homeschooling through a season of change: Janet's day in the life with a 7, 6,4, almost 2 year old and newborn.

*Today, I am connecting with Simple Homeschool blog for their "Homeschool day in the life" Link-up. Hopefully, our readers will enjoy this little glimpse of this part of our life here on the homestead, and maybe I can be an encouragement to those who are homeschooling through times of disruption or change in their lives.- Janet*

We recently welcomed a new little person into our family.This sweet little chubbiness has been a joy to get to know. The whole family seems enamored by his tiny toes, silky soft hair, and that sweet, indescribable "baby smell". As anyone with a new little one knows, the baby makes itself "priority one" from the moment of birth, and mom is is immediate need of rest and recuperation for at least a few weeks. This is all as it should be, but obviously, it can throw a wrench in a family's rhythm. Especially for homeschooling families for whom Mom is the principal teacher.

Of course, one solution, and a good one, is to take time off and make up for it during summer break. However,I wanted to avoid this as we tend to be extremely busy with our farm and gardens in the summer and really need to take the summer months off from lessons. So, our solution has been to relax all our normal schedule during this time and enjoy lots and lots of what I have been mentally calling " couch-schooling" :-) 

A "day in the life" for us right now looks something like this: 

I wake up. It is not early, maybe seven-thirty. My husband is already up and making his coffee, stoking the fire in the wood cook stove, and putting on the kettle for my tea( bless him!). I spend a bit more time in bed, nursing the baby, then get up, mosey to the kitchen and make my red raspberry tea. My midwife recommends this to help heal my uterus after the birth and I enjoy the flavor of the herbs each morning. Some how, even with five kids, I have never developed the need for morning caffeine. I head to the couch to drink my tea, cuddle little Aengus, and maybe read a little of my current book or devotional. Right now, it's "Mere Christianity" by C.S. Lewis. This is also when I go over and add to my daily journal. Its something like a cross between a bullet journal and a commonplace book. It holds my to do lists, quotes that inspire me, things I accomplished, and random ideas and ramblings. Right now I'm also using it at the end of the day to write what we learned as I haven't been bothering with my normal planner. I will go back later and fill in the planner with all we did during this time. I check my email and look at a blog post, and then I hear little feet pattering from the girls' room.

It's Ember who is the first riser this morning, and she climbs up to visit with me and the baby for a while. Soon, the two biggest girls are awake too and Daddy goes to get Conagher from his crib. Diapers are changed, girls get themselves dressed, I fix their hair (maybe), and then they have some quiet time as they listen to our scripture songs CD. Esther helps set the table while Daddy does morning farm chores, and I fix some scrambled eggs from our chickens, who have been laying like crazy with all the warm weather we have been having. We've been having lots of easy food like oatmeal or cold cereal too. Anything to keep it easy to make and easy to clean up, as the girls have been handling most of the after meal tidying.

After we are done with our breakfast, Lilly wants to know if we can read her book. She has been working through Rod and Staff's Stepping Forward series, and has found a lot of satisfaction with each book she has finished. We normally read a chapter a day, but lately she will often insist on two chapters as she is excited about finishing the series! She has learned a lot of new sight words and now is just getting into long vowel sounds.

After Lilly finishes, I call Esther over to read. She has been more motivated when she can choose what she is reading rather than just using her second grade reader. I'm just fine with that as long as the reading level is about right for her and a little challenging. Right now her favorite is the Frog and Toad treasury. :-) She has started to read with more expression and even 'do the voices'. We have dropped formal English lessons for now, but we find ourselves discussing quotation marks, compound words, and punctuation. I love lessons that just happen organically, and you can bet I'm counting them! Later on, the girls decide to count the money in their piggy banks and I listen in as they review coin values, count by fives and tens, and add and subtract. Math lesson, check!  The baby is sleeping and I take this moment to fold some laundry.

Next we eat lunch (sandwiches), and Conagher takes a nap. Normally, the girls would have nap/quiet time too, but Daddy decides they can farm with him today. He is plowing all the garden spots for spring planting and sowing turnips in the upper garden. We know time spent in nature, free play, and involvement in the day-to-day farm chores are just as important to the children's education as worksheets and memorization are. Today they have a wonderful time getting to ride the draft horses, Logan and Lincoln.

While they are outside, I take a nap with my boys.:-) When everyone comes in they are filthy so I make them rinse off in the shower and get into pj's early. They ask if they can listen to an audio book so we hear part of" The Wise Woman" by George MacDonald while I fix some supper. After, when things are cleaned up somewhat (only one dish is broken), the girls bombard us with requests for bedtime stories. I read a bit from "choice stories for children". I love the old fashion sound to these stories and they all have great moral lessons. The kids usually don't want me to stop.

 Daddy has started reading aloud a lot lately, ( I love this as much as the kids, btw!). He recently finished all the Mowgli stories from Kipling's "The Jungle Book 2" (leading to me strewing books about jungles and rain forests around the house for the kids to find), and now he has been reading "Grandfather Tales", a compilation of the Appalachian version of many famous and not-so-famous folk tails. It's collected and retold by Richard Chase and the language and tales are just wonderful and laugh out loud funny. Robin hood is friends with the Indians, Cinderella "goes to meeting' instead of a ball, and we love "How Bob-tail beat the devil", just one of the stories you've probably never heard before.

Reading done, The kiddos brush their teeth and get ready to go to bed. Kisses are given, bedtime songs sung, and requests for water made. One girl wants to listen to the auto book as they go to sleep but another wants some quiet music and I opt with the music as they listened to the book earlier and I feel more like music myself. I nurse the baby as they fall asleep and Daddy puts big brother to bed.

Before I hit lights out I read a bit and look at pinterest or update our etsy shop, and think about teaching Lilly how to chrochet or knit since she has been begging me to do this. We'll see. It does seem like it would be a good couch-school subject...