Our Large Family Routine and Rhythm

One thing I have recently learned about large family living is that some sort of a daily routine is imperative to smooth and easy days. Without a routine our days become chaotic and we all end up in a terrible mood while the house falls apart around us. Today I want to share with you our regular large family routine and rhythm. This isn’t necessarily our homeschool schedule, although homeschooling is just a natural part of our day 4 days a week. 

Our Large Family Routine

I don’t strictly schedule our days. One freedom of homeschooling is that I do not have anywhere to be at a specific time on any given day. Sure, there are days when we have appointments and I adjust our routine accordingly, but this is how we go through each day.

Wake up, eat breakfast.

Each day we all get out of bed and eat breakfast. I like slow mornings, and I usually try to get some of my blog work done during this time. I always have at least one cup of coffee, and these days I usually always have a second cup.

Get dressed, tidy up the house.

After we have had breakfast, we all get dressed and do a quick tidy of the house. This is also when I start a load of laundry. Often, the kids will go outside and play for a little bit while I finish getting ready for the day.

Start morning time.

We love our morning time. We all gather around while we go over our memory work and read from some of our favorite books in our morning basket.

Begin working on independent work with older kids.

I know that the baby typically wants to nurse around 10 a.m. I’m often nursing him while working on math and language arts with my two older children. I also try to do an activity with my preschooler.

Break for lunch and have quiet time.

Once we plow through some of our independent work, we have a break for lunch time. We all eat around the table and then we get ready for quiet time. The littles lay down in my bed and the bigs go to their rooms for a nice, quiet break. I’m usually nursing the baby again during this time.

Finish any independent work with the older kids.

After quiet time, I finish any independent work that did not get done earlier. The kids then play outside or play games inside the house. My daughter does piano lessons with Hoffman Academy.

Fold a load of laundry.

Time to fold a load of laundry. This does not always get done every day, but it’s supposed to. Haha.

Start dinner.

I typically start cooking dinner around 5 p.m. My goal is to eat around 6.

Evening clean up, bath time, bed.

After dinner, we all work together to clean up the house and then the kids get a bath and go to bed! We do usually read one of our family read-alouds or some picture books before they go to sleep.

Our Large Family Friday Rhythm

Fridays go a little differently in our house. First of all, Friday is cleaning day. I decided to move all of my weekly cleaning tasks to this day because it is currently easier for me to just do them all at once rather than spread them throughout the week, so the kids help me clean in the morning.

I try my hardest to schedule appointments on Friday. So, if we need to be out of the house, this is the day that we do it. Now that my kids have gotten older, I feel like they need to work on their school consistently, and random appointments throughout the week definitely mess with our homeschool day. There are exceptions such as field trips or homeschool days at the library, but all in all, our day for being out of the house is Friday.

If the weather is nice and we aren’t doing anything else, I take the kids to the park on Friday afternoon. It’s nice to get out of the house, do a nature walk, and just let the kids run and play on the playground equipment. I also tend to schedule our grocery pick-up for Friday afternoon if we need it.

After we play outside the house, we come home and have time to do any big science projects from our Apologia curriculum. And we always have pizza while watching a movie together at dinner time!

Large Family Weekends

Saturday is our family fun day. We use this day to go hit up a new hiking trail together, go to the zoo, go to the science museum, or just whatever else we want to do as a family. Sometimes that just means hanging out at home and playing board games. Once a month we pick up our large grocery order from Sam’s Club on Saturday.

I wish I could say we go to church on Sunday, but we still haven’t found a new church home since we moved. On Sundays we typically get some home projects completed. We do yard work and stuff like that. I also try to do some meal prepping, which for me just involves prepping healthy snacks like boiled eggs and celery and carrot slices.

And that’s it for now! This is how life is looking here at our new home. Eventually we will add in a few extracurricular activities for the kids, which will change our nightly routine a bit, but I have no desire to be out of the house every night of the week.