Welcome!

Hello!  My first blog post - woohoo! Let me introduce myself: my name is Danica and I have a husband, Hank, four kids ages eight and under, and a new one due this June. Hank and I started dating in high school and finally got married seven years after our first kiss. Our 10th Anniversary is coming up this year!  For the first eight years of our marriage we traveled around the country for the Army, but two years ago we moved back to our hometown in Utah so that our kids could be closer to their grandparents.

We have been homeschooling our kids since the beginning. Which, I guess, adds up to about three or four years. That by no means makes me an expert, but I have learned a few things along the way and we absolutely love it. I have a vision in my head of the kind of school and kind of home that I would like to create for my family. I want learning to weave it's way through our life without the kids realizing how much effort has gone into it. I want learning to be natural and joyful for them. I want my home to be comfortable, inviting, and a place where love abounds. So far, this vision is still just a vision, but it's something that I am daily striving for.  

I've had the idea of starting a blog rattling around in my head for a few years, but I've been hesitant to start for a few reasons.  One is the aforementioned lack of expertise. I hate to offer any kind of advice or make it sound like I have all the answers when I've still got so many questions. I also acknowledge that everyone has different styles of doing things and a lot of them work well. I've been disappointed at times when I've given a glowing recommendation to a friend about something I love and after they try it out they don't like it. I feel like I'm somehow to blame if they waste their time/money/whatever.  My hope is that on a blog where my readers are not people I know in real life, but who are truly interested in the same things that I am, that I can share the things I am excited about without fear. I would love to grow a community of people who have similar interests so that we can be a great resource to one another.  I have found that true friends are rare and hard to come by, but that relationships formed online can be some of the most meaningful.

On this blog I plan to share what I have learned through homeschooling, ideas that I'm considering to make our school life better, and some of our day to day activities. I also would love to talk about recipes, homemaking, books, parenting and whatever else strikes my fancy.

So, welcome to Cozy Homeschooling. I hope you'll come back and see if there are ideas here that you can connect with. I hope you'll leave comments and join in discussions. I hope that we can become good friends.