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Meet my friend, Forest Rose, a relaxed, eclectic Christ-Centered homeschooling mama of 3 girls.
Tell Us About You & Your Family.
Hi, I’m Forest Rose, a God lovin’, Wife, Mama of 3 Lil’ ladies ages Jordan 6, Jasmine 8, & Jada 10, I’ve been a blogger and loving it for 6 years now, and I also have a little digital Etsy Shop that I started last fall. I was born and raised in Michigan, moved to Northern Indiana about 16 years ago met my husband and never went back, except for visits of course. I do miss my family and friends and Michigan. But I love our life. My husband, Cornel owns his own construction business, so he has a lot of free time in the winter to spend with us.
We started homeschooling simply because we felt led to. We were actually super excited about sending our first daughter to school, but then… God! Yep, He had different plans for our family.
So off on the journey we go. I didn’t know the first thing about homeschooling or anyone who did. Yeah, seriously I was alone and clueless. So here I go walking blindly on faith into what God had called us to. So scary…..ahhhhh! But He was and is with us every step of the way. I started to see the fruits of it right away. Looking back I couldn’t imagine it any other way. It hasn’t been easy, actually it has been the hardest, yet most wonderful thing I have ever done in my entire life. But it feels great to know I am leading my kids down God’s Perfect Path.
How Long Have You Been Homeschooling?
We’ve been homeschooling from the beginning, currently heading into our 8th year. Wow, has time flown!
Tell us About Your Christ-Centered Homeschooling approach.
Christ-Centered homeschooling is just that, everything revolves around Him and about Him. In Keeping Christ the center, I have ended up with quite a well rounded homeschooling journey. What I’ve discovered is that it is an honor to educate my children. As long as I stay under His guidance and allow God to lead, my children will have the best education that is possible for them. I can’t go wrong. We are a very relaxed, eclectic, Charlotte Mason-y type of homeschool.
We have changed curricula quite a few times, but no matter what, we always center it all around the bible and we use a lot of living books. We’ve used Sonlight, Heart of Dakota, Easy Peasy and even Abeka. Abeka was little out of my comfort zone and a little too schoolish, but it was given to us so I just lightened it a lot and added some great readers. Every year we get a little bit more relaxed and that’s Okay, we have more peace that way.
Year-Round Homeschooling or Traditional School Year?
Traditional. We follow the traditional school calendar because we need a break. A big break. We love summer and all my girls’ friends are in public school, so they love to spend hours and hours playing with them in the summer. However, we still do a little bit. We do a little math and reading. I don’t like to reteach, so in order to keep them moving forward, I make sure to have them do a little here and a little there. Not too much, cause it is summer break after all.
Tell Us About Your Homeschooling Routine.
Our routine is pretty set, we’ve been doing the same thing since the beginning. But every day still looks a little different. We wake up, brush teeth, make beds, and get dressed (some days). Then we head down for breakfast.
After breakfast, we start with praise and worship, prayer and devotional time in the living room. We then head to the dining room table and do read aloud time, while they work on easy stuff like coloring for my youngest and copy work for the other two.
After that, the two oldest start with independent work (spelling, math & language) and me and the littlest lady work together. We then have lunch while watching something educational on YouTube or Netflix.
After lunch is alone time which consists of reading alone or coloring or playing with legos for my youngest. After alone time is over they do computer work which is usually some extra math or typing. We usually start at 9:30 and are completely done by 1 pm. The rest of the day is free playtime.
On Thursdays, we go grocery shopping and to the library for a homeschool class which alternates science, history, and art.
Complete the Sentence: Our Homeschooling Usually Happens Mostly…
Everywhere. You can find us all over the place. The living room, the dining room, even on the kitchen floor in front of the heat vent in the winter, also my oldest now has a desk in her room and she has a hard time concentrating, so she spends a lot of time there. We do not have a school room, but our main homeschooling hub is a little shelf in our dining room with all their current books.
In the summer, I move it next to my desk (pictured below on the left). I also have a lot of overflow on a much larger shelf hidden in the laundry room also pictured below on the right, which really needs to be organized.
What Have You Picked For Your Curriculum Next Year?
Well, ummm….I haven’t actually ordered, purchased or even decided wholeheartedly on our curriculum for next year yet, but this is my rough draft.
