11. Keeping the Kids Busy While You Work! Our Tips!

We share the simple routine that lets two full-time parents homeschool three kids without chaos, and we get honest about the social tradeoffs and timing that make it possible. Expect practical rhythms, age-specific advice, and tools that keep kids learning all day without living on screens.

• why the switch worked during a busy work week
• curriculum fit and keeping lessons short and focused
• the role of age in independence and responsibility
• morning checklist, rotating breakfasts, and light chores
• outdoor-first routine and stocking the yard for play
• replacing tablets with independent play and movement
• quiet reading time and building up to longer stretches
• Outschool, piano apps, laundry habits, and active games
• using weekends and early hours to protect deep work
• clear boundaries for interruptions and noise
• co-op and art class to widen community
• navigating friendship shifts and real tradeoffs

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Transcript

Welcome & Why We Switched

SPEAKER_02 0:00

We have a specific list of things for them to do. And I think that is the secret to making all this work is to keep them busy. We are two full-time working parents who just made a crazy decision.

SPEAKER_00 0:16

After four years in public school, we're homeschooling our three kids and documenting the whole thing.

SPEAKER_02 0:22

Never in a million years did I think we would be homeschool people.

SPEAKER_00 0:26

Welcome to, well, this wasn't the plan podcast.

SPEAKER_01 0:30

I'm slate, and school's in the kitchen now. I'm Scotty. We just start when I say so. I'm Sailor, and this whole podcast is my idea.

SPEAKER_00 0:45

This podcast is our real-time journey, unexpectedly juggling homeschool, jobs, parenting, and everything in between.

SPEAKER_02 0:53

Follow along each week as we document how it's going and share the good, the bad, and the ugly. Because we know some days are going to be ugly, and we're not holding back.

SPEAKER_00 1:04

We're learning to expect the unexpected. So let's get into it.

Workload Spike, Homeschool Still Works

SPEAKER_02 1:08

Let's go. We survived another week of homeschooling.

SPEAKER_00 1:15

We did it. We did a good job. It was a hard one.

SPEAKER_02 1:19

It was a crazy week just because of work, not because homeschooling was terrible. Just work. We have our last deadline of the year and we've been working a lot more.

SPEAKER_00 1:29

No, and in fact, it was actually pretty nice, to be honest, because several of the days went really smoothly and the lessons just happened to be short. Some days are shorter than others, and it worked out well considering we were busier with work. So that was nice.

Curriculum Fit: The Good and the Beautiful

SPEAKER_02 1:45

Yeah, well, this is like the part I think that I was most scared of was just when work picked up, like what are we gonna do? How is it gonna go? Are we gonna be able to get through it? Are we gonna be too stressed and regretting our decision or what? And this week was definitely one of those where we had a ton of work to do. But homeschooling itself has been really easy now. We're super into the good and the beautiful, we know what we're doing, the kids know what they're doing, and they usually just get started right away, they know what to do. So even Scotty is opening up her book to the right page, like looking over it, and you know, she's sick. So her lessons usually take no like 30 minutes maybe to get through all of her stuff. She's picking it up really quickly, and then the other two, they know the drill, and they know that once they get done, you know, we can do other things.

SPEAKER_00 2:40

And there's even been times now because some of the days have been shorter, that both of the older two have wanted to go on to do like extra work. Sailor was wanting to do extra mental math and say wanted to move on to the next lesson, and I was I didn't let them I don't know if it would hurt or not. I don't know. We have a s should we just have a system we're doing?

SPEAKER_02 3:00

And I don't think it would hurt, but we were like eager to get back to work and get things finished up. But yeah, I love that they are loving it and that it's not hard to get them to do it.

SPEAKER_00 3:11

So I know that there's some point at which your brain stops absorbing the new information. I don't know that one more lesson would have been the straw that broke the camel's back, but I'm just kind of like, well, I don't know, we're just gonna stick to the plan.

SPEAKER_02 3:24

So yeah, sticking to the plan is good.

SPEAKER_00 3:26

Go do something else. If you want to learn something else, if you want to keep learning, then let's learn something different, yeah.

