Simplify...The Saga Continues

I didn't know if I could get myself together in time, but we are starting school tomorrow.  I've been sitting at the computer so long I have pain in my hip when I walk from sitting in a hard chair.  BUT...I'm done. Do the happy dance with me! I have the first semester planned out for our 18 year of homeschooling.  Did I just say that?  Have we been doing this 18 years?

I still don't like it when moms ask me how I do things because I still feel like I have no clue.  I'm still figuring it out.  Yes, I am a slow learner. :)

This is our second school year living together in my in-laws house.  Bless their hearts. Our junk has taken over their house & I hate it. But they never say a word about it.  No matter how much I try to keep the level of junk to a minimum it sneaks in anyway.  And so the challenge to organize our school materials remained my biggest accomplishment yet.  In our house I had 11 bookshelves completely dedicated to school books & materials.  I had a huge filing cabinet packed full. There is no room for that here, so I had to learn quickly how to simplify & reduce.

I am excited that I have learned to simplify our school "stuff" tremendously.  The majority of our school books are still in storage even though I did bring some more here a few months ago. I pulled out what I thought we would need this year.  After I finally figured out who was using what & what I needed to buy I then packed up what we were not going to use & those boxes are in the garage waiting to go back to our storage unit.

I now have one and half bookshelves instead of 11. :)

 This is where our readers & History & Science books are kept.  The smaller shelf to the right is where I am keeping my books (Teacher Manuals, Solution Manuals, etc..).

My mother in law had this amazing piece of furniture made years ago. It is in the Dining Room which is also Scott's office (on one end of the table) and our school room (on the other end of the table). It is solid wood & beautiful & my school stuff kinda crept up on it & gradually took over the bottom part. She graciously offered to take the rest of her dishes off so I could have the space, but I told her no.  I'm making do just find with what I have.

Below is a plastic drawer unit I brought from home.  At first it stayed at my parents house when the younger kids & I stayed there more of the time.  When we moved here I brought it & it definitely keeps things more organized.

 

The four younger kids each have their own drawer.  In their drawers are their books, folders, pencils, and any other supplies they want to keep.  The top drawer are our art supplies that I do not want them to be able to get to.  I keep boxes of colored pencils, crayons, markers & pencils out on the buffet.  But misc type stuff is in the top drawer.

It isn't a perfect system, but we are making it work.  For years I knew I needed to simplify our school, house..life.  And the Lord has helped us do that.  Not exactly the way I would have chosen to do it, but that's ok.

Since we are short on bookshelves, I have learned to utilize technology.  Scott has a Kindle Fire & I have an iPad with the Kindle app on it so many of the books the kids will read are a Kindle download.  That saves on bookshelf space tremendously!   I'm also using some iPad apps for phonics practice, math drills & geography.

Another new thing for this year is I'm using a blog to post my oldest sons assignments.  I have 8th, 10th & 12th grade boys who would rather use a computer than a piece of paper any day.  I'm also trying to eliminate all excuses for not getting work done (I know you are shocked any of my kids would avoid school work).
So far, I have scheduled 5 weeks worth of assignments on the blog.  Each Sunday their assignments for the week will show up in a post.  For example, Collin's assignments will be in a post titled, "Collin: Week 1".  He had to subscribe to the blog so he will get an email.  The beauty of this is that when he is on break at work, he can pull up the blog on his phone & find links to his Bible, Science & History readings for the week.  He is so excited. **insert sarcasm HERE!**
This is an experiment, so we will see if it really works & if they use the blog like I hope they will.  If not, I will go back to my paper plans.

One more new thing this year is our Bible curriculum.  I have never really used curriculum for Bible, but since I am simplifying that meant less planning for me. Last year I really dropped the ball on Bible. This year I am excited to use Bible Road Trip by Danika Cooley.  She is writing a 3 year survey of the Bible.  She is still writing the 3rd year.  The first year covers the books of Law & History.  Year 2 covers Prophets and Poetry & Year 3 is covering the New Testament.  I spent many weeks pouring over this & the deeper I got, the more I loved it.  I'm so thankful for Danika's hard work on this & especially for offering it for free!  I went through 2 reams of paper to print all of this out & the more I printed the more grateful I became for her hard work!

