Hey there, friends, how are you? I hope you’re having a great day, whatever is happening right now, as you’re listening to this podcast, maybe you’re working out that is a lot of you work out while you listen to this. Today, I really hope and feel like, I just want you to feel like we’re just chatting, and maybe grab a cup of coffee, if you’re not working out or just, you know, definitely don’t take notes, because this is just hopefully, a little chat between friends here, which I love. A lot of you have said the podcasts in general feels like but truly I went to write out notes when to write out an outline and was like, You know what, I’m just going to chat with my friends and tell them what’s going on. And I’d love to hear it from you. We have talked a lot if you’ve been here for any amount of time on the healthy Catholic moms podcast about different kinds of schedules, morning schedules, what morning routines look like, just general stay at home moms schedules, morning routines, night routines, all this. And I think it’s so helpful to glean inspiration from each other, take some things that you can apply, leave the rest. And I know this is pretty specific.
So if you’re listening to this, your chances are good that you are a homeschool mom, or you are just listening, thinking maybe there are a couple things that can apply. Even though I’m not a homeschool mom, I just want to let you know that this, I obviously do not consider myself any kind of expert in this area at all. I am still very baby homeschooler here where my oldest is only in first grade. So I’m, quote unquote, homeschooling a first grader and a preschooler. But so this lineup and my kids ages is six, almost four, and two, and then I have a baby do in about a month. So that’s what we’re working with. But that’s a lot of you also are in these age ranges, who are homeschooling or not homeschooling, who might be listening, who I’ve heard from or have worked with, that we have, like, you know, oldest kid is eight and under a bunch of littles under that. And I think you know, this can be a sticky time to figure out how the heck you even homeschool, that one even though we’re only talking about one or two kids, because of the nature of the chaos of everybody else. No, I think for me personally that as that has been the most daunting thing to plan. And the most daunting thing to actually like encounter in everyday life is I can come up with the most beautiful, ideal homeschool game plan, and we’re gonna listen to this music and then we’re gonna observe this painting, and then we’re gonna do this and that and hands on science experiments. And then, in reality, you’ve got a two year old running around like a maniac, like emptying the spice cabinet, and you gotta nurse the baby, and this and that. So, you know, it’s like the Instagram meets reality or versus reality. But it’s like our, you know, our ideal homeschool day, versus the reality here.
So again, I’m just sharing that I clearly am not an expert, I am still a very much newbie, I have the absolute joy and privilege of getting to see my sisters do it as well, I have three sisters who are homeschooling into have been homeschooling way longer than I have. So I’m around it a lot. I’ve seen what other people do. And if you’re listening to this episode, too, you might have listened to other homeschool podcasts or are regularly do. And again, just to give yourself ideas. So I just going to share my piece on what we are currently doing, because you’ve asked for it. The only other reason again, so if I could say enough times that I don’t think I know what I’m doing. And that is not why I am doing it. I’ve said on this. It’s literally because it’s been requested several times. And I know it doesn’t apply to everyone in the audience. So I have held back from doing it. But if a couple of you do enjoy it, and you know some things that you hear might also work for you then awesome, but we’ll just see what happens because I just sent a little prayer to the Holy Spirit for started recording is like, help me share, you know what you want me to share in the honest truth, because we’re just flying by the seat of our pants here really in life and also in this episode, because I have no outline.
All right, so our day as a homeschooling family, so I don’t want to get too much in the hours and nitty gritty of times. Because, you know, first of all, just normal privacy reasons. Like obviously, it’s a bunch of my friends listening to this podcast, who are in similar phases of life, but on the off chance that there’s some lunatic listening who wants to know my husband’s work schedule and whatnot. You know, I’m always a little bit leery of that, like my race, but I did the race and like I can’t say where it is because what if a crazy person hears this, so I’ll just be kind of rough and loose on the times and things like that. But I will say that our setup in general is that one week day, we go to co op from classes are 830 to 125 the classes that we go and stay for. So that’s one day a week and then Usually it’s like two Fridays a month. So it’s kind of every other Friday, but not always. We do a st class with my sisters and my mom teaches it. So she teaches all the kids about a saint or like the feast, or liturgical season that we’re in, and it might be an adventure one or whatever. So, in my book, and then Fridays are also field trip days for some of our homeschool groups and things like that. So I just kind of nixed Tuesday, Friday, in my mind, even if it’s not a same class week, it might be a field trip, that might be always scheduled playdates, all that kind of stuff. So in general, we’re working with three other days there, Monday, Wednesday, Thursday that we are homeschooling with. And I just want to say that the schedule really varies because some days, I, you know, we have to do a grocery run, or some days, we have appointments, this was like, all of you and all of your normal lives. And you can relate to this like, right, okay, I have OB appointments in there now and all this stuff. But just a typical day, is what I’m going to kind of share.
