Thursday, July 7, 2011

A Day in the Life of Rose and her Tree

       Come with me and see what a typical homeschool day in our house looks like!
Diagramming sentences
Wednesday, in it's first minutes, I gave up trying to fall asleep as I realized that the few sips of Coke a few hours earlier had brought on insomnia. My experience has taught me that Morpheus will not take me in his arms until two A.M. after caffeine consumption. I served my time by leafing through a book of short biographies of Women of Achievement, reading the entries of women who lived before the 17th century, in preparation of our next school term. Thankfully, I spent the next hours with Morpheus until he left me at 8:30.

        Between waking and 10 AM, I showered, began washing dishes and laundry, did some stretches, had breakfast during my devotional, and did some brainstorming. Then I went back to doing dishes, filled the washer to rinse, had the older girls finish their breakfast and did some more cleaning. After I had wiped the counter, swept the kitchen and school room and fixed breakfast for Grace, I went to the school room. Rebeca had finished her Bible reading and she began math while Ruth began her Bible and Grace came and decided to draw. Chuy went to collect raffle money and got back at 11.
       From 11 to 11:30, we looked up the raffle winner, I updated Windows and restarted the computer twice and got Ruthie started on her math assignment after some examples on the board. From 11:30 to noon I read a Bible story to Grace and gave her a math page to solve with Cuisenaire rods. Then I worked with Beca and Grace on spelling. At 12:45 I had Ruthie quit math with only 1/2 the problems finished. She got a little lecture on her use of time as well as the need to look at previous problems for guidance instead of waiting for Mom! This brought on tears, challenging me to get them all settled back into work. Then I helped Grace with the first two lines of the Lord's Prayer which she's going to memorize and let her play with dolls.
      Chuy was finishing the mopping (we have the Bible study here at 8 o'clock Wednesday's) and I began lunch. At 1:10 he went for the last things I needed for making the spaghetti, and Rebeca hung up the laundry. She and I sorted the laundry and started load #2. Ruthie finished her History reading and I sent her to finish copying her Latin lesson and do chores. Beca began sorting beans and Grace had to take part in the fun, but got in trouble for the ruckus over how few beans her sister doled out for her inspection. Ruthie couldn't be denied the pleasure of cleaning beans while I cooked the meat, made the sauce and boiled the noodles. Rebeca refilled the washer, and I had finished the salad when Chuy got back at 1:30, and we finally began eating right after 2pm.
      The conversation must have been good, because it was 10 till 3 when we got around to clearing the table. By a quarter after, Beca had the laundry hung, we started a 3rd load and I did some more dishes.
      Back to school, I gave Rebeca and Ruthie spelling review quizzes and Grace returned to drawing. Ruthie finished the dreaded math and I gave Beca a reading comprehension test before she filled the washer to rinse again. Next I helped Grace review her phonograms (a phonics component of our language arts program).
      At ten after four we found Chuy on the computer, so we postponed reading aloud and opted for them to do assigned reading while I dozed on the couch. Chuy finished before the older two were done, so Grace used a neat drawing program called Tux Paint (I really recommend it!) until twenty till. Next I read two chapters of E. Nesbit's Five Children and It.
      Here my notes end, but as best as I recall, I spent some time on Facebook, e-mail and the Drudge Report. Finally, it was time to finish putting the house in order for the meeting. This involved getting the table wiped, having kids take clean clothes and toys upstairs, MORE dishes, and setting the chairs around the living room.
      To our joy, a young married guy who had fallen away from Christ showed up and then we began singing with six of us. One of the single guys asked me for something for a sore throat that was threatening his well-being, so I got him tea, ibuprofen and something to gargle. Pretty soon, a mother and her two adult sons arrived, followed by another married couple. I think all eleven of us truly enjoyed the time together in the Word, judging by the lively participation. When all but my patient had gone, I gave him one last treatment to ward off a cold.
      Finally around 10:30 at night, we ate leftover spaghetti (the lucky ones, did anyhow!) and eggs. Mattresses were brought out to the living room and Chuy watched the news and some CSI or Law and Order before we all finally sought Morpheus' company once again.
Rebeca was so sad about missing the Fourth of July in TX

Ruthie was tickled to find this patriotic bear at a garage sale

I think Grace was just happy to eat cake! Using sprinkles for the bars was her own idea and paid for from her allowance.

3 comments:

  1. Memories are made of days like this.

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  2. I saw your reply on the yahoo group and clicked over here to your blog. This entry immediately caught my attention. :-) It is nice to see a "real" homeschool day from a veteran. It's comforting to me when our homeschool day seems a little too chaotic (like today)!

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  3. Melissa, Thank you so much for stopping by! I'm glad to know my chaos can be of comfort to someone. Reading about other mom's has helped me so many days when I thought that if anyone was spying on me, they'd report me to the "home school police" for sure! In the end, I've discovered that my kids are learning, growing and maturing (just like me!), and it's all worth the effort.

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