General | Inspired Homeschooling

October 23, 2024 Encouragement, General, Workshops Post a Comment

Using October to plan for homeschooling in the months ahead

“I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers”

~Anne Shirley

We are having the most glorious October here in Denver. The trees are bursting with brightly-colored leaves. The skies are sapphire blue. The clouds are few and wispy. The wind is gentle, coaxing just enough leaves to the ground just often enough to make you feel like you’re in a postcard. And the temperature has been, if anything, just a touch too warm. But I’m definitely not complaining.

These are the kind of days that make me glory in being alive. They are days made for being outside and soaking in the beauty of it all. I am beyond thankful to be able to take this season and wring every possible drop of goodness from it. It is definitely one of the great benefits of homeschooling.

In two short weeks, we will turn back the clocks and I will be returning home from co-ops and preparing dinner in the dark. The days will get shorter and shorter until the Light of the World comes into the world on December 25. I guess it’s really only 8 weeks, but man those 8 weeks can feel like an eternity. And there’s so much to be done!

It’s time to start making a plan for November and December.

Homeschooling is a full-time job. When I remember this, and plan accordingly, my life, including homeschooling, goes much more smoothly. Homeschooling isn’t something that can be squeezed into odd moments. It doesn’t have to take all day every day, but it does require intentionality, planning, and yes, time.

We have other demands on our time as well – cooking, cleaning, laundry, appointments. And now we add preparing for holidays. How do we do it?

It can be done. And it can be done well, and peacefully.

It starts with prayerfully considering what God is asking from us in this season, on this day. Then we need to ask the Holy Spirit to show us how He wants us to fulfill these responsibilities. Then we need to ask HIm to pour out His gifts on us so that we can, with His help, do what He’s asked us to do.

I have a process I use to think through all of this, and I’d like to share it with you. I’ve described it a bit here. I plan to walk you through it more thoroughly in a series of blog posts I’m working on.

Because everything is more fun with friends and good food, I’m also hosting a workshop where we can all do this work together. It will be Saturday, November 9 from 9:30-1:00 at my house. If you’d like to know more about that, click here.

I hope you are soaking up these days of sunshine and color to fortify you during the dark, cold days to come. And I hope, whether you join us November 9 or not, that you will plan well to be a good steward of your family and homeschool in the months to come. God pours out His blessings on us in every season, let us turn to Him with open arms to receive them.

November 20, 2014 Encouragement, General, Parenting 2 Comments

How do you keep calm and homeschool on?

This was the question posed on one of my homeschool forums. Someone was asking for help in taming her temper. She wanted to hear from people who have real tempers (that’s me) and who have conquered them (that’s not me). Even though I am not a picture of perfect, peaceful motherhood (oh how I long to be that mother), under an amazing spiritual director I have made some steps in that direction. Here is what I shared with the other group.

I most definitely have a temper. Here are some things that have helped. Although please know, it is not conquered. And honestly, I think if that’s your goal, you will always be beating up on yourself. Try to make your goal “improvement” and thank God for each small improvement.

Spiritual direction helped tremendously. One of the things that came out for me is the motivation for order. I want a calm organized house, but the purpose should be toward family harmony. And if I am throwing a temper tantrum because things aren’t calm and organized, I’m not working toward family harmony, I’m contributing to the chaos around me.

These great little books: The 30 Days with a Great Spiritual Teacher Series | Ave Maria Press They’re bite sized and perfect for a quick 5 minutes in the morning, but also provide enough to sit and chew on for a good 30 minutes in the morning if I have the time.

Early to bed and early to rise. Getting up at least an hour before my kids helps my sanity so, so, much. I start with a little prayer, and then get my day organized before anyone else gets up. It was hard at first, but now it’s my favorite part of my day.

Really looking at my kids. So often I’m just trying to get through my day, but when I really stop and look at my children, I realize how little they are and how much I love them. Just taking a moment to really see my children has done more to develop my joy in parenting than any other parenting practice. With practice, I have gotten to the point where I can sometimes even do this when I’m about to lose it with them. It helps me to stop, remember my goal is family harmony, and to respond with love and a touch more patience than my natural instinct.

