When I started typing the title of this post, I typed “atypical” by mistake rather than “a typical”. Which is kind of interesting as our days were never “typical”, they were always “atypical” 😀
I wrote the following “essay” in answer to a question on some social media. As the question keeps resurfacing I decided to post it here rather than copying such a long post in WhatsApp chats and getting in everyone’s way.
So, here goes!
My “typical” has changed a lot over the years, depending on the age of my kids. So I will try to write about the typical day based on my kids’ ages.
First I am sharing how our days looked like up until all of my kids were under 10 years old.
I wake up really early (like before 5am early) but back then I woke up the kids only towards the end of Fajr salah time. This gave me some time on my own to catch up on Quran and just enjoy some quiet time except if I hadn’t slept well at night (babies, sick kids, etc.) then sometimes I used to go back to sleep after Fajr.
Although we homeschool but we don’t let the kids sleep in. They wake up for Fajr salah and even the toddlers wake up early. We eat breakfast together around 7:30. Usually we linger over our breakfast and spent some time chatting. This time is kind of special for us as a family and we still do this even though our other routines have changed over time.
After breakfast was cleared we sorted out some chores. As I had hired help, the chores were mostly making beds, sorting laundry, tidying up the rooms and bathrooms a bit. Nothing hectic. But kids were responsible for their own rooms/laundry.
Then we went straight to Quran. Spent some time reading tafseer, discussing it, and so on. Some of the best discussions I had with my kids of all ages was during this time. Then they started on their hifdh, and one to one recitation with me.
After Quran we spent some time on other things like learning adhkaar of Salah etc. Our routine pretty much ended after this. From then on the rest of the day was pretty much spontaneous.
Most of the days they had an ongoing game or imaginary adventure going on which they were eager to continue. On other days they used to spend their day writing stuff (they were very keen writers and wrote long stories and even written documentaries!) or sprawled on couches reading. We have been blessed to live in houses with gardens so a lot of their time was spent outdoors. Many days they used to do backyard camping, taking books and games and stuff to their tent in the backyard.
I always had a huge stash of recyclable materials handy, so they spent a good deal of time making stuff. They weren’t much into arts and crafts but they loved making stuff, like solutions to problems they were facing or their imaginary characters were facing.
They also used computers to look up stuff, or watch YouTube tutorials and stuff. Sometime during the day we also did read alouds. Most of the Islamic history we have learned was during this read aloud times.
During all this play and reading and games I used to be there, sometimes playing with them, sometimes getting my other work done, cooking, tending to the baby, or catching up on my own study. But they knew I was there, ready to help, ready to play, ready to share a joke, ready to talk if they want. They spent a lot of time without my active participation but some days we spent all day doing things together.
For those days when they were bored or couldn’t find anything interesting to do I used to keep a growing list of activities we could do together. This list of mine contained tons of ideas on everything from coding to soap making. I would usually suggest a few things and most often they would find something interesting we could do together. We have created arts, digital creations, scientific experiments, baked, and done so many fun things together. Thinking back to those days makes me really nostalgic.
I also used to strew a lot of stuff for them to find inspiration.
On days where we couldn’t agree on anything or were too bored, tired, or grumpy to do anything we used to curl up with a book or a nature documentary. And on other days I would leave them bored without suggesting anything. They used to find something or other after staying grumpy for a while 😀
Afternoons were usually divided between activities like swimming classes, horse riding, karate classes etc. which they did a few times a week. Usually my husband took them for these. Or they had friends from the neighborhood come over to play. Or screen time. We have a strict no cartoons, no movies, no video games policy in our house so screen time meant browsing websites, watching videos, or creating digital stuff.
I usually had a long list of good websites bookmarked for them. That was when I started sharing those resources on my old blog.
Nature walks, hikes, and other such stuff was usually weekend only as crime situation in Johannesburg makes me nervous to go alone with kids. So we went for these kind of activities when my husband could be with us.
After supper they usually read some more till bed time or we just talked or played a game.
That was how it was until my older kids grew up some more and then our “typical” shifted to accommodate more activities. I will write about that next time InShaAllah.
After typing the above I reread it and I sounds so….tame! So Instagramy! 😀
The truth is that those years were filled with battles and doubts! And there were days where I seriously questioned my decision to homeschool. But that’s just part of the journey. Looking back I am very grateful that I got the chance to spend time with my kids.