Typical Day

I woke up at 7 and took a bath (shower head broke!). L woke up a few minutes later, and she told me that last night she found a great recipe (maybe she dreamed it?) for strawberry muffins. So we made strawberry muffins for breakfast. I wanted something raw for me, but the cinnamon strussel on the muffins was good, so I made banana "icecream" with strawberries in it, and an oatmeal strussel on top.

We are trying a 30 day free trial of ABC Mouse (online game that E saw on a tv commercial and asked for), and L played that in the kitchen with me while I made breakfast, and we talked and hung out.

Then E and Z woke up. E played ABC Mouse for a while, and L and Z watched Barbie and The Magic Shoes off and on while playing and going outside. Meanwhile, I did yoga, called the insurance company, added the muffin recipe to my recipe collection, took a call from one of the other board members of the non-profit we are starting, and checked facebook and GCM.

E ate a peach and broke open the pit to find a smaller, almond looking part inside. She had discovered the pits have that inside part before, but this time she wanted to find out more about it. So we looked it up and found out it is the part with the embryo and endosperm. We couldn't find quite what we were looking for before it was time to get ready to go, so I posted on the "My Unschooler is Interested In..." facebook page to see if we could get some resources.

E found a frog in the yard, and we put it in a bowl with some water and a rock for it to sit on. It hung out with us while we got dressed and teeth/hair brushed. Then she released it.

E fed the dog, we left the house, and we went to the car wash to vacuum out the car. Then we went to the library's preschool story time. We picked out some books on flowers (for L who wanted to know about roses) and dinosaurs (for E who gets dinosaur books often) and a board book (for Z who liked the picture of the puppy on it), and we had to put some back because our library has a limit of 15 and we already had 8 out.

E had asked me in the car as we were going into the library why her schooled friend had asked me what day we were starting home school. I had told the friend that we home school all year. As E reflected on that, she said, "I'm glad we home school all year. I'm always learning something! I would get bored in the summer if I wasn't learning!" Then the story time was a school theme, with books about going to school. It didn't seem to faze the girls at all though, and the mom who read the stories at least said, "I know there are some home schooled kids here too!"

After the library, we went home and had lunch. L and E played while I sat in the bathroom with Z while she took a bath and I played on the computer. Then L played more ABC Mouse, while I read to E from an American Girl book about Josephina (it's the first chapter book series she has gotten in to). Then E played ABC Mouse, while L and I brushed each other's hair and I read her and Z a book about how trees grow.

A neighbor girl came over and they all played while I did dishes, picked up dog poop, filled out some paperwork to mail, and made half a dozen phone calls for the non-profit. Then it started to rain and the girls all wanted to come in and watch a movie. So I put on Cars, and that lasted about 15 minutes before they were outside playing in the rain. I played in the rain with them for a few minutes, then started making dinner.

L was full of meal ideas today. She had asked for pizza for lunch, but I said I'd make it for dinner. I made the dough and then realized that I was out of cheese. So I told girls we needed to run to the store and we got dressed again and headed out. We picked up a few things and sang "It's raining, it's pouring..." on the way through the parking lot. L cracks me up with her infectious laugh about that kind of stuff!

We came home and I got the chicken cooking. The girls all took a bath and then we ate dinner. I wrote most of this while eating dinner and right after. Which looked like writing, helping kids, writing, putting another pizza in the over, writing, calling my mom back, helping kids, writing, pulling the pizza out of the oven, writing, dressing the baby to go outside, writing, posting about today on facebook, writing, turning the piano on for Z, writing, turning music on for Z, writing, and so on.

At some point in there, the girls were getting snippy with each other and I tried to distract with a fun race of "Let's see who can pick up stuff in your room the fastest!" That one often works, but it floated like a lead balloon tonight.

E and L played outside for a long time, while Z alternated between playing outside, nursing and dancing to worship music. I cleared the counter, put food away, put away the clothes (dress up and regular) in the girls room, put away a load of laundry and started another load.

I found a spider in a jar that they asked me to catch earlier and they set it free outside. A few minutes later I heard squeals that were somewhere between being grossed out and fascinated. The spider lost a leg and the leg was still twitching. They asked me why and I told them it was reflexes/the nervous system. We'll have to look that one up later, because I have no idea how to explain it beyond that!

