A LIFE WORTH LIVING....: Tailoring our days.

Friday, 13 February 2009

Tailoring our days.

Some weeks seem to be non stop and others more relaxed....

Last week was busy, busy, busy,very enjoyable and full of impromptu play dates.

Wednesday was Home ed group and then off to a friends house for a good chat over a cuppa.E came back with us and we picked A off the school bus to come to ours for tea.Dropped them both back home later in the evening.

Thursday morning we were up and out by 10 (v early in this house!!)to go to a tea party held at my friends house(E's mum)she had invited a couple of other childminders over with their little people and E had made lovely sandwiches and cakes for us all.We stayed on after the others had left and then I went for a lovely 1 1/2 hours reflexology and massage.Home for a quick tea and out to meditation group meeting.

Friday we went to a soft play center with E and another friend and her two children.We hadn't been out together for a while and was nice to catch up.Took E home and then home to pick up A from the school bus.E came later after her theatre group and stayed again.

Saturday we spent planning Emily's birthday parties.On sat the 14th she is having A and E over for the day and I am taking them to McDonald's then on to the cinema.Then back to ours for a valentine sleepover with mudpacks, makeovers,Tattoos and dancing.On the Monday we are having a Dr who themed Birthday celebration and have 16 children with their mums coming over to ours.We didn't think everyone we invited would be able to come!! E has planned most of it and is making the Tardis cake,dalek cookies and fairy cakes with Dr who sugar paper pictures to go in the party bags.Wish me luck!!!!!!

Sunday we were over at my sisters house for a family get together.My brother in law had cooked Brisket and it was delicious.I have not had it for years and had forgotten how good it tastes.Played Scatagoriesit's a great fun game,I'm having problems finding it to buy though.

This week has been much more chilled and although we have been out and about and had friends over to play we have had quiet mornings and spent more time in pj's and generally a much more leisurely pace.Emily has been tired and has wanted to go to bed around 8ish.It has been around 9 when they have finished reading and put the lights out each night but the she has had great difficulty getting to sleep and has come back down after 45 mins or so,leaving Al snoring,he is up at 6 in the morning and needs his beauty sleep:-)
She has spent some time downstairs and has gone back up with me later.The two of us have cuddled and held hands but it has been around 12-12.30 before she has gone off to sleep.Consequently she has been sleeping in till 10 or 11 the next day.On wed night she went off to bed at 8 and although she had spent the whole 2 hours at home ed running around and then 2 hours bouncing at my friends house I thought she would never get to sleep as she hadn't got up till 11 that morning,however she did get off to sleep straight away only to wake up 2 hours later and couldn't get back to sleep. We watched TV together for a while and had a hot drink and went up to try again but were both still awake around 12 :-(

Not too sure what is causing it, maybe just be the mounting excitement about her birthday.It could be the new moon:-) We have tried all the homeopathy remedies and essential oils and nothing seems to be working.It is not unusual for Emily to go through these phases of disturbed sleep and we are just so lucky we can tailor our days to accommodate her energy levels.I do find her tired behaviour during the day incredibly difficult to deal with though.It seems that every little thing is just too much effort for her and we have butted heads on a couple of occasions this week.I know I have been to blame because I have got my "you will do as I say" head on and not backed down when I should have done and that has made a small incident into a battle.The good thing is that after lots of practice and self talk I am finding it easier and easier to move from annoyance to understanding and to connect again and to work through whatever the problem was.

4 comments:

Shirl said...: Happy Birthday Emily. Have a great weekend all of you! ... :0); 14 February 2009 at 09:20
Unknown said...: What great times you have been having - both the busy and the quiet cuddling.

Yes, well, you know my sleep issues with the LO. But we all go through these phases don't we? And there does seem to be plenty to be excited about for her.

I'm glad for you that you have worked through your own part in the 'butting heads' issue. Makes all the difference, ay?; 14 February 2009 at 10:40
The Witches Room said...: I came across your blog today and read your story about taking your daughter out of school. I always want to applaud people who are not afraid to follow their true selves despite what society may think. I look forward to following your journey.; 14 February 2009 at 22:32
K said...: Hope the sleepover went well, I bet everyone's shattered today!! I'm sure you'll all have recovered for the big party tomorrow :-)

I can sympathise with the sleep issues, we have ongoing ones of our own (a bit different from yours). I've sort of given in to it now and am letting things run their course, once I stopped stressing and worrying about it it all became much easier to deal with. (Although its never that easy to deal with a tired/stroppy/emotional 10-year-old!!). X; 15 February 2009 at 12:48

This is me.....

