First Day Back

Today was our first day back to homeschooling. We’ve been “off routine” for over a month, probably a little longer, between Visits, Holidays, and Nana Stays. So, we were off-and-running today.

Challenge Number One: how to fit my new exercise/fitness/self-care routine into a family routine that includes 4+ hours per day of homeschooling, plus quality time with each child, plus quality time with husband, plus keeping the house from degenerating into a complete pig sty. Oh, and spending some time and energy on my own on-going education, a la TJEd. It helps ENORMOUSLY that my dearest love, Papa Bear, is completely supportive of my self-improvement endeavors (it may help a bit that I’ve become slimmer, more shapely, and more energetic as a result of my exercising, and have been entirely supportive of his own self-improvement endeavors), and is partnering up in arranging work-out time for both he and I on a regular basis. I can’t imagine trying to achieve this virtual overhaul-of-self that I have embarked upon without the full, unconditional, loving support of my dearest. Luv ya, babe!

Two more aspects of this challenge are: the weather has been very cold (for us) for several weeks, with daytime highs in the 30’s and 40’s; and “they” have ripped up “my” walking trail at “my”park, so walking has become an obstacle course. The treadmill at the Y has been providing cardio on the two days I go for strength training, but that leaves me shy of my 3-4 days/week of cardio. I may just have to deal with less cardio for a while, or just get desperate enough to do “aerobics” on the WiiFit.

But, for now, I’ve “balanced” things out by adding Yoga every morning. About 15-20 minutes of “floor work”, followed by a 20-minute Yoga routine I set up on WiiFitPlus. I was pretty discontented with the original WiiFit Yoga set-up, because between each pose you had to wait for the coach to tell you what a good job you did (or not), that you should practice Yoga every day to improve your posture, watch the little ball jiggle around to show you exactly how off balance you were, return to the Yoga menu, and choose the next pose. Apparently, the folks at Wii received enough irate e-mails from folks pointing out, “That’s just NOT how you DO Yoga!”, that they’ve now fixed that. While it’s still not what I would consider a good “Yoga workout”, it does provide enough detailed instruction for beginners, and with Plus provides a seamless routine, that it certainly fits the bill for me and my need to work on postural exercises (my chiropractor will be very pleased).

Challenge Number Two: Setting up a flexible, student-directed “study plan” for each child, incorporating most of the “basics” that the School District and most “civilized” human beings view as being essential, while honoring the goals and objectives articulated by the child. Oh, and finishing up my “assessments” for last quarter, which I’m really not very good at.

Overall, I have to say our first day “back” was pretty successful, mostly because we (meaning, the kids, with my assistance) managed to write and post all of our holiday “thank you” notes to everyone who sent us (meaning, the kids) gifts via parcel post, including Santa. Of course, all of my correspondence-to-be-written-and-sent is still piled up on my writing desk, but at least the kids are up-to-date on theirs. Perhaps next week I can catch up on my own correspondence….