And then because I’m just sharing this, let you know, too, that I really now prioritize making those other three days home days, because I was the person and I like to get out with the kids. And I find it easier sometimes in staying at home. Like, yeah, let’s get in the car and go to Trader Joe’s. Yeah, let’s get in the car and go to the library. Yeah, let’s get in the car and whatever. And I have found like, even just homeschooling, like I said, one in kind of a half, really, to kids. And then managing the other the toddler in their room before the baby comes.
I need more time home. And then for my sanity and my peace and whatnot, I need more time home, to get my other stuff done to stay on top of the laundry, to be able to make home cooked meals and things like that, like I just need more home base time. So I’ve really kind of clung more to those three days of yes, we might pop out here and there. Wednesdays, we usually pop out to adoration because we have adoration really close by that’s, you know, just on Wednesdays, or we might go to the we do go to library at least once a month because our library you can take out for a month and that kind of stuff. But I just want to say that that kind of a tip too is I felt way crazier and like disorganized. And that’s kind of just dealt with like home management stuff too, when I was never checking in at home when like I didn’t have enough time at home because then you do come home and you’re like, well I have this to do that to do did where you’re behind in schoolwork, I would first start with you know, what do you need in being home and then playing with that schedule.
So for us again, on a normal home based day, I’m getting up before the kids, ideally, two hours before it’s usually like an hour and a half before to pray to work out. And then to get ready for the day is really more what it’s looked like I used to in sometimes do still kind of quote unquote work in the morning. But it’s been very rare that that’s when I’ll try to record a podcast. Usually, if anything or something like that. What I usually do if anything there workwise is answer some emails. Or if we have a live workout for one of our groups, the chasing greatness group or the eight week challenge, then you know, I’m technically working but that was still my workout. So usually it kind of looks like around five o’clock, wake up I have been prioritizing just in this personal season of my life. And then my third trimester, I’ve been playing this little more with when we get to bed, which we still shoot for I’ve done a lot of things on our daily schedules but my husband I shoot for like around nine o’clock in bed, and if I’m in bed beyond 930 I’m not setting my alarm till 530 And the kids wake up at around seven. So I they’re allowed to come downstairs at seven. So
it’s like I said love rough two hours to an hour and a half and a half by myself. And so that just dictates if I’m going to do any work but kind of the non negotiables are usually lately it’s been a groove of workout first to just get my body going first so I don’t sit and fall asleep when I try to pray. But this goes back and forth sometimes I do just wake up go right to praying for a half hour or so. Reading the Bible like stuff like that is included in there I have a couple books I’ll read it of silent prayer time, that kind of stuff. Either way. There’s prayer and workout whichever order they’re in. And then I like shower get ready like get dressed, throw on some makeup usually most days I like to feel prepared for the day. I like to kind of look at it as a job. So that you know even the little things I was just chatting on my sister’s the other day saying like if I wear slippers throughout the day, I feel more bullish like sluggish and now like frumpy but just like it makes me more lacks. It makes me like trudge around the house more than zip around the house and This is also just a funny thing. This is a whole aside conversation we need to do an episode need to have someone on though, because I’m definitely not qualified in this area, but about like, quote unquote, the idea of like uniform or just clothing. You know how every time maybe this is just me. I don’t think it is, though, that when you’re pregnant or postpartum, and you have a whole, like, outfit crisis, like we’re there, we’re at the point where I don’t know what to wear now, because I’m just really pregnant and like, oh, just do leggings and sweaters for the rest of this time. But then once I’m like, able to wear regular clothes again, like all right, what’s, what are we doing here and my current dilemma is how being barefoot is supposed to be really good for you. Right? It’s grounding your feet. You know, we’re supposedly not made for shoes, all this stuff. And I love to be barefoot in the summer outside in the grass, all that in general and barefoot my house well, I feel though, like so much more productive when I wear shoes in the house. And we don’t like we don’t wear shoes in our house. It’s just if I’m like unloading groceries and I come in and sneakers. And I just keep like bringing stuff in. And then I just finished unloading and sneakers. I’m like, Yeah, let’s go like it just makes me I’m more let’s go attitude. So I’ve been no pun intended, but kicking around the idea of getting like house speakers, but then I get to the whole like, alright, well am I gonna wear athletic clothes everyday because I’ve been trying to up my style game a little bit to have like nicer clothes that I wear that are more put together like linen pants or something that like looks a little bit better than leggings. You know. So then what I get like loafers is how shoes like or slip on. Thinking like Canvas slip on shoes is a bit in between. These are the things I’m debating.
