Large Family Logistics: The Weekly Schedule

In the spirit of the fantastic book, Large Family Logistics, I'm trying to get our family on a weekly routine.  Or maybe I should say that I'm trying to get myself on a weekly routine.  Lent is always a good time to build new habits, so it seems fitting to embark on this journey now.

Kim Brenneman offers the sage advice that mothers should adopt a rhythm of life not unlike that presented in the Little House on the Prairie books.  Sunday is the Lord's Day, and should be set aside for worship and family.  Her other divisions are Baking Day, Laundry Day, Town/Errands Day, Lawn Day, Office Day, and Cleaning Day.  So, while our normal day-to-day activities like cooking meals, changing diapers, and schooling the kids are maintained, each day has a particular focus.  It gives us a chance to take on one big thing at a time, and I see that as making so much sense as my own family becomes a "large family"!

So, here's my own weekly schedule:

Monday: Baking day
Tuesday: Laundry day
Wednesday: Office Day
Thursday: Errands Day
Friday: Cleaning Day
Saturday: Lawn Day
Sunday: The Lord's Day

Monday: Baking Day

I'm trying to get back into the habit of baking my own bread...from scratch...from flour I grind myself.  Yes.  It is a big job...but it is SO worth the effort!  The health benefits alone would convince me to do my best to make this work, but the taste difference is so amazing!  I always appreciate when effort = results pretty quickly...it's a great motivator!

So, since today is Monday, I got the following things done:

• made a 1/2 gallon of homemade yogurt, which is still setting up as I type
• made a loaf of whole wheat bread and a loaf of cinnamon raisin bread.  We enjoyed half the cinnamon-raisin version as an afternoon snack, and my boys all said that it was the "best bread they'd ever had".  We've come a long way from the long, disgusted faces as they down a slice of fresh-ground wheat bread!  I can't wait to get my huge mixer so that I can make 6 loaves at a time...we go through a loaf in no time flat, and this is a task that ideally I'd do just once a week.
• cooked pinto beans for homemade refried beans.  Boy B will not eat canned refried beans.  I love making bean burritos for Friday nights, and I was so thankful to discover that making my own beans results in a dinner that everyone can (and does) enjoy!  Once again, super nutritious and super easy!  I'm making a huge batch so that I can freeze a bunch.

Doing a happy, happy dance right now.  This is the first week in a really long time that I've been able to do these things!  Several things made it a success, so I'll share those with you here.

First of all, I got up early.  It helped that Baby Girl slept all night (finally, thank God!!!).  Hubby took the older three boys to Mass at 6:10 am and I got up at 6:20.  If I can get up when I have the house to myself (save sleeping Baby Girl and Mr. Energy), then my morning and my whole day just run more smoothly.  I was done with showering and prayers by 7 and then had coffee ready by the time Hubby and the boys got home.

Second, I had a plan.  I knew what I wanted to accomplish today and from experience I know how long each takes.  So I was able to plan my day around the tasks involved in yogurt and bread making.  We got school done as I rotated between the school room and the kitchen.

It really can be done!  You can do the things you really want to do for your family...you just have to DO them!  So...strap into your seats, because tomorrow is Laundry Day!

Blessings,
Shannon

5 Minute Friday: I Feel the Most Loved When...

Okay, so hopefully y'all remember how this game goes...five minutes of unedited thinking on the prompt for the day!  And, by the way, where did this week go?  I can't believe it's Friday again!

It's hard for me to write today, because we had to say farewell to our faithful and beautiful German Shepherd this morning.  But my tears are spent for now...so here goes my attempt!


I feel the most loved when...


I feel most loved when I am needed most.  We've been dealing with early spring sickness here the last few weeks -- coughs and runny noses and little fevers.  As many ways to love and tend as there are tissues in the box...and then some!  And it is amazing how loved you feel when you give all you have to others.  It is wonderful to be needed.


At the same time, I feel the most loved in the littlest acts of kindness and thoughtfulness.  Like when my dear husband offered to take the fussy baby last night so that I could have a couple of minutes to pray before Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament after Mass.  Like when my mom walked her and walked her so that I could get my hair cut yesterday afternoon.  Like when one of my little (and not so little) boys offers to do some small chore or help with the toddler so that I can put out a fire somewhere else.


Finally, I feel most loved in those precious moments of silence during Mass, cradling a sweet, sleeping baby, sunshine streaming through the windows, and it is just God and I in the peace of my heart.  All that I am, and all that I have been given...I am so blessed, and I know that I am loved!

Blessings,
Shannon 

Small Steps: Sacrifices

I am looking forward to Lent this year.  Truly.  What a blessing it is that the Church gives us the cycle of the Liturgical Year, with the beginning of each season like a port of call, where we can clamber aboard our spiritual vessel once more!

