The next item up for review the the TOS crew is a book called Papa’s Pearls. As you probably already know (but I have to state it, because the FTC thinks all blog readers are dummy’s), I received a copy of this book in order to facilitate this review. Of course, that doesn’t mean I have to give a good review, but in this case… I am. :)

This book is a series of lessons, or “pearls”, if you will, passed down from a father to his children. This father, lovingly called “Papa” by his children, has now passed on, but one of his kids, Diane Flynn Keith, wanted to make sure his pearls of wisdom didn’t pass on with him, so she wrote this book.

Papa grew up in the Depression Era and had to overcome many obstacles to become the loving, nurturing man he grew up to be. It was through the ‘school of hard knocks’, as the author termed it, that Papa learned life lessons that he would pass on to his children and grandchildren.

I received my first pearl, that I will start implementing immediately in our home, on page 4 of the book! When Papa got in trouble in school, he would have to write out his multiplication tables… therefore, he was a whiz at math. Whatever teacher thought of that, is a genius! It could apply to spelling words too… or anything you want your kids to learn. Love it! Now, to be fair… this wasn’t necessarily one of the lessons the author was sharing that Papa had taught her, but I was nonetheless happy to have read it!

The real pearls of wisdom were the bigger lessons, like, “What’s the worst thing that could happen?” or “If you ever need anything-You’ve got it!”. This is how each chapter in the book was titled. The title was a sentence. A sentence that Papa would say to his kids to help them form their life experiences. Each sentence had a story behind it which would be laid out within the chapter in an interesting manner, making it easy to read.

Besides being interesting, it’s an easy read because it is only 109 pages with 17 chapters. Each chapter is fairly short… just telling the story of that particular ‘pearl’. I think my favorite though, was not even one of the 17 chapters… it was the Epilogue at the end. It talks about how, in his final days, Papa wanted everyone in life…in the world… to know they are loved. What a wonderful man! He is struggling just to breath and get the words out and he is still worried that people won’t know how much they are loved! No wonder Dianne wanted to write a book in his honor.

There are many times when my dad is talking that I wish I had a tape recorder going, because I know myself well enough to know that I probably won’t remember what is said. Fortunately, I remember the feeling. And, sometimes that’s good enough. However, just as we all say we should keep baby books, so that we can always remember all the cute things our kids did when they were younger… maybe we should also have a parent book. The parent book would hold all the gems of advice and life lessons that our parents tried to teach us. Then, when we are having a bad day or think we need advice on something, maybe reading a couple pages out of the parent book will suffice in helping us come up with the right thing to do in that situation.

I do recommend this book. If for no other reason than to remind us of the pearls of wisdom our own fathers or grandfathers passed on to us. We all need that reminder!

You can purchase the book through the author’s website for only $14.97 plus shipping and that includes the author’s autograph.

Whether you live in an area with Spanish speaking people or you plan on traveling somewhere where Spanish is the first language, learning the language is not a bad idea!

There are many resources out there to learn Spanish and it can be overwhelming at times to figure out what is best for you. To help us out, Spanish For You! has given us their Estaciones curriculum to review and tell you all what we think! (You can also get sample pages if you would like to check it out for yourself!)

The Spanish For You! curriculum was designed by Debbie Annett to be used by children in grades 3-8, but it can be used by those younger or older with minor adaptations. It is designed to be used over 24 to 27 weeks, depending on the age of your children, with each week consisting of 4 days of work from the curriculum. That being said, you are homeschoolers, so you can spread that out over a longer period of time if you prefer!

The Estaciones curriculum is all about the seasons! It starts out by teaching the months of the year, days of the week, and common weather related terms, like cold and hot. The lessons include some reading, writing, drawing, audio pronunciations, as well as games,  so it is great for any way that your child learns.

When you get the curriculum, you will get a lesson guide which breaks down for you what you and your child(ren) need to do each day. You will also receive worksheets, flashcards, and an audio download of the book, by the author of the book as well as a native speaker audio. All of this comes in a pdf format and can be printed out. We also receive a soft cover  textbook with all the lessons and vocabulary in it, but that can also be purchased in a downloadable format if you prefer.