So also email me if you have ideas for this. And then I get back to the like, but it’s supposed to be good for you to be barefoot. So should I be wearing how shoes, I don’t know, but I’d be really productive. So without my house shoes right now, I don’t wear slippers. I just get dressed, get ready for the day, throw on makeup. And here we go. Kids, like I said are down and excited for life. It’s seven o’clock I put out breakfast we do breakfast, that kind of thing. And what’s pretty much from seven to 830 ish is usually a loose breakfast time. They kind of know what they have to do after that have clear their spots, go brush your teeth. Everybody goes upstairs makes their beds tidies the room, I do have checklists for them that I printed off this summer, and laminated and that’s been super helpful. Everybody has one even the two year old, like the three year old material that has pictures so that they can stay on track with it. So I can just be like, alright, kind of start working on your checklist. And then we’re gonna get started soon. So they know, you know what they have to do it. And by now we don’t really need the checklist for those first couple of things have eat breakfast, go make your bed, brush your teeth, tidy the room, whatever. So usually, they start free playing around like 815 Once they’ve done that kind of stuff. And then I’m you know, doing the breakfast dishes, starting laundry or switching laundry, that kind of stuff, I do go help the three year old make his bed and kind of oversee the end of that stuff, change the to help change the two year old or whatever. So I’m obviously not just totally doing my own thing at that point. But then it’s a loose start to morning time as well of I do write it here where if everybody’s gotten in their own little group playing nicely, I might go put offer to play with a toddler first to kind of give him some attention before we get into our day. So he loves playing catch him I just asked him if he wants to play catch with me or do a puzzle with me. Or I start reading a book with him and then sometimes the other to kind of wander over and we’re just starting. Like lately with some reading. This part kind of varies like Gannett or if they’re all just in their own zones playing I might let it go a little longer and get to something on my to do list that was like home oriented that day, like cleaned the bathroom real quick, or something like that pay a bill that I need to pay like I might squeeze something like that in there. I just really feel it out. But usually, then we start typically somewhere in this 830 to 930 time of starting together with what I just call morning time some people call morning basket and symposium, different things, whatever we come together, start our day together with prayer in the Catechism, things like that. And we do a couple of subjects together and the thrilled and trialed are free to do as they please like they start with us. And I’d say like you don’t have to sit here for this oh, I should say actually the very first thing we do is calendar so they’re always there for that because they love that part. A little Velcro take down the day the week put it up delta we sing or a little songs, that kind of thing for days a week months of the year. My six year old is still fine with it and into it and then it’s still helpful for me still kind of getting the flow of some of those things and then the three on trigger love it. So then I tell them like now we go to the couch and they are free to stay or go and usually they’re kind of doing a little bit of Old. The other day, my two year old wandered back over to look at the art book by the time we got to art, but he had wandered away and was playing with Mang tiles during the Catechism part. So also, I’m not going to say obviously all these singular curriculums that we use, but I do use into the deep for kid of cases. I love it. I’ve had Olivia on the podcast before. And I didn’t have it yet, when I had her on, I really love it, we’re doing the unit one, or whatever level one is together. And like my three year old, usually sticks around for a tune is interested. But we do. So we do that book, which incorporates scripture and all these other things. And then we do art, like looking at paintings and things together, not like physically making art. But we look at this art book together, we sometimes do a science reader, or sometimes sing a song or patriotic song or something like that.
