Trying to combine planning and rest? Looking for ways to build a solid homeschool routine while maintaining joy and relinquishing control? You’ll love today’s conversation with Brandy Coffin from The Nourished Mom!
Be sure to check out all the other interviews in our Homeschool Conversations series!
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Meet Brandy Coffin
Brandy is a wife, follower of Jesus, homeschool mom and time management coach. She is the host of The Nourished Mom podcast, where she talks about homeschool mom life and balancing “all the things.” Brandy is passionate about helping other homeschool moms create a balanced, peaceful and efficient homeschool through personalized time management systems, biblical priorities and routine strategies. Brandy enjoys hiking, reading, playing with the kids, board games with her family and a warm cup of tea.
Watch my Homeschool Conversation with Brandy Coffin
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Amy Sloan: Hello, friends. Today I am joined by Brandy Coffin. Brandy is a wife follower of Jesus, homeschool mom, and time management coach. She is the host of The Nourished Mom Podcast where she talks about homeschool mom life and balancing all the things. Brandy is passionate about helping other homeschool moms create a balanced, peaceful, and efficient homeschool through personalized time management systems, biblical priorities, and routine strategies.
She enjoys hiking, reading, playing with her kids, board games with her family, and a warm cup of tea. Brandy, I am so excited to get to chat with you today after having the opportunity to be on your podcast as a guest, which is really fun. Other than the official bio there, tell us a little bit about yourself, your family, and how you guys got started homeschooling.
Brandy Coffin: All right. I live in Massachusetts with my husband and two boys. We are just a typical homeschool Christian family. We just got back from a hike. The hiking, we enjoy hiking. Found a tick. Oh, it’s tick season. Do you guys have a lot of ticks where you are?
Amy: We do, especially when we go up to Virginia to visit family there. They have a lot of grass and woods, and it seems like we’re always getting rid of ticks while we’re visiting the grandparents.
Brandy: I just had one right before now. I’m like, “Oh, I feel something.” We love being out in nature. How did I get to homeschooling? That was a real great journey. We’re still on the journey of how it all evolves, but really, I had started a nutritional therapy business, coaching women in nutrition, and the Lord, it was so funny. I was wanting to be out of my day job and I was working this business on the side and I was talking to my husband.
I’m like, “I just feel like I’m going to be done working or maybe I’ll cut back my hours.” I don’t know what’s going to happen, but I’m like, in June. It was just an arbitrary month. I’m like, “I don’t know why. I just feel like it’s going to happen in June.” My boss had then told me, “Oh, one of the other employees, she needs to cut back her hours in June, so I need to know if you are,” I think she was leaving altogether, “what you want your role to be.” Because she is like, “I’m going to have to hire someone else.”
I’m like, “Oh, my gosh, is this the perfect time? I think that you should hire the new person to cover.” Because we were both part-time, Ashley’s role and part of mine. I gave away half of my job and was able to start working more at home. Then the same thing happened again. I’m like, “I feel like we’re going to be done. I’m going to be gone in whatever time.” The Lord took me home from work. Had me home, I was working in my business, and this is a year before 2020.
I had a first-grader and a preschooler. I’m working my business, and then all of a sudden in January, I just had it on my heart about homeschooling. I’m like, “That’s so ridiculous. I don’t know anyone who homeschools.” I actually did. I just didn’t realize that we didn’t talk about it. There’s no way my husband would go for that.
I remember writing it in my journal and with a question mark like, “Homeschooling?” Then it was COVID. It was like the perfect door was opened, I think, for so many people to realize, “Okay, I don’t actually–” the Lord had already put it on my heart. I just thought it was impossible, but now seeing how it’s going and knowing what the teacher does and I’m like, “I think that we could do this.” Me and my husband decided to take the kids home, and here we are a few years later.
