Already reflecting and looking ahead

I wrote an email to another homeschooling friend today and I thought that parts of it would make a good blog post, especially since I've been MIA here on my blog lately!

I've been poring over homeschool catalogs this week. I'm excited about getting started on "real" work with Elyse next year, her first grade year. If we continue with the Well-Trained Mind classical method, she'll be starting in earnest on the historical period of 5000BC-400AD and most everything (reading, history, copywork, etc.) will revolve around that time period. So, lots of mummies, pyramids, and Old Testament stuff. But, of course, I have to look at EVERY curriculum catalog I have, get overwhelmed, find a bunch of stuff that looks cool but that we don't really need, and doubt our choice of curriculum about 30 times before finally settling on the very first thing that we had chosen.

One of the alternate curricula that I really like is My Father's World (MFW). It's attractive to me because it incorporates the classical method along with the Charlotte Mason (a "gentle" education) and international mission/biblical focus. I really like the setup and the fact that everything is already planned out for you, but I have a couple of concerns.

1. Elyse is doing a lot of 1st grade work this year and I think the first grade curriculum would be a little redundant for her. But I worry about starting her on the second grade curriculum (Adventures).
2. If I started her on Adventures, then I worry that for third grade, the next year of curriculum might be too advanced.
3. I wonder how it would work as she and the other kids got older. I've tried to go through the years and see how it would work out but I can't see how I could teach Elyse and Aidan with the same curriculum year (especially if she starts in Adventures where she probably needs to be, but Aidan would be using the target curriculum for his year, as he seems to be more on target for his age). Which means that I would be teaching two different years of curriculum for three more years.
4. I worry that as nice as it seems, I might get antsy with the pre-packaged type of curriculum, where I couldn't change things as we went along if needed, and since I like to pick and choose from different curricula.

Anyway, I'm sure I will stick with the Well-Trained Mind (classical) method that we're planning on, but once it comes time to choose curriculum in the spring for the next year, it seems that I'm not immune to the same doubts and concerns and second-guessing that many homeschoolers go through every year. After all, we all want what's best for our children, and there are so many great options out there!

As for the extra curricular activities, I think I'm going to splurge and order the Rosetta Stone French for Elyse (and Josh and I ;)). I don't expect her to be speaking French anytime soon :), but I have studied (and love) French, and Josh would like to study it some too, so we might incorporate that for fun.

I bought the "Drawing with Children" book for this year, but I failed miserably at ever getting anything going. I think it was daunting for me since there aren't specific "lessons" laid out. Throughout the year, we just did holiday crafts and other art projects as the impulse hit us. So for next year, I'm thinking about using something that is more structured and hopefully, that will help me to actually implement a regular art time.

And for music? Once again, due to a lack of purpose and structure, piano lessons never really got off the ground. I'm hoping to do better next year. I have the "Little Mozart" book, but am trying to decide if I need to do something else? There's an excellent piano teacher at our church that we might look into. OR I found a book called "The Violin Book." I have a violin and maybe Elyse and I could learn together??? I'm just beginning to think about the extra stuff.

As you can tell, I still have a LOT of questions, but that's why I start planning so early! :)

Any of you homeschoolers out there have any advice? I sure wish I lived closer to other homeschooling moms so that we could have an art day or something like that. There's a group in a town near us, but they don't do co-op classes. Elyse did get involved in a homeschool girl scout troop, which has been interesting, but not very active. She is still taking ballet, which she loves.

Lessons from this year? One thing I learned very quickly was that I initially planned too much. But I just kept whittling things down to where we're now only working 1 1/2-2 hours a day on the basics. She and Aidan like to play a lot too, which I think is super-important for their ages!!

Here is our current (semi) schedule:
M-F: Phonics (One lesson from Phonics Pathways)
Reading (alternate readers)
Singapore Math (One lesson a day and working on math facts)
Handwriting (A Reason for Handwriting)

M, W, F: Spelling (We began Spelling Workout A this semester)

T, Th: Explode the Code (Elyse LOVES this.)