I have been thinking a lot about our home lately. The state of our home. The cleanliness of our home. The amount of time we spend in our home.
We are reading Little House in the Big Woods as a family and this really struck a chord with me.
What a simple life! Could we ever really be THAT simple? Only one day per week doing laundry? Only one day of cleaning? A day of rest! How relaxing.
So I cleaned the upstairs. Where the kids' rooms are. I gave away many, many things. Some I had to throw away. I think there are now so few toys that it will be hard to make substantial messes. A weight has lifted.
The laundry once a week is a bit easier. Perhaps that is all I was doing anyway (except cloth diapers). But we do always have a huge pile out in the garage. I think giving away or recycling some clothes and turning them into cleaning rags is in order.
This morning my kids asked me why we didn't bake yesterday. It was Saturday after all. I said because we went to the creek for hours and were in the sun all day. By the time we got home I was tired. Really tired.
The big question is should we stay home more? The kids need to be outside and I do not think our tiny backyard is going to cut it...
We are working on finding a balance.
The weather will start to change but really that only means we will be outside more...
I am also starting to think about the upcoming homeschool year. There will not be much change in what we do, but co-op classes will start up, we are enrolling for homeschool P.E. class at the YMCA, I will need to get new binders for the kids' work, art, etc., and maybe a new binder for our pictures.
Here are some pictures from the first meetup for a group I created called the Rainbow Warriors. I'm not sure if the group is going to work in the long run or exactly how it will work. It takes commitment from other families and I'm just not sure how committed other families are. Also, I am almost positive that once school starts (this is not a homeschooling group), involvement will drop. I guess we shall see. I wish everyone was as excited about getting kids (and ourselves!) outside as I am. I see an awesome bird, plant, or insect and take a picture thinking it's the greatest thing ever. But no one else cares. It makes me a little sad I guess.
And here are pictures from my family's trip to the creek yesterday. It was a lot of fun and the water was really nice. We stayed for a long time.
The park was having a program on stream ecology.
After the program, we hung out at the creek for a couple of hours.
We picked up trash. I just cannot understand why someone who enjoys the creek (they spend their time there) would leave garbage everywhere. It doesn't make sense.
We ate.
And we enjoyed ourselves..
The kids made up a game where they sit in the stream and wait for leaves to float to them.
Mirek was so cute. He would get a leaf, let it float away in the water, wave and say "bye bye," then all of sudden run real fast and catch it again. He did this over and over. I could have watched him for hours.
We observed this little guy inch along for some time. Very neat.
And then we headed to check out the Nature Center which is usually closed when we visit.
Maybe our balance is off. Maybe we spend too much time outside of the home. Maybe it is not. Can we ever spend too much time outside? If only our little house was in the big woods...
