Organizing the Homeschool Life
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
159.09827
Summary
Grace Peters shares how she got started in homeschooling and why she decided to homeschool her kids. She also talks about the challenges she faced when she first started and how she dealt with them. Grace is a wife and homeschool mom to four kids and a grandmother to two grandkids.
Transcript
00:00:00.000
Hello, good morning. Nice to see you here. My name is Doris Livingstone. I'm the homeschool
00:00:10.340
lead at Action for Canada. And I thought it'd be kind of fun today if you could write in
00:00:16.680
the chat how long you've been homeschooling. And if you're a grandparent and you're listening
00:00:26.560
in, maybe write down who you know in your life, that is how long they've been homeschooling.
00:00:33.620
And it's just fun to see that. You can even write down where you're from. It's always fun
00:00:38.440
to know where you're from, what part of Canada. Okay. Welcome again, everybody. And we now
00:00:47.440
have a guest here, Grace Peters. She's going to help us organize the homeschool life. And
00:00:55.480
many of you have started already. And you're trying to figure out how do I fit everything
00:01:00.340
in? There's a lot going on. And sometimes it's just a matter of getting food on the table for
00:01:07.200
supper. I remember having that five o'clock panic attack. And I would go in my deep freeze
00:01:12.460
and I pull out this big roast that was frozen. I went too late. So I would take it out for
00:01:20.640
the next day. And there's just little things like that, that kind of overwhelm us. And so
00:01:26.160
Grace is going to help us. And she's from Rhythms of Grace Homeschool Life. She's put together
00:01:31.640
a home management resource called the Simplified Homeschool Life Bundle, an organizational toolkit
00:01:38.040
that will help you along the way so you can enjoy the homeschooling weeks and years ahead.
00:01:42.840
We're going to cover school routines, daily and weekly meal plans, daily habits, cleaning lists,
00:01:50.560
printables for moms and for kids. And maybe if we have time, some morning baskets, which are always
00:01:56.720
fun to hear about. So Grace will also share her homeschooling experience. And we want to welcome
00:02:03.740
you, Grace Peters. Tell us how you got started in homeschooling. Why and how long you've been doing
00:02:09.440
that for? Sure. Thank you, Doris. Yeah. So my name is Grace Peters and I am a wife and homeschool mom to
00:02:17.180
four. Although I only have three homeschooling now, our oldest, she graduated in 2023. And so now I have
00:02:25.660
a 12th grader, a 10th grader and a sixth grader. And homeschooling was never our intention. I had grown
00:02:34.580
up homeschooling and I really loved it, but it was never something that we planned to do. And so the
00:02:42.140
night that we were going to enroll our oldest in kindergarten, we had to line up super early to be
00:02:49.000
able to get her into that school. I think it was like February or something that my husband was going
00:02:53.360
to go sign her up. And that night I had no peace. I couldn't sleep. Um, I just, I couldn't get
00:03:04.200
comfortable with the idea of putting her in school. And yet that's what everybody was doing. So I felt
00:03:09.840
like something was wrong with me, but really it was something God was putting on my heart and he was
00:03:15.500
encouraging us to homeschool. And so I tossed and turned with the idea for quite a while. Um, probably
00:03:22.180
about three in the morning. I finally said, okay, Lord, if this is what you're calling us to do,
00:03:26.780
I will look into it. And so I woke my husband up and I said, Hey, I think we should homeschool.
00:03:33.400
Um, I can't sleep. God's been putting this on my heart. What do you think? And he said, sure,
00:03:38.280
you know, let's look into it. And so after that I was able to sleep and, um, yeah, we're going on year
00:03:45.500
15 this year and, um, yeah, it's been the best decision we've ever made and it's been hard,
00:03:53.800
definitely hard. Um, there's been times that, um, I wanted to give up. I wanted to pack the kids
00:04:00.020
onto the school bus. Uh, sometimes I wanted to send certain kids to military school because I was
00:04:06.400
having enough. Um, but, um, yeah, God has carried us through and it's been something we've done since
00:04:13.860
the beginning and it's been so, so worth it. Wow. That's awesome. So tell us how you started to
00:04:23.140
think about creating this program and then maybe just go ahead and start, uh, just sharing everything
00:04:29.120
with us. Yeah. Okay. Um, so when I first started our journey, um, I was very overwhelmed. I was very
00:04:37.540
discouraged. I was frustrated. Um, I wanted to be a great wife and a great mom. I wanted to take care
00:04:43.840
of her home. Um, I wanted to do a really good job of homeschooling, but instead I just felt like I was
00:04:49.800
failing. Um, there was some really hard days. Um, but I knew that it was, I had a strong conviction
00:04:57.760
that it was what God called us to. And so I had to either keep going with the way things were or
00:05:05.600
figure out how to make it better, how to, um, not just go through the motions and be, um, frustrated
00:05:15.560
and discouraged and even resentful, but to actually go through the homeschool journey with joy, uh, with
00:05:22.340
grace and with intention. And so, um, I had to, I had to figure out kind of like why I was discouraged,
00:05:32.560
why I was frustrated, why I was overwhelmed. Um, and it was, it was two things. Um, it was my attitude
00:05:39.300
and my mindset. Um, I hadn't fully, um, I guess embraced that this was my life, that homeschooling
00:05:48.860
was my life. I always wanted to be a wife and a mom, but homeschooling was definitely something that,
00:05:53.900
um, took a while for me to make peace with and, um, start enjoying. Um, but it really started
00:06:02.520
with my mindset and my attitude. Um, the next thing I needed to do was figure out like rhythms,
00:06:08.740
routines, habits, plans, um, things that would support our day and support me in my role as a
00:06:17.880
homeschool mom and a homemaker. And, um, yeah, so that's how I got started with creating different
00:06:24.980
products for myself, um, finding tools that worked to help me stay organized in the day to day,
00:06:31.840
whether it was like meals, cleaning, organizing, uh, the school work, like all of it. So I just
00:06:38.260
started creating tools for myself, started sharing them with friends, um, other homeschool moms who
00:06:44.640
really love them. And yeah, so it's just been a process, um, figuring out what works and organizing
00:06:53.280
and planning and coming up with systems and routines and things. So, yeah, so today. Yeah,
00:07:02.940
go ahead and show us all the goods. So in, in talking about, um, like organizing the homeschool life,
00:07:08.820
there is so many things that we can organize for homeschooling. So supplies, curriculum,
00:07:16.120
um, different resources, but we're not actually talking about those things today because it's really
00:07:21.040
hard to have an organized homeschool if the rest of our life is in chaos. And so today we're going to
00:07:27.300
talk a bit about morning routines, school day routines, daily habits, um, simplifying home
00:07:32.220
management and simplifying meals. Now this is just, these are just my opinions. These are just things
00:07:38.400
that have worked for me. Every family is different. Everybody's situation is different. Um, and things
00:07:44.260
have changed for myself with the seasons, depending on like whether I had a newborn or whether,
00:07:49.940
um, you know, my kids were teenagers or, so there's, there's no set, um, system or routine that works for
00:07:58.800
everybody. So as amazing of a journey as homeschooling can be, it can also be very overwhelming,
00:08:07.460
confusing, frustrating. Um, and life as a mom is busy already, even without adding the homeschooling to it.
