My Life Rhapsody

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Non-Family Photo Friday

Friday, November 6th. Wow, what happened to 2009?

Well, I hate to admit it but I have no photos to share today. It's been a long week that has included sickness at our house and the camera has sat un-used.

So instead of photos, I will share this blog news:

Starting next week, I am moving... to a new blog. You can find it at www.lightathome.blogspot.com. I'll still be writing daily and following my usual format. I simply needed some of the benefits blogspot offers that this server doesn't.

This blog address will still be here with my archived posts, but current entries and photos will be posted only at the new blog. So make a note of it and stop by to visit sometime.

See you there!

Deals Around Town

It's been a while since I've shared any "shopping superstar" posts  but that isn't because there are no deals to be had. Rather, I've gotten a fair amount of free or very inexpensive items from WalMart, CVS and Kroger lately.

I picked up everything in this photo at WalMart a week or two ago for next to nothing. The pads were free. The razors were more than free (cost $1.99 and I used a $3 off coupon, so they allowed me $1.01 overage - yes, in that sense, I was paid $1.01 for buying that product!). Same with the Reach dental floss and the Johnson's soap - better than free! All of that was using regular coupons from Sunday newspaper inserts. Yeah!

CVS has a good deal on Glade products this week so I picked up a few of those for free this week.

And Kroger has a good sale this week with a few products that will end up being free with coupon match-ups (for example: Carnation Evaporated Milk is on sale this week for 50 cents - go here to get a free recipe book and a link to a coupon that will get you 2 cans of evaporated milk for FREE, if your store doubles coupons).

What about you? Found any great deals lately? They're out there...  

Works for Me Wednesday - Swagbucks

Swagbucks is a search engine website that actually rewards you for searching the internet!

Once you sign up here, use Swagbucks as often as you want to do the usual searching you'd do at Yahoo or Google or wherever. Randomly, Swagbucks will reward you by adding 1, 2, 3, or 5 Swagbucks to your account. Once you accumulate around 50 Swagbucks, you can redeem them for prizes including music downloads or gift cards. Or you can save them up for bigger purchases. The best deal I see is the $5 Amazon.com gift card that costs only 45 Swagbucks. By signing up now, they'll credit your account with 3 Swagbucks to start you off.

I've found it helpful to use Swagbucks as my home page and do at least 1 or 2 searches a day. And at least 75% of the time, I win a Swagbuck or two and then I go about my usual business on the internet. It didn't take long at all to earn enough Swagbucks to buy Amazon gift cards - which will come in very handy for holiday gift purchases made online. 

If you are interested in Swagbucks, go here to sign up.

It works for me!

Homeschooling: Compassion Lapbook

A few weeks ago I was given a free lapbook from Hands of a Child on the condition that I publish a review of the material.

[What is a lapbook, you may be asking. A lapbook is basically a portfolio, creatively displayed and made from a folder. Some people call them shutterbooks, project packs. They fold closed and have a front cover, then open up to display what a child has learned, projects they've done, etc. Lapbooks use imagination and creativity and can be as unique as each child who makes one. Think "scrapbooking meets homeschooling." ]

Here are some pictures of the lapbook my daughter created based on a study of COMPASSION.

COVER:

We created our lapbook using 2 crimson folders I had on hand.  

INSIDE LEFT:

Using the project pack provided for us in the Hands of a Child Compassion study, we printed off the material for the inside of the lapbook. Each activity involved a short story, a Bible passage, some discussion, and then writing or drawing a picture related to what we discussed. My daughter did a lot of drawing where as older children could do more writing.

INSIDE RIGHT:

My daughter LOVED this way of learning. She was disappointed to learn that we'd completed the 10 lessons on Compassion and was immediatley asking when we could start a new lapbook.

PROS of lapbooking: visual-learning at its best; in the end, you are left with a visual reminder of what you've studied, which is easy to look back on and review; can find many free lapbook projects here.

CONS: can pay money for each study, which really adds up; there is some prep involved in each lesson - looking ahead, printing the activity materials on colored paper, some cutting out ahead of time, etc.

Overall, I do intend to add some lapbooks to our homeschooling routine. I especially like the idea of doing a lapbook as a "book report" for some of the longer chapter books we read together. But lapbooking is so easy to adapt to any material, any subject, any age range that it's really a wonderful supplement to our regular curriculum.

