Mormons and Dia De Los Muertos

Is it just me or is Halloween just awful these days? It's become so gory and violent. I feel like I can't take my kids into the Halloween sections at the stores because they're too scary. Don't get me wrong, I love dressing up and carving pumpkins. But, last year I discovered Dia de los Muertos, and it is WAY better than Halloween.

Now, I think it's important right now to make one thing very clear. Dia de los Muertos is NOT Mexican Halloween. It is it's own very separate and distinct holiday. I've noticed recently, Dia de los Muertos  decorations being sold as Halloween things, but don't mix the two up. When you're celebrating holidays from other people's cultures, it's important to do so with respect and try to keep in line with the intent of the holiday as much as possible.

Dia de los Muertos is really more like a Memorial Day. It is on November 2, and is for remembering our loved ones who have passed on.

Hmmm, sounds a lot like family history, huh? Like...the hearts of the children turning to the fathers? ;)

To celebrate you're supposed to set out pictures of the loved ones you're thinking about, perhaps even little tokens that remind you of them. A lot of times people will build shrines, I don't think you really need to go that far. They make Pan de Muertos, which is a yummy sweet bread and decorate sugar skulls.

See Dia de los Muertos isn't about death being scary. It's really more of a celebration. So all the skeletons and skulls you see are decorated with bright colors and flowers.

So, what can you do to celebrate this awesome holiday? Well, here's some things we like to do and other things that we'll add in the future a part of our homeschooling.

Make sugar skulls! You can buy molds on Amazon!
Make Pan de Muertos. We like this recipe.
Tell stories of your ancestors or people who have passed. Set out their pictures.
Visit the grave of a loved one.
Watch this fun movie. 
Write a Calaveras Poem about somebody (a silly, sort of epitaph kind of poem. More info here.)
Make some yummy authentic Mexican food!
Do a family history project. Make a family tree. Gather stories and pictures from grandparents. Lay out a family history timeline. Make a book of remembrance.

Read these books.

   


And here's a song we really love to sing.

Cuando el reloj marca la una
los esqueletos salen de su tumba,
tumba, que tumba, que tumba, tumba, tumba.

Cuando el reloj marca las dos
dos esqueletos comen arroz
tumba, que tumba, que tumba, tumba, tumba.

Cuando el reloj marca las tres
tres esqueletos se vuelven al revés
tumba, que tumba, que tumba, tumba, tumba.

Cuando el reloj marca las cuatro
cuatro esqueletos van al teatro
tumba, que tumba, que tumba, tumba, tumba.

Cuando el reloj marca las cinco
cinco esqueletos se pegan un gran brinco
tumba, que tumba, que tumba, tumba, tumba.

Cuando el reloj marca las seis
seis esqueletos juegan ajedrez
tumba, que tumba, que tumba, tumba, tumba.

Cuando el reloj marca las siete
siete esqueletos se montan en cohete
tumba, que tumba, que tumba, tumba, tumba.

Cuando el reloj marca las ocho
ocho esqueletos comen bizcocho
tumba, que tumba, que tumba, tumba, tumba

Cuando el reloj marca las nueve
nueve esqueletos todos se mueven
tumba, que tumba, que tumba, tumba, tumba

Cuando el reloj marca las diez
diez esqueletos se duermen otra vez


Listen to it here! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYyRibaMQoA


Now, Dia de los Muertos is celebrated on November 2, but I like to take a week to build up to it. That way it doesn't get lost in the first day of Christmas music and Halloween burn out. haha You choose!

Mormons and Michaelmas

Several years ago, when I was still in college, I took a Christian History class. Being at BYU, there was definitely an LDS lens to the class. On the first day, the professor got up and asked us about some of the things we were jealous of in other religions. We talked about things other churches did or had that we wished were more a part of our own Mormon culture and worship. It was an interesting and eye opening conversation that first led me to start thinking about how this Mormon thing doesn't all have to look the same and that there are things in every religion that are worthy of incorporation into our own spiritual life.

