Going green and saving some green

My family and I have been doing the green/homemade thing on and on for years now and we are making the switch again. We are slowly but surely switching over. While it is awesome that we are doing our part to help preserve a little bit of what natural resources we have for our kids futures we are doing it to save money. Yes the cost seems prohibitive at first but in the long run it actually saves you a ton to use reusable or homemade items. We have been using homemade laundry detergent for over 6months now. We  love it. All you have to do is grate one bar of zote then add 1 cup of borax ,1 cup of Arm and Hammer laundry soap, and since we have a kids who create a lot of stains I add cup of oxiclean. Store it in a ziploc bag or other container with a 1 tablespoon measuring spoon. That's it your set. I use 1 scoop for normal loads and 2 for large or heavily soiled loads. My clothes come out clean and fresh every time. * Note I have a top load HE machine and this type causes no problems for my machine or others as I found this recipe ( sort of... I tweaked it a bit to suit my family) on other websites where I checked to see if it could be used in HE machines.  We have been using more and more cleaners that can be homemade or are natural, like Vinegar and Baking Soda. There are a ton of uses for these two products. Here are just a few I found and have tried on Pinterst
get this
This worked like a charm on my old funky towels. 

get this
I have used a few of these with varying degrees of liking

We have been looking into and I am starting to make and buy family cloth and unpaper towels. We spend so much money on toilet paper and paper towels and we are always running out. We cloth diapered so the idea doesn't completely freak me out when it comes to family cloth. 1st you store the wipes either dry or dampened like baby wipes near your toilet for easy use. Then after use you store them in with either a sealed bag like a wet bag ( a bag used to hold dirty cloth diapers that is usually moisture resistent) or some other container. Then when ready wash on hot and dry. That's it. No touching anything more gross than undies that you have run through the washer and dryer.  As far as unpaper towels these are made to roll up like a roll of paper towels for ease of use and you simply wash when done using it rather than throwing it out. I will be washing both with my towels,socks and whites. Here are some I found on ETSY.

Unpaper towels by The SassyMonkeyKY

Family Cloth by Free Range Family

I am also making the switch to cloth female hygiene pads. Just like cloth diapers that are so much healthier for you and plus I hate the way the commercial ones feel by day two. So I am hopeful this will feel better.  Most are made of super absorbent materials on top of cute fabrics. I already have me and a 1 teen girl with more on the way so the cost will only be growing monthly so after the first cost this will be a money saver. Plus just like diapers I am sure many of you have had the crap I am short and have to run to the store. Well with cloth ones you don't have to worry about that. After use just put in a small wet bag till you are ready to wash. Yes they are just as easy to store in your purse as commercial ones.You wash these like cloth diapers.... hot water and detergent (not soap) and then dry. You can find a lot of great ones on Etsy like these Panty liners by ecoAlternatives

 
I am also making a few dryer balls like the ones bellow. I found how to on ...you guessed it Pinterest. These will help with drying time and to soften clothes. Saving money by having to use the dryer for a less amount of time and by not having to by fabric softeners
 get this

We are also putting in a new clothes line and a garden. Like I mentioned in an earlier post. The clothes line will save money with less dryer use as well. The garden will help us have fresh fruits and veggies with only the cost of a little rain water ( oh yeah I will be watering with stored rain water as much as possible) and sweat. If you have any thoughts or questions I would live to hear them.
Here are the links to the Etsy shops mentioned 
Sassy MonkeyKY
Free Range Family
ecoAlternatives
Thank you for reading
 

Girls Night In

Every month my husband and I try to spend a little special time with our kids. My husband took our son out for some one on one father-son time. Which is awesome for both of them. They get to talk guy talk and my DH gets a chance to build up his bond with his son. Them being out of the house and us only having one vehicle meant a girls night in for the rest of us. Which was perfect. I love spending some girlie time with my girls. It may not have been a night out on the town but I mapped out a fun night for us. First I bought a special dinner at the grocery store. We had a dinner made out of party snacks and appetizers.

 We had crab cakes, BBQ chicken fingers, seasoned fries, potato skins,cheese nips, miniature pies, fried chicken, spring rolls, juice, Bomb pops and a kids meal for Coyote.I didn't make it all just a little of each. We ate while we watched Diary of a Wimpy kid 3. We were stuffed by the time it was all done. The girls loved the movie. All of them from Coyote all the way up to lizard. After the movie we made a special project.
  I got the idea from pinterest. I tweaked it just a bit. We made Kool-aid Lip Balm. Here is the link to the Pin I got the idea from.
 get this
  
I took  pictures of how we made it. 

We used Cherry and Mango/Peach Flavored Kool-aid, reused old makeup containers and coconut oil

This is where I made the change. I heated the oil on the stove instead in the microwave.Careful not to make it hot only warm.  When it started melting I stirred in the Kool-aid

We stirred the mixture till the Kool-Aid was well blended in and then poured it in to the containers. The I put them in the fridge to let them cool and set up.