Also from my spiritual director, I am constantly trying to practice responding rather than reacting. I find if I can just take a deep breath, even better if I can remember to say a quick prayer, and attempt to respond with some bit of self control rather than to just let it fly (which feels so good in the moment, but so, so awful later), I can usually come up with a better response than my initial impulse.

And finally I have had to learn to accept my humanness. I am not perfect, I fall constantly. Daily. A confessor once told me, “When you fall, get up quickly.” So that is what I try to do. Jesus loves me and he doesn’t want me to wallow in self-hatred. He wants me to pick myself up and try again. And again. Tiny steps toward improvement. A trust that Jesus will make it all okay. And a willingness to keep on keeping on.

September 29, 2014 Encouragement, General, Our Homeschool, Parenting, Schedules and Routines 4 Comments

Our Homeschool Schedule: Lessons Learned

We’ve been using our homeschool schedule now for about six weeks, and I want to highlight some of the things I’ve learned from the experience. For the most part, it is working as I hoped – sometimes even better. Here are the tips I would share with anyone else trying to make a major change like this.

Take baby steps
One thing I’ve learned repeatedly is that if I try to change everything at once, I will fail. I will burn out, get discouraged, and give up. I took a good 4-6 weeks to plan this schedule, and another 4-6 weeks to implement it. When I began living the plan, I started with getting up early and going to Jazzercise 3 days a week. My next step was to start getting the kids up at 7:15. I then added the morning group school (what we call Morning Time). Once each piece became routine, I added a new piece. Because we were moving from an anything goes free-for-all to a day of expectations and requirements, I felt it was critical to go slowly. This helped me to feel successful instead of defeated.

Get up early
I know. Everyone says this. And it makes me groan too. I have been dragging my butt out of bed 3 mornings a week at 5:30 so I can get to Jazzercise by 6am. Hard, but so worth it. I love having that workout out of the way, and it wakes me up and gets me ready to face the troops when I get back home at 7:15. On Tuesday and Thursday, I’m up at 6 for some office/quiet time. I spend 5-20 minutes of this time praying, depending on the day. This is one of my favorite times of the day. It’s all about nourishing my mind, body, and soul so that I can take care of others with a full tank.

I’m glad I started the schedule implementation by working on my own wake time. It was quite an adjustment, but what those all those annoyingly chipper bloggers say about getting up before your family is true. It really does make the day run more smoothly.

Go to bed early
I had been in the bad habit of staying up later and later each night because it was the only free time I had. The problem was, it was never really “free.” I was too damn tired from the day to do much of anything except maybe fold a load of laundry while staring blearily at a mild-amusing sitcom streaming on my Roku. Or I was taking care of a few last minute details for the next day. Or I was tucking naughty kids back into bed for the 457th time.

We’ve been getting the kids tucked in by 8 the last few days and it’s heavenly. I still have just enough energy to have a conversation with my husband, or read a little, or fold that laundry and enjoy a sitcom. And then I can go to bed at 9, be asleep by 9:30 and still get in 8 hours before my 5:30 Jazzercise alarm.

I will say that if you are a night owl and can truly use your night hours in a way that recharges you and still get up and face your family when you need to, then by all means ignore this. I will add though, my best friend, a consummate night owl, is the one who finally convinced me that getting up early is the way to go. She started doing it and talking about how great it is. This from the girl who cursed at the morning radio show host when my clock radio alarm would go off at 8 o’clock when we were in the dorms together.

Discipline and consistency are key
To really make this work, I’ve seen that I absolutely must stick to the schedule every day. When the kids know that this is what’s happening at this time and there’s no getting out of it, they’re much more likely to get with the program. They have all tested me. Because I’ve given up and thrown in the towel on things like this so many times in the past, I think they’ve all expected this to be one more thing they could get out of if they made it unpleasant enough for me. After a few weeks, they’re all getting the message that this is the way we do things now, and there’s no since in fighting it. An incentive program for my oldest has been especially helpful. Also, consistent expectations for my three year old during school time.

One of the things I changed after realizing this is we now do our Morning Time routine at the kitchen table 3 mornings a week. I had planned to do school in the car on the way to my parent’s house once a week, but I found that doing at least an abbreviated version at home before we leave makes more sense.

