By Lisa Appelo 
It started in Target when I passed the backpack aisle.
Instead of turning toward the school supplies and filling my cart with fresh Ticonderoga pencils, fun sticky notes, and colored spiral notebooks, I kept walking toward the shoes.
This is the first year I don’t have a child starting back to school. After 27 years straight of homeschooling my seven children through high school (with hybrid school the last six years), they are all launched.
Yay me! And also, cue the tears.
I worked for years to get to this point. After my husband died suddenly 15 years ago, I worried that I’d financially be able to keep homeschooling or that I’d have the bandwidth as a solo mom to keep the pace. I worried that my kids might act out in their deep grief, and whether I had it in me to raise them well.
God got us through. Walking past the school supply aisle signaled a faithful finish but also nostalgic loss.
With seven kids now launched, I have new freedom over my schedule and a growing wishlist of dreams I want to tackle.
I won’t miss teaching them how to diagram a sentence. But I will dearly miss seeing their eyes light up when they get it right.
I won’t miss the cost of tutors and classes. But I will dearly miss all of our car time on the way there and back.
I won’t miss the scramble to print off papers or get to co-op on time. But I will dearly miss watching them walk through the front door with friends who will help shape who they become.
I won’t miss having to remind them to stay on task. But I will dearly miss getting to learn elbow to elbow together.
I will miss our library days. Our field trip days. Lunch out because we need a change of scenery. Muffins with mom. Evening read-alouds. Crisp new books. And beginning a new school year that bursts with the promise of lives forever changed.
This isn’t just first day of school wistfulness. I’m pretty sure I’ll keep bumping into a quiet ache this year as Christmas programs roll around, on Friday night lights, in prom season.
But right next to these sweet memories, I’ll be making new ones.
It’s not lost on me that I’m headed out this morning to help as my four-year-old grandson starts preschool. Last week, I FaceTimed with another granddaughter excited to tell me all about her new kindergarten teacher. Another two start their hybrid school next week.
I’m signed up for Grandparents’ Day and a Christmas program, and I’ve passed down books and homeschool materials to a couple of my children to use with their children.
I guess I’m not quite finished yet.
I get to do it all over again. But this time as Nonni, I get the good parts. I get to hear about first days back to school and cheer in the stands at games and one day, Lord willing, see them off to prom.
I’ll pray for their hard days and be backup when there are sick days. I plan to savor every moment of lunch boxes and school pictures and book character days before my grandlittles launch.
Life hasn’t emptied. It has expanded.
I think I’ll head to Target and pick up some fresh crayons and glue sticks to keep on hand.
by Nickey J Dunn 
by Ashley Daniels 