A few years later I was introduced to Waldorf education. Festivals are very important in Waldorf family life, and while each family gets to choose which festivals they celebrate, the majority of Waldorf resources focus on certain festivals in the Catholic liturgical year. Most notably, Michaelmas, Martinmas, St. Nicolas Day, St. Lucia Day, Advent, Epiphany, and Candlemas. As I learned more about these festival/feast days, I realized that there was a really beautiful yearly rhythm to it and that each festival helped prepare me spiritually for other holidays.

Martinmas is the perfect beginning to Thanksgiving. Advent prepares my heart for Christmas, Candlemas is the perfect reflection on a world shrouded in darkness waiting for the coming light of Easter.

With these thoughts in mind, I wanted to introduce my Mormon friends especially to these festivals and a few others that are special to our family and that I believe incorporate beautifully into the LDS religion and will enhance your spiritual journey through the year.

So let's begin with the first big festival of the school year! MICHAELMAS.

Michaelmas is the celebration of the archangel Michael throwing Lucifer out of heaven before the world began. It is often kind of merged with the legend of St. George who defeated a dragon. So, often the pictures and stories have to do with Michael defeating Lucifer depicted as a dragon. You can read the Catholic version of the story here. As you do so, I hope you'll be able to see how similar it is to our understanding of premortal life. It doesn't take much to tweak the story just a little bit to tell to your children about the war in heaven.

Michaelmas is the perfect time to reflect on the importance of our own free agency. After all, isn't that what the war in heaven was all about? And more importantly, what are we doing with our free agency? Have things crept into our lives and become dragons in need of slaying? Now is the time to fight back and vanquish your pet sins, weaknesses, and addictions. Michael and all the hosts of heaven defeated Lucifer, you can conquer your dragons too.

Ways to celebrate Michaelmas with your family.


Found at http://bobbinsandbrambles.blogspot.com/2010/09/michaelmas-bakingdragon-bread.html (There's a recipe there too!)

Make dragon bread (bread shaped like a dragon.)
Act out the story of Michael throwing Lucifer out of heaven.
Make golden capes and wooden/cardboard swords and shields to battle dragons with.
With your older children, talk about what dragons in your life you would like to conquer.
Read this beautiful book about St. George.


Just so you know, celebrating a festival the "Waldorf" way is not a huge affair. You don't treat it like Christmas or Thanksgiving where you spend all month gearing up for it. You might build up to Michaelmas for a few days while you sand down your swords. But it is really supposed to be a very simple celebration. Tell a story, sing a song, eat a special kind of food, do a craft. That's it. You're done. (And if I'm being honest, we won't be making the swords this year.)

Reflect.

Now much of what you find for some of these Saint's Days (especially Michaelmas) read like prayers to these saints. As Mormons, I know this is a concept most will feel uncomfortable with. But in this series, I'm going to try to provide you with a few poems or songs that you can use. Here's the one I like for Michaelmas.

"Brave Saint Michael is my guide
as free and fearless forth I ride.
With courage like Saint George of old
I dare to fight fierce dragons bold."

November Plans for Second Grade

November is going to be a bit of a mixed up month. We'll spend a week with Thornton Burgess animal stories, a week on St. Martin and Martinmas (a really beautiful festival about helping those in need), another week on Thornton Burgess stories, and then a week for Thanksgiving.

Circle Time

Pledge of Allegiance

You’re a Grand Old Flag

Saint Martin  from Autumn Songs by Jodie Mesler

Over the River and through the Woods

November

The loud winds are calling,

The ripe nuts are falling,

The squirrel now gathers his store.

The bears homeward creeping

Will soon all be sleeping

So snugly till winter is o’er.

Spanish

This month we will be focusing on Peru. November 3rd is the celebration of Cuencan Independence Day.

Here is the outline of the story I'll tell. this is just an outline. Embellish, get into it, but this just helps me remember the words and how we'll learn them. I don't know how to add accents and markings like that when I type, so I apologize in advance.

