Home Education Week: Cause you had a bad day

Welcome to Home Education Week, hosted by Principled Discovery.

There is enough Mommy Guilt in general to go around for every woman on the planet. So, imagine what it's like to throw in homeschooling into your already struggling persona. Sometimes it can get ugly.

Yesterday I talked about what it means to be normal. I thought, today, I would share my good, bad and the ugly normal.

While, yes, we love our new approach to school this year, my kids still moan over anything that doesn't involve cookies or computer time, and they cheer with just a little too much delight for my taste when it's time for Spring Break.

When we go out to eat, my kids will always (ALWAYS) be cramming food into their mouths before we pray, and many times they shove in a wad WHEN we say, "Hey, why don't we thank God for the food?" Yup. That's us. The pastor's family.

My kids, despite knowing and understanding our guidelines, run indoors and knock over little old ladies.

My kids half-do their chores and fudge the rest of the way through them, hoping they won't be found out. They will happily still collect their "earned" coupons for the weekend and spend them with a smile on. They will lose every last one of said coupons if they do get found out ... at which point they'll wait a few weeks and try it all over again.

My kids bicker. They bicker over the color of the table, the phase of the moon, but mostly over who might be looking at, breathing on, or existing in their general area.

My kids will hear instructions on a regular and consistent basis, and still disobey.

My kids will hear a very clear instruction, yet do nothing, glaze over and look at me as though I'm made of pudding.

My kids will get really sweaty, smell REALLY bad, and then argue with me over whether or not they need to bathe. Bathing is like death to them.

My son would rather have his eyelashes slowly plucked than to sit through a hair cut or having his fingernails trimmed.

In case of fire, my girls' room would not pass a safety inspection on the average day. I'm just hoping they will be able to scale the clutter if there were such an emergency.

Speaking of clutter, my kids just have to LOOK at our car, and piles and piles of garbage will magically appear in every nook and cranny.

I'm pretty sure that my youngest has a hole somewhere in the bottom of her chin, because at least 97% of what she eats ends up on the table and the floor.

My kids can be totally bull-headed. Totally. Like bad.

Some days only one of them gives me grief. Other days, they all gang up on me. Then there are days when all is well.

If only people with perfectly behaved children homeschooled ... well, there would be no such thing.