I Will Not Let February Get to Me: Getting to it When I'm Prepared

I read a post on Donald Miller's blog yesterday and it simply made me laugh.  There are so many mornings after breakfast that I say to my boys, "We're starting at 9 o'clock!" and then...

I answer emails and check out Facebook (still have 30 minutes left).

Quickly make up that flipbook for B's notebook page and research some online activities to go with learning about pond life (10 minutes left).  "Boys get dressed please."

Then I remember what bills need to be paid, which makes me balance the whole account, add some things to my to-do list for the day, download some ecoupons to my shoppers card because one of my to-do's is to go grocery shopping, check email again and start responding again... and before you know it, it's 9:30, they still aren't dressed and I'm feeling very distracted.

I can so relate, Don.

So, I didn't want to jump into yesterday until I was ready.  I had to shake off the distractions and organize myself a bit first.  I began yesterday by doing the planning I should have done over the weekend.  This cut into our school time, but the boys were playing with Hot Wheels tracks nicely so no harm done. When I've planned a little, I feel so much less stress.  In trying to tackle February I'm also trying to tackle my stress level and flying by the seat of my pants doesn't support that goal. Over the course of the day we implemented much of what I'd planned and felt no stress.  Goal reached.


As we pursued our plan I had two sweet moments:
1.  While teaching S about yeast so we could make his big letter "Y," we pulled out my bread machine.  It became a project for all three of us.  B chose what "flavor" we made (sweet white bread), S helped to measure and turned it on.  We all looked forward to it as it baked.  In fact I had a ton of snow to shovel off the driveway and when I came from finishing that chore, I came in to the relaxing smell of freshly baked bread.  I loved that most of all.

2.  While teaching B about water we've been doing some experiments out of a book I got for free from the library cast-offs.  It's actually a great book with accessible experiments utilizing items I actually have in the recycle bin!  But the best part is seeing B's excitement to do the simplest tests: coloring water, freezing it to see if it expands, melting the colored ice in warm water while watching the denser, colder water fall to the bottom of the pitcher, and mixing salt water and fresh water and seeing where things will float.  He's really excited about doing these things.  And that is exactly why I enjoy being a homeschooler.

Score:
Me 3
February 3

I'm catching up.