Amy: I have actually talked to several women in the past few months who had either had this thought in the back of their head like, “Man, I’m interested in homeschooling, but I could never do that,” or had thought, “Well, there’s something that’s not quite right at school, but I don’t want to rock the boat.” Then the Lord really used 2020 to shake things up and provide that needed excuse or that little prod from behind like, “Okay, you can do this. Jump on in.” Now they’re like, “Oh, my goodness, I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Brandy: I know. I think it’s amazing how the Lord really used that in so many different aspects of life, but especially in the homeschool community, to really introduce moms to another way, a way that seems more aligned with– it just gives us more time to focus on the Lord. It’s good. I love it.
Homeschooling as a spiritual journey
Amy: Well, in those years since you started homeschooling, how have your thoughts about home education or schooling in general, how have they grown or changed since you first jumped in?
Brandy: I mean, it’s definitely been a journey. I would say in the beginning, I thought that classical like, oh, replicating school at home, that type of thing. I’m like, “Oh, I made our homeschool room perfect and put up all the posters and laminated all of the things.” We were going to have circle time, which is great. Just it was very organized in my mind and it was going to go a certain way.
Then that wasn’t really working. I’m like, “It’s just not feeling right.” When it didn’t go the way I wanted to, I was getting angry and trying to control. It was just not a great experience with that. Then I’m like, “Why don’t we try unschooling?” We went the whole other way. I was on these Facebook pages with unschoolers who were really all about like their kids don’t need a routine. They’re going to put themselves to bed when they’re tired. Let them do as much screen time as they want because they’re going to learn how to regulate it.
I tried that because that sounded great like, oh, my kids could learn how to put themselves to bed on time and not go overboard with screens. We tried that for a little bit. I would not even very long on those certain things and I realized, wow, this does not work. It could work for some people, but not for my kids. I was really brought into what the Bible says, train up your children, and what the Bible says about discipline. I’m like, I’m not training them in this method. I’m not giving them the tools that they need to grow and succeed if I’m not giving them that example, like saying these are the boundaries, and giving them those boundaries to work within.
Now, we’ve come to a place where we balance those different things because the Lord has really grown my relationship with him through this all, like learning what it really means to be patient, what it really means to trust in Him when I’m trying to control all of the things. It’s really been a spiritual journey as well as the basic homeschooling thing. We’ve ended in a place right now where it’s a balance, I guess the eclectic way of homeschooling, I think, would be the word that fits us best right now.
We just pick and choose what works and we balance that child-led learning and some of the principles from an unschooling way with that like, “Okay, well we want to train you to do certain things and focus on certain things like cooking.” One of my sons, my seven-year-old loves cooking. We’re training him on how to get good with that, how to be comfortable with that, communication, things that we find important that we know are important, communication, relationships, house management, time management, but letting them lead in the things that they’re interested in as well.
Amy: That’s great. I have a friend, Pam Barnhill, and she talks about this idea of “us schooling.” When I interviewed her– you may have heard her from your morning basket, but I thought that was such a great idea, because so often we try to, especially new homeschoolers, we want to fit into the group and find our groove and find our people. We’re like, “Okay, which label are we going to use?” At the end of the day, sometimes it’s just like, “Well, we’re just us schooling, what works best for our unique families.”
Brandy: Something that I was thinking about just this morning actually that a similar thing but a little bit different was that child-led learning. I’m like, “I feel like it’s more like family-led learning.” One son likes piano and we pour into that. If one child wants to get into– we’re learning about swans this week, we go into that. Also, it has to work for me and my husband too. I like the idea of, I don’t know if this is a thing, but family-led learning.
Amy: I love that. Well, if it’s not a thing, it should be. You heard it here first.
Brandy: I made it.
Family Led Homeschooling
Amy: Brandy, what have been some of your favorite parts of homeschooling?
Brandy: I would definitely say, and this is definitely the relationships, but I want to also say that it wasn’t all butterflies and rainbows. Our relationships were challenged to the max, when I came home from work, from the office. I think a lot of it had to do with control, thinking like I was able to control things the way I wanted them when– we’re all in our separate places and we come together for a little while, but then when we’re all home all the time together, I had to realize that sometimes the way that I wanted things to be, it wasn’t important. Me getting angry with the kids over something, it wasn’t important in the long run.