I sat in the bathroom with Z, reading my Bible while she took a bath. Then E and L came in from playing and took a bath too (Yes another one!), while I posted an interesting verse on GCM. They brushed their teeth and I put on a movie for them. They watched about half of it, Z nursed to sleep, and then I put my tv show on, and E and L fell asleep.

Was the day perfect? No! Most moments were good ones, but there were some bumps along the way. Z, who has been using the toilet since 17 months, peed on a chair at dinner and on the bed right before we laid down. I ended up apologizing to L for being cranky about her being slow getting dressed when we went to the store. After trying to problem solve with E and L (who were hungry right before dinner) over the space they were fighting over in the bath, I ended up pulling them both out so no one got hurt. I probably growled at the grabby handed 2 year old to "stop touching me!" when she was needing my boobs while nursing for the 3 thousandth time today.

 Overall, though, it was a wonderful day!

Typical Day

This morning I had a lot of housework to do since I got busy writing last night and didn't clean up the house. So while I cleaned the girls played and watched part of a movie. We did something that I'm trying to make a habit- prayers and a short devotion at breakfast. Then D took them to the preschool story time at the library, which one of us takes them to every Wednesday. They read a story about caterpillars and then made caterpillars out of egg cartons. While they were gone, I went to the Women's Business Network meeting. When we all got home, the girls and I ran a few errands- to the bank, the dump and to pick up some tools D had left at a friend's house. Then D left for work and the girls and I followed an interest with measuring cups and fractions.

Today was another great reminder for me- when I'm frustrated at the way things are going, just take a deep breath and wait as we had some cleaning and decluttering issues come up and be resolved.

The girls played in the wading pool while I cooked dinner- it's so nice to finally have a yard! After dinner we cleaned up the house and then walked to the store up the street so they could spend their money. Every week they get $2 that they can spend however they choose. L bought M&M's and chalk and E bought a toy turtle that swims in the water.

I'm trying to remember all the little things that happened today: I read them a book about sheep that drive a jeep and get it stuck in the mud. LOTS of rhyming word and they had fun with those. I gave them piggy back rides and they played with the baby a lot.

I hardly write about the baby! But she doesn't do much yet. She is crawling, pulling herself up and cruising a little. She loves watching her sisters play and they find it hillarious to do slapstick comedy to get her to laugh. She got her first two teeth about a week ago.

I posted this on facebook right before bed: My kids are "watching a movie" on the cupboard door. They are discussing the plot "wow, look at Ariel going in that hole! And the airplanes are flying and crashing into each other!" and using an imaginary remote to change movies. They have even made themselves a bed on the floor in front of their "movie." These kids are allowed to watch movies any time they want, but they are doing this instead.


It's not all roses- several times today they hit and pinched each other over things like E putting her feet on L's chair or L jumping on the couch while E was laying on it. Sometimes I was able to help them work through it in the most smooth, beautiful way- having both of them tell the other one what they need, asking them to give ideas for a solution, finding one that worked, suggesting apologies and amends which they willingly gave and moving on. But at one point I had to keep E with me for about half an hour because every time she got near her sister she started something and was not interested in solving anything. So she sat on the counter while I did dishes and cleaned up the kitchen and by the time I was done she had worked out whatever internal issue she had going on and was much more pleasant to be around.

Now they are fast asleep in their bed, dreaming good dreams I hope.

Chinese Dance and Dragon Boats

About a week ago, we were watching Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and E was really fascinated by the dragon boat that they take down the chocolate river. She's seen the movie dozens of times, but this time that just jumped out at her. "Why does it look like that? Why are they drumming? Why is it a dragon?" I told her that it was similar to boats in China and that's probably where they got the idea. I was planning on looking them up on youtube for her the next day, but forgot about it.

Then the other day, she bought herself an umbrella. She had it open and was kneeling down and spinning it in front of her and it reminded me of Chinese dance. I told her about that and when we got home I looked up Chinese dance and dragon boats. That led to fan dances and ribbon dances as well.

We found videos like these:

Dragon Boat Festival

Silkworm Chinese Dance

Korean Fan Dance

Chinese Umbrella Dance

The umbrellas all looked like parasols to me, so I explained the difference to her. Now she wants a parasol, a fan, and some ribbons too. This girl loves to dance!

Typical Day

I haven't written about a "typical" day for a while. I think it will be fun to look back in 10 years and see what our days were like.

