Sweet stuff

I've been saving these up for awhile, I don't think any of these are "hot off the press" posts. Some have been starred in my reader for months. Others I've discovered through the comments left here. 

I'm clearing out all my end of winter favorites and getting ready to read and savor spring inspired writing.

Mama Speak

• Right now we have an inspiration board with written notes but after reading Lusa Organics blog Clean what I really want is a manifestion board.
• Thank you Hillary for reminding me to stand back to witness and not always rush to fix my children's emotions. 
• I loved reading Kate's thoughts on love and marriage. I especially appreciated that this was a story of love for her husband and not some 4 point how-to have a good marriage post.

Creative Homestead

• You know I just love homemade skin care stuff so I enjoyed simplify your personal care from New Urban Habitat.
• In a similar vein The Homesteading Apartment posted homemade laundry and dishwashing recipes. These are worth a look-see if you don't make your own bar soap to use for cleaning ie: they use all store bought ingredients.
• Simple, Green, Frugal Co-op always has such good stuff (2 posts in this round up). Do you grow comfrey? You should. It's one of my favorites in my herb garden.
• I'm not sure how I stumbled across Old Recipe for a New World but I'm glad I did. This family is quitting plastic for 4 months, ie: not buying anything with plastic (they do a tally each month end and I must say they've been doing very well). As we aim to rid the plastic from our own lives, at a much slower pace I'm afraid, I'm humbled by their efforts.

Beyond my Backyard (Dreams) 

Pursuing our dreams is a big theme for our family this year. To see others do just that is so encouraging and inspiring.  

• I love what Erin at exhale. return to center is doing to follow her passions and support her community.
• The Organic Sister and her family have just left their home to travel the country in a converted bio-diesel Winnebago.  This is not my dream but watching someone else live an intentionally unconventional life makes for a good read. 
• Of what do you dream? at Simple, Green, Frugal Co-op.

Gallery

• A great how-to take photos in low light with a point and shoot tutorial at Wisdom of the Moon.
• Capturing children create is one of the most beautiful things to photograph.
• While we wait for spring to really happen here I'll enjoy these last shots of winter; leaf in the wind, chickadee wings and frost on a window pane (with apologies to everyone who is already reveling in spring).

No Homeschool Sweet Stuff this month.  I've been expending a lot of mental energy writing for Simple Homeschool and you can find my posts (all one but very soon to be two) here.  The contributions by all the writers have been really good.  I think it's a great go-to source for homeschoolers or would-be homeschoolers. 

It's been 2 months since I've done a sweet stuff post because Christmas threw me off my usual once a month routine. But I've been setting aside a bunch of links that I plan to share this month and next.

Because I'm in a homeschool frame of mind these days I decided to limit my link love to homeschool related stuff for this month.

• I so enjoyed reading Kate's real life story on following her children's lead in little teachers.
• Hillary from infintelearners wrote this great post on children using real tools at Steady Mom. I have wanted to write forever on the importance of this with examples of the scary things we let our kids use.
• The always lovely Lisa at 5 Orange Potatoes wrote about creating land art (art in the natural world). Her post reminded me of the great movie Rivers & Tides, about Andy Goldsworthy's work. A must see.
• Although I wouldn't call this unschooling (in which case I'm an unschooler and I don't think I am), I appreciate what Jena has to say about intentional unschooling. Ever wonder how an interest led learner is going to learn "everything they need to know"? This post helps answer that question from a mama whose been there and done that with 2 already graduated and one in public high school.
• You gotta be home to homeschool. A long one, but a good one. An excellent blog post brought to my attention by Kika (a regular commenter here at FIMBY).
• After attempting to teach Celine spelling as a separate subject (yeah right, that didn't last long!) I'm happy to put spelling in it's place. This quote of Karen Andreola's as shared at Handmade Homeschool pretty much sums it up as far as spelling goes in our home.
• My husband sent these last two links my way. Firstly, this is an amazing (but long) speech entitled Schoooling: The Hidden Agenda. If you can get past the dense text and lack of decent formatting this is very worth your time to read. I always knew my kiddos didn't need to know "all that stuff".
• This is more scary than sweet, US grants homeschooling German family political asylum. Damien, ever on top of the news, sent me this story just today. To think it's prohibited to homeschool your children in some countries. Thank God and all those early homeschooling pioneers for the freedoms we have here.

That's a wrap. Stay tuned for the winner of the Vegan Cuisine DVD and next week I'll draw the winner for the Steady Days Giveaway. Can't believe how many comments I'm getting on that. Wowzers.

Thanksgiving week; a week of cooking, traveling and/or hosting, preparing and cleaning up. We are going to friends to help them eat a home grown bird (or two). But in addition to the usual day of thanksgiving and harvest feasting we will be celebrating Brienne's 7th birthday this week - twice. Wednesday is the actual day, crossing our fingers that her gift will arrive in time. Sunday is theFancy Nancy Goes Bowling Birthday Party. A fairly simple affair; dress up, bowling and cake. But still I anticipate spending a fair amount of time in the kitchen this week. Because what is a celebration without good food?

And so I say to myself "I should take a blogging break this week". Ha! That's almost laughable. Blogging is something I enjoy immensely. Publishing my photos and thoughts almost daily - what a rush! But in the event that I do check out for a couple days I wanted to leave you all with these great reads, November's Sweet Stuff.

Mama Speak

• I consider myself a fairly energized, upbeat person. I haven't given much thought to the factors that contribute to this but The Secret Life of High Energy Parents really resonated with me.
• Somehow Earthy Crunchy's amazing parenting soup post from way back in September slipped through the sweet stuff cracks. I loved, loved, loved the metaphor of soup that Kyndale uses to illustrate parenting. So well said.

Homeschool

Nothing really hit me very much this month with regards to homeschooling.

Urban Homestead

• Someday when I finally find the motivation I will write about our family's natural body care. The only thing we buy for our personal hygiene is toothpaste (just haven't attempted to make our own yet) and as far as I know we don't stink too bad. But in the meantime you can read Simple Mom's (if you haven't already) Natural Beauty post.
• Another way back from September post found at Little House in the Suburbs, 6 lazy ways to reduce housework. I couldn't agree more with this post. The kids and I spend about one hour each weekday morning doing housework chores - cleaning, organizing, bathroom, laundry, cat care (not including breakfast clean up). The kids clean up and vacuum the play and living areas each night. And every once in a while I'll wash the kitchen floor after supper. That's about all the time we spend on non-food related house cleaning and we don't live in a sty. It's lived in but tidy. Housework - who needs it?

Recipes

Technically I don't have a recipes section on my blog but in honor of the big day coming up I thought I'd share three recipes I plan to cook this week, all found at Fat Free Vegan Kitchen, my all time favorite food blog.

• Celebration Pot Pie with Pumpkin. I will use tofu instead of seitan and plan to make other g-free modifications. A special meal for our long weekend at home together.
• Pumpkin Pie Bites, my dessert contribution for Thursday.
• Sweet Dumpling Squash stuffed with Lemon-Herb Rice, my main dish contribution for Thursday.

Neighborhood

• Bartering advice for the frugal mom from Steady Mom's guest poster Tori. As a mother who has no choice but to barter (because of my immigration status - absolutely legal but not permitted to work) I can relate to this post.

Gallery

• Remember how I said I didn't know what I wanted for my birthday? Well now I do, Digital Landscape Photography.
• Isn't this colored bokeh from Four Winds Photo Journal just wonderful?

Wishing you all a wonderful Thanksgiving week.