Back At It

As Sunday wore on, I felt the looming dread of school the following morning. I suggested to my dad that I might need to give full on un-schooling a try, just to avoid returning to structure. Break was busy and not long enough to accomplish all the things that I felt I should have done. Though you and I both know so many of those should-haves will never be done. I will always have a giant basket (or two...maybe three) full of orphaned socks tucked into my bedroom's corners. There is no break long enough to compel me to actually organize them once and for all. Nevertheless, somewhere in my illogical heart, I blame the lack of time.

But yesterday I woke up a little earlier than usual, drank a cup of coffee, and organized the house enough so that we could start our day, all before the kids came down the stairs, blurry eyed and bedheaded.

As I made the kids oatmeal for breakfast, Gus wrote a journal entry about Christmas.  Meanwhile Sena began compiling her writing portfolio, and Arlo found a few abandoned Christmas ornaments, and requested to make them "more awesome" with the aid of plenty of paint, his favorite color being "fire."

When Gus was finished, he took a break to play with the Magna-tiles. Later my mom came over and worked with him on reading comprehension. Sena went to the basement to do a yoga video on her own. Throughout the day, they both practiced piano. At some point, the two oldest snuck upstairs so that Sena could read to Gus from one of her new Percy Jackson books.

In the afternoon when I was able to get Alamae to take a nap, I worked with Sena on her math, and when we were finished,  Gus joined us and we pulled out the globes, one of our most used books, and the new map study sheets I order sometime before the new year.  We sat at the dining room table reviewing continents, locating countries we have studied, pulling up images and information on my phone as needed. We talked about why Native Americans were mistakingly called Indians. About how map size is distorted. About the Aboriginal people of Australia. In an effort to take advantage of the tail end of Alamae's nap, I rented Walkabout on Prime for the kids so they could see what the Outback looked like, get a sense of the Land Down Under. As they watched with Arlo,  I snuck down to the basement for my own short yoga practice.

As it turns out, the grind isn't so bad.

SHARE THIS | TWEET THIS