So, today I slept in late because I was up late last night working on my ezine (which is almost done!). D got up with the girls and made them breakfast, while I laid in bed and read my Bible. E usually likes to watch a movie when she first wakes up, and this morning she put on Shark Tales. I got up around 10:30, and she was about 20 minutes into her movie. I told her I was going to take a shower and asked if she wanted to take a bath, which she did.

After our shower/bath, she wanted to play "Don't Get Away," which is a game where I hold onto her and she tries to get away and I say "NO! Never! You'll never escape!" but of course she always does, and then I pretend to be sad that she got away, then she comes running back and we do it all over. Or sometimes she runs around me getting just close enough where I can almost grab her but I MISS. Or I pretend that I don't notice that she has escaped my arms and I go ON and ON about how she'll never get away from me, when she's already on the other side of the room. It's a great game for getting out big energy! Then L and D joined in the fun and we had a big tickle fight.

Then I offered to read some books to her, and she said that she wanted to read them to me. So, I suggested one of her "easy reader" type books with big, simple words that I could help her sound out, but she wasn't interested in those. She wanted to read A Snack for Phillip, so we did. She asked me to help her sound out the words on the cover, and then a few words on the first page. Then she wanted me to read a page to her and then she would "read" it after me. She started doing this a week or two ago. It's funny because when I first told people that we were going to be unschooling, someone asked me "so are you just going to wait and hope that some day she says 'hey mom, teach me to read'?" and I said, no, I think it will be a process of slowly picking up on words and sounds and making connections as we go through a word-filled life. I'm totally ok with her not reading until she's 8 or 10 or whatever, but here she is at 3 saying "mom, show me how to read." LOL

So, when she was done trying to read, I read a few books to her and then put on some music. E and L danced while I cleaned up the house. E's been asking for ballet lessons, and I'm not sure how I'm going to swing that financially, but we'll figure something out. Maybe not ballet exactly, but some kind of dance.

Then E fed her rat, and talked to it and both girls watched it. E got out a book about rats that we had gotten from the library and looked at the pictures. Then she wanted to play on the computer, so I set her up with the paint program. When she was done with that, she asked to type and did that for a while. Then she played uptoten.com. She printed a coloring page out and I helped her and L get set up at the table with paper and crayons.

I have a "strew basket" that I put new things in and rotate old games and puzzles and things. While they were coloring, I put the basket out on the table. E noticed her memory game and pipe cleaners and played with those for a while.

I made stir fry for lunch, and E ate just the broccoli and then asked for more. When we prayed, we talked a little bit about Yahweh being God's name. This is a little confusing for her still, because we use "God" and "Jesus" around most people, because they wouldn't know what we're talking about if we said Yahweh and Yeshua. But at home we use their real names, when I remember, since I'm so entrenched in the habit of saying God and Jesus after a life time of Christian church.

Not long after lunch, she told me she was tired and asked me to lay down and nurse her. So, we all laid down for a while. L fell asleep, but E got up and D put on Open Season for her while I read some of my book. I got up after 15 or 20 minutes and then E wanted to play Don't Get Away again, so we did. Then she wanted to hold her rat and watch Little Mermaid. While she did that, I did yoga and we talked about that movie and the rat. The rat fell asleep in it's box and E covered it up with a blanket- so cute!

Little Mermaid barely made it past the previews before D asked E if she wanted to go outside with him. So she played outside while he worked, and I got some work in the office done. When they came inside, E and L played together for a long time, then E took another bath.

The evening crankiness came and went without too much fuss tonight. She's at a point where she usually doesn't take a nap, unless she falls asleep in the car. But in the evening she gets cranky. When I remember that tireness is the reason for it, and don't get bent out of shape myself, it goes pretty smoothly. I laid down with her and nursed her, and then she felt better. I still had office work to do, so D played with the girls for a while.

Then we made a late night decision to go get a redbox movie. I thought the girls would fall asleep in the car, but they didn't. We got The Tale of Desperoux and it was pretty good. I think it's based of a classic book, so now I want to find out for sure and read it. After the movie, D and already sleeping L went to bed, I got on the computer and E watched a few minutes of a Dr. Suess movie before falling asleep in the living room.

All in all, a wonderful day! I wish I would have gotten myself outside though. I need to make sure to go out for a long time tomorrow. I get cranky if I'm inside too many days in a row. I wonder what tomorrow will bring....