South East Homeschool Convention
We are wrapping up our third year of homeschooling, which is really quite hard to believe. It has gone by so quickly and to be quite honest sometimes I sit back and am amazed at how much we’ve accomplished in the past three years, with it rarely ever feeling like school.
It’s such a joy to watch my children live, learn, and grow right before my eyes each and every day. They’re finally at an age where accountability is expected of them and I’m going to start printing their own Student Planners from the computer so they can be responsible for making sure each of their lessons and tasks are completed each day. They’re looking forward to that big kid responsibility….we’ll see how long the excitement lasts!
I had the privilege of attending the South East Homeschool Convention in Greenville, SC last weekend. There were a few of us who simply couldn’t get away for the full three days (Thursday, Friday, and Saturday) so we went up on Friday afternoon. I don’t know about you, but often times, the car ride is one of my favorite parts of the trip. Just being able to converse and laugh with your girlfriends is so refreshing. We arrived at the convention center around 5:30pm and still had a few hours before the Tim Hawkins concert began.
I guess I should preface this with the fact that this was my very first homeschool convention. I had no idea what to expect. It far surpassed anything I could’ve pictured in my mind. I could’ve spent a week walking through all of the booths and browsing through books and curriculum. I was in homeschool heaven! There were five or six session times throughout the day in which you could choose from 8-10 speakers on various topics and sit in on an hour long session. These sessions ranged from academic lectures to parenting and beyond. The cool thing was, many of the families attending the convention were literally there as a family; mom, dad, and five or six kiddos. It was fun to watch, but also fun to relax knowing our husbands were two hours away taking care of ours. Thanks babe!!
I was able to purchase all of our curriculum for the summer and fall while saving money I would’ve had to spend on shipping. One of the greatest things about Classical Conversations in the early years is that you really don’t have a whole lot of consumable products to purchase semester after semester and year after year. Most of my resources can be checked out from the library or borrowed from friends. The only things I needed were new math workbooks for the fall and our cycle three memory work resources since this will be our first time going through cycle three with CC.
I also purchased the first two books in the Explode the Code series for Owen. He’s only three and a half, but he loves workbooks and he actually sat at the table with me Monday morning and completed six pages on the letter F. Then when we finished I turned back to the letter “f” on the page and said, “Now what letter is this Owen?” and he smiled and said, “Number!” As I said, he’s only three and a half. Ha!
We ended our little weekend getaway with a big dinner at Applebee’s with seven of the ladies from our area who rode separately but all attended the convention. We had great laughs and shared some of the highlights from the convention. It was a fantastic weekend and I look forward to going again next year. Kelli, I wish we had taken a few pictures!
~audrey