Menu Plan Monday

The first week of November already! I can already feel the start of a knot in my stomach as I think about the holidays and all that needs to happen before they arrive. But one thing that makes life easier and stress-free for me is a menu plan for the week. Here is what we'll be eating for supper this week (with some repeats from last week that we didn't get to):  

• Marinated chicken, mashed potatoes, peas 
• Tater Tot casserole, corn
• Smoked sausage coins, baked potatoes, cabbage
• Crockpot Porkloin with carrots, potatoes
• Enchilada Casserole
• Breakfast for supper
• Wet burrito casserole (recipe below)

When I last mentioned Wet Burrito Casserole, I had some folks asking for the recipe. It is a favorite recipe of ours, which I will gladly share: 

Mix 1 and 1/2 cups sour cream and 1 can cream of mushroom soup. Put 1/2 of mixture in bottom of 9x13 dish. Brown 1 pound hamburger, 1 medium onion chopped, and 1 medium green pepper chopped. Drain. Add 1 package taco seasoning (and mushroom, refried beans, black olives, other favorite add-ins) to meat and heat. Divide mixture into 10 soft tortilla shells. Roll up tortillas and place on top of sour cream mixture in pan, seam side down. Top w/ remaining sour cream mixture and sprinkle with 2-3 cups shredded cheddar cheese. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes.

Family Photo Friday

The end of October already. Ay ay ay! Well, it's Friday again so here are a few of our favorite photos from this week.

This is my son kicking back and relaxing in the shopping cart at Lowes. Gotta love it!

Here's my daughter wearing some new-to-her jammies. She loved them because they are warm and cozy. Then I told her that they used to be mine when I was her age! They have been handed down from me, to sisters Heidi, Jenny, and Stephanie, then to sisters Bethany, Marissa, and Sara Lynn and now back to my daughter! How fun is that?!

Happy Friday, y'all!

Homeschool Field Trip: Creation Museum

Yesterday we took a day trip to the Cincinnati, Ohio area to visit the The Creation Museum. They were running a special deal for homeschoolers, so our family of 4 was able to get in for less than $30 - more than half off the regular admission price!

What a blast we had! The museum is so HUGE that it's hard to even try to describe everything we saw.

Lots of dinosaurs. This one was eating a pineapple that I just couldn't resist!  Some were robotic, moving their tails, mouths that chomped food. Very realistic.

There were at least 3 multi-media presentations... all of which were very well done. A big display on Noah's Ark. A large display on the Garden of Eden which then turned into an explanation of the effects of sin and the Old Testament sacrificial system, which then paved the way for Jesus Christ. There were some smaller exhibits that were also fun (fossils and gemstones were fascinating).

Near the end we realized that you can walk around their beautifully landscaped grounds and nature trails. The weather was wonderful for us to spend at least 30 minutes outside (thanks to clear skies and temps in the 60s). My daughter loved the suspension bridge. I loved the many waterfalls and ponds, as well as the beautiful fall leaves on the trees. We then headed to their petting zoo - which included some interesting mixes of animals (like a zorse - a zebra/horse!)

What fun! If you ever get a chance, GO!

Works for Me Wednesday - Build and Grow Clinics

I have young children who LOVE to help Dad with projects around the house. My husband makes a trip to Lowes approximately every 3.2 days  for parts, hardware, tools, and who knows what else. And my kids often accompany Dad to Lowes.

Lowes has caught on to this up and coming generation of Lowes customers and now offers "Build and Grow Clinics" every other Saturday at 10:00 am. Bring the kids and Lowes will supply them with a work apron, a wooden project kit, and all the tools they need for the kit (kid-sized tools, mind you = too cute). When finished, the kids receive a certificate of completion, a patch for their work apron, and of course they get to take home their completed project.

Here are some pictures of my kids enjoying a recent Build and Grow clinic at our local Lowes.

My son loved the kid-sized hammer but felt so grown-up to be able to work on his own project!

My daughter working on her project, with Dad's help [while my son and I were wandering the store, looking at inflatable Christmas decorations].

My son working on his project, with Dad's help [while my daughter and I were wandering the store, looking at their kitchen displays].

Lowes Build and Grow clinics - works for me!

