First Day: Homeschool & Meal Planner

I can honestly say that today was a great day. I actually got out of bed when my alarm went off and did not snooze it 5 times.  I took a bath and got ready for the day before the kids were even awake.  Sad to say, that doesn't not happen very often.  I set Jase's alarm for 8:30 since today we had our first day of kindergarten homeschool!! :)  (Jase was SUPER excited last night when we were tucking him in bed and I told him that tomorrow was his first day of school!)  Jase ended up waking up on his own at 8:00; he got dressed and made his bed before coming downstairs.  Then Ally woke up, even though she could have easily slept for another hour . . . she is my sleeper, takes after her Daddy! ;-)

We were all dressed by 8:30 and ahead of schedule in my book.  We sat at the kitchen table and had breakfast together (according to the meal plan), then headed upstairs for school.  We began right at 9:00, which is what I had envisioned, so it was nice to see your plans on paper actually work out.  We started our school day with prayer, asking God to bless our homeschool time together.  While I still have a lot of work to do with prepping and setting things up, we got through everything that I wanted to.  And little sister was right beside us the whole time, coloring away.  ;-)  Of course not everything went perfect and Jase did ask if we were finished yet and how much longer a few times, but we finished.  I've been reading on some organizational methods to help with this, that way he knows exactly what is expected of him and how much work he has to finish each day, but it will just take time to implement.  For tomorrow I did put green sticky notes (I have a few of them!) on all the pages/activities I have planned and he can remove them once finished. This should be a good visual for him on what he has left to do.  And we will get there, but baby steps for now.

We ended up sticking to the meal plan all day long, which was great.  And Jase even asked about our afternoon snack (grapes, cheese cubes and wheat ritz crackers) and was excited about it.  I know that today was only Day 1 and there will be days when plans change, but it was nice to have a plan and stick to it.

This afternoon I took the kids over to Shawn's parent's house to visit.  Shawn's older brother is in town with his three boys and his sister was also over with her three boys and Shawn's little brother's son was there as well.  With our two, there were nine grandchildren at the house; all boys except Miss Allyson.  Jase had a great time playing with his cousins and really enjoyed playing with the older boys too; I loved seeing them show him attention and taking the time to play with him.  Makes me think what it would be like if Jase had an older brother or how he is going to be as an older brother! And yes, if you didn't know Shawn is the middle child of 5 children, so he has a big family.  :-)