My BRAIN

(left: photo of my home organization binder cover.  I scrapped it :D  Thought - if I want to use it long term, I might as well like it!!! 7/20/11 by Zindra Nelson)

Well, thanks to the FlyLady and the Large Family Logistics book, I've finally decided to put together a Control Journal, Household Notebook or Home Organization Book.. Everyone has a different name for them, but they are pretty much all the same...  What I think I'm going to call it... My Brain.  (Hmm, I wonder if I could make it into an acronym??)

It's a nice thought, right?  To get all the important details of life down in one spot.  I've heard of doing this.. and thought about doing it so many times that it's crazy.  But lately, I just feel like there's too many things in life to keep track of... so I thought I would give it a try.

You know, "they" suggest that you add certain things - and mine has grown MUCH beyond that.  I have a 1" binder - and I think I'm going to have to upgrade :D

So far, this is what mine includes (or will include, once I get all the details inside of it!):
*My Daily Do's (my daily to do list)
*Routines (which I'm not close to having organized)
*Weekdays (Monday - Laundry day and what that entails)
*Chores (list of chores, room by room)
*Meal Planning (Dinner Schedule ie: Monday - Breakfast night.  Copies of past dinner menu plans.  Copies of meal planning forms.)
*Important Phone Numbers (I guess it's a good idea to have them written somewhere besides my cell..)
*Photo Storage (I've written down where the photo files are... which pictures are on which hard drive.  Whether they are uploaded to my offsite photo storage yet.  I have 100,000 pictures :D)
*Crafts & Hobbies (My craft to do list.  ie:  finish Jaden's baby quilt, wallpaper dollhouse)
*Lists & Forms (paper copies of forms that I like to use.)
*Birthdays & Gifts Planner sheets
*School Planning (what books etc. the kids did this year, what I want to buy for next year, etc.)
*IOU (ie: remember to send coach money for Josiah's special order baseball bat.)

I've made it simple.  Taken a piece of paper.. written "Meal Planning" on it with a fat tipped pen.  Slid it into a sheet protector.  Hole punch the items that go in behind it.  Simple.  Sweet.  Easy to change.

People are making them & selling them on Etsy.  Click HERE if you'd like to take a look!

How much time do we spend schooling???

My schedule with the kids feels a bit out of sync this year. Although we are covering a lot and enjoying quite a bit of it.

The older two, 7 & 10 do two or three workbooks (math, english, etc. dep. on the kid). They are supposed to do so many pages per book per day. That's just an easy way for me to keep track of progress.

The younger two, do schoolwork as well. Not nearly as structured. They do a lot of coloring, cutting, pasting and playing with playdough. Jaden does some bookwork, but not much.

Then I have tons of extra school material this year. I am a product reviewer for The Old Schoolhouse. I have so many products to review... it's like Christmas a couple of times per week. There are some not so great products, and then some that I adore.

Right now, we've added All About Spelling to our schooling. Hands down, it's the best spelling program I've tried yet. My "can't sit still" hands on, 10 year old LOVES IT. No traditional spelling lists... hands on... repeat til they get it.... He's so getting it. My 7 year old asks to do more... uh, yah! We are doing it at an accelerated rate because I have to get through a certain amount of material to do my reviews. So, you can see this throws a wrench into my structured bookwork.

Then we also got this amazing kids programming class... Logo Adventures. It uses a particular program... Josiah and Jed are having tons of fun learning basic programming. Fun and educational.

So, I'm in the middle of trying to find a balance. We are having a good time... and with Rod off of work, it turns out that it is nice to be a TOS reviewer, because I didn't have cash to buy school material for this year. Funny how those things work out.

Let's see we try to spend from 9 to 12 doing regular schoolwork. Then we normally take the afternoon off. We do our together stuff like All About Spelling, Spears Art (another product of many) and Logos Adventure after dinner a couple of times a week.

We are not really traditional, but i'm keeping track of hours through homeschool tracker, and we are WAY above "suggested" hours... so I feel pretty good about it all.