This evening, I had the great pleasure of introducing our children to some of my most cherished literary characters. We met the Pevensies, and traveled with them for the very first time to a magical country called Narnia.
Oh, my heart. They sat and listened. Isaac's attention wandered, but then he's only three. Mikayla, on the other hand, has never been so transfixed as she was by this story! I wasn't sure how we would all fare in the great big world of chapter books, but as each chapter ended, she begged for the next. She didn't want to stop for dinner, didn't want to stop for bed. As we closed the book at bedtime, I promised that we will read a few more chapters tomorrow - especially since it's supposed to rain. "The perfect kind of day for sitting together and reading!" I said. She tried to sound nonchalant as she responded, "Or, we could just read all the rest of it." That's my girl.
Have you ever mourned, in a bittersweet sort of way, that you can't go back to your childhood and re-experience certain things for the first time? I sometimes have that feeling at the end of a great book even now, or after finishing a movie with a mind-boggling plot twist. Reading a favorite book to a child - particularly my own child, my first-born who is more like me than I ever dreamed possible - is so much like reliving my own first reading of the Narniad.
The awe of finding snow and trees inside a big cupboard. The oddity of meeting a little Faun - and what is a Faun, anyway? Part man and part goat, so funny! The ferocity of the White Witch - the Queen of Narnia? - and Edmund's eating too much Turkish Delight. The mom in me secretly applauded Lewis for mentioning Edmund's tummy ache from over-indulging on sweets. See, Mikayla? I didn't make that up! But the child in me, that true kernel of self that never ages, only is - that part of me blossomed in the sheer pleasure of seeing in my daughter a near-perfect reflection of my own delight. I have never felt so deeply happy with her, nor so closely identified with her. As we turned old, familiar pages, the magic and the bliss of the experience was palpable to me.
One of these nights, I'll find her curled under the covers with a book and a flashlight. And I'm sure I'll scold her and tell her to go to sleep. But I'll be hiding a smile, and deep down, I'll understand that you can take the book out of the child's hands for a time, but you can't take the child out of the book. Sweet dreams, my daughter, sweet dreams. And welcome to Narnia!
No-Sew Bulletin Board
Welcome to the next installment of my dining room redecorating project! Today, a good friend and I set out on a sacred pilgrimage to Joann Fabrics with four children under five years old in tow. I had crackers in my diaper bag, a gift card in my wallet. What could possibly go wrong?
I mean, other than my children constantly (and loudly) deciding they wanted to go find the adult *other* than the one they were currently with, and Mikayla insisting on magenta chevron for her bedroom curtains.
With my kids being chaperoned around the store, leaving trails of Ritz crumbs where'er they ventured (a modern-day Hansel and Gretel), and little Oliver in a sleepy, feverish haze (sorry, third-born, the world continues to turn when you're not feeling well), I set out to make some serious decisions.
My object: a pretty, non-chevron gray print for the bulletin board and a few other accent items, a colorful fabric for cloth napkins, decorative buttons.
My favorite part was spending the kids' 25 cheerful/this-is-fun minutes trying to locate the home decor fabrics in appropriate colors, and then attempting to narrow down and price my options only after meltdown/we-ate-all-the-crackers phase commenced. You think that parents have ragamuffin homes because the kids make a mess and "we can't have nice things"; however, the truth is that we end up with pillowcases over the windows and mismatched lampshades half-cocked because our children have finely-tuned radar for those decision-making moments. Nothing like mentally coordinating colors in the midst of a toddler hurricane. You'd think I would have learned from my misadventures at Hobby Lobby?
Anyway, you are not here for the disclaimers, you are here for the art, the style, the reveal. I know your heart, friend. Without further ado, I give you The Process! Tutorials for no-sew bulletin boards are a dime a dozen on Pinterest, and I didn't really use one anyway, so please assume I am not stealing anyone's ideas by not providing a link. Behold, my blank canvas:
First, cutting my fabric with the rotary cutter and mat that have changed my life (do I say that every time I use it? Yes, yes I do.). Isn't it pretty?
With all my careful measuring, I did an awesome job of making it the right size and perfectly square. Not actually. The size was decent, but the pattern is regular enough that it was obviously crooked on my cut piece. I had to straighten it on the board, using my see-through straight edge to line up the pattern straight across, and then trimmed the edges. Needless to say, it was not nice and neat when it was all said and done.
What do you do when your edges stink? RIBBON! I had considered edging with this ribbon anyway, to match it to last week's wreath, but my pristine cut-job made it inevitable. Phew.
For a finishing touch, I gorilla glued buttons tomy dining room table plain push pins.
The twine you see along the upper edge? Well. I noticed after hanging it up that gravity kinda affected the hang of my board. Namely, the top of the frame pulled up slightly, revealing unfinished cork board between the ribbon and the frame. I had already ribboned myself out of one predicament, so that was out. The twine gives it a down-to-earth feel and coordinates it even more with grapevine wreath next door. Right?? Haha.
And voila, all finished:
You might notice that one of my beloved children has also forayed into the wonderful world of interior design, in the form of abstract dry erase marker art. If you think that's snazzy, you should see the mural going the entire way up my stairs and embellishing my bedroom mirror. One of these afternoons I will be up to my elbows in Magic Eraser juice. Really looking forward to that.
I mean, other than my children constantly (and loudly) deciding they wanted to go find the adult *other* than the one they were currently with, and Mikayla insisting on magenta chevron for her bedroom curtains.
With my kids being chaperoned around the store, leaving trails of Ritz crumbs where'er they ventured (a modern-day Hansel and Gretel), and little Oliver in a sleepy, feverish haze (sorry, third-born, the world continues to turn when you're not feeling well), I set out to make some serious decisions.