Ages Matter and Managing Expectations

SPEAKER_02 3:32

For sure. So I would say now that we're into using the good and the beautiful, like we're good. Like this curriculum works for us. So that I get that question all the time: what curriculum we're using? And I just think that it's so dependent on what you need. This one is working for us, but we also have other things that we are using that help us. So that's what this episode is all about. We try to base these off of things that we're getting on like my Instagram post, all of the questions. So the most common question this week was just like, how do you work with the kids homeschooling? But most importantly, what are the kids doing while you're working? So I think that we have a few tips to give on that if you are gonna be trying that. So that's what today's episode is all about.

SPEAKER_00 4:22

And not all of the tips will work for everyone, but some of the tips will work for just about everybody.

Morning Rhythm: Lists, Breakfast, Chores

SPEAKER_02 4:28

And I keep getting people asking about how old the kids are and especially, yeah, what are they doing to entertain themselves, all of that? And I just want to say first and foremost, two years ago, one year ago, this we couldn't have made this happen. All of this can happen because of our kids' ages. And they are six, seven, and ten, and they can do things on their own, they can have some responsibilities on their own and things like that. So this does not apply to you if you have like a three and a four-year-old. My advice to you on that would be to continue sending them to school while they're that age. If that's the boat you're in, most people that were asking me about that, their kids were in school and they were ready to pull them. And I think that that would be really hard to do. We wouldn't have been able to do it.

SPEAKER_00 5:20

If you're both working, right.

SPEAKER_02 5:22

Yeah, and that's what these are working parents that were trying to. So my advice to anyone considering it and going to work, whether you're working from home or whatever you're doing, is to just wait until they get a little bit older because that really is a secret sauce to making all of this work while you're working. They have other things to do. So let's talk about that.

SPEAKER_00 5:42

It is funny because that's literally the opposite of what everyone else thinks. They're like, oh, like keep your kid home until they're five or six and then send them to school for the next 12 years. And you're like the exact opposite.

Screen Habits and Independent Play

SPEAKER_02 5:54

Yeah. Well, I just think that time in their life is it's really hard. And they really thrive on being busy and they thrive being social with the other kids. They do learn a lot. All those like really great things about school, that is really good for them when they're that age. And they're not picking up all the bad stuff, like all the bad negative things we talk about, the school system here, we're not really saying that for like kindergarten and down. We're saying that for like things that we experienced once they got a little bit older. So if you're getting all of the good with very little bad other than probably too many viruses that you don't want, but that also builds our immune system. So having really young kids, this wouldn't have worked for us. I'm not saying that someone couldn't make it work, but we couldn't have done it. We would be pulling our hair out. And when they were that age, we were, because they're all three so close in age, it was hard. Even just to work and take them to school and daycare. But beyond the age, so if your kids are similar in ages than ours, these are some things that we do that I feel like make it completely doable. And we've talked about this before, but we get up and work every single day in the morning. So we do get a big chunk of that done. And a lot of that is when they're sleeping. But we do wake them up at nine o'clock or they have their alarm go off at nine o'clock so that they can get up and get the day going. Because we do have a lot of things that we need to accomplish in the day. But right when they wake up, we have a specific list of things for them to do. And I think that is the secret to making all this work is to keep them busy. And the other thing was people assuming that they're sitting on like a tablet. And a lot of people saying that when they work, the only way that they can get their kids to behave and be quiet is to get them a tablet. So our kids already weren't on tablets, and I'm not saying the tablets are like the end of the world or they're the devil or anything like that, but if your kid is not used to being on a tablet, then they are more inclined to play, do things on their own, find things to do. And that's kind of where we started. Our kids we took the tablets away when they were younger. It was not working for us, it was affecting their behavior, their moods. It was a fight every day. So we took them away and they've been without them for years. So they actually can entertain themselves very well already. So starting out, I feel like that gives you a really good place to start.