You get so much with this curriculum, that it can seem overwhelming at first. Don’t let the amount of material frighten you! It is laid out nicely and all you have to do is read the guide to see how it needs to be organized. As with any curriculum, you will need to take some time when you first get it to get yourself organized and figure out how you want to proceed on a daily basis. Once that is done, though, the curriculum is laid out in such a way that it makes it easy to stay organized!

One of the great things about this curriculum is that it is good for use with different ages at the same time. You may have to alter a few things, but mostly you don’t have to change anything to do with them. That is a big time saver!

Information at a glance:

What is it? A Spanish curriculum called Spanish For You!

For whom? for children in grades 3-8

How much is it? For the entire package, it is $64.95, but you can piece meal it together a la carte. And, remember, that price gets you all grades 3-8 information!

I do recommend you check it out and definitely click the box below to see what other TOS members thought of the curriculum as well.

Welcome to the 2nd Annual Green Your Mom Giveaway Hop, hosted by Happy Mothering and the Green Moms Network! We are excited to bring you great prizes valued at $25+ to help you "Green Your Mom" (or yourself) this Mother’s Day!. After entering my giveaway, be sure to visit the other blogs listed under the Rafflecopter form for your chance to win more great green mom giveaways.

Here on Some Call It Natural, you have the opportunity to win a $25 e-gift card for Miessence products. I’ve talked about Miessence before, but just in case you missed it… let me tell you again! :)

Miessence is the world’s first certified organic skincare, haircare, body, nutrition and cosmetic product range.

I thought Miessence would be perfect for this giveaway hop, because what green mom doesn’t want to try more organic products??

Miessence truly has everything you need to take care of yourself on a daily basis! You will be able to start out with it in your shower with the shower gel, shampoo and conditioner, then move on to facial cleansers and moisturizers, and finish it off with the haircare products and makeup! And you can feel good knowing it was all organic and natural ingredients!

One thing I love about Miessence is that the ingredients list has pictures of most of their ingredients in their products. How many products do you know that could do that? Miessence can, because most of their ingredients are plants!

Truly, I can’t say enough good things about this company, so I will just stop now and say good luck with the giveaway! :)

a Rafflecopter giveaway

As you probably know, I frequently am able to review homeschool materials as a member of The Old Schoolhouse Review Crew. Well, the next company up for review is Progeny Press.

They have over 100 wonderful study guides to help your child with their reading comprehension for Kindergarten all the way up to high school. There really is something for everyone!

At our house, we reviewed the Treasure Island Study Guide.

I have not done the best at doing reading comprehension skills with my kids. I always thought I just wanted them to learn to love to read and thought that wouldn’t happen if I was always testing them on the material.

The Treasure Island Study Guide by Progeny Press begins with some pre-reading activities. My daughter wasn’t super excited about that, as when she gets a book, she wants to just dig in, but it ended up being very helpful! In Treasure Island, there is a lot of vocabulary, that is likely new to most children. Samantha was able to learn about different types of ships and geography before she started the book and they made it easier to understand what she was reading.

A word to the wise: Make sure when you are getting your book from the library, you are not getting the abridged version of the book. My husband took our daughter to the library to check out the book. There were two Treasure Island books. He said one was bigger than the other and they didn’t know what the difference was between the two. He said the smaller book had bigger writing and the last line of the book was the same in both, so he assumed it was the larger writing that made the difference… or something like that. :)  Anyway, bottom line is they got the abridged version. We didn’t know this until she was already halfway through book and I didn’t want to make her start all over again.

It wasn’t a huge deal that she had the abridged version. It just meant there were a few questions in the study guide that she couldn’t answer, or had a hard time answering.

Anyway… just wanted to warn you to make sure you are getting the full version of the book! :)

Okay… back to the study guide…

It is broken up into sections by a group of chapters. For example, questions for Chapters 1-6, 7-12, etc..

This was a little off for us since we had the abridged version but we got it figured out.