Home Makeover: Tile Foyer

The most recent home improvement project taking place at our house is now done and it turned out GREAT! My husband took up some very old, very stained and dirty-looking laminate flooring and installed new porcelain tile in our foyer. What do you think of it?

OLD (also can see the black felt paper underneath the old laminate):

DURING:

NEW:

CLOSE UP (these are engraved fancy do-dads that made the tile project last twice as long and cost twice as much... but these little accents make it look great!)

We love it! This really changes the feel of the area as you walk in the front door. Instead of immediately seeing the won't-come-clean-no-matter-how-hard-you-try brown laminate floor, now there is this beautiful and welcoming tile.

One more project done!

To see the rest of our "home makeover" projects,  go here.

Menu Plan Monday

Another week is here. Our weeks always go better if I have a menu plan for our meals.

Breakfasts: homemade waffles and pancakes from freezer stash, sausage links, eggs, or cereal

Lunch: leftovers, sandwiches, carrot slices, fresh fruit

Suppers:

• Homemade beef and rice skillet
• Grilled chicken, baked potatoes
• Wet burrito casserole
• Homemade pot pies w/ pork, mixed veggies
• Chicken and swiss roll-ups, rice, frozen peas
• Enchilada Casserole
• Breakfast for supper (serve scrambled eggs, waffles or pancakes for supper one night a week - big money saver and usually very easy - makes a good Simple Supper Sunday meal)

All of this will be pulled off with ingredients we have already. I shouldn't need to do any more grocery shopping this month. I'm already looking ahead to holiday baking and have purchased about half of the baking supplies I need. The other half will come out of my November food budget. Splitting it up between months lessens the impact on any one month's budget - which works well for me!

To see the best of the best menu plans from around the blogosphere, visit I'm an Organizing Junkie.

Happy Eating!

Family Photo Friday

It's Friday once again. Here are a few snapshots depicting our week.

This is my little drummer boy. He is so precious!

We had some beautiful fall weather this week, so we enjoyed a few hours raking and playing in leaves. This picture shows my son, my daughter and our neighbor Sarah.

This is my daughter and Sarah. Give the kids the camera... this is what you get.

Happy Friday - make it a good one!

Crazy Thursday

It's Thursday again.

Thursday is the craziest day of the week for us. Most other days the kids and I are at home, homeschooling, doing usual at-home things like cleaning and laundry and meal prep. We might run some errands, but we're generally at home. However, on Thursdays, we get up and head out of the house at the same time Dad heads off to work - around 7:30 am. I take my kids to Grandma R's house where they stay for the morning. I then head off to church where I put on my secretary hat. I create and print bulletins, have a staff meeting with our two pastors, take care of emails, answer phones, maintain the church calendar, etc. Then back to Grandma's around lunch time to pick up the kids and head home. We grab leftovers for lunch at home and then try to settle in for an hour or so of quiet time. On Thursdays, I DEFINITELY need this as much or more than the kids!  Other people may be used to running at a crazy pace, but I am not. It drains me. So I need some time to myself to recharge. Then it's time to start supper and do a few things around the house before Dad gets home from work.

Yes,Thursdays are nuts for us. But I don't want to be a whiner. Rather, I want it to be known that I am thankful for a job. My job has many benefits:

• I am able to do most of the work from home
• I receive a fair wage for my work (including 2 weeks of paid vacation, which is very unusual for a part-time job)
• My hours are very flexible
• My kids occasionally accompany me to church for my Thursday morning work and it's ok
• My kids spend time with Grandma and Grandpa each week, which is a blessing to the kids and to the grandparents (most of the time )
• I have healthy relationships with our pastors, my "co-workers"
• I am able to do my small part to help our church function
• I am able to serve the Lord through this work, using the gifts and talents He's given me

So off I go, trying to live out this verse: Whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. (Colossians 3:17) 

Wordless Wednesday

Clergy Appreciation Month

October is Clergy Appreciation Month. Did you know that?

If you haven't already, take some time to find a way to let your pastor(s) know that you appreciate 'em. Pastors carry a heavy burden for their congregations and yet somehow they rarely hear a thank-you for the work they do.

There are so many simple things you can do to bless your pastor: invite your pastor over for a meal with your family, write a sincere thank-you note, give a small gift, ask if your pastor has any personal prayer requests and then commit to pray for them.

For more ideas, check out the Clergy Appreciation Month website here.