Our Life in Words

 I have done a lot of soul-searching about this blog recently.  Do I want it to JUST be about homeschooling?  Do I want it to be about crafts and decorating?  Cooking?  Is it okay to include a little of everything?  Am I sharing too much?

I love to write.  I have kept a journal since I was A's age.  For years I wanted to write a book, there is still part of me that would like to do that, but I just can not seem to follow a plot through....  Maybe someday...  But I felt the need to write.  Maybe not anything cohesive, but something.  And to put it "out there".

I've had blogs over the years and they were never very focused and I always felt like they wandered off in too many directions.  Also, I had no idea how to find readers.

Over the last few years, I reconnected with many high school friends via facebook.  Dr. Janet Johnson, the writer of the Cyber Rhetoric blog was one such friend.  I enjoyed the glimpses into Janet's life and world and circle of friends.  Janet is a Professor at University of Texas-Dallas and she teaches a class where her students are required to blog.

I asked her for some lessons, some ideas, to point me in the right direction. I asked her how important focus and streamlining were.  I asked her about finding readers.  I started a blog and shared it only with her for the first few months!  She was kind and generous with her feedback.

Recently, Janet honored me by highlighting my blog on her Friends Encourage Friends to Blog BLOG HOP.  This is such an honor for me, as I have a tremendous respect for my friend, Janet.  I enjoy her blog immensely and am honored that someone who teaches blogging to college students would highlight MY blog--it's really quite an honor!!  

This year, as I worked on our annual Year in Review photo book, I decided that I like blogging because it gets more in-depth into what we are doing, how we are feeling and what is going on.  I realized that this blog is like a dynamic scrapbook of our lives.  A journal with photos and links.  And I decided to investigate having my blog posts compiled and bound into a book as our "Year in Review" album.

So, there you have it, the purpose of this blog is to tell the story of our lives.  Our Life in Words.

It's a little bit of everything.  This blog is and will be about everything we are interested in and enjoy: homeschooling, cooking, decorating, crafting, yoga, photography, hiking, self improvement, growth, our thoughts about things, our feelings, what we are doing or interested in at the moment, family, friends.... It will be a voyeuristic glimpse into our lives - after all, that is what I LOVE about reading blogs, that little "behind the scenes" look at someone's life.  It will be a chronicle of our lives: the good, the bad and the ugly.  I want to keep it real.  I want to be able to look back on this time in our lives and remember it for what it was.  I aim NOT to sugar coat things, but to share the bad and the ugly, as well as the good, so that this is a realistic look at the lives of an American family as they begin their first year of homeschooling and navigate their way through life.

Thank you for sharing in these experiences with us!