Those are just, it’s just a little basket, I keep a morning time stuff. And I just kind of rotate it. So after that, I usually give my six year old some independent work. And then I get right into working with my three year old slash, usually also working with my two year old. So for my first grader, this looks like I give him like handwriting, or English pages, or Math Worksheets, or something like that, that he’s doing his own map skills. Sitting just sitting at the table, and then my three year old is working through it’s really cute. It was pricey. I didn’t get it for my first kid, because it was pricey. Do get a really good habitat schoolhouse. If any of you have been using it, we use that and it’s just so beautiful. I think I was just really motivated by beauty this time around, selecting curriculum and was like, Okay, this is so much more expensive than I should pay for a three year olds curriculum. But here we are, because I love this. So he and I start that together. And then the two year old at this point, usually like me do schoolwork, you know, so then he’s really into using scissors lately. So I will get him some scrap paper and scissors. And we’re all just kind of at the table together. And this is like the bulk of I would say the bulk of the work. But for the six year old, it’s his independent work. So you know, he’s got a lot more coming later. But he’s working through some independent stuff. And I’m checking it as we go. But my attention is mostly with a three year old. This is I think, like story of every homeschool person’s life. But then I’m also doing this and I’m also doing this. And then the two are like I said it fluctuates of, okay, he might be cutting stuff. If he’s, if I know he’s gonna want to do something similar to what the two year old did versus what the three worlds doing I will make him a copy of it or something like yesterday, I previewed the the into the deep catechism. And it’s not a catechism I should say catechesis. I previewed it and saw that they were referencing St. Torres in there. And we had been just a little bit past her feast day as well. So I printed out some coloring sheets of St. Torres, and my three year olds and a heavy loves to color face. So I figured that was something he could do in addition to his schoolwork. And I just printed an extra one for the two year old like pay if you want to do this, do this. And he kind of Bobs in and out of a lot of our stuff is kind of the flow of the day for him. But I just had that option. If I don’t have it, that’s when he’s like yelling me do it about whatever they’re doing. So sometimes I do do specific activities with him as well like last week, we made little apple trees, we just drew them up and use dot stickers for the apples. And then usually that is the name of the game, somebody’s doing something the other one or two want to do it as well, my six year old got in on that too. And he made it a whole thing to our family in there and made up a whole story to go with it, whatever. But it was you know, just from that little thing that I was going to do with the two year old but this is where then when my three worlds kind of wrapped up this we’re playing by ear. A lot of times by now it’s like 1030 ish, and we go outside and take a break like earlier this week. We went on a nature walk I had printed out little scavenger hunt sheets, we went outside for the nature scavenger hunt. We ended up going to the park too because we were already kind of going to pass it and by the time we got home it was just time for lunch and then nap for the little guy. So that means the bulk of my six year olds work that we still didn’t get to like the hands on where he needs me for it. Like sometimes if math lesson or history we do together those kinds of things. That’s again what some people obviously choose your adventure here. Choose Your Own Adventure some people do this is morning time when it’s the more like mom intensive things. It just depends for us but like this was you know a day that we then went outside and did this whole thing and then came back and just had lunch and then when it was time for little guys now we call it quiet time for everybody else. And we were gonna get to his harder subjects. There are more mom intensive subjects. But sometimes we just go outside in our own yard for like half hour or you know, we just play this by ear. It’s a play break for everybody. or if the little guys seem really good tend to still just dig into stuff. This is when I’ll just kind of switch and there’s about 1030 I sometimes will put out a snack, and then I’ll put out like playdough or kinetic sand or painting for them. And I will try to get some more subjects in with my older. My ideal is truly to have everybody’s schoolwork, primarily my first graders, done by naptime, which is usually around one o’clock for my littlest, because selfishly, I want to be able to use nap time. For my other work. Like I like to have an hour or an hour and a half there where I am sometimes making freebies or making the PDFs for our chasing greatness Wino group or something like that like that I love to use as a worktime. I’m not usually recording podcasts or videos there or anything, I usually just try to do that when my husband’s home and evening or a Saturday. But I will try to, you know, if usually, so backing up further, I usually use the first like 20 minutes to take what I call my union break, and I eat my lunch and read my Kindle. And then then I