Discipline applies to me as well. If I don’t get up early and do what I’m supposed to, the day doesn’t run as smoothly. If I don’t plan meals or start dinner on time, bed time is a mess. The more I follow the plan, the more smoothly things run and the more fun and free time I have.

Plan ahead and be prepared
I’m using several curriculum resources that spell out exactly what and when to do things, and so I thought I could get away with just doing the next thing each morning without any planning ahead. However, I have found that the day runs much more smoothly if I write out exactly what I want to cover each day and put it all in one place. I’ve resisted lesson plans for 4 years, but now find them necessary. Sometimes I want to do more or less of something than is assigned for that day. Sometimes I forget some small but critical piece (like handwriting). Making a written lesson plan helps me feel more in control and less scattered. It also keeps me from just blowing something off for the day.

Screen time during school hours is a Bad Idea
At least in our family. Our original schedule had bits of screen time scattered throughout the day for each of the kids. I’ve done away with that. The new rule is that, unless it’s been specifically assigned for school, you may not use a screen before 4pm. I found that it was too easy for the kids to stretch the screen time – and for me to let them because it was easy for me. Then there would be fights about turning it off, and it made transitioning through our day too contentious. What was screen time for each kid is now free time. Once 4pm rolls around, they can pretty much glut themselves until about 6 when I ask them to do some chores before dinner.

For the most part, I’m super pleased with the way things are going, and I’m happy I stuck with the bumps that came with making a big change. I feel much better about the way we spend our days, and my kids seem happier too.

August 18, 2014 General, Our Homeschool, Schedules and Routines Post a Comment

Homeschooling Multiple Children: Our 1st Grade Plan for 2014-2015

You have now seen my schedule, my 4th grader’s schedule, and my preschooler’s schedule. Because she’s involved in most of our schedules most of the day, you’ve also seen the bulk of my 1st grader’s schedule, but I’ll share it here on it’s own.

I want to note that in preparing each of these schedules I carefully considered my kids’ unique personalities. Helen is my most patient but also my most extroverted child. I knew I had to include time for her to play with her neighborhood friends which means that she has to be done with the majority of her stuff by the time they can play after school. It also means that I need to try to keep her busy when her friends are in school.

This is Helen’s first year of school with me. I didn’t do formal school with Henry at this age. I don’t think it’s necessary to have scheduled school time with a 1st grader, but Helen is begging for it. It also gives us a format for interaction that we both enjoy. Our one-on-one school time has become a highlight of the day for both of us.

I just don’t want anyone to read this and think that their 1st grader needs to have a bunch of formal school time scheduled into their day. I still stand by my relaxed approach. Henry was unschooled at this age. You know your kid. If they don’t delight in sitting down to do math and phonics for an hour a day, don’t force it!

You’ll see that much of her day is still free time, though I provide a little structure to keep boredom away. Most of the activities (like science box time and sensory time) are open ended and optional. If she has a better way to spend her time, for the most part, she can do what she likes.

