Keeping House Clean As a Busy Mom

HOW TO PULL OFF A CLEAN HOUSE WITH 

LITTLE KIDS

My number one strategy for keeping a clean house when our children were little was, limiting where they were able to roam. They only had one room that was their domain, and that was THE PLAYROOM. 

PLAYROOM: We had a small house, but we realized that we needed to designate an area where our kids would have their toys, things they played with, and that place had rules.

Coral The Kids

When kids are small and you are a homeschooling and working parent, there is little time for cleaning the entire house. We had to find a way to coral the kids into only a few areas in the house so we had to only clean two rooms daily. The kids rooms they played in was the Playroom (our former living room or dining room). We would be in that room with the kids and if we were working while they wanted to play or watch television, it would be in that room. We would take our laptop and either watch what we wanted on our laptop or tablet, do work, or read.  

The bedroom was only for sleeping and there were no toys in the bedroom besides what toy they wanted to go take to bed with them.

In the bathroom, they had their own shelf where they were taught to put their stuff.

The kitchen was for eating, snacking, and there was a small TV in there that they could watch if there was a show they just had to see while snacking. They couldn't watch television during lunch or dinner though.

Playroom (or Family Room) Rules

This is the kids domain. They need to have one and we gave up a living room and sometimes a dining room for them to have this space. As parents we hung out in the playroom with them. We just learned to tune out their play if we weren't actively playing with them. They also were responsible for helping us clean it as soon as they could walk and carry their own toys they learned to put them in the bins. Truthfully, they were cleaner as children than as teenagers.

-There is only one room for playing with toys, doing art, watching TV and looking at devices for entertainment

-No food in the playroom

-No drinking in the playroom without a top on bottle, sip cup

-Organization of types of toys in toy box with lid and bookcase

-Limit the amount of toys and do an overhaul monthly if needed to donate old toys

-Every night before bed is the sing the 'Clean Up' song and put the toys away

New Year - New Adventures

2016 Goals And Changes

I love the start of a New Year! There is HOPE, WONDER, CURIOSITY of what is to come. I can say 2016 is going to be a BIG year of adventures for our family.

As a working parent who co-teaches with her spouse who also works outside of the home, we realize that scheduling and planning is a big part of our lives. At the beginning of each year My Husband (Hubba) and I do the following:

PREP FOR OUR NEW YEAR: We go out, eat and discuss the following

• Review of 2015 'the positives and negatives'
• Hopeful list of improvements for 2016
• Marriage check ups 'What made us happy, What we need to work on, How to feed our marriage this year'
• Parenting challenges to tackle in 2016, new method, new direction, new hopes
• Finances in review and ways to improve, coming big purchases, expenses and payoffs
• PLANS - the big one, small one, or none

NOW FOR OUR HOMESCHOOL CHANGES

Of course we made changes. We are on a BLOCK schedule where we change up every 16 weeks or so. Especially now since TIGER LILLY is in Dual Enrollment College Classes.

SPEED RACER (age 12yrs) my Blended-Middle Schooler

Homeschooled at 4th grade on.

Course Lineup for 2016 Spring
We are changing gears and adding back on for Speed Racer:

Also, we hired a personal TUTOR from FunCation Academy - to help with Algebra1 and Spanish

Jan-Mar 2016 (Daily Courses)
English, Grammar and Spelling  (Abeka) *will end in March
Biology, History (Abeka) *will end in March

Jan-May 2016 (Daily Courses)
Algebra 1 (Teaching Textbook and Abeka)
Basic Math Review (CTCMath)
Spelling Review (Sequential Spelling)
Spanish (Middlebury Interactive)

Jan-May 2016 (1 day weekly)
Scratch Programming (Landry)
Electricity Science (Landry)
Robotics (Landry)
Vocabulary Building (Membean)
Python (CodeAcademy)

All the classes were discussed with Speed Racer and he is on board to stay on task this year. We went over his REPORT CARD for his 1st 2 quarters and made some adjustments due to our discussions. He enjoys feeling as though he has a personal say so in his interest and what he is learning.

