Harold and the Purple Crayon {FIAR}

I made Home made grape scented purple playdoh for the kids to play with


We have plenty of plain pillow cases  so I thought it would be fun if the kids drew on the pillow cases with purple fabric markers, then they could always have them to sleep on. Even if they outgrown them I know I would cherish them forever.

Not all of my kids wanted to use a purple marker like Harold so I let them choose a color they wanted

Falcon working on his with a red marker.

Robin stuck to purple (side 1)
We also wrote Robin and the purple marker on the pillowcase and added the date. I covered up her real name for the picture though.

(Side 2)

Owl just scribbled on his (side 1) I  put my hand over Owls and helped his draw the things he wanted.

I never did get a picture of Duck's pillow case he chose blue though!

Now when they lay their heads down to sleep they can dream of  the adventures their marker could take them on.

We made hot air balloons ( like Harold drew in the story) working on a blog post tutorial for that.

and read this book as well

Pinterest and Starbuck's

In my life this week...
After my 2 little ones just got over a tummy virus we now moved into a another virus, Sore throat sore muscles, headache, coughing, runny noses blah blah blah you know the rest. Seems like half of the U.S. has this and/or the tummy virus we had as well.

I had some heart testing done, I have been having difficulty breathing and palpitations its been going on for about a year but I felt the need to get it checked. Just last week I found out a close friend of a friend of mine went into cardiac arrest and died, she was only 35! Within the last month I found out a friend of mine has congestive heart failure and and another friend I went to high school with I found out he died of a heart attack 3 years ago at the age of 31! So I felt it was time to just make sure things are okay. people in their 30's having heart problems is just crazy!

Homeschooling around town...
On our way to homeschool event I felt that I was in need of a pick me up so I headed over to Starbucks's, home of the over priced but rather tasty coffee!There were 14 cars in front of me at the drive through. I bet no one  was was inside, lazy Americans! I sat in my car and waited like a lazy American as well. My excuse is that I have 4 kids to get out of the car just to go in, 2 of which I need to buckle and unbuckle from car seats which is a serious headache, so I choose the drive though. The kids were watching a documentary on volcanoes in the car, I LOVE our built in DVD system in the car its a great way to sneak in more education into a day.

  Yum!

Duck wearing the Starbucks's hat!

As far as our homeschool studies go we have been working on all sorts of things:

Weather

The human body

Indonesia

Volcanoes

Sharks

The war of 1812

Reptiles

Spanish

Latin

GMO's

and many other items.

I am in the process of changing up all of Falcon's work. I think we are going to be changing his studies to more of a Charlotte Mason method and try Ambleside online, now just trying to decide what level to start him at.

I am reading...

Whats cooking...
Lots of stuff a friend on mine has been pinning crockpot recipes like crazy so I have been repinning almost all of her pins on Pinterest and cooking some great food. So if you read this Sara, Thanks! Speaking of Pinterest I am highly addicted I spend to much time pinning stuff but I must say I have done some neat  projects with the kids because of Pinterest so I am very thankful for that.

A photo to share...

Falcon shot this picture at the zoo

The 1 year old tiger cubs were nose to nose with us today. They were pawing at the glass and chasing us back and forth in such a fun playful manor it was one of the most enjoyable moments I have ever had at the zoo. The kids were so excited to have the tigers interact with them so much.

Math fun with "Ten Apples up on Top"

We read Ten Apples Up On Top and while reading the book I had the kids stack their math manipulative block together along with the story.

They stack them on their heads and tried to jump up and down  without them falling. (sorry about the out of focus picture)

Duck decided to do pattern all on his own without me even asking him, then he placed a counting bear up on top!

 I asked them to guess which block there were the most of. Duck guessed blue, Owl guessed yellow.Falcon stopped over taking a break from his work and guessed red.