7:15-8:15	Wake, dress, brush teeth, eat breakfast
8:15-9:15	Group School	This has been happening at the breakfast table for the most part. I read aloud from Life of Fred, our science reading for the day, and our history reading for the day. The kids can color or draw or play quietly on the floor.
9:15-9:45	Outside Time	All three of the kids go outside while I clean up the kitchen and such.
9:45-10:15	Free Time	This was initially read alone/book time while I do school with Thomas, but in practice it’s been free time while I finish up chores or play with Thomas if he’s interested.
10:15-10:45	Morning School	Here is more read alouds or picture study, composer study, or nature study a la Charlotte Mason. This is still developing.
10:45-11:30	School with Mom	We’re working through the Primary Arts of Language phonics/reading program. We’re also starting Ray’s Arithmetic. Phonics takes priority. If we have time, interest, and attention, we do a little math.
11:30-12:00	Time with Thomas	They can choose to do whatever they want as long as they leave Henry and I alone to work. The science box materials are still out. I also plan to have a planned sensory or craft activity available during this time. Or they can play with dolls or trucks or whatever. Again, as long as they let Henry and I work, it’s all good.
12:00-12:30	School Alone	Yes, 1^st grade is young for independent work, but the idea is that she’ll work on her phonics games and worksheets at the kitchen counter while I prep lunch.
12:30-1:00	Lunch
1:00-1:30	Spanish with Henry	I don’t know if this is going to work, but I’d like to have them do some sort of Spanish at this time. We have Power Glide Spanish, but we may switch to Spanish videos or something.This time has two goals in addition to learning a little Spanish. 1) Henry and Helen spend time together doing something constructive. 2) They leave me alone to do some prayer and reflection.
1:30-2:00	Screen Time	This is first (of three) 30 minute screen times. During this time, Thomas is resting in my bed with me, and Henry is working on his independent work.
2:00-2:30	Rest Time	Quiet play in her room, preferably resting on her bed. She can listen to audio books, look at books, or play quietly alone with her dolls and such.
2:30-3:00	Time with Mom	This is for us to do whatever it is she wants to do with me. Often it’s playing with dolls.
3:00-4:00	Outside Time	Free time outside. I’m available at this time to supervise, but I’m reading or making phone calls or doing yard work.
4:00-4:30	Afternoon Chores	Making sure everything is picked up from the day and straightening up her room.
5:00-6:00	Outside Time	As soon as afternoon chores are done, they’re free to play outside with the neighbor kids.
6:00-6:30	Screen Time
6:30-7:00	Dinner and Clean up
7:00-7:30	Screen Time or Free Play	Sometimes she heads downstairs for more TV after dinner, sometimes she spins around in the living room for a half an hour.
7:30-8:30	Bath, bed, tuck-in	Lights out at 8:30.

August 13, 2014 Encouragement, General, Our Homeschool, Schedules and Routines 8 Comments

Homeschooling Multiple Children: Our 4th Grade Plan for 2014-2015

A few days ago I shared my plan for my preschooler, and I’ve decided to go ahead and share my plan for the rest of us as well. I do this with some hesitation because I am certainly not holding us up as The Family That You Should Imitate. We’re not. But I have found it helpful to see how others with families similar to mine are managing things. I share this so you can see how I have solved some of the challenges associated with educating multiple children at different developmental levels and scheduling when things aren’t always the same.

Our Homeschool Up ‘Till Now

I am a very relaxed educator in the early grades. My oldest was very much unschooled from birth through 2nd grade. Periodically I would pull out some sort of reading or math program and give it a go, but if he didn’t take to it (and he never did) we put it away and just went on with our lives. At some point between 2nd and 3rd grade I began requiring him to do 10 minutes of reading and 10 minutes of math a day. He was allowed to choose anything he wanted to read and anything he wanted to do for math – computer games, card games, Life of Fred, etc. Through this process he went from reading the same Henry and Mudge book every day to reading Harry Potter in a very short period of time.

The rest of our time was spent playing with friends, reading books, listening to audio books, field trips, outside time, and yes, a good amount of computer time and television.

Last year, his 3rd grade year, I tried a more formal approach. What began as a day involving math and handwriting and spelling and reading devolved into just trying to get through a lesson in our Saxon math book without killing each other. We limped toward the end of the year, me stubbornly clinging to the idea that we must get through a lesson a day in math if nothing else. I ignored his atrocious handwriting and poor spelling. I felt science and history and language arts were more than adequately covered by all of our exploration and the great books we were reading.

Our Big Picture Plan for 4th Grade

At the end of last year, I was ready to give up on homeschooling. We started talking about school. We toured our local Catholic school. And I prayed a lot. And a few seemingly random opportunities for this year just fell in my lap. And these opportunities and resources made me believe that we can do this – that we can find a balanced approach to homeschooling that works for us.

First, we got an email telling us that our enrichment program will begin carrying the Book Shark curriculum. One of the perks of our enrichment program is access to free curriculum. The Book Shark program is a literature based approach to language arts, history, and science. And it is amazing.