TIGER LILLY (age 14 yrs) the Dual enrolled High Schooler

Homeschooled at 7th grade on. 

 Artwork done by Tiger Lilly for my presentation

She had a great end to her Fall Semesters with a 3.5 gpa and completion of 15 College Credit hours! Woot! Total hours completed: 21 college credits.

She is enrolled in a University as a Full time student now.


Jan-Mar 2016 (Spring 1 Semester)
Java Programming 1 
College Math 1 (this is a redo since she dropped the course with the other college to do this online)
Illustration and Computer Graphics

Mar-May 2016 (Spring 1 Semester)
Java Programming 2
Pre-Calc
Economics

Landry Homeschool Classes: (Jan-May)
C Programming Pt. 2
PC Pro
Japanese

Personal Interest Homeschool Classes:
Animation Part 2: Animation Course.

Tiger Lilly loves this new college experience. It gives her more freedom and she's able to fit in classes during the days she wants to.


WORKING PARENT's LOG


Meals Revised meal planning since Momma is going on a New Year's diet (wish me luck).

Cleaning. We are clearing out our basement in preparation for our move/house sell and it is not fun. Causing lots of 'disagreements' between my hoarder hubby and me who likes to just toss stuff away.

Work & Life Balance. Finally, I think it will be controlled. Had to closeout things with a rather difficult customer and am thankfully transitioning to another. God is good, because the difficult customer actually apologized to me for his behavior and then sang my praises at a close out meeting. "God will do it!"

Also, I am working with my company to transfer my job to Hawaii. It is a rather frustrating experience as I am having to do more legwork than I anticipated, but I know it will work out with due dilligence.

Did you know, I had a part-time business? Well I do, that was suffering some in 2015, but now it's back on track and I revamped my product releases so this will be a promising endeavor. Besides, Tiger Lilly helps me out with this business and loves it.

Lesson Planning. I finished just 1 week so far. Just in time for our coming school semester.

Rest. I am getting more restful sleep now that I am the proud owner of a Sleep Apnea machine. Didn't think I'd ever need one, but it is helping me tremendously! 

Marriage Check Up. Well this moving, and parenting has caused us to have some BIG arguments lately. More so than typical. We decided to have a truce, to stay in our lane, respectfully not argue but redirect. It's been working these last few weeks. Also, we did a few date nights - even locked our bedroom door to be able to watch a movie and eat in bed without the kids bothering us.

Flexibility Planning For Homeschooling

BEING FLEXIBLE

This is the one thing about homeschooling I really love. As I start to plan for the next year, I realize that yet again - our schedule will change.

SLIDING SCHEDULE

As a working parent, I've had to be able to take a 'mental health' day, slide our schedule, shorten a day, do work on the evening and weekend. Also, taking work on the road trips or switching to a less demanding curriculum is a way to augmenting schedules when needed.

BLOCK SCHEDULE

This is a lifesaver. We put our more vigourous schedule of courses in the Fall when we are really motivated with the new year and it last 6 to 8 weeks, then we add a new set of classes. It's set up similar to a College Schedule of 5 weeks/ 8 weeks of specified course instruction. We make the schedule very light in the Spring Time and now plan to take the summers off.

EVENING, NIGHTS and WEEKEND SCHEDULE

With our working schedules, we sometimes have to move school days to the weekends. It gives us the flexibility to let the kids be involved in many extra-curricular activities that they loved when in traditional school. As well as it allows us to work our jobs and still be available for our kids to get work done.

ORGANIZATION OF WORK

Worboxes is a must for us. Keeps us organized and makes the kids more independent. Lesson Plans and weekly schedules help to keep us all on track. Curriculums that are well laid out and pre-planned has made organizing school easier. Location! Location! Location! is the key to getting kid motivated to do work. Find what works for your kid to 'spark them'.