So, I have spent all of this time planning & printing & creating.  But we all know what will happen.  I can plan all I want to, but if I have planned away from God, his plans will succeed, not mine.

"Many are the plans in a man's heart (and on a mom's lesson plan page), but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails." Proverbs 19:21 {emphasis is mine}

I'm excited about our new school year.  I can't wait to see what the Lord has in store for us.

Mommy Day Camp

We are deep in the season of summer camps.  Sarah is at her second one already.  Monday morning she along with Morgan & Ben will go to another camp.  And Collin is on his way home right now from a camp.  I'm so thankful that our church provides such great opportunities for my kids like these camps.

But just for a moment I had a thought that turned into another thought. 

I want to go to camp!

Not as a chaperone, but as a camper. 

So, I started thinking about it.  How cool that would be to have a "camp" to go where just for a little time I didn't have household duties, or taxi service or any other demands that come with being a mom.  Just for a little bit, I think it would be great to have some time to take a break.

Then I started thinking about it even more. 

What if there was a Mommy Day Camp for moms whose husbands were unemployed or under-employed?  What if there were a Mommy Day Camp that for one day, provided a mom a day off from her mommy duties and was pampered in a way she could never afford otherwise. 

Manicure
           Pedicure
                      Haircut
                               Massage
                                       Breakfast & Lunch (real, not fast food)

and great fellowship with other women.

and best of all...

It's FREE!

I know, I'm dreaming.  But it's my dream.  I can't afford those things, as simple as they are & I know it would so much fun to be pampered one day.

So, I'm dreaming & praying.  I would love it if the Lord would show me how to make this happen.  I can't tell you the excitement in my heart that I have at the thought of giving this simple gift to moms who can't afford to do it themselves.  It may never happen, but a girl can dream can't she?

Blessings from a Broken Phone

"And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose." Romans 8:28

I don't blog much about our personal trials.  Usually those closest to me can read between the lines in my posts.  But I just had to share this with you, because it is just so cool!

The story starts a few weeks ago when my son was playing in a friends garage with some other kids.  They were running around.  One of the kids laid his new phone on the ground & while the kids were running around, my son accidentally stepped on it.  He didn't even realize he had done it, but just the same, the phone was broken.
A few hours later, the mom of the boy showed up on my door step demanding that we buy her son a new phone NOW.  She was hopping mad!  I tried to be as nice as I could, but when she got in my face I popped off, "Well, I"m sorry this happened, but my husband is without a job and there is no way we can buy your son a $250 phone.  We don't even have phones that cost that much!" 
She backed off a little & then told us to contact her ex-husband because he bought the phone.
No problem, my husband said.
That night the dad called & he & Scott talked.  They got everything squared away as well as most men can...completely non-emotional.  :o)  The dad could fix the phone & we wouldn't have to pay a thing.
In the mean time, the dad found out that Scott was without a job & decided that he wanted to do something to help us out.  He happens to be a manager at Sonic & emailed 16 other managers about us.  They decided to do a food drive for us.

That is 600 employees collecting food for us.

The response was so overwhelming the managers were completely shocked!
Scott got a phone call Friday by the dad (of the kid with the broken phone because of my son) explaining what they had done.  WooHoo!  God is so good!
Today, they brought over the donations.  It literally took 2 pick-up trucks to get it all here!
They filled up my living room with boxes of food & other things. 

Then they told us the best news of all!  

Oh, I'm just so excited about this part.
They had such an overwhelming response that they didn't even bring us all the food.  They took a lot of it to 2 other families who also needed it.  Is that not cool?

It get's better!

They decided that their Sonic Restaurants would hold a food drive twice a year every year to help families who are in need.  How fantastic is that!?! 

All because my son stepped on a cell phone!

I took pics of my living room, but really it doesn't do justice.  I can't fit it all in my pantry, so we have canned items sorted into boxes under my kitchen table.  Crazy huh!

"And we know that for those 

who love God all things work together for good, 

for those who are called according to his purpose."

Romans 8:28

5 Minute Chocolate Cake - better recipe

I received an email this morning from a fellow chocolate addict.  It was the recipe for a 5 minute chocolate cake that you cook in a coffee mug in your microwave!  Oh my goodness!  So, I had to share it with you.  I also found a mug you could buy with the recipe on it!  This obviously is not a new thing.

