Finally.

Finally.  We live in a house that we own...Or will own after we finish paying the bank.  The kitchen is functional.  The bathrooms are functional.  We have enough clothes to wear as long as I keep washing.  The most important school items are out of boxes.

Finally.  I was wondering if my old drive for plan-making was lost forever, but I found out that it was (mercifully) hidden behind the urgency of moving out of a rent house into a more permanent home.  It would have driven me crazy if it were not hidden.  For the first time ever, I did not even care to make a weekly plan for our school year.  We simply went to Classical Conversations on Tuesdays and practiced the memory work each day while we packed, cleaned, and moved.

Finally.  My planning brain emerged from its hiding place today!

I decided to try a plan based on The Core by Leigh Bortins, which I read this summer and highly recommend to all parents.  Each row is a 30-minute segment.  I will work with Thing2 first and then Thing1 at the start of Math, Language Arts, and Read to Mom.  Thing1 will have to work alone and hold his questions until I am finished with Thing2.  (We will see how that goes.)  If they finish before the segment is over, they can play, get a snack, read, etc.  When the timer buzzes at the end of the segment, we all move on to the next subject.  The idea is that I might have a few minutes at the end of the segments to do a chore or two, and the kids won't be sitting in lessons for a solid two or three hours.  Yes, it will drag school out longer, but my intense two-to-three-hour get-school-done-as-quick-as-we-can plan isn't working for us any more.  It exhausts and overloads us.

Here is a sample from my new plan:

I did not include times on the spreadsheet because I want us to be flexible.  I left out things like lunch and rest time so that we can insert them at whatever time is convenient for the day.  There is no piano on Thursday because we go to lessons on that day.

I realize that this is an experiment, as are all of my plans, which is why I record them.  An experiment is no good unless the purpose, hypothesis, materials, procedure, and conclusion are clearly recorded, right?

I am so thankful to have my planning brain back.  Finally.