Merchi and Kathy,
I am just seeing these questions now, so I'll pop-in and answer. Before we had our upper guides written, and when I only had two kiddos who were school-age, my schedule (and my time were a bit different than they are now)!
Back then, we did do each of those areas I listed once each week. Prior to writing our guides, I also did poetry once weekly, but once the guides were written (and we included poetry in every guide) that was no longer necessary.
You'll notice Bigger includes a pretty full poetry study (skill-wise) and each of the guides that follow Bigger include poetry in a unique way as well.
Hymn study is another CM area that is included in both Bigger and MTMM - with the history of the writing of the hymn, sheet music, a corresponding devotional, and a fully orchestrated CD with which to sing along.
Over time, I did discover that some drawing lessons were very helpful prior to our kiddos diving into a nature journal. So, to compensate for that we schedule Draw and Write Through History in multiple guides in row from Preparing Hearts on up to prepare kiddos in that area. We also discovered some work with watercolor painting was also very helpful prior to doing much nature journaling, so we added that into CTC every week to give kiddos experience in that area. Then, we scheduled nature journaling all year in MTMM, once kiddos have the experience of drawing over multiple years and painting in CTC under their belts.
While I loved the idea of classical music, and it is wonderful to have the kiddos listen and enjoy music, we realized that a more formal study of classical music was appreciated more as the kiddos got older. So, we scheduled a year-long study of classical music in Rev2Rev.
We also scheduled a formal picture study time throughout the year in RTR, as it matched so well with the study of the renaissance time period.
So, as you can see we eventually took all of those strands of a CM style education and wove them within the fabric of our guides at a time that we felt kiddos could really absorb and enjoy those skills most.
In the essence of being time conscious, we did not do all of those areas every year.
You'll notice through HOD that what we try with our own kiddos often becomes a part of our guides, after years of pondering where these types of skills and studies seem to fit best.
If you desire to add any of these things earlier, you can of course do that in a very low key way.
Just be sure that you're not dropping other needed skills from the HOD guide to make room for the extras.
Blessings,
Carrie