 The girls loved it. It tasted a little tart but over all sweet. It did turn our fingers a little red. I took a picture of the finished product but it didn't turn out and Coyote got fuzz in the container. So no picture but it does mean we get to do this project together again. It was really simple and the bonus is coconut oil is so healthy and wonderful for skin and the chapped lips. Also it means if my girls lick it off (which they did) there are no hidden chemicals. In all I think we had a better night in than the boys did out. 

Thank you for reading.
 

A Wordless Wayback

My Sweet Coyote Then and Now

Raising and Disciplining teens

Brother Bear being photo bombed by Lizard.

I am the proud mom of not one but 2 teenagers. Lizard is on her way to 16 and Brother Bear is on his way to 15. They are really good kids. Lizard is pretty mature for her age and Jerry is very sweet for his age. We homeschool and I think that helps but they do get influences I wish they didn't. These influences and others will come at them again and again in life so while they do worry me I know it is for the best that they are confronted with them while still under my roof. Things like teen pregnancy and romance, Lizard has friends who had done things like snuck out to meet a boy and then ended up pregnant and Brother Bear has had a group of friends that wanted to go into an abandoned home and hang out. They both have made good choices when confronted by such things so far. That being said I am no fool and they are no angles. They frequently break our rules and need a little correction. We believe in discipline not  punishment when an infraction is made. Look at it like this you don't say look at that well punished Soldier no they are well disciplined. Do you say that about someone who comes out of a prison where they are punished for their crime. Also look in the Bible it encourages parents to discipline their children. Now as your children age this becomes some what of an interesting event. You see you can put a small one in time out or even give them a small spanking but as they age these things either begin to not work or become inappropriate. We have learned this does not have to leave you with out an arsenal to get your point across.

Here are just a few of the things we implement in our home.

1. Writing Bible scripture that is relevant to the infraction.
   Now I know not everyone is a Christian but we are and we stand firm in our beliefs and it is our intent to do our best to pass them along to our children and this is one way for us to do that
2. Explanation Writing from a paragraph to pages long
       We have them sit down and write out what they did wrong, why it was wrong, things they should do differently and why 
3. Added Chores
    Now each of our kids have things they have to do everyday and some that can be spaced out through out the week, but at times they earn extra chores to be done for varying amounts of time. Chores such as cleaning the dog poop out of the yard for a week or clean the bathroom floor with a rag and a toothbrush ( not theirs or ours of course)one afternoon. Nothing to beyond their abilities or dangerous. Just "bad" enough to get the point across. 
4. Privileges Taken away
     Our kids understand that things like Ipods, Mpg3 players,Cell phone usage, TV time, Computer time, Game systems are all things that are earned and thus can be taken away if they choose to do things they shouldn't or to not do things they should. We typically take them away 1 at a time until they earn it back  unless there is no change then they are all taken away 
These are the ones we use the most often. Our kids usually respond to these things rather quickly but there is always things like this if things get our hand and you get fed up 
 




Thank you for reading

Getting Ready For Spring and Summer Events

We stay very busy around here. Always some activity or event to get ready for. We are in full swing of preparing for late spring and summer events. My older two kids Lizard and Brother Bear are starting to gather items they will need for church camp this summer.

Lizard with one her BFF's at a previous church camp

lizard on a roof last year. She loved it so much

We have made a check list with things they will need ...Summer clothes they can get mess in, bathing suits, each has to have their own sunscreen, bug spray, soap, shampoo etc. So we can try to budget a little in here and there so it is not a rush or a huge hit to our budget when it comes time to get them all packed up. Also so we can use coupons or find a sale on some of the items. Which I suggest if you have kids going to camp this year. Especially if you have  more than one going. Somethings we won't know about till a few weeks before they go because this is a volunteer camp and they do work around a community. Last year it was roofing and painting which both of them loved. So for their sake I hope it is the same this year but each camp is a little different.

Sunny Bunny

 Then Sunny Bunny will have Irish Dance camp this summer for a week. Happily that is local and only a day camp so I only have to plan the time and a lunch there. However in late may is our Irish Dance Recital. Yes I did say Our for those of you who are new to my blog. I have been doing Irish dancing for over a year now and sunny bunny nearly a year. Which means getting Sunny Bunny's costumes together. Kind of behind on that but I am working on it. It also means lots of practice and learning new dances. Sunny Bunny has been learning hard shoe and the dances she will be preforming in the recital and we will be practicing a 3 hand  with mom who also takes Irish Dance with me. This will be 3 generations preforming together on stage.  That will be something special for all of us. I am learning a new dance in the adult class for the recital. Here it is being prformed by others but it will give you an idea how cool it looks. I will be honest it wears me out with all of the circles. Oh and for those who wondering this is soft shoe not not Lord of the Dance style hard shoe.

We also have a  a Sweet Birthday Party to plan coming up for Lizard. Can't belive my baby is getting so big and is starting to learn the rules of the road.  She is good kid though and I am really proud of her. We have been gathering ideas from Pinterst and family for her party. I hope she loves it what ever we end up doing. 

 get this

This all on top of planing our garden, fun field trips and outing for the kids to go along side with their class work and getting ready for Craft shows that are coming up.  Also I am working on another Pinterest I tried it post for this month so I have started trying some the spring and summer thing I have found on there. Some have gone well and others not so well. It may be more of a funny post than an informative. Well Thank you for reading.