SPEAKER_00 8:29

And I think that's important if you're going to be on this kind of like two to three hour of core curriculum schedule, because the whole point is that kids learn all day or they should be learning all day, but it doesn't have to be math, science, history, whatever. Those are important, and we spend the time to get what we need to get from those, but they're learning so many other things throughout the day. But I don't, they're probably not if they're sitting on a tablet. I mean, unless if it's a homeschool curriculum on a tablet or something like that. But if they're just, you know, watching TV on the tablet, they're not really going to be learning anything. So that's important. I don't want them to just learn for those two hours that they're sitting with us doing school. I want them learning those other hours, whether that's, you know, Sailor Made Eggs the other day. She learned how to do that without any supervision, or whether they go outside and learn things, just learn about making friends and playing games and stuff. I mean, all of that is a part of it.

Outdoor Setup and Self-Directed Options

SPEAKER_02 9:28

And it's important that you kind of build that stuff into their day to keep them busy. So I think having a daily rhythm to tell them what they're gonna do, what time they're gonna do it, and what are the most important things that get done in the day, I think that is so important because that's the kind of structure that kids get at school that actually is good for kids. People say, oh, like if you're homeschooling your kids, like why are you waking them up at this specific time or something? Well, there's been a lot of research shown that kids actually thrive with a good routine. So we're not like hounding them, oh, it's like 9.07, like you got to be doing this or this, but they have a list of things that need to be done before we start homeschooling. So what that is for them, and that could work a lot of different ways. It could, you know, however your situation is, you can set that up for what you think they could be doing those hours. So our kids get up, they have breakfast, we have a set menu that's set up, and it just says like, Monday we're having this, Tuesday we're having this. And that seems maybe a little type A, but the reason is I don't want them going in and eating cereal or a waffle every day. You know, we want to have something different, but I also want them being able to prepare it. So on Sunday nights, we all sit down and we make the list so they know what's what they're supposed to be having for breakfast. So they go make their breakfast. It's all pretty easy stuff, even though, like you said, sailors have been making eggs some mornings. They have been learning to cook, which has been really nice. So, like you said, they are learning stuff during that time.

SPEAKER_00 11:09

Right. Simple things and Sailor Made Scrambled Eggs, they make you know the microwave chicken sausages, the breakfast sausages like that, toast and yes, waffles or sometimes yogurt with granola and blueberries. Oatmeal. Yeah, oatmeal.

School Block, Lunch, Quiet Reading

SPEAKER_02 11:24

Just kind of like store things, you know, for kids. So they start off making breakfast. Now, our six-year-old does have our 10-year-old in there helping. So that's why this works. So they get their breakfast done. They have morning chores that have to be done, and they have to get ready for the day. So just getting dressed, getting shoes on to go outside, getting their teeth brushed, all of those things. And they have a checklist. Those all have to be done before 10 o'clock whenever they move to the next thing. So they have like an hour to do those things. It's not a lot of chores. We are not abusing our children. They have a morning tour and there's a list and it says, Okay, Monday, here's your chore. So pretty easy. They stay pretty busy during that time that we're working from six to ten.

SPEAKER_00 12:13

Right. Just to be clear, as you know, the children do about 10% of the chores, split between three kids, and the other 90% are still done by Taryn and myself.

SPEAKER_02 12:24

So had a lot of hate on Instagram about our kids doing chores because we're ruining their childhood. I firmly disagree. But if chores don't work for you, have something. Do they in the morning, do they play Legos? Do they do art? What is something that you can tell them that, okay, this is what you will be doing while at work? That's the whole purpose. Then we like to get them outside first thing in the morning so they know that once all those things have been done, they go outside. And a lot of mornings that's us going with them to the park, we walk, things like that. But if for some reason Carson had a call or I had a meeting, something came up where we couldn't go out, they're still going outside. They can go outside without us. We do like to get out and go for a walk with them, but they're very capable of playing without us. So if you have a backyard and you're like, okay, at 10, you're gonna go out for basically for recess. Like that also keeps them busy so that they know what is expected of them at that time.

Piano Apps, Laundry, and Active Gaming

SPEAKER_00 13:27

Set yourself up for success in that area by making sure you have things for them to do outside. I mean, they can't just stand in your backyard and spin a circle. You know, you're gonna need to might need to invest some money or some some man hours in putting together something or getting basketballs, basketball goals or swing sets, trampolines, you know, whatever, things that that will keep your kids occupied outside.

