Thrift Schooling

Moving Beyond The Page  is a homeschool curriculum geared towards gifted learners. It provides a challenging environment allowing their creativity to flourish! This program can be used as a full curriculum or you can choose to order bits and pieces and use them as unit studies. For this review, they were extremely generous and provided materials that I could use for two separate unit studies! For a literature study I received the  Charlotte's Web  unit and for science I received  Amazing Weather .   What arrived in my MAILBOX: ~ Moving Beyond the Page Catalog ~ Charlotte's Web Curriculum Plan and Worksheets ~ Charlotte's Web Paperback Book ~ On This Day in March Paperback Book ~ Weather and Climate Paperback Book ~ Thermometer What arrived in my INBOX: ~ Access code to  Amazing Weather Online Curriculum  Both of these studies are a part of a larger program designed for learners ages 7-9. The way the program is set up is there are ...

I hate mildew. It grosses me out. Not only in my bathroom, but my kitchen as well. For some reason it likes to form in the grout of my kitchen tiles and of all places, that is the worst possible, ever! I'm preparing food there so mildew is not welcome! So even before I hit the shower tiles, I put  Soft Scrub Mold and Mildew Stain Remover to the test in my kitchen! It worked right away. I was impressed. No waiting, no hard scrubing, it honestly did the work for me. It was actually kind of fun rubbing up the grime and seeing how shiny my kitchen could actually be. Then I tackled the shower. Again, sparkling clean, I would use this product again in a flash! Do you want to give it a go?  Enter below to win 2 Bottles of Soft Scrub Gel Cleaner for yourself! a Rafflecopter giveaway Disclaimer: I received a free product for the purpose of this review. All opinions expressed here are my own.

Who wants cleaner, brighter, shinier toilets? And all the moms said, "I DO!" Especially the moms with little boys. Yikes. Long gone are the days of cleaning the bathroom only once a week. No. Daily my kid's bathroom needs to be checked (of course I didn't say I'm always on top of that). Sometimes everything inside of me wants to avoid it because honestly, I'm scared of what I'll find. When I saw that Soft Scrub's   4-in-1 toilet care was up for review, I was excited. What I like about this toilet care product is that it fits right on the rim of the toilet, under the seat. I can't stand the ones that you have to open that heavy lid on top of the toilet. I don't know, it just seems gross to me and I'm always afraid I'm going to drop and crack it. This is much easier and you can actually see it working. Every time you flush, the water runs through the product causing it to clean, prevent build-up, prevent toilet ring and stays fresh fo...

Back in middle school we could choose to  learn a language  as one of our electives. The only choices we had to pick from were Spanish and French. Even though Spanish is more popular in our country than French, I chose French. At times it just seemed like just another class for me, not a big deal. Little did I know what the power of learning one, single, foreign language could hold. When you learn a new language, a whole new part of your brain is being used, which makes it easier to learn other languages in the future. The love for traveling developed early on in life for me and had already travelled overseas before I hit the teenage years! In high school, I had the amazing opportunity to be a part of an exchange program in France. Since then, I have traveled and spent time in close to a dozen different countries. Now even though these countries weren't French speaking, some Arabic, Telegu, Dutch and others, I honestly believe that it was easier for me to adapt in these cul...

Well, sort of. If you search for Thrift Schooling on FB then yes, you will still find our page. The problem. I no longer have access to that page. It seems as soon as I went over 2,000 followers on the fan page, things went downhill. Rapidly, my numbers began dropping. Then one day when I went to sign in to my account, I was not allowed in unless I provided some further personal information. Either,  1. My cell phone number   2. A photo copy of my ID  Believe it or not, I'm one of the few people left in the world without a cell phone. You read that right. No cell phone, and by choice. And, I refuse to send FB a copy of my ID, I mean, it's FB for goodness sakes, they certainly do not need a copy of my ID. When they requested that information, the red flags went sky high in my books and I said good-bye to that social site for good! Now how is this going to affect this blog? Good question! At first I was nervous thinking that I would not be able t...