Ernesto wakes up and says Buenos dias to his animals. Perro, gato, pez. Then he opens the window (abre la ventana) and asks Que tiempo hace hoy? Have children tell the weather in Spanish. Today Ernesto is visiting his friend Daniela. She is from Peru and her family is celebrating Independence Day for their home city of Cuenca. When Ernesto gets to Daniela’s casa, her mama was still in la cocina cooking up a storm. Her padre was in el bano, getting ready, and her hermano was in his dormitorio, reading un libro. Daniela and Ernesto decide to ir a caminar (go on a walk). They walk through the bosque (forest) behind Daniela’s casa. There are many arboles (trees) and their hojas (leaves) are falling to the ground. (Review some color words here. Rojo, anaranjado, marron, Amarillo). While they are walking they see many pajaritos (little birds) and even a buho (owl). So they sing, El Cucu. http://www.mamalisa.com/?t=es&p=1315

When they get back to Daniela’s casa, her mama has just finished making tortitas de Manteca (shortbread cookies.) So Daniela and Ernesto play a hand clapping game.  Tortitas de Manteca. http://www.mamalisa.com/?t=es&p=2082

Before Ernesto leaves he makes sure to say gracias to Daniela and her familia.

Music

Recorder lessons 5 and 6 in Living Music From the Heart volume 2 by Jodie Mesler

Handwork

Jane will be knitting a scarf to give as a gift that uses the pattern k2, p2.

Science

We're learning about Sea Otters this month to go along with our main lesson. I have some books (fiction and nonfiction) and our aquarium has a great otter exhibit that we'll visit.

Spelling

k12reader.com lists for grade 2. Weeks 9-11.

Main Lesson

Week 1 - Two Thornton Burgess stories about Buster Bear and Joe Otter. One day on parts of speech (nouns and verbs).

Week 2 - Story of St. Martin. Retell and summarize with nouns and verbs highlighted, write out a St. Martin verse for practice

Week 3 - More Buster Bear and Joe Otter stories, one day on parts of speech and another verse for writing practice.

Week 4 - Mostly break for Thanksgiving, but hopefully some Math lessons/practice. We'll see.

All Main Lessons are accompanied by an art lesson, either painting, block crayon drawing, or beeswax modeling.

Service

Week 1 - None, because of Halloween on Monday throwing off our groove.

Week 2 - Tie a blanket and give it away.

Week 3 - Donate to the Food Bank

Week 4 - none

On Celebrating Martinmas

During the week of Martinmas, we'll be making these wet felted lanterns. I would also like to have some friends over to make lanterns with tissue paper and mason jars, eat a yummy fall stew, and go on a lantern walk after dark. To do this, you just light your lantern, go outside and walk around your neighborhood and sing songs about fall and the coming winter, darkness and light. This is also probably when we'll tie blankets to give away.

October Plans for Second Grade

In October, we will continue to follow the lesson plans in our Waldorf Essentials curriculum. We also will have lots of fun celebrating Halloween and Dia de los Muertos. We actually prefer Dia de los Meurtos to Halloween these days. Remembering our ancestors and telling stories about them is such a nice change to the usual gore and scariness.

Circle Time

Gathering Verse
Pledge of Allegiance
Yankee Doodle (We're learning a new patriotic/American song each month.)
Five Little Pumpkins
 Five little pumpkins sitting on a gate.
 The first one said, "Oh my it's getting late."
 The second one said, "There are witches in the air."
 The third one said, "But we don't care."
 The fourth one said, "Let's run and run and run."
 The fifth one said, "I'm ready for some fun."
 Ooooh, went the wind and out went the light
and the five little pumpkins rolled out of sight.

Pumpkin Pie (Found in Jodie Mesler's "Autumn Song")

Hallowe'en (Found in "A Journey Through Time in Verse and Rhyme." Just the first verse.)


Spanish

This month we will be focusing on Dia de los Muertos. It is a Mexican holiday. We've already talked a lot about Mexico, but you can probably never know too much about our neighbor to the south. :)

Ernesto the gnome is having a big fiesta with all his amigos in Mexico. Dia de los Muertos is coming and he is having a fiesta at his casa and must get ready. First, Ernesto wakes up and says hola to his animals. Then he opens the window (abre la ventana) and asks, “que tiempo hace hoy?” Have the children tell you the weather in Spanish.

Now Ernesto is getting ready.  “Que hace Ernesto?”

Me estoy bañando  (I am bathing.)

Me estoy secando  (I am drying myself.)

Me estoy poniendo los pantalones. (I’m putting on my pants.)