 Duck sitting in his triangle  putting all his blocks together in 2's then we worked on counting by 2's. We just started using painters tape on the floor in  the shape of shapes to play games and such. They work so well I will be composing another blog entry on that later in the week..

All lined up, and the winner is RED and BLUE it was a tie.

It was such  a fun and simple story that really added a lot of fun math into this mornings circle time.
Linking up with The Children's bookshelf 

Simple Sunday Afternoon

Simple,... well I try and try harder each day for a simpler stress free life!

 My fabulous dining room centerpiece. Homeschooling projects have taken over my table this week! ( most weeks really)

 The high today! (very warm) 36 degrees

 The pumpkin hat, its Owls favorite, we picked it up from Goodwill in the fall of 2011 and he still wears it almost daily even in the summer. 

 I broke my fruit bowl so I improvised!

The Christmas dish I got on clearance for 75%off  so I paid $5.00 for it, yay! I plan on using it year round to put fruits and veggies on for the kids at snack time.

 My afternoon tea!

 Paint samples I collected today for an upcoming art project.

 Wintertime! = lots hats, scarves,  and mittens that we always struggle finding a match to.

 I finally took our tree down last night,  here are 2 of my kids  dragging our tree to the road.

Browning my meat for Tacos tonight.

Linking up with Sunny Simple Sunday

Homeschool Mothers Journal

In My life this week ( well 2 weeks)...

On Christmas eve night my 5 year old woke up vomiting, as soon as it started my husband and I just gave each other the look. You see, 2 years ago on Christmas eve night  Robin started vomiting then within 48 hours it spread to all of us and was one of the worst stomach bugs I had ever seen it was BAD  my husband was laying on the floor unable to move shaking, I had passed out. It was bad. So as soon as this started we feared the worst. Luckily it only spread to my 3 and 5 year old. My poor 3 year old would not stop chugging water and was throwing up and dry heaving at least once an hour for 30 hours. The bug ended up lasting  7 days in both kids....Duh!

The living room floor on a vinyl table cloth is where my 2 littles hung out for 7 days. I cant believe  that I Did not come up with the waterproof table cloth earlier in my parenting years. It worked out so well,  its waterproof and easily wiped up.

On Christmas Eve day before anyone was sick I took the kids to go see Wreck It Ralph I even bought popcorn and soda which I never do because of the icky ingredients but it was a special day so I did and the kids were overjoyed!

It was such a cute show, we all loved it. I can't wait to buy it on DVD. I must say that when the movie was over we all wanted to play video games.

I worked on my goals for 2013 you can read all about it here ,as well as read about how well I did on last years goals.

I planned on spending time redoing Falcon's school priorities, cleaning and de-cluttering school stuff and packing away Christmas  decor. Instead I laid  around for 7 days rubbing bellies, holding  buckets and nursing my littles back to health while my 2 older kids played video games.Not quite what I planned but life never is!

In our homeschooling week...
The first week of January brought back our routine a bit.
Robin mailed off  a poem to Zoo books about "little cats" as well as she wrote a letter to Mulan  link here  according the the website she should get a signed letter back,I will let you know if she does.

She worked on animal adaptions for her zoo class next week.

We started our whether unit and made a weather journal, here are the daily charts we are doing.

We also look at weather across the country daily and today we were checking out what it was like in Disney World.

We went to the planetarium to see Zulu's Weather Patrol.


Duck and Owl
Have been working on ABC mouse and Reading eggs. They also have been doing projects with us for our FIAR book this week Harold and the Purple Crayon.

My little boys were in trouble for breaking their toys for fun so they are grounded from their toys, out of boredom Owl decided that he would start cutting up his sock.

Falcon
 Is working on a paper about the dangers of GMO's. He also started back doing Latin using Lively Latin its a great program we have used it for quite some time.

As family we are working on
Studying Indonesia for Geography
History of Buddhism
The Composer  Handel
The artist Mary Casset
The 2 older kids creating their own blogs.

Art project Robin and Falcon did for our Ancient China studies we are wrapping up.