My object: a pretty, non-chevron gray print for the bulletin board and a few other accent items, a colorful fabric for cloth napkins, decorative buttons.
My favorite part was spending the kids' 25 cheerful/this-is-fun minutes trying to locate the home decor fabrics in appropriate colors, and then attempting to narrow down and price my options only after meltdown/we-ate-all-the-crackers phase commenced. You think that parents have ragamuffin homes because the kids make a mess and "we can't have nice things"; however, the truth is that we end up with pillowcases over the windows and mismatched lampshades half-cocked because our children have finely-tuned radar for those decision-making moments. Nothing like mentally coordinating colors in the midst of a toddler hurricane. You'd think I would have learned from my misadventures at Hobby Lobby?
Anyway, you are not here for the disclaimers, you are here for the art, the style, the reveal. I know your heart, friend. Without further ado, I give you The Process! Tutorials for no-sew bulletin boards are a dime a dozen on Pinterest, and I didn't really use one anyway, so please assume I am not stealing anyone's ideas by not providing a link. Behold, my blank canvas:
First, cutting my fabric with the rotary cutter and mat that have changed my life (do I say that every time I use it? Yes, yes I do.). Isn't it pretty?
With all my careful measuring, I did an awesome job of making it the right size and perfectly square. Not actually. The size was decent, but the pattern is regular enough that it was obviously crooked on my cut piece. I had to straighten it on the board, using my see-through straight edge to line up the pattern straight across, and then trimmed the edges. Needless to say, it was not nice and neat when it was all said and done.
What do you do when your edges stink? RIBBON! I had considered edging with this ribbon anyway, to match it to last week's wreath, but my pristine cut-job made it inevitable. Phew.
For a finishing touch, I gorilla glued buttons to
The twine you see along the upper edge? Well. I noticed after hanging it up that gravity kinda affected the hang of my board. Namely, the top of the frame pulled up slightly, revealing unfinished cork board between the ribbon and the frame. I had already ribboned myself out of one predicament, so that was out. The twine gives it a down-to-earth feel and coordinates it even more with grapevine wreath next door. Right?? Haha.
And voila, all finished:
You might notice that one of my beloved children has also forayed into the wonderful world of interior design, in the form of abstract dry erase marker art. If you think that's snazzy, you should see the mural going the entire way up my stairs and embellishing my bedroom mirror. One of these afternoons I will be up to my elbows in Magic Eraser juice. Really looking forward to that.
For now, though, it's onward and upward to my next projects: increasing our collection of everyday cloth napkins, and pondering how to fancify (apparently not a word, per autocorrect changing it three tea before giving up) my dining room chalkboard.
I'm also contemplating another refashion sewing project. Just waiting for the right inspiration to come along...
Good Enough Wins: Part 2
In my previous post, I wrote about doing SOMETHING for homeschool instead of nothing, which is where we've been firmly planted for the last several months. I promised a few more thoughts on making "good enough" work for our family, and trying not to get so overscheduled and overplanned that I wind up doing nothing.
So, 1. Golf ball principle - plan the biggies, don't worry about the stuff that always seems to get done anyway. 2. Record success and completion, but don't overplan ahead of time.
And now I give you principles 3 and 4:
3. Visual reminders/accountability, particularly a Job Chart - I know, I warned you, ROCKET SCIENCE. Mikayla was given a magnetic/dry erase responsibility chart for her birthday, and we finally rolled it out. We picked ten things that should happen every day, or most days, for the chart. They are all about marking off their jobs as they finish, and may I say, for a girl who has never made her bed before in her life, Mikayla's bed looks PRISTINE today. I wonder how else I underestimate her? Also, both kids actually brushed their teeth after breakfast. To my shame, this is noteworthy. Thanks for the applause.
On our Job Chart I included lines for "Bible/catechism" and "School" and "Read-Aloud". Those are more for me than the kids, because I so desperately need the visual reminder to do those things. We do them in fits and starts and eventually burn out from undertaking too much at once. So even for tasks that don't happen every single day, I can now see where we marked them off and how many more times we should shoot for in a week. A stack of beautiful lesson plans in a schoolroom drawer have not, so far, helped me be very successful in "doing school" very often. Out of sight, out of mind. (The Read-Aloud category is for us to do a longer read-aloud book or series in addition to the regular short-book reading we do all the time.)
4. Semper Gumby. I got this phrase from my laid-back mother in law, meaning "always flexible!" I mentioned my brain paralysis that I get when I feel overscheduled and overwhelmed, even if I simply write down all the things I probably will be doing that day anyway. Flexibility is key for me, which on one hand means not boxing myself in with too strict a plan. And on the other hand, it means noticing how things are going and using that feedback to keep boosting our success.
Example of Semper Gumby in action: in our pow wow yesterday, Joel and I agreed that the kids should do Bible time/catechism every day. Ok, big golf ball item into the jar. I thought we would work on one memory verse until we've got it mastered, and put it on our chalkboard, write it in memory verse notebooks, and review it out loud, and move onto a new verse when it seems right. None of this "a verse a week" business. And maybe we'd put our new verse up on the chalkboard on a Monday (or whatever random Day 1 it might be for a verse) and learn it, or part of it; write it into notebooks on Tuesday; copy it onto different paper on Wednesday for practice; and simply review it Thursday and Friday. If it takes more than a day or two to learn a whole verse, then we take longer. No biggie. Also, catechism would involve learning a new question and reviewing old ones, maybe a question every few days or so. And then we'd do some Bible reading every day as well.
