The Start of My 15th Year Homeschooling

Monday, August 24 2026, I will begin my 15th year of homeschooling my children. 

It all started in 2011 when my oldest was 4.  I had just come home from working for 3 years to be a SAHM after the birth of my second child.  This wasn't just a temporary thing...I was going to permanently be a SAHM and I was so happy about it. 

A few weeks after giving birth to Liam I decided to begin PreK with my oldest, Ruy.  He was eager to learn to read and write.  I bought the Horizons PreK pack and our homeschooling journey began. 

At this point, I wasn't sure if I'd homeschooling him in Kindergarten or not.  I just knew that right then, he wanted to learn and I felt capable and excited about teaching him. 

He learned a lot that first year, and before starting Kindergarten he was reading small books like the Bob Books.  I was so proud of him.  

 I needed to decide if he would be attending public school or be homeschooled for Kindergarten.  I looked up the bus schedule and school schedule.  It said the bus would pick him up around 7am and drop him off around 4pm.  I looked at my husband and we both knew without having to really say anything....there was no way I was going to have him gone from 7am-4pm.  I closed my laptop and the next day began researching what I wanted to use to teach him Kindergarten.

...and that's how my homeschooling journey began.

I'm now at the beginning of 15 years of homeschooling. 

This year I will be teaching my first year of high school.  Due to custody changes with my son Ruy, he started attending public when he was in 5th grade and graduated from public school in 2025.  So, I will be teaching high school for the first time this year with my son Liam.  I will aslo be teaching 7th grade, 5th grade, two in K5/1st grade...(my twin girls will be finishing K5 and beginning first grade in the next few months),  and two in PreK.  My two year old daughter Bridget will be joining in with whatever the other four younger ones are doing because she doesn't like to not be a part.  

I've taught in so many different homes, so many different seasons, so many grades. 

I've learned so much from teaching year after year...and not just from the schoolwork, but about myself, about patience, endurance, discipline.   Homeschooling is a full time job, that requires so much of you.  It is hard, it is wonderful, it is sanctifying, and it is so incredibly rewarding. 

The memories and the time with my children during all of these years is priceless. 

I'm beginning this 15th year of homeschooling with more grades than I've ever taught before, and more responsibility than I've ever had before...but I'm beginning it feeling pretty prepared and pretty confident.  

I researched, I planned, I organized, I prayed, I reflected, and I made some changes. 

I think this 2026-2027 school year is going to be a really good one. 

And I am so excited to document our homeschool days and share them with you. 

I hope it encourages you and inspires you in your own homeschooling journey. 

Xo, 

Lauren 

I SOLD ALL OF MY KIDS' YOTO PLAYERS

 I sold all of my kids' Yoto players.

For a LONG time before I bought them, I researched them over and over.  My first thought was always "This seems way too complicated."  Eventually, I convinced myself I must be overthinking it...so I bought them. 

For the next few years, I tried to make them work.  But I never could.  Not because they're a bad product and not because my kids didn't enjoy them.  I sold them because I couldn't keep up with them. 

...charging the players, keeping up with all of the cards, making new cards, learning MP3 files, keeping track of it all.  It didn't make my life better, easier, or more joyful...anytime I had to deal with them all I felt was dread and guilt.

About a year ago, I bought each of my older kids as CD player for their bedroom and a portable CD player for in the car.  The little ones are getting a CD player in the school room.

We gave them Nathan's and my old CDs, started checking out audiobooks from the library, and they've slowly started collecting their favorite soundtracks, Adventures in Odyssey, and Patch the Pirate CDs, etc.  One of their favorite things now is digging through the CD section at Goodwill to see what treasures they can find. 

This isn't an anti-Yoto post.  I actually think Yoto is a wonderful company with a great concept.  

This is a post about permission. 

Permission to let go of things that aren't serving your family.  Permission to stop forcing something just because everyone else seems to love it.  Permission to do things differently.  

For me as the mother...things need to be simple.  Things need to be uncomplicated.  They need to be easy to manage.  If something feels like one more things I have to keep up with, eventually I won't keep up with it.  

Since coming home from the hospital after my miscarriage in June, I've been ruthlessly decluttering our home.  Not because these things are bad.  But because I've been asking myself the same questions over and over...

Does this make my life easier?  Does this bring me joy?  Or do I feel a sense of dread every time I have to deal with it?

If it doesn't bring me joy...if it's not easy to manage...if I don't need it in this season and won't need it again anytime soon...I've been letting it go.

And honestly...that has been incredibly freeing. 

Where Have I Been?

Hello friends...The last time I wrote here, we were celebrating our first Christmas in the RV. 

Several years have passed...a lot has changed...and a lot has remained the same.

James and Fionna were just a couple months old. We were living in a  tiny space with 8 children, (multiple sets of twins,) trying to find land in the country.

Life kept going even though I wasn't posting here.

