Luv U See

Two weeks ago, I was in North Carolina selling BiblioPlan for Families, our homeschool history/literature curriculum.  Our little company was among the many vendors peddling wares at a homeschoolers' convention. Since we homeschool our three boys, I also use these conventions as opportunity to find whatever curriculum I need for the coming school year.

Ben and Elijah's needs are simple now. Ben has moved on to the local community college, and Elijah uses hand-me-down books from Ben's previous courses.  Elijah takes science and English composition at our homeschool co-op, studies Spanish and math at home, and of course uses BiblioPlan for history. In his spare time, he pursues his new goal of launching a satellite.

Aaron is another story.

Even though he's made a lot of progress since the year he spent sitting silently in a shed filled with moaning boys, he still needs a lot of help to get ready for kindergarten. So I have been looking and listening to find helpful curriculum that can meet his needs. 

After looking around at the convention a bit, I decided to check out the Math U See booth. Their booth is MUCH bigger than ours. They had several cash registers and lots of representatives wearing matching blue shirts. They definitely made us look like small potatoes. I walked up to a man who was selling Primer books and struck up a conversation. We talked for 20 minutes.  I shared Aaron's story with him and described Aaron's special needs.  We looked at the curriculum in light of these needs. I decided that I liked Math U See; but I had to go, so I left the booth without buying anything. We were busy at our booth, and the day was ending when I finally found time to run back to Math U See to buy the Primer materials for our little guy.
When I got there, I let my friend know that I wanted the primer books for Aaron.  He bagged up the materials and carried them to the cash register. And then, without preamble, in an unbelievable act of love and kindness, he took out his personal credit card and paid for Aaron's books. 

I was stunned.  It was all I could do to keep from dissolving into tears right there on the convention floor.  Love in action.  The Kindness of Strangers.  Aaron's story touching hearts and lives in a way that continually astounds us. Nearly everyone seems moved to give him something. I could barely mumble my heartfelt thanks as I took the books and walked away, shaking and crying. 

So many people have been so generous to him over these last few weeks.  It is humbling, because we simply can't provide all of these things. Without the help of generous strangers, Aaron wouldn't have nearly as much as he does.

We have another convention this weekend, this time in Richmond. This one's called HEAV, Home Educators' Association of Virginia (I think). I plan on visiting the Math U See booth again, and if our benefactor is there, since Rob is bringing the boys on Saturday, he'll get a chance to meet the little guy whom he generously blessed a couple of weeks ago. 

*****
To the many people who donated to Ian, Thank You! We have reached our goal of 90 puzzle pieces and raised $1,000.00 for Ian. I'm quite sure, however, that the Stewarts wouldn't reject any extra donations you might want to make. They're still well short of their goal.

Please continue to pray for Jonah's parents, Tom and Mary. They are waiting and hoping that their paperwork will arrive in time.  Please pray Jonah home.

And please keep praying for the Goodmans and Sweet Caroline.  They were not submitted this morning.  So they wait another week on pins and needles.