I learned very quickly yesterday that we are not going to be doing all of the above every day. News flash: my kids do not have the attention span! I got a Bible verse onto the chalkboard and started to teach it with lots of movement to keep little man interested. "God is our refuge" - lots of pretending that one person was the storm ("crash! boom!" stomp stomp stomp) and I would be the refuge, sheltering the other child from the storm. Etc etc. Totally on the fly, we had fun with it. But we barely made it through the whole one-sentence verse before people were losing interest. No way we were going to also do catechism and a Bible story in the same sitting. Lesson for me: teach a verse one day, and then on a day when it's just verse review, maybe undertake to do a new catechism question. And alternate structure with non-structure. Twenty minutes of Bible time probably earns a good 20-30 minutes of free play, after which they might be ready to come back for some Phonics Museum.
Did I mention I realize this isn't rocket science? Veteran parents are reading this like, "DUH. You are trained in psychology?" But it's a change from my previous vision of modeling our preschool after what the "real" preschools do out there in the world. Or what I imagine that they do. And just putting this out there: I will probably never create a sensory bin, unless some toys accidentally fall into a bag of rice. My kids get loads of sensory experience from playing outside with rocks, grass, dirt, and water. They play with their food. They blow bubbles. To borrow one of my favorite PoMo phrases, they "do life". (You're up, Joel.*) Which, incidentally, also gets them a fair amount of "school" experience - reading words from labels, boxes, and signs (not to mention books), and doing numbers, measures, and sizes from recipes, board games, and such. They have interests that guide our library book choices and Google searches.
Does any of this sound familiar to you? What have you learned about being a good enough parent or caregiver? Have you had to adapt your "ideal" vision to account for personalities and the realities of life? It can be tough to give up on the perfect, but the honesty of saying, "That doesn't work for me!" is SO liberating, and freed me up to find ways to be more successful. My homeschool may not look like your homeschool, EVER, and that's ok! After all, something is better than nothing!
And my four year old just marched sternly into the living room, declaring, "We have to Read Aloud." Score one for the Job Chart!
*Joel and I play this game where we try to speak completely in postmodern catch phrases. It's so authentic and genuine and fosters such a sense of community between us as we jump on the trampoline of experience together.
So, 1. Golf ball principle - plan the biggies, don't worry about the stuff that always seems to get done anyway. 2. Record success and completion, but don't overplan ahead of time.
And now I give you principles 3 and 4:
3. Visual reminders/accountability, particularly a Job Chart - I know, I warned you, ROCKET SCIENCE. Mikayla was given a magnetic/dry erase responsibility chart for her birthday, and we finally rolled it out. We picked ten things that should happen every day, or most days, for the chart. They are all about marking off their jobs as they finish, and may I say, for a girl who has never made her bed before in her life, Mikayla's bed looks PRISTINE today. I wonder how else I underestimate her? Also, both kids actually brushed their teeth after breakfast. To my shame, this is noteworthy. Thanks for the applause.
On our Job Chart I included lines for "Bible/catechism" and "School" and "Read-Aloud". Those are more for me than the kids, because I so desperately need the visual reminder to do those things. We do them in fits and starts and eventually burn out from undertaking too much at once. So even for tasks that don't happen every single day, I can now see where we marked them off and how many more times we should shoot for in a week. A stack of beautiful lesson plans in a schoolroom drawer have not, so far, helped me be very successful in "doing school" very often. Out of sight, out of mind. (The Read-Aloud category is for us to do a longer read-aloud book or series in addition to the regular short-book reading we do all the time.)
4. Semper Gumby. I got this phrase from my laid-back mother in law, meaning "always flexible!" I mentioned my brain paralysis that I get when I feel overscheduled and overwhelmed, even if I simply write down all the things I probably will be doing that day anyway. Flexibility is key for me, which on one hand means not boxing myself in with too strict a plan. And on the other hand, it means noticing how things are going and using that feedback to keep boosting our success.
Example of Semper Gumby in action: in our pow wow yesterday, Joel and I agreed that the kids should do Bible time/catechism every day. Ok, big golf ball item into the jar. I thought we would work on one memory verse until we've got it mastered, and put it on our chalkboard, write it in memory verse notebooks, and review it out loud, and move onto a new verse when it seems right. None of this "a verse a week" business. And maybe we'd put our new verse up on the chalkboard on a Monday (or whatever random Day 1 it might be for a verse) and learn it, or part of it; write it into notebooks on Tuesday; copy it onto different paper on Wednesday for practice; and simply review it Thursday and Friday. If it takes more than a day or two to learn a whole verse, then we take longer. No biggie. Also, catechism would involve learning a new question and reviewing old ones, maybe a question every few days or so. And then we'd do some Bible reading every day as well.
I learned very quickly yesterday that we are not going to be doing all of the above every day. News flash: my kids do not have the attention span! I got a Bible verse onto the chalkboard and started to teach it with lots of movement to keep little man interested. "God is our refuge" - lots of pretending that one person was the storm ("crash! boom!" stomp stomp stomp) and I would be the refuge, sheltering the other child from the storm. Etc etc. Totally on the fly, we had fun with it. But we barely made it through the whole one-sentence verse before people were losing interest. No way we were going to also do catechism and a Bible story in the same sitting. Lesson for me: teach a verse one day, and then on a day when it's just verse review, maybe undertake to do a new catechism question. And alternate structure with non-structure. Twenty minutes of Bible time probably earns a good 20-30 minutes of free play, after which they might be ready to come back for some Phonics Museum.
