So… the first day of homeschool didn’t exactly go as I hoped.

I don’t have inspiration for you or a nugget of insight to share, but I wanted to show up anyway. Let’s pretend that we are sharing a latte (make mine chai!) and sharing stories about the day.

I had visions of starting with something fun and special: letter pancakes for breakfast! In my mind, these were going to be Pinterest-worthy. Crisp golden edges, perfectly formed letters, the kind of thing that makes you feel like yes, I am nailing this homeschool mom thing.

Reality check: they were a disaster. The batter didn’t want to cooperate, my “N” looked more like a snake that had given up on life, and the only semi-recognizable shapes were blobby versions of the first letters of each girl’s name. They ate them anyway, but no one was exactly wow’d.

Then came the attitudes. Two out of my three kids started the morning grumpy and entitled, which meant I spent a good chunk of time playing patience referee and gently re-directing. (And sometimes not-so-gently. Let’s be real.)

Morning time was supposed to be this sweet, calm start to the school day… but it dragged on forever thanks to constant toddler potty breaks. By the time we wrapped up, it was much later than planned, which pushed lunch way past its normal time and left everyone just a little extra cranky.

To make it all more fun, I wasn’t as prepared as I should have been. Instead of feeling like I was leading the day, it felt like I was scrambling to catch up from the very beginning. It’s two days later and I still haven’t taken a “first day of school” picture of one of my kids (you know, the ones you see with the cute little chalkboard signs?) Oh, and remember how we were supposed to be focusing on learning manners? Yeah… all those lessons went straight out the window. At one point, one child just got up in the middle of her math work with me and wandered off. No explanation, just poof. Like, hello?? I’m talking to you!

But, it wasn’t all bad. I did have enough sharpened pencils for everyone (a small miracle), all of our curriculum actually arrived on time (another small miracle), and both girls genuinely love their assigned independent reading books for the week.

So, that was Day One. Not exactly the smooth, cozy, first-day-of-school glow I had in mind… but we survived, and I guess that counts for something.