00:08:15.080
Um, so trying to balance it all is it's a lot. Um, but I have found the, the best way to stay
00:08:23.520
organized in my homeschool life is with good habits. Um, the things that we do daily, the things
00:08:30.500
that we do weekly, um, in our home, in our homeschool personally, like those will affect our life. Um,
00:08:39.080
and so they either, our habits will either move us towards our goals or away from them. So starting
00:08:46.160
with morning routines, um, morning routines are a set of activities that you are going to do every day
00:08:54.060
with the purpose of setting your day up for success. It's like setting the foundation of a home.
00:08:59.700
Um, so tell me if this sounds familiar to anybody, um, especially when your kids are little, um,
00:09:09.100
you know, you wake up, say, you know, 536, whatever time they wake up, your brain is already going with
00:09:14.460
all the things you have to do for the day. Um, kids need to be fed. Baby needs to be fed. Uh, diapers
00:09:21.400
need to be changed, you know, and then before you know it, it's like two in the afternoon and you're
00:09:26.560
still in your pajamas. You're trying to decide, like, do I do the dishes that have been in the
00:09:31.200
sink all day? Do I have a nap? Do I have a shower? Like, what do you choose? Um, I know that was,
00:09:38.820
that was what things were like for me at the beginning. And I did not like personally being
00:09:43.820
in my pajamas till two o'clock in the afternoon. Like, I felt like I hadn't gotten anything done.
00:09:49.540
I felt like I wasn't ready for the day. And, um, so I didn't want to just
00:09:55.460
be surviving each day. I wanted to thrive. I wanted to get through all the things that needed
00:10:01.720
to be done and even have time for myself if possible. And so I got to a point where
00:10:07.180
I didn't want to keep going. I wanted, um, I wanted more, I wanted things to be, to be better.
00:10:16.160
And so, excuse me, I wanted to be, uh, proactive instead of reactive. And so I decided to start
00:10:23.640
creating a morning routine for myself. Sorry, excuse me a second.
00:10:29.800
So I started setting up habits and the habits were, um, it was so that I could be focused,
00:10:38.640
productive, and also operate from a place of peace. Um, I wanted to use my time and energy in a way that
00:10:46.560
would allow me to achieve my goals, um, for myself, for homeschooling, for the home. And so
00:10:53.520
it was, sometimes it was things that had to get done, but it was also things that I wanted to get
00:10:59.860
done. Um, I was able to, with a morning routine, I was able to, um, prior to prioritize a bit of
00:11:07.520
self-care for myself. Um, it provided some structure for our homeschool day, as well as help me to get
00:11:14.720
things done throughout, um, around the house. So, um, I would break my morning routine down into
00:11:22.460
different areas. So for myself, it's, um, like personal. So, um, spiritually and physically,
00:11:27.900
I like having a quiet time in the morning, um, getting some exercise, being able to shower and
00:11:32.900
get ready for the day. Like those are important to me. Um, some people that might not be their morning
00:11:38.300
routine. Maybe they shower in the evening, maybe they exercise with their, their kids in the afternoon,
00:11:42.360
right? Like it's going to look different for everybody. Um, and then as far as, um,
00:11:49.900
for home management, um, having the dishes done so that they weren't piling up all day. So making
00:11:56.820
sure like the dishwasher was unloaded so that dishes could go straight into the dishwasher.
00:12:02.840
Um, and then that also meant having the dishes done at night, making sure they were done in the
00:12:06.980
evening. Um, and then for our school morning routine, um, I, so I hope it's okay if I talk
00:12:15.760
about morning basket here, Doris. Um, so for the morning routine, um, I was finding that there were
00:12:24.360
certain things I wanted to get done with the kids that if I left them to the afternoon, like if
00:12:30.420
everybody went off and did their own individual work, it was really hard to collect everybody and
00:12:35.640
have them all come back. And so originally I thought a morning basket was just like another
00:12:40.740
thing to add to the to-do list. And I already felt like we had enough to do, but when I realized I
00:12:46.380
could use it to take care of those things that I wanted to do as a family, first thing in the
00:12:51.680
morning, it actually really set our, our day up. Well, I felt like it set it up for success because
00:12:56.980
those things were already done and then everybody could go back and do what they needed to do.
00:13:01.860
Um, so our morning basket, very simple. Um, it is, we read the Bible, we do a devotional together.
