Ladybug Farms: Graduation Day--Joy is a Kindergartener!

Joy's last day of school

My baby graduated from K4 today. Sniff, sniff. My how the time has flown. It seems like it was just yesterday that my big kids were in school and Joy was bored being at home with just me all day. Then we brought the big kids home and Joy kept going to school because she loved it, we'd already paid for it, and she was learning new skills.

Joy went to the school that Hubby and I graduated from--a private church sponsored school. It'd been a long time since I'd last stepped foot into the school when we went to register Joy. It was a pretty good school back when we went there, so it was the natural choice when we decided to enroll Joy in preschool. There had been a very large turnover in staff, curriculum, even the principal. Yet the spirit of the school remains the same. If anything, it is even better now.

Whenever I sent Lizzy and David off to public/charter school, I always worried what they were going to be learning, what the other kids were going to do, what nonsense they were going to come home with. Some days I was livid, others I was horrified, a few times I was shocked, but rarely was I happy with what the kids brought home. Not once did I ever worry about Joy. I knew that she was in a safe place, surrounded by the very best teachers, in a school where the "big kids" went out of their way to be kind to the "little kids." I knew that while she was busy learning how to read, write and do simple math, she was also learning about the Bible, who God is, and memorizing scripture.

It was exciting to watch her mature this year. She went to school barely writing any of her letters and graduated being able to write all her letters mostly right most of the time. But at least she can write! She went to school knowing all her letters, able to sound out a few simple words and graduated being able to sound words out in a way that my other two never did--she's by far the best at it. While she isn't ready to tackle Shakespeare, she is definitely a beginning reader. She started the year scribbling rather than coloring and finished the year coloring near the lines and drawing simple pictures that you can usually tell what they are.

The next stop on Joy's academic journey is homeschooling. While she was hoping to go back to school in the fall, she is very excited about doing "school with mom." She loves her momma!

Today her school had an awards ceremony and Joy received the "Sweet Spirit" award. She really is a big sweetheart who loves nothing better than snuggling up in my lap.