Something that's working:
Abbie over at M is for Mama shared a fantastic tip that is helping peace to reign in our home. She instituted 7:30 nightly clean-ups that involve everyone. I've always done a nightly clean-up, but like Abbie, I'd fallen into the trap of believing that it was all on me, with only a smattering of Blossom help. I'd be grouchy every night, discouraged at how hard we'd worked all day and how I couldn't get it all done to start again in the morning. Yep, we make big messes here, but we've got lots of minions to help clean up. Every night. At 7:30. And they lived happily ever after. Plus, I've taken it a step further. If we happen to be busy at 7:30 pm, I schedule the alarm for an appropriate time to clean up before we all hit the hay for the night. #itworks and #itsabeautifulthing
Something that's hard:
Homeschooling is hard. By that, I mean that it takes a lot of steady, gritty, sweaty, hard plodding to make good progress. Right now, one of my Blossoms just really would rather daydream instead of work. What should take her til 1:30 pm in the afternoon, has become an all day process. We're doing mama reminders. We've done 10 minute fresh air breaks. We rearranged the school room to help keep a busy little sister not quite always in the line of sight, but basically, we're just plowing through. At some point, you gotta learn that the quickest way to get schoolwork done, is to do it. It isn't always fun, but not everything in life is fun. I came through this stage successfully, as did some of my other Blossoms, so I'm optimistic that we'll weather it well.
Something exciting:
Blossom3 and I have a mommy date at the ballet coming up. I'm super excited to see Sleeping Beauty with her. Based on how well Swan Lake and Cinderella went over, this should pan out to be a delightful and inspiring evening.
Something lovely:
I'm totally digging the scarlet carnations given to us after a friend's wedding. It's so pleasant to see the splash of vivid color they bring to the dining room table and kitchen island.
Something funny:
At previously mentioned wedding, the Blossoms were given peacock feathers. This morning I arrived in the school room to discover quite the calligraphy in progress. They'd soaked markers in water to detract the "ink" and then used said "ink" to dip their quills into. I couldn't really argue with the fact that peacock quills have gotta be the "glammest" writing instrument ever.
Well, friends, thanks for sitting down to have a "cuppa" with me. Have a terrific weekend.
Dominique