00:13:09.520
Um, the kids and I all, like they all do history together. So we'll do it at that time and then a
00:13:15.600
read aloud and that's it. Some people will add poetry and different things. Um, something called
00:13:20.840
the morning menu. Um, that's usually for when kids are littler. Um, but that has been helpful in
00:13:28.860
getting our day going. So the kids know like, okay, morning basket, everybody's had breakfast.
00:13:33.160
We do our morning basket and then they go on to their individual work and that way we get those
00:13:39.220
things done. Um, let's see what else. Yeah. So that's a little bit about, um, like our morning
00:13:51.020
routine and how, um, it's good for me. It's good for the kids. It's good for the home. Like it,
00:13:57.320
it kind of covers all those things. Um, yeah. Do you have any questions or anything about that
00:14:04.200
Um, I was just thinking, so, um, as the kids change and grow and develop into another, you
00:14:15.780
know, age of maturity and understanding, um, do you assess what you put in that morning
00:14:22.480
basket like monthly or like per year or like a semester? Cause some, like I was just thinking
00:14:31.360
when they're little, um, like I didn't do morning baskets. That wasn't a thing when my
00:14:37.740
kids were little. I think it's an amazing thing actually. And I would highly recommend
00:14:41.480
it because it gives you that time in the morning to do, um, well, like you said, prepares you
00:14:47.580
and then mom can maybe do the other things that also need to get done at the same time.
00:14:51.520
Um, yeah. So how did you develop that part and change and adapt it?
00:14:59.040
Well, I actually didn't do it when the kids were younger. Like I said, I felt like it was
00:15:05.460
adding another thing. And so I put it off for a really long time. Um, it was just in the last
00:15:11.820
couple of years when we started doing history together. Um, like we were already doing like
00:15:18.340
a devotional and we would read the Bible, but, um, it was when we started doing history together
00:15:23.320
and a read aloud, um, more often that I, I started doing a morning basket. Um, yeah. And I've kept it
00:15:31.680
pretty much the same thing, um, throughout, like at one point I had tried to add poetry and other
00:15:38.440
things. And it just felt like we were just going through the motions because somebody had said we
00:15:42.680
had to. And, um, I mean, there's so many things you could add to it and it's wonderful for that.
00:15:50.720
But I, for me personally, it was just what I felt like we was important to me for us to get done
00:15:55.760
together each day. Um, so yeah, I haven't really had a lot of experience doing it when they were,
00:16:02.240
when they were younger, um, and changing things up. So that's just what's working.
00:16:07.720
And that's a really good point you made because you have to do what works for you and your family.
00:16:12.020
And sometimes you get bombarded, especially when you're learning how to homeschool, you get
00:16:15.720
bombarded by how other people are doing things and that you should too. And maybe it's not even
00:16:21.240
relevant to what you're doing, but you think you have to because that's what others are doing.
00:16:25.700
And so that comes with this time and learning and yeah, everybody figures out how, what the rhythm
00:16:36.700
So now talking about, um, school day routines. Um, so this is going to look different for everyone
00:16:45.860
as well. And it changes from year to year, depending on the age of your kids. It depends on
00:16:51.600
how many kids you have. Um, but I have found that having a school day routine or not even a routine
00:16:58.940
because that seems to be more set, but kind of a rhythm, it helps everybody to know what to expect
00:17:04.780
for the day and for the week. Um, so when I first started homeschooling, um, I actually,
00:17:13.020
I actually didn't make it a priority. I had, I kind of, it was one of those things that I would
00:17:18.980
get to when everything else was done, but everything else was never done. There was always something to
00:17:25.720
do. So I would put it off and put it off. Um, and I realized that I needed to plan for it. I needed
00:17:31.160
to make it a priority and I needed to do it early in the day so that it would actually get done. Um,
00:17:38.300
so, um, once I finally got into a routine with her, each kid that we added, um, to the school,
00:17:48.120
uh, routine, um, that would, we would have to kind of change the rhythm and how things would do,
00:17:55.560
how things would go because I would have to work with the younger kids the most. So, um,
00:18:01.820
I had tried setting up like an hour by hour schedule, but it didn't go well at all. Um,
00:18:08.660
I would have, I would say, okay, we're going to do math today, you know, give us an hour or so,
00:18:12.900
um, to do math. And one kid would be done their work in like 20 minutes. And then another would take
00:18:21.060
hours because they were not focused and just all over the place. And so I realized for us that an
00:18:26.660
hour by hour schedule, a school day routine would not work. Um, and it was really frustrating. So
00:18:33.380
instead for our school routine, I would have like a general start time. Um, like even now it's like,
00:18:40.500
okay, we'll start anywhere from like nine to nine 30. So the kids know, like be ready for nine.
00:18:46.680
Sometimes, you know, we're still finishing up dishes or whatever. So it'll be a little later,
00:18:50.440
but we have a general start time. We have a kind of a general order to the day. Um, so we do a
00:18:58.060
morning basket and then everybody goes on to their individual work and they're allowed to pick
00:19:02.160
kind of whatever they want to start with. Um, so they do their schoolwork and then there's chores
00:19:09.720
and other activities. There's free time throughout the day. So, um, yeah, so that's kind of our,
00:19:17.400
our routine. And so the kids know, um, kind of what's expected of them. Like they don't even have
00:19:24.560
to come to me anymore after school and be like, okay, now what do I do? They know, okay, it's time
00:19:29.720
for chores. Like if I want to go play or go do something, um, I have to get my chores done first.
00:19:36.020
Um, yeah, so that's how kind of our school routine, everybody's going to look different. I know
00:19:42.300
some people like to start later in the day. Um, so it's going to look different for everybody,
00:19:47.700
but having kind of a rhythm, an idea of how the day goes is helpful for everybody to know
00:19:53.880
kind of the expectation and what the day looks like. So, yeah. Any questions or comments about that?
