TheHomeSchoolMothersJournal..20

In my life this week:

Do you ever feel like life has got ahead of you? Well that is how I have felt this week. I had the feeling that I had my home had spiraled out of control into a disaster, I had no control over anything, and couldn’t get motivated to do much of anything. Although, come Thursday and Friday, God had given me grace and I am, again on the top of the mountain. I have taken control of the laundry, dishes, and our normal day to day cleaning. There is a lot to do daily and sometimes I get overwhelmed on where to begin. My husband works outside of the home, and I work inside of the home with my daycare.  My God is the only one who can help me overcome, rise me up, and lead me in the direction He wants me to go. So I lean and ask Him to take me! He is so faithful!

In our homeschool this week:

This week has been lead by an un-schooling approach. My kids have not done much “book” work, but have taken interest in learning what they want to learn and when they want to do it. Its actually been a lot of fun. They have learned a lot. We have had sporadic talks about Heaven, Hell, and Satan. We have drawn dinosaurs. Built with Legos. Played outside, made cakes with rocks and grass in the yard! Pulled weeds and picked our pumpkins that grew in our yard. Its has been a great week for us! I am so in love with how they love to learn and pick up on things so easily when just given the gift of time and the presence of someone who cares!

What’s working/not working for us…

I have enjoyed getting up a lot earlier than normal. My husband goes to work about 6:20 am. I have been getting up about the time he leaves and getting myself ready for the day before the kids get up. It works so much better, that way I don’t have to worry about breaking up anything between the children  while in the shower! HAHA!

Questions/thoughts I have…

Nothing this week.

My favorite thing this week:

Learning right along side my kids!

Something to share:

Isn’t this so true!

Product Review

For the past few weeks we have been working with a PE program. Family Time Fitness is a very exciting program in our homeschool. We are able to work inside and out with the exercises given to us.  Family Time Fitness has programs for Kindergarten through Fifth grade. It is reasonably priced for a lifetime of fitness at $99 for the entire program from kindergarten through fifth grade, and its all online.  If you have multiple students in a certain age range, you are able to print off as many copies as you would need. So no paperwork or workbooks to keep track of.

Since we have began this program the kids have learned new exercises, vocabulary and definitions of fitness terms, health and nutrition. They also had a lot of fun. We used the K-1st grade workbooks. I thought that would be best, so that we could focus a little more on my kindergartener and my not so athletic 2nd grader.

We didn’t do a lot of the writing or extra worksheets. We mainly worked on the exercises and formation. We did talk a lot about vocabulary and spelling the fitness words. I believe the kids favorites were the crab walk and the superman pose.

 

Natalie doing Jumping Jacks.                Natalie in the superman pose.

 

If you are interested in Family Time Fitness you can get more information at www.familytimefitness.com.

 

Jaclynn Creek is a homeschooling mom to three wonderful blessings at Soaring Creek Academy. Her days are spent learning side by side with a 2nd grader, kindergartener, and 2 year old, reading lots of books, cooking and spending time with her wonderful family. Her favorite thing about homeschooling is learning new things through her children. You can find her on her blog at www.thecreekfam.blogspot.com.

Happy 2nd Birthday Travis

Travis was born September 23, 2009 at 10:37 AM. He weighed 7lbs 9oz and was 19 inches long! He was a little guy with big, puffy cheeks! I loved him the minute I knew he was coming! He is a blessing in our lives and is a very active little boy!

We celebrated Travis’ 2nd Birthday with a baseball theme! If you know him, you know a baseball party was an excellent selection! He lives, breaths, and eats baseball, football and any other sport with a ball!

My friend made our cake!

We then had presents….

We also had great fellowship with friends and family.

Here are a few of the people, others were in the kitchen and basement.

 

I am so thankful for all the people that came to Travis’ birthday party! It means a lot to us to know we have so many people that love us! We are blessed.

No More Poo…

I have finished my 2 week trial with the no poo. I am happy to say that I believe I have perfected the system for myself and my hair. I will continue to keep using 2 tbsp of baking soda and 1.5 cups of water as my hair wash along with 1 tbsp of apple cider vinegar to 1 cup of water as my conditioner. I am using so much baking soda because I have very thick hair and its past my shoulders.  I am also washing my hair every other day.