I loved how the guide was set up. You can print it off (we got the instant download, but you can buy a book as well) or you if you prefer, you can enter the answers right on the document on the computer. There were multiple choice questions, fill in the blank, and essay type (a few sentences… not long). And then there were “Dig Deeper” questions that required a bit more than just a few questions and forced my daughter to think a little more about the material and maybe how it relates to life in general.

Progeny Press is a Christian company and as such, their study guides include biblical content. For example, one of the questions in the study guide was

These types of questions were usually (if not always) in the “Dig Deeper” portion of each section.

Overall, I think this was a wonderful study guide and we will be purchasing more from Progeny Press!

Information at a glance:

What is it? Treasure Island Study Guide from Progeny Press

For whom? The company states it is for grades 7-10, but our daughter is nearing the end of 5th grade and did fine with it. Like anything else, it depends on your child and his/her reading level.

How much is it? For the instant download or a CD, it is $16.99. If you would like a printed book, it is only $18.99.

Knowledge Quest is a wonderful company that has maps, timelines, games, geography programs, and historical biographies. The kids and I have had the opportunity to review their eBook entitled, “Sacagawea: Brave Explorers Every Child Should Know”.

It is only 112 pages and we used it as a read aloud. That way, even my 5 year old could learn a little bit about Sacagawea. Obviously, I don’t expect her to remember any of it, but when it is time for her to learn about the subject, she will have a better time remembering it since she’s already been introduced to it!

The book is written in a story form. It is not your typical boring bibliography. It is told from Sacagawea’s perspective with thoughts that she may have had learning about the white man’s way of life. Of course, when history is written in this way, there are some things in the story that may not be exact, but it does make it easier to read. I don’t want that to concern anyone though… I feel like it is one of the best things about the book, because it is written in a way that makes it interesting to read!

My favorite part of this book is definitely the links. There are links embedded within the story that you can click on to get more information. For example, on just the first few pages, there are links to William Clark, river otters, buffalo grass, prairie dogs, Fort Mandan, earth lodges, and many more.

I thought the best way to use the links was to look all of them up and talk about them before we read it in the book. So, basically, if I planned on reading one chapter with the kids, we would look up all the links in that chapter before we read it. That way the kids would have a better idea of what we were reading about and not be confused by words or names they had never heard. We would not look up the links and read the chapter all in one day. It would take a day or 2 to look up the links depending on the information in the links. Then, the chapter would be read on another day.

This is a very enjoyable eBook and a wonderful way to learn about Sacagawea!

Information at a glance:

What is it? Sacagawea eBook from Knowledge Quest

For whom? Ages 10 and up (although younger kids might enjoy sitting in if you use it as a read aloud)

How much is it? There are 4 parts and they start at .99 each. Or you can get the complete saga for only $3.99!

Of course everyone wants to know what activities they can do to burn calories and exactly how many calories they are burning during said activities. In addition to that, it would also be great to know which foods are the best when you are wanting to burn calories.

The following is a cool infographic that gives you all that information!

Enjoy!

The girls and I have never really done any ‘spa nights’ or things like that, because I don’t see the point in having bonding time where I’m putting a bunch of chemicals on their skin, hair and nails so they can look “pretty”. That being said, it is fun to put on nail polish and I also hate that my girls friends can where nail polish, but I’m always mean and say no. I have recently been able to review a nail polish called Piggy Paint.

Piggy Paint is an all natural nail polish that is targeted for little girls. Piggy Paint is water-based, non toxic, hypoallergenic, and has no formaldehyde, toluene, phthalates, Bisphenol A, ethyl acetate or acetone!! Now, that is something I don’t mind my kids using on their nails!

Piggy Paint sent us the Color Me Happy set of nail polish. All the Piggy Paint has super fun names that little girls will get a kick out of and the Color Me Happy set includes Pocketful of Posies, Jazz It Up, Dragon Tears, Girls Rule!, Forever Fancy, Mac-n-Cheese Please, Ice Cream Dream, and Tea Party for Two. How cute are those names!?