happen to whatever else needs to happen if it’s work for me, or doing you know, this fluctuates a little bit. So my ideal is to have all that work done. I’m just saying that a lot of times, if it’s not getting, if it’s not going to get done without being stressful, or like we want to do something else, like the whole nature rock playground thing the other day, then I do use quiet time to work with my oldest kiddo. While and the three year old is allowed. He’s down with us as well. The only one who’s napping is the little ones. So they have their own little flow here. This is where during quiet time they get a half hour show like Wild Kratts or Super Book or st movie whatever that movie they get 30 minutes of it but still and then they get to do quiet stuff. Now this is where the checklist come into play again, because I have things on my oldest that he needs to still get done like practicing taekwondo practice piano read independently. So it’s better for him to if we get his work done earlier. So then he can use some of this quiet time to do his checklist or an to play because he does get I don’t know all about your kids. School but like, don’t get me in for a really rude awakening. If you saw how little playtime you get if you actually were in school, X amount of hours a day, because if he does not get like, morning time to play and time at quiet time and time at night. It’s like I’ve had no time to play and like most of your days actually playing bear doula. And he’s not in a ton of extracurriculars and stuff. So anyways, that is what that’s usually looking like is bulk of our time done. I really try to get his work done before lunch, then I feel better at naptime. Two are quiet time. Now, after fast for them. So little guy gets put down. I take my little union break, the kids are watching their show. That’s usually I don’t let them start it until I come down from putting the toddler for nap. So that I get the full benefit of their show like that is usually when I’m sitting, having my lunch and on my Kindle. And then after that is what if I do need to work with the oldest I’ll work with him a bit or I’ll dive into work. They sometimes do like I’ll put an audiobook for them. We listen to Boxcar Children, we listen to seeds, live podcasts, those kinds of things. Then after a little guy’s nap, about three 330 I put out a shear plate of you know like fruit, nuts, vegetables, pretzels, that kind of thing. And they’re allowed to kind of graze on that before dinner. This is one I might be prepping dinner. This is also this is like a total I’ll be honest crapshoot time. We’re depends on the day. Like some days we do have take 104 30 So it looks like shear plate getting tangled Oh stuff, get out the door. Like that’s what we’re looking at. I’m quickly making dinner so we can have it for when we get home and take window. Or it looks like as soon as my husband gets home, I’m planning to get out and leave to work like today. That’s exactly what happened is, as soon as my husband got home, the plan was me to be able to sit down and record a bunch of podcasts. So I pre made tackle meat yesterday for today. Like you know, like all of us were just trying to kind of get a little ahead of the game and kind of think through where we are and see what makes the most sense to let it run more smoothly. And always that day, but I guess I’ll just finish out to a little bit of we do obviously try to have dinner been together about five nights a week. As much as we can like today he just asked me because I’m staying home to record sometimes I’ll go out to a coffee shop and work but I knew I needed to record so it’s very gonna come up for dinner and I was like yeah, no, I just need a blog do this. I have have the to do list before the baby comes in. And like Nia Not tonight, and one night, he for sure is not home for dinner for work. So those two nights are out, I guess that’s yeah, that’s about our five nights. But um, so we do try to prioritize it the other nights, even if it is somebody has an extracurricular, we try to still work it in, we do the best we can. And then we also, it’s usually, you know, the nighttime routine has begun then after that have
baths or showers. We don’t do that every single night. But what we do, where we might go back outside again, or go to a park together, while it’s still been nice out, that’s probably changed by the time this comes out. I’m recording this early October. So it’s still we still get that little bit of sunlight. And then we do pray a family rosary before bed, helps them all wine down and then get into bedtime. So that is truly our whole day. Now, like I said in the flow of the week, things differ. One big difference is on Fridays, because I plan to not do school. So we try to get it all done Monday, Wednesday, Thursday. i We call it time Fridays, and I’m sure this is not a new concept. I know it’s not a new concept. But I’m sure many of you have heard about this idea or just read alouds or whatever. And I just get some kind of fun drink or make fun drink with the older to them the six year old and a three year old. And we read some kind of special or fun book we did. Alexander the Great last two weeks took us to different ones to do. I did five chapters each day, you know, I have some ideas for things that I want to do Robin Hood and things like that, that you know, just a little bit more intensive time. So I plan also then for Friday, like I don’t plan on using that quiet time for