Managers of Their Homes

I'm most of the way through reading "Managers of Their Homes" by Steve & Teri Maxwell (www.titus2.com) A homeschool mom was kind enough to let me borrow her copy. I'm amazed at just how many homeschool moms have read this book! I got all sorts of feedback ("loved it, it changed my life", "we used some of the tips", "hated it, we aren't schedule people" etc.) So now I guess its my turn to leave my feedback...

What did I think of Managers of Their Homes?
There were some good tips in there. Its not a demanding "you must do this" kind of book (IMO), but gives a lot of scriptural emphasis on having a regular rhythm to things. I liked some of the ideas -especially about assigning certain playtimes, playareas, and sibling playmates in half hour increments. I always thought that if I could organize my child's time every day that the day would run so much smoother. I haven't tried scheduling my children's day yet. I began trying to puzzle out my own schedule first, then I'll fit the kids in to that. Oh, and the author keeps mentioning the schedule bringing out disciplinary problems in our children. Yup. I'm dealing with one right now! (dd5 on floor having a fit) LOL. And disciplinary problems in yourself. Yup. I don't have "write in blog" on my schedule right now, but I really wanted to write this morning...and I didn't get any real *me* time yesterday since the kids were sick & wouldn't go to sleep for me & I spent my entire time glued to one or two of them without any peace... Excuses abound! So. Interesting book, don't know if it will help me yet. My complaints:

• Most of these women scheduled their wake up time at 5:30AM!! Won't work for me, we are a late schedule sort of family.
• Most of these women had 5 or more kids. I think it was more of a challenge for them to piece a schedule together, but once they did, I think they had an easier time managing their children's time, because they naturally had more options (kid 1 plays with kid 2, kid 1 plays with kid 3, kid 1 plays with kid 4, etc.) And eventually had an easier time cleaning house, once they trained their children to do their chores. Can you imagine 5 people helping you clean house each day? I only have 2 kids, ages 5 & under.
• These women somehow managed to fit their own time into the schedule (half hour of reading, an hour of writing, hour of sewing, etc.) I don't think that will happen here, but I would love to have more time to do the things I want to do (blogging for one!)
• It didn't offer much advice on leaving the house & fitting in extracurricular stuff. Its main advice was: DON'T. LOL. I can understand that. I feel so unorganized & frazzled every time we come home from an excursion. Still, I'm feeling that pressure of "what about socialization?" and wondering if I provide enough - especially since we moved from a kid-run neighborhood out to the country on 10 acres. I wouldn't worry as much if I had 8 kids that could all play together. But somehow I think DD5 & DD3 might need a little more playmate time than with just eachother.

So I think the main argument I have for the book is that I saw moms with large families, and didn't see a whole lot of small families, or small families with only young children. I still think the ideas are valid, I just would like to see more examples for my kind of family.

All in all, it was a worthwhile book to read & I hope to implement some of it. I hope to post my schedule once I get it all worked out (and maybe I'll add an 8am computer time!)