Did I mention I realize this isn't rocket science? Veteran parents are reading this like, "DUH. You are trained in psychology?" But it's a change from my previous vision of modeling our preschool after what the "real" preschools do out there in the world. Or what I imagine that they do. And just putting this out there: I will probably never create a sensory bin, unless some toys accidentally fall into a bag of rice. My kids get loads of sensory experience from playing outside with rocks, grass, dirt, and water. They play with their food. They blow bubbles. To borrow one of my favorite PoMo phrases, they "do life". (You're up, Joel.*) Which, incidentally, also gets them a fair amount of "school" experience - reading words from labels, boxes, and signs (not to mention books), and doing numbers, measures, and sizes from recipes, board games, and such. They have interests that guide our library book choices and Google searches.
Does any of this sound familiar to you? What have you learned about being a good enough parent or caregiver? Have you had to adapt your "ideal" vision to account for personalities and the realities of life? It can be tough to give up on the perfect, but the honesty of saying, "That doesn't work for me!" is SO liberating, and freed me up to find ways to be more successful. My homeschool may not look like your homeschool, EVER, and that's ok! After all, something is better than nothing!
And my four year old just marched sternly into the living room, declaring, "We have to Read Aloud." Score one for the Job Chart!
*Joel and I play this game where we try to speak completely in postmodern catch phrases. It's so authentic and genuine and fosters such a sense of community between us as we jump on the trampoline of experience together.
Good Enough Wins: Getting Back in the Game
Have you heard the saying that the good is the enemy of the perfect? It means that it's not always fear of a terrible outcome that defeats you, but rather the fear of not attaining the perfect outcome that prevents you from trying in the first place. This has been floating around in my brain lately as I've felt like a HUGE slacker in the area of school for the kids. I've not been doing much of anything. And do you want to know why? Because I had this whole Pre-K curriculum printed, laminated, and beautifully organized in a file drawer, but with all the sickness and husband-out-of-townness and every other kind of distraction, I simply have not had time to prepare, let alone execute the perfect Pre-K lesson every day (or three times a week...or even bimonthly...). My certainty that I would not achieve perfection (checking off all of the things on all of the days) has prevented me from doing ANYTHING for like three months.
So that's an awesome reason for neglecting my kids' development, right?
Maybe it's the changing of the clocks, the longer daylight, the melting snow; or perhaps it's the new coffee dependence motivating me. But this weekend, Joel and I had a pow wow and came up with a plan. Usually when the fire lights under my behind, I am all like let's do it ALL, 150%, it shall be perfect, thus and amen. (See also: redecorating the dining room.) This time, I tempered my administrata with a healthy dose of reality. When I plan out a schedule accounting for all the things that need to get done, I get OVERWHELMED. Yes, I've proven that I have enough hours for cooking, cleaning, educating, and sleeping (technically), but when I look at my list the next morning I'm all "Wow, that is a ton to do today. I'm tired looking at that. Let me just avoid everything."
So this time? Instead? I took the "golf ball" approach. What are the most important things to fit into my day and week? Let's map those, and let the rest of the chips fall where they may. I'm sure the bathrooms will get cleaned...someday...no need to write that in every Friday where I will inevitably go Chore-Blind to the task because not all Fridays are created for cleaning bathrooms, am I right?
My golf balls: (I have balls now!) (And I'm apparently a twelve year old boy because that made me giggle.)
1. Bible time/catechism/memory verses
2. Clean up stuff, at least some of it, and have the kids learn to do more of this (my knees! my back!)
3. Read-Aloud book (something ongoing like Complete Winnie the Pooh or Beatrix Potter, and one day the Narniad, in addition to all the books we read hundreds of times repeatedly each day)
4. Actually, that's it for the daily stuff. I told you I'm shooting low, people. We all need to eat and groom and that is enough some days.
Weekly:
1. Phonics Museum 3x a week, however many lessons and worksheets we happen to get through before students lose interest (I am all official because I have students plural).
2. Math/patterns/something nonverbal 1x a week. This could be doing puzzles, for all I care, which makes this a super easy requirement to meet. At some point we will do something to exercise the visuo-spatial development. BOOM.
3. Art a few times a week. Also easy to do. Crayons, markers, stamps, paints.
4. Piano/music lesson once a week. This one will take the most preparation, namely brainstorming a little concept and activity for the kids. Tempo, beat, pitch, learning simple tunes on the piano. I cleverly mapped this in on Tuesdays so that I have all day Monday to dig deep for something.
5. Family night - Thursdays seem like we don't usually have anything going on, so if we are all home, we're going to try to all do a game or something together. This happens sometimes but we thought it'd be good for the kids to see us prioritizing time all together doing things THEY love.
Notice I said "mapped". The word "schedule" seems to paralyze me, even though I dearly love the IDEA of having a schedule and routine. When I write it in pen on a calendar page, it gets in my head. Suddenly I feel suffocated by the idea of having to do it EVERY TUESDAY FOREVER. So I'll map it as a goal and if we miss it one week, everyone will survive. It's totally a psychological thing, I realize.
Also, instead of lesson planning ahead of time I'm simply going to track what we get done. I have the Phonics Museum curriculum (shout out Veritas Press!) which means no prep ahead of time. We will sit down at least three times a week and open the teacher manual and workbook together. If the kids have eleven minutes in them to do a song and a few worksheets, done. If Mikayla is having a Big School Day, maybe we crank through ten worksheets. And I'll write down what we do. None of this "Get through three lessons in a week! Three worksheets per day!" Because, again, paralysis with the uber structure. (Which totally surprises me because I am a 48/50 Administrative Gifting on the spiritual gifts inventory. Systems. Schedule. Planning and organizing. BUT kids, reality, and being a finite human being. Learning, here.) Plus I don't know if you're this way, but I notice if I'm keeping track of something, I end up doing it more just because awareness or something.