SPEAKER_02 13:52

Yeah, now that they're older, we have purchased some skateboards and skates. They have bicycles, they have scooters. We have a ton of outside stuff for them to do, but when they were younger, I made them a little chart that just said, here's like ideas for you to play with outside. And it was chalk, it was a jump rope, it was they had a little scooter then. We had all these little things that they could do.

SPEAKER_00 14:16

Hoo hoops and skippets.

Building a Full Workday and Weekends

SPEAKER_02 14:17

Yeah, hoo hoops, skippets, all these things. And I just had like a little thing that they could look at if they were like, I don't know what to do. And it would remind them, okay, like this is a good idea, I can do it. So yeah, you gotta get creative, but they also have to know that getting outside, moving your body, you know, getting vitamin D, all that is important. So that's what our kids do next before they do school. So obviously we have to break to do school. We all stop and do it together and we just split it up. It takes us about two hours, and then we're done for the day with school. So the biggest question is what do they do the rest of the day? What happens after you do school? Well, we have lunch. We have lunch at like the same time frame every single day. Everyone cleans up after lunch, and then they have like quiet time. And that's when we generally will get back to work if we need to. And we have needed to a lot this past week. We've worked quite a bit beyond that four hours in the morning. So they have to go read for 30 minutes, so that's kind of like mandatory quiet time. They go to their room and they read, which is outside of their schooling. So we just want to make sure that they have 30 minutes. Then they have some other things that we're checking off the list in the afternoon, but for the most part, I would say afternoons are pretty much free play until we have to start sports and activities. So that usually puts us about like two o'clock. And, you know, if it's not a time where we're busy and we need to do more work, like we have a lot of hours to go do something as a family or whatever. Like there's so many things. But this week, and I'm sure all throughout tax season, we're going to need that time to get more stuff done. So here's a couple of other things that they do when we're working. One of those is Slate and Scotty, I guess, have been taking piano lessons and it's on an app called Simply Piano.

SPEAKER_00 16:25

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 16:25

Yeah. So those are like 15, 20 minute lessons that they do every day, just a little bit every day. Slate will do that after he reads. So he does it most every day. Scotty does it whenever she feels like it. They can do that while we are finishing up emails and stuff. I just help get them set up. And then in the afternoon, a lot of times they're finishing up some of their chores. They each have a laundry day. So, like Sailors is Monday, Slate's Tuesday, like that. And if they put their laundry in in the morning, then in the afternoon they're just folding it and putting it away. So they've got that. And then we also have what's called a playground, which is like an active video game system. And in Texas, it's been like ridiculously hot in the afternoons. So that's something that we allow them to do once all important things have been done. Because when they're done playing that, they are exhausted. If you haven't seen it, it's like the only video game system that I will allow, but it's all played standing up. So once everything's been done, like afternoon chores, their lessons, lunch, everything like that, their reading, they will usually go play on the playground or play in their rooms.

SPEAKER_00 17:41

So Yeah, it that's a good one. The next playground, it's a very good activity for them. The lightest activity on there is probably equivalent to, you know, a light walk or a yoga, but I mean, some of them are very intense. I mean, with my heart rate up at, you know, like high intensity interval training levels whenever I do some of those games with the kids. So there's I mean, they jump and and then crouch on the ground and then jump again and and just like slash their arms for the Ninja Turtles game. It's it's a lot of exercise and it's a lot of fun.

