"Once Upon A Time"...now what?

No, this isn't about a fairy tale or what really happens after the fairy tale ends or anything fairy tale related.  This is actually a post about college and going back to school once you've actually finished college...

Once upon a time, I was a college student.  To make a short story even shorter, after four years, I stopped being a college student and graduated with a degree in engineering.  Fast forward some years later, and here I am trying to figure out whether I'm brave enough to return to college with folks I was old enough to babysit as babies.  As you can imagine, the idea of going back to school after six kids and some number of years away sounds like a walk in the park (not!).

So what do you do when you want to go back to college, but aren't quite sure your brain, the kids, and everyone's schedule will survive the shock? Why, you jump on the latest educational bandwagon and sign up for a MOOC (or two or three), that's what!  [In case you're not familiar with what a MOOC is, it's a Massive Open Online Course that's offered by various universities as part of various educational start-ups like EdX or Coursera.]

A chance to see if Mom's brain remembers how to think critically?  Sounds good.  Classes that are broken up into ten to fifteen minute segments?  Totally doable.  A low/no cost chance to take a class that might actually count as transfer credit to a college? Ooooh, interesting.  A chance to let the both Mom and the family dry run the "Mom and school experience"? Where do I sign up?  

In my case, I signed up for courses through Coursera.

I'll tell you more about what those first couple of courses were like later.  For now, I hear someone calling...

-L

Where to start?

Say you're interested in trying something new.  You're not quite sure that it's going to work out. You want to give it a shot, but at the same time, you're a little scared to.  What do you do?  Sometimes, the best answer is to jump right in and hope you don't sink.  Other times, the answer is say, "Not right now." and wait until a better time.

For years, I've said, "Not right now. This isn't the right time." This year, I said something different.  This year, I said, "It's time."

Time for what?  Now that is the big question.

Welcome to my world!

Hi Everyone!

I'm so glad you're able to stop by!  As you might guess from the title, I'm a mom of three boys (aka the  "J's") and three girls (aka the "C's").  If you do the math, you'll know that makes me a mom to six.  Needless to say, I spend a lot of time being "Mom", but I'm blogging here as I try to be more than just that.

The big question is how will I do it around pre-schoolers, school-aged kids,  their activities, and my primary job as Mom?

I hope you'll join me on this journey!

-L