Lunch this week: egg salad, gluten free crackers, cucumbers, apples and grapefruit. YUM!

linking up with

My Juicing Journey

I actually did this fast in May of 2012 but just now got around to putting in on my blog. I had it all written out in word but just kept putting off posting it until now.

My juice detox fast.

Over the last few years I have become enlightened  to what is really in our food and as a family we have cut out all processed foods and gluten. We now eat whole foods from REAL farmers. It was amazing that after I got all the junk out of our diets how much the kids and I really enjoyed and craved good foods like fruits veggies and wanted to pass up non food items like cookies and cakes. I knew the next step I wanted to take was going to be some sort of detox diet. I have read about a few but knew I really  needed a detox buddy to get through it. I had asked a few of my natural health friends but none were on board so I  just put my detox plans in the back of my mind for awhile until my husband brought it up to me.

He had to have blood work done for  insurance reasons  and was scared for his life after he looked at the numbers then did some research online and realized he is close to liver failure. He had just watched Fat , Sick and Nearly Dead and was ready for a juice fast.

He spent a few days researching about juice fasting and types of juicers and he finally came to the decision of this juicer

 Omega VRT350 Heavy Duty Dual-Stage Vertical Single Auger Low Speed Juicer. Its a masticating juicer that yields much more nutrients than your average $100  high speed spinning juicer.

 The first juice we made- it was just random fruits and veggies in the house, but it was good.

We bought our juicer just 4 days before we were leaving on  trip to the coast  we were eager to start our detox but knew that it wasn't logical to start then go on vacation so we drank 1 juice a day  experimenting with our new health toy just to get our bodies used to all the micro nutrients.

Day 1

Today is the beginning of our fast we replaced lunch today with juice.

feeling excited and motivated to start.

Day 2

Today I will be replacing 2 meals with juice

My breakfast juice concoction:

2 handfuls of spinach

1/2 inch chunk ginger root

1 banana

1 half lime

3/4  of a small pineapple

a few strawberries

It was a very sweet juice, too sweet for me I think next time I will cut back the pineapple and increase the spinach. The lime and ginger added a wonderful zing to it that I very much enjoyed.

I was feeling quite hungry when lunch came around today and I really want to eat some roasted pine nut hummus I bought a few days ago but I resisted the urge and made some juice.

I am feeling...

Very tired today.

Day 3 All juice All Day!

Today is the first day that we have juiced all day with no solid food.  It was very difficult to feed the kids lunch and dinner and not even sneak just one little bite. I did very much enjoy smelling dinner even though I didn't get to eat it! My husband told me today that he is so hungry  that he wouldn't even complain about anything I put in front of him. ( he has been unhappy over the last year that we have been eating gluten free, he loves his white bread!)

I don't know who ever said that they were never hungry when juicing because they LIED I am STARVING! It must have been the same woman that said she forgot all about the pain of childbirth as soon as she saw her beautiful baby. I didn't forget that pain either, it hurt and it sucked and

I am STARVING!

I am feeling ...

Very tired  and weak today and went to bed very early.

Day 4

 My dinner tonight

Kale
cucumber
green beans
lemon
ginger
beet root
watermelon
It tastes like DIRT! The beet is so earthy and over powering I will not make this combo again.

I did like the apple carrot beet root I had as a snack yesterday though.

I am feeling...
So full of energy today and I am no longer STARVING, just hungry now. When I was at the grocery store today picking up more organic celery and kale I was not as bothered by all the foods as I was yesterday. It looked good but I didn't really want any of it.

Day 5

My dinner tonight was pretty yummy.

salsa juice

5 Tomatoes

1 pack cilantro

1 whole lemon

1 red bell pepper

1 clove garlic

1 small  brown onion

1 Jalapeno pepper with seeds

I am feeling...