The only planning I'll need to do is picking a Bible verse and story each week, and coming up with something for music time. I *think* I can accomplish this.
Is it a matter of semantics? Yes. But I have totally learned that I need to remove mental barriers and get out of my own way. If I plan and schedule the perfect, but then one night someone only lets me get four hours of sleep and there's no way momma is waving her arms around to teach a memory verse, then we won't even accomplish a little bit. But if I give myself a general gist of what we want to do, it is far more likely to happen in some approximation. Win.
In my next post, I'll share a few more tweaks to my homeschool approach that I hope will help us to be more successful and consistent. (Read: implementing tools that every other family ever has probably been doing since the beginning of time, and taking my kids' and my personalities into account. Rocket science, I'm telling you.)
For today, tell yourself: the good is the enemy of the perfect. Something is better than nothing! So just gather your kiddos and crack a book. Boom, school. At least for the under-five crowd. Especially if you're pregnant, and you know who you are, ahem. If you're much beyond that in your home schooling, I got nothing. Except a crying baby with a fever, so pardon me while I go enjoy a healthy dose of the Reality, now that we've dispensed with the Aspirational for the day.
So that's an awesome reason for neglecting my kids' development, right?
Maybe it's the changing of the clocks, the longer daylight, the melting snow; or perhaps it's the new coffee dependence motivating me. But this weekend, Joel and I had a pow wow and came up with a plan. Usually when the fire lights under my behind, I am all like let's do it ALL, 150%, it shall be perfect, thus and amen. (See also: redecorating the dining room.) This time, I tempered my administrata with a healthy dose of reality. When I plan out a schedule accounting for all the things that need to get done, I get OVERWHELMED. Yes, I've proven that I have enough hours for cooking, cleaning, educating, and sleeping (technically), but when I look at my list the next morning I'm all "Wow, that is a ton to do today. I'm tired looking at that. Let me just avoid everything."
So this time? Instead? I took the "golf ball" approach. What are the most important things to fit into my day and week? Let's map those, and let the rest of the chips fall where they may. I'm sure the bathrooms will get cleaned...someday...no need to write that in every Friday where I will inevitably go Chore-Blind to the task because not all Fridays are created for cleaning bathrooms, am I right?
My golf balls: (I have balls now!) (And I'm apparently a twelve year old boy because that made me giggle.)
1. Bible time/catechism/memory verses
2. Clean up stuff, at least some of it, and have the kids learn to do more of this (my knees! my back!)
3. Read-Aloud book (something ongoing like Complete Winnie the Pooh or Beatrix Potter, and one day the Narniad, in addition to all the books we read hundreds of times repeatedly each day)
4. Actually, that's it for the daily stuff. I told you I'm shooting low, people. We all need to eat and groom and that is enough some days.
Weekly:
1. Phonics Museum 3x a week, however many lessons and worksheets we happen to get through before students lose interest (I am all official because I have students plural).
2. Math/patterns/something nonverbal 1x a week. This could be doing puzzles, for all I care, which makes this a super easy requirement to meet. At some point we will do something to exercise the visuo-spatial development. BOOM.
3. Art a few times a week. Also easy to do. Crayons, markers, stamps, paints.
4. Piano/music lesson once a week. This one will take the most preparation, namely brainstorming a little concept and activity for the kids. Tempo, beat, pitch, learning simple tunes on the piano. I cleverly mapped this in on Tuesdays so that I have all day Monday to dig deep for something.
5. Family night - Thursdays seem like we don't usually have anything going on, so if we are all home, we're going to try to all do a game or something together. This happens sometimes but we thought it'd be good for the kids to see us prioritizing time all together doing things THEY love.
Notice I said "mapped". The word "schedule" seems to paralyze me, even though I dearly love the IDEA of having a schedule and routine. When I write it in pen on a calendar page, it gets in my head. Suddenly I feel suffocated by the idea of having to do it EVERY TUESDAY FOREVER. So I'll map it as a goal and if we miss it one week, everyone will survive. It's totally a psychological thing, I realize.
Also, instead of lesson planning ahead of time I'm simply going to track what we get done. I have the Phonics Museum curriculum (shout out Veritas Press!) which means no prep ahead of time. We will sit down at least three times a week and open the teacher manual and workbook together. If the kids have eleven minutes in them to do a song and a few worksheets, done. If Mikayla is having a Big School Day, maybe we crank through ten worksheets. And I'll write down what we do. None of this "Get through three lessons in a week! Three worksheets per day!" Because, again, paralysis with the uber structure. (Which totally surprises me because I am a 48/50 Administrative Gifting on the spiritual gifts inventory. Systems. Schedule. Planning and organizing. BUT kids, reality, and being a finite human being. Learning, here.) Plus I don't know if you're this way, but I notice if I'm keeping track of something, I end up doing it more just because awareness or something.
The only planning I'll need to do is picking a Bible verse and story each week, and coming up with something for music time. I *think* I can accomplish this.
Is it a matter of semantics? Yes. But I have totally learned that I need to remove mental barriers and get out of my own way. If I plan and schedule the perfect, but then one night someone only lets me get four hours of sleep and there's no way momma is waving her arms around to teach a memory verse, then we won't even accomplish a little bit. But if I give myself a general gist of what we want to do, it is far more likely to happen in some approximation. Win.
