The Beautiful Homeschool Mess

It began with a single binder.

And a single child.

And then it grew.

As many homeschool parents did in the early 2000s, I began my homeschool journey with a big-boxed curriculum. This curriculum came with a huge teacher's binder, a student binder for work pages, and plenty of books.

I still remember excitedly unpacking this curriculum with my firstborn at the time and putting it neatly on a shelf. We lived in a small apartment then - just my son, my husband and myself.

But just about a year after beginning this curriculum, we had the wonderful news - a new sibling would be joining our little family. 2 years later we would get the same wonderful news again. And so we decided to move into a bigger home so we would have room enough to fit everyone - and everything!

While these babies grew from infants to preschoolers, we managed to keep our homeschool space pretty tidy. After all, with just one child doing school at the time, it didn’t take up too much room.

We had moved on from the big-box curriculum as we discovered more and more options online, and the wonderful worlds of notebooking, unit studies, and science kits. Soon we would get a better printer to print all of these wonderful options out.

Next, we would get shelves to put all of the science kits and experiments on. Another shelf would be bought for notebooks and binders, and then more supplies and bins and shelves as those preschoolers grew and started homeschool too.

I probably don’t have to tell you what comes next - the title of this article probably gave it away. What came next was, well, messy. Preschoolers go through sensory boxes of rice, crayons, finger paint, and paper.

An older child going through notebooks, library books, piles of worksheets and boxes of science kits. Suddenly the binders were bursting at the seams, the science kits migrated from the shelves to cupboards and under beds, random experiments lined our counters, and we had art supplies pouring out of kitchen cupboards.

Then there was the paper.

Paper was everywhere from the school space in our dining room to the front entrance. I remember finding drawings in pots and pans, and paper tickets my kids made for a game in the washing machine. Heaven forbid we would have to find a specific drawing that one of the kids made and wanted to finish, it was mission impossible!

If you’re a homeschooling parent, chances are you’ve dealt with something similar at some point in your homeschool journey (and if not, I seriously envy your organizational skills!). You’ve probably wondered what to do with all the books, papers, and experiments.

You, like me, may have woken up to an absolute mess and just felt like giving up any hope of ever having some order in your homeschool. Some days it can feel downright discouraging and exhausting. But I am here to tell you something good (and maybe somewhat disappointing).

That mess may never disappear.

Not until the day your youngest sets foot out the door and starts their own life journey without you. Or until they get ‘too old’ for the experiments, crafts, and read-alouds on the couch.

Since my son was quite a bit older than my other children, I got to experience the two worlds at once. While my babies were still getting messy with all the fun, my oldest would work more on his own. Slowly his things crept from our school space to his room.

Now, in college, nothing of his is in our school space. As a family, we’re still very close, but it’s not the same. His mess is his own now, not ours. And I miss it.

So as I think about all of the things that used to be, I’m always reminded of what that mess in our dining room signified. It meant we had kids who were learning amazing things and doing amazing things. It meant we spent all day together as a family, learning and playing and forming close bonds.

That mess was a symbol of our days as a full family unit. And now, one-third of that mess has been cleaned up. One day, there will be no mess at all.

But the good news? Now that I have experienced this, I no longer dread the inevitable mess of the day. Yes, it does get annoying and in the way at times, but I remind myself of what those things mean.

Over the years I’ve learned to accept a certain amount of messiness, but have also learned strategies to control it. That there is a balance between having a thriving, happy, relaxed homeschool - but also a somewhat organized school space.

Our home isn’t Instagram-perfect or magazine-ready, but it’s not a disaster either (unless maybe you count the crazy-busy holidays).

If you’re struggling to accept the physically messy parts of homeschooling, here are some reflection questions I find have helped me over the years.

What is upsetting me the most about the mess? Is it in the way? (Maybe we can move our things somewhere else or get a few bins from the dollar store to hide them in)
Is the mess affecting our homeschool in a bad way? ( If yes, then perhaps I or my kids can figure out a better system of storing or organizing things. Kids are great at this! If no, then it’s not a huge issue.)
Is the mess affecting other family members like a spouse or older sibling? (Then perhaps we could ask them for help to make a better system, or we can move things into a different space)

Once I began reflecting on these things, I realized that some things were working for us and others were not, I had to switch some things around and have a better way to store things.

This certainly didn’t happen overnight and it will never look perfect, but it does work for us. And yes, there is still a mess! But I look at that mess now and all I see are memories, precious moments, and a happy home.