00:20:02.500
Um, not yet. Um, have you got visuals, uh, for the morning routine?
00:20:12.540
Yeah, so I do. Um, you want me to pop that up now?
00:20:19.040
Yeah, go ahead. Yeah. Um, yeah, so these are some of the resources. Okay, let's see.
00:20:26.220
Some of the resources I've created, um, for, um, creating a morning routine. And so this is for mom,
00:20:41.080
for moms. Um, and I've included in here kind of like a rundown about morning routines and what that
00:20:49.160
looks like and how to plan them and, you know, what works for you and what would be helpful for you.
00:20:54.340
Because for some moms, maybe their morning routine, what they really want is just to have
00:20:58.840
a cup of coffee by themselves for 15 minutes before the day starts, you know, um, for other
00:21:04.020
people, maybe they want to exercise and have a quiet time and get ready for the day. Like everybody's
00:21:08.920
going to be different. So this is just kind of some ideas and suggestions. Um, and then, sorry,
00:21:15.400
scrolling quickly here, there's, um, uh, kind of a work worksheet for creating your morning routine
00:21:21.980
to find out like what's important to you. What are your non-negotiables? Um, yeah. And what helps
00:21:28.800
you feel like, you know, you're being proactive instead of reactive to the day and what's to come.
00:21:36.740
Um, so morning routine and schedule. And then there's also, um, self-care checklist, um,
00:21:45.820
daily habits and routines for planning and just keeping track of, and then there's also one for
00:21:52.020
kids. Um, so routine checklist for them to help them stay on track. So that is for the morning routine.
00:22:04.200
And is that, um, printable or how do they find that if they want to, um, either order it or get it from
00:22:20.740
you so they can go through it themselves? Yeah. So that is, um, an ebook with printable pages. Um,
00:22:27.860
it is on, um, it's in my Instagram shop. Um, now that morning bundle is also included in the whole,
00:22:40.160
the simplified home life homes, or sorry, homeschool life bundle as well. So it's individual or
00:22:45.980
included in the bundle. Um, and I can put a link.
00:22:51.940
Um, it's, um, I have it here. Rhythms of grace homeschool life.
00:23:01.080
Yeah. Okay. We'll get that in the, in the chat there. Thank you. And I think that's also your
00:23:06.380
Facebook link, right? Pardon me? Rhythms of grace is also your Facebook site. Yes. Yes. Yeah.
00:23:14.740
Yeah. Now in the bundle, what else is included? Uh, okay. So in the bundle, there is, um, the
00:23:24.320
simplified home management kit toolkit. And so that is like cleaning, organizing, decluttering
00:23:30.120
checklists and lists, um, different printables for managing the home meal planning, shopping lists.
00:23:38.200
And then there's the morning routine bundle, which we just look through. There is also, um, a planner for mom.
00:23:44.740
And that includes like your calendars and your two page weekly spread. And on there, it's got lots of
00:23:52.120
space, whether you want to plan school for the kids in your planner or their own planner. There's also
00:23:58.500
student planners, um, with different cover options and different layout options. Cause I know different
00:24:04.120
people like different layouts for how they plan their lessons. Um, yeah, so that's all included in the
00:24:12.180
bundle. Um, could you show us what the cleaning and, uh, meal plan bundle or part of the bundle looks
00:24:20.900
like? Sure. That'd be great. Then we can see how that works and how you use it. Maybe. Oops.
00:24:30.560
That's a pretty house. Okay. Yeah. We wish right. All of us. Yeah. Um, okay. So that's showing. Okay.
00:24:50.220
Yes. Okay. So the home management toolkit. Um, so this is going to have, sorry, I got to
00:24:57.160
roll through quickly here to get to the pages. Um, okay. So there's a declutter challenge,
00:25:03.460
uh, master declutter checklist, like for every room, there's a weekly planner for organizing,
00:25:11.840
cleaning. You could use it for your day to day, depending on how you want to use it. Uh, living room,
00:25:17.740
dining room, dining room, like all the rooms in the house, a cleaning checklist, um, and then
00:25:23.280
cleaning schedule. So daily, daily tasks, and then a place for you to plan kind of what you're going to
00:25:29.780
do for the week. Can you scroll back and just show us your list of what you had on your, just above
00:25:36.180
that? Okay. So these are, these are the things, um, for home management. These are the things I
00:25:41.500
recommend doing daily just to kind of keep on top of the house, the house work. Um, and then,
00:25:49.420
so that's the daily. And then below is, uh, Monday to Friday, and then the weekend, just different
00:25:56.540
cleaning tasks that you want to do things that you would do weekly, monthly, um, just to plan for
00:26:02.300
them. And then, um, so there's, there's different versions of that. This cleaning schedule is also
00:26:08.780
another, um, version. Like people like to look at them differently. Some people like things
00:26:14.580
vertically, some horizontally, like it just depends. Um, this one is broken down by room. Um,
00:26:21.820
so Mondays it would be bedroom and you can write in what you need to do. Um,
00:26:27.020
and then this one is blank and you can pick what room you do, which day, and then these cards. So I've
00:26:34.500
actually cut these out and laminated them and I give them to my kids so that they know what to
00:26:40.260
clean. So whoever's on bathrooms, they'll take this little, little, uh, printable with them and then
00:26:47.140
they can go through and, um, clean. And then there's a family chore chart or scheduling and delegating.
00:26:57.300
And then there's the weekly meal plan. Uh, let's go back to the chores. So with chores, um,
00:27:08.020
and so when my kids were younger, that grew from like the youngest doing like the dishwasher to,
00:27:13.940
and they were a little older than they were the ones that actually washed the dishes, et cetera.
00:27:18.580
But as they also got older, then we started adding like so-and-so's turn to cut the lawn.