My scalp feels so much better, my hair looks healthier, and its easy.

Be poo free!!

Jackie

TheHomeSchoolMothersJournal..19

In my life this week:

Its been a pretty good week around here!

In our homeschool this week:

We have taken a few breaks with our schooling. We had 3 official school days this week. I needed to get something's done around the house and we skipped school!! We were due for a break anyways right!

Places we’re going and people we’re seeing:

We had our normal Monday Co-Op. Church on Wednesday night. We are going to a bon fire tonight to have s’mores, hotdogs, and great fellowship with friends!

My favorite thing this week:

MOMS NIGHT OUT! I had such a great time with a group of homeschool moms.

Something to share:

I am amazed at the depth of my daughters (7) mind and understanding. We talked about the events of September 11, 2001. She amazes me! Here is a picture of what she drew after she took in all of the information. Natalie truly expresses herself in her drawings. It’s a way I can fully grasp what is going on in her mind.

Natalie 7 Years Old

9/11/11

No More Poo..

I have been absolutely terrible about posting this week. Sorry! I know you are all dying to know if my hair is greasy or not!!

Day 5

I rinsed my hair with water again this morning. It was extremely greasy, and I wasn’t sure if I should wash it or not.

I ended up washing my hair this evening. It feels so much better. I did change the formula a little, I went with 1.5 tbsp of baking soda to 1.5 cups of hot water and 1 tbsp of apple cider vinegar.

Day 6

I have decided that I will now rinse my hair with water in the shower any more. I think it is making my hair get greasier quicker. So I did not wash or wet my hair today. It looked very good.

Day 7

I went all day with out doing anything with my hair other than putting it into a pony tail.  By early evening it was really gross, or atleast I felt it was. So I decided to wash it in the sink with the same formula from Day 5. I blow dried my hair this time and it looked great.

Day 8

I put my hair in a twisty thing a bob and then used a claw clip to hold it. My hair was not greasy or dry feeling and held up all day.

Day 9

I washed my hair again this morning. I blow dried it and left it down for the first time in a week. I got a few compliments on it also! (It looks so clean. Did you get a hair cut? Your hair looks GREAT!)

I again changed the formula. We have hard water and I just want to make sure I am getting my hair clean and helping my scalp out the best I can.

I used 2 tbsp of baking soda to 1.5 cups water. 2tbsp apple cider vinegar to 1.5 cups water.

My scalp is still itchy, I still have the red patches (eczema), and I am still working on the perfect formula.

TheHomeSchoolMothersJournal..18

In my life this week:

Life is still pretty crazy around here. It was nice to only have a four day week, although weeks like this might seem longer than most. We had a pretty good week all together, and took a few days off so that I could get things together and focus on a few other things in life.

In our homeschool this week:

We finished with two days of “school” this week.  We have been reading every night and doing outside of the box things for learning too.

Places we’re going and people we’re seeing:

The only place we went this week was church on Wednesday evening.

My favorite thing this week:

Actually sitting down, and having a bit of time to myself in the evenings. So what do I do with this time…I read of course. I love Beverly Lewis, so I am reading The Shunning.

Something to share:

I would have taken some pictures this week, but the batteries in my camera are dead.

Freezer Cooking Saturday

This week in freezer cooking was a lot more like Freezer Baking!

13x9 Pan of Pumpkin Bread. Broke down into 4 loaves and frozen.

81 Chocolate Chip Cookies….sitting on top of the fridge..out of reach and out of sight! They may last a while???

13x9 pan of Cornbread. Broke down into 4 loaves and frozen.

6 dozen Buttermilk Pancakes.  We had some for breakfast and then I separated them into piles of 6 pancakes. Wrapped them in wax paper, put into a Ziploc bag and then put into the freezer for easy breakfast.

All of the recipes I used came from the Better Homes and Garden Cookbook.

No more poo….

Day 3

I only rinsed my hair with water this morning in the shower. I also used the blowdryer this morning. My hair was pretty oily today. My scalp was also very itchy. So I ended up pulling my hair into a pony tail.

Day 4

I rinsed my hair with water only in the shower, and pulled it into a messy bun and air dried. I took it down in the middle of the day (when it had completely air dried) and it is much less oily.  I am pleased to say my scalp is not itchy today.