I started our nail painting extravaganza with Olivia, my 4 year old (5 in a couple days!). I let her tell me what to do and how to paint her nails. And, oh my goodness, did she have fun telling me exactly how she wanted it done!

On the first hand, she wanted me to do Dragon Tears (green) and Forever Fancy (Pink). I couldn’t just do it normal, though.

Here we go…

She is so excited about her idea to make stripes!

Piggy Paint suggests you run the hair dryer over your nails for about a minute to help it set.

Now, to start on her right hand. She gets really crazy with her requests on this one! :)

She has picked out LOTS of colors and she has me do stripes on each finger. I let her tell me exactly what colors to do together. Some of the fingers look really cute and others, well, look like the colors were put together by a 4 year old! It is all hers, though, and she had a great time doing it!!!!

And, voila… the final product!

So cute, right!!??

Next up was my 11 year old daughter, Samantha.

Samantha’s favorite colors are blue and green, so naturally, she picked those colors for her hands! She chose Ice Cream Dream (turquoise greenish color) and Tea Party for Two (blue).

We decided together we would alternate the base coat on each finger and then put polka dots over that color.

And, since the girls got their nails done, I thought I would do mine too. I decided on the Girls Rule! color. :)

Okay… enough about us… I know you want to hear about the giveaway!!!!

Piggy Paint is giving away a “Toe-Tally Fancy” 3 polish set to one of my readers!!

All you have to do is use the Rafflecopter form below to enter! Good luck!

Also, just in case you don’t win… or you want more colors (of course!), Piggy Paint is offering my readers a 15% discount if you enter the code PiggyFun at checkout. This code expires on April 30, 2013.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

I participated in a campaign on behalf of Mom Central Consulting for Piggy Paint. I received a product sample to facilitate my review and a promotional item to thank me for participating.

Okay, so I know it’s a little past the day(s) that it really mattered, but I also know that this fight isn’t over, so I need help from you guys!

There were SO MANY different pictures that people used as profile pictures on all the social media sites… of course, I mainly saw them on Facebook, because that’s my fave one.

I’ve never really been one to change my profile picture due to anything going on in the country/world. I never really thought it would make a difference… and I still don’t… I mean, do we really think that the judge is going to change his/her decision based on how many people change their profile pictures??

Well, maybe…

I found that picture on The Chicks on the Right’s Facebook page. I don’t know if they made it or not, but it got me thinking… CRAP! Maybe I should have changed my profile picture! I really could have made a difference!

I feel it’s a little late for this round, but I would love some help in deciding which one to use for the next battle round.

Here are you options for if I want to express that I am FOR equal rights for homosexuals (which I will reveal in a bit my stance).

Obviously, we have the ever so popular pink equal sign on the red background.

She has lots of children as well…

The equal sign with the words, “Marriage Equality” in them and around them. I suppose this is if I have super stupid Facebook friends that really need to be told what’s going on??

The equal sign made out of two wedding bands. I like this one. Very clever and touches the heart a bit more than just the plain equal sign.

Then we have these three kind of silly versions…

Bert and Ernie, of course, have been in the closet for years. I, for one, am happy they are finally admitting their truth. I am shocked at Justice and Liberty, but whatever. I’m not really sure what Data and C3PO have to do with marriage equality… I mean, neither one of them are human???

You also have the grumpy cat expressing his opinion, but clearly he’s confused. He has conflicting pictures all over Facebook profiles.

And then, you have the anti-Marriage Equality picks…

The main one I saw that was in direct response to the equal sign was the cross in the same colors.

And then the man+woman picture…

There were a couple of anti-abortion folks that jumped in on the cause with their view point, which is that the thousands of babies being killed (aborted) every day is more important than marriage equality.

I will have to agree on this one. We have 2 people that want to have the right to have a piece of paper saying they are committed to one another, and while I’m sure that is important to homosexuals, I think the “right” people have to kill the humans living inside them is a little bit more of a pressing issue. Sorry if I stepped on toes there, but that’s how I feel.