1.    Sticky Spider Web 2.    Edible Web 3.    Oreo Spider 4.    Spider Relay Race 5.    Nail Web (similar to pictured above) 6.    First School Spider Printables 7.    Online Spider Games 8.    Handprint Lacing 9.    Spider Trivia 10. Yarn Web 11. Preschool Spider Activity 12. Spiders and Flies Group Game 13. Straw and Yarn Web 14. Clothes Hanger Web 15. Insects and Spiders Lapbook 16. Miss Muffet Spider Game

Enjoy these exciting giveaways! $75 of Curriculum Art Class DVD National Donut Day Giveaway Jamie Oliver's Meals In Minutes

My neighbor is the one that started it. Last summer she decided to get some trees cut down in her backyard for some extra cash. She didn't clear cut or anything drastic but the view has certainly changed. Well, after several days of having the kids outside watching the loggers (safely from a distance of course) we began thinking. Now I love having our woods, really I do, it was just those hideous pine trees directly outside my backdoor that annoyed me. So we did it. We hired the same logging company that my neighbor was using to chop down those obnoxious trees, for a small profit too! Then the snowball effect began. Another neighbor decided to jump in on the fun and before you knew what was going on, neighbor after neighbor began getting their trees cut down. The crazy thing is, several of them did indeed clear cut their entire property, making for an entire different view for the rest of us! Now I have to be honest, we didn't make a whole lot of money, but we now have a bea...

When you homeschool, the budget isn't always there for big vacations. Day trips are a great solution, and you can count it as a school day! Our family loves to take advantage these to break the educational doldrums; we just can't let them break the bank. Here are three thrifty day trip ideas: #1.) Take advantage of your local National Parks and Monuments! The entrance fees are pretty low, and the facilities are always nice. We love the Junior Ranger Program , where the kids each get an age appropriate booklet to fill in the blanks, complete little games, and research facts throughout the park. When they've filled in the book they can turn it in at the ranger station and be sworn in as junior rangers, complete with badges! This is available at nearly all National Parks, and there's sure to be one near you! Did you think all National Parks and Monuments were mountains and rivers? I'll bet you didn't know the Liberty Bell is in a National Park. It is! Lots of...

I used Grammerly.com  to grammar check this post since a college education isn't all that it's cracked up to be! The images you place on your product reviews are primarily what are going to make or break your review. Your images are what will draw the consumer  into your site. When you post on social media networks such as Facebook and Google +, the image along with your teaser, is what will determine whether or not you receive that page view or not. 1- CHOOSE IMAGES WISELY  Too many images may cause a post to load slowly for someone, causing them to search for what they are looking for somewhere else! I generally tell the companies I'm pitching for that I will provide them with 3-5 pictures for a 250 word review and 5-7 for a 500 word review. These seem like enough pictures for me to get my point across without overwhelming my readers! 2- INCLUDE COMPANY LOGO AT TOP OF POST I tend to be long winded with my opinions about a product and wan...

Having a bad hair day? Me too. As a mom I just don't know what to do with it sometimes. Should I leave it curly, make it straight, or just put it up? It's sad to say, but my hair is not on the top of priority list. Especially when I have three kids to make sure have clean clothes in the morning, a healthy breakfast and teeth brushed! Back in high school I was forever dying my hair, perming it or cutting it into cute styles. Now, what gets me excited, is a simple clip or hair accessory that can liven up my natural colored hair!   Fine Featherheads  is a cute site that provides easy add-on accessories that can liven up any style hair! From hair chalk, to hair feathers to  feather earrings  this company was a wide variety of both bright and natural colored hair accessories. I don't know about you, but spending money to dye my hair each month just sounds pricy. I understand for certain reasons it is worth it, but for me the thought of going to the hairdresser, with all t...

Reading Horizons is Online!  Subscribe to the  Discovery At-Home Learning Software Program and provide your student 4 and up  with hours of educational fun! Each parent who sets up an account can add children who are working on their reading skills to their account. Using the same methods as found in their written materials which I reviewed here . This program is designed for all types of learners and is adaptable for the following: Beginning Reader Homeschool Student Dyslexic Students Students with Learning Disabilities Students with poor educational background or opportunities ESL Learners What is Included for $199 You receive online access to the Discovery Online Software for one year. The renewal price for an additional year is $50. This program includes 63 interactive lessons that teach the students the 42 sounds of the Alphabet, the Five Phonetic Skills and Two decoding skills. Included are 22 most common words lessons which inc...

   I had the amazing opportunity to review the DVD,   God's Special Surprise , created by Christian company  See The Light . This company specializes in Christian homeschool art class DVD's. From cartooning, to Bible story themed art, See The Light provides a wide selection of art classes that you can enjoy from the comfort of your own home!  God's Special Surprise DVD $14.99 Includes: 3 Quality Art Lessons The Moses Story  Bonus Features 285 Minutes Total Art class was not one of my strengths in school. I always admired the students who had their work displayed in the school hallway, but I was just your average art student. Looking back, I remember that art class was very cut and dry. Technique driven. Maybe if I had more focus, more drive, I would have conquered those techniques and then used them creatively in my own way. Sure art was fun, but not a passion. I remember when I finally did fall in love with art. I took a...