Outschool and Nurturing Interests

SPEAKER_02 18:12

Yeah, it's very active. There's no talking to strangers on the internet. They can't talk to anybody on the chats. It's only played with you and the people in your household. It's multiplayer, it's great for all ages. It's awesome. So if there's a day where we need to work more, then they can play that once everything's been done. And then after that, it's like activity start in the afternoon. The kids have gymnastics, or Slate has swim or they'll have basketball, all those things. All the kids in the neighborhood get home. So that's when kids start coming to our house and showing up to play. So really that is their day. And they are very busy until about two o'clock, depending on the day, what they do. And so that gives us time because we could start working a little bit before two till at least four. Then some days we need to like be getting them places. But if not, that gives us an extra two hours. So that's six hours there that we could work very easily most days. And then usually the days that like you're still needing to get stuff done, like I could take them to whatever sports and activities that day so you could finish up work. So it actually does give us a full work day. And if you are a parent who works and has your kids in school, you know you don't ever get a full work day. You don't. You don't get a full six or eight hours to sit and work by the time you drop them off and then have to go back to the pickup line and all of the things. So it is really nice to have that time because I think that when you haven't been doing both, it's hard to compare. But we saw it's just because you send your kids to school doesn't mean you have all of these work hours. There's a lot of extra work on you. So being able to do it this way and get that time in, it's it's been really nice for us.

SPEAKER_00 20:12

So and don't forget about the weekends. That's how we're getting a lot of our extra time in. I know to some people it sounds bleak to say, oh, I have to work seven days a week then. And but we've found that we kind of enjoy, you know, working with it spread out like that. And I'm already used to waking up to go work at six, and it's actually better for your body to wake up at the same time every day. It's better for your circadian rhythm. So we're up anyway. The kids are gonna sleep until nine anyway. So now, if that's usually when you go for like your long run or some other things that are good for your physical or mental health, I mean, sure, keep doing those. But for us, we found that, you know, that was time that we weren't gonna be with our family because they're asleep and we weren't going to be doing anything else productive. So getting, you know, four hours on Saturday and four hours on Sunday of work before the rest of the house is awake is actually really helpful. Takes some of the stress and pressure off from the weekdays.

Quiet Time That Actually Works

Co-op, Art Class, and Flexible Afternoons

SPEAKER_02 21:09

Yeah, if you're new, if you're new here and this is the first time you're listening, we do work six to ten every day most mostly. And that's really just because we can get those extra hours in really easily. And like you said, we're already up. If you want to do it Monday through Friday, and you're old like us, your body's just gonna wake you up. So a lot of times that's just responding to some emails, especially if we're not super busy at work, but it makes us feel like we aren't behind. I feel caught up. Another thing that our kids are really loving that I wanted to share helps if you have weeks like we had this week where you just need some extra time, or you can just do it every week. We love it so much. It's called Out School. And what it is, is it's an online school, and you can pick from hundreds of subjects. And when you pick the subject, it's like let's say every Tuesday at two o'clock, you pick your subject. So it's an actual class that you show up to, and we tried it out. Our kids absolutely love it. And right now they're all doing drawing classes. Sailor's doing a Spanish class, so it's just something that they can do for an hour and they can learn something that they're very excited about learning. I didn't pick like science or history or something like that that might be boring. I just let them pick. And now Slate, he probably would want to do a science class, and that's completely fine. But they all picked drawing. They love to draw, and it's just a live teacher in a live class. So they sit down, it's very small. There's like usually one to like four kids on there, and they sit down and they teach them how to do something they want to do. There's Lego classes, there's book clubs, there's so many fun things. And that's something that really does hold their attention and that they look forward to doing. And I put them on that in my office, and I sit down and get some more work done. So that has been really, really nice.

SPEAKER_00 23:17

They really like it, and there's so many good subjects on there, and it's amazing how good they're drawing already.

SPEAKER_02 23:24

Yeah, Sailor, she's the oldest and she's always really been into art, but it's really hard to like nurture those things that they love when you're in school. There's not enough.

SPEAKER_00 23:35

Neither one of us are artists.

