Counting Blessings on a Monday

198.  A relatively successful church attendance for the family.
199.  The way Kai takes charge and organizes his day, filling it with fun and productive activities.
200.  Play-fighting with lots of laughter.
201.  The silliness of these boys.
202.  Prayers and advice at women's Bible study.
203.  Hide and go seek at the park.
204.  Writing in my journal consistently again.
205.  Your powerful majestic lightning and thunder.
206.  bookshelves
207.  re-arranging furniture.
209.  benadryl
210.  Walking with my neighbor.
212.  My neighbor starting to homeschool.
214.  Provision
215.  rain, rain and more rain.
217.  Our awesome backyard.
219.  Getting our brakes fixed on the car so quickly.
221.  Christians in Jaco.
222.  Our amazing hermit crabs that are somehow still alive.
223.  Never having to even think about trash or stress about dishes because my husband is so on top of it.
225.  Feeling a flow with homeschool.
226.  Finally, a flexible schedule that Kai likes and sticks to.
227.  Little boys washing dishes.
228.  Koa learning to swim.
229.  Finding a little soccer club for Kai and he loves it.
230.  One-on-one time with Jude.

What a day

Well, today was my first day back to homeschooling since having Koa and our first official day with Sonlight - our new curriculum. I think overall the day was positive but it was not without some tense moments.
This moment was a triumph. Kai was really giving me a hard time about doing any chores because he "just didn't want to." He finally made a good "choice" (I told him he could either do his chore quickly and we can move on to the next activity, or if not we could keep working on chores for the rest of the day). That kind of kicked him into gear and he actually went above and beyond what I asked him to do and was very proud of himself.

I have to include this picture because this is what I'm seeing a lot of these days with Ezzy. Actually taking this picture kind of snapped him out of this fit he was throwing, he was so surprised and then wanted to see his photo. Right now we're working on "Angry Choices." This is something that really worked with Kai at his age. Just knowing that it's ok to be angry - and there are things you can do when you're angry instead of hurting other people. I feel like I am saying the same thing over and over and over to him. I know he's going to get this - I have faith! Poor guy - it's tough to have such strong emotions and not know what to do with them.

Another struggle I have with Kai is writing - he does not like writing at all, especially any type of work with handwriting. I'm not sure what to do because he needs to be writing and he puts up a fight when it comes down to it. So we did this activity today - writing in shaving cream - bubbles and sticks. I think it really helped because a little later Kai sat down and did a whole page of handwriting. So hopefully this will get easier. I hope, I hope.

I love what I'm doing right now, but in those tense moments (for instance when every child is screaming or crying at the same time - last night at bath time this did actually happen) I sometimes seriously think I'm just going to lose it. I get frustrated, I get angry, I get irritated, I yell - and I know that is completely not productive or helpful in any way. Sigh. Luckily my kids have grace with me and we seem to pull through together and keep moving forward. In the end there's always lots of hugs and lots of love. No matter what has happened in the day, I can always count on laying down with Jude at bedtime and without fail he gives me a hug and kiss and says, "I love you so much mommy" over and over again. You can't beat that.

Tomorrow is a new day and a new adventure!

First day on my own

Our family left yesterday and that means it is back to reality for the Freeman family! I realize that if I am going to manage these four on my own I can't do it all. I need these boys to start pitching in and taking some responsibility. I was encouraged by The Successful Homeschool Family Handbook (that I referenced earlier). They place an emphasis on work being as important as academics. The Moore's say that it is good for children's self worth to know that they are an important, valuable and needed family member. One suggestion they make is to never do anything for your kids that they can do themselves. This is harder than it sounds! When dealing with a 6, 4, 2 and newborn a lot of times it is faster, easier and more efficient to just do it myself. And that's really what I've been doing the last 7 years. It's definitely time to change my ways.

I called a "family meeting" (first ever) yesterday evening. I explained to the boys that now that Grandma's gone I'm going to need them to be helpers and take responsibility. That means cleaning up their toys, putting their clothes away and working together to keep our home a nice place. We ended with high fives and enthusiasm. Well, within a half hour I heard Scott from the kids room, "What???!!!" I walked in to see Jude and Ezzy with a pile of side walk chalk. Chalk was mashed in and all over the entire floor and bed. Somehow I don't think they got my message!

This morning - my first day on my own - Kai was very enthusiastic about helping out. He is a kid who thrives on praise and verbal reinforcement. He really loves to make me happy. He did the breakfast dishes, made his bed and straightened his room without even being asked. Wow - off to a great start! It was harder to motivate Ezzy and Jude to put away the cars that they dumped all over the living room. They finally were motivated because they wanted to have music but I wouldn't let them get their instruments out until they cleaned up.

For music we put on Veggie Tales Worship. The boys danced and played instruments through 1/2 the CD. This is a little embarrassing and probably hormonal but as I sat there holding Koa I was tearing up a little bit! I just enjoyed watching them and taking a few minutes to close my eyes and give thanks and praise to God for being with me, loving me and being my friend. I've been having some "baby blues" the last few weeks and it was just a moment of realizing God is with me and it was comforting. Funny how God can reach us in just about any moment.


The rest of the day progressed pretty smoothly. The boys did chalk drawings (on a chalkboard this time) and played while I folded laundry. They put their stacks of clothes away. When they got hungry I didn't let them eat until they put everything away. Then I got out this book that I just got - it's pretty cool. We read a pretty large amount of it about simple machines, different kinds of matter and energy. The other boys drifted off to play but it held Kai's attention very well. Scott surprised me by coming home at 2! So my first day on my own was a short one, thankfully.

So, I was really nervous about this day, but it ended up being good. Overall I feel happy that these boys are home with me. I like having them here and I like spending time with them (even though Jude was tantruming from about 3:00 on - fun times - that's a whole other blog post). I'm feeling pretty optimistic right now. We'll see how we do tomorrow!


p.s. if anyone has suggestions or ideas about getting young children to clean up after themselves, I would love to hear from you!