One Little Day

The days are flying by.  I can hardly believe we're already cruising toward the third month of 2013!  Or that before long, my oldest two children will officially be done with third grade, my middle child done with kindergarten, and the four year old will know that I no longer have a reason to not do 'real school' with her.

I don't know what this 'real school' that she speaks of is about.  It's not like I don't throw all kinds of stuff at her.  Apparently it doesn't comply with her sense of 'real school'.

Before the year gets away from me, I wanted to write out how our typical day looks.  I keep looking back at last year and wondering how we made it through, what with having a baby in the house and me trying to potty train Anna.  I personally feel like it's a victory that schooling actually happened!

One of the major perks of homeschooling is that I don't have to get up before the sun and coax my children into readiness by 7AM.  Or earlier!  I have one friend who puts her kids on the bus at 6:30.  Y'all, I don't see that hour very often.  The alarm clock at our house doesn't even go off until 7:15 and I am over feeling guilty about that.  We pack enough into a day that I have no qualms about 'sleeping in'.

The older two kids start moving around 7:30.  Thomas and Sarah Grace are responsible for getting themselves dressed, eating their breakfast, doing their morning chores, and getting a start on their independent work without me having to say a single word to them. 

Unless, of course, it's a pajama day.  When it's cold out, it's just understood that on Thursdays, putting on real clothes is totally optional.  The rest of their morning routine holds, though.

Elizabeth and Anna have a tendency to sleep in a little more, but they usually make it down around 8 to have their breakfast and then I send them back upstairs to get ready for the day and make their beds.  It can sometimes be two hours (or more) before I see them again because they are prone to simply stay in their room and play.

Daniel is left to sleep as long as he'd like.  My philosophy has always been that you don't wake a sleeping baby.  Especially my sleeping babies!  He is usually making noise by 8 or 830 and he gets to eat and be dressed in pretty short order.

Thomas and Sarah Grace emerge from the school room about 8:30 and wander about until 9 or so when we go back to the school room for me to check what they've been working on.  We naturally roll into anything that they need me for and I work with just the older two for about half an hour while Daniel wanders around bringing me anything that's not nailed down to the floor.  'Hewuh doh, Mama.'

Once we finish up this round of school, we scatter for a few minutes while I flip laundry and think about lunch plans.  Somebody practices piano during this time and the other kids get the laundry put away before we plop Daniel in the pack and play to watch Baby Einstein or Eebee Baby.

When Daniel is settled in, the rest of us troop back into the school room.  Anna sits at her little student desk and works on her work, Thomas and Sarah Grace settle into math, and Elizabeth and I spend a few minutes on phonics with Elizabeth.

It's about 10-ish now and at this point, I usually sit down in my seat in the school room and catch up on blogs, research, banking, whatever needs my attention.  If I leave the room, my sweet children last 43 seconds before the giggling starts.  Some days, I issue a threat reminder from wherever I am about how I need to get something done elsewhere, but for the most part, I just stay parked with them for about an hour.

Daniel's show is 30 minutes long, but on a good day, he'll play quietly in that pack and play for another 30 minutes.  On a typical day, I get him up before the screeching commences and he comes to join us in the school room and plays with math manipulatives.  Or one of his siblings finishes up their work and carries him off to the reading nook with a handful of books.

Most days, Thomas and Sarah Grace work right up until our 11:30-ish lunch.  Elizabeth and Anna are done with their school room part of the school day and Daniel is done being nice for the morning, so one of them helps me get lunch ready and the other tries her best to keep Daniel distracted.  Once everyone has something in their bellies, the kids clean up from lunch and I take off with Daniel and Anna for a few minutes of whatever makes them happy that day.  Reading is always a favorite.

At 1PM, Elizabeth, Anna, and Daniel all go off for naps.  It will be 2-3 hours before I see Anna and Daniel has been known to sleep until 4 or later.  Elizabeth usually sleeps for 30-45 minutes before she joins us back downstairs.  We work on her reading when she gets up and her official schooling for the day is over.

While the younger kids nap, Thomas and Sarah Grace tie up any left over work from the morning and are supposed to study spelling and work on their Bible memory.  Once they have checked off everything on their assignment sheet for the day, they are free to go outside, use a screen-time ticket, or play with their toys inside.