So here we go!

The recipe is easy.

Ingredients:
  4tablespoons flour
4 tablespoons sugar
1 egg
2 Tablespoons baking cocoa
A pinch of salt
  3tablespoons milk
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 Tablespoon oil
1/2 cup chocolate chips (optional, but not really)
Microwave safe cup

Spray your cup with cooking spray, just enough to coat the cup. In a bowl, mix together all your ingredients and stir well. Now pour this batter into your cup.

 

 

Put the cup in the microwave and cook it on full power for 3 minutes. Depending on the power of your microwave, and your altitude (go figure) you may have to cook the cake longer. Only cook in additional 15 second intervals, because an overcooked cake is no good, and it's even worse because you're microwaving it. 

Your cake should be nice & fluffy.  Now you are ready to serve it.  Here are a few idea's I found that you can do with your cake.

   

Sprinkle some powder sugar on the top.

Top with some cherry or strawberry pie filling. 

 I also think that adding some chocolate syrup on top would make is extra chocolaty!  Yum!

This would make a great gift.  Take all of the dry ingredients measured out and put them into a food safe bag.  Print out on a card the directions with a list of the remainder of ingredients needed (egg,milk, vanilla extract & oil) .  Attach the card to a ribbon and tie around the top of the baggie.  Place the baggie in the coffee mug.

There ya go!  An inexpensive, yet really cool gift for someone.

Decorating for Fall

Before September is even over we begin to see Fall decorations in the stores.  Actually, I saw some already on clearance in one particular store in July!  October marks the beginning of "holiday season" for the stores.

For our family is it just October. We do not celebrate Halloween in our family, but I do love decorating for Fall.  We leave all the spookies out & enjoy treating our home to a little extra care as we pull out our Fall decorations.

I especially love to decorate with the "fruits of the season".  Pumpkins, gourds, corn, etc...can be found as decorations, centerpieces or front porch treasures.

I found some new decorating ideas on the Better Homes and Garden's website that I hope we can try this year.  These idea's use pumpkins of all kinds.  You don't have to make a pumpkin scary, you can make it fun and welcoming with just a little bit of creativity.

 Stack pumpkins of all sizes on top of each other & paint your house number on them.  Makes for a simple & very fun front porch decoration.

Hollow out a gourd or pumpkin and put Mum's or other Fall type flowers in it.  What a great center piece for a table!

This looks so fun!  Here are the instructions for creating Polka Dot Pumpkins.  Your kids can help you do this one.

Instead of painting scary faces, paint fun designs on a pumpkin.

These are simple, but fun ways to decorate your home for the Fall season. I know that when my home begins to take on the look of Fall then usually my cooking does to.  Hopefully next week I will share with you some of my favorite Fall recipes.  You will find out that I have a thing for pumpkins.  I like them as decorations & as a meal.  So stay tuned!

3-2-1 Biscuits

A friend of mine brought biscuits to a meeting we had this past year & they were the best I had ever had. Up until now, my biscuits were just from a baking mix. I didn't like making them from scratch because there just seem to be too many ingredients. Not so with these 3-2-1 Biscuits. My kids love these. They are not the most healthy, but very delicious!

Recipe
3 Tablespoons of sugar (I never put 3, more like only 1)
2 cups of Self Rising Flour(not all purpose) (may need a little more)
1 cup of Heavy Whipping Cream (the not so healthy part)

Mix together, roll out to about 1/2 inch thick. Cut. I use the top of a coffee mug because I don't have a biscuit cutter. But for your kids I bet they would like fun shapes from a cookie cutter.

An easier way.... My friend never rolled her dough out. I didn't know that until recently. She just dropped them on the pan & patted them down a little.

Bake 400 degrees for about 15 minutes. Just watch them & smell them. When they smell real good & are browning on top, they should be done.

We love putting a little butter & strawberry preserves in the middle of ours. No gravy needed!

Enjoy!

Homemade Dishwasher Detergent

I found a new blog today that sounds frugally fantastic! I just had to share it with you!

I Am Frugal has great idea's on how to save money. But here is her recipe (super easy!) on how to make your own dishwasher detergent for only about $7!

Read here