In my next post, I'll share a few more tweaks to my homeschool approach that I hope will help us to be more successful and consistent. (Read: implementing tools that every other family ever has probably been doing since the beginning of time, and taking my kids' and my personalities into account. Rocket science, I'm telling you.)
For today, tell yourself: the good is the enemy of the perfect. Something is better than nothing! So just gather your kiddos and crack a book. Boom, school. At least for the under-five crowd. Especially if you're pregnant, and you know who you are, ahem. If you're much beyond that in your home schooling, I got nothing. Except a crying baby with a fever, so pardon me while I go enjoy a healthy dose of the Reality, now that we've dispensed with the Aspirational for the day.
Plan B which should have been Plan A
Remember this post about our big dining room makeover? I bet you're dying to learn more about my plans for that lovely yellow window. Well, at first I thought it was too gold and not happy enough. I started to paint it a nice, sunshiny yellow instead.
The first paint went on, and my soul smiled at the happiness of the yellow. Halfway through, and my soul began to panic a little at the euphoria of the yellow. I squelched my feelings, but when I hung the window on the wall, the downright banana-ness of it all gave my soul a stroke. Nope. I mixed my original too-dark yellow with my new YELLOW!! yellow and got something nice and mellow-yellow. Which, in pictures, and probably most people's memory, is basically the old color all over again. What are you gonna do.
The first paint went on, and my soul smiled at the happiness of the yellow. Halfway through, and my soul began to panic a little at the euphoria of the yellow. I squelched my feelings, but when I hung the window on the wall, the downright banana-ness of it all gave my soul a stroke. Nope. I mixed my original too-dark yellow with my new YELLOW!! yellow and got something nice and mellow-yellow. Which, in pictures, and probably most people's memory, is basically the old color all over again. What are you gonna do.
Mikayla agrees about the yellow, obviously. YOWSA!!
So we are basically here now, with a much toned-down version of the yellow above:
It looks lovely, but not quite finished. My hope is to add some touches to soften the look of it all and coordinate the dining room with our living room, since the space is open. Plan A for the window was to create an elegant wreath made out of pages from an old book. Once I got started, though, it looked like someone was just vaguely crinkling pieces of paper and pinning them randomly onto a big circle. Probably because that's exactly what I was doing. It looked a lot like a bad Kentucky Derby fascinator, I'll be honest. All you really need to know is it quickly spiraled into a whole a lot of ain't going to happen. So we are basically here now, with a much toned-down version of the yellow above:
Lovely idea, right? You don't even want to know how mine looked. On top of the sad appearance of my wreath, the straight pins I bought had teeny tiny heads and poked my fingers AND the papers pulled right off of them if I so much as looked at one sideways. I didn't make it past about five pages pinned onto my wreath before scrapping the whole thing. No, it wouldn't have gotten any better if I'd stuck with it.
I returned that failed experiment to Hobby Lobby, and left there with much better odds of success. So far, Plan B seems way more coherent and better thought through, for the simple reason that I didn't have my three small children with me as I navigated the glass-infested aisles of Hobby Lobby. Now that is a gauntlet if ever there was one. Have you ever tried to simultaneously brainstorm, visualize, make good shopping choices, and herd small children away from numerous breakable objects? It was a disaster waiting to happen, but we made it, albeit with a terrible project design. Bonus: my children only panicked twice thinking that I left them at the store. I guess the million repetitions of "mommy's going this way, please keep walking, I'm turning the corner, mommy's going this way," just weren't quite enough.
My method for putting the wreath together was to shove the stems from my fake flowers into the grapevine wreath and wiggle as needed, and then kind of bend the bendy parts into the wreath so they didn't stick out funny. It was highly technical and precise. The ribbon was added as an afterthought for balance, and to tie this in with my bulletin board, which will feature the same gold ribbon. I hung the wreath by driving two small nails through the ribbon into the top of the window, while praying that it was centered on the first try because NAILS. And you should have seen me trying to hang the whole thing back up while avoiding wreath shards and not crushing the flowers. The picture might look Pinteresty, but we all know the truth: behind every pretty wreath stands a bedraggled lady covered in craft debris and hoping it doesn't crash to the floor.
Also, I strategically moved all of my dining room mess out of the window reflection. I kept lining up the photo and going "phooey, you can see the Hobby Lobby bag!" "oh no, now there's me!" "oops, is that a half-eaten banana?" I didn't move the sippy cup because I am so into showing you (carefully censored portions of) my reality.
I'm purposely withholding the view of the whole wall, because I want to blog each piece and then do a big reveal at the end. Doesn't that sound like fun/a lot of waiting/slightly vain? Joann Fabrics is calling my name next week, and then I should have the next phase of the makeover ready to show you. Unless I get antsy and come up with a project in the meantime, but probably not. Nope, that's not likely at all....
Anyway, so there I was on my return trip to Hobby Lobby (by myself!!! It felt much like twirling carefree through a feminine product commercial.) in hope of finding awesome ribbon to hang my wreath. Me: Gee, I wonder what cute ribbons Hobby Lobby has today. Hobby lobby: I hope you like chevron! Or maybe this medallion print in every color of the rainbow. Which, I don't hate Chevron, but it is so stinking trendy that I fear my wreath will look dated by September. No offense, but I hope to not redecorate my dining room again any time soon. Wait, who am I kidding? This is the girl who waited for her husband to leave town, and then promptly painted a piece of furniture, a window, a frame, and a vase, and completely rearranged the dining room. I dunno, maybe it is kind of like me to get bored with a space?