I had to really realize that balance. Sometimes it’s important to do things a certain way, and sometimes it’s not important to do things my way. Sometimes I need to open up and look at, actually, their way can work too, and I should be open to that. It’s really grown our relationships big time. I would say doing life with the Lord, really being able to teach them and just have it be like the focus of our days and our life.
I think also this journey has grown my relationship with the Lord. We were Christians before we started, but definitely, we do life different now, and a lot of that has been what we learned on the homeschool journey and just being able to pour into that and teach them and they have time to do their devotions and we have time to read the Bible at breakfast. Those are things we didn’t have time for when we were running all different directions.
Amy: Yes. I think nothing like homeschooling will show you your need for a Savior. You definitely are brought to the end of yourself, which is a really good thing.
Brandy: Yes, I definitely agree. I would say the other thing is just learning together, being curious. Many things I get to learn again that I forgot about, you forget to be curious, you forget to use your imagination and your creativity sometimes, and being able to explore those things together is really fun.
Learning to relinquish control in the homeschool
Amy: Definitely. You mentioned the issue of control and having to relinquish that idea. Have there been any other challenges that maybe you still face in your homeschool day-to-day life, and how do you seek to overcome those challenges?
Brandy: Definitely, I still deal with control. Looking back to even when I was a child, that was an issue for me. I was the kid who was like, if we don’t play my way, then I’m not playing with you. I’m like, “Oh, so cringe.” I’m looking back, I’m like, “Ooh, I’ve had an issue with this for a real long time.” It’s something I still struggle with, but it’s, like I said, I’m growing with the Lord. It’s like now I’m able to see He just is always correcting me with prayer through scripture and guiding me in the right direction, but I still struggle with control, but I’ve come a long way.
I think, let’s see some of the other chapter, patience. Patience is definitely one, and I think that really is rooted in control too. I want things to be done at a certain time so we can move to the next thing, or feeling like you don’t have time for this. I think that’s really a lie that we believe that we don’t have time to do the things that the Lord’s calling us to.
Recently, the Lord really put it on my heart that we were learning a new morning routine, the kids had gotten to a certain developmental stage, and me and my husband were like, all right, we need to step it up a notch. They need more responsibility, we need to change things around a little bit, and a lot of that is they’re learning new chores.
Recently, as we’re learning the chores, the Lord had put it on my heart like, you are doing it together with them. Meaning you’re not leaving the room and trying to feed the dog when they’re doing this. You’re not trying to do your grocery list when they’re doing their bedroom. That’s really hard for me, because I’m like, “Ooh, do I have to sit here and watch you clean your bedroom?” For whatever reason, I really felt called to, “Yes, I do.”
I think a big part of it is the training, because otherwise, if I’m trying to do something else while they are doing their thing and they’re getting it wrong and they’re calling me for help, I’m getting impatient. I’m like, “Can’t you do this? Why can’t you do whatever you want? You know how to do this.” I’m getting patient because I’m torn in two different directions. It’s that the Lord is just like, “No, just while they’re getting good at it, you’re just going to stay there with them.” That is definitely growing my patience.
Finding the balance really between all the things. If I am supposed to be in the room while they’re cleaning and pointing out what’s next and teaching them how to stay focused and all of these things and do it efficiently, when am I going to do my chores? That’s always been something that I was really passionate about, like finding that balance, because I feel like when we’re not balanced, we’re stressed.
Managing time as homeschool moms
Amy: Sometimes it’s so much easier to say, “Okay, let’s find the balance, let’s organize our time.” Then we’re like, “Yes, that’s great, but then how do we actually do that?” I know you have a lot of really great ideas about managing our time as homeschooling moms, so I was wondering if you could share a few of your top strategies.
Task Partitioning
Brandy: Yes, so one thing that works really good for me is task partitioning. You know the idea that when we take a big task and we split it into smaller tasks, and I do this with most of my tasks because I find that I don’t have that 30-minute block that it takes me to write my grocery list and plan out my meals for the week. Sometimes I split it into multiple different blocks. I do 15 minutes here, 15 minutes there, and I find that it works a lot better because the kids are going to need me. If I think I’m going to have 30 minutes to sit down, uninterrupted to do this, my expectations are just off in this season.
