I have been thinking about creating a morning ritual for starting the day off right with my adopted children for quite a while now, but just haven’t done it. With older adopted special needs children you never quite know how they are going to act each day. Because we homeschool it is particularly important to me what their attitudes are like each day. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a special morning routine that sort of set things off on the right foot every morning? I knew a family that had adopted six children. Every morning she sat out on the porch with them talking quietly and watching the sunrise.

When I first began homeschooling we used a curriculum that had a morning Bible study. The children would take turns reading and that seemed to start the days off right. We had to change curriculums after about four years because some of my special needs children just couldn’t do that work.

There are two ideas for morning rituals that keep resurfacing periodically in my thoughts. One is a family walk every morning, which would be good exercise and really wake us up for schoolwork. I envision the children and me walking down the lane to the back hayfield experiencing what the morning has to offer. This time of year, that would be trees in beautiful colors, deer, and turkeys grazing in the fields.

I guess I am a little apprehensive about doing it because things never seem to turn out as wonderful as I envision them. Of course, once the routine was established it might be ok. It is difficult with special needs children to change their routine and this would be a big change.

The other idea is reintroducing the morning Bible study. Of course, it is no longer part of our regular curriculum; they children study their individual AWANA books. Therefore, it would take some effort on my part to prepare the study for each morning. We used to snuggle on the couch in our Pajamas and with our blankets and do our reading. It really was a nice family time of bonding.

Do any of you have morning rituals that just seem to start every day off right?

Photo Credit Julia Fuller 2004