Having a large space or an entire room dedicated to homeschooling is great. Sometimes I dream about having a house big enough to have an entire room just for our books and school supplies to do our projects and school work in. Not everyone has space for that though, and that's okay. You don't need to live in a large house to successfully homeschool. In fact, I follow several blogs about families that homeschool out of RVs or renovated buses, and my own family is currently homeschooling out of a small apartment. In this post I share some of my best tips for homeschooling in a small space. Remember That Learning Can Happen Anywhere Like I mentioned before, as awesome as it would be to have a whole room dedicated to homeschooling, it's not necessary (and it's a whole extra room to clean). One of the greatest things about homeschooling is that it doesn't have to look anything like public school. You can make it whatever you want. The idea that learning has to hap...

We had to plan an entire day out of the house last week because our apartment was scheduled to be treated for bugs. Luckily the weather was gorgeous so we could spend most of the day outside at the park. Instead of skipping a day of school, I decided to plan a few educational activities we could work on outside. I've been wanting to do a seed investigation for awhile now and this was the perfect opportunity.  In this post I share the activities and resources we did to explore different types of seeds and learn about how they work. Collect and Compare Seeds come in many different shapes and sizes. Go outside and have your kids search for different types of seeds. Some common ones to look for are dandelion seeds, acorns, and seeds from fruit and nut trees. You can also collect seeds from your kitchen or grocery store like sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, peach pits, avocado pits, apple seeds, bell pepper seeds, etc... Compare the different sizes, shapes, and colors of ...

Screen time is often made out to be an almost evil way for kids to spend their time, and parents who allow more than a very limited amount of screen time, are often labeled as lazy. Screen time isn't always a bad thing though. I allow my kids pretty free access to our television and their tablet, as long as they don't let it consume their entire day, and they stay active and work on other activities through out the day. Here are a few reasons I don't put strict limits on screen time in our house: We Live In The Technology Age There's really no way around it. We live in a world full of technology and screens. There are screens in the check out lines at the grocery store, the drink dispenser at the pizza place, and at the photo kiosk at the drug store. We take pictures with digital cameras. More and more college courses are being offered online. Our kids need to learn how to use the technology needed to function in today's world. Learning to use a tablet or a ...

I tend to get really dry skin in the winter time, but I'm not a big fan of the ingredients in most store bought lotions. A few years ago I decided to give homemade lotion a try, but couldn't find a recipe that didn't leave my skin feeling really greasy. I finally came upon a couple different recipes for lotion bars and tried them out. I immediately decided lotion bars were the way to go. They didn't leave my skin feeling greasy, and they're super simple to make. After a few adjustments, I settled on a recipe I really like.  Why Avoid Store Bought Lotions? There are a lot of potentially harmful ingredients in most mainstream lotions, including: parabens, artificial fragrances, and triethanolamine. Parabens are often added to lotions to prevent bacterial and fungal growth but are endocrine disruptors that have been linked to various types of cancer. Many artificial fragrances are also endocrine disruptors and can be irritating to the respiratory system. Triethanol...