Our Homemade Valentines

Not long ago I shared a post with lots of different ideas for homemade Valentine's.  Well, I did not share the ideas I knew my kids would pick!

Fortnite is a big deal in this house so I was pretty sure they would both pick Fortnite related Valentine's and they did not disappoint.  We have worked this week on getting them ready for our Co-Op this Friday.

First up, Nate picked his Llama Fortnite Valentine's.  These go to every family in the group. I loved that this year, I could just print, cut, and staple :-) So easy! 

 Nate picked Starburst as the candy to go along with his Valentine's.  We put them in a snack size baggie. 

 Then we stapled the card to the bag.  He also picked out a second design for his closest friends.  I'll share that at the end of the post. 

Then, Josh picked out his main cards. 

 Josh wanted Heart lollipops to go along with his card. 

Again, we used baggies to attach to the cards.  I thought about taping the lollipop to the card but both Josh and I were afraid it would fall off. 

Here are links to all of the cards we used: 

Curious and Geeks supplied two different options for the Fortnite Unicorn Llama

Mandys Party Printables provides the free printables for three designs.  Josh actually used all of them - some for his whole group designs and then some for his close friends. 

This was Nate's second card he made for his close friends and it can be found at Curious and Geeks too. 

This was Josh's final choice (and my actual favorite!) and this one can be found at Swag Grabber.

So, if you are in need of some last minute Valentine's - just print and go with any of these ideas!  

Flylady

Periodically on my blog I talk about Flylady.

Flylady is a great system of decluttering, cleaning and organizing basic weekly tasks.  I started using Flylady techniques probably about 12-15 years ago.  What I have learned is the following:

1) The Flylady plan is truly a great starting place. She lays out daily and weekly plans based on the rooms in your home.
2) It's ok to change HER schedule to meet YOUR schedule.  For example, her errand day is Thursday - but if you run errands on Tuesday, make that your errand day :-)
3) Alter the cleaning tasks/schedule to fit the size of YOUR home.
4) Her daily tasks for each zone are really great - follow them if you can; alter them if you need to.
5) The key is totally to declutter first - you can't clean clutter.
6) Dig through the website and find all of the extra stuff like deep cleaning checklists :-)
7) Understand that her concept overall is that if you have decluttered and then follow her zone cleaning and basic weekly cleaning concepts, your home WILL be clean and you don't have to do deep, hard cleaning because you will be on top of all of that stuff.  Sure, you will deep clean areas in your home throughout the year (thus the deep cleaning checklists) but you will do it easily on a monthly basis instead of all in one huge chunk.
8) Read about and follow her Flylady Journal from step one - babysteps are key.

When I started this system years ago, I built my journal - I have it saved on my computer.  My morning routine and bedtime routines have changed many times based on my season of life but the over all concept has stayed the same.  I would like to say that I have followed it perfectly over the years but I tend to really follow it well for awhile and then I let it go and get out of the routines.  One of my goals this year is to get back into those routines.  Is Flylady for everyone?? Nope :-)  It might not be your style and that's ok!

There is one thing that I've never done . . .. one of her "things" is to get dressed to your shoes )So if you have to run outside you always have shoes on)  . . well, I don't wear shoes if I don't have to!  I keep a pair of flip flops by the door and, this time of year, a pair of tennis shoes, so I can slip them on and do what I need to do but I hate wearing shoes!

February Goals

I'm a little behind on getting my February goals posted!  Remember how I said that January felt like a year but the first three days of February just flew by - well, holy moly, we are almost half way through the month!

Again, I'm picking one main item to focus on in February, just like I did in January (even though I didn't do that great!)

My February focus is

Strengthen our Homeschool

Part of the reason I picked this for February is that it won't take as much time and, considering I'm just getting started, I only have a half of a month to focus on it!  I also feel that if we can stay in our established routines this month now that we have missed 2 weeks of school (yes we did!! The weather has not been our friend - but it has brought extra friends to our house making school hard to do!!) that we will end the month on schedule, if not ahead of schedule. 

1. Make sure we are doing Math Minute daily, 

2. Accomplishing our IXL goals weekly (IXL is a math/reading practice program the boys are required to do).

3. Focus on cursive writing - the goal is to be writing in cursive by the end of May.

4. Go to the shelter and read at least once this month to the Shelter animals

5. Look at some other options for homeschooling next year - do we need to change from Connections Academy?  It's the time of year to re-evaluate what we are doing. 

6. Get the boys reading daily - I have the books and they need to read daily! 

7. Josh needs to finish 1 Social Studies project and Nate has 4 reading journals he has to complete - I want to be on schedule with these extra projects.

Even though that's my main focus, I also have some other goals to work on as well. 

1. Add exercise to our daily schedule - we started this and then the horrible winter weather hit and "locked us in" thanks to bitter cold, lots of snow and then ice, upon ice, upon ice. 

2. The basement is always on my list.  I just have to do 15 minutes a day - that's my plan.  I know from past experience that 15 minutes a day = lots of work done.  