Anyway… sorry to get serious on you… on with choosing me a new profile picture next time this subject comes up!

This next one might be my favorite one, and therefore, the winner, but I will let you help me decide.

I think bacon is pretty much awesome, so this one is probably the most suited one for me to use. I mean, come on… what’s more important than my right to access to bacon!? (organic and nitrite / nitrate free, of course)

The other avenue people took with the marriage equality profile picks was to discuss the companies for or against it.

Starbucks has apparently taken a stance on being FOR Marriage Equality. As you can imagine, people that are against it, are not happy about that and are choosing to forego their cups of $5 coffee for the cause. I predict that lasts about a month before they start getting Starbucks coffee again, but regardless, they can use this profile picture in the meantime.

The problem with this kind of boycott, is that there are so many companies that are outspoken and have taken an official stance for marriage equality, that I don’t think these people realize how much they will have to give up. And, you’re pretty much a hypocrite if you don’t boycott them all. Here is a small list and I’m sure there are more that are not listed.

Take a good look at that list… Even if you are against marriage equality, it would be difficult to boycott ALL of those… including FACEBOOK!!!!

Okay… those are all your choices.

Here’s the thing. I don’t really care if homosexuals get married or not. To me, the government has no right to get involved in who gets married. It’s not like they are marrying animals… they are marrying other human beings… that happen to be the same sex. And, no matter how you or I feel about whether or not that is right or wrong in the eyes of God makes no difference. Their marriage will not affect my life or your life. The only life it will affect is theirs. And, they will be happier people due to this right. I, personally, want to live with happy people in my country, so I guess I’m okay with them getting married.

I’ve realized recently what being married will mean for them. It will mean that if only one person in the relationship is working, that the other person will be on their insurance. It means that if they are having health problems, their partner can make health decisions for them just as any spouse should be able to do. There are many other things just like this that a man and woman that are married get to benefit from, but a homosexual couple does not… even if they have been together for 10, 20, or 30 years.

I will never understand homosexuality. My brain just doesn’t work that way. I am not sure that I will ever not take a double take when I see two men or two women together in a romantic way. Or hesitate when I hear a woman talk about her wife. It all just sounds strange to me, to be completely honest with you.

That being said, it doesn’t matter how it makes me feel. It is not for me to judge. It is not for me to understand. If it is wrong, then God is the only one that needs to decide what to do. If God has no problem with it, then neither should we. And, I repeat… even if God does have a problem with it, we are not here to decide how they live their lives!

If you are against marriage equality… ask yourself why. If it is just because you believe it is wrong to God, then fine. Just also realize that is your belief and not theirs. I can guarantee you that your preacher (or rabbi or priest or whatever) will not perform any gay marriage ceremonies. Homosexuals are just asking to be recognized by the government as a real relationship and want to have all the governmental benefits of that relationship.

And, in the end… this is for people on both sides of the debate… ask yourself how changing your Facebook profile picture will help the cause. I think if you really think on that you will realize it’s not going to help at all. You might as well have a bumper sticker, too.

So, on that note… forget this whole post. It was a waste of time. I won’t be changing my profile picture anytime soon to support any of these causes.

Except maybe to change it to the bacon one. I truly do feel strongly about equal opportunity to bacon.

I never have had a specific math curriculum for my youngest. We have just kind of gone with the flow and taught her counting and number nonchalantly. Well, TouchMath decided to remedy that, and sent me their Pre-K math curriculum (although you can get the curriculum for Pre-K through 2nd grade)!

The curriculum I received was something I needed to download onto my computer, which is nice because it gave me that instant gratification of being able to check it out right away!

The picture below gives you an idea of some of the worksheet pages that you can print out for your child to use. It also gives a list of the things included in the download: Implementation Guide, 6 Module Guides with Instructional Strategies, 90 Student Activity Sheets, Real World Connections, Answer Keys, Progress Monitoring, and Vocabulary.

This program is multisensory. It helps your child make the connection between an abstract number written on paper and the same number of objects in front of them. One way it does this is through something they call “TouchPoints”. There are optional manipulatives you can buy to go along with the curriculum.