I stopped writing here. Not because I stopped loving this space...but because my focus shifted away from long form writing for a season.  I poured energy into growing on Instagram.  I listened to the voices saying blogging was dead.  I thought maybe long-form writing didn't matter anymore.

But over the last few months, I've realized something...it matters to me.   Whether it's the main way people consume content or not- I love writing in this space. 

I love slowing down.  I love documenting our days in more than captions.  I love finishing a post and knowing it holds a full thought.  

Blogging brings me joy.  And that's a season to return to. 

Since that post...

We were pregnant with our third set of twins.

We miscarried one.

We moved out of the RV.  We bought a house out in the country on 3 acres.

We miscarried again.

We’ve been living in the country for two years now.

The babies grew.

The older kids grew taller.

Homeschool continued.

Our days filled out in new ways.

There were seasons of pregnancy and postpartum.

Seasons of grief. Seasons of great joy.

Seasons of adjusting and rebuilding.

 One thing that stayed steady was how we ran our home.

We still made beds every morning.

We still cleaned up after every meal.

We still reset before leaving the house.

We still protected quiet time.

We still homeschooled at the table.

Even in the RV.

Even during moves.

Even when life felt uncertain.

The rhythms held.

Over the past few months I’ve been writing more intentionally.  Not because our life suddenly changed...but because I began to see more clearly what has stayed the same.

The rhythms.

The steadiness.

The way our home runs quietly in the background of everything else.

I’ll still be sharing our days here.

Homeschool moments.

Ordinary dinners.

Little snapshots of life with nine children.

But I’ll also be putting language to the systems that carry us...

the ones that have held through moves, pregnancy, grief, and growth.

That’s where I’ve been. Living it. Refining it.

And slowly preparing to share it more fully.

If you’ve been here since the RV days or longer, thank you.

If you’re new, welcome...I’m glad you’re here.

You can read my updated ABOUT ME page HERE or my updated MEET THE CLAN page HERE

Our First Christmas In The RV

 Our First Christmas In The RV….

Christmas Eve my husbands truck broke down on the way to work.

Two of my kids got into a huge fight and I wish I’d responded differently.

2nd Set Of Twins (Jamie + Fionna) Birth Story- Part 2 We're Having Our Babies

Part 2 of Jamie and Fionna's Birth Story

Read Part 1 HERE

I woke up the next morning feeling very nauseas.  My braxton hicks contractions seemed to be a little more intense as well.  I got out of bed and went about my normal routine of getting coffee and reading but I felt so nauseas and threw up. I had no signs of being sick like a fever or anything like that so I assumed the vomiting had to do with pregnancy and that maybe I was just having an off day.  The nausea continued though throughout the morning after the kids were up.  As we were getting ready for the day, I threw up several times. 

I told my husband about it when he got up.  He planned on staying home but I told him to go to work because I didn't feel like I was in labor.  My contractions were not really any different than they had been for weeks.  He felt I was in transition though because the only time I have ever thrown up during the end of a pregnancy is when I am getting close to the end of labor and nearing delivery.  That made him really nervous.  I assured him I was going to be fine and to please go to work.  

Soon after he left though, I threw up once or twice more and just really didn't feel well.  I called him and told him that it would probably be best if he just turned around and came home.  We talked when he got back home and I decided to go ahead and call my midwife and try to get an appointment.  

I got an appointment for 12pm that day which was just 1.5 hours from when I called in. We rushed to get everyone together and in the van to make it to my appointment on time. 

When I got there, my midwife was unavailable since she was delivering a baby but one of the doctors saw me.  She did an ultrasound and said the babies looked great but didn't feel the need to check me because clearly I wasn't in labor.

 (Photo from my 36 week check up)

2ND SET OF TWINS (JAMIE + FIONNA) BIRTH STORY PART 1- THE DAY BEFORE

 Monday, July 25 2022... 

37 weeks 2 days pregnant. I felt like a ticking time bomb.  I was almost to the same point where I had my twin girls at 37 weeks 5 days.  It was literally a big waiting game at this point which can be very mentally exhausting because you are just wondering and waiting for at any minute to go into labor. 

I had a lot of laundry that needed cleaned, so I decided to head to the laundry mat that day.  After breakfast and cleaning up the RV, Liam helped me load up the laundry and we headed out.  I was incredibly exhausted those last few weeks of pregnancy.  My stomach was so big and heavy, my swelling was so bad that my legs hurt terribly, I was tired, very dizzy, and so ready to not be pregnant any more. 

We got to the laundry mat and got everything started and then waited outside on the outdoor seats they have while it finished washing and I read some of The Black Stallion to the kids.  It takes about 30 minutes for everything to wash.  Once it was washed, we switched it to the dryer.  The kids like helping with this.  The dryers are huge and they think it's just amazing how big they are and how much clothes can fit into them.