00:27:23.780
Yeah. Um, so-and-so's day to help mommy with weeding. Yeah. Um, is that something that is that
00:27:33.460
shows up? Like we can use your chart that way. Oh yeah. Yeah. Other external chore charts besides
00:27:40.900
cleaning. Yeah. Oh yeah. So yeah. Family chore chart, just add whatever it is that the kids have
00:27:47.380
to do. Um, yeah. Like my boys will take turns with, um, doing the, the yard, the weeding as well. Um,
00:27:55.060
lawn mower, uh, mowing the lawn. So yeah, anything can be added, excuse me, feeding the animals. Um,
00:28:03.620
and then there's a weekly meal plan and then meals with shopping lists. So, I mean,
00:28:10.580
I like to have my meal plan personally in different places. Um, I will use this one on my fridge and
00:28:17.700
then I will write my shopping list and I will take this with me shopping because I like to see when
00:28:23.060
I'm shopping, what meals I'm actually doing that week. Um, and then another shopping list if somebody
00:28:29.780
just wants something simple. So that is the home management, um, home management toolkit.
00:28:38.260
And then this is, uh, so this is part of the, the main planner. This is what I call the mom planner.
00:28:47.860
So everything is undated so it can be used anytime. Um, so this is, this will be the calendar, um,
00:28:55.940
your monthly goals and your notes, and then the days. I'm just trying to find it here. Okay. And so this is
00:29:03.540
what the days look like. So you have a space for weekly goals. Again, the daily habits on the side.
00:29:08.500
Um, I like to have everything in my planner as well as, um, the other pages printed and
00:29:15.700
put up around the house for the kids to see, to know what they're to do. Um, and then weekly
00:29:21.140
cleaning place for meals. Um, some people will use this like for appointments, work stuff, um,
00:29:29.620
schooling, and then, um, at the bottom, like, um, whatever kind of notes you want to put up.
00:29:38.340
Sorry. My screen is lagging here. There we go. And place for meals. So that is, um,
00:29:45.300
the bulk of the home life planner. And then there's also, uh, I don't know if I've pulled up.
00:29:53.300
Are there printables like you could, if you want to print them,
00:29:57.220
hole punch them. If you want to put them in a binder and have it open on your desk or somewhere.
00:30:04.100
Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So you can put them like you can, some people have put them in binders. Uh,
00:30:09.780
some people will coil bind them. Um, just depends. Um, and then there's also,
00:30:16.660
forgot to open that up. There's also, um, student planner,
00:30:20.500
different student planners that come with the bundle. Um,
00:30:45.220
so, yeah, like with the bundle, it's nice. If you have multiple kids, they don't all have to have
00:30:49.620
the same planner. They can all have a different planner. Um, and also there's different layout
00:30:56.980
options for how to plan, plan the week, plan the lessons.
00:31:09.620
Okay. So this is another planner cover and there's, I think I have, oh goodness. I think
00:31:18.980
I want to say four or five different options for the layout. So the student planners, it can be for
00:31:24.340
one student. It can be for multiple students. Um, you can plan vertically, horizontally, like really
00:31:30.740
there's a lot of options there. And then there's different pages in there. Um, so it is undated,
00:31:36.900
but I have included, um, the year at a glance for 24 and 25. Um, yearly plan schedule, blank calendars
00:31:47.220
for the students. Um, there is like unit study printables. There's a weekly study.
00:31:54.260
Schedule. Like there's a, there's a lot, a lot.
00:31:57.060
When you have the, um, boxes there for the students, uh, do you feel what your expectation
00:32:03.940
expectations are for them or can they, as they get older, start creating their own?
00:32:09.140
Yes. Uh, both. So when the kids were younger, I would, so I'll just show you one of the,
00:32:15.300
because I know I remember, I was just thinking back, it's bringing back a lot of memories.
00:32:19.300
It was very helpful to my young children at the time to see on a piece of paper or something.
00:32:26.900
They're going, Oh, I need to do math and I need to finish reading three chapters of this book.
00:32:32.900
And mom wants me to do the dishes today or something. Um, and then later on, I remember
00:32:39.700
working with them saying, these are my long-term goals for you together. Let's break it down.
00:32:45.460
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then they're self-directed at that point.
00:32:50.580
Oh yeah. Yeah. Which is the goal of them working independently. So yeah, for younger,
00:32:57.860
I would write out their, their lesson plans. So like in the side here, I'd say math,
00:33:03.220
these are the pages you're doing or, you know, flashcards or whatever, um, social studies. And so
00:33:08.820
I would write it out for them. Now they know kind of what the requirements are. And so they will write
00:33:13.140
it out themselves. Um, so this is just one option of the academic planner. So some of them are blank
00:33:21.140
across the top. They have boxes. Um, so that if you want to do like kids across the top and subjects on
00:33:27.940
the side or whatever. Um, so there's lots of different options for how to plan, how to plan.
00:33:36.500
The question in the chat is where can we access these templates? Is it on your Instagram page?
00:33:41.380
Yes. Yeah. Um, do you want me to drop the link or I'm typing it in right now so you can keep talking
00:33:49.220
here? Yeah. Rhythms of grace, homeschool life. Yeah. Okay. So it should be in my link, uh, my bio
00:34:03.060
up at the top of the page on Instagram. It will bring it, bring them to, um, where they can find them.
00:34:08.820
Um, okay. Yeah. Um, now I, I know for some people they're, they love, they're highly organized and
00:34:21.140
they're going, Oh, this is great. This is exactly what I've been looking for. Some, for some other
00:34:25.780
people they're, they're not highly organized. Um, but they're looking at this as, wow, what a phenomenal
00:34:33.060
tool. Um, and they can piecemeal what, what they need to add into their life. Right. Oh, absolutely.
00:34:40.100
It's not like you have to follow this for smart kids and your day is going to be amazing.