They are:

• TouchShapes ($30)
• Math Fans ($239)
• 3-D Numerals ($79)
• TouchPoint Posters ($43)
• Texture Cards ($99)
• Number Concept Posters ($53)

Those prices seem a little steep for my personal taste, BUT I know the families on The Old Schoolhouse Review Crew that have children with special needs have found the manipulatives to be essential to the curriculum! And, they said it is much more reasonably priced than similar products they have seen. So they are very happy with them.

In addition to the curriculum, TouchMath sent me the TouchShapes, 3-D Numerals, and Texture Cards.

My daughter has liked using all of them!

Here is my oldest daughter working with my youngest daughter on the Texture Cards. She loves it when her big sister helps her with school, so as often as I can, I try to allow that to happen.

On the Texture Cards, each Touch Point is numbered. The child is supposed to trace the number and count the Touch Points as they go along. On most of the cards its a very cute way to help them count and remember the value of the written number. I am not a huge fan of the numbers four and seven on the Texture Cards. I’m not sure if you can see on the number four in the picture above, but the order of the Touch Points is a little confusing, I feel. You start top left and go down, counting the first and second bunny touch points and if you continue and go right, like you would if you were writing the number, the next bunny is numbered “4”, then you go up and take the line down and go over 3 and 4 again. I’m not sure of a better way to do it, honestly, but it was confusing for my little one. Same thing with the seven. They have touch points 1-6 on the straight line down, and then on the top line that goes left to right, you will find the number 7 touch point. You don’t write a seven like that, so it seems confusing.

Other than that little complaint, we love the program AND the manipulatives. My daughter likes to arrange the 3-D Numerals around and ask us what the number is. For example, she will put down the 5,7, and 3 and ask “What number is this?” and we would say, “573!”. This is obviously way too old for her and it was not a part of the curriculum, but she has a lot of fun with it!

The TouchShapes I think would have to be my favorite manipulative to go along with the program. Many of the worksheets have shapes on the page and the child will use the TouchShapes and place them on the shapes on the page.

Of course, you don’t have to have the manipulatives to get benefit from this curriculum. It stands well on its own. So, please don’t feel like you can’t use it unless you buy all the extras. The lessons and ideas they present in the curriculum are wonderful and do not require the manipulatives. That being said, if you child is more hands on, then the manipulatives are perfect.

One thing I love about the curriculum is that it gives step by step directions on how to use the program. There are some curriculum that when you buy it, you are then left to fend for yourself on how you would like to use it. I guess they think we like the freedom. I like being told exactly what to do and then if I choose to change it, then fine, but I like knowing what the curriculum makers have designed it to do.

All in all, I love this program and we will continue to use it. I think my daughter has already learned a lot in the short time we have used it and I can’t wait to see what she has in store to learn with the rest of the curriculum!

Information at a glance:

What is it? A multisensory math program for grades Pre-K through 2nd

How much is it? $59.95 (and remember its a download, so that will last you through all your kids!)

Did we like it?? YES!!!

If you like cheesy garlic bread, I am here to tell you it doesn’t have to be a big production!

For this recipe, I’m not going to give you actual measurements for your ingredients, but here is what you will need:

• your favorite bread
• butter
• minced garlic
• shredded mozzarella cheese

The first thing you do is preheat your oven (or toaster oven) to 350 degrees. Then take your piece of bread and butter it. Then spread minced garlic on it.

If you are mincing your own garlic, this is probably the equivalent of two cloves of garlic. I cheated and used the kind that is already minced in a jar. They sell it at our grocery store and it is organic with no extra ingredients! I love it!

Okay, now just sprinkle as much mozzarella cheese on top of it as you would like. Can you tell I like cheese?

Alright, put it in the oven for 5 minutes. And voila!

When I just make one piece, I put it on one of my dinner plates, because they are oven safe. If everyone in the house wants cheesy garlic bread, then obviously just make more and put it on a baking sheet. :)

Enjoy!

I shared this recipe on Delicious Dish Tuesday.