Sonlight Series, Entry 1

We recently made the decision to switch to Sonlight for our homeschooling. This will be my first blog in a series on the curriculum, starting with explaining why we decided to make the switch as well as some money saving tips, and covering first thoughts when we receive the curriculum, thoughts after the first couple of weeks of using it, and then periodically throughout the year touching on things that we love, and, if applicable, things that we do not love. At the end of the year I will give a final overview on what Rich and I thought, what the kids thought, and how well our children learned with it.

*Disclaimer* I am not being compensated for this in any manor. These are my own thoughts, and where applicable Rich and the kid's thoughts.


Before now, we have been using a mix of various curriculum, and I was beginning to feel rather overwhelmed realizing that I would now be trying to balance that for three separate levels. It has honestly been enough of a challenge to balance time for everything for just two kids.

I have always thought full curriculum was not for us. I liked to be able to customize things more, and hated how expensive it was, and how hard it was to find every single piece you needed used, because you need tons of pieces that are only available new from them. I also really prefer learning through literature verses doing lots of worksheets.

The first thing that attracted me to Sonlight was the amount of reading. A lot of the curriculum is reading together. Yes, there are still work sheets that the kids are supposed to do, but they are limited and mostly focused on teaching children to love to write. I think this is great, as I love writing. Even with that aspect, though, I was really turned off by the price, and the amount of time it would take me to teach three levels with this. Then my friend told me about something awesome that they offer. They actually make it easy to group kids that are close enough in age together so that they are doing a lot of the core work together, drastically reducing the teaching time required. It also cuts down on the price a good deal. Lastly, I did find out that they offer time payments. They will break your total into four payments, the first is due immediately, then they have different lengths of time available for the other three payments. It is interest free. This helped us as our payments are almost exactly what we set aside for school needs every two months, so that is the option we went with. If we stick with this curriculum next year, I will budget ahead of time and be prepared to pay up front since I truly hate owing money, but it was definitely a nice option that helped us make the decision to go ahead and dive in for this year.

I will also mention that for the girl's Pre-Kindergarten things, I tracked most of them down used. I also did this with Tobiah's readers, although I could not find two books in particular (or at least not for less expensive than Sonlight offered them) so I ended up ordering those. It did help that we had several of Tobiah's readers already (which is GREAT! I certainly love that Sonlight uses regular books verses books only offered through them for the majority of their teaching), and one of the girl's books. I managed to save about $200 by ordering the books this way. I likely could have managed to save more, but it was already pretty overwhelming to track the long list of books I had down, and the thought of doing that for more was a bit too much for me to handle in a short amount of time. I feel like I picked a good middle ground between making things a bit easier on myself and saving money. Again, assuming we continue to be happy with the choice we made to switch to Sonlight, I will likely work on tracking down the list for next year all year long, eliminating the need to make a choice between saving money and not completely overwhelming myself. The one thing I want to ensure that I do, though, is to buy at least ONE core from them each year, as this gets you a 10% off all purchases made for an entire year, as well as free shipping on all orders. This has already come in handy with a book that I thought I had found, only to have the seller refund my money. I could not find it inexpensively anywhere else and managed to get it for very cheap from Sonlight-the one I originally bought that was refunded was only 50 cents cheaper than ordering from Sonlight.

The things that I did make a point of just buying new were all the teachers guides, which come with the student worksheets and really everything you need but books themselves for the older kids. For the younger girls I had to buy four work books each, but they were not terribly priced. You can find the teachers guides used on various websites where people sell their used curriculum, and I also found them at Homeschool Potpourri here in Washington (but remember, even if you are from out of state you can call Homeschool Potpourri and make a phone purchase!), but for this year at least I decided to just buy them new. If I can find them in good enough shape for next year, I may do things differently. We will just have to wait and see.

So, there you have it. A big and exciting update about our homeschool journey, the reasons why I decided to make the switch, and a few pointers to save some money. Check back soon for my next post in this series about our first impression when receiving the curriculum.

The truth behind the man I tease

Ok, I love to poke fun at my husband on Facebook. It's a lot of fun to tease him. However, I feel the strange need to actually be nice to him, so here is the week my husband has had so far...

Monday was "normal". He got up at his normal time, did some chores, got dinner in the crock pot, and went to work, which takes over an hour. Spent eight hours at work fulfilling his various duties that help ensure the computers for the regions biggest hospital (Harborview) stay running. Then he commuted home, again taking over an hour. On his way home he stopped at the store to get me ice cream. He got home and all the kids excitedly piled on him, then he got them a snack. He then got me a bowl of ice cream and took over child care responsibilities so I could rest and take it easy after a long day. He also made sure to do math lessons with all four of the older kids since he has decided that he wants to fulfill that part of their schooling, which all I have to say about is THANK YOU! I hate math. After feeding the kids supper he put them to bed and spent the next hour ensuring they stayed put. Then he eventually came to bed and helped me fall asleep, then got back up and did some more chores (one of which was taking care of the chickens he never wanted).

Tuesday was much the same, only I had way over done it chasing the stupid chickens that got outside, so I was having tons of contracts and completely miserable and on the verge of crying while biting his head off for dumb stuff that didn't even matter. So he caught the stupid bird I could not catch then took care of my cranky self AND the kids.

