Holy Crap, bless it, Jesus be near....Tanner Crew is bringing school home! I can't even. Let us all take a moment to really think about that. Whoa, my stomach just flipped a thousand times. I am not even joking. Close your eyes...wait for it...did you hear it? That really dramatic theme song music that lets you know something is about to happen...the atmosphere changed...something is happening? That's coming from this corner of the world.
Some have called me dramatic....some...I have fought this, I am not dramatic...no no...I just feel things very deeply and things are very big and very much a BIG HUGE GIGANTIC thing. Also. My educational status of my brain is very much on a 1st grade level and that is being gracious. How many times I have had to look at my very smart and intellectual (had to spell check that word...) husband to make sure I am explaining something correctly to my children... Yeah...that girl and that brain is bringing home her two (TWO as in at the same time) Boys to teach. Holy crap, Bless it, Be near Jesus.....I can't even.
But, Jesus. always and forever people BUT JESUS. It wasn't an overnight journey. It wasn't a split second conversation. It has been happening since my Sweet Tyler, and then my Sweet Jaden. Things...signs, that stirring in your heart that something was just not ok. And we pray, and we pray, and we talk, and we agonize. So I invest, and investigate. I become room mom (uh....yeah don't do that.), I make it a priority to be IN the school and IN the classroom and IN the cafeteria. I warm (beat, bang, kick and knock down) my way into the front desk receptions cold heart and receive finally her grace and occasional kindness (Yes...elementary front desk.). I watch, I listen, I have 5 IEP meetings where I cry and bang my hands on the desk and literally FIGHT for my son. I come to the end of two years of that school and feel just as much an outsider looking into my children's education and its not ok.
I watch one kid fall further behind and not because he is not smart...no, he is very smart.... and I'm not just a proud mama...but that brick and mortar school is failing him.
And then there is my other kid, the one who is listening and watching EVERYTHING. I could handle the "what does this mean?" As my 1st grader waves his middle finger around, and I could handle the "I learned a new word, what does Shit mean?" But the day my 7 year old bounded into the van and before the sliding door of the mom van could close he says "mom, a learned a new word...Fu**...." Why couldn't of been Fart. I was ready for that word. I sat there paralyzed, literally, teachers kept waiving me down the line and I couldn't even move. I have always tried to prepare myself so that I didn't react in a way that would make my boys not ask me questions...but I couldn't stop the tears, I couldn't form a word, I just sat there and let the tears fall from eyes. I was witnessing innocents robbed from my children and it made me angry. I am not stupid or naive y'all. I know its coming, but not at 7, not for the ears of my 3 and 4 year old...where they ALL took turns saying it because mom wasn't breathing or speaking or responding she was sitting in the carline crying.
On that day, my heart begin to break. I knew something had to change. I begin asking all my friends their experiences and I couldn't find a similar story...not in 1st grade...not in the little hallway before moving up with the 5th graders...but this was MY reality and OUR story and Jesus was calling me to something beyond myself.
Then one night in our 1,000 conversations I say to Kevin "Here's the thing, my only job, my only focus right now for the next 11 or more years is these boys. This is my mission field, my job, my reality. I am being asked to do something outside of myself because I know its Jesus. I am weak, and will have gaps as big as the ocean, BUT JESUS..." We had exhausted every other single thing. We cannot afford another school or a move to be in a different district. This is where we are. It was like peace once I came to the point that I realized Jesus was asking me to step outside of myself. I would sacrifice anything for these boys and that is just what Jesus was asking me to do.
I know my limits though people, I am not a teacher. I also know my children...one does not respond to me as a teacher...So I begin researching the online public school. And before I knew it I had a classroom in my home and was registered as a Georgia Cyber Academy learning coach, and had students attending for 2nd grade.
We start Monday. I don't know beyond today. And I don't know what the future of the next year will look like. I wake in the middle of the night sick to my stomach as I adjust to what's about to happen. So come along, why? Well, I have said it before and I'll say it again Jesus has always asked me to live my life is a glass box, because I know that when I share what is happening in our lives chances are...someone can relate. I love it, I love being real and honest and inviting people in. I have looked for anyone who has done this and allowed people to experience their experience and I can't find anyone. So I am that person hopefully for someone else. I also miss writing and with having the boys home and on a school routine it is allowing me sometime to sit and write.
So here is your invitation- come along. I am also planning on documenting some of this by video on our YouTube channel...uh...don't think this fancy or that I am planning on getting famous for this...that is not my hope or desire. My desire- authentic reality. Can we all stop pretending. That is intended to be a statement not a question. (my editing and spelling probably drives most of you crazy..yeah sorry about that.)
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdSMVd28GTywSg9CwiAY9CQ
I also love Insta its the best way to document a day in the life of chaos- so find us I believe we are Tanner Crew
