Beth's Spicey Oatmeal Cookies

This is one of our favorite cookie recipes.  We made some just the other day.  A dear friend of mine shared this recipe with me a few years ago, I thought I'd share it with you all.

Ingredients

1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup butter flavored shortening
1 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 cups rolled oats
1 cup raisins

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).

In a large bowl, cream together the butter, butter flavored shortening, brown sugar, white sugar, eggs, and vanilla until smooth. Combine the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, and salt; stir into the sugar mixture. Stir in the oats and raisins. Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets.

Bake 10 to 12 minutes until light and golden. Do not overbake. Let them cool for 2 minutes before removing from cookie sheets to cool completely. Store in airtight container. Enjoy!

Makes about 36 cookies

A Little Revamping Required

I have been a bit overwhelmed lately, to be quite honest.  With school, with kids and with life.

For starters, I was never one of those moms that ran my kids all over creation for activities, until this year.  I know that this works great for some moms and some kids.  Just not for us.  I prayed about ALL of the activities that I wanted my kids to do this year and REALLY felt that the Lord was leading us to them and opening doors in these directions.  As we attempted to plug along I very quickly realized I was more stressed than ever and so were my kids. 

As much as I wanted my girls to learn to play the flute and the fact that the Lord provided a friend to give them the lessons, it just it not the season for us to be doing that right now. 

As much as I wanted my girls to be doing speech and saw the Lord open the door for them to do it.  As much as I see the fruit in other "speech kids" and really desire that for my kids, it is just not the season for us right now.  

Again, being honest here, I allowed myself to feel guilty for not making these things work out.  Oh the guilt of a homeschool mom!  Thanks be to God, I am over it.  I felt the immediate relief once we gave up flute and speech, again both great things, just not for us right now.  Doing all that running around made me a big ol' stress ball, REALLY!  Don't believe me, ask any of my kids they'll tell ya.

The Lord is growing me little by little that we have to do what works for our little family.  I really thought I already knew that but I guess I am a slow learner.  I can not compare us to other families, although that is my natural tendency.  Obviously, I want my children to know the Lord and grow in godly character.  Of course I want them to learn and succeed in academics but it has to be at the pace God puts us and His plan, not mine and not The Jones Family down the street. 

For us right now, we are keeping choir which all 4 of our chidlren can participate in.  It is a wonderful ministry, it is a wonderful way to worship the Lord and it covers music for school. 

We are also keeping my Tuesday morning Bible study.  I need it.  In addition to it being all about me : ) both of my girls get to help out with watching the little kids.  I think it is good to be helping out and serving others in our church. 
With all of that said, I am trying to revamp a bit, the way we school, the way our house runs and my mind set of it all.  I have decided to go on Winter break a bit earlier than usual {can a get a whoo hoo!}to sit at the feet of Jesus, to work on some training and character issues as well as building relationships and tying heart strings.  I may also read a few "How to Overcome Homeschool Burnout" articles : )

Holiday Movies to Watch

I love a good holiday movie.  Holiday movies are some of the best around.  Tthey are so warm and cozy, don't ya think?  I love them so much that I have compiled a list of the ones I really want to see between now and the New Years, time permitting of course.   

I went to my handy dandy DVR and scheduled several movies to be recorded.  I plan to cozy up a bit with the crew in the evenings to watch them.  Thought I'd share my list with you all:

The Christmas Card - his is one of my favorites.  We actually watched this one this evening : )
The Christmas Wish - We also watched this one tonight, another keeper.
Christmas in Canaan
Christmas Comes Home to Canaan
A Dog Named Christmas
The Note - not really a holiday movie but it's still on my list
A Princess for Christmas  - This one was VERY good!!
Christmas Pageant
Christmas Snow - We saw this one last year and it was a WOW!  I purchased this one on sale at the Family Christian bookstore. 
November Christmas
It's a Wonderful Life - My mother used to watch this movie EVERY year and somehow I think I still have not seen it all the way through.
A Christmas Wedding Tail
Call Me Mrs. Miracle - This is the sequel to Mrs. Miracle, which we recently watched and really enjoyed.
Trading Christmas
You may have noticed that there aren't any Santa Claus movies on my list, that is not by accident.  We simply do not do Santa Claus.

What are you favorite holiday movies?

Loving my Homemade Laundry Soap

I am sure by now if you watch the Duggars or read any of the blogs out there, chances are you have heard of people making their own laundry detergent. 