I defiantly have detox symptoms now. I have canker sores in my mouth which I read is a result of  a toxic build-up in the mouth and the absence of the washing-action of chewing food can allow an increase of bacteria between the teeth. The tongue becomes coated with waste. So I am brushing like 4 times a day now to help get rid of waste, YUCK! I have severe low back pain due to toxins in the lower intestine. Blood vessels that draw nutrients from the colon are very close to the nerves of the spine. Still feeling motivated to continue though I am a bit more tired today but I did take a 1 hour walk with the kids.

Day 6  

I  am feeling...

 Weak and energetic if that makes sense. I wake up and feel pretty energized and well rested. I have never felt like that in the morning before juice fasting. I always hated mornings and was tired and groggy as I dragged my butt out of bed. My limbs feel very week like I have been working out hard but I also feel energized like I want to get up and move. I took another 1 hour walk with the kids this morning. In the evening I had so much energy still so I went for a 30 min bike ride.

Day 7 

I am feeling.....

Good and Bad I am feeling full of energy I wake up in the morning feeling bright eyes and bushy tailed. On the down side my mouth is so sore from all the canker sores, my tongue in white and the  lymph glands in my neck but there is a bright side that means that my detox is working (YaY) I am not doing this for nothing. I went on another long walk with kids.

Day 8

 I am feeling ...

That I finally got the hang of  juicing and not eating. The hunger pains are still there but they have dulled quite a bit. I go to bed early most nights so I don't want to indulge in nightly juice snack. Before juicing I would indulge in a light snack after the kids were in bed, that has been one of the hardest habits to break. I have been. I now am in the habit of going on evening bike rides. I throw in my ear buds clip on my ipod and take off, the peace and quite from the kids in nice and I find that I feel so much better about myself now that I have found a way to get a workout in everyday. 

Day 9

I am feeling...

Good, most of my detox symptoms have subsided I am now full of  energy.

Enjoying Mean green juice

Day 10

Food at last we broke the fast a bit earlier than we had planned but since  my Hubby was heading to South America for a business trip we thought we should end it a bit early so strange food from another country wasn't a total shock to his system.

Our first meal was:

 A mix of raw peppers, cucumbers, onions and tomatoes with Raw apple cider vinegar. It was sooooo good I really missed chewing!

Some recipes I love that I invented along the way.

 Juice all skins if they are organic, if they are not organic peel all skins.

Citrus Delight 

1 whole pinnapple

2 whole carrots

1 orange

1 lemon

5 oz of spinach

1/2-1 inch chunk of ginger

 Berry Spectacular

1 Whole orange

1 apple

1 whole lemon

1- 1 1/2 cups of blueberries

1-2 whole carrots

Mean Green: from the movie Fat Sick and Nearly Dead 

6 kale leaves 

4 celery stalks

1 lemon

1 granny smith apple ( I found that I didn't like the juice if I used a sweet apple)

thumb size piece of ginger

1 cucumber

The Green juices are not my favorite tasting but they have great health benefits so I choke them down. I have found using a straw helps get them down easy. You are supposed to chew your juices though swishing the juice around in your mouth for a bit to get the saliva flows which helps aid in digestion. I cannot always stomach chewing my whole green juice. 

You should also always drink juices on an empty stomach to maximize absorption.

I add spririlina to a lot of my juices as well.

My final thoughts:

Juice fasting was HARD I did not do it for weightloss I did it for my health getting  in mirco nutrient in my body and detoxing all the junk. I did lose 7  lbs on the fast and have since lost 20 more just adding more juice into my daily life and not eating wheat or processed foods. I think when people makes changes for the right reasons you will find more success in whatever you do. It was a hard and amazing experience and I plan on fasting at least 2 more times in 2013.

In case you are new to my blog I do have 4 kids and I cooked and fed them meals throughout the whole process I took great joy in just smelling the foods because I couldn't eat them. I would  make a big juice before I started cooking each meal so at least I wasn't STARVING and sip as I was cooking so I wasn't tempted to snack.

