Catch Up Day

I like homeschooling. We have a pretty set schedule of doing school 4-5 days a week. But every now and then, I take a Catch Up Day.

This was actually my husband’s idea. (He is where about 75% of my good ideas come from.) I was getting stressed out because I had what felt like 80 little things to do, and it was time to start school. But I can’t just turn off the part of my brain that runs through my to do list. Kind of like how I can’t separate my role of teacher from my role of wife, or mother, or cook, or house cleaner, or any of my other roles. They’re all there in my head.

So as I was looking around, trying to figure out which little task I could fit in the two minutes before we started the day’s lessons, Jesse told me to take the day off. You can do that when you homeschool, you know. So I did. And I felt like I could breathe again.

Catch Up Day has become a way for me to get my house back in order. I walk around the house and return things to their homes. I take care of an extra cleaning project, like wiping off the top of the stove by the buttons, which has been bothering me, but which I haven’t made the time to get to. (It only took me two minutes, by the way).

I fix the stack of books Elizabeth has ripped her way through.  There’s always a stack.  My go-to baby shower gift is now a board book and a roll of packing tape to fix all the non-board books, because all of my kids have gone through this phase!

I try to keep the toys from completely taking over.

photo credit from pexels.com

I enter codes from diaper packaging.

I clean off my desk.

I write letters, fold laundry, go through kid clothes, watch a video I’ve been meaning to get to.

I catch up on one of my favorite tv shows before the episodes expire on Hulu.

My productivity level feeds on crossing things off my mental list, and before I know it, I’ve accomplished quite a bit. It’s good for my house. It’s good for my family. And it’s great for my sanity.