00:34:46.020
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Led me to actually creating all of this was, um, I was looking for resources for
00:34:55.860
myself to help myself, excuse me, stay organized. I was trying to find a planner. All the planners
00:35:03.940
were, they were very academic focused, which was fine, but I needed to see like the lesson plans
00:35:11.700
and my mom life and everything. Like I wanted every to be able to see it all kind of in one place
00:35:18.660
or at least amongst a couple planners. Um, but everything else was very much, um, lesson plan
00:35:24.820
heavy and I needed something that worked for my whole homeschool mom life. And so that's why I created
00:35:32.180
the planner and then creating the tools. And I tried following other people's, um, like cleaning
00:35:39.860
schedules and routines and they didn't work for me. Um, like they would say, you know, you got to clean
00:35:46.500
bathrooms on Monday. Well, Monday, we weren't home all day. I needed to clean bathrooms on Friday.
00:35:51.220
Right. So I needed something that was flexible, um, and would work with our life. And so in creating
00:35:57.540
the tools there, the whole purpose of having like these tools and resources is to be a help,
00:36:05.220
but if they're not helpful, if they stress somebody out, or if they're like, you know what,
00:36:09.060
I don't actually have to fill out a cleaning plan. I already know what we're doing. Great.
00:36:13.940
Then don't use it. Right. Um, but for somebody who actually wants to plan it and wants to see it,
00:36:20.020
it's really good to have a place to write it down and plan it. And, um, and it's fun. Like
00:36:27.620
I'm one of those people who will write something down after I've done it, just so I can check it off.
00:36:31.380
And, um, so, um, it's nice to have like the checklist and kind of the, uh, the focus,
00:36:41.300
it helps you focus and, um, yeah. Does that answer your question?
00:36:46.420
Yeah. And I was just thinking about that really good feeling of checking something off for me,
00:36:52.020
it's putting a line through it. And, um, for some people might be in check Mark, but, uh,
00:36:57.540
one piece of advice I was, I heard very early on, and it was very helpful for me is I may have this
00:37:05.140
big list of my own. It's usually chores, but it can be actually the child's, um, schedule, school
00:37:13.060
schedule. And so let's, let's just talk about chores. If I didn't get it done, I just roll it
00:37:21.140
into the next day or the next best opportunity day to do it. And by the end of the week, it usually
00:37:28.260
got done. And so it wasn't like I was stressing myself out. Like I didn't get it done on Tuesday
00:37:34.260
and my Wednesdays, there's no, you know, like you just go, no, just roll it over. And eventually you
00:37:39.540
get to write, put that line through. Yeah. Yeah. And, and, and same with, um,
00:37:46.180
the kids when they're learning and if they're stuck on a math problem and they cannot grasp the concept
00:37:53.140
and they need another week, then you, you just gotta like relax. And because comprehension
00:38:04.180
and understanding is far better than like, oh, good. They finished page 23 and I feel good about that,
00:38:14.020
but they didn't remember a thing and you knew that they were struggling and it's so much more
00:38:19.220
important to slow down. And if they don't get to unit two till next month, then you take unit one
00:38:28.580
out of the calendar and you focus on unit one until they've mastered. And then you start again in unit
00:38:36.500
two. And that's kind of the joy of homeschooling is they're learning at their own pace.
00:38:45.060
like get her done this week or get it done this month because there's pressure from around us that,
00:38:51.460
you know, they need to finish mastery is so much more important and it all comes in its own time.
00:38:57.540
And, um, so the tools you've given us are very, very, very helpful in, uh, organizing
00:39:05.060
all the parts of the day. Yeah. Laurie, did you have any insight into any of this or comments you
00:39:14.180
wanted to add? I've just been putting them in the chat here. There's been a few things that, uh,
00:39:20.420
that worked for me and, and what, what you've described as morning baskets and with younger
00:39:25.220
kids, it's sometimes fun to have them, uh, do a craft or something or work with blocks or something
00:39:31.380
while you're reading just to keep their attention. And, uh, and honestly, some of my older kids even
00:39:37.300
have, have done that they would sketch or, or do some kind of a craft so they could have a longer
00:39:42.100
attention span and, uh, and just with history, trying to make it as hands-on as possible. And,
00:39:47.860
and those kinds of things that was probably my, that was my favorite part of homeschooling,
00:39:52.340
honestly, was, was our morning time together. And it, I would, I agree. It really helps solidify
00:39:58.340
our whole day when we could start at a certain time with our routine. So yeah, these are great
00:40:04.580
ideas and I love the, the organization and, uh, and helpful tips. That's great, Grace. Thank you.
00:40:12.660
Uh, Grace, let's talk a little bit about evening routines. Um, yeah. And do you have a printable for
00:40:19.220
that or is it just a concept of helping us along here? So I don't have a printable for that, but it is
00:40:25.860
kind of part of the, um, like the, the daily checklist. So, um, on there I have, uh, like
00:40:34.180
getting the dishes done and the kitchen cleaned up. I like to call it bringing it back down to ground
00:40:38.500
zero. Like it's, it's ready for the next day. Um, yeah. And just like a general house, tidy up,
00:40:45.380
pick up. That's, that's kind of the morning, uh, the evening routine. Um, which if that's done well,
00:40:53.380
it helps the morning routine, right? If the dishes are done the night before and the kitchen's clean.
00:40:57.940
And even if we, you know, if we can get the dishwasher done, then it's ready to go the next
00:41:01.860
morning. So that's, that's kind of our, our evening routine. Okay. Um, let's go back to
00:41:12.020
talking about meals. Cause that's, that was an area of weakness for me. Um, probably because I don't
00:41:18.660
really enjoy cooking. I did it out of necessity. I enjoyed baking. Yeah. So I always made time to
00:41:24.340
bake with the kids, but the cooking was very stressful. Um, and for others, it'll be something
00:41:29.540
else. But, uh, from your experience, do you find, um, that having something written for the week is more
00:41:40.980
helpful or, or have an idea for the week and then kind of mix and match it and like going, well,
00:41:49.220
I think I'm going to swap Tuesday and Thursday because the day has changed and it's hard.
