I'm beginning to rethink Sweet Potato's Sunday nights. She has life groups where part of the time they are in a big mass of teens all eating what ever is for dinner in the commons at church. The other part is when they get together in age appropriate groups and talk about what ever five 6th graders would talk about while a leader keeping tabs.
I do like the life groups because Sweet Potato is so accepted and loved on. I don't like it because Mondays are so difficult when she goes to life groups the night before. By the time we get home get her medications, vesting, snack, water, and bed time ritual were pushing 10 pm... then the inevitable chatting with sister all about how great her friends at church are. Many is the night I'm the heavy sneaking up to the door waiting till they are chatting full on... I swing open the door and quietly say "Girls... don't make me have to send you to bed 30 minutes early tomorrow." In that ominous parenting tone. I always do my best to sound like my father used to. I have to hold my giggles till I get back to my room.
Mondays after life groups are so awful when she doesn't get enough sleep. Her brain is in S...L...O..W Motion. Her school can easily last from 9am -7pm. While her sister with (no extensions) takes from 9am-12pm max. If I send her to her room to do her work she gets "distracted" from the toys/legos/DSI. She at least looks like she is doing her work if she is at the kitchen table. It seems every time I plan on watching a netflix movie in the afternoon she dawdles through school. Its like she knows what my plan is!
I could tell she was off in la la land today when she finally got to DITHOR Sweet Potato narrated to me from her Chapter in Narnia novel Voyage of the Dawn Treader after reading 3 pages of her chapter... and claiming she read it all. She finish reading the last 2 pages of her chapter to me and told me it was a scary green island scene where Edmond the dragon kills the sea serpent. (That is what happened in the movie not at all near what happens on Goldwater Island.) It was all I could to to keep a straight face. While she was sot in the corner for deception, she read the chapter in it's entirety.
Part of me kicks against the goads on days like this, part of me knows I just need to hang on and next week will be better. Last week I was feeling icky and my kiddos did fabulous. School was completed by 1pm and we watched lots of Man vs Wild, and got grossed out while learning valuable life saving skills on survival. Who knew you could eat scorpions! (high Ick factor tho). Of course last week I felt Icky on Sunday night and didn't take her to life groups... am I the only one spotting this pattern?
Update: I was on the right track http://nymag.com/news/features/38951/ This home work made me shift lots of stuff so my kids can sleep MORE!
My son is also a zombie on Mondays because he is out at youth group on Sunday evenings. Like you, I tell myself it's important - that time of fellowship and interacting with other teens is vital. I have tried to schedule a little less for our Mondays. Since CTC is a 4 days/week curriculum, we postpone some of assignments, usually science and part of the Language Arts to be completed on Day 5. Probably too confusing for some, but it has made our Mondays a little more manageable. Never a perfect day though :)
ReplyDeleteAndrea
Well 6 weeks later I have totally revamped my School Schedule. I had this as Homework http://nymag.com/news/features/38951/ Really Opened my eyes to the need for Sleep! I shifted to a slightly later start time. I also have moved our Free Day to Wednesdays because Wednesday we already had a late start due to our Prayer Meeting (that the kids never get to bed before 10pm.)
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