As for me, my second wind kicks in about 4 and I manage to 'get something done' before Joshua gets home.  We try to eat dinner around 6-6:30 and then the kids clean up the dining room and stack the dishes.  Joshua or I do a final wipe down in the kitchen and we're done for the day.  That last hour leading up to bed time is filled with anything from reading to wrestling and occasionally even school with Daddy.

We try to have everyone prayed up, tucked in, and lights out between 8 and 8:30.  Some nights it's much closer to 9, but that works fine too.  So long as Joshua and I have a little bit of time for just us after the kids go down!

And there you have it.  A typical school day with my 8 year old, 7 year old, 5 year old, 4 year old, and 22 month old.  It's hectic and busy and loud and hard and fun and tiring and fulfilling and so much more.

And it's good, y'all. So good. 

The Realities of Right Now

There are all these things that are going on that contribute to our days, but do not wholly make up our days.

Like the fact that the kids bathroom is only half usable.  We have to replace the vanity in the bathroom (more trouble than it sounds like due to it not being a standard size vanity, of course) and re-ceiling the closet in the entry-way.

There should be a ceiling there... but we're thankful that the frame wasn't damaged, so that is a beautiful site!

A month ago, there was minorly-major leak.  Minor in that it could have been oh-so-much worse.  Major in that we filed our first ever insurance claim.  It's not repaired yet because we like to take our sweet time and live the rest of our lives.  And y'all, we've got a lot of life to be living!

*****

In case I haven't eluded to it in some other post, our sweet little Daniel is a crazy little thing.  He is this weird mix of I-want-to-do-it-all-by-myself-so-don't-you-dare-touch-me toward his siblings and oh-my-word-would-you-just-pick-me-up-and-carry-me.  And he waffles between those two idealogies about 3862 times an hour.  You always know how he's feeling: Independent brings out screeches of why-are-you-touching/looking-at-me while happy to be coddled brings about sweet peace. 

There is no middle ground.

*****

We did a little bit of bed moving recently.  The boys now share a room again.  They are both highly content with this arrangement, except at naptime when I refuse to allow Thomas to go into his room for any reason lest he wake the baby. 

Please, whatever you do, let the child get his sleep!  Or things could get really ugly!

Sarah Grace moved into the playroom, which was never really a play room.  It just happens to be the place where the toy box resides.  Daniel's crib was in there so, again, the room was only available for use when he was awake.  And it was always messy because I booted people out as I was putting the baby down for nap, leaving them not even two minutes to clean up.

I'm rabbit trailing again, though.  The room is now Sarah Grace's room.  All by herself.  We moved her in an effort to teach some responsibility to the younger two girls.  Sarah Grace is very neat and organized and will do what she can to cover for the lack of neatness and organization in her sisters.  In the end, she winds up working way harder then the other girls do and Elizabeth and Anna have no idea how to care for their space.

So.  Anna and Elizabeth have the big room to themselves and Sarah Grace has her own space.  The little girls room is much neater than I would have thought it would stay!  They took their task seriously.  Plus, I spent an entire day cleaning up and cleaning out and I might or might not have made noise about doing away with all material possessions if they were not properly cared for.

Ahem.

Suffice it to say, the girls' bedrooms are typically staying much neater than they have in the past.  The boys' room tends to suffer a bit because Daniel takes luxuriously long naps leaving Thomas precious little time to actually clean up.  I'm trying to teach him to QUIT DROPPING HIS JUNK all over the floor.  That's only working about so-so.  For the most part, as long as there is a path cleared to Daniel's crib, I can bite my lip.  I know the day is soon coming when Daniel will be awake more and I can give more focused energy to teaching BOTH boys to keep their space livable.

Speaking of Daniel... he has words.  Actually, he has phrases.  He tells us what he wants...outside, to play, banana, orange, good cookie, to be read to, a drink, more.  And if he doesn't have a word for something, believe you me, he will get his point across.  See paragraph 4.

*****

Before Christmas, I entered a give-away on Facebook.  All you had to do was "Like" the page, and you were entered to win a 2 year supply of Go-Go SqueeZ.