Me estoy poniendo la camisa…(los calcetines… los zapatos…) (I’m putting on my shirt, socks, shoes, etc.)

Play Mientras que Viene el Lobo.  http://www.mamalisa.com/?t=es&p=3370

Then Ernesto makes caleveras de azucar for his fiesta. Soon his amigos arrive. They are wearing skeleton face paint and big, decorated sombreros. Together they all sing, “esqueletos.”

Sing “Esqueletos.”  My kids love this song!!!  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORsWE4ZyiFw

Our recipe this month will be making and decorating Calaveras de Azucar. Be sure to order your molds early! Have fun celebrating Dia de los Muertos. It is NOT Mexican Halloween, though we allow our celebrations to overlap week wise. Dia de los Muertos is remembering loved ones who have passed on. Displaying their pictures and things they loved. Leaving food offerings on their graves. It is not a fear of death but almost a celebration of it, which is why the skeleton faces are decorated, pretty and smiling. It's not about scary. We love it.

Handwork

We will be practicing mixing knitting and purling by knitting a washcloth that is two rows knit, two rows purled.

Music

Recorder lessons 3 and 4 from Jodie Mesler's "Living Music From the Hear, Vol. 2"

Main Lesson

This month we will focus on fables. Each week we will do a kind act to exemplify one of the lessons from a fable that week. Each story will be accompanied by an art lesson, either painting, drawing, or modeling and then Jane will retell and summarize it the next day in her Main Lesson Book. This month we will begin learning parts of speech too. So in her summaries she will have to write each noun in red and each verb in blue.

I'm not going to name each fable here, they're in the curriculum, but I'll list the act of kindness.

Week 1 - Send a note of encouragement to someone going through a hard time.

Week 2 - Send a thank you note

Week 3 - Send a card to a soldier https://www.operationgratitude.com/writeletters/

Week 4 - Clean out toys and clothes and donate to Good Will. Ask each child to give up something they still enjoy.

Math

Because of how the calendar is working out, there will be a week at the end of September/beginning of October without Main Lessons. We will have math lessons that week and continue to practice math through skip counting, verbal math, and board games.

Science
In honor of Halloween, let's learn about a scary ocean animal. Sharks! Books, maybe this kit. https://www.amazon.com/Discover-Dr-Cool-Shark-Science/dp/B00500EKU6

Spelling

k12reader.com spelling lists 6-9 for grade two

September Plans for Grade 2

I'm so excited about our upcoming school year. All my lesson plans are created using the curriculum found at waldorfessentials.com through the Thinking, Feeling, Willing program plus some other books and resources from around the internet that I'll make note of as we go along. If you have any questions or want to share, feel free!


Circle Time

Gathering Poem

Pledge of Allegiance

Thirty Days Hath September

We’ve ploughed our fields

We’ve sown our seed

We’ve made all neat and gay.

                Then take a bit, and leave a bit

                Away, birds, away.

-A Journey through Time in Verse and Rhyme

Michaelmas Song from Jodie Mesler's "Autumn Songs."

Class One Song from A Journey through Time in Verse and Rhyme

       This is a really fun poem with four or five stanzas about different animals getting ready for autumn. I plan on having the kids memorize it and then put it on as a short play. We'll rehearse it and take turns pretending to be the animals and finding costumes and everything during Circle Time.

Spanish

For Spanish this year we are going to focus on a different Spanish speaking country each month. We'll learn about a holiday there, a game, a song, and make a recipe from that country. This month's country is Puerto Rico. My kids take a weekly Spanish class and do some online Spanish work starting in second grade, but I design these lessons to introduce them to culture and try to build vocabulary even though I don't speak much Spanish myself.

The way I do this is by telling a story every day about Ernesto the gnome. Every day, he wakes up and says 'hola' to his perro, gato, and pez. (Have the kids say hola perro. hola gato. hola pez, along with you.) Then Ernesto opens the window (abre la ventana) and looks outside and says, "Que tiempo hace hoy?" (what is the weather?) Have the children tell you in Spanish what the weather is like outside. (We learned weather terms last year.) Ernesto decides to go visit his friend Gabriela. I won't give you a line by line layout of how this will go. But Gabriela is from Puerto Rico and she has dos hermanitos (two little brothers) who need to go to sleep (dormir). So Gabriela teaches Ernesto a game outside.

