Ten things you should know about the homeschooling mom

1. She's sleepy. (This applies to all moms, everywhere.)

2. She can be slightly irritable. Remember, she's with her kids all.the.time. And while most of the time, she is doing what she knows in her heart she's supposed to do, she can also be about ten seconds away from a mental breakdown.

3. She generally feels like she has to prove her value as an educator and her kids' intelligence to everyone on the planet. Well meaning (sometimes), but rude people will grill her about her choice. She's not allowed to ask this barrage of questions to traditional school parents, but she is regularly questioned about her credentials, schooling, methods, curriculum, social activities, religion, blood type and worth as a human by complete strangers.

4. She thinks the socialization argument is the lamest thing she's ever heard, but she has to word it nicely so no one gets offended. Because homeschoolers are frowned on enough.

5. She may or may not wear denim jumpers. Her choice to do so has nothing to do with her choice to homeschool. (More likely, she's wearing pajama pants.)

6. She's under a lot of pressure. Because if one of her kids doesn't excel in something, the entire world is going to have something to say about it. And she is constantly battling the "weird" stereotype, even though she's pretty sure her kids would still be every bit as wacky in a traditional school. It's genetic.

7. She's home, yes. But not available. She's not frittering away her days with soap operas and bon bons. She's up to her eyeballs in children and phonics worksheets and laundry that's been backed up since just after the Israelites were released from Egypt. She wishes others saw it as a full time job. She has to turn people down when they ask for favors, and then she feels guilty, but at the same time, she knows that getting school done has to be top priority or before long she'll give up and WILL be frittering away her days with bon bons while her children roam the streets in their pajamas like stray dogs.

8. Her favorite part of homeschooling is going to museums and parks and libraries on weekdays when they're totally empty. Bonus.

9. She likes that her kids have no idea who Ke$ha is. That they eat healthy lunches. That they don't compare their clothes with someone else's. That she's present to record all the funny things they say and do. That they don't have to get up at the crack of dawn and sit on a bus for an hour. And that they get to be kids a little longer than most children these days.

10. She's insane, but knows it's totally worth it, and loves that when her kids have questions they come to her, whether it be about how the axis of the earth affects the distribution of the sun's rays or precisely how that baby got into Mommy's belly. She has no money, no time to herself, no clean pajama pants and a thin thread of sanity, but she knows it's a sacrifice she won't regret.