Feb 2024: Brittany’s Bilingual French Day in the Life
(with a 3.5 yr old and 7 month old)
6-7 am No alarm clock needed these days. I just let whoever wakes first of the baby or toddler get me. To make up for the early rising I try to have a slow start with cuddles in bed.
7-9 am Once we’re up I make breakfast. After eating the girls may or may not play independently and quietly enough for me to supervise them from the couch so I can read a devotional chapter on my Kindle. Otherwise we’ll read or play together.
We’ve also started Music Morning where we listen to French music:
* Un, Deux, Trois by Opal Dunn
* Mini Languages: Music & Movement
* My Favorite French Songs on Spotify
9-12 am Usually by 9 my House-Helper comes. Living in a Western African village means lots of cleaning and cooking from scratch so I’m blessed to have a local woman work for us. Her main activities are dishes, kitchen prep like cutting veggies, mopping, and watching the toddler.
Jubilee is always excited when our House-Helper comes because she brings her 6 year old daughter with her. Despite the fact that they can barely communicate with each other they love playing together!
While Jubilee is busy playing and baby does her morning nap I’m usually able to squeeze in a morning work project, either laundry, cooking prep, emails, or organizing supplies to prepare for our new teammates' arrival.
12-2 pm By midday we make and eat lunch and then aim for Quiet Rest time. We’re still waiting for the quiet part to really catch on for Jubilee. Maybe twice a week she will actually nap but otherwise we are trying to teach her to play quietly in her room so mom and baby can rest.
2-3 pm Jubilee’s reward for obeying during Quiet Rest is to be able to watch something on her tablet. That means we read a French book together first and then she can watch a French language learning show:
3-5 pm Most weekdays I’ve been sending Jubilee with our House-Helper to play at her house. This is some great village living experience for her where she picks up a lot of the local language, with the occasional French borrow word mixed in too.
I try to make this afternoon stretch line up with baby’s afternoon nap so that I have another pocket of time to work, rest, blog, or read for pleasure.
5-7:30 pm Around 5 or so I start cooking dinner so we can eat by 6. Then we have baths with the goal of baby going down by 7 and toddler by 7:30. I’ve found that having a regular evening routine helps everyone.
Before bed we read a Bible story (I actually really like the illustrations in this one), tell the girls what their names mean, pray, say what we're grateful for and say our Family Mission:
* Jubilee - God helps people and so should we
* Eden - The garden where we meet with God
* ”We seek Jesus, we proclaim Jesus, and we’re satisfied with Jesus”
* “On cherche Jesus, on partage Jesus, on est contente avec Jesus."
7:30-9 pm I’m not much of a night owl so evenings are either conversations with my husband or blogging or reading before bed.
There may be days we go with my husband to our Fruit Tree Farm or I do a Market Run while our House-Helper stays with the girls or we greet our African neighbors but these are the basic shape of our days. Sometimes I feel silly for sharing this since we’re not really homeschooling yet but I figured there are other Moms of Littles who can relate to this kind of schedule and how we try to consistently incorporate French into it.
P.S. Don't miss Simple Homeschool's "Day in the Life" series, which inspired this post!
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