Game - Cheki Morena  http://www.mamalisa.com/?t=es&p=3760

Then Gabriela tells Ernesto all about a holiday coming up Grito de Lares. (There's lots of info about this online, do some research and decide how much to tell your kids. But it's basically Puerto Rican independence day.)

Then they sing a fun song.  "Brinca la Tablita." http://www.mamalisa.com/?t=es&p=3217

Have the children learn the following words in Spanish by giving reasons why Gabiela and Ernesto have to sing this song all these different ways and have the kids sing the song these ways.

Yell = grito

Whisper = susurro

Talk = hablar

Sing = canta

Whistle = silbar

Hum = tararear

Recipe: tortilla de gueneitos.  http://www.elboricua.com/Tortilla_de_guineitos.html

Handwork

Learning to purl. Make a dishcloth with just purl stitch.

Music

Lessons 1 and 2 on recorder from Jodie Mesler's "Living Music From the Heart vol. 2"

Main Lesson

This month our Main Lessons will be focusing on Saints Stories.

St. Francis

St. Jerome

St. Christopher

St. George

St. Michael

We are going to try to do a weekly act of service based on the stories of these saints.

Week 1 - St. Francis - make a hummingbird feeder

Week 2 - St. Christopher - clean up a stretch of the local creek

Week 3 - St. George - donate to the women's shelter

Week 4 - St. Michael - make cookies for firefighters

All lessons are accompanied by painting, drawing, or modeling from the story and summarizing in a Main Lesson Book.

Math

We will keep up on our math facts by practicing addition and subtraction on our walks and playing the several math games I purchased this summer.

Science

This year we will focus on marine biology. This month will be fish. I'd like to go to the aquarium, buy a goldfish and observe it, and read books about fish (both fiction and non fiction.)

Spelling

We will again be using the weekly spelling lists from k12reader.com http://www.k12reader.com/second-grade-spelling-words/

December Chalkboard Drawings

Chalkboard Drawings for August

I'm trying to use the container story for my big chalkboard drawings and just do one a week. I'm also trying to hide each week's letters and form drawing in each picture. Above you will see the letter M,V and this week's form which is similar to letter M. Below you sill find lines, curves, and a sort of wave.

Real Life Waldorf Homeschool: What Real Life First Grade Art Looks Like (Also, learn from my mistakes.)

I think it's important to realize that your child will not be turning out these beautiful Main Lesson Books right off the bat and to get a feel for what real best work looks like for children. So with that in mind I've decided to show you what we are doing for our art. And along with showing you my daughter's work, I'm going to take you through my work and my reflections of what went right and what went wrong. Okay, ready? Let's go!

Here are our paintings for the letter M. M is for mountain and that's what we painted. Jane decided she wanted yellow fields at the base of her mountains so it could be like California right now. I had practiced this painting before and decided to get fancy. "Hey, let's shroud our mountains in just a touch of mist and fog. That would be cool, right?" Yeah, I went a little over board on the mist and fog. Next time, one little ring of mist will be plenty and I'll remember that. The other thing I will do differently next time is have Jane wait a little longer for the rest of her painting to dry before adding the red letter over the top of her painting. We did it too early this time and her M sort of spread out.

This is our very first block crayon drawing. It's a garden. Above, you can see the retelling for the container story from that week. I'm giving Jane lines to write with right now because without them she writes everything really huge and we only get a couple words on the page. I made these lines a bit too far apart and she still couldn't quite fit all her words on one page. This morning I made the lines closer together and she fit her whole narration on the page.

A side by side. My garden picture on the left. Jane's on the right. She though the mixing crayons were really cool and kept saying, "This is fun."

This is our painting from last week. The blue sky wasn't wet enough when I had Jane add her red. It was supposed to be a purple dawn. Next time I'll check the wetness of her page. We put the blue on first and then added all the hills and it was just too long inbetween.

This was my picture of hills at dawn. I'm not sure where all those white splotches on the hill came from. I kind of suspect some young picasso's got a hold of a wet paintbrush when I left the table. We now call them sheep.