(Milla was cleaning Mara's face with a a wipe in this photo because she had chocolate from a beachbar all over her face.) 

Once that was done, we headed to Chick-Fil-A for lunch.  This ended up being our laundry mat routine for the past month we've been in the RV.  It takes an hour for the clothes and towels to dry and CFA is just a few minutes down the road.  It works out perfectly to just hang in the van or outside and read to the kids while it all washes and then head to lunch while it dries. 

After we picked up the laundry I really felt like the kids needed some time to run around in a different place other than where our RV is parked. 

It had been so hot and humid with temperatures sitting around 95-100 that I had not had a lot of energy to go many places.  The heat made me feel like I would pass out and so our normal routine of being outdoors on adventures had been very difficult to keep up with. But that day was overcast and slightly breezy with the temp around 85-90 so I was feeling a little more up to an outdoor adventure. 

One of our favorite parks is near the laundry mat we have been using but we hadn't been there in a long time.  I surprised the kids and said "who wants to stop at such and such park and take a hike by the river!?"

Of course they all said yes and so off we went. After bathroom breaks for everyone  (which consisted of walking up the huge hill the bathroom is on)...we were off on our hike/walk down the trail by the river.

I made a joke to the kids while we were walking where I said "Watch guys!  Tomorrow I'll go into labor since we came on a hike today just like I did with the twin girls!"

The day before I went into labor with my twin girls, I took the kids to another one of our favorite parks with lots of trails by a pond.  We spent hours there playing and walking and then the next morning I woke up to my water breaking and being in full on intense labor.  You can read their birth story HERE.

We all laughed about what I said and they all agreed that yes, that would be funny because it would be basically the same thing that happened before. 

The kids asked if we could go to the same spot we'd come to the last time we had come to this park about a year prior, where there is an easy access spot to the river.  They wanted to get wet and since we had all our laundry and all our towels in the van from being at the laundry mat, I said it was fine for them to get in.  

It's a good 10-15 minute walk probably to the spot we were heading to with little toddlers and a big pregnant woman :) 

The bigger kids pointed out all kinds of bugs on the trails, different trees, and other neat things to the twin girls as we walked.  It's so fun watching Milla and Mara get excited about all the new things they are seeing in nature and it's so fun to watch my bigger kids help them, guide them, and teach them all about the things we have learned about together on all our outdoor adventures.  Of course, I am there doing these things with the twins too, but the bigger kids really really love the twin girls and sharing all they know with them.  I think it is so good for kids to be able to help little children and so good for them to know they have knowledge to pass on to someone else. 

We reached our spot and my bigger kids jumped right into the river.  I just took off the twin girls diapers and dresses and let them swim in their little biker shorts. 

They were so excited to get in.  I sat on a fallen tree that was laying in the shallow water and the girls played right next to me.  Jude can't swim yet.  He's so close to getting it but isn't quite there yet.  Liam and Alanna are good little swimmers. Jude spent most of the time finding clams and pretending he was collecting them for clam chowder.  Alanna and Liam swam a lot and tried to help Jude learn how to swim.  They found dragonfly larva, clams, and jumped off this huge tree that was leaning over top of the water. 

The girls were so happy the whole time and it felt so good for me to rest my feet in the water and enjoy watching all my children having such a great time.

We stayed for about 1.5 hours and then headed back to the van.  

Being in nature together is my absolute favorite and it's their favorite.  Jude talked the whole way home how fun the river was.  I have missed  our weekly nature adventures so much the last few moths and am so happy I am already feeling so much more energetic and ready to start them back up every week again.  We did get into nature together just not as much as normal since we were so busy moving and I was not feeling like myself energy wise those last few weeks of pregnancy.

We told Nathan all about our wonderful day when he got home from work and about our joke of how I'd probably go into labor the next day since we went on a hike that day. 

To be continued....

MOVING UPDATE

 

We are moving in TWO days!

The closing on our house is on Thursday, June 2nd but we are heading out on Sunday.

I wanted to make sure the kids and I were out of here in time for Nathan to finish up any last minute things, and to be able to get the house fully cleaned without anything in it. 

We were supposed to close on May 26th, but the buyers asked us to fix some things on the house, which we needed an extra week to be able to have enough time to hire a contractor and get it done. So we moved closing to June 2nd. 

Many are asking if we have our RV yet and if not, where are we staying in the meantime?

We booked an air bnb starting Sunday that will take us through the end of June.

During that time, my husband will go and get the RV we picked out.  We are buying it from a private seller and he has been holding it for us until our house sold.

Once we have the RV, we will begin the process of figuring out which things fit into the RV and which things we simply need to do without during this season of living full time there. 

I am kind of in shock that all of this is actually happening. My husband and I started planning this a year ago, trying to make it happen by last fall.  It took longer than we had anticipated but here we are...

just a few days away from moving from this house and being on to the next step in the adventure.

xo, 

Lauren