Homelife Routines

Shirley Klein's mentioned in her talk how American Homelife is on the decline, and followed with this quote by author Cheryl Mendelson:

Homes today often seem to operate on an ad hoc basis. Washday is any time anyone throws a load into the machine. . . . Meals occur any time or all the time or . . . never. . . .

. . . Many people lead deprived lives in houses filled with material luxury. . . .

. . . As people turn more and more to outside institutions to have their [everyday] needs met . . . , [our] skills and expectations . . . diminish, in turn decreasing the chance that people’s homes can satisfy their needs. The result is far too many people who long for home even though they seem to have one.

I like that "long for home" imagery. I long for a feeling of home, and am always working and thinking of ways to make it how I want it to be, how I picture it in my mind. One thing that I think will help me get our family there is having schedules and routines. Two that I've started are mealtimes. Like I said, I've gotten dinner on the table consistently the past few weeks, and the miracle that has made that happen is having A PLAN instead of winging it! Here is our family dinner plan that we've been following the past month, not sure if I'll always keep all these dinner themes or if I'll change them around every month or so:

Sunday - Soup
Monday - Curry
Tuesday - Pasta
Wednesday - Breakfast
Thursday - Latino
Friday - Pizza
Saturday - BBQ

And leftovers will substitute occasionally when the fridge is full of them. Another thing I'm working on but haven't figured out is the kids' housework routine for during school, but first I better get mom's figured out, so I like this "Ultimate House Cleaning Schedule" that my BFF Nicole sent me and I plan on pondering over that and modifying it to fit our home.

And as for capturing that "feeling" of a beautiful family culture, we had a few of those moments the past few days - Sunday night after I let myself vent, I felt better and actually cleaned up the kids rooms a little bit around bedtime. At 8:00 I let the brush and floss routine slide cause they reminded me there was no school the next day, it was a teacher work day. So they got involved in a game of Kick the Can (gallon of milk) outside in our awesome back yard and Corey went out to join them. It was so fun to have the windows open and listen to them playing, I loved it. On Monday night they wanted to do a repeat of their fun and so they all got ready for bed quickly so they could have their reward of playtime with Dad. We had to finish up the game earlier this time cause they did have to get up in the morning for school this time. And they took their game up a notch with black clothing:


Abi and Lily's face painting inspired Corey to watercolor his face with a little camo...


Abi, upon seeing Corey's outfit, ran upstairs and shuffled through the costume box grabbing random items and throwing them upon her little self - pink cape, rainbow hat, blue wedding scarf, purse, etc... I totally laughed when I saw her -


Even a monkey doll holding tightly to her neck with it's velcro hands. Love it.


Love feeling like they're making some fun childhood memories. My job is family historian, recording these delightful moments for them to enjoy when they are older. :)