Kara S. Anderson

Homeschool connection, not perfection.

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The More Than Enough Audiobook is LIVE! (and even more fun news!)

by Kara S. Anderson

You guys!

Yesterday was kind of the best day …

Because yesterday, The More Than Enough audiobook, which is officially out now, hit No. 1 in homeschooling new releases on Audible!

It also hit No. 1 in new Motherhood books on audio!

And No. 3 in ALL Motherhood books.

I could barely breath most of the day, and I am just so grateful.

Honestly, this has been so encouraging for me. It’s incredibly reassuring in a process that is definitely scary and at times overwhelming.

So I wanted to share a little peek behind the scenes for a minute …

That Cover Art

First you may notice that the cover art looks different than the paperback and Kindle versions of More Than Enough.

Some of you may remember this cover – it was the original book cover, but then we had to go with something else for the paperback and Kindle versions.

I love that cover too, but I’m glad to get to return to this original cover for the audio version. Isn’t it cozy?

Wait – you wrote a book?

Yes – in case you are as newer friend here, yes! I have a book. It’s called More Than Enough, because I honestly believe that we have everything it takes (more than enough) to homeschool our kids well.

That doesn’t mean it’s always easy or that we never worry – but I actually have become pretty convinced during the past 13 years of homeschooling that worry just means that we are invested – so invested, that we really can not fail.

To learn more about my book and how to get it, you can head here.

A huge favor

Thank you so much to each of you who has purchased my book, or now the audiobook. I am so grateful for the support.

I do have a quick favor to ask!

If you have read my book and have a moment, please leave an honest review here. Reviews help SO MUCH. It also helps to tell you pals!

And if you listen to the audiobook, I would love if you left a review here.

Thank you again for all of your continue support!

Much love,

Kara

This post contains affiliate links.

Stop trying to do it all in your homeschool

by Kara S. Anderson

Well first, let me apologize for the bossy title.

I’m not normally so forceful, it’s just that I happen to have encountered a lot of moms lately who are dealing with burn-out.

Like, drag-me-up-off-the-floor-to-make-a-quesadilla level of burn-out and exhaustion.

I think a lot of things can cause us to burn out, and right now, I think a lot of us are still coping with pandemic exhaustion.

Yesterday I was talking with some friends and we decided that the pandemic has made everything at least 15 percent harder.

Everything.

Some things are even harder than that.

  • My son opening a bank account –  at least 40 percent harder than it used to be.
  • Our family just bought a car – minimum 50 percent harder than it was two years ago when we bought a car.

And this applies to everything right now.

Enough

Yesterday on the way to physical therapy, I realized I forgot a mask, which is still required at the clinic. I found one ON THE FLOOR OF MY CAR, picked it up, inspected it, and put it on my face.

Near my mouth.

Where the food goes.

(Speaking of food – food is just always hard. Forever. Send Doordash.)

So if you are like me, you are always looking for ways to make things a bit easier.

That’s where this post comes in.

And my bossy tone.

Giving up?

Because none of us feels like it’s OK to give up, right?

Our culture tells us moms are supposed to work hard, be exhausted, surrender to the messy house and messy bun, and then start drinking wine at 4 p.m.

Yikes. (Yikes about the wine being the answer – I have proudly rocked a messy bun pretty much every day of my life since college).

We’re constantly told that to BE ENOUGH, we have to DO “ENOUGH.”

Now, I wrote a whole book about how this is not true, but still, I get haunted by the lies. They sneak up on me like ninjas whispering: “your bathroom sink is gross right now, you are a Complete Failure As a Human Being.”

Doing less in your homeschool

A while back, I sent out an email to my blog friends (you guys!) asking about your Number 1 struggle with homeschooling.

It was kind of incredible – the answers varied, but many, many of them said the same thing: being consistent.

Now I’m not saying I have all the answers, but I definitely think I have an answer to this:

Do Less.

Doing less it just easier than doing more. It’s a lower barrier to entry. It’s attainable and therefore less intimidating to start.

I know – we think homeschooling isn’t supposed to be easy, because then we aren’t “doing enough“.

But I promise you, that isn’t the case.

And if trying to do it all is causing you to feel exhausted and burned out, you’re kind of shooting yourself in the foot, friend.

Simplified homeschooling

The past several weeks, my daughter and I have been doing a pared down, simplified version of homeschooling.

And amazingly, we’ve been really consistent about it.

Here’s the thing: Less is more when you do it more often.

 

 

And you know how I know it’s enough?

Every day Almost every day, we get through everything we set out to do.

Is it perfect? No.

Is it fancy? No

Is it infinitely Instgrammable? Gosh no.

Do those things really matter?

Hell to the No.


A mindset shift

So as you plan our your days and weeks, I have a few resources for you to simplify things:

  • My book, More Than Enough: Grow Your Confidence, Banish Burnout and Love Your Homeschool Life.

 

  • Cactus Schooling  – my gentle approach to homeschool planning.

Sending virtual hugs friends, and a reminder that you don’t have to do it all to homeschool really well.

I promise. 💙

This post contains affiliate links.

How I know that you’re enough, homeschool mom

by Kara S. Anderson

I can still remember the day that I quit homeschooling.

I was on our cordless phone (this is an old story), pacing in my dining room. I was talking to the woman at the nice Montessori-esque school, and she was walking me through how to enroll my son to start in January.

And I’m going to tell you, in that minute, it didn’t feel like giving up. It felt like such relief. It felt like getting good news from the doctor.

If we’d had any extra money then, I might have celebrated.

Because I had tried homeschooling for an entire semester, and I couldn’t hack it. But in a few weeks, all the responsibility wouldn’t be on me anymore.

