A Year’s Worth of Blessings
January 6, 2009 | 4 Comments
Hello everyone, I am currently on vacation, but a few of my readers volunteered to take over the site while I am away! They have written some excellent posts that I am sure you will love. I also have some posts I wrote answering your burning questions about The Happy Housewife. Enjoy!
A Year’s Worth of Blessings
As I reflect on 2008 I am amazed at how all the little things we so often take for granted pile up into something more than we could have imagined. This is how home schooling is for me. Some days I think, “Are we really accomplishing anything? What can we possibly learning from being together so much?” Yet, when I look back at an entire year I can see just how far we have come and the blessing that home schooling is for our family.
The largest blessing is the gift of time. The time for the kids to make homemade cards for birthdays, thank-you notes, Christmas cards and any other occasion we are faced with. My children are allowed the opportunity to be with me when I’m making a meal for a family faced with a newborn or a crisis. We are able to schedule doctor and dentist appointments in the afternoons. The freedom of our time to schedule field trips and vacations when it best suits us. The best of all is the time to enjoy the beautiful weather during the spring and fall. There is so much more learning going on at home than just reading, writing and math. The curriculum is the curriculum of life.
Most importantly, the blessing of time allows us room to breathe. I notice when our schedule gets too hectic I’m stressed, the kids are frazzled and there is definitely a lot more yelling going on than I would care to admit. We live in a society that stresses the importance of “doing.” Sometimes not doing is just as important as doing. It’s finding the balance between the two that strikes a harmony between peace and discord.
Here’s wishing you the gift of time for you and your family for the year ahead and may you enjoy the relationships that grow from it.
Julie is a homeschool mom of four kids with another blessing due in March. Currently she does not have a blog, but she is thinking about starting one.
Disney on a Dime
January 5, 2009 | 6 Comments
I have so many things to be grateful for this week, a safe trip to Florida, the lady in the gas station restroom who offered us her kleenex when the stall was out of toilet paper, happy travelers… but most of all I am so thankful we are able to take advantage of Disney’s Armed Forces Salute, which will cut our Disney cost in half for this vacation.
Tomorrow we are headed for our first day with the Mouse and I am surprised the kids were even able to fall asleep tonight.
Hopefully pictures and lots of fun coming tomorrow.
For more Gratituesday visit Laura.
Vacation Day 2
January 5, 2009 | 4 Comments
Today was our “recover from the 15 hour car trip day.” We basically relaxed at my mom’s house and visited with family. The kids had a blast playing with their cousins and I went out to lunch with my sister-in-law. Tonight we headed to my in-laws house since they live a few minutes from the Magic Kingdom gates. We will home base from here as we go to the parks this week.
We planned out the week and tomorrow we are heading to the Magic Kingdom. One trick for the Magic Kingdom is to work your way from the back of the park to the front of the park. Most people start at the beginning and work their way back, so the back of the park is always less crowded at the beginning of the day.
Tonight we are addicting my in-laws to the Wii Fit
Here are a few pictures from our first day in Florida.
The orange tree in my parent’s back yard.
Picking oranges for some fresh orange juice. It cannot compare to anything you have ever purchased at the store.
My parent’s living room. Doesn’t it look so Florida and relaxing?
You can read Day 1 of my Florida Vacation here.
For more Talk about Tuesday visit Lara’s blog.
When Frugal was a Bad Word
January 5, 2009 | 8 Comments
Hello everyone, I am currently on vacation, but a few of my readers volunteered to take over the site while I am away! They have written some excellent posts that I am sure you will love. I also have some posts I wrote answering your burning questions about The Happy Housewife. Enjoy!
Hi! I am Mom from Momstheword and I am so happy to meet you all today. I am so excited to do a guest post for Toni because I love talking about frugality. I am a stay at home wife and mother to two wonderful sons, one of whom I homeschool. I love to blog about frugal living, homeschooling, organization, homemaking, parenting, and other topics. And if we can laugh along the way, it’s even better!
There was a time when the word “frugal” left a bad taste in my mouth. When the word “frugal” automatically meant “cheap or stingy” in my mind. On our first date, my husband sat and fished a Black Angus restaurant coupon out of the glove compartment of his car. I was appalled. I wanted him to like me at full price, not half off!
