Random Flexible Homeschool Life

As it is in our home, life is unpredictable (as is any home with 5 boys ages 6 and under-or any home with one little person and a parent for that matter)  and so our learning time has to be flexible.  Plans and good intentions get us so far, only to be let go for an option that involves less stress or conflict, or to carry through with an idea that came along right then and just sounds more fun.

Today we started with The Pledge of Allegiance, a prayer, and a scripture story followed by some reading aloud.  We never do things in the same order, or even in the same room.  We then took a break that was supposed to be 10-15 minutes and turned into I think 45 minutes.  (A lot of this is due to the beautiful 3 week old addition to our family.  The kids of course didn't mind some extra lego time.)

When we finally got started again we did some math and a science experiment.  The PLAN was to then do writing before lunch BUT everyone had so much fun with the science I could tell they were too wound up and it wouldn't be fun or pretty to get them to sit down and do their writing.  The other factor was that during the science experiment I had put a masking tape finish line on the carpet and remembered how fun it was over a year ago to make masking tape roads in the front room.

  So we built a little town with masking tape roads in the front room.  So fun!  We're going to leave it up for a couple days and probably add a few more roads.  

 I still planned on doing writing after lunch.

During lunch Spiderman's ukulele showed up on the front porch!  Yea!  We've been expecting it for over a week and he was SO happy!   He now gets to start learning his first instrument!  I think cute Robin is hoping to play it sometime too. :)

Of course after lunch we couldn't go straight to writing!  They had to experiment with the ukulele. They didn't care about me looking up what notes to tune it to first.  THIS was SO fun.  All of the boys got on an instrument.  Big brother Superman has now decided he wants them all to be a band when they get bigger.  We had Robin on the piano, Baby J on the drum, Superman-ukulele, and Spiderman-guitar  (I love how they were all playing the guitar like it was an upright bass--it made me want to get one.)  They rotated a couple times and although musically there wasn't a ton happening, they did all get on the same rhythm a few times, and that was pretty awesome.

Since I had Baby A 3 weeks ago, Robin (will be 4 in Nov) has become one of the big boys in the house.  He is VERY musical and I'm excited to see what comes out of him when he's older.

 Can you get over how cute it is to have that adorable 1 year old on that big drum!  I love it. :)

After the park I put Baby J to bed and tuned the ukulele. Spiderman learned the C chord, and I played a little progression on guitar while I shouted out notes for Superman to play on the piano.  I hope this happens many more times! 

We never got to our writing, or the other "work" I had in mind for the day, but that is the beauty of homeschool.  You don't have to do EVERY subject EVERY day and you have this beautiful opportunity to create special memories with these little people that bless your life.  

P.S. This was our second weekly NO SCREENS day.  I hope to write more about this later!