Yes, well, carry on, then.
Every morning around nine o’clock, I finish my breakfast smoothie and call the girls to join me in the living room. “Time to start our day,” I say, although really the day’s been chugging along for hours already—I’m up around six, joined early by sleepy boys; at 7:45 I walk Wonderboy around the corner to school, and then Scott and I take a long morning walk; around 8:30 Scott whips up the smoothies and I sit down to sip mine while catching up on blogs. “Start our day” means, during high tide, “start the high-tidish part of the day with some Spanish or something.”
So just now, as always, I announce it’s time to start our day. As I say this, I’m carrying some dishtowels through the house to the laundry pile. I pass through Jane’s room (there’s a hallway right through it): she looks at me quizzically over the top of her laptop; she’s in the middle of a PSAT practice test online.
I poke my head into the room shared by the other three girls, ready to nudge Rose. She’s perched at the table beside Rilla, making a doll. Handstitching two felt doll forms from a kit I’ve had on the shelf for, I dunno, four or five years? Rilla, all smiles, watching her progress, thinking up names. (She’s leaning toward Susie K.)
In the living room, Beanie is deep in the final Harry Potter book: her first time reading it. We take series-finishing very seriously around here: no way I’m interrupting that business.
Huck is playing a Sesame Street game on the patio-room computer.
Scott’s hard at work on something superheroish in his office, aka the boys’ bedroom.
Um, yeah, I guess this day is already well underway.
Penny says:
awesome 🙂
On October 6, 2011 at 9:00 am
Phoebe says:
That happens here too. I am very reluctant to interrupt 3 children at Minecraft rebuilding a medieval castle, two little girls reading books to one another, and one child making title sequences for his movie in Windows Movie Maker.
On October 6, 2011 at 9:32 am
MelanieB says:
I love this picture of your day!
On October 6, 2011 at 10:14 am
Melissa Wiley says:
Melanie, I keep meaning to tell you—I’ve resumed daily-notes blogging of the sort I used to do at Bonny Glen Up Close. Typepad got me grumpy so I’ve shifted to Blogger for that, for now…
I’m sure I’ll be inconsistent in posting there; I always have been with the daily notes. But I like the record of what we were into, even if it’s spotty.
unschoolish.blogspot.com
On October 6, 2011 at 10:40 am
Hannah @ Lovely Woods says:
I was just saying to the kids today, “How is it that when I want you to come do lessons, you have all kinds of other ideas, projects, and creative endeavors, but when I want to get something done of my own, you suddenly need to be right where I am?”
Maybe not the nicest thing to say, but it certainly is an observable phenomenon. There are times when I think offering kids structure is just a good way of giving them something to push off against.
On October 7, 2011 at 5:46 pm