A Look Inside Our Homeschool Schedule

I have been planning and planning for first grade since January! Jane will be starting Grade 1 and Max begins his first year of Kindy.

Kinergarten in the Waldorf philosophy is very laid back. So Max's schedule will go something like this.

Monday - Circle time, painting, music, and story
Tuesday - Circle time, music
Wednesday - Circle time, music, bread baking, story
Thursday - Circle time, music, story, and craft/recipe
Friday - Service project, homeschool sports and park day

Pretty chill life, right?

Jane's school just stepped it up a notch. This year we begin a foreign language, knitting, narration/writing, lots more art, spelling, recorder and form drawing. It sounds like a lot (and it feels like a lot some days) but I have been slowly adding each of these things in for the last few weeks to work into the rhythm of it, and it's amazing how much I can get done during our anchor points like circle and quiet time.

So, Jane's schedule.

Monday - Circle time, which includes songs and poetry memorization, Spanish lessons, beanbag math/spelling, and jumproping. Then we go straight into recorder practice (right after her recorder I do a quick "music lesson" with Max. He plucks a pentatonic lyre and we learn a new song to sing.) Then the Fairy Tale, Watercolor Painting, and Form Drawing. After lunch we have 15-20 minutes of knitting time while listening to a sparkle story, and then reading (I read a loud and Jane reads aloud).

Tuesday - Circle time, Recorder, Jane Retells the story and we add her narration to our Main Lesson Book. Handwriting. Knitting, Reading

Wednesday - Circle time, Recorder, New Fairy Tale, Block Crayon Drawing, Reading, knitting and Afternoon Science Co-op!

Thursday - Circle time, Recorder, Retell and add to MLB, Reading, knitting, and homeschool classes

Friday - General Free Day, but we try to do the following. Service project, catch up (if needed), homeschool sports and park day, play practice.

I can usually start circle time around 9:30 or 10 and be done by 11:30 or 12. Some days will be longer. Mondays definitely, with the form drawing. Other days will be shorter. Those are days when we'll add in some cooking or projects to go along with our stories.

You may notice there is no math in this lineup. I promise we're teaching it. But Waldorf teaches subjects in blocks. So some weeks, instead of new fairy tales we will have math lessons. All social studies and science/history will be done through homeschool co-ops/classes and our daily read-aloud time.

Phew! We begin on Monday with EVERYTHING!

Our Waldorf Week of May 18

I actually made this felt crown several years ago and didn't think it would last a month. It's still going strong and one of the most used parts of our dress up box! I made it stiff by using cardstock as the liner.

I'm really enjoying the rainbow tulle over our nature table this month. I made the flower baby last week, and the flowers are leftovers from my Mother's Day bouquet.

It's a big week for Toby in our Super Sam stories this week. He finds his family! Of course, I had to illustrate it on the chalkboard. The kids were so excited for Toby to finally get his happy ending. They've been anxiously waiting for it for a while.

Here is Max's painting from Monday. He has become very adept at mixing colors and not just getting a brown sludge. I'm impressed and kind of jealous. I don't think I could do this if I tried. 

The Music of the Gospel Chalkboard Drawing

I summarized the conference talk, "The Music of the Gospel" in Sunday School this week. Here is the chalkboard I drew to accompany. And here is the talk.

Real Life Waldorf: Getting Back on Track

I got off track within the last month. Not too terribly, but at the end of last week I looked around and thought, this is not how I run my house and homeschool. The kids were watching television every day for at least an hour, usually two. We weren't doing circle time or story, or math. We were still practicing reading and plowing through our chapter book. But that was it.

Granted, in the past month I've taught two week-long classes for the educational enrichment center in town. It's fun to do, but it uses up my entire morning and then I'm beat and need a nap in the afternoon, so the TV goes on. And then what about dinner?

Lots and lots of processed or fast food.

And the weather has been so nice that the kids just want to play and play and play, and so I've let chores and school slide. Granted, it's kindergarten and we go year round, so I don't think that is the biggest deal right now. But our rhythm was off, and at the end of last week I could feel it and I knew my kids could too.

I was harried, and my heart wasn't anchored in slow and peaceful, mindful and intentional, like I wanted to be.

