are making huge sacrifices while homeschooling, and I just can’t do all this work for free anymore. I hope you understand.

I will, of course, write a post introducing any new resource I write, and I still have two years of elementary school with my younger son, so there may be a few posts about that. But for the most part, I want to use this blog as my place to relax from a busy day and reflect on daily life, nature, books, music, (maybe documentaries?), and other things I’m learning whether it’s with the boys or not. In other words, I’ll keep writing my monthly updates.

If you have read this entire blog post, thank you, and if you have been a regular reader of my blog, I thank you even more. Have a wonderful 2020!