Focus on Johnnie Parenting

Having done the one task that was due today, I got up this morning and focused on homeschooling Johnnie, especially considering that Lisa simply hasn't gone through an entire day lesson plan day for whatever reason. Somehow she feels overwhelmed that she's not doing things right that she simply shuts down. My approach is far different only because I tend to keep Johnnie to routine anyway, which is why Lisa finds it hard to focus with the absence of such a routine, and a surprising inability to create one. I remind myself that it is not so much as Lisa's shortcomings as my own tendency to find those shortcomings to push out. And I remind myself that ALL THAT is simply another way to defend my point of view and to uphold my need to be right. When I think about it that way, I know it's not about who's right and who's wrong... because believe you me all I need is to remind myself of my OWN shortcomings when I was navigating Johnnie's lessons with him a week ago. I figured I just need to make sure he's learning and in an environment where I can cultivate his natural curiosity. And I WILL stick to my routine because that is what makes ME comfortable. Johnnie and I went to McDonald's drive thru this morning because he felt like eating pancakes.  Another place to magnify the difference between Lisa's style and mine. To her it is much easier to fix pancakes. To me, I'm happy to spend $4 to drive thru at McDonald's.  We'll just agree to both be right and do what we like to do. The rest of the day, and indeed the morning was spent on Johnnie's lessons... not that it took all that long to do those things. He gets done with his phonics in 10 minutes, his math in 15. Yep he's usually done with half the morning's lessons inside of a half hour. We had so much time I even threw in some extra work, including an art session within the Mar Vista Enrichment environment. He learned how to draw SpongeBob in fact. It was pretty cool to watch. And the drawing was pretty good as well.

So the day went by pretty quickly and the afternoon with Johnnie is always an exercise in figuring out how to keep him occupied, especially when I had meetings lined up. Today it was all about getting him to make a special drawing for mommy since he's headed there tomorrow morning. And of course Tuesday night routine is STILL Tuesday night routine.

And that would still include barbecuing our Italian sausage for dinner. Especially on a day like today where it was actually a nice day out. And it was starting to get even warmer too. So much so Johnnie actually got a bit hot hitting the soccer ball against the wall while I barbecued in the background. Still, it was on to our usual Tuesday night of penne pasta, Italian sausage and chocolate chip cookies. And for Johnnie, more of the Magic School Bus. The only real difference was that I found some time to talk to Jodi for the 2nd night in a row. And for the 2nd night in a row, we talked for about a half hour before I put Johnnie to bed. It's sort of my own test for myself on how interested I am in doing this.  I need to see how I do this while Johnnie is commanding 90% of my attention. Tonight though with nothing urgent pending tomorrow, I looked forward to even more resounding sleep...