Til next time 
Ali-Kat 

 

Our Family Easter

My little family and I had so much fun this Easter and the week preceding it.  I took lots of pictures of all of the fun. First we did a craft but my little coyote ran off with them and hid them before i could get a half decent pictures of them. That is ok though because the point was to do something together and have fun, while discussing Easter. That was accomplished.  Later in the week we dyed our Easter eggs. We bought the kids 3 dozen eggs and set up 3 different dyeing stations on the table.

You will have to excuse the table and the mess in the back as this really is our family table. I do my work and crafting on it, we eat on it, home-school on it, craft on it, play games on it and a million other things too. So it has seen better days and yes there is a mess on it that is always being cleared away or moved about, but there is a lot of  evidence of the love around that table.  This was 2 of  the 3 egg dyeing stations. We had marble effect, bright, and a Qtip dyeing station. We reuse the glass jars you get from food items for crafting and those cheap cups you can get from Walmart for parties. I used almost every single one of them in this adventure.  The kids had a blast. 

Coyote Qtip painting her first egg

Coyote dip dyeing 

One of the eggs got stuck.

Did I mention we had a decorating station as well.Glitter was everywhere.

Sunny Bunny kept turning on me when I tried to grab a picture but she had fun

Even Brother Bear got into. Notice the look of concentration haha

Yes even lizard came around.

some of our finished eggs

 My hands were a mess after our egg adventure but well worth it. Also surprisingly  there is only a few eggs left.  Saturday night the Easter bunny came to our house. He comes a little early to our house and hides the basket so our kids can find them before they go to bed. Our Easter is usually so busy that we have started doing it this way. Plus it helps to keep the focus of the day in the right place.  

Brother's Bucket

Coyote's bucket under the chair  and Lizards Bucket in our coffee table.

Sunny Bunny's bucket in a corner behind a bin

Lizard looked everywhere for her's even in the dishwasher

The kids had a really good time looking for their baskets and loved their little gifts. They got items like glow sticks, silly string, crayons and yoyo's. They each got a ring pop but we just did not want to give our kids a ton of sugar that we would have monitor later.
 Saturday we also spent time with DH's parents for Easter. We played games and had  dinner together.We played a new game "Would You Rather" It was so much fun. We all laughed so hard over some of the questions and the others surprising answers.

Easter Sunday Sunny Bunny  and Lizard went with their DH's parents to their churches service and the other accompanied us for the morning. It was a good morning and that after we had all the kids back together we went to My mom and stepdad's for lunch and family fun over there.  It was a lot of fun and the kids loved playing with their cousins and the surprise guests their Aunt Country brought.  They brought a baby bunny and some chicks.

Coyote getting ready the Easter egg hunt at Mimi's

She had so much fun

Brother bear pulling Coyote and Cousin Bird around in the wagon

Cousin Firecracker had to get in on trying to be a big boy

Lizard helped Coyote with the bunny

Sunny Bunny hula hooping for her MIMI and aunts and uncles

my sweet little Coyote

Brother Bear is such a good kid. Always willing to play and help with the little kids

Lunch Time

Kicking the ball around

The baby chicks were a huge hit

Coyote hardly ate. She was so excited to play. Plus MiMi made cake.

Cousin Bird and Coyote had so much fun together

Lizard with her nose in a book or napping. She is a teen.

Sunny Bunny holding a bunny

Sunny Bunny playing ball with bug

 It was a very full and busy day. We didn't make all of our usual rounds but we will see more of the clan soon I am sure. I hope your Easter was as full of blessings as mine was. Thank you for reading.

I love being a mommie

My DH and I have 4 wonderfully awesome kids. It amazes me how each one has such unique look and personality. They have since birth. I love being a mom. It has been the greatest gift God has given me. It also the most stressful, fear inducing, patience testing, and whirlwind of a gift I could have ever been given. I can not believe Coyote is already 4 and even more than that Lizard is going to be 16 this summer. Time just goes so fast for a parent. Somedays I wish I could just freeze them where they are, but my job is to raise them. To lead them to be responsible upright adults. DH and I love having a large family and know that one day we will miss hearing itsy bitsy spider coming out of the back of our van as we drive down the road. Hopefully we will be  as blessed as our parents are with lots of grandkids to play with after our kids grown ( not to soon though I am not looking for any chances to be staring in a MTV reality series). Happily though we our family is growing.

Yes we are pregnant! I am a little scared and nervous as this was most definitely not a planned baby but I am also very excited. Hopefully this pregnancy won't be as hard as my last one. My last pregnancy I was so miserable it was hard to enjoy it. Though I will start stocking up on my stash of diapers from Diaper swappers and etsy. I do love some baby fluff and those two places you can get them for a good price.  I have always sang to my little ones and  I think it would be fun for all my little family to learn to sing Día de tontos de abril. You should look it up you will really like the words. It is so sweet.  Well Thanks for reading.