My son graduates in Japan

Psalm 127:3  Behold children are a gift of the Lord.  The fruit of the womb is his reward.

When I started homeschooling my firstborn son, Gage,  I had no idea that the end result of it would be that he would grow up and not just leave me, but actually go half way around the world to Japan to get a masters degree in law, and then love it so much that he decides to stay half way around the world by taking a job in Viet Nam!

He graduated from Kyushu University last week with a LLM - International Economic and Business Law degree!

Gage would have liked for Bill and I both to travel to Japan to see him graduate, and what a once in a lifetime trip that would have been!  But even if the timing would have been better (we had two foster/adopt daughters move in with us just a couple of weeks before) the money just wasn't there.  It was a stretch, but Bill manage to get it together, and soon he was in Japan!



I admit I was a bit jealous when I saw this picture!  "I" wanted to be there!!  :o)

We all wondered if Bill, the world's pickiest eater, would starve to death in the land of raw fish.  I think it did take a bit of persuading for Gage to get him to eat...

But he must have eaten something, because he lived through it!  I know they had a lot of fun, and I know Bill needed a vacation, and I am so glad one of us was there!!

Soon the big night came!

Gage's diploma was in two lanuages!

 I never imagined him going this far.  I just wanted a good moral boy.  He went far beyond the expectations of everyone who told me I was:

ruining him
keeping him from being socialized
keeping him from ever amounting to anything at all

And that:

no college would EVER accept him because I didn't allow him to go to school.

Take heart, all you homeschooling moms!!

I'm really proud of my kids, all ten (and soon to be twelve) of them are doing great.  I am so thankful God led me to homeschool them, and spend all my hours with them as they grew up from little babies to big grown men and women who are pursuing their dreams.  I obviously didn't ruin them after all.  The grown ones have all ended up so differently, doing different things than I thought they would do, but they are productive adults earning and making their own way in the world.

I want to just publicly say, thank you, Lord, for the gifts you gave me!!