The Lord so knew what I needed when He set up seasons. I love the fresh start each new season brings in its own way. With both of us being teachers, it makes it even more a time for renewed & adjusted scheduling, reflecting on what worked/didn’t work & high hopes that the new plans will work better.
Take summer for instance. With Keith home, our world changes a bit. It takes a while to sort out who’s going to deal with what in the children’s discipline department. When it’s just me home, that’s obvious. When he’s home, I don’t want to just dump it all on him. So, it takes a week or so to sort that part out usually in ours as well as the kids’ minds.
But summer also frees us up to get those things done spiritually & educationally that have been simmering on the back burner, but just never got done – journaling consistently, some of those discipling tools that didn’t get used, etc. I am pretty stoked about this summer’s plans. I got to thinking, there are so many great materials out there to use in discipling kids, at times it can be overwhelming! I want the kids to know hymns for instance in their growing up years. We have five great books with stories of hymns & a CD to play. Have I used them? No. Summer is the perfect time to schedule those into the morning routine. Here’s my list…
Character Building materials
Hymn Exposure
Christian US History
Heroes of the Faith
Odyssey (listening with them & discussing)
That makes one per morning for the week. How convenient.
The one I’m particularly excited about this summer is the US history. I’ve had my eye on that curriculum for years just waiting for the right time to use it. This is the summer! They have a children’s read aloud version plus activity books for the children to color while you read.
And then there’s the things I’ve wanted to get into more of a consistent habit… journaling every day, daily chores, their personal devotional time (vs. me leading it), memory verse chunks (Psalm 23, Books of the Bible, the Lord’s Prayer). Summer is the perfect time to get these established again. Sure, there will be days when I chuck it all & spend the whole day at the poolside, but most days I can get these things made into some semblance of routine. (If you go into summer with no plans, you will go bonkers. Guaranteed.) Then come fall, we can start fresh again with a renewed hope in polishing up on these and a few more routines. But at least we’ll have the satisfaction of having used a few of these great resources & not totally wasting away the summer.
On top of all that, we’re free to plan all those great summer fun activities to do in the afternoons – swim lessons, library reading programs, history time down town, free movie Tuesdays at the local theatre (not doing this year, but have in the past), outdoor ed program, VBS, etc. Poke around in your area to see what places are offering this summer. Take advantage of a few of those along with an occasional bringing out of the Slip & Slide or jar for collecting lightning bugs and you’ll have yourself a summer full of great memories/R&R/time well spent. I can’t wait to get started!!
Club 252 