I envy how they run their lives.
THEY are in control of their lives. They make decisions for their family based on what their family needs. They order the steps of their day based on what their family needs. They have or do things that are best for their family.
Now I don't mean that I never do these things for my family. We do, but I still struggle with making decisions and worrying about what others will do.
***I still struggle with doing what the world indicates is necessary.
***I still struggle with allowing other peoples lifestyle to govern what ours looks like.
***I still struggle with thinking what I choose to do is wrong or bad or not the best judgement.
***I still struggle with choosing a path that is not conducive to what we want for our family.
*** I still struggle with not setting up our day and home to meet the needs of our family.
I plan on giving more examples of this in the coming weeks... but with this being the year of decor, I want to embrace our lifestyle of being a home schooling family. I go back and forth with wanting home schooling to invade EVERY area of our life.. but then thinking it isn't okay for our home to look like we home school. Of course those two thought patterns don't jive. Now maybe if I had a separate room for our schooling stuff I could of course mesh those thought patterns, but our current living situations dictates where our school room is. I have thought of moving the dining area back to the "real supposed to be dining room" area and the school room back into the utility room.
My problems lies with the fact that I don't like how big the "real dining room area is" I don't know how to separate out that space so that the area doesn't feel WASTED. The utility room is small, technically large enough for us to school in, but still small. So should I switch the rooms and just work it out? What meets our needs more? Or just EMBRACE our current situation...and let the school room be the MAIN emphasis.
Well Hubbie decided for me! He says embrace that we are home schoolers and keep as it... he reminded me of why I moved from the utility/ dining room in the first place. He said this is just how it is for now... anyone who comes to our house---KNOWS who we are.
So there you have it.
Ways I am going to embrace this is to decorate the school room in a manner that is whimsy and promotes learning! I want to not be ashamed of the wall of posters -showing what we are learning! I will simply display them proudly! It brings to mind the movie CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN- the new one, not the old one!
I don't want THIS....
Nor do I need THIS..
How about this peaceful, well ordered school room...
I want a bigger white board---- I always run out of room!!!
I know that I want scripture. One of the main verses we have for this year is 'hiding God's Word in our heart, so that we might not sin against Him"--- I cannot expect my children to learn scripture if I do not show it's incredible importance. I need to have God's Word be the focal point of our home- I want it in my decor, but not like this...
more like this
GOSH I AM SO PICKY!!!!
Anhoo I digress.
Embracing our homeschooling lifestyle. It is important to me because it is so much a part of who I feel I am, and who we are as a family. I do want my home to be welcoming to others, I do want my home to be used for other purposes so there must be a balance that I can find....
What are your thoughts???
3 comments:
We, too, have chosen to embrace our homeschooling lifestyle. It may have been a little easier for us as there is no semblance of order in our house anyway, so throwing a timeline up on the breakfast room wall was no big deal. : ) Since you are schooling 3 children, I don't know how you could do anything but have it spilling all over your house. And I don't see a problem with that. Your lessons are constantly evolving, so how you set things up will be as well. Just roll with it.
I understand your struggle! Our dining room is where one child and I do school, and the other child takes over the breakfast counter. Because we use our dining room table every (well, almost every) night for dinner, I must completely clear it off at the end of the school day. It does get old, and I would love to have a separate school room, but right now that is just not possible. (Sigh)
1st of all.....(prepare for lecture)...that peaceful, well-ordered classroom is a WRECK right now. I mean, I closed the door. My blood pressure went up just looking at it. It is a constant struggle. They go in there and work at the table after hours and play and destroy everything. Oh it is so not peaceful or well-ordered right now. (but give me 20-30 minuts and it would be better. Maybe tomorrow.)
Secondly, I LOVE that your homeschool room is right there. Your dining room is way too small to homeschool in. You would be on each other's last nerve. I think you have done a good job of making it not look like a classroom.
Every house I go into, I think, "If we lived here, where would we homeschool?" I love rearranging and decorating in my mind. :) Homeschooling is who we are and everyone knows that. The reason I prefer having a seperate room is I really like using the wall space and husband does NOT want our home looking like a classroom. So...the girls do not get their own room and we have a school room.
I already have plans for when Sweetheart is older, should we still be in this house, and it involves rearranging!!! :)
Oh and I can't wait to see how you decorate!!
Post a Comment