A big inspiration to me was Drew Canole from fitlife TV  you can follow him on Facebook he posts weekly juicing videos as well as all sorts of great juicing facts.

Happy Juicing!

5 Simple Goals for 2013

My 5 goals for the year 2013.

1. The most important goal for me this year  is to let go, just breath and walk away from those who are negative and want drama and chaos in their lives.I have come across  Zen and really like the ideas, this website I have found very helpful. 

I have a had a difficult year full of family drama, negativity, bad news and stress it has affected me in ways I do not like. My primary goal in life is to be the best mom I can be and this year I feel that was not always in the best of moods which has affected my children. I have come to the difficult decision that if I need to distance myself from those who are not happy to make a better life for my kids then I will, they are my priority.

I love rainbows they make me smile! When I was a kid my mom decorated our bathroom in all rainbows we had a rainbow rug, shower curtain towels and all the accessories it as so fun. I just pinned this cute rainbow craft on my pinterest page, planning on making it soon with my kiddos,

2. I am going to set aside time each week where Falcon and I take the time to write our books, helping to motivate each other. Who knows we could succeed and be duel published!

3. Play more games with my kids and try to focus more on fun hands on learning instead of lots of book work.

Funny that this is just a web image I picked out but we actually own this game but have only played it once, guess I will move it to the top of our game playing pile especially since the kids were playing with the display just last week at the teacher supply store.

4.Continue working out and do at least two  5-7 day juice fasts in 2013.

I love the message in this picture, so true!

5. Continue on with our famous artists study and introduce famous composers as well. We will study 12 composers and 12 artists making a replica painting of each artist.

The Van Gogh  replica we did last year that I framed and hung above the stove.

Curious to see how I did on my goals last year? Read below:

My 5 Simple Goals in 2012

1. Write at least 1000 words a week for my novel in hopes of completing it by August 2012

Did I complete that NO but I did make progress toward that goal I did write every week for the first few months but it died down. My 12 year old thought that it was really neat that I was writing so he started writing a book as well. Him and I both don't write as much as we  would like we both want to write but just find other things to do instead.So  for the year 2013 Falcon and I have decided to set aside time each we were we will both sit down and write.

2. Make a kids created monthly scrapbook.

Did I do this? NO, we did for the first 3 months but nothing after that I am hoping to spend the rest of our winter break finishing that up. What I did do though is photo project that was called "Our Lives in 366 days" ( leap year in 2012) I posted a picture a day on facebook of our everyday lives with a little snippet on what we were doing in that picture. It was such a fun project I LOVED  doing it and I LOVE looking back though the pictures. I can't wait to put all the pictures into an album.

3.Do yoga at least 2 nights a week

Did I do this? NO, I did at first but I made excuses, got lazy and just didn't follow through.

I do not plan on  trying to make this a goal for next year but I would like to check out a new Bikram Yoga studio near my house.

4.Jog outside, kids free at least once a week.

Did I do this? NO I did more! I stared out just running  once a week then as the year progressed I started adding more and more workouts in. As soon as it got warm I would ride my bike every night. It was so nice to have some alone time and just pop in my ear buds turn the music up LOUD and sweat. I lost 35 lbs this year. I also tried my first juice fast. That was an amazing experience it was very hard but I felt so great afterward.

5. A year long study of 12 famous artists. Each month we will focus on one 1 artist and create an art project replica of a famous painting.

Did I do this? NO, we did not  study an artist every month but we did focus more on famous artists and we studied at least 7 and did replicas of their work.I will be continuing this onto next year striving for 12 new artists instead of just 7.

Here is one of the famous artist projects that we did last year. Robin won 1st place in the State fair for this one.

I did not complete each of the 5 goals  exactly as I had set for myself but I did move forward and am happy with my progress. I strongly believe that if I had not set any goals, I would not have achieved these great results. I am very happy with myself for what I did accomplish.