Wednesday again was much of the same, until after work when he found out his train was having problems. He sent me a message letting me know what was going on and we ultimately decided he would take the light rail to our old neighborhood and I'd meet him there, which was a compromise between figuring out a way for him to get to Auburn on his own (possibly taking hours) and me needing to drive clear to Seattle. When we got home I very quickly realized the contractions I had been having since I woke up were getting worse, so I tried to find a sitter, and when I could not Rich drove me to the hospital, dropped me off, then went back home to get my phone charger since I had forgotten it and wanted something to do while I was being monitored. He then brought it to me, and proceeded to go home and take care of the kids and clean the house up. Then he came back and got me past 11pm, and helped me fall asleep. Then around 2am Jeanette woke up SCREAMING, and he tended to her, trying everything he could think of to calm her down, and ultimately dozed in a chair holding her for an hour or so before laying her back down.

Thursday morning he got up early to start getting everything we needed for the day ready, having the intention of allowing me to sleep until it was time to go. He prepared the kids breakfast (they always eat at therapy verses before we go), got diapers together, then one by one got the kids up. This is a task in and of itself, as when you wake my kids that early they are ALL cranky, and the fit Ruth threw in particular was extreme. He got all five kids dressed (even if he only buttoned the top button of Nette's dress), got their shoes on, and got them in the car. Then he came upstairs and woke me up from a very groggy state (I had taken benedryl to counter the shaky on edge feeling the drugs they gave me at the hospital left me with), brought me my clothes since I was having trouble waking up, then helped me find my shoes. He drove to Seattle, and he hung out with the kids while I went to the pharmacy to get some Tylenol for poor Nette who was not feeling well. He pushed me around the zoo in a wheel chair (I weigh more than him and was also holding our 20lbs Jeanette), humored me when I wanted to stop and buy more chicks, waited in the car with the kids while I ran inside various places, then when we got home he let me go upstairs and relax for a while. He mowed the front yard, took care of the kids (ok, he turned the TV on for them, but I am not faulting him here), and tidied the house. After a bit he had the kids start working on chores. Then we had our cupcakes to celebrate Naomi's speech therapy graduation, and I promptly left after that for an HSA leadership dinner. While I was gone, he bathed Zeke, moved his kennel in the house, moved the pen he was in to a different part of the yard, put a cover on it, put the chicken coop in it, and put the chickens in it. He also set up the chicks, did some chores with the kids, did math with the kids, cleaned, hung the diapers he had washed at some point, and got the kids in bed. Then he waited patiently for me to come home, and even more patiently when I sat in the driveway chatting with my friend for an hour and a half. By this point it was about 11pm, and he then helped me go to sleep and finally fell asleep, exhausted, himself.

Today is Friday. He got up at 4am to do patch work for work since he is on call, did some chores, and went to work. Today is the first day of something they call TGIF, which basically means in the summer, if you get your work done early, you get to come home early. We're both very excited about this. He is going to come home and take me to Puyallup to fulfill yet another random pregnancy craving, then I am quite sure he will come home and want to work on a million different little projects around the house. This weekend, he won't take time to have fun unless I force him. He will instead work like a dog to help prepare things for when our newest little girl arrives. He is also going to make a dump run with my step dad then help him make a trip from their storage locker to their new house.

Yes, I love to poke fun at my husband. I love to tease him. I am married to an incredible man, though, that does so much for our family, constantly sacrificing of himself to ensure that things are running as smoothly as they can and to ensure that I do not over do things. I am blessed beyond words to have such an amazing husband.

For my best friend on Father's Day

You are shaping and molding six precious lives, and while I know you feel like you are constantly falling short, you aren't. You do so much right. The fact you care that you may be falling short is further proof of the amazing heart that you have for your babies. So here is the kind of father I see when I look at you:

One who is not afraid of the dirty work, even if you hate it.

One who spoils them every time you think I am not looking.

One who creates elaborate routines with them that they love and cherish.

One who strives to nourish their bodies with healthy food.

More importantly, one who strives to nourish their souls.

One who includes them in hobbies, even if you know it drives me crazy (WOT anybody?).

One who loves to teach.

One who protects.

One who let's them experience life outside a bubble.

One who understands that even when it hurts your heart, discipline is important.

One who tries to be the best he can be, and asks for help when he doesn't know what to do.

One who is willing to sacrifice personal needs for their needs.


I could go on indefinitely. You are an amazing dad, and I hope today you understand how important you are to these kids, and how important you are to me. I hope you realize even when you feel like a failure, they look at you with love and see the Daddy that plays with them, puts medicine on their owies, snuggles them, cheers them on, and lifts them up when they are down. You are their superhero. We all love you. Happy Father's Day.

I remember when...

Fair warning, this post is about something that is heavy on my heart today. I try to keep an upbeat attitude about the fact that I have children on the autism spectrum. I am a very firm believer in the fact that this is NOT a death sentence, that it is NOT the end of the world, and that my kids will grow up to be the amazing people God created them to be.

Sometimes, though, it makes me sad.

Sometimes it gets hard.

And sometimes, like today, I remember what my life was like before we knew anything was wrong.

Before the heartache.

Before the fear.

Before the confusion.

When we were a "normal" family.

Today, autism is hard. Today, my heart hurts, and I miss the plans and dreams I had for my kids. I miss the life I thought we would live. I miss the simplicity of what my existence was.