When we married and were both working, my husband and I agreed never to spend more than $100 without talking to one another first. We never spent huge amounts of money, and lived somewhat carefully, but we were not overly frugal either.
We ate out, a lot. Sometimes three or four nights a week. While shopping I didn’t agonize over whether to buy something or not. If I wanted it, and it wasn’t too expensive, I bought it. I wasn’t overly concerned about sales or coupons. I never stopped and asked myself if I really needed it or not.
Then came our first child and I wanted to stay home with my precious baby boy. Suddenly, we couldn’t even afford a hamburger at McDonalds. Then came our second precious son. Then the company my husband worked for closed it’s doors, and he was out of work for a year. Suddenly, frugal wasn’t a scary word, it was a lifeline.
I remember walking through the grocery store, my eyes so full of tears that I could barely see. I felt discouraged and defeated because I couldn’t even buy a jar of olives, because they were now a “luxury.” I felt frustrated and discouraged. I wanted my “life” back. I also felt ashamed for feeling that way. I had a home, I had food, I had a healthy family. But I wanted more. I wanted “luxury.”
When my husband and I got married, we had so much more than my parents ever did. My family did not have two cars when I was little. We didn’t have more than one t.v. In fact, we didn’t even get a dishwasher until I was ten.
Yet, when we married, we both had a car. We bought a washer and dryer, microwave, T.V., fridge, VCR, (o.k., so I just dated myself), and several other things to make us happy. We wanted everything that our parents had. Only it took our parents years of hard work to attain those luxuries, and we wanted them NOW. We weren’t willing to wait. That was the beginning of our trouble with debt.
When we were able to get out of debt, we determined to stay out of debt, and so far we have (except for the mortgage on our home, which we’re working on). We have done that by making intentional choices. By looking at a purchase and asking if this is a need or a want. By asking ourselves if we can make do with something else instead. By thinking before we buy or by waiting for a sale if we determine that we must have it. We don’t always make the best choices (like we still like to eat out to much!) but we do try and live more intentionally, as a rule.
Living a simple, frugal lifestyle is not about depriving yourself. It’s all in the attitude. It’s choosing what you really value, what is really important to you, and then using your money to best serve that value. It’s examining your needs and your wants, and knowing the difference.
For more tightwad tips visit Mary.
Vacation Day 1
January 5, 2009 | 9 Comments
I decided to journal my vacation because I am really bad at writing down “memories.” Feel free to skip over these posts and get to the meat in my site, but if you want to read about taking 6 kids on a family vacation to Disney World read on.
Day 1
We planned to wake up at 4 am and get on the road about 4:30. The car had been packed the night before and everything was ready to go. Usually we go to bed early, but my husband and I ended up staying up pretty late. At 3am boy #2 came in our room and flipped on all the lights…
We tried to go back to sleep, but I was wide awake. I made a command decision at 3:30 am to get up, take my shower, and start our trip. We left of the house around 4:15 am. The trip was relatively uneventful in the early morning. Unlike most children who groggily sit in the car, mine are wide awake from the first second. They are talkative, excited, and have no intention of sleeping peacefully for the first several hours.
We stopped around 7:30 for breakfast in southern Virginia. Our waitress had an accent thicker than molasses and she called us names like sugar and honey. We should have stopped at a fast food joint, but we chose Shoney’s instead. I thought the kids would fill up and perhaps eat some fruit. I was wrong as donuts were on the buffet, and most of the kids chose those over pineapple and grapes.
We got back in the car and encountered heavy traffic and bad weather. We were able to make it another 4 hours before we stopped for a bathroom break and gas. We ate lunch in the car and the kids happily watched movies.
At some point in the afternoon our four year old asked, “Are were there yet?” I wasn’t officially keeping track, but I think this was the 1,786,398 time this question was asked. I told her we weren’t and her reply was, “Well, that’s a problem for me because I really have to go to the bathroom!” We stopped again briefly for a potty break.
In Georgia we encountered heavy traffic and ended up sitting on I-95 for over an hour. We found a secondary road and finally got around whatever was causing the back up. We pulled into my parents driveway around 7:30 pm tired and ready to be out of the car. No one really slept on the trip, but seeing the grandparents gave the kids a small second wind. They all went to bed without a fight and are eagerly awaiting their cousin’s arrival this morning.
