All that I’m not doing

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

All that I’m not doing

Yesterday was a fabulous home-schooly type day. Lots of creative, hands-on, passionate, child-led learning in the heart of our wintry home. It was everything that I see homeschooling as being in my mind’s eye. My camera had been left elsewhere for the day so I have no pictures to show you and as I was regretting this the fact dawned on me… the thing to do is not to tell you about all the neat-o things that I did yesterday but instead to tell you about all the things that I did not do. This will be my own little antidote to that crappy mixed feeling of envy, guilt, admiration, inadequacy, self-doubt and judgementalism that are so easy to fall into while reading the blog records of all the great mom's out there who look like they have it so together. We are all choosing all the time. If someone looks like that are “doing it all” then be sure that they are not. We had a great homeschool day yesterday and yet we did NOT…

Do any Religion, Math, Spelling, Spanish, Science or History. What does that leave? Nature Study, that’s what.
Any laundry
Any dedicated preschool time
The grocery shopping at the proposed time
Daddy had to pull dinner together so I could get the grocery shopping in (no milk and a “big storm” coming).

There are only so many hours in the day, only so many arms gifted to each mom, only so many creative cells endowed to each brain, only so much energy granted to the sleepless parents out here. I had a great day yesterday – one that I hope I’ll remember even without the aid of a camera but I don’t want to feed the culture of ‘never-good-enough’ that is the siren call of the mom-blog world so I’ll just keep it to myself. I hope you enjoyed YOUR day too.

(I did manage to get one picture at the end of the day. I just can’t get enough of this sight. How dear is he? My newly independent reader. He didn’t even notice me and the flashing camera. I could just eat him up.)

1 comment:

Katie RoseFebruary 3, 2011 at 10:55 AM
We had a great day too! I could just eat him up Alexis. How wonderful that he can read, way to go teacher.
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Loves and Loveletts

Lex - somewhere in her mid-30's. Homeschooling mom as well as a homeschool graduate. Lives in a little Burg in the Appalachian mountains but will always have a little Michigan inside her. Mother of 6 that were born within 9 years of each other. Lover of audiobooks, praying through singing, birding, asparagus patches, and photographing kids. Grateful for the gift of community - the beauty, the ugly and the mediocre. Follower of Christ.

John - Late 30's Theology Professor, aka The Love Doctor. Always burning the candle at both ends he works hard during the day to form the future of Catholic priests and in the early mornings and evenings he carts children to and from activities and makes his wife mean G&Ts. Evangelization, providing music for Mass and adoration, sharing insights from St. Thomas Aquinas are what he's most known for in his professional life. Doing the dishes every night, dropping everything to meet us in the ER, and fixing the constant rotation of things the kids break are what he's most popular for here at home.

Anthony - Thirteen. Geography and grammar are where he shines academically - both requiring a precision that Anthony has a hard time not overusing. He enjoys playing soccer as often as possible and he stands out on his team as being a guy with his head and his body in the game - attentive and thinking. He works hard on living with equanimity as an introvert in a crowded, loud, busy home.

Rosie - Ten. Leader of "The Tribe": the three loveletts that were born within 2.5 years. She is a hard worker in school and rarely requires my help, just plugs along and gets her stuff done. She takes a lot of art classes and keeps a nature journal and I love what she is able to observe and translate through a pencil. She loves to make up all sorts of games and fun pretends for the younger member of the family. Everyone should be so lucky as to have a Rosie.

Thomas - Nine and all E. Energetic, enthusiastic, eager, excitable, extroverted, exhilarated and engaged. The only trouble we have with Thomas is that it's hard to keep him busy enough - he has an appetite for life that can be overwhelming! He's been this way ever since he mastered crawling. He was off and the rest is history. Anthony wrote this limerick about Thomas this year.

My brother is energetic

His body is super frenetic

He yells and he jumps

and he gives us all bumps

But Thomas is never pathetic.

This is all true.

Cecilia - Eight. Cece is such a great "smack-dabber". Smack-dab in the middle of the family and always wanting to be part of the team. She is generous, inclusive and positive. We often call her excited, positive, can-do presence, "The Power of Positive-Ce". She has none of her older sister's innate sense of fashion and often rollicks around in outfits that make me question her ability to see colors. And patterns. And cleanliness.

Catherine - 5 going on 30. Probably the most thoughtful and caring person in the house. She is totally normal when it comes to wanting to run with the big kids and "do it myself" and other such developmental standards. What sets her apart in our family is that she is so tuned into how other people are feeling and how her actions effect them. When she throws a fit (which she still does occasionally) she is the only child to offer unprompted apologies and amends. She is our sunshine.

Gloria - 3 and THE BABY. She is well ensconced in her role - having no desire or inclination to reliquish her tyrannical hold on all the people older then her. We do her bidding and she entertains us by singing herself little songs, letting us tickle her and having big beautiful eyes and super long eyelashes.

Love Life - Our Grand Tour

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

All that I’m not doing

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