My revamped idea consists of a grapevine wreath, three nearly-white burlap dahlias (some of my favorite flowers!), a similar burlap rose, yellow lilies, gray twill ribbon and coordinating yellow grosgrain ribbon. This was to hang from my yellow ochre window frame, so the yellow lilies and ribbon were to be a pop of coordinating color, whereas the brown and white of the wreath and flowers would be the focal point. The gray ribbon for hanging will hopefully tie it in with our eventual gray living room walls, and the gray in my eventual bulletin board cover. Lots of unfinished projects right now. I don't know how I sleep at night.
Speaking of unfinished projects and lack of closure, how long do you think I can make this post without showing you my completed wreath?
Voila!
My revamped idea consists of a grapevine wreath, three nearly-white burlap dahlias (some of my favorite flowers!), a similar burlap rose, yellow lilies, gray twill ribbon and coordinating yellow grosgrain ribbon. This was to hang from my yellow ochre window frame, so the yellow lilies and ribbon were to be a pop of coordinating color, whereas the brown and white of the wreath and flowers would be the focal point. The gray ribbon for hanging will hopefully tie it in with our eventual gray living room walls, and the gray in my eventual bulletin board cover. Lots of unfinished projects right now. I don't know how I sleep at night.
Speaking of unfinished projects and lack of closure, how long do you think I can make this post without showing you my completed wreath?
Voila!
My method for putting the wreath together was to shove the stems from my fake flowers into the grapevine wreath and wiggle as needed, and then kind of bend the bendy parts into the wreath so they didn't stick out funny. It was highly technical and precise. The ribbon was added as an afterthought for balance, and to tie this in with my bulletin board, which will feature the same gold ribbon. I hung the wreath by driving two small nails through the ribbon into the top of the window, while praying that it was centered on the first try because NAILS. And you should have seen me trying to hang the whole thing back up while avoiding wreath shards and not crushing the flowers. The picture might look Pinteresty, but we all know the truth: behind every pretty wreath stands a bedraggled lady covered in craft debris and hoping it doesn't crash to the floor.
Also, I strategically moved all of my dining room mess out of the window reflection. I kept lining up the photo and going "phooey, you can see the Hobby Lobby bag!" "oh no, now there's me!" "oops, is that a half-eaten banana?" I didn't move the sippy cup because I am so into showing you (carefully censored portions of) my reality.
I'm purposely withholding the view of the whole wall, because I want to blog each piece and then do a big reveal at the end. Doesn't that sound like fun/a lot of waiting/slightly vain? Joann Fabrics is calling my name next week, and then I should have the next phase of the makeover ready to show you. Unless I get antsy and come up with a project in the meantime, but probably not. Nope, that's not likely at all....
An Almost-Before and Call for Ideas
You know what would be an important part of a good Before-And-After? A Before photo. Which, as I've demonstrated here and here, is not my strength. It's like I'm impulsive or not patient or something. YEAH RIGHT. Ok maybe.
This time was no different. A few days ago, we started kicking around the idea of moving our hutch out of the dining room to see if it helps make the space feel bigger. Naturally, that very day I reorganized the hall closet and kitchen cabinets to make room for all the items stored in the drawers, and moved everything from the shelves to our corner cabinet in the living room. It was great motivation to tackle a few things I've been procrastinating (feast or famine when it comes to motivation, I'm telling you; it's either X-Files during naptime for days on end, or DO ALL THE THINGS IN ONE DAY. I have no idea why you are flipping through your DSM-IV-TR to the "cyclothymic disorder" page.).
Here's the corner cabinet post-reorganization. It used to display my great-grandmother's china, which is gorgeous (thanks to my dear Katherine for setting it all out so beautifully when we moved in!), but as the months have passed, I decided it wasn't quite our "look". These pieces bring more color and a bit more of our style, which I honestly can't name. Casual elegant almost-country? No idea. We defy categories, people. Or, I am not a designer.
I'd show you the corner cabinet "before" but, you know. In similar fashion, the following is the only photo I could find that even remotely shows the hutch in our dining room. I'm sure others must exist, but they are not contained on my phone or laptop. If you can somehow divert your eyes from the glory that is my royal jammie-clad children, you can spot the beautiful hutch taking up oodles of wall space in the dining room. Not the full effect, but you get an idea of the scale.
Now, I did think to take a photo after the hutch, and before all the finishing projects to pull the space together:
We are actually really loving the openness of the space now. The table is far more inviting for the kids to color, for a family game of Go Fish, and more, because the hutch is not there to bump into and squeeze around. Surprisingly, we don't miss the storage at all (the items inside haven't gone far - table linens to the hall closet, and serving dishes to a kitchen cabinet).
So here's the plan:
1. Console table - paint white to prime, and then when we paint our living room, we will paint it the same light gray color as our living room walls. The hope is it will help tie the two spaces together and still be neutral enough to work in the dining room. Worst case, I fall in love with it white, and finish it in white instead!
2. Gold window - paint it a lighter yellow color to better coordinate with the kitchen. Create some sort of something to make it a work of art - perhaps a wreath, maybe something else. Stay tuned. The creative juices are just beginning to flow on that one.
3. Chalkboard - paint this white, and possibly add a bulletin board where those silver plates are hanging on the far side, painted to match. The bulletin board, if I like it there, will probably be covered in a pretty fabric and criss-crossed with a bit of ribbon to make a photo board. The silver plates might go to the short wall by the glass door. One thing I can promise: this chalk board will never be covered in adorable bubble lettering and calligraphy while I am the lady of the house. Not my gifting.
