A Brave Writer's Life in Brief

Three tips to fix a rough morning:

1. Feed your child a turkey or almond butter sandwich.

Protein goes a long way toward improving a mood.

2. Move the lesson to the floor.

Create an egalitarian environment where you are both at the same level—the ground.

3. Include the pet (or a favorite toy).

Cuddle the cat, pet the dog, snuggle a baby doll, admire the assembled LEGO kit. Everyone needs a support companion on a rough morning.

This post is originally from Instagram and @juliebravewriter is my account there so come follow along for more conversations like this one!

Have you seen this on social media? 

“Parenthood: I would die for you, but I really don’t want to make you dinner.” 

—adapted from a meme by picklebums

It’s funny because sometimes it’s true. One of the mysteries of life is you feed your kids, you turn around, and in five seconds, they want to eat again. And again. And then again. 

Are we raising children or hobbits—who have second breakfasts, elevenses, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner, and supper?

In between serving the second breakfast, dinner, supper, and tea, someone must also plan the meals, go to the store, put away the food, chop the food, cook the food, clean up the food. 

Oh yeah, and don’t forget to homeschool, too.

Help is on the way! 

Mary Ann Kelley tells us her Secrets of a Busy Cook in our Brave Learner Home Master Class webinar, bringing with her twenty years of experience with meal planning and cooking while homeschooling!

Her food blog, Add Salt and Serve, has been highlighted in The New York Times, PBS Parents, The Spruce Eats, and more. 

Let Mary Ann help you with the combined challenges of homeschooling and feeding the kids! 

You can be gentler with your children if you get into the habit of being gentler with yourself.

Have you ever noticed that when you yell at one of your kids, it’s more like you’re yelling at yourself?

If I let my sweet child have it for being too silly, or leaving their shoes strewn down the hallway, or for spending too much time watching TV, the underlying meaning is: Darn it. How did I raise such (fill in the blank) un-self-regulated, messy, laze-abouts?

My anger and irritation usually had more to do with how much I felt I wasn’t succeeding in parenting than it did with a true judgment of my child.

The source of so much parental anguish is the feeling of failing—failing to provide the best resources, failing to teach good habits, failing to instill higher values. Then we turn that anguish onto our kids, hoping there’s a shortcut. We can shame them into better behavior and absolve ourselves of those uncomfortable feelings.

To be gentler with ourselves would mean we are less attached to how our kids show up in the world. We could see them as independent beings rather than products of our parenting.

The more we lower the parenting bar, the more success we’ll feel and the less we’ll rain down the wrath of Mom or Dad on our children’s heads. The gentleness starts inside—a kind word, a warm smile in the mirror. Reminding ourselves that we are human, limited and glorious all at once.

Once you get in that habit for yourself, you’ll notice the quirkiness of your children and feel less compelled to treat them with harsh words and pressure.

This post is originally from Instagram and @juliebravewriter is my account there so come follow along for more conversations like this one!

A Brave Writer parent asked what to do when her daughter refuses to write. Here was my response:

What would happen if she simply were asked to write each day by herself whatever came to mind in a notebook starting with one minute per day (that no one would read)? Could she get used to putting her thoughts on paper away from anyone’s eyes.

• Start with 60 seconds a day. Increase when she starts to feel more comfortable.
• Don’t read any of it.
• Give her her favorite drink or shake to go with the writing time.
• Let her use a good pen and a notebook of her choice.
• Her only responsibility is to move her pen without anyone peering over her shoulder.

Do this for a semester, gradually increasing the time length according to her stamina. Your only task is to simply check in to see how it feels to do it. Perhaps once a week.

If she finds THIS difficult to do and won’t do it or can’t do it, let it go for now. You can simply say to her: “You are bright, intelligent, and insightful. I know when you’re ready to write you will.” You can then let her know that you will be available to support her when that time comes.

Damage is not overcome with pressure. So whatever damage is there, she will need to face it when she’s ready.

Another option is to sign up for our Brave Writer 101 class together. If she’s the kind of kid who would value having some support and insight into writing to help her (there are no grades), she may find that class particularly surprising and helpful. It’s not punitive in any way.

Learning doesn’t have an endpoint—you know that because you are still learning almost as much as your kids are while you homeschool them!

We start homeschooling because we want our kids to love learning.

We often keep homeschooling because WE fall in love with learning.

It’s a paradox, right? Maybe you thought you hated history in school and now you can’t get enough of it. A couple decades or four under your belt, and suddenly ancient Egyptian embalming methods are riveting!

• I never read Jane Austen in high school or college. It was a thrill to discover her charming wit in my thirties.
• I discovered that multiplication (the word) comes from “multiple” which is precisely the reason I didn’t learn how to multiply as a kid. I somehow missed the point—that each times table described multiples of the same number, added together in a shortcut! Thank you Cuisinaire rods.
• I became an expert at naming our backyard birds, and we had so much fun making homemade suet.
• I can’t believe that I actually saw Saturn, the real planet with the real ring around it, through my own son’s telescope!
• Never have I been more interested in what comes out of an animal than when we dissected owl pellets.

And since these experiences have been as meaningful to me as they were to my kids (maybe moreso, if I’m honest), then I don’t have to worry about my kids and what they are learning now. Sure, there’s the school-subject dating introduction service I provide them (making matches, hoping they swipe right). But there will be so much more left for them to learn after they leave home, on their own time table, perhaps even at the hands of my grandchildren.

Lifelong learning means your whole life, not just until eighteen. We, who homeschool, know this in our bones. We are the lucky ones.

This post is originally from Instagram and @juliebravewriter is my account there so come follow along for more conversations like this one!