It helps me in my mind to really like, “Okay, I need to do the homeschool planning. All right, what are the steps of that?” I look at what we did last week and see where we left off then I come up with the ideas for this week, I go through the steps and I write that down kind of like a workflow, how I would do it for my business. Then I go through that workflow with those tasks split into pieces. I even do it with my showers. I love to take a long shower, that’s great, but in the morning I’m like, “10 minutes, let’s get in, get out.” If I’m washing my hair and shaving and doing all the things, I’m like, “Oh, that’s more than 10 minutes.” I’m like, “All right, one day I’ll wash my hair, one day I’ll shave.” Then I rotate them, so I’m splitting it up into smaller tasks.
Task rotation
Then another strategy that really works well is task rotation, so like I just said in the shower, I’m rotating the tasks that I split up. I also do it with our cleaning schedule. A lot of people will approach cleaning like, “Okay, Monday I clean the bathroom, Tuesday, I do this, Wednesday, I do this.” I found that it stresses me out because what happens on Tuesday when the day was filled with kids arguing and most of your day was spent in conflict resolution. Now, the bathroom’s not clean, so do I skip Tuesday and not clean the bathroom because then all the other chores for the rest of the week are going to be put off? It just got overwhelming and confusing.
Instead, I have a flow, like, okay, the first day of the week or whenever it is, we have this rotation, we do the animals, we clean the upstairs bathroom, we clean the downstairs bathroom. We have it all set out and then we rotate it. It’s like the bathroom might not get cleaned every week, every week and a half, then it’s not a big deal. If I have to push it off a few days because something happened, I’m not stressed out. I know it’s going to come up in a few days in the rotation. Rotating my tasks really help.
Routines
And then routines. Routines just are a lifesaver, I feel like. They can definitely keep us sane because we have so much that we have to remember as moms. There are so many things that fall through the cracks if we’re not doing them in a habitual way.
Routines, you can make a routine around getting chores done, make a routine around the Bible study, make a routine around the things. You know that when you eat breakfast, you do your Bible study, or when typically, when we’re done with breakfast, we do our chores, but the great thing with the routines is you can plug it in somewhere else. If we decide we’re going to the beach instead of doing chores after breakfast, you know what? We can pick up that routine when we get home and we still know the steps. It’s still easy and the kids aren’t pushing back because they know the routine.
Amy: Yes. It eliminates that decision fatigue like having to make the choice, what comes next can be debilitating for us and for our kids. Having a routine in place that’s not tied to a specific day or time is such an important and helpful strategy. That segues into my next question because one of the things I really encourage moms to do is to think about their homeschool plan and find ways to balance and combine freedom and flexibility with the well-ordered structure that is so needed for many of us, if not all of us.
Finding flexibility through routine blocking
I talked about that in my homeschool planning guide, but I would love to hear your ideas for this structured, well-organized homeschool day, and freedom in the plan when we need the flexibility. What are some ways you’ve been able to do that?
Brandy: Yes. I call it routine blocking is the term that I use. You do time blocking, so you pick from 8:00 to 9:00, we do this, 9:00 to 10:00, we do this. The way I teach it is that instead of– we will look at the clock when we’re setting things up, “What is your ideal day?” Look at like, “Oh, it would be great if we woke up at this time and I did my morning routine and it took me this long.” Looking at like, what do I want to have in that routine? What do I need to be ready for the day? Then what do we want to do next?
Building the ideal day and building your routines into that, so I have my personal morning routine. Then the morning routine with the kids. We have our chore routine. We have, when I do things like this, they have a routine of doing the skill. We set up like, okay, what three skills do you want to work on when I’m busy? That’s the routine that we set up for that.
I set it up according to the clock, just so you have that structure and like, okay, this would be a great ideal day, but then those routines can all move, like I was talking about earlier. They don’t have to stay where they are, so it gives you that flexibility to say, ”Oh, do you know what, our friend needs our help”. We don’t have to stick with this, we can come back to it later.