Today we plan our 5 Day Disney Adventure!
Meal Planning 101
January 4, 2009 | 6 Comments
Hello everyone, I am currently on vacation, but a few of my readers volunteered to take over the site while I am away! They have written some excellent posts that I am sure you will love. I also have some posts I wrote answering your burning questions about The Happy Housewife. Enjoy!
My Road Map to Meal Planning
I am really excited to be helping out the Happy Housewife with a guest post for her blog! My name is Megan Spears, I am mom and organizing consultant. I help busy families create household management systems. In addition to running my own consulting business, avid blogger, I have two boys (3-6) that keep me on my toes, so it’s important to have good systems in place to stay organized.
One system that I use and encourage my clients and friends to use is meal planning. I know Toni does meal planning so I thought it might be fun to share how my meal planning process works. There are a couple of things I need to say first… I love coupons and seeing the big savings at the bottom of my receipt so it’s important to include those things in my planning!
1. I do my shopping and planning every two weeks. Less trips to the store!
2. Before I do my plan, I pull the grocery ads (only two stores where I live, so it makes it easier to choose where I go) and surf all my coupon sites beforehand.
3. Once that is done, I collect my Fridge Grid Pad, all my printed coupons, my Couponizer book, my recipe file and the laptop.
Once I have all my “stuff,” I sit down and look through the ads and start mapping out meals for the next two weeks.
1. I plan meals around what’s on sale.
2. I use my laptop to search recipes based on the sale items.
3. I have a selection of recipes that I want to make and if the items are on sale, I will plan to make it.
4. I try to base meals on using up first what is in my pantry.
A few helpful planning tips:
1. I base meals around our schedule so if I am gone, the family will still eat something other than McD’s or frozen pizza (although I am not opposed to that, I just prefer real food first).
2. I try to add in at least one or two crock pot meals in each week, less prep time on busy days.
3. I plan in at least one meat free meal each week.
4. I document my meals on my fridge grid pad so it’s easy to reference for me and the hubby through the next few weeks.
Once I have my meals planned out, I can start crafting my shopping list. Once I have my list I am ready to go.
A few last minute shopping tips…
1. Eat first!
2. I take my youngest with me (he is a good helper and keeps me focused on getting it done quickly).
3. Shop in the morning if you can, first thing! It’s amazing how empty the store is and makes for a nicer experience, not to mention the staff is usually so attentive to help first thing.
Check out Blissfully Domestic for more homemaking posts.
Brita Filters can be Recycled in 2009
January 3, 2009 | 5 Comments
A while back I wrote about bottled water waste. The point was made by one commenter that Brita filters could not be recycled unlike plastic water bottles. I agreed this was a negative, but stated that many water bottles are not recycled, they are tossed in the garbage.
Last week I was excited to learn about Brita’s new recycling program for their filters beginning in January 2009.
Preserve will recycle 100 percent of each Brita plastic pitcher filter casing collected. The No. 5 polypropylene plastic from the casing will be used by Preserve in their line of products. The filter ingredients – activated carbon for creating great-tasting water and additional ion-exchange resin that reduces lead, mercury, copper, cadmium and zinc that might be found in tap water – will be regenerated for alternative use or converted into energy.
“The Brita filter recycling program gives Brita pitcher filters new life as Preserve products,” stated John Lively, director of environment and material science for Preserve. “We calculated that the benefits of keeping Brita filters out of landfills outweigh the impact of shipping them for recycling through this program.”
Drop Off or Mail Options for Recycling
Consumers can drop off their used, dry Brita pitcher filters at participating Whole Foods Market stores or mail them directly to Preserve. Full details and instructions on both options, including a complete list of Gimme 5 stores, will be available at www.brita.com in early January 2009.
· Drop off: Through the Preserve Gimme 5 program, select Whole Foods Market stores will begin collecting No. 5 plastics and used Brita pitcher filters.
· Mail in: Consumers who wish to mail in used Brita pitcher filters are encouraged to package the filter in a small, used box and send it via ground shipping. The box will also be recycled by Preserve.
Kudos to Brita for developing a program to recycle their filters. The closest Whole Foods is about 40 minutes away, but I plan to save my filters until I am in the neighborhood.
