A little while back I mentioned sharing what a typical learning day looks like for our family. I am always interested to find out how others, particularly those who choose to educate outside of the classroom, go about their day to day. Picking up useful tips or finding different ways of doing things often freshens how I look at & go about my day. But the more I pondered a 'typical day', the more I realised that there really aren't any typical days for us. I would call our days rhythmical instead. The learning simply nestles around our daily rhythm. It's a challenge finding a rhythm that works for everyone because the interests & needs of a mama, nearly ten old and a two year old are vastly different. We each have our own rhythms which bend and flow into one another's so that our family rhythm is layered with each individual rhythm. Our daily rhythm is a dynamic force that flows, changes & settles on a constant basis. Finding common ground involves creativity when it becomes clear we need to change things up & hash out a new rhythm. On top of our daily rhythm we have layers of weekly, seasonal, family traditions & yearly rhythms that centre, ground & sustain us.
I try to keep the flow of our daily rhythm flexible yet at the same time I need to be ever mindful of its boundaries as all too often when limits are reached discord is inevitable, whether it be between the girls on a sibling level or within myself on a soul level. To keep an awareness of how we are all travelling with the dynamic nature of our day to day I've made intentions an important part of my personal rhythm. Before I go to sleep each night I put forth intentions for myself & the girls for the coming day. On waking , when I get the chance to spend a few solitary moments in bed before rising, I reinforce these intentions. I find this process really grounds & focuses my energy for the day. I would like to say that I wake before the girls every morning & spend quality time with myself meditating or doing yoga but more often than not this is not a hard reality for me. When I do get some time alone before the girls wake I usually lie in bed for a while listening to the birds, trees & street noises, then I creep out of bed, put the kettle on, make a cuppa & head outside to greet the day. I often find these moments are some of my most creative for writing & making images, sifting through ideas & getting out of my head. More often than not my day begins with snuggles in bed with our sweet pea chickadee Niamh. She nurses, sometimes we lie for a while but generally she's prompting me out of bed to answer the rumbling of her tummy. It is a rare thing for Zahra to wake before Niamh, but when she does she sneaks in for a cuddle & we chat quietly in the morning light. In this winter season I move around the house and light the lamps if it's a particularly dark day, get the porridge going & put some laundry on. The girls are usually content to play, read or put some music on to dance, while I potter in the kitchen getting breakfast ready. We're been slowly moving toward Zahra fixing her own breakfast & making meals for the whole family. It's a work in progress. We always eat together and lately we've been enjoying a read aloud during breakfast. Zahra then usually heads off to practice her cello or take the dog for a walk while I dress Niamh & organise an activity for her. Some mornings it's a quick breakfast then out the door for an organised activity like swimming or tennis.
Our rhythm naturally flows with the breath. A breathing in & breathing out. This tendency was something I learned when Zahra was little & we attended our local Steiner playgroup. Quiet activities are balanced by more rigorous activities where stillness & focus are replenished by more energetic, whole body movement. When Zahra has been sitting for 20 minutes playing her cello, focusing her mind energy, she follows it up by walking the dog, getting her whole body active or vice versa. I try, but don't always succeed, to create a space that carries this rhythm throughout the day so the girls & I can stay balanced within ourselves & with each other. After cello & dog walking, it's now about eight thirty, Zahra spends some of the morning on independent learning activities, while Niamh & I stack the dishwasher, feed the chooks, hang the laundry, fold laundry, read stories, sing songs, read more stories, have a tea party, read even more stories, & organise morning tea. Some days Niamh & I bake morning tea or Zahra makes pancakes. Morning tea is usually around ten, the girls dance or play together & if the weather is fair we head outside. For Niamh the transitions between breathing in & breathing out activities are soothed with songs. We have songs for washing hands, brushing teeth, story time, baking, bedtime, packing away time, playing outside, you name it, there's a song for it. It truly does turn those moments around where I find myself negotiating with a toddler.
Lunch happens early here, eleven thirty. Keeping their active, little, bodies nourished means they stay even keeled & Mama is happy. After lunch it's a short play, story time then nap time for Niamh. This is when Zahra & I finish off any learning activities together, like a main lesson block we may have been working on. Traditionally we used our mornings for main lesson work but we found this increasingly difficult with an active toddler, so for the moment we slot this in when Niamh is either asleep or busy. It's the season we're in right now & I know it will pass, our rhythm will shift, change & restore itself. For Zahra the afternoons are more active to balance out the mind focused activities of the morning....climbing trees, knitting, drawing, building fairy houses, riding her bike & always, always reading. This girl of mine devours books. For me, the afternoons are mostly filled with quiet...knitting, writing, catching up on reading, phoning friends, crafting, emailing, prepping for the evening meal & a quick whip around to tidy the house. Some days when I've had a particularly trying morning I'll go outside lie in the sun on the trampoline & reorganise myself. When Niamh wakes, usually around threeish, it's afternoon tea time, then we either head off for afternoon classes or the girls potter while I finish off whatever I'm working on. If I haven't prepared dinner earlier in the day I start prepping around four, which usually gives me enough space for enjoying the task, filling the the girls needs & getting dinner on the table by five thirty. It's Zahra's job to set the table each evening. I find eating early lays the groundwork for a peaceful bedtime routine.
William leaves the house in the wee hours before we're out of bed, cycling to work as early as four thirty. He's home from work anytime between three and five depending on what we have on in the afternoons. He's amazing for working such long hours and then jumping straight into the fray as soon as he gets home. If I haven't cooked he takes on the task. If I haven't folded and hung the next round of laundry, he's there. If there's shopping to be done, I load him up with a list and an armful of bags & off he goes. If I'm cranky from just filling everyone's else's needs and neglected my own he sends me off for a walk in the bush. I reckon he's pretty special. After dinner the bedtime routine begins. William & I have a quick conference in the kitchen, who wants to do bath & PJ's & who is on kitchen cleanup? We each head off in our respective directions & fingers crossed after stories and teeth, Niamh will be in bed by seven thirty & Zahra asleep by eight thirty, after reading in bed for a while. We both take a big breath in, exhale & enjoy each other's company until it's time to get ready to do it all again tomorrow.
And there you have a day in the life of us, how we roll so to speak. With each new day if I remain mindful of flexibility, create space for a breathing in & breathing out in our activities, head outdoors, try as best as I can to maintain regular mealtimes & let go of any resistance to change, our rhythm sustains & nourishes us. This is not a hard & fast way of how we do things as every day brings new surprises, like right now as I type, my two year old endeavouring in earnest to drop her afternoon nap. Rather it's a loose structure around which our rhythm can flow, the rhythm of the season that our lives are in, a rhythm with which we can play.
