Hearing this week's question for the first time, made me think I'd skip this one. I have no rituals. Or so I thought.
Then @eco-alex reminded me that even the rolling of a cigarette can be a ritual and it made me think of all those things I do each day and don't even think about it twice. 🤔

Now, some people might think that I have to have some kind of ritual, routine or something in place because I have kids. Well, newsflash: nothing could be further from the truth. What started out as a 'normal' homeschooling family, slowly evolved to a unschooling family, now bordering on a chaotic radical unschooling wildlife jungle. Only without the jungle (ah, I wish...). This didn't just happen overnight or with a plan in place. No. It just happened. I think it might have been around the summer of 2017, right around the same time I joined Steemit. Wait a minute! Maybe it happened partly because of Steemit. Actually, now that I come to think of it, it probably did. And with it, some kinds of rituals possibly developed as well. So yeah @eco-alex, you're right again. Even I have rituals...What a wise man... 😉

Oh, how I wish my mornings would be more like this boy's day (Photo pixabay)

My 'somewhat' morning rituals

The mornings here can be kind of stressful at times. I thought I was past the 'I-can't-find-my-shoes-and-pants' stress in the morning when I pulled the kids out of school. And I was, for a while. Then, after 3 years at home, my eldest daughter decided to go back to school. NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Well, I couldn't blame her really. Being with your much younger siblings and annoying mom all day long, may get annoying at times. Also the activities with the homeschooling families in the area are usually more suitable for younger kids and even if it's an activity for older ones, there just aren't as many teens in that group. Life gets boring for a teen in rural Ireland. I totally understand. That might be one of the reasons why I love Steemit so much. It's pretty much the only time in the day when I actually have adult conversations! Well, anyways...she's back in school since September last year, hates it most of the time (regretted it even more) but she's sticking with it, just so it gets her out of the house. She has met a few decent people because of it, so not all was in vain.

So there we go: our morning rituals usually consist of:

Either:

A. me waking up, drumming up the others, making sure they get dressed, eat and put their shoes on. Sometimes even get a quick shower in. Followed by me yelling to at least one of them to "Put those shoes together in the evening in order to find them in the morning! Our house is not that big! Jeez, how can you lose your shoes?" Go for a quick run outside with the dog, let her do her quick business (she's used to it lol). And then rounding them all up to move their butts into the car to make our 10 minute drive into town to drop Miss Teen BlahBluhBlah to school. Hopefully on time.

Or:

B. me waking up to discover that my extra loud old-fashioned alarm clock has fallen off the wardrobe because it was ringing so annoyingly loud that even the wardrobe had enough of it...AND my alternative alarm clock in the form of my cell phone has been stolen by one of the kids to play secret games in the morning, and when the alarm goes off, they somehow don't see the urgency and turn it off. Which in its turn then makes for me getting up late to find that we have 20 whole minutes to get teen daughter to school. Me repeating all of the above less the shower and oftentimes less the breakfast ( I know, I'm a horrible mom...but don't worry, they'll have it twenty minutes late...Jeez. Get off my ass will ya!) My teen eats in school, so no worries there either. The dog will have to wait for the morning run and instead gets drummed up to get into the car like the children and is then walked on our way back from town.

PHEW!!! Our mornings are Stressful. I SO need the weekends to recover just from the mornings.
I wouldn't even know how to get back to the bringing 4 kids to school...They'd be late all the time!

Our 'kinda' day rituals

For a little while, I kinda implemented a little bit of structure when it came to 'school' work. But since the term 'Radical Unschooling' came into my life (Thanks Dayna!) I realized that I was much better at the radical thing than anything else. This means that I do some kind of schoolwork in the mornings and throughout the day, but it is not really set to time or a schedule. This ritual is so much less stressful for us all.

Then, at half past 3, I have to round up the gang of wildlings again to collect the eldest wild horse from school. Usually also paired with running around the house trying to find those damn shoes. Only to come back with 4 different odd ones...

My 'in between chaos' break rituals

Well, here you go @eco-alex: This is where the rolling ciggies comes in. When the kids are working or otherwise occupying themselves, there can be moments of about 5 minutes in which I actually take a break. I roll my cigarette and smoke this outside, sometimes while hanging laundry. Sometimes my smoke break moves to the garage because it rains. I always try to meditate or Ho'oponopono (meditation too) the crap out of my 5 minutes, so that I filled my time in a useful manner. It's kinda like my 5 minute holiday!

My evening "after rounding up the gang for bed" rituals

When the critters are finally in bed and I can breathe a bit better, it's usually time for my one joint a day ritual. I make myself coffee, roll one and smoke it throughout the evening. I don't drink or do any other kind of drugs...this is my only way to reflect on the day and get back to myself a bit. It's usually also the only time when I can hit the keyboard to get a decent time on Steemit or other internet activities in, without interruptions. I write a little during the day too, but usually don't get more than 15 minutes of peace to keep going.

If I can, I also try to do a workout of at least half an hour. Mr. Billy Blanks and his Tae Bo workouts are favourite, because they don't take too long and you still get the feeling you achieved something.

And then somewhere between my writing and bed time, I try to get my ass into the shower where I use my time wisely.
I meditate in the shower. It's the best and at times the only way for me to let go of stress and wild thoughts and to delve a bit deeper into myself.

Steemit and Utopian/Davinci, crypto and other blockchain related activities then occupy pretty much the rest of my night. Sometimes I even manage to totally unwind and get an episode of some series in. But usually this ends with me falling asleep on the couch. This can be anywhere between 1 am and 4 am. Then at 8 o'clock in the morning, we're back to square one and drill sergeant 'Yours truly' is back running around trying to get the wildlings in gear.

Welcome to my world!