We have always learned so much through the great books and stories we enjoy together. My kids love to listen to me read aloud or to audio books in the car. The Book Shark program pulls it all together for you. We’ll be studying American History this year through reading a series of engaging, often award winning, novels. No dry textbooks. No tests. Just good stories and conversation. The approach is very much in line with a Charlotte Mason living books and narration approach. And I don’t have to do the legwork myself.

The opportunity that came our way was the chance to participate in a Catholic co-op based on the Classical Conversations curriculum. This was such an answer to prayer. We have tried to find a Catholic homeschool group that fits our family, and we just haven’t been successful. Many of the groups were simply farther than I wanted to drive. This one is less than 10 minutes from my house.

Classical Conversations is something that has always intrigued and repelled me. If you’re not familiar with it, it’s essentially rote memorization of facts. They memorize parts of speech, math formulas, a history timeline, science facts, geography facts, poetry – all kinds of stuff.

This year the group will be studying American History and Anatomy. Which goes perfectly with what we’re covering in Book Shark. The co-op also offers an amazing writing program for my oldest son. They’ll also be learning Latin.

I am so, so, excited about all of the great things my kids will be learning this year.

How It Will All Work in Practice

So I had to figure out how all of this was going to fit together in real life. I knew that between the Classical Conversations co-op on Thursdays and our enrichment program on Fridays and our weekly trip to my parents’ house on Wednesdays, I had to be very realistic about how much we could do at home. My challenge was to figure out what I really needed to teach the kids this year, and how to fit that into the time we have without making everyone crazy.

Managers of Their Homes strongly encourages you to have the same schedule for every day. That was my first challenge. We’re only home two days a week this year. How in the world was I to make every day the same?

I solved the problem by creating a schedule that keeps our mornings, late afternoons, and evenings the same and only changes the “school time” in the main part of the day. When we’re home we follow our homeschool schedule. When we visit Grandmother on Wednesdays, we follow a modified version which has our “group school” time happening in the car on the drive down and the drive back plugs into our afternoon rest/outside time.

Here. I’ll show you. This is what my 4th grader’s day looks like.

I’d love to hear what you’re doing this year and how you handle the variability of a homeschooler’s week. Do you have more or less the same routine every day? Every week? Or do you start from scratch every day? What works for you?

*7:15 – 8:15*	Wake and Morning Chores	Henry’s morning chores are dressing, making his bed, personal grooming, eating breakfast, and unloading the dishwasher.
*8:15-9:15*	Group School	This is when we do our Book Shark reading, a chapter from Life of Fred and our Classical Conversations memory work. We’re all together in the living room. The work is primarily read alouds. On Wednesdays we will listen to audio books and our Classical Conversations memory CD in the car as we drive out to my parents’ house.
*9:15-9:45*	Outside	The kids all go outside at this time and I do my FlyLady chores.
*9:45-10:15*	Morning Ticket	My kids each get three 30-minute blocks of screen time per day. This is Henry’s first “ticket.” He earns his ticket by finishing his morning chores on time. If he doesn’t, he uses this time to finish up anything he needs to from the morning chore block before he can “spend his ticket.”
*10:15-10:45*	Morning School Time	We finish up anything we didn’t get to at Group School Time and spend some time learning a hymn, reading about a Saint, or doing a Picture Study or Composer Study.
*10:45-11:15*	Science Box Time with Thomas	I need to do a whole post on Science Boxes. This is time for Henry and Thomas to do open ended science exploration. They may do anything they want, really, so long as Henry keeps Thomas busy while I do school with Helen. The science box gives them a place to start.
*11:15-12:15*	School with Mom	This is when we work on writing, math, spelling, and anything else he needs help with.
*12:15-1:00*	Lunch
*1:00-1:30*	Spanish with Helen	We’re using Power Glide Spanish. I’m not super concerned with mastery or anything. So as long as they’re not bothering my prayer time, I’m not too concerned about what they do at this time. I wanted to make sure that each of the kids had one-on-one time with each of the other kids and I provided some structure to help keep it sane. Thomas will be having his Kindle time in bed with me so the kids just need to leave us alone at this point.
*1:30-2:30*	Independent School Time	This is going to be tricky. We will definitely be slowly working up to a whole hour of working independently. Very slowly. But that is the goal. I will give him a daily assignment sheet so he knows what to do.
*2:30-3:00*	Ticket Time	His second ticket. He earns this by being cooperative with schoolwork.
*3:00-3:30*	Rest/Outside Time	This is free time for him. If he wants to rest or read or play Lego in his room this will be a quiet time for him. The rest of us are outside and he’s welcome to join us. On Wednesdays, this time is spent driving home from my parents’ house.
*3:30-4:00*	Read Alone Time	This will be assigned reading from the Book Shark program. On Wednesdays, this is still car time.
*4:00-4:30*	Mom Time	This is his chance to do whatever he’d like with me. Right now he’s working on learning to make Minecraft “Let’s Play” videos.
*4:30-5:00*	Afternoon Chores	For Henry this is taking out the trash, tidying up his room, and putting away anything of his laying around the house.
*5:00-6:30*	Outside/Free Time	Whatever he wants to do so long as it’s not screens. When the weather is nice this is usually playing outside with the neighbor kids.
*6:30-7:00*	Dinner and Cleanup
*7:00-7:30*	Nighttime Chores	Shower, jammies, brush teeth, bring family laundry down to basement.
*7:30-8:00*	Nighttime Ticket	He can hit the screens as soon as he finishes his nighttime chores.
*8:00-8:30*	Reading with Mom or Dad	Bed time stories.
*8:30*	Lights Out