As a child growing up, I was in a military family.  As I got older, I started looking at those inevitable moving days as an opportunity to start fresh.  It was a gift -- an uprooting that made growth possible.  Now that I have settled down quite firmly and no longer have the chance to make a clean break and start fresh in a new place, my heart often misses those days.  I have caught myself looking for watershed moments in other places: the changing of the quarters or semesters in our homeschool, and most especially in the turn of the seasons of the Liturgical Year.  Lent, more than any other season, is the chance to uproot the old and stale habits and let new ones bud out and flower.  Fasting becomes a symbol of letting go of all those things that tie us down in the spiritual life.  For me, so often either pregnant or nursing during this season, actual fasting hasn't been much of an option, so I have to look to other sacrifices to fulfill this purpose.

This Lent, I'm once more nourishing another little life, so I must forgo the fast.  But I hope that as I give up the sweet and sugary things from which I too often seek comfort, I will reach instead for true consolation - true sweetness - that fills the soul but not the stomach!  As I give up a little extra sleep to meet the Lord in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, I pray that I will find true rest in His peace and grace.

There are so many things that fell out of our routine with the arrival of our youngest child!  The proverbial wheels came right off the wagon.  As we adjust to the "new normal", I'm taking the start of this Lent as the moment to reassemble the wagon.  Perhaps we don't need wheels any longer.  I'm thinking hover technology with a jet engine might be more appropriate at this point.  But I want to redouble our efforts, especially in our homeschool, to bring back on board some of the things that got jettisoned in order for me to keep my sanity.

Little by little, I must remind myself.  Small steps, but steps upward and onward nonetheless!

Blessings,
Shannon

Five Minute Friday: When I look in the mirror...

I love chances to unlock some creativity, especially these days as I work on editing a manuscript....  I got the idea from Elizabeth Foss's blog, which I totally adore! :)  So, here goes!








When I look in the mirror...

Quick glances.  I see a body changed by vocation, most recently by the gift of a precious baby girl, so welcome in our house of little gentlemen!

I don't smile as often as I should.  I am constantly reminding myself that I am surrounded by joy and laughter, and that I should slow down and drink it in!  I used to practice different smiles as a girl -- trying to work out how to capture an image in words.  That same girl who practiced a confidence she never felt, learning to conceal so many things.

I see a tumble of red hair.  It is so long now that when I cut it next week I will be able to donate it to Locks of Love.  I am so excited to have the chance to give something of myself as we begin the Lenten season!  I think of St. Paul, of discarding the old and putting on Christ Jesus.  As those scissors work through my mane of hair, I pray it will be as a shedding of my old bad habits and a chance to walk, lighter and more free, in the footsteps of my Lord and my God!

I see a woman constantly surprised by love, surprised by joy.  Fearful, yet hopeful.  Anxious and striving to trust.  Trying to give with open hands and heart so that they may be filled to overflowing.

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Okay, that's five! :)  Take the challenge...and have fun!!!!

Blessings,
Shannon

Fall Days

It's been raining here since yesterday, and the weather has finally turned chilly!  I have to admit that it's a welcome change after the long Texas summer - but my boys are sad to see swimming weather fade.

Maybe it's the changing of the seasons, but I've been inspired to change many things around our home, hopefully for the better!  I have a newly awakened sense of curiosity and am avidly reading and contemplating many things, something I haven't felt the urge to do in years.  It's a nice feeling!  I have to smile as I consider, however, that what I am researching and reading and contemplating has nothing to do with the detached and academic pursuits of my earlier years and everything to do with family, education, religion, and wellness.  The seasons of my own life are changing, it seems!

When I realized that I wanted to learn more about homeschooling and the philosophy of education, frugal living and family finances, and herbalism and natural wellness, I realized that the papers flying from my printer would quickly overwhelm the little corner of our home known as Mommy's "office".  With the end of the calendar year in view, I set about creating a binder organization system or household journal.  It allows me to keep track of all our different "irons in the fire" -- all in one place.  I love it!!!  The best part about it is that it is totally customizable and infinitely expandable, exactly what I wanted.

Here's to organization and the start of a new season!

Reflections: The Beginning of a New Year

September is such a wonderful month!  I start pining for fall and the start of a new school year in, oh, probably July.  And I so enjoy shopping for pens and pencils and notebooks that it is almost ridiculous!  Some mothers drink tea or get a massage when they are stressed.  I shop for pens.  I suppose that's the writer in me coming through.

Anyway, we almost threw in the towel on homeschooling last year.  I was convinced that the kids weren't learning anything and that it would be better for them all to be in school.  So we started looking into private schools, but the promise of astronomical, budget-busting tuition was enough to make me return to take a hard look at why I was so unhappy with homeschooling.

After some scrutiny and self-examination, I realized that I wanted a program that was more enjoyable to teach, that was flexible and not overwhelming for the boys, and that had a minimal workbook component.  After a discussion with some friends of ours, they recommended that I look into The Latin-Centered Curriculum by Andrew Campbell.  I borrowed their copy, read it cover to cover, and fell immediately in love.  Here at last was a curriculum designed with me in mind!  The promise of "much, not many" appealed to me, as did the classical philosophy behind the design.  And so, after explaining its many advantages to my husband, I charged ahead.