There comes a time when you have to stand up and shout: This is me damn it! I look the way I look, think the way I think, feel the way I feel, love the way I love! I am a whole complex package. Take me... or leave me. Accept me - or walk away! Do not try to make me feel like less of a person, just because I don't fit your idea of who I should be and don't try to change me to fit your mold. If I need to change, I alone will make that decision.When you are strong enough to love yourself 100%, good and bad - you will be amazed at the opportunities that life presents you.” Stacey Charter.

Why we Home educate

( Slightly edited from a blog post I did when we started out) In the end the actual decision to take Emily out only took a matter of days but before that it had been around a year and a half of talking about ti and reading books, Free range education by Terri Dowty, Educating your child at home by Jane Lowe and Alan Thomas were two that had a real impact for different reasons. Free range education has lots of examples of real life home educators and I think I can say that it was this one that convinced me the most that we could do it. We are two very average people ,neither of us left school with many qualifications, we went on to do quite well in our chosen professions and had no need to think about the education system at all until Emily came along.

I knew about home education and when Emily was born considered it as an optionbut always felt my lack of education would be a problem and that I wouldn't be capable of providing her with what she would need.Looking back with hindsight it is easy to see how wrong I was!!

School never really suited Emily......After the nursery year at a very highly rated, high achieving school we knew that particular School wasn't for us and took her out. We enrolled her in a lovely village school with only 70 children in the whole school .The ethos of the school was totally different, the children didn't wear uniforms and there was much more emphasis on the children being individuals.The head was a sensitive and principled man who wanted the best for the children. We thought we had struck gold.Over the reception and year 1 Emily gained confidence and really started to bloom. It was at this time she was diagnosed with dyspraxia( we had had to go down the diagnosis route as our observations of Emily's difficulties were not enough to enable the teachers to tailor things so she was helped and given less work in class) but she managed quite well in the more relaxed play orientated early years.Year 2 with more emphasis on academic activities got progressively harder for her. She is very sensitive and it wasn't just the academic side it was the embarassment of having to put her hand up for the toilet,seeing others being told off and worrying in case she did something wrong and got the same treatment, panicking because she couldn't do the work and the teacher never had time to sit with her (alot of this did not come out until she had left school) her behaviour at home became worse and worse she was so angry and obviously stressed . At this time we began to seriously consider taking her out but held back because of my lack of confidence in my ability to provide her with an adequate education ,my health being so poor was also a major stumbling block.

Then in year three it became blatantly obvious that something needed to change .She was struggling on all levels and we couldn't allow the school system to damage our daughter anymore.She became ill with a bug that was doing the rounds and she was off for two weeks , during that time I had a conversation with a friend who home educates her two children and I was so upset I couldn't make a decision and she said just go with whats in your heart and that really helped me to shift my thinking and stop worrying about what I couldn't give her and focus on what I could give her.

We never sent her back.I still get emotional when I think of that time , the look on Emily's face when we told her she would never have to go back to school was priceless,the immense sense of relief that we were off the treadmill of school life and the excitement of the time ahead and to be honest the fear of the unknown......

So here we are four years on and a lot of reading and researching later I feel comfortable with what we are doing . The changes that have happened so far have been helped along the way by the many wonderful blogs out there.They are so varied and there are so many different approaches , I have found ones that I can identify with and have read a lot of archive material that has been written in each and found answers to so many of the questions I have had that they have helped me to sort out what will work best for us .As much as I wish we had done this earlier and saved Emily from the distress that she went through I do believe things happen for a reason and that the time was right for us to take her out and that looking on the bright side one of the benefits is that at least she has had a taste of school and now we all know without a doubt that it is not for us !!!!

It is very liberating to be making decisions based on what works best for us as a family and not what society expects.

Let your child be a child.

No child was ever spoiled by too much love.

Be authentic with your child.

Listen openly to your child’s needs.

Believe in your child’s good intentions.

Find the humour.

Look past the behaviour… what is your child feeling?

Have fun with your child today!

“There is no reason why we cannot say ‘No’ to children in just as kind a way as we say ‘Yes’.” - John Holt

“Play is really the work of childhood.” - Fred Rogers

“The best way to make children good is to make them happy.” - Oscar Wilde

Children thrive in a peaceful and loving environment.

A child needs love most when things go wrong.

Children reflect the treatment they receive.

A few qoutes I like....

Life shouldn't be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in, broadside, thouroughly used up, totally worn out and loudly shouting, 'WOW'.... Beth Moore

The perpetual testing of public school children is like a gardener constantly pulling his plants up by the roots to see if they are growing....(unknown)

Children require guidance and sympathy far more than instuction...Helen Kellers teacher

I hear and I forget I see and I remember I do and I understand...Confusious