Letter of the Week Home School Curriculum

As I have mentioned before, I home school my two oldest children. Because of my daughters learning style, she is currently on the same level with my 4 year old. We use Letter of the Week curriculum to teach our kids.

Through my research on home schooling, I have come to the conclusion that finding a good curriculum is like attempting to pull teeth from an alligator. It can be so confusing for some one just starting out. What is the best? What style works for my child? There are no easy answers but I have found this website to be extremely helpful. It spells everything out for you.

The Good: It primarily focuses on reading readiness in the preschool years. It has entire themes planned out, including rhymes, animals and songs to sing. It is based on a 26 week school year for the 2-4 age group, which teaches counting up to 25. A huge bonus is that it goes all the way to 10 year old curriculum. Including math, science, geography, history and more. Each module can be adjusted to fit any age level and gives suggestions on how to do so. Unlike a lot of sites that can be overwhelming, this site is super easy to navigate. The best part, it's all free..

The Bad: There are no direct print outs on the site that I could find. For example, each week has something specific you learn about. An animal, food, object etc. which you are on your own to find a suitable print out for to have your child cover.

The Ugly: I actually haven't found anything I would consider "ugly" with this yet.

The Bottom Line: This curriculum and website are an awesome resource for any one wanting a simple way to plan their weeks. It is not religion based, so if you want to incorporate religion into your childs learning, you have to work it in yourself. I love that I can slightly alter the themes or daily lessons to fit my childrens needs with out completely throwing off the curriculum.

How to clean *anything*

Todays post is part of Works for Me Wednesday.

How to clean virtually anything with 4 items and next to no effort.

First: a 1/3 combo of water and apple cider vinegar in a spray bottle and an old rag. I have gotten literally anything off or out with this mixture. I have even gotten grout off of tile with it. I've also used it on my flat top stove to get rid of the burn marks. Just spray your mixture onto the mess and wait a little bit then wipe it off. Sometimes you have to do this twice but it always works.

Water and ACV replaces: toilet, shower, sink and window cleaner.

Second: Rubbing alcohol & an old rag. Rubbing alcohol removes any ink (even permanent marker) and most paints from just about any surface. It's gotten pen, marker and permanent marker out of my couch cushions. It has removed all of the same marks from different walls and tiles in my house. Even the cupboards. It removed acrylic paint from my dining room chair. Just make sure the alcohol is at least 70%.

In my house rubbing alcohol replaces: Magic Erasers, bleach and other hard chemical cleaners.

These things also save: My couches, pillows, sheets, mattresses, sanity, money and my children from endless time outs.

It works for me.

Moby Wrap infant carrier

The Moby Wrap infant carrier is a type of infant carrier that is soft, made of one piece of fabric and designed to literally wrap your baby onto your body. No straps, no clips. Just you and your baby.

I have tried many styles and brands of infant carriers. The Moby is one of the best. 

The Good:  It is soft and breathable. Living in Florida, this is a must. It doesn't get deathly hot while wearing. The design on the front makes it easy to put on centered. It's decently priced at around $40.00 and comes with an instruction book, DVD and a carry pouch.

The Bad: It isn't as stretchy as I like. It's harder to adjust once tied on then other wraps. It also isn't as light. 

There is no "ugly" for this. 

The Bottom Line: For the price, it's a good wrap. It's not my favorite, but it does come in many fun colors and designs. For the first time baby wearer, it's a good pick.

Arm & Hammer Laundry Detergent

Today I am going to tell you about my favorite laundry detergent. Arm & Hammer® plus Oxiclean laundry detergent.

For years, I have searched for a detergent to not only clean my clothes, but make them smell good. I had laundry envy of any mom who could get all of her clothes to not only smell clean, but good. My clothes always smelled like.. Nothing. I could tell they were clean but they didn't have that fragrance guaranteed by the company.

For a long time, I was making my own laundry soap, overdosing on the essential oils in hopes to get them to have a specific smell.

I've spent tons of money on all detergents, from the super cheap to insanely expensive. All in vain.

Now, before you start saying "But you have to stick it out to get a solid smell.", I was. I would use the same soap for at least two months. Which means, in this house, every sheet, blanket, towel and piece of clothing we own  made the cycle at least twice.

It seemed there had to be a trade off. I could either have clean clothes and no fresh scent, or a decent scent but my clothes didn't seem clean. And then, on a whim, I picked up some Arm & Hammer® Plus Oxiclean. After only a few loads, my clothes and towels had staying power in the scent department!

