Homeschool mom t-shirts...

Ok, so if you homeschool, I know you've seen those homeschool mom t-shirts. I've walked by that booth at the homeschool conference. I'll slow down in the middle of my mad dash to get to Rainbow Resource before they're out of my preferred spelling book, but I don't slow down much.

Maybe this is considered sacrilege, but most of those t-shirts make me cringe a bit. Yeah. Sorry, but it's true.

One of the best sellers seems to be this one that says "I'm a homeschool mom. What's your superpower?" Then there's this one about being a full time multi-tasking ninja. Maybe I could like the one about being in love with your kid's principal, but I think "yeah, too confusing and possibly risqué."

I think what I don't like about most of these shirts is the tone of "we can do it all, and we're proud of it."

I'm telling ya, if I was wearing one of those bad boys to the park, that would be the day that my boys decided to play rough with all the toddlers, and then my oldest would come up to me and say, "Mom, how do you spell "us" again?"

Where's the t-shirt that says, "I'm a homeschooling mom, and I'm completely exhausted, and we're behind in math, and I'm just praying that I'm not making my children stupid?" Yeah, they're not making those yet, shockingly enough.

People buy t-shirts that say that they're proud of their sports team or they love chess or that they think Wyoming is beautiful. I know t-shirt sayings don't mean that much.

But when I see those t-shirts I think about the mom I met on the playground the other day who asked me how many boys I have, and then she told me that she'd homeschooled her two boys for a year. "They were so close together in age, and it was just too hard." I'd had a rough morning with my guys, and I understood. I could look at her and say, "I know what you're saying."

In my state, homeschooling is an increasingly popular education choice. Last year, there were more children in my county being homeschooled than were enrolled in our private schools. Homeschooling feels like it should be a viable option to a lot of families around here, and it seems to me that some of the people who aren't choosing it feel like they're not choosing it because they aren't strong enough.

How are those moms going to feel if I show up in a "homeschooling superwoman" shirt that is a complete lie on most of my exceptionally ordinary days with my non-child prodigy children who are not reading the Latin Vulgate for fun?

I want this company to make this into a t-shirt. I'd totally buy this one. Totally. :)