Boundaries During Work Hours

SPEAKER_02 23:37

Right. But but also if if you want them to get better at something like that, whether it's piano or art, something like that, that's not a core subject, there's a very limited time in your day. So, of course, if she was doing volleyball, like where are we gonna fit in art? So this is actually awesome. You can do it even if you don't homeschool. You can just do it for things like art. We're basically paying for art lessons for her, but we don't have to leave our house. And so she's doing like an older kid's everything's based on age. So she's doing like an older kid's drawing and she's doing pencil drawings, and she's getting really good. And it's just something that she's been asking for forever, but we've just never really been able to do that. We've never been able to let her take art. So now she wants to take art every day. We're not gonna pay for it every day. But she looks forward to it and she reminds me. And that's how I know with my ADHD kids that she really loves something because she reminds me that it's coming up. So Out School has been amazing for that. And if you wanted to do something on the tablet or on a computer, you know, there are things like that out there that could buy you an extra hour or something. I think what's most important here is to give your kids a set routine and keep them busy. That's how we do it. We did talk a little bit about our kids having quiet reading time, but we've always done like a quiet hour since they were little when they stopped napping. We needed a break from them. So they're really good at doing quiet times. I think that if your kids aren't great at that yet, give them some ideas. Say every day we're gonna have quiet time where you can do a quiet activity. Usually we split our kids up because they need to be alone. But we sometimes let them do it together if it's something they want to do. But that's just like get them some puzzles, some audiobooks, something to draw. Like think of things like that that they would like and say, like, this is your time to do your audiobooks, this is your time to do your puzzles, your your Lego building, that type of things. Definitely, if you're trying to work and homeschool, build in a quiet hour. If your kids are a little bit older, like our kids could definitely do a quiet two hours, no problem. But that is something that I think a lot of people don't think of, and you can build up to it. Like start with 30 minutes and just build that time and they'll get better at it.

SPEAKER_00 26:05

And let them pick from a m multitude of activities, and then they won't feel like it's a punishment, you know, because sometimes I think kids feel like that if you're like, you have to go sit in your room for an hour and read. And that that sounds like a punishment.

Friendship Shifts and Social Tradeoffs

SPEAKER_02 26:18

But yeah, it's just getting working up to it and practicing because now the kids will come to me and I'll be like, hey, dad and I need to finish up some work. And Scotty will say, Can I paint on the back porch? And I'm like, sure, it's just watercolor. She goes and she gets it all set up. She knows that during that time she's got to pick something quiet and she wants to paint, and that's completely fine. Sometimes she'll go get a Lego out. Sometimes they'll want to play a little board game together. But the thing is them knowing what they can do during that time. So first just tell them what they can do, and then you'll quickly see them be able to take over that themselves and build up more time that they can do alone. Now there are a few days where there are different things. We don't homeschool on Fridays, the kids go to co-op, so that day our schedule looks completely different. But the beauty is we still do get to work in the morning, so that's nice. And they have art class all together on Tuesdays, which I take them to. That's just something that we're trying out. We didn't know like how much we wanted in our week to pull them from school and then to like have nothing. So we we tried art this semester and they are really loving it. So they have like a teacher. I drop them off for an hour, and that's usually in the afternoons when Carson takes client meetings, which works out because our house is quiet.

SPEAKER_01 27:36

Right.

SPEAKER_02 27:37

And I can get the kids out of the house and he can continue to work. So I feel like we've got pretty creative on how we can get as much work done as possible without having to stay up like super late and do work. But obviously that's an option. If that does have to happen for some reason, we could work later in the evening.

SPEAKER_00 27:57

Yes, but I don't want to.

SPEAKER_02 27:59

No, we don't like to. I think probably because we're getting older and our work is very like brain heavy, it's really hard to get back to it once you've been working since 6 a.m.

SPEAKER_00 28:09

Yeah. Takes me twice as long to do stuff late at night.

unknown 28:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:12

And that's it, it probably just depends on your job. There's been so many people message me telling me, oh, my husband and I make it work and I'm a nurse, or my husband and I wake at work and I work at a big business, or like a he's a firefighter, all of these things. So I'm really it's really amazing to see how people are making this work. And hopefully this episode gave you some ideas on how you could keep your kids occupied during the day so that you can get some extra work done. And then I do think that setting really clear boundaries is really important. If you're gonna try to do this, you do. And we've had some problems with this the last couple of months and a few days where the kids did respect the boundaries, and we had to like really talk about it again and focus on it. But, you know, what can they do if they need you during work time? Who can they talk to? When are you done? Our kids know we work till 10. They also know that they cannot come bother us until 10 unless it's an emergency or they absolutely need something. But also they know that if they're gonna bug anyone, they need to bug me because you're usually on a phone call.

