Being able to share this room was one of my main motivating factors for coming back to the blog. It's been a total labor of love, and Steve has been our hugest supporter! The process started last October when he was out of town for 5 out of 6 weeks. I started to think about homeschooling pretty strongly, because I didn't want our family to have to be separated for that long ever again.
Fast forward through a lot of prayer, a lot of talking, and about four months, when we saved his Christmas bonus in order to paint the room and re-do the floors. The floors made this room! It's bright and sunny, and so completely functional.
So...here it is!
Bella's desk and art supplies. This area is usually covered with various drawings that I have to go through and purge about once a month. In my head, this is where I imagine Bella will do some of her work when it requires "quiet", or at least fewer distractions from the other two little humans. The shelves have pens, pencils, markers, erasers, glue sticks, and scissors. The top shelf has items we don't use a lot (yet), like beads, dry-erase markers, and felt animals.
Our Calendar and Bible Verse wall. This room has a ton of windows, which is amazing! But the downside is, that there isn't a ton of wall space, so if you don't want to cover all the windows, you have to get creative. On the window ledge are our "calendar things" like coins to "make the date", extra calendar squares for holidays, and a little laminated list of what I'm supposed to do during calendar time.
(Because I find calendar time super boring, but I also know Evelyn needs to learn it, so I don't want to forget something.)
Right now, Mel's piano is acting as a very pretty shelf. Lessons aren't in the budget right now, and the girls haven't shown a whole lot of interest anyway, so I use it to hold file folders and extra books.
Our main table. When I first started thinking about buying a dining room table for this room, we were a little worried it would be too big, but it makes the room so functional, and allows Henry and Evelyn to be included, as well. We even got a second booster seat for Henry, so we don't have to keep dragging his chair from dining room back and forth. Money well spent for the sake of sanity.
My corner is a pretty great mix of things that I love and things that I need. I have pictures and art and hanging files...it's a Type-A girl's dream.
Okay, some of my favorites...my copper mug with the brass knuckles that Whitney bought for me, my little plant, because succulents are apparently the only thing I can keep alive, the gold-handled scissors that Steve got me, and the paint-dipped pencils that Mel just surprised me with this morning! (They're in the copper mug...aren't they beautiful!)
And no, it doesn't normally look like the picture above. Normally, it looks like this...
These are my daily workboxes. I have a few "brand new to me, but look really cool and would be bang-a-rang if they worked" things in our classroom, and these boxes are one of them. On the left, are each of Bella's subjects. I have her first 12 weeks planned out in hanging folders, so in theory, I'll go to the hanging file each week, and pull out the papers or experiments and supplies that we'll need for each subject. In my head, this is organizing at it's finest. We'll have to see how it actually works...
My extra construction paper, printer, laminator, and all of my teacher manuals are on this shelf. Along with math manipulatives, books I want to read with the girls, and binders with my lesson plans.
Whew! So, there it is! I'm so excited and can't wait to get started! We're praying that it's a positive experience for the girls, too, and for our family as a whole.
One more week to go!
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