Alright friends. Let the Quarantine writing begin!
I am challenging myself to write on my blog each and every day while we are home in Quarantine. My family and I have been ‘safe at home’ on our farm for 4 weeks now, and we are sticking to physical distancing and only going out when truly needed. This means we are almost always home. All of us.
For the past few weeks I have spent a bit too much time on social media. I quickly got sucked into all of the memes and posts talking about how hard this was, how isolating and lonely, how I need to let me kids watch lots of TV and not feel guilty about it, how I need to be in ‘survival mode’ and not be hard on myself.
Well that is all well and fine, but it was not ME that decided these things for me. I was letting all the noise on the internet get into my head and my heart.
It turns out, that doesn’t actually work for me.
I don’t want to – or need to – be in survival mode. Is this situation ideal? Absolutely not! Do we miss our family and friends and our activities? Of course we do. But can we make the best of it? Yes.
I am not writing this so you think everything is all sunny over here. We have had plenty (PLENTY) of trying days. I have felt sad and confined. But I can feel those things and have tough moments and then have other moments when I am feeling pure joy. Like all things I know that my feelings are temporary.
So I am going to set myself AND my family up for success while we are all home together.
First things first, we are turning off the TV. That was announced today and was not met with much rejoicing. In fact, 3/4 of the kids were very, very unimpressed (the baby was reasonable about the decision). Now, we will still be having screen time each day – but back to how it used to be, an hour a day starting at 4 and stopping at dinner. AND limits on the shows we watch too. Goodness some shows portray sassy-ness … and goodness does it turn out my kids like being sassy!
This might seem a bit extreme, but it is what we did prior to March 14th, so really, my kids are used to it.
TV has a way of not bringing out the best in my little people. Or in me. And it takes away all of our time to DO and MAKE!
When we first moved out here to the country almost 6 years ago I had really big dreams. I am the first to admit that I am a huge dreamer. But wow, those dreams were BIG even for me. We were going to grow and make our own everything, we were going to live off the land, homeschool, no TV at all, we were going to live a really slow, really good life.
(This is sweet little Poppy, one of our two babydoll sheep. She was just sheared yesterday)
Well, fast forward 6 years and I feel like we are currently living in fast forward!! Who has time to grow and make anything? I am not really sure how we got away from these roots, but my friends, we are far, far away from them.
I have decided this is a very good time to start fresh. Now I am not going to throw out the TV (mostly because I believe 3/4 of my kids would jump after it), but we are definitely going to slow down.
I thought I would share with you what our days will be looking like in the coming weeks. I know I shared with you both my home with kids schedule and my working from home schedule recently. Today I wanted to share with you what that schedule kind of looks like in action by sharing what our current homeschooling day looks like.
My eldest daughter is in Grade 12 and is independently finishing up her year through e-learning. This takes her about 3 hours a day. She spends her morning doing this and most of the rest of her time right now is spent hanging out with us. Don’t listen to the hype about teenagers, friends – my daughter is AMAZING.
My other children are in Grade 4, Grade 2, and 16 months (or teacher’s helper). Prior to being on Quarantine and having every one home, our learning time was becoming a big challenge! Turns out homeschooling with a toddler is hard.
Since my husband is now working from home he has a bit of flexibility in his work schedule. He spends an hour each morning with Ms. Norah while the boys and I get our ‘school work’ done.
We still just spend 1 hour a day on ‘school work’. I use quotations because my children are learning all day long. This one hour period is more peace of mind for me and my teacher background. I can see the improvement and advancement in their reading, writing, and math and this helps me to feel more at ease.
Here is my plan for our coming weeks:
Wake Up, Quiet Play, Breakfast
Chores, Morning Self-Care Routine
School Work (I am wanting to do this right away for a few reasons. It gets it out of the way so we have a huge expanse ahead of us to learn and play naturally. As well, John can watch Norah so I can work more one-on-one with the boys and then he can get to his work. And I can have a second cup of coffee sitting with the boys while sweet little Norah is busy with Daddy. (Mostly the last one)).
Morning Snack (I am making healthy food a big priority in the coming weeks)
Outside Play, Nature Learning
Lunch
Quiet time (All of my children have an independent rest time each afternoon. They do so many creative things during this time. This lasts about 1 hour, sometimes longer. My goal here is to do my daily blog writing each day!)
Create or Activity Time (I have decided I would like to do a more structured activity with the kids each day. So often in the morning we discover something as we are at play and decide to ‘look into it’ later, but we rarely do. This time would be a great time to follow up on some of our natural questions. This will also be the time we do a neat art project or science experiment. Nothing fancy, but cool and meaningful.)
