Dec
31

Happy New Year & 2012 Monthly Meal Plan

By | Mom Stuff, Recipes

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Hi everyone! I hope you are all having a safe and happy 2012! I can’t believe it’s already here. 2011 was kind of a blurr with school and blogging, so I’m definitely excited to see what this new year has for us!   Resolutions? Part of my plan is to start back up on weight watchers. This menu isn’t totally weight watchers friendly, but I will update it as I go replacing some of the menu items to fit a little better, so you can expect that change in February. So for now, here’s my January 2012 Monthly Meal Plan for you! Click below to download: 2012 January Meal Plan PDF 2012 January Meal Plan Word Doc (editable)   Hope the meal plan helps alleviate some of your stress! Here’s to a wonderful 2012!! … [Read more...]

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Dec
29

Sweet Confections Digital Scrapbook Kits

By | Digital Scrapbooking

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Hi everyone! I’ve been busy over here creating some more fun digital scrapbooking kits for you! This is my first mega collection and I’m so excited to share it with you today! Introducing the Sweet Confections Mega Collection! I’ve broken it up into 4 separate paper packs, and 4 separate element packs so you can mix and match, then at the very bottom you’ll have the opportunity to grab the entire  Sweet Confections Collection if you can’t resist it all!   Here we go! First up is the Bahama Cream Paper Pack. It includes 7 lovely blue and neutral 12x12 300dpi .jpg digital scrapbooking papers.   Get the Bahama Crème Paper Pack for just $1.99!     Next we have the Passion Fruit Paper Pack. This time I went with a fun pink and lime mix. It also includes 7 12x12 300dpi .jpg digital scrapbooking papers. Get the Passion Fruit Paper Pack for just $1.99!   Grape Soda is one of my new favorites! I absolutely LOVE … [Read more...]

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Dec
28

Living Math: Logic Links

By | Homeschool

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Welcome to a fun day of Living Math! I’ve always been a fan of Logic Links, but now that I know my Teeny Tot can use them too, I like them even more!   I originally put them in Strawberry Shortcake’s workbox for the day, and after she had done a few puzzles, the Teeny Tot came over to see what all the fuss was about. I was pleasantly surprised to see Strawberry Shortcake directing her through the puzzle. She read the instructions then told our Teeny Tot where to put which color disk. It was great practice for her with colors, and manipulating those little disks onto the grid was also good for her fine motor skills!   Obviously she couldn’t do this activity alone, but definitely with the help of an older sibling! And I have to add that I love anything that encourages my kids to work together! Logic Links has quite a few other activities including workbooks for older kids and other fun games. We have the Logic Links Puzzle Box which includes 166 puzzles and 32 … [Read more...]

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Dec
27

All About Reading Level 1 Review

By | Homeschool

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Hi everyone, as promised, I have a review of the new All About Reading Level 1 program for you! We are totally loving this program, and it’s no surprise really since we absolutely adore All About Spelling! I already started Tinkerbell with All About Spelling Level 1 at the beginning of this year, so she was able to skip ahead a few lessons in the All About Reading Level 1 program, but I still like how the two compliment each other. The Level 1 of both AAS and AAR have a similar scope and sequence. All About Reading focuses on decoding skills, fluency, comprehension, vocabulary, and will include lots and lots of reading practice. All About Spelling focuses on the spelling side of things like how to know which letter to choose for a given sound. Both are complete phonics programs and use the same letter tiles which make them easy to use together. We also love the workbook activities, the pages are hands-on and interactive which makes the learning more fun! All About Reading … [Read more...]

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Dec
26

C is for Clown Free Preschool Printables

By | Homeschool, Printables

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  I think most of you know I write for the Totally Tots Blog and this month’s theme was the Circus! So I went ahead and made some fun games for the Teeny Tot to work with a circus theme.   -->Download the Circus Preschool Pack here <-- Silhouette Match Up: she did great at the silhouette matching game, I cut out the colorful clowns and then had her match them to the “shadows”. She actually did really well.   Pattern Activity: The Teeny Tot doesn’t quite get the pattern activity, so I helped her by telling her the pattern. “Tent, clown, tent, clown, tent, clown”   Lacing Activity: She’s becoming a wonderful pre-sewer! The lacing activity is always one of her favorites, and although she still skips a few holes here and there she’s pretty well got the concept down.   Magnet Activity: The Teeny Tot loves the magnet activity! She does a great job at matching up one magnet per circle, and has started to count her magnets as … [Read more...]