The Good: I no longer need bleach. I have never seen a detergent work so well at actually getting clothes clean. Clothes I had long ago surrendered to play drawers came out sans stains. White socks are staying white! I don't need dryer sheets to help add smell either. Saves quite a bit of money if you can remove those two things from the budget.

The Bad: It comes in both liquid and powder, but the powder definitely works better. The liquid not only didn't make my clothes smell the same, it didn't seem to get them as clean either. Also, watch out because if you are going for a specific scent, different stores carry specific scents. Our local grocery store only carries "fresh rain" while Wal-Mart only carries mountain breeze. But, it is in small writing so you may not notice.

The Ugly: Because the powder works better, that is what we buy. Every so often (usually when hubby does a load of laundry) if you add the detergent after clothing or overload your machine, the soap clumps up into really hard crystal balls. Other than that, no ugly from me. :)


The Bottom Line:   I have 5 kids 6 and under. I go through a LOT of detergent. Of all the detergents out there, this was the best value for the decent price tag of about $10.00 for around 100 loads.
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Disclaimer: Arm & Hammer®, its parent nor affiliate companies have provided anything to me for writing this review, monetary or otherwise. I wrote this review out of pure love of the product.

First post. First review

This, my first review, will be of the Shark® Steam Mop.

The first time I used the Shark® Steam Mop I was cleaning a friends house. It was so easy to move around on the tile floor and it made a pleasant "whoosh" sound and you could actually see it working. She raved about it and I knew eventually I wanted one. I've used every other mop out there. Sponge mops, flat mops, swiffer mops, microfiber mops, string mops. Every brand in every style. I have never been happy with my floors after mopping. Various reasons: not clean enough, too hard to use, too much prep time.....
Not the Shark®.

The first time I used a Shark® on my own floors, I was borrowing my parents' mop. The floors we had were vinyl and had been very abused by previous tenants. The sealant was gone, and they had clearly rarely been cleaned before. We'd tried everything. Even the industrial cleaner they use in mechanics shops to get the grease out of concrete. That stuff promises to remove anything from any surface. Nope, not my stubborn floors. While the floors never got 100% clean, I can't place blame on the Shark®. It worked very hard and got my floors as clean as they had ever been. It took a few uses, but finally, my floors looked and felt clean.

I recieved my very own Shark® for Christmas this year. I use it nearly daily. We have since moved and now own our home. I have 4 different floors I use the Shark® on. Concrete, tile, hard wood and pebble. The shark works on everything in our house.

I have the purple "fluffy" (as I call it) cover that is used on the hard wood. It is designed to release less water with the same amount of heat and steam to clean. That way, your floors don't get stripped and the wood doesn't warp. It works exactly as it is supposed to. The white microfiber cover is for basically every other floor surface. It works excellent on our tile, concrete and pebble flooring.

It comes with 2 covers per head. One rectangle head and one triangle head for corners, stairs etc. Each cover has two sides.

The results


The good: This is a truly versatile mop. It cleans nearly every surface type with relative ease. A bonus: It sanitizes. The steam actually kills any germs it comes in contact with. I love that I can add essential oils to the water and make any room I mop smell really good. It's quick (takes about ten seconds to fill and ten seconds to change the cover) and I can mop my 2,000+ square foot house with only two water refills.

The bad: Stuck on gunk is a bit harder to remove. It is not impossible, but it takes either several swoops and scrubs with the mop or you have to actually get down and scrape it off.

The ugly: While I love my Shark®, it is not flawless. If you don't use distilled water, it will leave a film on your floors. It makes my floors look like they have a dust layer on them. It's a very strange thing and only happens on tile with a high shine polish to them. Every now and then (when I go a week or more between mopping) I have to go over the floors twice. Once with one cover and once with a completely clean cover to prevent the film and to prevent mess from spreading. If your floors are very dirty, the shark will spread sticky substances around, even though they look clean.

The bottom line: I love my Shark®. It takes me about 10-15 minutes to mop my house once. So a total of less than 30 minutes (the second round is always faster) to mop my entire 4 bedroom, all tile house is a huge plus for me. Even having to go over it twice, and buy distilled water *just for my mop* is completely worth it. It makes my floors shine and it is so easy to use.

The Shark® Steam Mop can be bought just about anywhere. My parents got theirs at Bed Bath and Beyond and paid over $100.00. I bought the newer model from Big Lots and paid less than half the price and mine works just as good. I recommend this mop to any one who is asking.

*Disclaimer: Shark® Steam Mop, their parent & sister companies have not paid, given free product or endorsed me in any way. This review is completely my own.