Um, yes, please.

If you check Facebook, you'll see Go-Go SqueeZ in my "Like"s and there they will remain forevermore.  I honestly forgot about it (how often do you click on something like that and actually remember to check it out?  Wasn't that why I'd given them my e-mail address??)

You see, I won.  No, not the grand prize, but the tenth place prize.  Which still amounted to a Great Big Lot of squeezable applesauce.  Thirteen cases, to be exact.  Plus a handful of other 'stuff' that was a part of the give-away.

I thought they'd send vouchers, but y'all...  the Fed Ex guy knocked one day with a dolly loaded with boxes.  He unloaded them and went back for another dolly full!  Currently, every spare inch of pantry space we had is devoted to housing Go-Go SqueeZ.  There is some major happiness in knowing that I don't have to put a lot of thought into snacks right now.

Also, if you come to visit and bring your kids, you can count on them having squeezable applesauce.  You're welcome. 

*****

We implemented a Screen Time system a few months ago.  It is a beautiful, amazing, wonderful thing.  The rules are simple: Each child gets 5 screen times a week in 30 minute increments.  They are allowed to use them after lunch, if all their chores are caught up with.  We do not use screen times on the weekends.  If one child chooses to watch a show on Netflix, all the siblings who have their school work and chores done are welcome to watch.  They are also allowed to watch each other play computer games, DS, iPad, or Wii.  If two children want to play a game on Wii together, they both give up a ticket, but they get to play for 45 minutes total.  And, thanks to my friend and her hubby's brilliant idea, Thomas and Sarah Grace have the opportunity to earn extra tickets each Friday (to be used for the following week) for perfect test scores in Spelling or Math.

It sounds a lot more complicated than it is when I type it all out like that!  But the kids and Joshua and I all know the rules in our head, so I guess that's all that matters.  They still have to ask me if they can use a ticket, and then I go to the fridge where we keep the chart, and place a magnet over one of their tickets.  When I printed it out, they each got two television tickets and three tickets for other screen time.  After less than two weeks, I realized I didn't care how they used their tickets as long as it was understood they only got 5 each week.

 
Sometimes, a child will use three in one day.  Fine.  Occasionally, by Friday, no one has any tickets left and I grant them a television show 'on me'.  This is always met with cheers and 'Thanks, Mom!'  'You're the best!'

Which is why I do it.  Sometimes I just need some words of affirmation.

And if I'm feeling super-sweet, I give them a screen time on me AND a Go-Go SqueeZ!

Rock star status every time.  I'm sneaky like that, y'all.  

Valentine's Day 2013

Honestly, I should really put some effort into some fun titles for the posts I write.  My brain is just so wrung out at the end of the day, it's all I can do to sit and put the words to paper.  Or computer. 

Semantics.   

We had a fabulously fun day with friends to talk with (for me) and play with (for my sweet children) and tons of sunshine to enjoy!  By the time our last guest left, the kids were all happily played out.  They watched a little television while I got dinner going and we all kind zoned thinking about the day.

Joshua came home bearing Valentine's treats for all the girls in his life.  Sarah Grace, Elizabeth, and Anna were presented with a variety of chocolates while I was gifted one of my very favoritest things in the whole wide world: A chocolate covered apple from the Chocolate Crocodile. 

If you've never had one, you need to.  You can thank me later. 

Honestly, we're not hugely into Valentine's Day.  I'm not anti- Valentine's, I just don't get real concerned over it.  However, the kids and I have discovered that we really like cutting our food into heart shapes and making the day special in small ways. 

There were lots of hugs and extra 'I love you's' throughout the day, but one of my favorite moments came late this evening when Anna presented me with her Valentine's Day gift.

Three little leaves.  Anna loves all things outside.  Rocks, acorns, seed pods, flowers, and leaves frequently find their way into her night stand drawer.  So when she came to me tonight and gave me these three lovely leaves, even though I knew that I wouldn't keep them, I documented the moment.  They are each special to her and that she chose to gift them to me along with a smile and a hug makes me feel like one lucky Mama. 

