Encouragement for homeschool moms often comes from the most unexpected places. Leigh Bortins, founder of Classical Conversations and veteran homeschool mom of four sons, has spent nearly thirty years standing alongside women who chose to educate their children at home.
For Mother’s Day 2026, Leigh brings a gift from 250 years ago: a letter written by Abigail Adams in the spring of 1776, read aloud in Leigh’s own voice. What Abigail wrote from her home in Braintree, Massachusetts, while her husband was in Philadelphia and the nation was being born, sounds remarkably familiar to any woman managing a household, raising children, and holding a life together under pressure. The days are numbered. What you are doing with them matters more than you know.
“What a privilege it is to be a mother.” — Leigh Bortins
Why Abigail Adams Encourages Homeschool Moms Today
Abigail Adams is often remembered for a few famous lines, but this full letter tells a richer story. She was not writing a manifesto. She was writing to her husband from the middle of an ordinary, yet extraordinary day: worried about the war, relieved about the state of the house, heartbroken over a neighbor’s dying children, and grateful for the return of spring. She is a woman fully present in her life, turning it over in her mind and writing it down.
That is what homeschool mothers do. We are present. We pay attention. We are the ones who notice what a child is struggling with and what is finally beginning to click.
This year, many Classical Conversations families will be studying Cycle 3, walking through American history, the geography of the nation, and the remarkable truth that the human body is fearfully and wonderfully made in the image of God (Psalm 139:14). Abigail Adams belongs to that story. She is primary source material. She is what it looks like to tend a home while the world is being remade outside the door.
What stands out most in this letter is not what Abigail accomplished in spite of her circumstances. It is what she became through them. The classical tradition has always understood that wisdom is formed through attending, through naming what we see, through doing the work faithfully. Abigail Adams thought deeply and worked hard, and for her, these were not different things. The same is true of the homeschool mom.
Read how to live and learn with purpose with Intentional Homeschooling: 5 Ways to Make Every Day Count
A Letter from Abigail Adams to John Adams, March 31 to April 5, 1776
The following letter is presented with original spelling intact, as Leigh reads it in the video above. The original manuscript is held in the Adams Family Papers at the Massachusetts Historical Society and is available through Founders Online, a project of the National Archives. *Section headings have been added by the editors to aid readability and do not appear in the original document.
Braintree March 31, 1776
A Wife’s Questions for a Nation at War
I wish you would ever write me a letter half as long as I write you; and tell me if you may, where your Fleet are gone? What sort of Defence Virginia can make against our common Enemy? Whether it is so situated as to make an able Defence? Are not the Gentery Lords and the common people vassals, are they not like the uncivilized Natives Brittain represents us to be? I hope their Riffel Men who have shewen themselves very savage and even Blood thirsty; are not a specimen of the Generality of the people.
I [illegible] am willing to allow the Colony great merrit for having produced a Washington but they have been shamefully duped by a Dunmore.
On Liberty and the Christian Conscience
I have sometimes been ready to think that the passion for Liberty cannot be Eaquelly Strong in the Breasts of those who have been accustomed to deprive their fellow Creatures of theirs. Of this I am certain that it is not founded upon that generous and christian principal of doing to others as we would that others should do unto us.
News from Boston: A Home Reclaimed
Do not you want to see Boston; I am fearfull of the small pox, or I should have been in before this time. I got Mr. Crane to go to our House and see what state it was in. I find it has been occupied by one of the Doctors of a Regiment, very dirty, but no other damage has been done to it. The few things which were left in it are all gone. Cranch has the key which he never deliverd up. I have wrote to him for it and am determined to get it cleand as soon as possible and shut it up. I look upon it a new acquisition of property, a property which one month ago I did not value at a single Shilling, and could with pleasure have seen it in flames.
The Town in General is left in a better state than we expected, more oweing to a percipitate flight than any Regard to the inhabitants, tho some individuals discoverd a sense of honour and justice and have left the rent of the Houses in which they were, for the owners and the furniture unhurt, or if damaged sufficent to make it good.
