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Hi Carrie,

I have been looking over the schedule thread in an attempt to get a workable schedule together for us tonight. I really do believe that your schedule is as close to what would be good for us too. Your schedule is somewhat what we do anyway when we do actually get to doing ANYTHING. I'm going to make a schedule and just do it everyday. period.

So I was curious about your 07/08 schedule since we are doing Bigger. I noticed at 2:05 - 2:35 that you have a rotating focus for each day. Do you mind to share what you used for Poetry, Art Appreciation, & Nature Journal? I would like to incorporate all those things as well. Also if you don't mind I was curious what time your boys woke and went to bed each day? I understand that kind of thing is personal so you don't have to share if you don't want to I am struggling with our whole day and evening schedule and I am quickly figuring out that I need to schedule us from wake to bed each day until we can get a routine going. Way too much free for all for my sanity anymore.

Thanks so much for anything you care to share!

Obviously, I'm not Carrie. I just wanted to let you know YOU ARE NOT ALONE! There has been much 'free for all' in our family lately, due to our move and my parents here visiting, then next week Thanksgiving...can't wait to return the first week of December and get at least a couple of good weeks of school in. Although, I am SO looking forward to the vacation time!!I plan to get a schedule together that is 'wake to bed' also...to see if that helps us all to be more disciplined. Looking forward to the answers Carrie gives you.

Paige,

I'm sorry I didn't get to this thread until now! I did answer your other thread with some suggestions for your 2 year old that may help though! I can emphathize as I have my own two year old running around this year, keeping things interesting for us!

My kiddos must all be up between 8 and 8:15. They eat breakfast at 8:30 and must be dressed, have rooms picked up, beds made, be groomed (teeth, hair, deoderant, etc.), and be downstairs by 9:10. Some of my kiddos are early risers and that is fine, but they must stay in their rooms until breakfast. My early risers love their time alone in the mornings. My oldest son often does all of his getting ready before breakfast. He also is in charge of setting out breakfast for everyone. My second son is NOT a morning person and must be hustled out of bed and prodded to be ready by 9:10!

I am also NOT a morning person, so we have honestly gone to having Nature VAlley Oats and Honey or Peanut Butter breakfast bars, dried fruit, and juice boxes for breakfast. We started this two years ago, and it was a HUGE relief to me! The benefits are that it is easy to clean up, has few to no spills, is able to be eaten quickly, and is even what my hubby's heart surgeon has for his breakfast! My hubby suggested it several years ago, and since I grew up on a farm with hot breakfasts I was taken aback. But, once we made the switch, our days began much more smoothly.

My kiddos head up to bed in the evening around 7:30 or 8:00. They may read in their rooms quietly until 9:00. On Fridays and Saturdays they may read until 9:30 and typically head up to their rooms later than during the week. No toys are allowed to be out during this time. Audio books are o.k.during this time though.

Each evening we have a different child do a "Clean Sweep" of the house to put everything that is out of place away. My husband checks to make sure the clean sweep is done well. This ensures the house is ready for the next day and helps train the kiddos to see things that are out of place. Whichever child is not doing the clean sweep, takes a turn reading to the kindergartner while my hubby is packing orders, and I'm putting the 2 year old to bed.

Blessings,
Carrie

Paige,

I'll link you to a thread that will really help spell out what I do for those CM-style areas you mentioned on my 07/09 schedule. My sister, my3sons, and I have done the same thing in the past. So, just scroll down to read her post on this thread:
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=1733

This thread is more in-depth on the nature journal if you read my response there:
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=527

For poetry, you're really covered through the HOD guides, but if you want to add more, we have used and enjoyed the Poetry for Young People series. We have done many of them, but William Wordsworth, Robert Frost, Rudyard Kipling, and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow were some of our favorites. Robert Louis Stevenson is our all-time favorite, but many of his poems are already included in Preparing, so you may wish to skip that one! You can pull these books up on Amazon if you type in Poetry for Young People. We just had each kiddo choose a poem from the book to read on Fridays. We all cuddled up and followed along with the child as he read it. Then, the next person took a turn. I took a turn too. We placed a small checkmark in the corner of the pages of the poems we'd read, so we knew they'd been chosen already. When we'd read all the poems in the book, we took a few Fridays to read the "About the Author" segment at the beginning of the book. Then, we moved onto the next poet. We usually got through 2 poets a year. We did that for 4 years, until my schedule got too full! Now, I'm VERY thankful for the poetry in the HOD guides, or we'd be missing poetry terribly.

Hope that helps!

Blessings,
Carrie

Carrie,

I can't thank you enough for your transparency as usual. It has really helped me and I have struggled with breakfast for a long time myself. My 2 year old is a huge meat eater so we end up making bacon, sausage, or some other time consuming breakfast. I will try to introduce him to peanut butter breakfast bars and I had not thought of dried fruit either. I PMed you about the breakfast bars too

My older son is an early riser (6 or earlier if I let him) and the boys have a room together so I will have to start setting up something for him to do in the morning. Right now I am barely up at 8 but that has got to stop too. I want to work out and have my quiet time in the mornings and I can't do it if I don't get up around 5:30 I am going to try to keep getting up earlier until I can get up then.

Thanks again!

Paige,

I applaud your efforts to get up earlier. I know how difficult that can be, as I am much more of a night person. I would encourage you to set a realistic goal for the morning. If you know you're not a morning person, then it may be better to set 6:30 or 7 as a wake-up time and then make sure you actually do it every day. I find that goals that are terribly hard for me to do consistently often get pushed to the wayside, and I fall into my old habits again, while goals that are actually attainable with my personality style get done more consistently.

After years of trying to have my act together to start school at 8:10, I finally realized that starting school at 9:10 fit better with my personality and made me less frantic in the morning. It gave me more time to get in my quiet time and more time to spend with the baby and the little ones in the morning before the school day began. Consequently, I was less frazzled and more alert/awake to teach.

Anyway, just some food for thought.

Blessings,
Carrie