Yesterday capped off our Homeschool Journey which has been a very interesting adventure. I am not sure who learned more and who has more change and growth on their evaluation sheets, Charles or myself. This was a "Transition marker" and celebration of this year, which has many bright spots along with the major struggles and emotion turmoil, but through every experience we learned more about God and His wisdom and power, more about our selves, and most important more about the TRUTH– all of these events were important and the results were going to make a significant impact on our lives (as we know it) but it is just a blip and God is in control of even the blips, Romans 8:28 tells us "And We know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his prupose. So over the last few months I have found comfort in that and have sssslllloooowlllllyyyy began resting and trusting God to lead. Much prayer has been over me and my pulling it together, stiffling the feelings and making this year end positively and making this transition really speak of and give glory to God as that is my purpose, as He has so plainly made it clear to me over the last year. Still have a million questions and wrestle with the what if’s and how is this going to work, but He is merciful and patience and gently guides my wayward thoughts and fears and takes me to my green pasture and makes me sit and allow Him to work.
Okay enough about the prep on me, onto the Graduation preparation and ceremony.
I got really motivated and tried to pull the Five years of homeschooling together in a memorable way and tried to really show our philosophy and our faith as the major influence in our lives and homeschool. I also wanted it to be personal and pleasurable for our family and friends and most importantly give God the praise and glory as we tried to do in all our activities and throughout the homeschool experience. I also wanted this to be a memorable keepsake for Charles and I to look back on and really look at how God was with us through this whole experience.
I think in themes and imagery. I went through our pictures and made a slide show (see the post prior to this for the link to the show) and picked three songs that are very much the soundtrack for our experience. I thought about the whole homeschool purpose, for us our Mission statement was Titus 2:1-15 and we talked alot about the "battle" over sin and satan, about being in the word to protect our minds and hearts and about being diligent and consistent in the things that will glorify God, so I made our "theme" the Armor of God. I went through my school files for the five years and pulled together samples of his work and put them together in a binder "scrapbook" divided the years and added a section for the notes and cards from family and friends for the Graduation and Going to public school in August.
Wanting to show there is more than just academics to homeschooling I explained the book and talked a minute about how our main focus in our school was the instruction and direction of Charles heart as it would not matter if he was academically successful but lack the heart for Christ, the world could snatch him away from us and we tried to grow his faith during our academic instruction and stopped and worked on eternal matters sometimes. The public school can give him the academics, but they cannot and do not attempt to give the spiritual instruction and although we are official closing our school and enrolling him in public school the spirtual and character training will continue in our home for his lifetime.
Charles marched in wearing his dad’s, college cap and gown. We talked to charles about the work that went into his dad earning the priviledge to graduate with Honors from highschool and later college and because he had not earned that award of diligence yet, we turned the stoll around to cover the words honor but encouraged him to work hard and when he graduates from Highschool he may earn that priviledge and we would be very honored to let him wear his dad’s stoll for graduation. He seemed to be very motivated and actuall appreciated the cap and gown and got dressed very respectfully.
Charles gave a short speech he wrote himself about homeschool: "Homeschool was fun we did alot of stuff together like co-op, reading and typing. My mom is very nervous and scared but it will be fine. We went to museums and Blue Jay Point Park. I loved home school so much I don’t want to leave but it will be very fun to go to public school. The school system would only give me 45 minutes a month of reading help but we chose to put me back in public school for now. I will get more time. We were going to go from genesis to revelations but we did not have enough time to do it we were too busy with school we could not do it all in 5 years."
( I was so proud of him, he worked really hard on this all by himself as my gift. I did not think he really understood what I was telling him when we discussed it, but he got every word, and he did care.)
Wanting this to be fun for Charles and something unexpected I really tried to get creative and a bit silly (which is very hard for me, but with prayer and a little diligence) I came up with a Knighting ceremony using the Armor of God playset and I even wore a crown and officiated the ceremony as The Queen of Titus Academy. As I read Ephesians 6:13-23 I had Charles put on the piece of Armor mentioned by the end of the reading he was fully dressed, he bowed before me and I took the sword of the spirit in my left hand, holding the bible in my right, I touched him with it, declaring him "knighted" I charged him with the respect of this responsibility and told him ‘When you do your devotions in the morning you are essential "suiting up your heart" and this is very important for you to be able to carry out your tasks as an honorable knight and ambassador and then we had a chuckle at how silly he looked in the plastic playset designed for toddlers, (he is 12 with very long arms and a big head which the helmet barely capped.
We presented Charles a teddy bear dressed in the armor with a booklet outlining the verses and practical ways to "suit up" and a declaration of his knighting and proclamation that he is now known in our land as Sir Charles Wiggins the honorable knight and ambassador for Christ. Our gift to him was a leather wallet with a cross carver into it, a shield key chain with the verse on the back, a watch, and a ribbon that said "Very Special Son".
Our families were here and our closest friends, some of which changed prior plans to join us for this special day for Charles. We truly appreciate everyone who attended and those who sent notes of encouragement and blessings that were unable to attend the ceremony and party. Everyone invited was involved in some way with our school over the 5 years. We ended the ceremony and cooked out and fellowshipped with each other and Sir Charles, it was a great day.. and all the praise and glory goes to God, the main attendee that really made this experience and He will be with Charles "in the land to the East, Cedar Creek Middle School.
Now we begin the new adventure, but one thing will remain constant.. our dependence on God to guide us and teach us the way to go.
Thank you for all your prayers and encouraging words.
Queen Dot
oh, well. Success is sweet. 
WHOA!!!!
Dot Wiggins