00:41:55.060
Although the meat might still be frozen. Right.
00:41:59.620
Yeah. Yeah. I love having a meal plan because it does help me know what to shop for and know that
00:42:06.900
I need to pull the roast out or I need to pull something out, uh, to thaw. And, um,
00:42:13.780
but with my meal plan, like I've been doing it so long that I have the flexibility. Like I know how
00:42:19.300
to like, I'll look at the fridge and go, Oh, I plan this for Thursday, but those ingredients don't have
00:42:25.700
much time left and it's Monday. So I'm going to use, I'm going to do that meal Thursday's meal
00:42:30.580
on Monday instead. So, um, yeah, like I, this has been a bit of a process for me because when,
00:42:38.260
when I first started meal planning, I made it so complicated. It took me forever to plan.
00:42:43.060
And I thought I had to have a fancy new meal every night. I don't know why I thought that,
00:42:48.500
but I thought that was meal planning. And over the years I have simplified it so much.
00:42:53.540
And so I meal plan every week so that I know what to grocery shop for. But as far as like
00:42:59.700
our breakfast and our lunches, I have seven to 10 ideas that I just rotate. So we eat a lot of the
00:43:05.620
same thing, but it's, it's simple. Um, and I have the ingredients. Like if it's oatmeal, I tend to have
00:43:13.700
a lot of oatmeal on hand because we buy bulk. Um, so I don't have to shop for it every week. Um, so I do
00:43:20.580
that with, um, breakfast and lunch. And the nice thing is too, like there's variety. So if we have,
00:43:26.580
if we know we're having sandwiches every week, once a week, twice a week, I mean, we could have,
00:43:31.700
um, I don't know, we could have like a turkey sandwich or we could have, you know, a grilled
00:43:36.100
cheese or whatever, like there's variety there. So the kids don't get bored of it and they learned
00:43:40.420
early on, they eat what they're given. Um, and, um, yeah, so for me, I'm planning for breakfast
00:43:47.460
lunch. I'll write out, um, seven to 10 ideas and then just rotate through, through them each week,
00:43:53.140
through the month. And then I do the same with dinner, but with a bit more variety. So like 25
00:44:00.100
to 30 meals, um, rotating those through and, um, yeah, so that helps with the meal planning. Um,
00:44:10.180
sometimes I'll even take those meal plans and I'll, because I write it out, I'll just save it
00:44:14.420
for another week. And then if I don't want to plan anything, I'll just pull that out and go,
00:44:18.260
I guess we're doing these meals again. Um, I like to do freezer meals. That's super helpful
00:44:26.020
for, um, the days that are just crazy busy. Um, or I just don't want to cook. It's nice to have free
00:44:32.980
freezer meals on hand. Um, and then as well for meals, um, to simplify things throughout the week,
00:44:39.620
I like to prep things say like Sunday or Monday, we'll make, uh, we'll do like a bunch of hard
00:44:45.620
boiled eggs and we'll chop up a bunch of veggies, like, um, uh, like for a veggie tray so that we can
00:44:51.860
just add those to our lunches or dinners, or just chop them up smaller for salad, but they're already
00:44:57.220
prepped. Um, things like energy bites or granola bars or muffins, like pre-making those. And then
00:45:04.740
pre-making, um, I'll pre-cook like some ground beef or, um, some chicken and just pull it apart
00:45:11.140
and freeze it. Cause it's really quick to just add to a soup or to quesadillas or something. Like
00:45:16.420
I like to make meals as simple as possible. I don't, I like feeding my family well, but I don't
00:45:22.820
want to spend the whole day in the kitchen. So those are some of the things that I do.
00:45:26.580
And how often do you incorporate, how often do you incorporate your, your, one of your kids
00:45:31.060
to work with you and learn? Almost. Do you do that every day? Somebody's on board with you or,
00:45:36.900
or, or you're down for lunch today or something like that? Yeah. They all take turns with lunch
00:45:42.660
and then with dinner. Um, sometimes it'll be a couple of them helping me. Sometimes it'll be one,
00:45:48.100
sometimes all four, like it just depends. Sometimes I don't make dinner and they do. It just depends.
00:45:53.460
So, yeah, I think I recall with the kids as they get older, I want to say from maybe ages,
00:46:02.580
you know, and maybe eight to 15 or so or older, but I would give them like two or three lunch ideas
00:46:10.900
because I'd be tied up helping one of the other kids with their schoolwork. And I'd say, Hey,
00:46:16.260
to the other one, can you get lunch started? This is what's down for today. And they would have had
00:46:21.380
experience learning how already to do it with me prior and now they're on their own. And, um,
00:46:29.460
so it's one of the other tips I recommend is always, um, showing your children how to work,
00:46:37.300
how to do a certain chore or food prep. So that frees mom up to do the more important things or more
00:46:46.020
adult things with the child or whatever is required from the parent and the child can start
00:46:52.340
taking on some of the responsibility of, of, you know, just the basic duties in the home.
