A peek into our morning + an awesome morning recipe!

I've been asked many times how our typical  mornings go, so I decided to  give you a peek into one of them.

First of all, we do not have alarm clocks at our home.....our wonderful 2  and 4 year old children serve the purpose very well since no matter how  little of a nap or how late they stay up, both wake up at a pretty  consistent time of 7:00 to 7:30.   Between the two of them, they persist in making  enough noise that our older two are awake by 8:00 and then have until  9:30 to eat, get dressed, and do their chores (one yearly assigned chore  as well as one I see that needs to be done)

Chores consist of a variety of things in our house..... dishwasher duty, sweeping, laundry duty, washing bathroom sinks and counters, and cleaning windows and mirrors to name a few.  One thing I have learned to do is that when our children reach the age of five, they then proceed to have an assigned chore for a year that is done on a daily basis.   During the summer when they don't have their schoolwork to do, they  then "train" a younger sibling to do this chore so the younger sibling  is ready to do it in the fall.  At the moment, my ten year old is in charge of our dishwasher (unloading and loading) and my seven year old  is in charge of the dryer (folding and delivering clean piles of clothes  to rooms).  Even though they were both excited at getting these chores  in the beginning, they are now both looking forward to June to pass on  their chore! We do it this way because for one, it gets confusing  in assigning these chores on a daily or weekly basis and two, I have  learned that it teaches a great deal of responsibility and pride in  getting a job done well.

By 9:30, morning duties are done by all, and we settle in for our  schoolwork.  The little ones go to the play area for a bit and I start  the older two on math and language arts.  They each have responsibility  to get done any copywork or worksheets they are able to do while I am  teaching a lesson to the other so we can get the work done quickly.  I  have little learning games for the preschoolers or they paint or color  when they are through with playtime.

By 11:30 or 12:00, we are ready for lunch.  After that, we have our  devotion, read-aloud time along with our history and science.  Special  days contain art, Spanish, or cooking.

After this, everyone goes to their rooms for "rest" time for an  hour.....little ones take a nap and big kids get to lay in their beds and have their own personal devotion plus read, journal, or draw.  Even  though this seems like a long time for these activities, I've found it clears everyone's head and gives each of them time in a favored learning activity.

Our afternoons are spent in learning activities or play as long as they  have finished their schoolwork that morning.  So, for the most part,  this is a typical day for us when we do not have fellow homeschoolers over which we do once to twice a week.  On those days, my older two have  agreed to do their school later in the afternoon so they can have  playtime or special history or science learning time with their friends.

And since I am a huge fan of cooking, I always try to have a tasty treat  when we have visitors.  Muffins are a favorite over here and this is one of  the tastiest versions I have found....soooo moist and delicious!  I  found this on allrecipes.com  and substituted strawberry yogurt for the plain since it was what I had on hand, but it didn't seem to matter.....these were gobbled up by that afternoon!

Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins
Ingredients:
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup plain yogurt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup mashed ripe bananas (about two medium)
3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips
Directions:
In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. In another bowl, combine the egg, oil, yogurt and vanilla.  Stir into dry ingredients just until moistened. Fold in bananas and  chocolate chips. Fill greased or paper-lined muffin cups two-thirds  full. Bake at 350 degrees for 22-25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool for 5 minutes before removing from pans to wire racks

Hope you enjoy these as much as we did!!