SPEAKER_00 29:20

Right. And if they're being loud, especially during the times when I might be on the phone, then they will have earned some additional outside time that they get to enjoy, which coincides with the remainder of my on-the-phone time.

SPEAKER_02 29:31

So yes, I do have to kick them out sometimes in the mornings, but it's getting less and less that I have to do that. They will just get into the kitchen, they'll be like laughing and loud and goofy, and I've had to remind them a lot like, hey, dad's on a phone call. But that's literally one hour. I'm like, guys, it's one hour that I'm asking you to just keep it down.

SPEAKER_00 29:55

Or go outside and be loud as you want.

Pros, Cons, and Choosing Your Hard

SPEAKER_02 29:57

Yeah. And so we do have a patio to Table on the back porch that they can go eat at in the mornings if they're being super loud or if they want to be crazy, so free to eat out there. But setting these boundaries, I think it's really it can be hard, but it's so important because they everybody has to work together to make this work. Like they have to know that your job is important. They have to know that that is going to happen every single day, and knowing like a time frame is really good too, so that they can know what to expect during that time. Well, there was one other thing that I wanted to mention because I had a couple people message me about this, and then it was something that I saw this week. We have two homes and we were at our other one for a while visiting Carson's family, and we just came back to be around my family. It's a very weird setup, but we are back on the family compound. And our kids for the first time were around like their cousins and their friends they went to school with. And I do think that that part was a little bit hard for them, which was the reason we weren't here when school started, just because that can be hard, you know, especially if you're pulling your kids out of school, it's a big change. And someone messaged me saying that that happened to their kid. And they're like, Do you have any advice on if your kids feeling like missing their friends, like not wanting to go back to school, but missing their friends, feeling left out? And I definitely saw that with my oldest today and this weekend. And I didn't really have any advice to give. My only, my only advice was just like, like anything in life that's hard, you just kind of have to write it out, right? We have to find our new normal. And for years we've been doing the school thing, and this is still very new to us. We are still the weird people. There's a lot of people in my family who still think that we're very strange for doing this and don't agree with it. And we just need to see it through. We just need to continue letting the relationships grow with the people that are homeschooled and even let our kids like let it sink into them, you know? They're used, they have had it the same schedule for years. They've been doing the same things at school, like kind of the same routine throughout the year with homecoming and this season next, and then grandparents stay at school, and now they're not. All of a sudden, they don't have any of that. Everything is new, and that can be hard. And I think that's just it. It's hard. And they don't want to go back to school, but that doesn't mean that they're not feeling left out and they're not feeling like they're the weirdos, you know. Sometimes, well, anytime you're doing something that not everybody else is doing, it's hard. And it's a hard lesson to learn.

Closing, Fan Mail, and Reviews

SPEAKER_00 32:50

Yeah, it can be. I think it can be hard, but I think that going through hard things can also be a learning experience. And sometimes you have to learn that when you walk away from something, not every part about it was bad, but you walked away from something that wasn't working. And you have to give up the good things along with that. And that's the that's the reality of life that goes along with anything. So it's it's a hard lesson to learn, but it's an important one. And I think as you go through it and when you look back, you'll realize that, well, yes, there were a few good things I had to give up, but there were so many more good things that I got out of this change.

SPEAKER_02 33:29

Yeah, that is such an important life lesson. I think I didn't learn too long ago that when you're making decisions, you know, I'm the typical like make a pro and con list person. There is always good and bad in both decisions. There is never a decision you're gonna make where it's crystal clear on what is the best option. Because there are things that we loved about school. It's just the good for us didn't outweigh the bad. So there's so many things that the kids did love about school, but we love homeschooling. Wouldn't it be way easier if it was just black and white? Or you were like, yep, this one is right and this one is the best, and this one has no cons, only pros. But it never is like that. When you're making a decision, I think that's why it's so hard because you're kind of sick to your stomach about, well, it all makes sense except maybe these two things.

