I am sat eating all the snack food my kids have taken out with them today to the local home-ed social, namely fruit winders and crisps. Must at some point get a sandwich or the health police will be knocking at my door.
Since my last post on schedules a lot has happened and it was only 2 weeks ago!
M didn't want to go back to school after the half term. We discussed it and she seemed convinced she had had enough. I rang the school on the Tuesday and arranged to take in the de-reg letter. The head teacher was lovely and fine about it all. He handed me her books...and she is free again.
A week later I received a letter from Trafford, nicely asking to come and visit me at home with an EWO and the schools improvement officer...I think that is his title. It seems most LA's have a different title for the person in charge of contacting home-edders.
I politely declined the home visit but said I would meet at a local venue if it was deemed necessary, though I was capable of asking for help on anything. The thing is they state the support the LA can offer home-edders, but really what support is there??? What has anyone ever been offered?? Except home-visits and checklists?
He asked if I could send a brief educational report which I have so I am awaiting a reply. He seems a nice guy but not terribly efficient so that may be the last I hear of him.

I would like to contact him to see about home-ed kids having access to this but the funding comes through schools, so ideally I would need a school to put my dd's name on the role but not attend EVER. Not sure I can see that happening. Course I could see about getting a grant from somewhere.......

So once again I am re-jigging our days and routines. We are quite relaxed really. It seems colleges have a blanket MUST HAVE MATHS + ENGLISH statement so if a kid wants to go to college at 16 it would be worth enduring those. Tricky for my eldest though who is dyslexic and possibly dyscalculic...... but I am not sure where she is heading yet.
I do know for me, this journey has been extremely tough, heart wrenching and often lonely. I don't share my worries or fears amongst my home-ed friends. To be honest they mostly seem to be doing well and their kids not particularly struggling and few people share their journeys openly, so I am not sure they would understand, or would possibly judge me somehow. I do enough of that for myself.

Of course as I type that last section, I secretly hope no-one is reading this. I often blog stuff thinking no one is out there but maybe some day someone pops over!