When Plans Fail

In April of 2012, I carefully mapped out what our school year would look like come fall.  It wasn't so much the curriculum choices that needed my attention, as we were basically sticking with the same things, but I was evaluating what activities to commit ourselves to.

By the end of June, I had our 2012-2013 school year all wrapped up and ready to be opened by the kids the following month.  In July, we kicked off our school year and had been rolling along for about nine weeks when the first wrench was thrown in the works.

The class schedule for the girls' ballet school changed and conflicted with our music class.  Joshua and I had agreed that we wanted music to be a part of our kids intentional education, not an extracurricular, so we dropped ballet.  The girls were very sad.

While the girls had chosen ballet, Thomas had opted for karate.  He enjoyed the class immensely, but we soon discovered the class wasn't a good fit for our family.  His class times were a little inconvenient, but the real challenge was that the school wanted the parents to stay on hand while the student was in class.  This presented a huge issue for our family because the place was not designed to hold more than one watcher per child (one adult watcher, no less), and we had an adult and four other children.  Twice a week.  It wasn't pretty, and we soon opted to simply drop Thomas off for his class.  This worked against us because we realized we were missing information that the instructor shared with the children and the parents were meant to overhear.  We weren't overhearing it because we weren't there.  It was cycle that was maddening.

Ultimately, we opted out of karate, too.

We had arrangements to be a part of a once a month meeting with other families for a character study and topical craft type thing that wound up falling through, as well.

Is short, all my plans failed.

Thankfully, my mother raised a ridiculously over-confident gal who's not particularly afraid of failure.

I soon realized that this slower paced, quieter life was exactly what our family needed.  We've been able to really settle in and find a routine that works for us.  Instead of being out of the house three days a week (what was I thinking?!), we are only out one day.  Two days, tops.  I've been able to really sit back and see the academic weaknesses and strengths of our schooling children and, more importantly, character issues that need to be worked on.

We are more serene.  We are more focused.  We are more content.  As a person who loves to be busy and thrives off a full calendar, these kinds of quieter days were not something I thought I would ever be able to appreciate.  It's an answer to prayer, I tell you.  I struggled when I became a stay at home mom with how to handle my 'all me free time' and feeling like an unproductive partner in my marriage.  I prayed about my restlessness and tried to fill my days with 'stuff'.  Now I know that I need to revel in these slower days because, all too soon, they fill up with their own 'stuff'.  

As I start looking toward planning for next year, I'm keeping things pretty loose.  We'll continue with piano and our general music classes.  We'll stay home more and focus on being at peace with what we have and cultivating the most important of our relationships.  Everything will still be there when and if we decide to jump back into it.

But for now, rest and a calmer pace are having their way in our home.  

Pajama Day

A major perk of homeschooling is Pajama Day.

I know there are many different schools of though concerning how to prepare for a day of homeschooling.  I know folks who insist that everyone get up and get dressed, families who are relaxed and wear pajamas our lounge pants and t-shirts throughout the week, and I even know a family whose school room is located in renovated shop on their property.  They get dressed and go to school as a family every day.

Now, I don't have any real hard and fast rules concerning dress code.  By default, the kids have to be dressed on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.  We have classes out of the house or teachers coming to the house for various things on those three days.  In fact, on Wednesdays, we leave the house around 10AM and frequently don't come home until closer to 10PM.

By the time Thursday rolls around, we're tuckered out.  We rarely make plans for Thursdays, intentionally keeping things low-key and recovering from the previous couple of days.

And by recovering, I mean a pajama dance party!

Monday Merriment

Thomas was in a mother's day out program when he was three or four.  They focused heavily on pre-reading and blends and by the time I started working with him on reading, we more or less coasted.  Sarah Grace was impatient to get started learning and then deemed my pace to slow for her little self.  So she leap-frogged ahead of my plan and basically taught herself to read.  I quit 'teaching' her about a quarter of the way into The Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading.  I simply corrected her when I heard her mispronounce something she was reading, and it was forever locked into her brain.

So this year when I started officially teaching Elizabeth to read, I was in new territory.  Although she knew all her letters and their sounds, stringing them together was quite a challenge for her.  We plodded through the first semester arranging beginner words into sentences 'Jim pat the wet pet cat.'  But it wasn't true reading.  It was tripping and stuttering along and not realizing what the sentence had said when we reached the end.