Hi there, Doubt

Our homeschool story doesn’t end there, of course.

My son attended the Montessori school for 5 months, and it was great, but the next year, they wanted to move him into the 6-9 year-old classroom because he was an early reader. We were sent home that summer with instructions to work on handwriting every day.

In turned out that trying to force a kid whose fine motor skills were not ready for handwriting to practice handwriting EVERY DAY was a fairly miserable way to spend a summer, so we gave that up pretty quickly, and in the fall, I registered him for Kindergarten, but then panicked and decided to try homeschooling again.

Now we’ve been at it for almost 12 years, and we love homeschooling, but let me tell you, I have dealt with some doubt.

What’s interesting is that I haven’t doubted my kids.

But I’ve doubted myself A LOT.

When a particular homeschool method didn’t work 100 percent in our home, I blamed myself.

When a certain curriculum wouldn’t work for my kids, I figured I was doing it wrong.

Maybe I wished for a minute that my kids weren’t so wiggly? Or that they didn’t dislike timed tests quite so much?

But again, I saw that as my own failing. Better moms would be better at getting their kids to sit still. They would be better at instilling perseverance!

For so long doubt was my companion in our homeschooling journey.

What changed?

So what’s changed?

I think things began to shift when I started writing to you.

Of course it helps that I’m actually seeing my children succeeding. At 13 and 16, neither of them have become bank robbers or Mob bosses.

But what really changed things for me was writing here – sharing our struggles and wins, and all the bumps and U-turns.

Because homeschooling is anything but a straight and simple path – but that’s kind of a benefit, isn’t it? We get to chart our own course.

Like Magellan.

Or Oprah.

Of course, any time we do something different from the norm, it’s a little scary. So doubt still creeps in for me.

It’s just that now, I know I’m enough.

And I know you are too.

I know because I feel my intense, overwhelming love for my kids, and through talking to all of you, I’ve learned you have that too.

In fact, for so many of us, it’s that intense love for our quirky kids that led us to homeschooling in the first place. It’s that love that keeps us going, even when we hit rocky patches – days, weeks, even months.

But I believe in us and our love for our kids – so much that I wrote a whole book about it.

It’s called More Than Enough: Grow Your Confidence, Banish Burn-Out and Love Your Homeschool Life.

It’s for all of us who feel scared and overwhelmed sometimes. It’s definitely for all of us who doubt ourselves – for those of us who wonder if our family is cut out for this.

(Can I tell you a secret? The very fact that you worry means that yes – you are equipped to homeschool. Because that worry is just our intense love peeking out.)

I truly believe that you are enough, your family is enough, and your love for your kids is more than enough to homeschool well.

So if you need that reminder right now, I hope you’ll check out my book, available here.

I KNOW that you love your kids endlessly – so how could you possibly fail?

Bringing hygge to your homeschool

by Kara S. Anderson

For many years, winter and I were not friends.

I would get terrible winter blues and struggled with the cold.

It made me cranky.

Our windy old Victorian was so architecturally interesting and so, so terribly drafty and miserable.

It was built in 1905, and remodeled many times. The last time, right before we bought it, some genius put the bathroom right by the back door, so all was OK unless anyone opened or closed the door at any point – then the bathroom became frigid for 4 hours and there was nothing you could do about it.

And a cold tush is enough to make anyone grumpy.

I was so Waldorfy then you guys – my kids wore woolen hats and long underwear all day … and I knew the cold and dark were getting to me every minute, but I always got through it until one day when the snow would thaw and I’d spot green again.

Eventually we moved, and I started to notice right away that first winter that I didn’t want to hit things anymore, and it was like the beginning of something.

And then around that time I started learning about hygge.

If you aren’t familiar with the idea of hygge, my favorite definition is from hyggehouse.com:

“The Danish word hygge (pronounced hue-gah) is a feeling or mood that comes from taking genuine pleasure in making ordinary everyday things simply extraordinary; whether it’s making coffee a verb by lingering over a cup, to a cosy evening in with friends to lighting a candle with every meal … Words like cosiness, security, familiarity, comfort, reassurance, fellowship, simpleness and living well are often used to describe the idea of Hygge.”

Cosiness.

Security.

Familiarity.

Comfort.

Reassurance.

Fellowship.

Simpleness.

Living well.

Sounds pretty good, right?

***

Things are different now, friends. Sure – winter days are still hard some times, but I know what to do. We make cocoa and pull out library books and we turn on all the twinkle lights.

That reminds me – a few things that make me feel all hygge-ish:

  • Baking bread. I’ve recently learned to use the dough function on our bread maker, and pretty much every day I make some kind of warm, fresh bread.
  • Rice pudding. My Swedish aunt used to make rice pudding and it makes me feel so cozy. It’s perfect for breakfast, lunch, snacks and right before bedtime. I’m mastering it in my Instant Pot.
  • My tea collection. My tea collection is a little out of control. I love our happy little tea kettle, and my favorite varieties for winter at Trader Joe’s Cinnamon Vanilla and Republic of Tea Vanilla Almond (they have a decaf version too).
  • Beeswax candles. No scent except melting beeswax. Bright. Warm.
  • Battery lights – you can put these in any window, any little table, any little holder and you don’t have to worry about the cat lighting himself on fire.
  • Twinkle lights everywhere.
  • Warm socks.
  • Cozy blankets.
  • Good books.
  • Chocolate.
  • Cats.
  • My people.

The End.

Oh – except two quick book resources for you if you want to learn more:

  • The Danish Way of Parenting
  • The Year of Living Danishly
This post contains affiliate links. For more information, please see my disclosure statement. Thank you!

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Hey there!

I’m Kara – writer, tea drinker, yoga-doer and girl with the overdue books.

 

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