Tales From Another Planet

First of all, I hope that everyone reading this knows that I am not being gender-biased when I use the term "mommy guilt". It can and does affect men as well as women. Actually, my husband was feeling pretty bad about himself Monday night, and that's what originally caught my attention regarding this topic. We've all felt it at some point in our lives as parents. That awful feeling in the back of your head saying, "Am I screwing this all up?" The answer, my friends, is "Yes, you are." The question should not be whether or not we are screwing up as parents, but we are doing to prevent the screw up the next time. We are all imperfect people in an imperfect world with (extremely?) imperfect children. So in those moments, when you've just yelled at your 2-year old for doing something completely normal for a 2-year old to do, or when you're frustrated with your 4-year old because of something you're trying to deal with on a phone call an...

I have been somewhat concerned about my ability to homeschool my oldest when he is driving me crazy. However, I think as long as the weather is nice, he should be fine. He has been so busy playing outside 3-5 hours a day and riding bikes around the culdesac, that he is exhausted. He took a 2 hour nap yesterday and went to bed without much of an argument. Getting him to focus and participate for the hour and a half or so that school will take is my main concern, in addition to making sure he has enough social activities. The curriculum I've chosen would be perfect with 2-3 other kids, but I hesitate to take that upon myself when I don't know for sure if I'll continue homeschooling or how my youngest will handle "school time". Of course, we just moved into the neighborhood too, so it will be an interesting summer as I (hopefully) meet more families with young kids once the pool opens. It is fascinating that we have so many kids the same age as my oldest in the n...

So, a one-person emergency food budget will be a bit more difficult at $29 per week. First, you will either need a few extra dollars the first week, a good friend who is also looking to eat cheaply for a week, some basic items in your pantry, or the willingness to go without for a month or more. It is really not possible (unless you come across some great sales) to find the basics you need without having something on hand first. That being said, I came up with a plan for one person for $29 a week. Most people do get paid bi-weekly, but I'm sticking with the $29 each week for those that are limited in start-up funds. This is a 4-week plan, because it will take that long to get enough food and basics in your rotation so that you aren't eating ramen and hot dogs every week (as I have heard some people complaining). If you have the benefit of a "head start" on pantry items, you can consider skipping down to week 4. Week One food list Week Two food list Week Thre...

It hit me late in the sermon Sunday morning. Every time I've heard the call to give all of yourself, I specifically hold part of me back. Which part do I hold back? Generally it's the part of me that wants to do it myself. It's the old fallacy of "at least I'm better than so and so" or as my pastor put it, thinking that true repentance is just a morality tune up (as in, well I've been pretty bad at treating my kids with love lately, so I'll commit to doing better). We think that what we've achieved morally on our own is somehow comparable in the eyes of God. Yet, we dare to tell the Creator of the Universe that we can do okay on our own? I remind myself of my just turned 2 year old. If you have kids, you know they go through stages of "I do it myself". This is a natural and healthy part of child psychology, however frustrating it may be for the parents. When I try to help him into his car seat he screams, so he tries on his own and slip...

This weekend is somewhat busy, next weekend even more so. As I write this on Friday, I'm thinking about everything that I have to do. In reality, I need to be thanking God for the opportunities I have been given. My father-in-law is turning 65, and we live 5 minutes away. We are incredibly grateful to have moved back closer to family after being 8-9+ hours away for the past 7 years. After living in our new area for only 3 months, and our new house for only 3 weeks, I am volunteer coaching my first soccer game this weekend. I have brand new friends, a church home, and family events nearby, and my cup is full to the brim. As a reserved extrovert, I have often had trouble making and keeping friends and finding community. I've been told by people that I can seem "stand-offish", but I have been working towards being more open to opportunities lately. I realized that for next weekend, my plate is already pretty full. I never would have thought that 3 weeks after moving ...

So, here's the thing. I've been so proud of myself for having such a low grocery budget and doing so well. So, we decided to eat out a few extra times, stock up on some good deals at the grocery store, and generally ignore keeping track of the budget. Needless to say, when I did catch up on budgeting, we only have $80 left in our food budget. Now, that's not necessarily a problem, because we just stocked up at our last trip and have all the meat we possibly need for the next few weeks, however, when I looked at the calendar next month has five Saturdays (our normal shopping day), and our budget for food and household supplies is a monthly amount of $415. What does this mean? Well, for the next 6 weeks, our grocery budget is actually going to be an average of $80-$83 per week. Since I usually spend at least $10 at Aldi's on produce, that leaves us only $70 or so for the rest of our food (including any fast food), paper products, cleaning supplies, and basic toiletries....

So, if you're in the homeschool world, you probably already know that there is one "homeschool group that is trying to take over the world". You may not call it that, but it has the word Classical in it. I think the reason it is so successful is that it's a great business model, although I disagree with the whole learning philosophy in general. So I figured I'd come up with a "business model" for a cottage school to go along with my general Charlotte Mason Philosophy. When: 3 days a week, 9am-12pm. Where: An open, bright environment with large rooms, various seating arrangements, lots of hands on learning tools, and easy access to the outdoors. Ideal environments could also include several homes within the same neighborhood broken up by age group. For example, babies through preschoolers at Jones house with 3 parents, kindergarten through 3rd at Smith house with 2 parents, etc. Who: Everyone! Ages 1-high school (parents of infants should get a mate...

I haven't been able to listen to the whole sermon yet from last Sunday because I was in the nursery. We did have the sound from the service through a set of speakers, but it wasn't turned up high enough and I didn't want to be distracted from my baby-holding duties. However, one thing I do remember hearing, was that we should be glad when we are feeling tempted because it means we're doing something the devil really doesn't want us to do. Well, I guess that applies to my Monday. First of all, it was a Monday. Secondly, it had been raining off and on for a couple days and my two boys were driving me crazy. From the moment they woke up until they went to bed they were disobeying, not listening, tearing things apart, and non-stop fighting. It all culminated with an event (during what was supposed to be rest/nap time) involving a box of tissues, lotion, my glasses case, and a lamp. Needless to say, I was frustrated. My oldest, at four and a half, had decided time ou...

OK, so maybe I’m going to sound a bit like Paul here again (becoming everything to everyone, but hopefully not in a bad way). Obviously, I’m not Paul, so take everything I say with a grain of salt. My husband asked me yesterday whether I thought a law that put LGBT into a protected class would be a loving, Christian thing to do. I said that I did think it would be the loving Christian thing, because Christians should be loving and protecting every class of people from discrimination (Jesus ate with tax collectors and prostitutes). However, he then asked if I would vote for legislation that created a protected class, and I said that I would not. Why not? Well, the problem is that if we keep creating protected classes (people we cannot discriminate against for any reason) we are going to create conflicts within those classes, and then ask the government to legislate the gray areas. This is not what anyone wants (what everyone wants is just never to be “discriminated against”...

Interested in completing the challenge, or truly need some help? Read on to find out more! A lot of people have been “trying” to live on $29 per person per week as a special challenge to identify with how difficult people in poverty have it (mind you the $29 is just for food, and does not cost them anything, or include other resources they may receive such as WIC, food banks, etc.) However, I have heard many people claim that they “can’t” follow such a strict food budget (for whatever reason). I was intrigued, because when I ran the numbers for my family, it came out pretty close to what we actually spend on food (although I also include diapers, paper products, toiletries, and cleaning supplies in my food budget). So, I didn't really see this as a "challenge" for me, since it's what I do every week anyway. However, a lot of people had a lot of excuses or concerns when trying this challenge. I’ll try to address a few excuses before providing a basic food plan f...