Early to Rise Challenge {week 1 update}

Last week I briefly mentioned that I was joining in with Money Saving Mom's Early to Rise Challenge for this month. And I thought it was time for an update (it's been a week already!).

And what a week it has been! Not much has gone according to plan and there has been sickness (stomach but) to deal with. But isn't any week that you give yourself a challenge like that? If something can go wrong it will, right? Or at least it seems like that sometimes.

And being the dyed-in-the-wool night owl that I am it has been a very tough week of waking up for me. I must confess that I feel like more mornings have been failures than successes. It's just plain ol' hard for me to go to bed early and wake up early. The mornings that have been successes have been very enjoyable though.

Being married to a night owl makes it a bit harder to even want to change, too. I don't like going to bed at night alone and I really enjoy spending time with my husband in the evenings (and late evening is when that has a chance to happen).

But I am pressing on. This was only the first week, so hopefully next week will be better. I will say that I am really enjoying the eBook that we're reading through as part of the challenge. Early To Rise is well-written and challenging, even if the author does make me feel like somewhat of a loser when he says that I have a hard time getting up early because I don't really like my life (don't think I agree with that point). But it is a good read.

So there it is: my accountability for the week.

How about you? Do you enjoy rising early?

One Way I Refresh During the Summer as a Homeschool Mom

As our homeschool takes some time off this summer, my mind almost never stops thinking of and planning ahead for the upcoming school year. This is probably because I'm Type A and an obsessive planner...lol Whatever the reason, I do enjoy this season of planning. But I also need to be refreshed as a homeschool mom. Homeschooling can be incredibly exhausting and all-consuming. It's not easy and it's a lot of responsibility. And I take that very seriously when I am researching curriculum and planning toward the next school year. So also taking some time to rejuvenate and refocus myself is very important. How do I do this? Each summer I take some time to read something inspiring and motivating that speaks to me as a homeschool mom. Some of my fave reads from past years--that I have nearby on my shelf and refer to often--are Educating the Wholehearted Child, The Well-Trained Mind, The Charlotte Mason Companion, A T...

The Making of an Egyptian Death Mask

We are learning all about the ancient world this year with Story of the World I and loving it! We've been learning a lot about Egypt, of course, which is completely fascinating. Most recently we have studied the New Kingdom of Egypt, which includes the story of King Tut. So we decided making an Egyptian death mask in the style of King Tut's would be a fun project. First since it was too cold at the time to paper mache in the garage (it probably would have frozen instead of dried-ha) and it was too messy to do it in the house, we decided to pick up a couple of cheap craft masks at Hobby Lobby. Next we cut out cardboard shapes to complete the shape of the death mask, attaching them with hot glue. Vince even put a little detail on the *beard* with the hot glue per The Princess' request. Then the kiddos started to paint them with this metallic gold tempera paint. It worked okay for the cardboard, but would not coat the plastic of the mask. We thought maybe a second coat ...

Door Hanger Chore Charts

My kids have had a chore chart for a while. It's one of those magnetic boards and they share it. However, it's not by their rooms and often they (and I) forget to update it. Plus it's a little bulky. When I saw the concept of a door hanger chore chart on Pinterest, I loved it! It was compact, right there were the kiddos could see it coming out and going into their rooms, and it costs almost nothing to make. I headed over to one of my favorite stores: Hobby Lobby, of course. They have these little wooden door hangers for .79. I also grabbed a couple of packets of decorative buttons for $1.99 each. I already had the clothes pins and the paint so those cost me nothing. I began by painting the door hangers (I used tempera paints because that's what I had). Then I grabbed a fine point Sharpie and the clothes pins and started writing chores on them, making sure to write them correctly so they will ...

my blessed life

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