New Season!

Where to begin? Teaching is hard. Being a mom is hard. Doing both sometimes feels impossible. I hate to start out negatively. So let me state the positives. I love teaching. I love art. I have a great school and coworkers. My kids are great and my husband is the ultimate wing man. He supports me in every decision and dream (well almost all of them)! Sometimes you can have all the support and best circumstances and you still end up finding that life is just upside down. That was me this school year. Most days I have felt like I was barely keeping my head above water, trying to juggle it all. At the end of the day, I just had nothing left. I was always left with the guilty feeling of not giving the best of myself to my family. So many other people and other people’s kids were getting it all. That’s teaching though isn’t it! I know that is the sacrifice so many of us teachers make, but something about it just didn’t settle in my soul right this year.

Back in March I found myself losing sleep over the decision of returning as a teacher for another year. The possibility of not returning to my small private Christian school also meant a potential change in schools for my daughter, since she is enrolled where I am working. The idea of sending her to a new school wasn’t settling right with me either and we began to pray and consider other options.

After a lot of tears, middle of the night prayers, scouring through scriptures that were speaking to me and long talks with friends and family, I’ve made the TOUGH decision to resign in my teaching position. This decision has been met with an equally new draining job, as I will not only be staying home with my kids, but also taking on the job of homeschooling Ada!!! I never in a million life times would have guessed this would be the path God would take us on. I have always found a lot of pride and honor in being a working mom, with GREAT respect for those who had the courage to stay home with their little ones. And HOME SCHOOLING… I don’t even have my brain fully wrapped around that adventure yet!

I have wanted to be an art teacher since high school and it took me 10 years of waiting after college, before getting an art teacher position, so I don’t take this decision lightly. It has been met with a lot of tears and roller coaster emotions. I’m moving forward confidently in this decision knowing I’ll never regret spending more time with my kids. I know that this is just a season and that art education in the formal sense will always be there. This is a season where I’ll get to put my family first. I’m excited about the future and new doors that will open for us.

I plan on keeping art in my life. Like so much of it. I want it to bleed into our everyday with homeschooling, to teach more art classes independently and to maintain a regular flow of creating for myself.

I came across a quote on Instagram in the midst of making this decision. I liked it and its given me some encouragement when in the trenches emotionally with this decision...

"When God tells you it's time to sit down and re-evaluate, nothing but goodness can come from being obedient. His plans are always better." I do trust that God's ways are always better, even when they don't seem to make sense. I'm trusting that He knows what's best for me in this season. I'm only called to be obedient. I've been clinging to this verse: Proverbs 16:9 In their hearts humans plan their course, but the Lord establishes their steps.

So that’s it. That’s the BIG ONE! If you’re still here reading, kudos to you, you deserve a candy bar, or at least an extra cup of coffee! Thanks for sharing in my celebration and loss. On to a new ADVENTURE!