Speaking of recycling, did you know that IKEA has recycling bins in the front of their stores? They recycle batteries and CFL light bulbs, which should not be thrown away. Another reason to love IKEA!
Disney’s Armed Forces Salute ~ Free Admission!
January 3, 2009 | 11 Comments
Disney ran this offer a few years ago. We were able to take advantage of it and unbelievably this offer comes the day before we are scheduled to leave for our Disney World vacation. I am so glad I waited to purchase tickets!
I just spoke with a representative Disney World and confirmed this information with guest services.
Free 5- Day Park Hopper Ticket for active duty service member. $99 5-Day base ticket for up to 5 guests.
Anyone on active duty- Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard
Retired military personnel
Federal/State National Guard and Reserves (with active papers dated 1/1/08-12/23/09)
Dept of Defense (CIA, FBI, Secret Service) and Coalition Forces are excluded
The military service member will receive one Complimentary 5-Day “Disney’s Armed Forces Salute“ Ticket with Park Hopper and Water Park Fun & More - this ticket is not upgradeable.
Up to 5 of their guests can purchase for $99 a “Disney’s Armed Forces Salute Companion” (5 Day Base) ticket and can add on the Park Hopper or Water Park Fun & More option for $25 each (which is 50% off the normal price); however, these tickets may also be upgraded to Premium, Annual and Seasonal Passes. Seasonal Pass upgrade requires proof of Florida Residency. No other upgrades, such as adding on additional days or the NE option, are available.
This promotion will begin on 1/4/09 and end on 12/23/09. Tickets will expire on 12/23/09 and have no block-out dates
Tickets may be upgraded anytime between January 4th -December 23, 2009 as long as there is usage left on the ticket.
You may purchase tickets
- At any Vacation Planner or Guest Relations Window
- They can purchase an exchange voucher at Shades of Green (ticket is tax free)
- They can also purchase an exchange voucher at their Base (ticket is tax free)
The entire party needs to be present for purchase (Spouse or military dependents can receive the companion discount without the military service member being present as long as they have their military ID).
The military service member will need to show ID; Cast Member will ask for their Base’s name, and the State where the base is listed.
This offer is only available once per service member.
This is a great deal for military members, especially if you live near Disney and don’t have to travel! Please pass this information on to any military family you know, active duty or retired. I hope many families are able to take advantage of this offer.
Handmade vs Factory Made
January 3, 2009 | 9 Comments
Thanks to Lisa’s post I spent most of last night and this morning researching the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act. I am intrigued and disappointed by this new law. After much research, it appears that this law will indeed ban the sale of any item (for children under twelve) that has not undergone independent third party testing in order to meet safety requirements. The Act is so vague that even people on the Commission cannot answer the question of if this act would also apply to used toys or toys already on the shelves.
Small businesses and people who make toys will not be able to afford this testing as it can range from $200 to $5000 per product. While this law was written to protect our kids from the dangerous toys made in China, its scope is much broader and will affect everyone who makes and sells toys for children.
To be honest I am sure our house is filled with hundreds of “made in China” toys. But I prefer handmade toys for my kids. In my opinion they are usually better made, encourage more creativity, and I like supporting small businesses. What is your opinion? Are handmade toys better? I have a friend who refuses to buy anything made in China, I love her dedication, but have been unable to pass up certain items. Does it matter to you where the items you purchase are made? What about food, would you rather purchase something grown locally or get a better price on apples grown in China?
As we ring in the new year, this is something I want to be more conscious about when spending money. How about you?
National Bankruptcy Day
January 2, 2009 | 3 Comments
Lisa has written an excellent piece on my other blog Happy to be at Home. If you haven’t heard about a new law that has been passed that will affect everyone who sells children’s toys you must read this post.
As if the horrible economy wasn’t enough, if you sell products targeted for children ages 12 and under, be prepared to THROW AWAY these items, as you will no longer be able to sell them unless you comply to this law.
You read that correctly. Thrown. Away.
I don’t know about you, but I feel ill just typing it, let alone imagining it.
Oh, and if you plan to sell and make a little money from your children’s old items, be forewarned, local yard sale groups and places like Ebay and Craigslist will no longer allow sale of those items, either.
No joke.
Let me back up a bit, as I’m pretty sure this might be the first time you are hearing this.
You can read the rest of the post here.
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