Knowing priorities is another thing that’s huge. Especially your overall priorities for your homeschool, for the year, for the season, but also your priorities for the day. What is my priority today? Is it to make sure I’m giving the kids enough attention and spending enough one-on-one time with them? Is it to get some of the lessons done because we’ve been slagging on that? Is it making sure we’re all there to greet dad when he comes home, but what is that priority?
Then knowing the priority helps you to determine like, okay, these are the routines that I definitely want to make sure we’re hitting today, and these other ones, they’re not so important for today. We can let go of those and choose to do, go to the beach or go out hiking or something like that.
Amy: That’s a really great tip. I think that is so important and valuable to have those routines in place and to know that you can still move them around and shuffle the pieces so that your overall priorities, the value, obviously, you put on going outdoors or having adventures or serving others or relationship, those don’t have to be sacrificed to our homeschool plan.
Brandy: Honestly, I think that’s what homeschooling is all about. When it comes down to it, what is the Lord calling us to? Definitely, to relationships. I feel like so often, we can get into that box like, “Ooh, we don’t have time to hang out, we don’t have time to help this person because we have to get this done.” Sometimes there’s a place for that, but most of the time, the Lord’s going to make room for what he’s calling you to do. All the time, the Lord is going to make room for what he’s calling you to do. It’s just having that faith to be like, “Okay, I know the Lord is calling me to go help this friend. I need to let go of that fear that X, Y, and Z aren’t going to get done,” and it reminds me of that. Is it when they were marching around? No, no, that’s a different story.
It was a story in the Bible where the Lord made time stop. The day, the sun stayed up for their battle, and it’s just I love that story because it reminds me the Lord is in control of all these things. He can certainly bless my time in whatever way he does it, but so often, I find that when I do follow what I feel called to for that day or where the Holy Spirit is leading, somehow all the things get done anyway.
Nourishing our own bodies and souls as homeschool moms
Amy: He is going to equip us for what He calls to do, for sure. Brandy, we’ve been talking specifically about our role as moms as it comes to the house and the homeschool and the kids, but moms are people too. What are some of the important things we can do to really nourish our own bodies and minds and souls as moms?
Brandy: I think rest is something that we overlook so much, especially in our culture. We’re like, go, go, go, and if we’re not achieving something, then we feel like we’re not doing what we’re supposed to be doing. I shouldn’t be sitting down now because the house is messy or I shouldn’t be resting, and that is not true. There is a scripture, what is it, the Lord gives to his beloved rest? I think something like that, and that just really stood out to me for a really long time, because especially my personality type, I do like to achieve.
I like to check things off the list. I like to get things done, but that can come at a price. When we are constantly focused on being busy, it hurts our body, it hurts our spiritual relationships with the Lord, it can hurt our relationships. I think rest, and what does rest look like? It doesn’t have to be like I’m taking a nap. It can be reading a book, it can be exercising, it can be going out in the garden, but whatever feels restful to you is important that we make the time to do it, so we don’t get overwhelmed, we don’t feel weary, we don’t get overburdened.
Amy: Sometimes it’s hard to just sit and feel like you’re not wasting time by taking a moment to read a book or take a nap or leave the dishes in the sink and go to bed, those kinds of things. Not that we should just always leave dishes in the sink, that’s not what I’m saying, but there comes a time when work never ends.
I joke the internet never ends, the work you do online or homeschooling, the books never end. There’s always more you can do and so, at some point, just having to accept your finiteness, and that’s actually a humility of just being like, I am a creature, not the creator, and so I need to stop and say it is enough for now, and then the Lord covers over all that we are unable to get to.
Brandy: Yes. I really learned. I’ve been watching my husband do this because I’m like, ”How do you find time to rest?” I had realized at one point in my motherhood that I never– you know that feeling when you were a kid and you could just lounge on the couch and feel so peaceful, there was nothing that you had to do. I’m like, I don’t know the last time I’ve ever felt that way, and then looking at my husband, he has the ability to turn it off for a minute and be like, “Oh, I’m just like going to chill out for a minute.” I’m like, “Ooh.”