Not that I was without qualms.  Being without a prepackaged curriculum for the first time made me nervous.  Would I be able to plan my own lessons?  Could I set my own pace?  And the fearful delight of choosing a math program set my motherly heart a-flutter.  I gathered myself together and chose and planned...carefully.

We are now into our second week of the new school year, and I am glowing from the harvest I am beginning to reap!  The boys are actually excited about school for the first time in years!  It is delirium scarcely to be imagined.  More than just their enthusiasm, they are actually learning and retaining what they are learning!  My husband is beside himself with relief and joy.  And I am content. 

There is one thing that I have realized in the last several months, as I have weaned myself from prepared curricula.  Homeschooling requires mother's full attention.  At least, it requires mine.  When I tried to teach my children while my attention was fragmented between this and that side pursuit, I was frustrated and impatient ~ which meant that my children were frustrated and impatient.  Sacrificing six hours of my day (at least) to teach my sweet boys is indeed a sacrifice, but I find such joy in the time I spend with them, watching them learn and grow!  And I find that I have quiet time to myself in the afternoons after all, when I can recharge my own batteries.  It is wonderful in strange and unexpected ways.  An everyday miracle.

God willing, it will be a fabulous year!

Contraception and American Birth Culture

I recently had the privilege to read an amazing article by Penny Simkin called "The Experience of Maternity in a Woman's Life" (Journal of Obstetric, Gynecologic, and Neonatal Nursing, March/April 1996: 247-252). In this article, Simkin looks at the history of women's roles in the United States in order to discover the reasons for our 20th (and now 21st) century American birth culture of highly managed, medical childbirth.

The entire article is fascinating, but her observation that the introduction of birth control and the subsequent divorcing of sex from babies in the 1920s was partly the cause of the change in our birth culture is particularly so. After the introduction of contraception, women felt free to flaunt their sexuality becuase they were "protected" from the sex = babies equation, but, ironically, even as they gained this perceived control over their sexuality, they began handing over their control of the birth process:

Several other trends combined to lead women to relinquish the control they had in childbearing and to foster the medical perception of the human body as a complex machine that is devoid of feeling. The practice of birth control, leading to a steady decline in the birth rate, meant a reduction in women's personal experience, knowledge, and self-confidence in giving birth. Grand multiparas had been important teachers.... But now there were fewer grand multiparas. (249)

The sexual liberation provided by birth control not only affected birth, but also breastfeeding -- artificial formula meant "freedom from child care" (249). Women wanted freedom -- freedom to be out in public when pregnant, freedom from nursing their babies, and freedom from pain in childbirth. When twilight sleep was introduced (a combination of scopolamine and meperdine) and touted as the way to achieve best outcomes for mother and baby, women demanded to be put under to be delivered of their babies.

In the 1960s, the introduction of the Pill and the desire of many women to return to the workforce heightened the problem. Enter the Women's Liberation movement and the birth of feminism. Enter also the degradation of the position of mother and housewife. As Simkin puts it, "No longer could women find fulfillment, respect, and pride in housework and motherhood. Such work was no longer valued in society" (248). To stay at home and raise one's own children was perceived as low class and ignorant. What was the result of this matrix of attitudes about children and work? Simkin argues that

[t]he belief that anyone can raise a healthy, happy, competent child lowered the value of child rearing and produced a careless attitude toward day care. People who could not do anything else could raise children, so only minimal standards of safety and cleanliness were set, and day care centers...proliferated to meet the needs of mothers who entered the work force. (248)

Today, the combination of overworked parents who have little time for or interest in preparing for childbirth, the uptick in medical malpractice litigation, and the perception that it doesn't really matter how you birth your baby (250) has led to a birth culture where more than 1/3 of women will give birth by cesarean section and almost 3/4 of women will opt for epidural anesthesia (see the Listening to Mothers Survey II at www.childbirthconnection.com). Most companies allow new mothers six weeks to give their full attention to their babies, and then mothers find childcare arrangements and go back to the office. We need only look around or listen to the news to see that quantity, not quality, still dominates child care in this country.

I find Simkin's article so illuminating because it demonstrates that the sexual relationship between man and woman -- and one that is open to the creation of a child -- is absolutely integral to society as a whole. The violation of that order through artificial contraception has had devastating ramifications across the board.

We need to do some hard thinking as a culture regarding our attitude toward children. If they are perceived as a burden, an inconvenience, or something that needs to be scheduled around career or something else, can we really expect women to desire normal, natural childbirth, with all its unpredictability and emotional and psychological intensity? And when we as a culture have rejected babies and motherhood, why should we expect it to welcome and celebrate birth?

Blessings,
Shannon