Others have committed abominable Ravages. The Mansion House of your President is safe and the furniture unhurt whilst both the House and Furniture of the Solisiter General have fallen a prey to their own merciless party. Surely the very Fiends feel a Reverential awe for Virtue and patriotism, whilst they Detest the paricide and traitor.
A Season of Hope Returns
I feel very differently at the approach of spring to what I did a month ago. We knew not then whether we could plant or sow with safety, whether when we had toild we could reap the fruits of our own industery, whether we could rest in our own Cottages, or whether we should not be driven from the sea coasts to seek shelter in the wilderness, but now we feel as if we might sit under our own vine and eat the good of the land.
I feel a gaieti de Coar to which before I was a stranger. I think the Sun looks brighter, the Birds sing more melodiously, and Nature puts on a more chearfull countanance. We feel a temporary peace, and the poor fugitives are returning to their deserted habitations.
April 5
Grief at a Neighbor’s Door
Not having an opportunity of sending this I shall add a few lines more; tho not with a heart so gay. I have been attending the sick chamber of our Neighbour Trot whose affliction I most sensibly feel but cannot discribe, striped of two lovely children in one week. Gorge the Eldest died on wedensday and Billy the youngest on fryday, with the Canker fever, a terible disorder so much like the throat distemper, that it differs but little from it. Betsy Cranch has been very bad, but upon the recovery. Becky Peck they do not expect will live out the day. Many grown persons are now sick with it, in this street 5. It rages much in other Towns. The Mumps too are very frequent. Isaac is now confined with it. Our own little flock are yet well. My Heart trembles with anxiety for them. God preserve them.
The Work of Home: Provision, Prayer, and Faithfulness
I want to hear much oftener from you than I do. March 8 [John to Abigail, 08 March 1776] was the last date of any that I have yet had. — You inquire of whether I am making Salt peter. I have not yet attempted it, but after Soap making believe I shall make the experiment. I find as much as I can do to manufacture cloathing for my family who which would else be Naked. I know of but one person in this part of the Town who has made any, that is Mr. Tertias Bass as he is calld who has got very near an hundred weight which has been found to be very good. I have heard of some others in the other parishes. Mr. Reed of Weymouth has been applied to, to go to Andover to the mills which are now at work, and has gone. I have lately seen a small Manuscrip describing the proportions for the various sorts of powder, such as fit for cannon, small arms and pistols [illegible]. If it would be of any Service your way I will get it transcribed and send it to you. — Every one of your Friends send their Regards, and all the little ones. Your Brothers youngest child lies bad with convulsion fitts. Adieu. I need not say how much I am Your ever faithfull Friend.
What She Was Doing All Along
Abigail Adams’s letter says something without quite stating it directly: she was doing the most important work in the world, largely alone, and she did not need anyone to tell her it mattered. She already knew.
Homeschool mothers are often asked to justify their choices. But the better question is this: what kind of person are you forming, and in whose image? As Cycle 3 families are studying this year, the human body is not a machine to be optimized. It is the dwelling place of an image-bearer. The homeschool mom is not running a factory. She is raising children who bear the mark of the living God, with her own hands, in her own home, day after day.
God does not need the lessons to be flawless. He does not need the schedule to hold. He sees the ordinary faithfulness, the hours at the table, the prayers offered when no one else is listening. The homeschool mom is known. You are seen. And what you are building will outlast every assessment.
The Best Books for Classical Conversations Cycle 3: A Complete Reading List
A Founding Mother for Every Mother
America turns 250 this year, and it is right to honor the men who signed the Declaration and took up arms. But Leigh Bortins reads this letter to encourage homeschool moms and to honor the women who kept the home, tended the land, nursed the sick, and never stopped asking hard, thoughtful questions. Abigail Adams did not go to Philadelphia. She stayed in Braintree. And the nation was better for it.
A homeschool mom may not go many places this week. She may stay at her table, with her children, in the middle of an ordinary day that feels like it will never end. The next generation will be better for it.
If this message encouraged you, share it with a homeschool mom in your community who needs to hear it. And if you are looking for a community to do this work alongside, we would love to welcome you. Find a Classical Conversations community near you.