PLAN but WILLINGNESS TO REDIRECT

Don't get attached, tied too, or grounded in a curriculum that isn't working for you or your family. Using a 'BLOCK' schedule or 'QUARTER' schedule allows you to figure out what's not working faster and to 'give yourself permission' to change things up often. Almost like a college schedule.


KEEP GOING TIL GOALS MET

If you don't meet your goals for your kids learning for the year, just keep on working through the summer. We do this around my kids activities.

OUR GOALS

My kids and I have set down after I finished up their report cards for this school year, and their 'Review Forms' that I submitted to our Umbrella group, to decide on the 'Way Forward'.

Tiger Lilly's Goal:
*Desires to be a Game Designer and Developer*

Focus on getting AA degree with High School Diploma (like her sister Rose did)
Build her Game Design Programming and Animation Portfolio
Find more STEM events that focus on Girls


Speed Racer's Goal:
*Still undecided about 'career' but likes to build Video Games and thinks being a Surgeon would be cool*

Build up Math Core skills (finish off Middle School Math)
Learn Game and Website programming languages
Do more fun hands on projects

Mom & Dad's Goal:

Gain better flexibility in Work Schedules
Support the kids with curriculums that are easy for us both to administer
Stick with DVD based, Computer based curriculums
Hire a weekly tutor for Speed Racer and Tiger Lilly as needed

Our last day of school will be May 15th, then we'll have Math daily when the kids aren't in camp or traveling.

WEEKLY WRAP UP

Sliding into the last week!

Speed Racer, 6th grader

This week we are winding down. Only doing, Math with Teaching Textbooks Math 6. Language Practice and Fraction practice with (IXL). Writing, Spelling, Reading, are all our Spectrum workbooks this week.

Seems we will only be doing 'Math' daily for the summer. At least for the weeks he isn't at sleep away camp.

Breakdancing competitions last week were SO FUN to watch! His Lacrosse team has had a losing streak. But Speed Racer doesn't care because his brother Razor Ray has been practicing with him one on one on Thursdays and allowing to hang out at the college with him.

Tiger Lilly, blended 9th grader

Tiger Lilly's finishing up some of her final projects in her Community College courses in Interpersonal Communication and Art Appreciation. May 10th is when everything has to be turned in.

Her final projects in Web Design with Currclick.com and Python (with Landry Academy) are being completed this coming weekend. This weekend is her last Digipen-Animation with 3D Maya class. She didn't work on her YouthDigital.com using Blender Animation at all this week. The Psychology class with Currclick on Monday is also closing next week with 3 quizzes she is finishing over the weekend. Can you tell she got a little behind?

Her scores in US History to 1877 using Instantcert are improving, now over 51% and shows she is ready for the test. So we may attempt to let her take the CLEP next week. Pre-Calc is still going well with the integrated IXL for extra practice.

WORKING PARENT's LOG

Meals. I nailed it this week! I think this is one of 7 weeks I had dinner on the table everyday without having to purchase a fast food meal for the week. Hubby helped me out this week which probably explains how I got this done. 

Cleaning. We did wash and fold clothes, kept the main floor clean and realized the basement and the floors need a really good do over.

Work & Life Balance. I am preparing to start a new job! This means that I will be working a total of 7 days before we leave for Hawaii. I was so greatful my new job allowed me to still go on vacation.

Lesson Planning. Starting to build list for what we are going to be purchasing for curriculum for next school year. Also, had to turn in final year in Review forms to my Umbrella (this was brutal! Took all week). I did the weekly lesson plans pretty fast though.

Rest. I actually made it a point to get more this week. I took a nap daily and got about 6 hours sleep through the night. It's easy since the kids really don't have a vigorous schedule.

Marriage Check Up. Hubba and I went to a business pitch get together. We both are into start up businesses (have one we are currently running together) and thought this would be a great way to meet new people and get re-motivated. We had a blast and did see some old friends since it was at the college we both attended.