Play, indoor or out
Screen Time/Dinner Prep
Dinner
Outdoor time, or Quiet Play
Night Routine
Reading
Bed
This is similar to the rhythm we have held previously to Quarantine when I thought I should be moving into some sort of a survival mentality. Turns out, we were doing just fine.
Do you know what I find kind of cool? We tried to order our seeds for our vegetable garden the other week and they were all sold out! We tried to order our yearly chicks, and they were on back order! These things have never happened to us before — all of a sudden John and I are feeling like the cool kids. Ha!
So, I am not exactly sure about this post. There is not a lot of helpful content or creative crafts, or even any kids activities in it – but I am going to publish it anyway. This will be my first official post for my Quarantine series.
I am not going to call it a Quarantine series though … because … well, that sounds super creepy.
I’ll just call it my “Back to my Roots Daily Writing Challenge” … because … well, that sounds super dorky, which is very fitting for me.
Thank you so much for joining me friends! I will write to you again tomorrow!
Will it be about a cute craft we just did?
Or maaybe some sour dough bread?
I will leave you in suspense …. oh the fun you are in for…
pretty please come back ….
xo
Sarah
Julie V. says
Thank you for being so real! And it’s so helpful to see into your day. I often wonder how you get it all done LOL Your emails and blog posts are such a blessing. And even if I do just one of the crafts in a month, I feel accomplished. ?
Sarah says
Awww thank you so much Julie! Now that some of my kids are getting older I find it much easier to get more done in a day – I have lots of helpers now. I am so happy that my blog is helpful to you. Thank you very much for taking the time to tell me. One craft a month is wonderful!
Michele says
This is so great! We have let down our guard on spring time too and I have needed it for sanity sometimes but I am ready to pull back too.
Can you share what curriculum you use for your teaching time?
Sarah says
Hey Michele, Great to hear another Mama is in a similar boat. I find the screen time thing to be such a slippery slope in our home.
Of course I can! We love to use the Oak Meadow Curriculum within our homeschool. This year, knowing we would have a young toddler joining us and having used Oak Meadow for so many years, I felt confident switching things up a little bit and giving myself a little bit of grace. This year we are just using a Math Curriculum (JUMP Math) and Writing Books (currently KUMAN ones) as well as an online program for a solid language arts foundation called Lexia Core 5 (highly recommend). Otherwise, we are holding to many aspects of the Oak Meadow curriculum from previous years naturally throughout our day, but I am not putting pressure on myself to ensure we fully stick to a schedule for other subjects. My intent is to get back to Oak Meadow more fully next year.
How old are your little ones? Do you homeschool?
Michele says
Thanks so much for your response!
My kids are 7 (first grade) and 4. It’s ironic that my husband and I were getting ready to trial run homeschooling over the summer and then we’re thrust into it with the quarantine. My oldest is in public school and my youngest is in a private preschool. Both have been sending weekly lessons and activities. While I am still using the learning activities given by their teachers, I’m currently supplementing with my own created lessons. Being in this current situation has given me the confidence that I can homeschool and that they will love it.
My biggest hangup is trying to figure out which curriculum to use. I am overwhelmed with the abundance of choices and really just don’t know how to pick. Any suggestions for how to decide would be so appreciated.
Sarah says
Oh that is so so exciting Michele! Starting a homeschooling journey is incredible. I am so happy you are liking homeschooling right now, as it will be SO MUCH BETTER once this quarantine is over. We have so many activities out of the house that my kids are missing terribly. And I am very much missing seeing MY friends as well! I believe that homeschooling is such a wonderful gift for my family.
As far as choosing a curriculum, I absolutely understand the trickiness! There are so many wonderful options. A few things you might want to consider:
– you mentioned you have been preparing some of your own material, are you comfortable doing this? You could opt for very simple structure with core skills from workbooks and then prepare all the fun and engaging activities on your own when you discover them, or following your children’s lead.
– a great idea is to narrow down what is MOST important to you in the way of education. Do you want to be outside a lot? Is music/art very important to you? Do you want to do a lot of projects, and learn in a project-based way? Do you want to have a lot of freedom to go places and do things keeping actual school work to a minimum? Once you narrow down what is most important it is much easier to select a curriculum.
You are welcome to email me and we can chat more about this Michele! HowWeeLearn@gmail.com I would love to connect further!
Christie Rains says
I love your wonderful posts and am so excited to see more! I haven’t heard too much about your homesteading and farming and I’d love to hear more about that! And I’m secretly hoping for sourdough bread next….. Thanks for all you do!
Sarah says
Aww, thank you so much Christie! xo