Started the new year

Well, I planned on starting the homeschooling year around the equinox, but since Brother is midway through the 6/7 year transition it just felt right to start now. We had an absolutely crazy 2 weeks containing 5 birthday parties (3 at our house) and the prep involved, a fair and a camping trip. Obviously rhythm was lacking and he was out of balance, either over expanded or over contracted - I'm not sure which. Phew - the poor kid was just screaming for some rhythm and the Kindergarten rhythm works best for us, so we just started up again today.

We mainly reinstated the larger pieces of the rhythm and I will fill in the detail later. Next year when Brother is in first, it is really important to me that the baby not be exposed to the first grade fairy tales. So, I am setting up the environment for that this year. I am reading a story book to Baby (who is only a little over 2) in the rec room and setting up a little scene with the tree blocks, animals and silks. Today it was "Home For a Bunny" which is a Spring book. Oh well, then I am reading a Folk tale to Brother in the living room. If (when) Baby follows and if he interrupts, then I am redirecting him back to his toys. I am holding the expectation in my mind that he will not be following us out any more by the Spring.

Today Brother's Folk Tale was ThickHead from our Enki Folk Tales. He has been so inflexible lately. I know that that is a characteristic of this age, but if I could just temper it a little bit. Clearly having a 2.25 year old Brother getting in his way and disrupting his plans is frustrating, but he does need to be a little flexible. Baby shouldn't always have to follow his rules. I have been reading about the meaning of Fairy Tales and the Dummling character embodies flexibility, so I am hoping that if I give him a few different stories with that character it may help him to relax a bit.

Another way I thought I could deal with the frustration upsets is by pulling him away from the play for a bit and engaging him in meaningful work. So, I put the granola ingredients out for us to make homemade granola and just figured that we would float in and out of the activity as needed. The morning went so well though, that I didn't have to pull him over to the project. Oops! I started pounding nuts anyway and Baby became interested. Before I knew it, they were both dying to help make granola, so we did that together and all was well.

Another really neat thing we did today was clean off the back porch. It was so dirty with stains. I took water and gave the kids brooms and brushes and we swept it off. It looks so much nicer! And we had a lot of fun doing a meaningful task together.