Thrift Schooling

Living in the Blue Ridge Mountains has certainly changed me. My lifestyle, goals, daily habits and forms of entertainment are dramatically different. Growing up in the suburbs led me to visiting a mall weekly, coffee shop bi-weekly and a hike in the woods once every, lets say, five years! Now, all I have to do is step outside and the woods await. I go half a mile and a mountainous view is begging to be enjoyed. Life is different. Good, different and I am so thankful that I am able to raise my kids here, like this. One hobby that my older ones have really taken to is metal detecting. Homeschool nerds to the max, right? We first started out with a White's and then had an opportunity to review a Tesoro, you can read my Tesoro Review Here . My boys have found piles of goodies with this detector and love it. One of my son now has a Garrett, but my oldest still uses his trusty Tesoro with great success.  Every find, has a story. My kids love trying to figure out what that story ...

What do you get a nine year old for his birthday? Toys have become babyish. Gaming systems and  tablets are too consuming and addicting. In our home, we encourage hobbies that involve the outdoors or that are lucrative. We don't do allowances in our home. It might work well as a motivator in some families but we have chosen to allow our children to find opportunities outside of their chores to make money. I have noticed that my oldest is very careful how he spends his money. I am convinced that it is because a majority of the money he has in his wallet is his own hard earned cash.  One of the ways that he adds cash to his pockets is by scrapping metal. He used to help his dad and get paid a portion of the profit. Now, he will tear apart old televisions on his own and get the money for the metal, himself. Needless to say, when he received a Tesoro Metal Detector for his birthday the first thing out of his mouth was, "am I dreaming?!" He was beyond excited. He kept t...