New Things

I'm reveling today in the thoughts of the new life Christ gives. I love that in His plan He gives a new day with fresh potential. We're making a fresh start this week in many areas of our lives.

In schooling we are forging ahead with a new schedule and a new way to organize our materials. I hope to have my first-ever-tutorial up in a couple of days all about the fabric wall pockets like these that I made to help organize our days. Today was the first day of our new schedule and it worked out so well. I'm confident it will keep the kids on track and keep me accountable to be prepared for each day. I really don't want to just create a public school at home feel, and have been accomplishing the work we needed to do, but a schedule give me the peace of mind that we are progressing and that there is some order to this crazy place. Our schedule is made with room to be flexible and I think even the kids were surprised at how much we all got done today, before lunch, just by starting half-an-hour earlier and staying focussed on the tasks at hand.

In the efforts to have a clean (enough) house we've established some new routines for keeping up with dishes, laundry and other housekeeping tasks. I plan to get up earlier for a quiet moment in God's Word, begin the day with an empty dishwasher and a tidied house. Then I want to make sure that the dishwasher is empty and the kitchen counters are clean when I begin dinner prep. That little bit of amazing wisdom comes straight from Auntie Leila over at Like Mothers, Like Daughters. I only wish she were my aunt in real life.

"how fair the realm imagination opens to the view,"

- from L.M. Montgomery's Anne of Avonlea.

Sometimes I just want to run away! The daily household chores are truly never ending and I'm not sure if I'll ever measure up to the standard I wish to attain. I must admit that my imagination has grown dusty from lack of use recently, and pretending the dishes and laundry are done is definitely not productive. Instead of feeling sorry for myself I may need to dust off that imagination and dream a bit.
The idea of visualization gets a bad rap in the light of new age religions. But what if it was turned to better use? Can visualizing myself as a diligent, happy neat-freak change my lazy habits? No, but visualizing myself taking an active part in becoming who Christ wants me to be may put me on the right path with the right attitude.
In his book Talent is Never Enough, John Maxwell writes, "You have to believe in yourself and what you're doing. You have to be able to see yourself doing it with your mind's eye. If you can't imagine it, you probably will not be able to achieve it." This makes me feel like saying 'I can imagine myself living every moment purposefully. I can imagine us successfully homeschooling.' Imagining myself living life to the fullest, as Christ wants me to is definitely a worthwhile exercise. And I'd have to admit that the perspective that comes from looking on the positive side of things is a much, much better view.