These Homeschool Days

This year I'm a student, too

It's 7:40. I wake up and take a shower (on a good day), or turn off my alarm and lay in bed until 8.

It's 8:00. I leave my room and wake M, the four-year-old who is still required to stay in bed until 8. The required elements for breakfast (which always centers around cold cereal, because we're not so good at mornings) are already available on the table. The twins (S and C) are already up and have eaten their breakfast. They have only recently gained the freedom to run their own mornings and usually get up on their own sometime between 7 and 8.

It's 10:30. I have to make lunch. Most of our lunches take about half an hour to make. We have chicken nuggets, taquitos, grilled sandwiches, oatmeal, PB&Js and other things. With our lunch, we always have a serving or two of fruit. 

It's 11:00. The kids eat lunch. M hates fish sticks and will sit and not eat them for hours if you let her. We decided we should try to replace fish sticks on our menu because no amount of, "eat it anyway" seems to help. 

It's 1:00. M and the Cub need a nap. M is four and will probably start outgrowing her nap soon. But for now, if she doesn't get a good nap, she's an emotional wreck by dinner time. The twins don't nap. The Cub is almost always happy to get back in his crib for a bit, but usually wakes up a bit early.

It's 3:00. I wake M and Cub is probably already up. Lately, he's been waking up from nap on his own at about 2:45. 

It's 4:00. The kids are allowed to watch TV and/or play video games until dinner is ready. This allows us two hours to engage in food preparation without worrying too much about them. 

It's 4:30. Papa should be home by now. He works as a mobile tech for the school district. His arrival time at home is varied based on what he has scheduled that day. 

It's 5:30. I make dinner if I haven't already made something in the crock pot. We try to keep our non-crock-pot dinners down to about 30 minutes, like lunch. I don't like to spend a lot of time busy in the kitchen. In fact, when I bake, I prefer to do it at the dining table, surrounded by children (believe it or not).

It's 6:00. More often than not, we're at the table having a family dinner. Sometimes we're early. Sometimes we're late. Whatever time it happens to be, we value this time. We get a lot of strange learning in during the 45ish minutes we spend eating together. I'm often surprised at the questions that come up when we're all tethered to the table without our technology.

It's 8:00. The kids get ready for bed. They won't go to bed for another hour, but there are three big kids trying to use the same bathroom and we don't want them to be in a hurry. If there is time left over after they're ready and before "lights out", we get lots of reading done.

It's 9:00. It's bed time for all of the kids. C and S have reading lights clipped to their beds and are allowed to lay quietly in bed and read for as long as they want. M just goes to sleep. The Cub often talks for 5 or 10 minutes before sleeping through the night. 

I go to bed at around 11:00.

In between all of those things, we learn. I don't have a schedule by which we do lessons. The twins have restricted access to a lap top every day, for one hour each. They've been using that time to practice math on Khan Academy. They play outside a lot. We bake together. We garden. What we do depends heavily on what they want to learn and how bored they are. As you can imagine, we do a lot more structured learning in the winter months, when they're complaining about the weather and, "there's nothing to do!"

On Mondays and Wednesdays I leave at about 2:30 and drive for about half an hour for my biology class. Mondays I get to come home when it's over at 4:45. Wednesdays, however, I also have my biology lab, which keeps me on campus until 8:50. 

Tuesdays I have a sign language class from 6:00 to 8:50. So, Tuesday and Wednesday I sometimes miss bedtime. I hate that, but I love that I'm finally working toward my own personal goals and becoming more of a role model for my kids. I'm also really enjoying my classes. 

I have two online classes that also add to my work load. I'm just finishing out my first week of classes, so I'm still trying to work out how it's all going to fit together now. So far, 13 credit hours doesn't seem so bad. I enjoy everything I'm learning and biology looks like it will be pretty easy for me. However, I am aware that week 1 alone isn't the best sample group.

So here's to the women who work or go to school and still make time to show love for their children. You are heroes.

This post is part of the "NOT back-to-homeschool" blog hop through iHomeschool Network