Our New (Home School) Schedule

Now that we've had Rylee for about a month now (and she's only waking once in the night!), we've gotten into a new routine. It's definitely different with three than two! Ashtyn's also been asking to go to school, so we started relaxed homeschooling at the beginning of September. Here's roughly what our days look like nowadays.

We start our days between 7:30 and 8:00 am. I try to get Ashtyn and Parker's breakfast set up while they watch Alphabet videos or signing time for a bit so I can feed Rylee at 8:00. While Rylee's awake, I'll get ready for the day, get her ready for the day, make our bed, and pick up Ben and my room a bit (that's where Rylee sleeps, so I can't do any of this while she's asleep).

Rylee is awake for about 40 minutes. I put her down and then quickly eat and clean up breakfast, finish getting ready for the day, and get the girls ready for the day. I usually try to have this all done by about 9:30. Then we start our homeschool day by reading picture books (usually from the library) together.

Rylee wakes up sometime between 10:00 and 10:30. I feed her, we read and sing with her, do some tummy time, then put her back down.

Between her naps, the older girls and I do our other homeschool stuff. We spend about five minutes on letters; Parker is learning her letters (very slowly) and Ashtyn is learning letter sounds in preparation for reading. We have a snack around 10:00 or 10:30 (depending on when Rylee is awake) and while they eat their snack, I read to them (right now, we're reading Little House in the Big Woods). We also have journal time, when I transcribe a little in their journals for them and then they draw a picture of it while I write in mine. Most days, we also trace letters in a dry erase book we have.

We usually finish all of this around 11:00, which is when the girls play outside until lunch around noon.

On Fridays, I don't worry about doing all our school stuff. We still read aloud, but instead of focusing on letters and everything, we do a special activity (usually one I've found off of Pinterest) and clean the house. On Tuesdays, we go to the library for story time instead of playing outside.

After lunch, Parker goes down for a nap and Ashtyn has a quiet time drawing and watching a show. Rylee sleeps for at least part of this, which is when I work on my own stuff and take a break. After quiet time, we get dinner ready, eat, and then have family time the rest of the evening (sometimes at home, sometimes with Ben's family).

We start getting the girls all ready for bed around 8:00 pm. I help get them ready and then nurse Rylee to sleep while Ben puts the two older ones down. They're all in bed around 8:30. Then Rylee sleeps until between 4:00 and 7:00 am and then goes back down until 8:00 am.

Saturdays are a lot more relaxed. Saturday mornings, we don't worry about school at all and usually Ben doesn't work. We just hang out and relax usually. I'll finish any cleaning and we'll do things to get ready for Sunday. Saturday afternoon, Ben and I spend time together during their naps and then after naps, we drop the girls all off at his parents house and do a little date. We get home at night in time for baths (we can't do it before because they almost always get covered in dirt at Ben's parents' house).

Sunday mornings are a whirlwind getting everyone ready for church and church is quite exhausting with three, but we make it work. After lunch and naps, we have a video call date with my parents and then head over to Ben's parents' house for dinner. Once church is done, Sundays really are our most restful day and church (even with kids) is very spiritually renewing.

I feel like we've quickly found a new rhythm with Rylee. It's really helped that she's such a content baby and a great night sleeper (naps leave something to be desired, but we can't have the perfect baby ;)). It also helped that we had a good base schedule to fit Rylee's routine around. It's been wonderful to have her in our family and a lot of fun to start our homeschooling (the girls both love it, Ashtyn asks for it everyday and gets after me if I ever try to skip anything).

How Many Kids??

How many kids should we have? Are we done? Should we have more? This is something that we, obviously, don't need to worry about yet, but it's also something that I (a planner and major nerd in that department) just can't help thinking about.

I have always wanted more than three kids. Four or five or six. There have even been times when I've seriously thought about having eight. Ben would be fine stopping at three. In fact, he's not sure he wants to try for more. Before we had Rylee, I thought I for sure wanted at least one more. 

Now, I'm not sure. 

Rylee is a beautiful, perfect, easy (for a newborn) baby. She goes to sleep between 8:00 and 8:30 pm, stays asleep until around 4:00 am most nights (last night, it was 7 am), then sleeps again until 8:00 am. Her naps are iffy, but I would rather she sleep at night and fight naps during the day and I can usually get her to take a couple naps easily. When she's awake (and supposed to be awake, not down for a nap) she's such a content baby. And we love her, she's just darling. 

So it's not that she's too hard or having three kids is too hard. I still think the transition to having one has been the hardest for me thus far. There is the fact that labor is hard and I'm not sure I want to do that again, but I would be willing to, I feel like. 

Lately, I've just been thinking about what it would be like to be done. To have the kids we have and not have more. And honestly, I like it. 

We could take all the kids to Disneyland while Ashtyn is still young enough for it to be magical, but Rylee was old enough to get something out of it. I could focus on homeschooling and not push through it while pregnant (with less energy/time) and not juggle homeschool and a newborn. I know exactly how I'd set up their rooms while they were young (they'll probably make changes as they get older) and Ben and I could really start travelling without trying to fit that in between pregnancies and nursing (the main reason we haven't traveled more yet). 

Honestly, a lot of that sounds appealing. Plus the fact that having children is hard and a lot of work. Babies are a lot of work. Pregnancy and labor and lack of sleep after is hard. Maybe we just need a break, since we've had our kids pretty close together so far, but my midwife is retiring at the end of 2020 and I don't know that I want to have babies without her; that would be really hard. 

But then I think, are those good reasons? Do I just want to avoid the work and pain of more children? I hope not. I don't want to stop unless Ben and I and the Lord all know that we're done and our family is complete. 

So, I'm in limbo. I'm not sure what we're going to do or what's in our future and that's an uncomfortable thing for me. 

I guess we'll have to wait and see.