The flexibility of homeschooling offers so many more options than traditional school; however, like a young child at a huge buffet table, too many choices can be quite overwhelming. When we look at all there is to choose from and we can end up short-changing our own plans, our lives, our families and our children if we're not careful. Planning and being selective are the two keys to making sure we are not too busy to give out and take in the things of value.

If you feel like the activities, list of assignments, plus regular running of the household have all begun to cave in on you, you are not alone, but - take heart! There are solutions so we can breath!

Planning may seem time consumptive on the front end, but it will save you your sanity while in the midst of trying to maintain the quality of life your family expects. I don't mean, material quality of life, but the "peace of mind" quality of life. Plan your meals way in advance, if nothing more than dinner. I plan out our week based on grocery store flyers (sales) and can swap any one meal plan for another because I know it's all in the house. Then in the morning I just decide what's for dinner. Lunch is easier taken care of with light meals and leftovers. When I didn't plan meals, I was harried trying to run to the store when we were either out already or busy with school work and disrupting my whole family and we rarely got a decent meal on the table! No peace at all! Life was happening TO us, we were not having a life.

This also applies to school work. Check the science projects supply lists the week before your homeschooler comes to the unit. Put the items on your weekly shopping list and purchase them well in advance. Another option would be to purchase science or project packets that have all inclusive items already prepared for you. This may seem costly at first, but your time and gas spent trying to FIND everything, may actually cost you as much or more! Inevitably, however, you will need a 'common' household item that you just happen to be missing, so it's a good idea to check the list ahead anyway.

The second solution is being selective. There came a time when I had to ask myself if my one daughter needed guitar lessons, choir, tennis AND homeschool support group activities? When they all would fall in the same week, we were going and going far too much to keep our sanity! We came to a realization that our limit was one regular physical activity (sport) and one regular 'lesson' of another type. If the kids wanted to do karate and tennis - they had to choose between the two, at lest for the school year. If they wanted to go on the special support group field trip, they had to forfeit another activity for that week. This kept our family time at the higher priority it deserved and our road time was down to a minimal.

These may not be easy choices for a family to make, especially when in the habit of going all the time and managing the chaos. These ARE, however, worth the effort to bring balance and peace into what can be an overload of choices.

Some people think that homeschooling families have it 'made' because we have such a flexible schedule and no other schedules imposed upon us. The truth is that we can easily eat up our time with being busy and miss the best blessing of all in homeschooling: spending peaceful time with our children.

Blessings to your Family!

Donna Miller

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