I’ve been really practicing that because I’ll say I’m resting, but then I’m not really resting not only in what I’m doing with my time, but resting in my body, letting it go, not feeling that burden, that tension, resting in the Lord, just really finding rest. I’ve been practicing that, letting it go, getting rid of the thoughts in your mind, getting rid of that tension in your body, and really feeling restful when I’m resting.
Amy: I think one thing I would also just mention here is we’re talking about rest is this idea of the Sabbath rest that God gives us. One day out of seven he gives us every week, and if you think about that over the course of a year, that’s 52 days, but that’s like seven weeks. Seven weeks where God says, ”You don’t have to strive on that day, come and worship with my people”. I had a friend, a mentor who once said, ”Sometimes people wonder, when am I going to have time to read the theology book and to read the bible study book or these other things you want to do?” She was like, ”Seven weeks a year, save that book and read that on Sunday.”
Sometimes I’ll have a Sunday book, not that I can’t read it on a Tuesday if I want to, but I have that freedom that I know, “You know what? This is a day set apart.” I don’t have to worry about all the other things that they’ll be there for me on Monday. They’re just going to always be there, but today, it’s set apart, and that is a true rest as well. The rest of worship, the rest of trusting that if the Lord tells us he’s given us this day, then we can rely on him to provide what we need the other six.
Brandy: I totally agree. I think Sabbath is a beautiful practice, and there’s so many great promises in the Bible about the Sabbath, and it is, but you have to break through that fear that like, “Oh, I’m not going to get the things done.” The Lord will provide, you will get the things done that need to get done.
Amy: Exactly.
Brandy: Not all the things that you think you need to get done.
What Brandy is reading lately
Amy: That’s a very good distinction, very true. Brandy, this has been wonderful. Here at the end, I’m going to ask you the questions that I love to ask all my guests. The first is just, what are you personally reading these days?
Brandy: I am talking about rest, so I would rest and read non-fiction which is fine, but there was something in my– I had a hard time reading fiction, and it has to do with the whole letting go of achieving types of things, and recently, the Lord has really put on my heart as we go through this really resting that it’s okay to read fiction, pick up a fiction book. It’s okay if you’re not learning something right now.
I started reading Francine Rivers, she’s a Christian author and her books are so great and she’s been around for a long time, I guess. I’m not the first to jump on this train, but her books are great, and there’s just these undertones that link up to scripture and that many of her characters represent the Lord and/or people with struggles, and the way she pulls it all together, it’s just really beautiful. I’ve been reading her books, and then I’m reading some book about Train Them to Work or something about helping kids do chores.
Brandy’s best tip for helping the homeschool day run more smoothly
Amy: Oh, we should all probably read that book. Maybe I need to be trained to do chores. Brandy, what is your best tip to help the homeschool day run more smoothly?
Brandy: I love this phrase, “Do your best and let God do the rest.” Meaning yes, it’s good to make plans. It’s good to build the routines. It’s good to use your time and your resources wisely. The Lord calls us to do that, so you do your best, but if it’s not going the way that you planned, lean on God and let him do the rest because he might just be taking you a different way that day.
Opening up a different door so you can help your kid with something else that they’re struggling with or whatever, who knows? You do your best and then you let God do the rest.
Find Brandy Coffin online
Amy: As a good reminder, where can people find you all around the internet?
Brandy: Yes. I have a podcast, The Nourished Mom Podcast, my website, The Nourished Mom, and then on Facebook, The Nourished Mom.
Amy: I will have links to all those things over in the show notes for this episode at humilityanddoxology.com. Thank you to everyone who has joined us today, whether with your podcast app or on YouTube. I would encourage you, if you enjoyed this episode, you can just take a screenshot, share it in your Instagram stories, tag a friend, tag me. I would love to see it.
While you’re there, if you would leave a rating and review for homeschool conversations with Humility and Doxology in your podcast app, that would be so amazing. It really does help. As Brandy knows, as a fellow podcaster, it really helps other homeschool parents find the encouragement that you find every week here. Thank you again, Brandy, and I look forward to chatting with you again soon.
Brandy: Yes. Thank you so much for having me. It was a pleasure.
Check out all the other interviews in my Homeschool Conversations series!