Jada Age 10
- History/Geography/Reading – Sonlight Core D & 5th Grade Sonlight Readers
- Bible – Easy Peasy New Testament
- Math – CTC Math
- Science – Easy Peasy/YouTube/Fun Experiments
- Language Arts – Easy Peasy
- Poetry – Random Poetry Books/ Poetry Tea Time Fun
- Foreign Language – Mango Languages
- Spelling/Vocab/Art/Music – No Idea lol
Jada loves to sing and it constantly writing songs. So we may look into something to help her out with that.
Sonlight Curriculum – Awarded Best Overall Homeschool Company in 2012 by Old Schoolhouse Magazine
Jasmine Age 8
- History/Geography/Reading – Sonlight Core D & 3rd Grade Sonlight Readers
- Extra Reading – BLHFHG Heart of Dakota 3rd – 4th Grade Readers
- Bible – Easy Peasy New Testament
- Math – CTC Math
- Science – Easy Peasy/YouTube/Fun Experiments
- Language Arts – Easy Peasy
- Poetry – Random Poetry Books/ Poetry Tea Time Fun
- Foreign Language – Mango Languages
- Spelling/Vocab/Art/Music – Undecided
Jasmine loves to create. She loves to make piles of junk into something and she could do it all day long.
Jordan Age 6
- History/Geography/Reading – Sonlight Core A Maybe or she will just listen in with sisters
- Other Reading – The Reading Game/The Reading Lesson
- Bible – Family Devotional Time
- Math – CTC Math
- Science – YouTube/Fun Experiments
- Language Arts – Easy Peasy
- Poetry – Random Poetry Books/ Poetry Tea Time Fun
- Foreign Language – Mango Languages or Duolingo
- Spelling/Vocab/Art/Music/phonics – Undecided
Jordan is my little artist. She loves to paint and color.
List 3 Books About Homeschooling That Really Impacted You.
- Teaching From Rest (reading now) by Sarah Mackenzie
- For the Children’s Sake by Susan Schaeffer Macaulay
- Charlotte Mason Companion: Personal Reflections On the Gentle Art of Learning By Karen Andreola
Your family is going on an unplanned trip, not much time to pack, you must homeschool the kids while traveling and you can only take 5 of your homeschooling resources/books with you. What would you take?
- Tablets – Which includes Bible/Apps/Etc.
- Pencil/Notebooks
- Read Alouds
- 1 Reader Per Child
- Books on Cd
If you had the chance to start homeschooling all over again today with the knowledge and experience you have now, what would you do differently?
I would chill out and not rush reading, math, table work with my middle child. My oldest daughter was one of those early quick learners, so I kinda rushed my middle daughter into everything too soon. If I could go back and give my new homeschool mom-self any advice it would be to be patient, slow down, enjoy it, relax and quit being so pushy lol.
Forest, I absolutely love your story! Your heart to serve God and to follow Him – even when not sure what He is up to – is such a blessing! I know that your girls love you even more for it. Thanks so much for sharing your vision board with us. I loved looking at it. It encouraged and inspired me!
Thanks, Angel! I can’t imagine my life any other way now. It just goes to show how awesome it can be to take a leap of faith even when it seems like you will fall flat on your face! God is faithful!
Forest, I really enjoyed hearing more about what homeschool looks like in your family. I love that you guys have simplified more each year and that it’s brought you more peace. We’ve felt that way, too! Let me know what you think of Teaching from Rest!
Thanks, Lynna! I will surely let you know how Teaching from Rest was! I’ve only read about 1/4 of it and it’s one of my all time faves already. It speaks to me on so many levels.
Forest, this is amazing, I can really relate to how God spoke you and your hubby and being clueless about the homeschool lifestyle. I am always comforted in knowing that not everyone has a school room, when we first began researching our thoughts of homeschooling our crew school room was at the top of the list meeting families like yours seeing that you can successfully homeschool without a designated area has been a breath of fresh air. Thank you for sharing your story with us, your family is beautiful. Continue to allow God to lead your life you guys are doing a great job!
Awesome Domonick, so glad this encouraged you! Although I would love extra space to put all my books and supplies, I love homeschooling right where we do everyday life, I think it helps to keep us relaxed and an extra bonus I don’t have another room to clean.?