3. Have a movie night at home.  

4. Find one activity to do this month as a family - my father-in-law gave us money to take the boys out to do something as a Christmas gift so we are tossing around a few ideas for that.  There is also a place called "Cat Cafe" that I think the boys would enjoy that is on my radar. 

5. Update my Holiday Journal - Superbowl and Valentines Day

6. Scrapbooking - my goal is to order pictures to finish up 2014; and then order January 2019 photos.  I also want to scrapbook both December 2014 and January 2019.  

7. Find my song to sing at church at the end of April. 

8. Read - I'll have a book club book, a Baker Book House book club list and just general reading. 

9. Plan Darryl's birthday (it's coming up quickly!) 

10. Work on the idea of what class I want to teach at the co-op in the fall. 

11. Totally 100% clean the playroom (I have a motto of "organize one thing" to accomplish each month). I'd like to empty the playroom, clean the carpet, clean everything else, and then reorganize and put things back neatly. 

12. Purchase 2 items for our grinch calendar in December - I'm trying to get ahead. 

13. Shipt - try to into shipt shopping to earn extra income.  It's hard to get into it started. 

14. Schedule my dental cleaning

15. Make a list of summer clothing items the boys need so we can get ahead of the game.

16. Practice piano - pick one or two songs to work on until I can play them well. 

17. Plan ahead for St. Patrick's Day - find the annual shirts and plan activities

18. Set up my 2019 Scrapbooking file folders

19. Incorporate Flylady routines. 

Yes, once again I have 19 goals :-)  I like aiming for that HA! 

Sunday Worship- Well Done

Another amazing song that I heard for the first time in the car (I apparently spend a lot of time in my car). 

Our Week in Photos #6

We've had another week of no school due to our friends having no school.  I'm really ready to get back into our routine.  It's different in the summer when we are all here - we can go to a pool, a park, or hang out with friends.  This week we were stuck at home a lot.  It was icy and cold!  The kids were all great though and actually got along pretty well.  So, here's our week!

 We started out our week with the Superbowl :-)  

 On Monday we celebrated our friend's birthday.  She was very excited :-) 

 This was our view on Wednesday - Ice, Ice baby.  There was a whole lot of ice for sure!!  

 On Thursday, trees and power lines started falling.  This was our neighbors tree - thankfully it fell in their yard and not on the power line. 

 More Thursday views!  Everything was covered in a frozen mist.  We did actually get out on Thursday to a board meeting  It was great getting to hang out with our friends. 

 Friday we were all home again - Friday School was cancelled too.  This is how we spent a lot of time - snacking, watching TV/Movies, and playing video games.  

The view on Friday included white out conditions and about 2 more inches of snow.  There were many times that we couldn't even see across the road.  It was crazy. 

Weekly Menu

So, last week I did do the "two store shopping".  I started at Aldi's and got what I could on my list before moving to Meijer to finish up.  I would guess I saved maybe $10.00.  It's a gamble, though.  I bought chicken at Aldi for about $10.00 (a family pack) but at Meijer I could have purchased the same size pack for just under $9.00 because it was on sale.  I did purchase some amazing dry salami (to have with cheese and crackers) and also tried Aldi brand crescent rolls and they tasted exactly like Pillsbury but cost about $1.50 less.

So, here's the plan for the coming week

Friday - Tacos.  Something simple after Friday School.

Saturday - We have a banquet at church tonight so I don't have to cook :-)

Sunday - Darryl has a concert so we usually grab lunch after that is done.

Monday - The boys and I have a field trip so we will either eat on the road if we have to head for home due to the weather forecast or we will eat at my mom's if we can stay the night and head home on Tuesday.

Tuesday - Chicken Pot Pies/Chicken Nuggets - something super easy :-)

Wednesday - Maybe we will actually have AWANA tonight - if we do, the boys and I will celebrate and go out HA! Otherwise, we will eat simply at home. (The boys have not had AWANA the past 4 Wednesdays due to weather so we will see!)

Thursday - It's Piano Night but also Valentine's Day!  We have a tradition of Spaghetti and Meatballs (I'll probably make crock pot stuffed meatballs), Salad and Garlic Bread.  I usually make something fun for dessert but I'm just not sure yet.

Food Favorites - Superbowl Sunday!

We love football in this house, as I've stated many times through the years.  This past Sunday was Superbowl Sunday - a day we all look forward to!  I love watching the coverage of it all afternoon - the stories, the look back at the season, and just all of the football talk.  Then comes the game, halftime show, and commercials.  Now, lets keep it real.  This year, those last three things were kind of disappointing. The game was, honestly, boring; the halftime show was awful; and the commercials were disappointing.  What was great was our food :-) 

So, what did we have this year?

Shrimp Cocktail
Chicken Nuggets
Nutella Dip and Nilla Wafers
Pigs in the Blanket
Cheese, Crackers, and Salami
Fruit Dip and Fruit
Bacon Crescent Wraps
Snickerdoodle Muffins

Quite honestly, it was the perfect menu.  There were things that every single person liked so it made it a fun "party".

Ultimatly, it was just a fun family day which is really all that matters.