00:46:58.020
Yeah. Yeah. Life skills. It's good. Yeah. Life skills. I know it's good. It's forever. Um,
00:47:06.740
and the thing with laundry, so some of you do laundry every day and I started that way. Um,
00:47:14.260
and I got to a point where I went, I feel like I'm doing laundry every day and it was actually driving
00:47:20.580
me crazy. So my Fridays were typically, um, a half day by Friday morning. I, I, we piled,
00:47:28.340
unless there was an emergency laundry load I had to do, but, um, we actually sorted all our,
00:47:36.180
we combined all our laundry Friday mornings and all the darks here and all the lights here and
00:47:41.380
cold water, hot water, whatever. And I taught them how to sort accordingly. And then I would just run
00:47:47.620
the machine all day kind of thing. And, uh, it was not a, my favorite Friday night to be folding,
00:47:53.540
but, um, so we did a half day and then got the laundry started in the morning, finished up whatever
00:48:01.860
was required to get done from the school week. And then by lunch we were wrapped up and then the
00:48:10.100
afternoon they were free to do whatever on their Friday afternoons. And, uh, sometimes we had co-ops
00:48:17.540
on Fridays and when that happened. Um, so let's say we were doing, uh, a six or eight week gymnastics
00:48:25.220
co-op slash we rented the ice rink in the afternoon, um, for the same amount of time. Cause we lived in
00:48:34.100
a small town. We had to commute and drive into this town. Um, and we spent the whole Friday doing a co-op,
00:48:41.780
which was amazing, but here's my laundry. What do I do with my laundry? And then Saturday was like
00:48:46.820
soccer community leagues and all that little league and all that. I went, when am I going to do this
00:48:52.260
laundry? But somehow between Friday and Saturday, I got all the laundry done. And again, so I just
00:49:01.300
want to say, put it out there. Everybody's got their own rhythm on how they handle things. For
00:49:05.620
some, they want to do laundry every day. And for some, you may not want to, and you may want to do it
00:49:10.820
on Tuesdays or whatever your day is. So yeah. Um, let's go back, Grace. So just going to wrap up here
00:49:19.060
shortly, but you have some resources also that people can purchase and can you tell us what they are
00:49:26.900
and how they can get those? Yeah. So what we, what I showed, those are resources, um, that are for sale.
00:49:37.380
So that is, um, the simplified homeschool life bundle. So with that, it's all the resources I showed.
00:49:46.340
Um, so you've got your planners, mom planner, student planners, the home management, the, um,
00:49:54.500
Izzy mom's guide to a morning routine, and there's other things in there. Um,
00:49:59.780
lots of stuff in there. So that's the bundle. And then, um, the home management kit that is separate.
00:50:08.820
You can purchase that separately. You can also purchase the morning routine
00:50:12.900
ebook and printables separate as well. Um, and then I do have, um, I do have planners
00:50:21.940
separate as well. Those are not on Instagram. Those are actually in an Etsy shop, but the best,
00:50:28.420
the best deal is the bundle with all, all the things. So, yeah.
00:50:35.140
Okay. Now if they want to look at your Etsy stuff, is that information available on your,
00:50:40.660
your two other links? You know what? I don't know if I've ever linked them
00:50:46.500
and it's actually a different shop name. So I, I can drop that in the,
00:50:56.180
Okay. And if they follow you on your Instagram and Facebook's,
00:51:02.820
there's a way to communicate with you directly as well. Like,
00:51:05.940
Oh yeah. If anybody has questions or wants to chat. Yeah.
00:51:15.540
Yeah. Fantastic. I love that you don't have to invent the wheel all over again. You can, uh,
00:51:20.260
take part of these resources and make them your own. Yeah. A lot of flexibility on the resources.
00:51:28.260
Okay. So Grace has pop the Etsy.com in the chat there. If you guys want to
00:51:33.700
jot that down or copy and paste. All right. So any closing comments, Grace, anybody have questions
00:51:40.500
they want to put in, you can pop it in the chat or you can just unmute yourself if you want to
00:51:44.980
throw in a question. There's a lot of information. I highly encourage you to go and check out her site
00:51:51.780
sites. Um, it looks like ordering is only on Instagram, but you can also join the Facebook
00:51:57.380
community, correct? Yeah. Okay. Good. And it's basically the same as Instagram. I kind of cross
00:52:06.340
post between the two. So, right. And you have newsletters as well, I guess. Right. Yeah.
00:52:12.660
Yeah. Wonderful. That's great resource. Okay. So no further questions. Um, yeah. Thank you. Do
00:52:21.620
you have any closing comments, Grace? Yeah, definitely that. Um, I think
00:52:27.620
sometimes people will see resources like this and get overwhelmed. And so I just want to say,
00:52:32.740
like, they're tools that are meant to help you. And if they're not helpful, you don't don't feel like
00:52:37.940
you have to use them, right? Like they're there, um, to support you in your, your goals and your
00:52:44.980
journey. Um, I know, like, personally, I had looked at different principles and planners. I'm like,
00:52:51.300
okay, it's more work for me to actually use that. That's not actually going to help me,
00:52:55.540
but I felt like I had to use it because somebody said that's how I would organize my life. No. Um,
00:53:01.860
do, do what works for you. Um, and yeah. Yeah. My, um, sister-in-law has seven kids and she's done
00:53:11.620
homeschooling. They're all adults now and she would use different colors for each child. So it was,
00:53:19.940
it would stick out. So if you're using Grace's planner and if you, you know, I mean, two kids is
00:53:26.820
easy to figure out, but if there's multiple children involved and delegate a, a colored pen
00:53:33.060
for them, that's just another thing to throw in there. That helps at all. I know it helped her a
00:53:38.180
lot. Yeah. All right. Well, we're going to wrap it up. We appreciate everybody signing in. We're going
00:53:45.300
to be back again, September 24th. We are, um, doing live webinars, the second and fourth Tuesday mornings
00:53:53.220
of the month, 10 AM PST. And, uh, if you ever miss a session, you can go to our website under
00:54:01.940
homeschooling revolution and look for the word webinars and you will find all the previous
00:54:08.340
webinars. They're on our website and they're also posted onto rumble. And so they're shareable.
00:54:15.380
They're easy to listen to in the car. If you're doing a bit of a drive, um, yeah,
00:54:21.300
we just want to make them as, as available to everybody as possible.
00:54:26.420
Thank you, everyone. We're going to say goodbye.