I must say, I am so, so, so happy to be homeschooling again. It just feels so "right" for so many reasons. As I have said before, we have tried public school twice, and it has been made very clear to us that we are a homeschooling family.  (That's a soapbox for another day, though. )

It is also a very good feeling to have finally come up with a schedule that works for us LOL You can see the schedule below. I am not a fan of scheduling for babies, but when your children are older, I think they work wonderfully for family dynamics of all sorts. I had to figure out how to fit in working, exercising, cleaning, and homeschooling (since I refuse to homeschool past lunch), and have discovered that the key to sticking to our schedule is staying off of the computer so much.  'Tis true--I was addicted to Facebook, message boards, email, the works. But I have a life to lead, and cannot spend all of my time on the computer--as fun as it is haha!

I have had a couple people ask how we manage to fit all of it in, stay on top of housework, run errands, etc. So, I'll answer those questions now:

First, I work from home as an editor. So, the times you see in our schedule designated "work" for me simply mean me curling up on the sectional and working, or possibly upstairs in the classroom at my desk, as I am now. I am NOT coming and going from the house at those times. Second, the children have "zones" that they are each responsible for keeping up on a daily basis. For example, Abby's zones are the kitchen (we all help w/that one though by doing our part, such as taking dishes to the sink, etc.) and straighening up the classroom. Lexi has the family room/playroom and living room. The younger two have zones as well. The children are to keep up with their zones on a daily basis, such that by Saturday, they are rewarded with a movie of their choice (along with their daily allowance, which we keep pretty minimal, since the idea is more about working together as a family and less about $$$). While they watch their movie, I go through the house and do all of the deep cleaning/chemicals. I should not have to spend more than an hour doing this (our house is 2400+ sf, afterall). In order to keep it that way, though, they must stay on top of their zones. Basically, that is ALL I should have to do. And since they keep up their zones on a daily basis, it has seemingly been taking anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes for them each day. So, that's 5-10 minutes of work per day--not a big deal for them. Two days a week, I am doing the laundry (now that we are caught up), just as before, and the older children sometimes help with folding (they all love folding towels!) and they put away their own pj's and everything other than regular clothes.

Because we do not send our children to school, we are able to take advantage of getting nice clothing in all places, and their clothes do not wear out CONSTANTLY (like they did both times we sent them to school--drove me crazy, because I pay good money for their clothes LOL!!)  We also do not have to spend money on ridiculous "school supply lists," full of household items, and none of which we are allowed to label! I looked at the list--when it was handed to kids on the last day of school--and went, "Seriously?? Are you kidding me? If I buy crayons, glue, erasers, etc, they are not for 'everyone'--they are for my own children!" (Socialism at its finest, ladies and gentleman!) I do, however, take advantage of the cheap-o school supplies at WalMart (well, only what we'll use in our homeschool that year) and stock up my supply closet!!

So, that's the jist of how it all comes together. Jeffery does grocery shopping one day a week for me (I HATE grocery shopping, and since he is a manager at a Publix, well, it works out perfectly LOL) Dinner is done by me, but he'll wrap it up if I'm working and trying to finish something up.

I have also been asked about pictures of our home since we moved here (in March), but I have not had the time to take them. Maybe I will do that tomorrow.  For now, I'm gonna go downstairs and fold some more laundry, eat dinner, and possibly come back upstairs and do more work (since Jeffery will be going to bed soon, I'm sure), or just veg on the computer, since I don't seem to do much of that anymore  hahaha!

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