myself either. It’s like okay, once they get their show and I maybe to do my lunch and Kindle break, then after that we do a little special drink and read aloud time and science experiments because I don’t love science experiments. But they really do. And that is something that I cannot work in like daily, I would take up so much of our time. And you know, but I think is a good thing. And they really do love it and are interested and enjoy it. And I think that’s a more quote unquote fun thing. So it’s something for them. Like they love Fridays like yes, like on Tuesday. They’re like, can we teach on Friday like, just pumped about what you know, we get to do here. So for myself when I was kind of trying to structure day, I things I liked that I heard on other podcasts and other people’s days I liked the idea of starting with a together. So I like that we do that with morning basket time or morning time. I like the idea of just certain anchor points. I also should say because I didn’t really talk much about when I get anything else done like home wise. And I snuck in meals and stuff a little bit there. But I just use the pockets of free playtime, to sneak other things in. Like if they’re having a little bit of free play time before lunch, or say after lunch that actually happened the other day when we did come back from our whole little scavenger hunt and park. Usually then it’s like lunch clean up put the tolerate down. But they all fell into their own little rhythm playing there to individually and I was like you know what, writing this out snuck away to my bedroom folded a bunch of laundry came out like so I’m a huge fan of finding the pockets of time and then we have our own rhythms within our weeks to like Thursday’s they deep clean the room day so in the morning that’s like after breakfast. And when they would just make their beds and get dressed usually they know and I know that like they need to dust the room they need to vacuum the room we I’m washing the sheets that day. So at another like free play time I’m gonna sneak back upstairs and make their beds you know for them I will only make their beds when I have to totally remake them after washing the sheets. So I’m not here to give tips or advice I will just say the things that are working well for us are having some things automated like that where I know Thursday cleaning day. I know Fridays tee time Friday. I know that I need to have several days home and really be home those days I’ve started I haven’t used grocery pickup guys in like over a year and I used it last basically since school started like last month. And not all the time last Saturday I ran out to the store with a big list in the morning because I knew there was a bunch of things that I wanted to be in the store in person for to get. But today on the way home, it was a co op day. Last night I scheduled a Walmart pickup pops and on the way home so that tomorrow we can be home we can take our time to do the things that we want to do to have the outside time to have the music time to you know all these other things that would be stressful to work in. We just need that time at home and so again another thing that’s just working well for us because everybody’s different some people do criminal and like, like Yeah, we do two hours of school that were done. That would not work well for us in general like usually it looks like a lot more breaks For us, so it is spread out longer. Like I said, I would love to be done by one each day, and not take any of it into quiet time. But I just have to weigh, how that’s going and like what that will look like for all of them as the day’s going, because what typically happens is if I were to truck through my six year old kind of has that much attention span, he still needs breaks and things. But my two year old would just be destroying our home if no one paid attention to him for that long, or we’re just trying to plow through. So it’s more peaceful to me to take outside breaks, play breaks, free play breaks, like different things. And then I just tried to see how much like I said a little bit of how stuff in between that making bread, I gotta go, you know, stretch and fold the bread real quick and then come back. And you know, Mike, give him a free play break for that and that kind of thing. So I hope this was helpful. I would love to hear if you want to email me some of what your days look like I would love to do a future episode on sharing just listeners days as homeschools as homeschool moms or just put samples of them in an email, I think that’d be really fun to share. And I hope that you know, this inspired you in some way or there’s you’ve heard something that you might want to take and apply. But I think it can look so different and is so personal to your ages and stages. Like I said, we’re gonna have a baby soon and we’re gonna have to work in nursing breaks look very, very different. I might have to find another homeschool day and there we might have to do schoolwork on Saturday mornings, you know if with just my six year old if it’s easier for me to get some in when my husband’s home. You know, it is what it is. It’s supposed to be flexible. So, all right. I hope you have a great rest of your day. And in the meantime, if there’s anything you want to look up programs we have going on or anything like that, just head over to healthy, epic moms.com And you can always email me, Brittany at healthy Catholic moms.com. All right, talk to you next time.