Do you have any ideas for me, especially for that window, and maybe for making the bulletin board something worth featuring? I hope to hit Joann fabrics next week to shop for fabric for the board, and also to make some everyday cloth napkins because ours are about shot (and we don't have enough, due to tossing some of them that got super stained). Maybe coordinating or matching fabrics?
Pinterest me, people!
This time was no different. A few days ago, we started kicking around the idea of moving our hutch out of the dining room to see if it helps make the space feel bigger. Naturally, that very day I reorganized the hall closet and kitchen cabinets to make room for all the items stored in the drawers, and moved everything from the shelves to our corner cabinet in the living room. It was great motivation to tackle a few things I've been procrastinating (feast or famine when it comes to motivation, I'm telling you; it's either X-Files during naptime for days on end, or DO ALL THE THINGS IN ONE DAY. I have no idea why you are flipping through your DSM-IV-TR to the "cyclothymic disorder" page.).
Here's the corner cabinet post-reorganization. It used to display my great-grandmother's china, which is gorgeous (thanks to my dear Katherine for setting it all out so beautifully when we moved in!), but as the months have passed, I decided it wasn't quite our "look". These pieces bring more color and a bit more of our style, which I honestly can't name. Casual elegant almost-country? No idea. We defy categories, people. Or, I am not a designer.
I'd show you the corner cabinet "before" but, you know. In similar fashion, the following is the only photo I could find that even remotely shows the hutch in our dining room. I'm sure others must exist, but they are not contained on my phone or laptop. If you can somehow divert your eyes from the glory that is my royal jammie-clad children, you can spot the beautiful hutch taking up oodles of wall space in the dining room. Not the full effect, but you get an idea of the scale.
Now, I did think to take a photo after the hutch, and before all the finishing projects to pull the space together:
So here's the plan:
1. Console table - paint white to prime, and then when we paint our living room, we will paint it the same light gray color as our living room walls. The hope is it will help tie the two spaces together and still be neutral enough to work in the dining room. Worst case, I fall in love with it white, and finish it in white instead!
2. Gold window - paint it a lighter yellow color to better coordinate with the kitchen. Create some sort of something to make it a work of art - perhaps a wreath, maybe something else. Stay tuned. The creative juices are just beginning to flow on that one.
3. Chalkboard - paint this white, and possibly add a bulletin board where those silver plates are hanging on the far side, painted to match. The bulletin board, if I like it there, will probably be covered in a pretty fabric and criss-crossed with a bit of ribbon to make a photo board. The silver plates might go to the short wall by the glass door. One thing I can promise: this chalk board will never be covered in adorable bubble lettering and calligraphy while I am the lady of the house. Not my gifting.
Do you have any ideas for me, especially for that window, and maybe for making the bulletin board something worth featuring? I hope to hit Joann fabrics next week to shop for fabric for the board, and also to make some everyday cloth napkins because ours are about shot (and we don't have enough, due to tossing some of them that got super stained). Maybe coordinating or matching fabrics?
Pinterest me, people!
Bottomless Breakfast Buffet
Let's play a little game. (That feels like a line from a super creepy movie. Is it?) I'll list a breakfast menu, you guess which child ate which meal.
A) Two waffles, one apple, one clementine, one bowl of cheerios with milk, a partial pancake
B) Two pancakes
C) Three pancakes, one apple*, one clementine, one bowl of cheerios with milk
*Joel told me about the apple after I originally published this post.
Joel, do you see why I struggle with the grocery budget? I apparently started out with very little grasp of the quantity of food consumed by people under five years old. And still learning.
This also explains why breakfast takes a sweet hour and a half. If you ever roll up to our house at the crack of 10:00 and we are in pajamas, it's because people won't stop eating long enough to get dressed like civilized preschoolers.
I won't lie, though, there is something about filling your children's bellies full of delicious food that is the perfect mother's love language. The moods brighten, the laughter grows louder, and even if it takes all morning to get there, the "Thank you for breakfast, mommy!" and post-wipe-down smooches never get old.
Oh, the answers to the quiz are: A) Mikayla B) Oliver C) Isaac
Momma wolfed down two pancakes, two leftover clementine segments, and a cup of cool coffee in between refilling all the other plates and cups and peeling fruit. That caffeine is welcome to kick in aaaaany time!
Stay tuned, we've got some projecty goodness planned for you. A little painting, a little organization, some miscellaneous crafting. It's going to be a busy week, Lord-willing!
A) Two waffles, one apple, one clementine, one bowl of cheerios with milk, a partial pancake
B) Two pancakes
C) Three pancakes, one apple*, one clementine, one bowl of cheerios with milk
*Joel told me about the apple after I originally published this post.
Joel, do you see why I struggle with the grocery budget? I apparently started out with very little grasp of the quantity of food consumed by people under five years old. And still learning.
This also explains why breakfast takes a sweet hour and a half. If you ever roll up to our house at the crack of 10:00 and we are in pajamas, it's because people won't stop eating long enough to get dressed like civilized preschoolers.
I won't lie, though, there is something about filling your children's bellies full of delicious food that is the perfect mother's love language. The moods brighten, the laughter grows louder, and even if it takes all morning to get there, the "Thank you for breakfast, mommy!" and post-wipe-down smooches never get old.
Oh, the answers to the quiz are: A) Mikayla B) Oliver C) Isaac
Momma wolfed down two pancakes, two leftover clementine segments, and a cup of cool coffee in between refilling all the other plates and cups and peeling fruit. That caffeine is welcome to kick in aaaaany time!
Stay tuned, we've got some projecty goodness planned for you. A little painting, a little organization, some miscellaneous crafting. It's going to be a busy week, Lord-willing!
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