This is my eleventh summer in Virginia, but I’m still surprised at how things grow in abundance. Today I noticed a sprout in the door frame. The door frame! As I studied it, I noticed another one nearby in the crack of the deck floor. Ah! “Anything will grow well in this Virginia humidity,” I thought. After all, the conditions for growth are all here: abundant seeds, moisture, and heat.

My summer is spent poolside, participating in our neighborhood swim team. Our team is developmental, which means even children who don’t know how to swim strokes are allowed to join. Over the season, their strokes refine and improve. To me, breaststroke is especially descriptive of the changes. Once the arm pull and frog kick movements are mastered, some children repeat this sequence rapidly. They move their arms and legs as quickly as they can while following proper form.

I’ve met a wide variety of homeschoolers from really relaxed to super structured. Though I definitely fall on the “structured” side of the spectrum, I am not nearly as structured as some. One friend told me she fills up her car every Thursday. “Why would I wait until the car is nearly empty of gas?” She anticipated the need and planned ahead each week. I was astonished. I realized I could do the same.

We have a recipe we enjoy for a dessert that uses Mascarpone. Originally, the recipe was for Tiramisu, but I made some modifications. First of all, we don’t drink coffee, so I eliminated that. We added some orange zest and freshly squeezed orange juice instead. We also don’t use sugar, so we had a substitute. Nor do we eat white flour, so in place of the lady fingers we made a light almond flour cake.

During the holiday season, gift-giving is a big focus for parents. Like you, I search for gifts that communicate my love. Ultimately, one of the gifts I am most proud to have given my children is actually a consistent experience: ninety minutes of daily free time. Without exception, whether weekday, weekend or holiday, this is part of our family routine. Each child has ninety minutes to themselves, in a room alone, completely free of my expectations.

Perhaps the biggest difference between homeschooling and more mainstream forms of education is the quantity of time as a resource. I recently came across this quote and it resonated with me, especially in the context of homeschooling: Someone who experiences time as a scarce commodity…is creating a completely different personal reality from someone who perceives that he has all the time in the world. —Deepak Chopra The opportunity to choose my speed (plus the opportunity to choose my focus) is what keeps me homeschooling.

My family loves playing the game Wingspan. The premise of the game is engaging–”buy” bird cards by “feeding” them the food they need from the birdfeeder. Put them in their preferred habitat (woodland, grassland or water) and give them time to lay eggs. Each bird in the deck is unique. The illustrations are exquisite. We learn about the birds as we play, but recently we found a way to extend the learning.

What are the best ways to spend time with your 7th and 8th grade children as you homeschool them? How can you decide what curriculum to use? How do you choose what to focus on? There are no “government regulations” on the topics that need to be taught. As a homeschooler, you have flexibility to do what you think is best. It’s most important that you and your child find a way of focusing on what she most needs.

“One star reviews don’t tell the whole story,” is the reminder I get when I read Amber Share’s delightfully clever book, “Subpar Parks.” The project started as a joke about the negative reviews people put online about National Parks. Amber took her graphic design skills and created artful hand-lettered travel-poster style images, poetically enshrining the disparaging remarks. Glacier National Park: too cold for me Arches National Park: looks nothing like the license plate

Throwing down the pencil in disgust and tossing aside the papers in frustration, my child unleashes a stream of forbidden words: “I hate this; I can’t understand this; this is impossible; I’ll never understand.” Moaned in one continuous exhale, my child repeats what has become a familiar script. She’s only 13, yet she is convinced that some of the academics she studies are beyond her reach. When faced with new or challenging material, her default is to pour out this verbal protest, usually ending with “This is stupid!