August 9, 2014 Book Reviews: Books for Parents, Education Theory, Encouragement, General, Our Homeschool, Schedules and Routines 4 Comments

Why you should consider a schedule for your homeschool

If you know me or have followed my blog at all, you know that I have always tended toward a relaxed, unschool-ish, laissez-faire approach to my kids’ education. You probably also know that I have flirted with curriculum on and off, and that part of me has always longed for a more predictable routine and, yes, even schedule.

At the beginning of last year I had big plans. I made a really impressive Excel spreadsheet that laid out our week for us from 7am to 8pm each day. I scheduled 20 minutes for phonics, 20 minutes for math, etc. It all looked so nice on paper. And parts of it did go smoothly. The kids loved morning recess. Though I usually wanted to use that time to do a few chores.

We gave it the good college try for about a month before I threw in the towel and decided that our homeschool schedule now consisted of a math lesson and some handwriting. Eventually I just insisted on math. And then there was the day it took us two hours of screaming and crying to get through a Saxon math lesson. I should note that only my oldest was required to do school. The other two kids could do whatever they wanted. Which usually involved staring at a screen.

Despite my greatest hopes and desires, most days simply deteriorated into either tears or screens or both. I didn’t feel good about what we were doing, but I didn’t have the energy to change course. “You guys want to play a game? Or read a book? Or go for a walk?” was usually met with “Nah. I’m watching My Little Pony. Or Pokemon. Or Thomas the Train.” And so I spent a little more time scrolling through Facebook.

This isn’t how I imagined homeschooling would be. I imagined science experiments and read alouds and nature walks. And we did those things. We did a lot of great stuff and learned a lot. My kids even learned stuff from My Little Pony and Pokemon and Thomas the Train. I’m not saying they didn’t.

But on those days when we had no plan – no field trip, no co-op, no park days, no play-dates, no science club – we all felt at loose ends. I wanted, as my friend Clea wrote so eloquently, to put the “home” back in our homeschool.

And then a woman whom I like and admire on our local Catholic homeschooling board recommended the book Managers of Their Homes. She described her homeschooling days, and it sounded much closer to my dreams for my family. Now, I know we should keep our eyes on our own paper. I know that what works for her and her 7 girls won’t work for me and my motley crew, but the book promised to help me create a custom schedule for my family.

So with a bit of fear and trepidation, I bought it. And I read it. Slowly. And prayerfully. I watched my anxiety ebb and flow as I processed the lessons. And I began to see the wisdom and the peace of having a predictable daily routine.

What’s great about this book (and I’m not an affiliate so I’m not trying to sell you anything here) is that it really baby steps you through it. It has you think about all of the things you want to fit into your day for yourself and each of your children. It has you prioritize. And it asks you to be realistic about how much time there is in a day. It reminds you that God does not give you more to do than you can fit into the 24 hours in a day He gives you. So if you don’t have enough time, you’re not following God’s plan for you. That one was hard to stomach. My schedules hand’t worked in the past because I didn’t start in the right place – with God’s plan for my family and with respect for the limits on my time.