Well, I have finally joined the ranks and am SO glad I have!  I have made about 3 batches now and plan to continue on as long as I can find the supplies. 

I actually made a batch of homemade liquid laundry many months ago and but didn't care much for it.  I had used Ivory soap instead of the soap the recipe suggests.  I also diluted it, like the recipe calls for, but it turns out I prefer to not dilute it so much. 

This recipe is so easy, so cheap and not full of harsh chemicals.  Here it is:

• 4 Cups - hot tap water
• 1 Fels-Naptha soap bar ( I have only been able to find these at Walmart and when I do I buy several now because evidently I am not the only homemade laundry soap maker round these parts : )
• 1 Cup - Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda
• ½ Cup Borax

I start by boiling my water, then I grate the bar of soap (I use my handy dandy food processor for this). Once the water gets good and hot I add the soap into the saucepan. Then stir continually over medium-low heat until soap dissolves and is melted.

Next, fill a 5 gallon bucket half full of hot tap water. Add melted soap, washing soda and Borax. Stir well until all powder is dissolved. Fill bucket to top with more hot water. Stir, cover and let sit overnight to thicken.  This whole process takes about 15 - 20 minutes tops.

The most time consuming thing about making this laundry soap is that you have to let it sit overnight to gel, which is really not a huge deal at all. 

Once your soap has sat overnight it is ready to use.  Stir and fill a used, clean, laundry soap dispenser or empty milk jug.  The other option, which I didn't like as much is that you can half full with soap and fill the jug half full and then fill rest of way with water. Shake before each use.

Either way you do it, it will gel.  I feel like it gels more when you don't dilute it as much.  Depending on whether you decide to dilute it or not you will end up with either 5 ot 10 gallons of laundry detergent for a fraction of the store bought stuff.  Yippee, aren't you excited!  I know I am! 

I am sure that many of you are wondering if this stuff really gets the clothes clean, and my answer is a definite yes!  I have 2 little boys and it gets their stuff clean - that kinda says it all right?  You may also be wondering how it smells, well my husband has not complained.  When I would buy the store bought stuff, I'd get the fragrance and dye free stuff and he used to say that his clean clothes smelled like feet : ) So far no smelly feet comments so I aqm thinking we are doing good. 

The Reading Game

We have a great educational game to tell you about.  We received The Reading Game to review for the TOS Crew.

 

The Reading Game is, just as it's name implies, a game to help children learn to read.  It is a fast action memory card game that incorporates storybooks to make learning more fun. 

 The game is for 2 players, ages 4 and up.  It includes 6 decks of cards, each of which coincides with a different storybook, as well as a parent/teacher guide.
 
 

The Reading Game is played like memory, the cards are laid face down and players take turns flipping over two at a time to make a match.  While flipping over the cards and making matches players are to read the words aloud, the parent initially reads the words out loud to the child but the children do eventually memorize them. 

Each deck has 6 levels of word cards.  The game is gentle in my opinion, it doesn't throw all 180 new words at a child all in one sitting.  For instance, we start with the cards that go along with book one first, that is the skunk book.  Level 1 for the skunk book has 5 new words to learn and once those have been mastered you move to level 2 which introduces 5 new words.  Once you feel the child has memorized their new words you can have them read the test sentences in the parent/teacher guide just to be sure they are really ready to move on. 

After completing the whole series the student will have a reading vocabulary of 180 words.  Children will learn words like:

• about
• after
• back
• bark
• by
• can
• cat
• clock
• day
• dolphin
• even
• flower
• girl
• glide
• honey
• hop
• house
• play
• rabbit
• shower
• toad
• treat
• tree
• what
• where
• zebra

After moving through the 6 levels of the skunk card you child should then be able to read the skunk book on their own.  Of course they love this and it helps to build confidence in their reading : )

Over all my feeling on this game was good.  I think The Reading Game is a fun game that is reasonably priced.  It is a simple and enjoyable way to practice reading.  Like I already said, I really feel like it helps to build children's confidence with their reading.  The Reading Game would make a great addition to your phonics program and could be a great way to help a struggling reader. 

I have been playing this game with Alpha Boy.  He does seem to enjoy it and is good at memorizing the words.  He is not reading the books yet, but we are getting there.

You can purchase The Reading Game directly through Allsaid & Dunn for $24.95 plus shipping and handling.

Please take a moment to see what other members of the TOS Crew are saying about The Reading Game.

We received The Reading Game at no charge for review purposes only.  The opinions stated are mine and I was not compensated in any way.