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Dec
26

Lakeshore and WriteShop Winners

By | Give Aways

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Hi everyone! I  hope you all had a wonderful Christmas! As promised, I have a lot of winners to announce today! First up is our winner for the $25 Gift Card from Lakeshore Learning. We used ours on a Zoob Building Kit.   And the winner is: Didn’t win? Visit one of the links below for more information on Lakeshore products: Lakeshore Learning website  Lakeshore Learning on Facebook: let them know Erica @ Confessions sent you! Lakeshore Learning on Twitter   Next up we have 10 winners for the WriteShop Story Builders!   And here they are in random order:     Didn’t win? Visit the links below to check them out for yourself! World of Sports StoryBuilders (e-book) ($7.95) StoryBuilders Christmas Mini-Builder (e-book) ($3.95) World of Animals StoryBuilders (e-book) ($7.95) World of People StoryBuilders (e-book) ($7.95)   Thanks to all for reading my blog and entering … [Read more...]

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Dec
25

Estimation Station Review & Giveaway

By | Give Aways, Homeschool

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I know it’s silly, but I’ve seriously always wanted an Estimation Station for our school room! I mean how fun! We participate in a monthly Boy’s Lego club and Science day. Each month our host has a little jar filled with something that the kids get to estimate. Whoever is closest wins the jar, which usually has something totally fun like M&M’s in it!   And wouldn’t you know it, the awesome people at Educational Insights just happened to have one of these bad boys for us to review! This one is so cool, it even comes with a little cup that you can fill so the kids can really use some actual math skills to help them estimate how much the whole station holds. Obviously ours has Lego’s in it. Aside from school use, we used our Estimation Station at my son’s Lego birthday party this summer too. We had all the boys guess the amount of Lego’s inside and then the winner received a fun Lego set!   The possibilities are endless here, and the … [Read more...]

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Dec
23

Merry Christmas!

By | Family

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  Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.” ~ Luke 2:13-14 Blessings from our family to yours, We wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a wonderful 2012! Erica, Jason, Strawberry Shortcake, Turbo, Tinker Bell and the Teeny Tot! I wanted to leave you with a little holiday cheer that can be found over here at Confessions…    Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night! … [Read more...]

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Dec
22

Homemade Snowflakes!

By | Art, Homeschool

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A wonderful friend of mind did such a fun winter snowflake activity with Turbo, that I just had to share! They’re so easy and while they make really cute Christmas decorations, you could easily do this anytime you’re looking for a fun wintery craft activity!   The ingredients are simple: Borax (2 Tbsp per jar) Pipe Cleaners (3 per snowflake, we used green, but I think white might have been a better choice!) A pen or pencil to secure the snowflake while it’s crystalizing Boiling Water Wide mouth glass jars Scissors Directions: Step 1: Cut your pipe cleaner into 3rds. Lay one section horizontally on your workspace, then lay another one on top of it and twist it into a v shape around the horizontal piece. Lay your 3rd pipe cleaner section on top of that and create a v shape again only going the opposite direction of your first one so you have something similar to the below:   Step 2: Using your 2nd pipe cleaner tie it around the center of … [Read more...]

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Dec
21

Road Trip USA: Pennsylvania

By | Geography, Homeschool

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Welcome to our Road Trip USA post! This week we traveled to Pennsylvania!  We started off our time by reviewing all of the states we’ve learned so far, then locating our new state on the map. Here are some of the things we covered this week: Located Harrisburg, PA on our Wall Map State Capital: Harrisburg State Bird: The Ruffed Grouse State Flower: The Mountain Laurel State Insect: The Firefly, we also learned about bioluminescence. Famous People: Betsy Ross US Presidents: James Buchanan, the 15th President of the United States. Landmarks: Hershey’s Chocolate Company Learned about the Declaration of Independence signed in PA on July 4, 1776 Sang our 50 States Song Read Who was Thomas Jefferson? Food: We had some yummy Philadelphia Cheese Steak Sandwiches! Learned about The Liberty Bell and did a Liberty Bell kids craft. We finished up our time by reading “If You Were There When They Signed the Constitution”. … [Read more...]

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