As I was reading Managers of Their Homes, I was also reading Teaching from Rest by Sarah Mackenzie (again, not an affiliate). There is much wisdom and gentleness in this book. One of major points was that each interruption to our schedules is a visit from Our Lord. Each time a child needs us to tie a shoe or wipe a bottom or “look at a really cool block tower I just built,” it is Jesus asking us to look up from our own agenda and meet Him in our day.

Reading these two books together really pushed me to think about finding the balance between having a predictable routine and schedule on the one hand, and being a slave to my planner and the clock on the other.

I confess that this is never a line I have walked well. I have some OCD tendencies, am prone to anxiety, like to have everything “under control,” and can become a cruel task master when trying to follow a plan. I tend to waffle between anal-retentive-Type-A-crazy-woman and it-can’t-be-perfect-so-I-give-up-anything-goes sloth.

It has been a constant spiritual battle for me to come to a place where I believe I have a reasonable chance – with much prayer and God’s continued out-pouring of grace – to approach a plan like this without making myself crazy or my family resentful.

If you’d like some help getting started with thinking about a schedule/routine that will work for you and your family, I’d love to walk you through the process and share what I’ve learned. Check out my Homeschool Consulting page for more information on working with me. It is always my goal to encourage and inspire you on your homeschooling journey.

November 30, 2010 Bellies and Babies, General Post a Comment

Nesting

Guess it’s been awhile since I’ve blogged. As this post title would indicate, I’ve been quite busy nesting.

I actually feel like I’ve been nesting this entire pregnancy. I’ve rearranged and organized the entire house. I’ve put little systems in place that make it possible for me to get my housework done – at least to my satisfaction. I’ve created routines for myself and the kids that make our days run more smoothly. I’m filling the freezer with food so I won’t have to cook or worry about what people are going to eat while I’m snuggling a newborn. I’ve gotten most of my Christmas planning and shopping done. And I am feeling really good about the home we’ve created to bring this little baby into.

I know I wasn’t nearly this prepared to bring home my other two babes. With Helen, I had grand plans to cook ahead, but I never got around to it. I think I somehow expected life to be easier after my second was born – like I knew what I was doing. I didn’t. I was a mess.

This time, I’m trying to be more realistic. And more prepared. Which is easier, because this time, I have a little bit better idea of what needs to be done. And I have more realistic standards. I now that my older children will need to eat and that I will need to be prepared to feed them. I also know that it is perfectly okay for them to live for awhile on a diet made up solely of PBJ, canned fruit, apples, mac & cheese, cheese sticks and gold fish crackers. They’ll be thrilled, it’ll be easy for me, and we can worry about variety and nutrition when I’m no longer nursing a newborn around the clock.

On the other hand, I know that my hubby and I are not usually content with such monotonous fare. Especially me. Especially when I’m nursing a newborn around the clock. I must eat. I must eat copious amounts of food. I must eat meat at every meal. And so I have a freezer full of food that I like and that can be quickly nuked to feed a starving new mama.

My vision for this time is a bit different too. I’m learning to live with a bit of mess. I no longer harbor delusions that I’ll be able to get through baby’s first year with a shiny sink. I’ve built into my daily routines times that are just for sitting with my kids. I no longer rely quite as much on television to babysit my kids, and at the same time, I have no guilt about using it when I need it.

All of these are practical, pragmatic changes I’ve made that I hope will help me get through the addition of this new bundle of joy without a third bout with post partum depression. I know I still have some personal demons to face. I need to trust in myself as a mother. I need to trust that I can parent my older children and my newborn in a way that won’t mess them up for life – even if that doesn’t look like what Dr. Sears or Alfie Kohn or the wonderful, gentle mothers in my mother’s group would consider ideal. I need to know that children are resilient and what they most need from me is my sanity. I need to know, deep in my soul and not just intellectually, that life is not perfect, that I am not perfect, that my imperfection is not the end of the world and that we will all survive it.

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