While I was contemplating our learning path -

I came across some articles by Pat Ferenga that really made a lot of sense to me and I thought I would share some of it here...

I define unschooling as allowing children as much freedom to learn in the world, as their parents can comfortably bear...This is the way we learn before going to school and the way we learn when we leave school and enter the world of work...Certainly these interests can lead to reading texts, taking courses, or doing projects, but the important difference is that these activities were chosen and engaged in freely by the learner. They were not dictated to the learner through curricular mandate to be done at a specific time and place, though parents with a more hands-on approach to unschooling certainly can influence and guide their children's choices....Unschooling, for lack of a better term (until people start to accept living as part and parcel of learning), is the natural way to learn. However, this does not mean unschoolers do not take traditional classes or use curricular materials when the student, or parents and children together, decide that this is how they want to do it. Learning to read or do quadratic equations are not "natural" processes, but unschoolers nonetheless learn them when it makes sense to them to do so, not because they have reached a certain age or are compelled to do so by arbitrary authority. - taken in part from this site - HERE

This makes so much sense to me and it is just what I have been looking for as some kind of definition that really clicks! The one line that really makes it work for me is "as their parents can comfortably bear." This one line gives me a clearer link and as I grow more and more comfortable, as KM becomes more and more self-guided and we both get farther and farther from the PS thinking of "this is what you have to learn and when you have to learn it" mindset, I feel that we will be able to more and more free with our thinking, learning and life in general. CJ of course just really wants us to be happy and fully trusts in me to take the path that will get us to an educated end. I am feeling much more confident as this "school year" comes to an end than I did last. I know that we have the supports in place and that we can make these decisions on our own. We (CJ and I) know what is best for our daughter and we (KM and I) are totally capable of having a learning lifestyle that is fulfilling for all of us.