It was time to get back on track. We had a busy weekend and by the end of it, I was itching to slide back into our rhythm.

I think that's the nice thing about having a good rhythm. Once it's really extablished, even if life gets crazy and you get off of it for a week, or two, or six, once you decide to go back to it, it's right there just waiting for you. It's comfortable and goes on easy...with a little help.

Yes, getting back to your old rhythm is kind of like riding a bike, but there are a few things you need to do to grease the gears.

1 - Get Your Husband On Board. Rob has a rotating schedule. When he's on early shift, things run smoothly. But when he's on late shift...things seem to deteriorate. We sleep in, take longer to do chores, don't play outside. It just throws things off. So Sunday night I sat down with him and said, "I can't have this happen every two weeks. I need your help to stay on rhythm."

Rob, bless his heart, has seen the difference it makes in our kids and in me, too. So he said, "What can I do?" I then wrote out a list. I wrote our morning rhythm, I wrote each of the kids chores, I wrote the chores I try to do every morning, and then I wrote out additional activities that might not be a daily thing, but would be helpful. That list has been a wonderful visual for Rob to see how he can help. I don't know what your husband is like, but I have a husband who wants to help, but doesn't always have the clearest vision of how to do so. Now he can automatically see what I need. This has helped this week run much more smoothly.

2 - Go Screen-Free. Has your rhythm gotten off? Have you fallen off that free-play, Waldorf wagon? The next best thing you can do to climb back on is to turn off the TV, and really cut back on your own phone time. It may be hard at first, with some whining. But I let my kids know all weekend that there would be no TV this week, and they've done well. Jane actually said, "Oh, good," when I told her, which I found enlightening. I think TV is easy, but not always enjoyable. You know how after watching too much of it, you feel 'blah?' I think it was doing the same thing to my sweet girl. With all that extra time you can read, play outside, attend to lessons, craft, bake bread, etc.

3 - Get outside. Getting outside is definitely the next biggest thing to getting back on track. It helps work off excess energy, makes you feel happier, gets the kids playing, and it keeps your house cleaner because...they're outside! Take a nature journal out and count it as school. Read outside. Do circle time outside. It's May. Everyone wants to be outside right now. Go with that flow. That's part of the natural rhythm of the year. Your expanding out with the seasons. Your kids feel it. You can do this and keep your rhythm, just move your rhythm outside. It's far better than fighting the crankies inside. Today, Jane ran in and said, "Mom I saw a bird and a butterfly and now I know what I want to do. I just want to watch the bugs and birds."

4 - Cut yourself (and your kids) some slack. But not too much. We've been getting back on track but that doesn't mean it has all been smooth sailing. Jane cried for quite a while today when I said she had to play outside for an hour. Tommy broke one of the wheels on the brand new wooden cars I got to replace the old metal ones, making me second guess if I'd made a wise decision. There were plenty of squabbles. Tommy is in a growth spurt and extra tired and all he wants to do is read the same book (sometimes just one page) over and over and over and over. Does this throw off my rhythm? Only if I let it. I can cuddle with Tom and still eventually get done what I need to. Remember, a rhythm is not a regimen. Don't fret over the tears, or the detox, or the roadblocks. Just reach into that peace surrounding your heart and push through. You know what your family needs to thrive, don't let it get pushed aside out of fear or disappointment that not everything is perfect. But also don't rationalize yourself out of doing what you need to do to feel good about your work.

5 - Wake up Early - This is probably actually the number one thing, but oh well. The most important thing to getting back on track with your rhythm, your home, your homeschool, is taking control of where your heart is. It's the anchor of your home and family. Wake up early and get yourself into a place that is good with God and the world. Do what you need to feel connected, at peace, and alive. You can not be a good Mom if you don't feel like a good/real person. For me, I've been reading my scriptures AND Anne of Green Gables (gosh I love Anne.)

You CAN  do it. Forgive yourself and get back on that wagon, Mama!

Watercolor Painting: Letter W - The Fisherman and his Wife

Elijah and the Still, Small Voice Chalkboard Drawing

I did this drawing for my Sunday School class on reverence. Got was not in the wind, or the earthquake, or the fire. But then a still, small voice. I need to work on flames apparently.