I knew we just needed that final pin to fall into place and she would take off.  That pin just wasn't in a hurry to fall.  She was never discouraged and because of her cheerful and excited demeanor, it was sometimes tough to hear the stuttering about, but not at all stressful to work with her.

And then it happened.  She picked up a book and, instead of making up stories she believed fit the pictures, she read the words on the page.  We'd just finished our first several lessons of consonant blends and she put her new skills to good use and only asked about the words that had special vowel sounds.

I nearly cried as I stood there and watched her beam as she read the story to her little brother and her baby doll.  Her gentle spirit and quiet perseverance had finally paid off and she had reached the long awaited moment when she could pick up a book and uncover the mysteries locked in the arrangement of the letters.

I don't know who's prouder, the student or her teacher.  

The End of an Era

Wednesday night, we added three little boys to our home for an overnight stay.  Thomas had carefully prepared his room to accommodate all the guys and was pumped about a bunch of boys crammed into one space.  Our 'extras' were 4 years old, 3 years old, and 1.  There was much giggling and guffawing from the room for nearly 90 minutes after we put them to bed.

As for me, I went to bed not long after the peace settled in.  I knew the next day would be busy, at best.

Thursday morning dawned bright and sunny, but cold.  I made a HUGE pot of oatmeal and dished it out in bowls for the kids.  They lapped it all up in record time and fairly vibrated about the house for the next four hours.  I walked around in awe of the noise and movement and wondered how to fit school into this wild day.

At some point, I tossed the ingredients into the bread machine to churn out a few loaves of bread for us.  I couldn't get the canister to fit into the machine (which is kissing ten years of age) and wound up sitting on the floor with the bread machine begging it to do what it was supposed to do.

I've been waiting patiently for my bread machine to die.  It was a wedding gift and I've used the mess out of it.  I long to replace it with something that makes more bread dough in one sitting and suits the appetite of our family better. However, I wasn't willing to toss aside an appliance that was chugging along faithfully and getting the job done.  Even if I did have to make bread multiple times a week to make it meet our needs.

Tears came to my eyes as I struggled to get the canister in the machine.  I'd already put the ingredients in and didn't want them to go to waste.  Also, I think I was a little stressed since both the little boys (both named Daniel and both somewhere in 15-20 month range) were falling apart at that moment right there beside me.

Finally, the mechanism snapped into place and I giggled through the silent tears and was almost giddy as the machine started up.  I picked up the little boys and we snuggled into a chair to read a book or three. 

The morning proceeded calmly but loudly (mama's of many understand that phrase).  The kids were truly amazing playing with and taking care of one another.  I wandered from room to room kissing the occasional boo-boo and wondering how long before they wore themselves out.  Finally, I made lunch and there were a few moments of peace while everyone scarfed down their next round of energy.

Thankfully, five of them went down for nap shortly after lunch!  When my friend arrived to sit in the afternoon quiet while our kids slept, she poked at me about how she'd hoped to have fresh bread.

And there it was.  The warning bells that had been quietly ringing in my head all morning long went to a dull roar as I ran to the bread machine, expecting to see bread dough oozing out the top.  I realized I'd never heard the buzzer telling me to set it out to rise, though I admitted to myself it was entirely possible I'd missed it among the other noises of the morning.

I peeked in the top to see a lump of weird stuff globbed in the bottom of the canister.  My heart sank and soared at the same time as I realized this was what I'd been waiting for.  I pulled out the canister and giggled nervously as I tried not to cry.

All our 'extra' money is tied up in a leak from the kids bathroom that grew the To Do List substantially.  My sweet friend offered me her bread machine on loan since she doesn't use it.  I sent up a prayer of praise that I could still go about making bread for our family using the 'cheat method' I so adore.  (Yes, I know you can make bread without a machine, and I have done it, it's just not at the top of my Things I Love And Wish I Had Time For list.)

I also am ridiculously excited knowing that a new bread mixer is in the nearer than far future!  Do you make your family's bread?  What method do you use?  Have a favorite recipe?  Tips and tricks?  Do share!