SPEAKER_00 34:24

And you do have the two options. I mean, you can try to force the situation a little bit and try to, you know, if you're still in the same town, the same sports, a lot of it, you can try to force the situation and try to keep those friendships, and you might be able to, especially if they're involved in things outside of school together. But if not, then it it might not be realistic and you might just have to kind of face a hard truth on that and be like, yeah, they're, you know, not all friendships last for forever.

SPEAKER_02 34:56

Yeah, and I mean our daughter is 10 and the grand scheme of things, she's not that old. And I think it's just hard for her, especially to see her friends, and it's been a few months, and then they're like, oh, like, how's homeschooling going? You know, they don't know that much about it. So to her, it seems very important. But as adults, we know that she will make new friends, she will find her new groove, she will find her new people, and she just has to give it time. But it's hard. I mean, I can totally relate and I can see why that could be the hardest thing about it, because there are a lot of kids now asking to be homeschooled, but this is probably not something that they think about when they want to make that decision.

SPEAKER_00 35:42

Yeah. And it's something that you should tell them before, I think, because Well, we did, but they don't they just don't grasp it. Yeah, I mean, we did. I'm just saying I think that you should tell them before because, you know, then that's even if even if you're not giving them a choice, even if you've you've just because we gave our kids a choice, but even if you decided that that's what you're doing, then you should still tell them like this is a part of it so that they have a heads up on that.

SPEAKER_02 36:08

Yeah. I do. I mean, I think that just having a heads up is good, but they just can't really fathom what it's gonna be like, you know? Right. It's kind of like starting your life over in a new town. You know, as an adult how hard that is because you have to figure everything out, what your new routines are, but you also have to find like a whole new friend group. And that is hard, really hard. And we are putting in the work and we're making sure it happens for them, but it doesn't happen overnight. She's not gonna have those same relationships in two months that she did with these kids that she went to like pre-K with all the way up to third grade. So I think that's just something that is hard. You definitely don't have a solution to it.

SPEAKER_00 36:53

It's a little easier for us because I mean, she has her cousins on the compound and those have always been her closest friends. And they're they're still here. And so, I mean, we live right next door to them, so it's not like you know, she had her very best friend in the world and now she's never gonna see her again or anything.

SPEAKER_02 37:11

Yeah, they have plenty of people that they're around and so many cousins their ages, which makes this really nice.

SPEAKER_00 37:17

But the cousins are still with those friends from school, and I think that, you know, I'm sure she feels a little bit left out, and not that they're trying to leave Rod, they're just she actually is literally physically left out of the situation from a lot of the things that they're doing.

SPEAKER_02 37:31

Yeah, she's no longer in that group, and I think that has been the hard part. But one, she understands, but doesn't mean that it's not a hard part of all of this because we can sit here all day and say that this is great and we love homeschooling, and all that is true, but it also is true that it's hard to miss your friends, it's hard to have people that don't agree with what you're doing and look at you like you're weirdos, all that. There are a lot of hard things in this. I just hope that with more time, those will kind of fade away and things will get easier. The hard things will get easier.

SPEAKER_00 38:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:09

Well, I think that's all we have for you today. We did have some fan mail, so thank you so much for sending those in. I'm not gonna read all of those because they were just really nice, kind words saying that you found the podcast and that you absolutely loved listening. So we appreciate that. So keep sending those in. If you have a specific question, you can find send a text. That's where you send fan mail.

SPEAKER_00 38:32

Yes, and thank you for those. We really did read them and we really did appreciate them. Some of the words were so nice that I kept looking at the username to see if one of our moms had written it.

SPEAKER_02 38:40

Yeah. We did get some really nice ones. I sent one to Carson at like six in the morning one morning because I was like, this is so nice. Please keep those coming. If you haven't left us a review, we don't have that many. And that is definitely how your podcast gets ranked and it gets pushed out to more people. We don't know how long we'll be doing this podcast. We've committed to a year, but it is growing really quickly. So if you have a minute, if you're on an Apple podcast, all you have to do is scroll down to the bottom and it will say write a review. So if you have a click five stars, too. Yeah, five stars. If you're gonna give us four, just don't even bother. And until next time, thank you so much for listening to Well, this wasn't the plan podcast.

SPEAKER_01 39:25

We will be hot on this podcast.