A Day in the Life of Homeschool Mama Lindsay
Here’s a little look at the Day in the Life of Lindsay, mom of five who currently homeschools her kids while traveling the country in a renovated toy hauler! At Learning Well, we understand that homeschooling doesn’t look the same for all of us. We understand it doesn’t have to either for us to learn and glean good things from each other. Each Wednesday, on our Instagram feed, we feature a new homeschool mama to take over the feed and show us what her day looks like.
Some of us homeschool for religious reasons and that inspires our homeschool days. Some of us homeschool from the road and never do school in the same place twice. We might have been homeschooling for years and years. Or we may have just begun our journeys. We understand that those details don’t really matter though. The common thread that binds us all together is our desires to educate our children differently.
We might all homeschool differently, but we can always look for ideas from each other that inspire, encourage and equip us in our own homeschool days.
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So, each week, we create blog posts for you to access later of each of those “days in the life”. We hope you keep coming back for more inspiration. Keep going, mama! These days at home are so worth it!
Meet Lindsay
I think there are endless things that make homeschooling amazing. But one of theeee coolest is being able to travel pretty much whenever you want to. I especially think it’s cool when homeschool families just pack up and take school on the road—just because we can!
Lindsay did just that and she’s going to show us what that looks like tomorrow in her #lwdayinthelife. Here’s more about Lindsay:
Lindsay is a mom of 5 children ages 18, 15, 11,10 and 7 and has been married to her high school sweetheart since the age of 18. They’re in their 13th year of home education and they’ve recently celebrated their first homeschool graduate. Collaborating with her oldest daughter they have recently released National Parks Themed Bundles hoping to inspire families to get out, enjoy nature and our US National Parks together.
A true native Texan at heart, Lindsay is currently filling her adventure bucket by exploring the United States with her family in their renovated Toy Hauler. Large house or 5th wheel she also finds pleasure in creating and cultivating a peace filled calming home, regardless of the size. Waking up early to enjoy a cup of coffee alone in the early morning hours fuels her days. She finds immense joy and peace in the daily drawing together and reading good, living books with her children during Morning Time. Documenting both the adventurous and the mundane days through photography is a rekindled passion and she couldn’t imagine living life any other way.
On the Road
Good morning Learning Well mamas! It’s such an honor to share a glimpse into our day with y’all! I’m Lindsay and you can follow our family of 7 over at @laneslesstraveled. We’re currently in our 13th year of homeschooling. We graduated our oldest last year and are down to 4 students this year. Our kiddos are ages 18,15,12,10, and 8.
In November of 2018 we sold our 10 acre property in northeast Texas and hit the road to travel the US in our renovated toy hauler fifth wheel. I say we’re relaxed Charlotte Mason homeschoolers and even after so many years of home education we’re still morphing into what works for our family in each new season.
The views out our windows change every 1-2 weeks and we have absolutely loved embracing learning all about each place we visit.
I can’t wait for you to join us over the course of today to peek into how our days sometimes look! Traveling full time to new places has taught me to embrace each new day looking differently than before as we take time to go out and explore where we are!
Morning Time
On our slow days we gather for morning time somewhere between 9 and 9:30. Each year our readings look a little different but what remains consistent is that we’re all together, focusing our hearts and preparing for the day.
Morning time is probably my favorite part of homeschooling because I’ve realized it’s where rich discussion tends to happen. My attention isn’t divided among 5 different children but instead we’re all focusing together. Our oldest girls pour into the discussion with our youngers and I get to witness the beauty of this time we all spend together because we’ve chosen to keep our kids home.
As we’ve gone from babies and toddler seasons to everyone in school years season, I’ve learned that they all still like calling the seat next to me to cuddle while I read. Food always provides quiet mouths and listening ears and hands busy in quiet activities really does allow minds to soak in what they’re hearing. The habit, and investment of time, of gathering together has been worth every effort over the years!
Meal Prep in a Tiny Kitchen
Each of our children have their own unique strengths and one found within our 15 year old is an incredible servants heart. She loves preparing meals for our family and I don’t mind that one bit! Whether we’re already out hiking and exploring, or staying home for the day, she’s our resident lunch prepper.
When we first decided to travel full time, and move our family of 7 into 350 square feet, the kitchen felt like our biggest hurdle to overcome. The great thing is that we’ve embraced living with less and are still able to prepare and serve healthy meals even in our tiny kitchen.
I will say though….we get stuck in lunch ruts from time to time so I’d love to know what your favorite easy to prep lunches are!
Individual Work
After morning time, sometimes before lunch and sometimes after, everyone sits down for individual work. Math, narrations and light language arts is done on their own. Our current high schooler joins us for morning time but also does her own subjects after our time all together.
We converted the garage section of our toy hauler fifth wheel into a school room by day and girls bedroom by night. When we left our sticks and bricks house we knew giving up a school space was going to be the hard because we spend so much time in that space together.
I’m so thankful we’ve been able to create this space, no matter how small it is! We’re also thankful that we know life learning can take place anywhere, anytime!
Exploring National Parks
We move locations about every two weeks. That means we get to spend that time exploring where we’re currently parked. Many of our school weeks consist of 2 to 3 days visiting the National Park in the area and other natural, and even touristy, sites.
My goal is to bring each location to life even more by reading living books about them before we arrive. That desire is what’s led me to create our National Parks bundles (found in the bio arc @laneslesstraveled).
Since we know we won’t be traveling and getting to spend this much time in each place for forever, I’m aiming to maximize this entire roadschool experience while we are on the road.
In addition to learning about each park during morning time on our at home, down days, we also take advantage of the National Park Jr Ranger programs and other ranger led programs in our parks. We have all learned SO much about our country over this past year through these programs and they have enhanced our schooling in such an incredible way!
Most places we visit also have other traveling families around so we all plan days to explore together. It’s like the ultimate destination field trips! One thing this has taught me is that even when we’re finished with our time traveling I need to be more intentional to explore the local area. Before hitting the road there was always this ‘oh, we’ll visit there someday’ but often times someday never comes and you simply don’t take the time.
So go out and explore where you are, as if you were a tourist in your own city! Each place has so much to offer us as home educating families!
Nightly Routine
Nights around here can look a few different ways. If we’re not around a bunch of other traveling families we have our normal nightly routine of daddy reading our family read aloud to everyone and then prayers before bed. Some of our most cherished read alouds have been read at night by dad at bedtime.
If we’re with other traveling families the adults will gather around a fire after dinner and the kids play or even watch a movie with friends.
Initially we struggled with our routine not looking exactly like it did before traveling but we’ve learned to love the new rhythms this lifestyle has brought to our family.
I think that’s one of the best lessons we’ve learned with homeschooling. We have the ability to ebb and flow with what life brings and adjust our life around that. That’s the beauty of this home education lifestyle, right?
Thank you all so much for allowing me the privilege to share a glimpse into our daily life. It’s been so fun! I’d love for you to come follow along some more over at @laneslesstraveled.
Thank you so much to Lindsay for sharing your family’s day with us!
If you want to see more Day in the Life photos and videos, be sure to check out our Instagram profile. There are highlights of each takeover at the top.
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