No More Poo

Day One

Just this morning I tried the baking soda and water solution. I loved it and my hair is squeaky clean. I did however forget to do the apple cider vinegar and water mixture. My hair is a little dry, but not oily. So, I am impressed so far. I also had a hard time brushing through my hair with my brush. I have very thick hair. I will try to use a comb tomorrow. I also put my hair into a pony tail.

Day Two

Today I only wet my hair with water only, used a comb to brush through and pulled it up into a pony tail. My hair feels less dry and not oily.

No More Poo…

I am trying something new, and excited to see the results of no longer using store bought shampoo with lots of chemicals that leave my scalp itchy and dry. I have tried numerous shampoos and conditioners all with the same end result. I also have dandruff  and red sores on the back of my head that remain the same way with any type of “helping” or “specialized” shampoo.

I have read a lot of information online, watched you tube videos and taken in great advice on going poo free! The remedy that I have come up with is using baking soda and water, apple cider vinegar and water.

My Formula….

2x a week I am going to wash my hair with 1tbsp of baking soda mixed with 1 cup of warm water. This may need to be tweaked a little? The amount of baking soda and/or water may need to be more or less depending if my hair becomes very dry. 

On the days that I do not wash my hair I will just wet it while in the shower and style as normal.

To wash hair your simply mix the baking soda and water in a cup of squeeze bottle until the baking soda is dissolved. Then you wet hair with water and pour the baking soda and water mixture all over head while massaging it into your head with your finger tips, concentrating on the crown of your head and around the temples and ears and neck areas.  Allow for mixture to sit for about a minute and then rinse out.

Following the baking soda and water mix is the “conditioner” which consists of apple cider vinegar.

To condition your simply mix 1tbsp of apple cider vinegar to 1 cup of warm water in another squeeze bottle, shake and pour over ends of hair. You may only use a little if your hair is naturally oily.

Pretty simple if I do say so myself!

I’ve collected that hair may be more oily with in the first 2-8 weeks of going poo free. This is due to your hair becoming so clean and rebuilding the natural oils and removing all of the chemicals from traditional shampoo that strip away natural oils. So, I have figured I will wear my hair in a ponytail or clip of some sort.

I am going to write about my no poo experience over the next few weeks! Enjoy!

TheHomeSchoolMothersJournal..17

In my life this week:

Have you ever had a week where you would like to crawl in a closet until it was over? Have you ever prayed so hard for Jesus to come back?  I have had one of those weeks. I have been up and down emotionally and am feeling weak and inadequate of all God is calling me to do on a daily basis. I feel so overwhelmed at times, but know I am doing what He wants me to do. Does that make sense?

In our homeschool this week: 

 We started our first co-op classes on Monday. Natalie and Adam are taking a Phys. Ed. class and art class. I am of course in the nursery with all the littles!

Places we’re going and people we’re seeing:

The kids and I went to the Childrens’ Museum this week and then to Taco Bell for lunch. It was a free day because we used their free pass for the museum and free taco card that they earned from the Summer Reading program at the library!

My favorite thing this week:

 I cleaned and straightened up my laundry room. Washed. Dried. Put away. ALL of the laundry. I love being ahead of the laundry pile!

Something to share:

A picture I snapped on our trip at the museum. Don’t you just love the Mr./Mrs. Potato Heads!!

Broken Pieces

My heart sunk when I heard the crash against the tile in the kitchen. I knew there was something broken, but didn’t know what had broken? I walked to the kitchen to find Travis standing there with the broken pieces. The cabinet was open and there was our Christmas cookie plate. This plate has been used for many years. I remember using this as a little girl on Christmas Eve to put cookies on for Santa. We have also used it for our children for all of their Christmas celebrations.

This incidence has led me to think of  people of the world. We are all broken with pieces spread about. Can we just pick them up the pieces and everything be fixed? Nope. We need something larger to pick up the pieces because we can’t do it on our own. Although a lot of times our first reaction as humans is to fix our own problems.

How often I forget to call upon my Lord. I am broken, oh so broken. I can only be fixed with the help of my Lord. Which leads me back to a verse that I refer to often…

Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the LORD and shun evil.  Proverbs 3:5-7 NIV