Homeschool Day at the Capitol

Today was a very interesting day. We got the opportunity to meet with over 600 (YES!) other home-educators and put our best foot forward for the staff at the Capitol. I thought I would give you a brief report. I do not have too many pictures though (which is not how I had planned it) as there were not many chances to take them.

We began the day by going to up to a main meeting place and dropping off our homemade desserts to have them labeled and handed out to the senators and legislatures. It seems that homeschooling families have very good baking skills. There were tables and tables full of cookies, bread, etc. I am sure that the staff that received it will be well-fed =)

Our support group had about 45-50 people there. We all met up and tried to get in to see a bill being discussed by some representatives, but due to the mass amounts of people, we were not able too. Then after some confusion (OK...a lot of confusion), we got to take a tour of the Capitol. That is what most of my pictures are from. I found out (much to my disappointment) that out of 100 Representatives, 75 of them are democrats, and the rest are republicans. Oy. But one of the encouragements was seeing "In God We Trust" in gold letters over the house of senate. I am not sure how many of them live by that, but it was still good to see that they hadn't take it out.

During the tour my sisters and I slipped out to get ready for our performance. There was a one hour block of time dedicated to home schooled children singing, praise dancing, playing instruments, etc. The acoustics in the rotunda were very interesting, being as it was round and marble. It traveled well, but almost killed the sound. The effect was one that caused everyone to lean in and listen a little bit closer. We began with "God of Our Fathers", a traditional hymn, and then closed with "The Price of Freedom". It went very nicely. We were glad to hear a young bluegrass group play, which inspired some foot-tapping (I love that!), and were awed by a beautiful arrangement of "How Great Thou Art" in which the young lady who sung it had all of us waiting for the chandelier to fall. I had goosebumps by the time she was done. A few others from our group performed also, and did a great job. Then at the end, our support group's young ladies closed the performance session with the National Anthem.

I am sad to say that we did not meet the Governor. Elizabeth accidentally bumped into him as we were leaving, but did realize that it was him until she heard everyone whispering "that's the Governor!". Even though it seemed that some of the staff was not pleased at our being there, the ones who spoke to us were pleased with the behavior of all of the children, and said they were encouraged because of what they saw. It was a good day. I hope that every year that we have more and more involvement and are able to show people the good fruits of home education. Have a blessed rest of the week!


Paige =)

(the pictures are coming soon!)