Eco-Friendly Gift Giving

Lately I have been very conscientious about how much waste goes out into the environment. Although supermarkets and other stores are finally getting the message and not supplying so many plastic bags, people are still not getting the whole fact that they are the ones causing the problem, not the stores who are just going on the whole supply and demand thing.

There are so many little things we do in everyday life that contribute to the downfall of this planet. While going through the supermarket check out about a week ago, I had a conversation with the girl behind the counter. I was purchasing an extra carry bag with a cute picture on the outside. She asked if I would like to use it along with the rest. "No, I am going to use it as a gift bag", I said. "Oh, its cute" she replied. "But, I prefer to wrap things nicely. I always keep the paper when I receive a gift and recycle it in my craft work. It really irks me when people just tear open the wrapping".

Now while I sympathised with the poor girl, I could not help myself and had to ask " So how many trees do you think have to die for people to wrap presents?" The poor kid looked mortified! But she thought about it all right to the extent that she looked a little ashamed. "Why don't they teach us that in school?" she said. Hmmm, well, Im sure they do teach kids where paper comes from, surely? Around here, all it took was me walking past a big row of boxes and boxes of xmas wrap and casually saying "I wonder how many trees had to die to make this paper?" Dinoboy immediately frowned and replied "A lot mum". We then went on as a group discussion and it was decided that we would not be buying any this year!

It only takes a comment here and there for kids to work out things for themselves. And of course leading by example. If they see you doing the right things by the environment, they will follow. There are so many "little" things that you can do, that in the long run make a VERY BIG difference. So what can you do to help?

Firstly ask yourself before placing things in the garbage, "Can this be re-used?" A lot of what we throw out can. eg. glass jars, plastic jars or containers, pieces of string or ties (those ones that they seem to think all toys need a million of, these are great for use in the garden). Try to buy products that have the least amount of packaging or even better, none!

In the gift department, here are just a few.........

* Don't wrap gifts at all.
* If you must, how about a gift bag? If you do not write in the tags they can be re-used
* Or buy an eco bag and put the gift in it. (If its a childs gift there are heaps of cute ones available now and the kids can use the bags for outings, sleepovers etc.
* For adults....wrap in teatowels or fabric for crafty people.

Any ideas?????

Remember, every little thing we do helps! Make our planet a better place for our children!

Hey Alta

I am bestowing upon you, an award and since I can get in here thought I'd deliver it myself! LOL! Enjoy!

"This blog invests and believes in ‘proximity’ [meaning that blogging makes us 'close' - being close through proxy].”

Friends are Forever!

Love, hugs and smoochies Karisma xxxx

Snake in the Napkins

Ok - not really. There really isn't a snake in the napkins. I used that to get you interested and so that I wouldn't forget what I wanted to talk about. Pretty smart of me! LOL

Snake - It was AWESOME! Camera? Oh yeah - it was in the house. I have heard a lot about teachable moments. Well today was a teachable moment. I don't even remember what I was doing outside. I walked by our garden and I just happened to see a snake. Of course I called the boys over and we admired it's beauty. I was amazed at myself for remembering the name of it. Oh yes - it was my time to shine! Once we oohhed and aawwed until the snake was tired of us entertaining him, he decided to crawl out of the garden and into the flower bed. I immediately came inside and googled our snake. You are gonna love what I found...

Masticophis flagellum better known as the Eastern Coachwhip and here is another awesome website Coachwhip

I read that the coachwhip snake is very slender bodied and extremely fast. I saw it first hand today. What was the most unique to me was half of it was black and the other half was a light brown color. Interesting indeed!

What a teachable moment!

Oh yeah!!! I almost forgot! Napkins
With times the way they are and money kinda tight, we have been cutting back on lots of things. One of those things that I ranted about the other day was the use waste of paper napkins. Use it once and throw it away. Not anymore at our house. I announced to everyone at supper that there would not be anymore paper napkins bought. We will now make our own napkins and not waste another penny on something we are only going to throw away.
In my mind I had this idea about how to make our cloth napkins. I thought hmmm...if I can google a snake, why not google a napkin. So I did and this is what I found.

Molly's Handmade Napkins and Rebecca Writes Cloth Napkins
I really think that you will love the handmade clothe napkins on both of those sites. I know I sure will be doing some sewing in the next couple of days. I have some scrap material stowed away just for such projects.

Peace Within

What has happened to me? Where is this coming from? I don't know the answer to the questions and I don't want to know the answer. All I know is that I have a peace within. It's awesome. After just about driving myself nuts, I have finally figured out that the best thing for me to do is to lighten up. Yeah!

I'm really just updated and catching you all up to let you all know that I'm still around and we are still home schooling and we love it.

Money and more

$700 Billion - How in the world can someone or something get that far in debt? How can it possibly cost that much to clear up a mess? Shoot, when we spill a glass of milk it only cost a few cents. Ok - maybe a whole dollar now that the price of milk has gone up. I just really have a problem with this whole economy thing. Isn't it all just ridiculous!

Me and the boys save some money today. We turned off the air condition and opened up all the windows. Oh it was a beautiful day today. We are starting to feel fall in the air and it is a joy to have it. I'm either getting older or wiser...LOL...maybe both. I am noticing things that I knew about before but I didn't really notice them. Now not only do I know about them but I notice them. It's pretty awesome.

The boys have grown so much! Not only have they grown taller but they have really matured mentally. Some of the problems that we had before are a thing of the past.

School is going really well this year. I am so proud of all of our accomplishments. I'm gonna scoot outta here for now. Everyone is asleep but me and I want to do a little reading.

Home School Videos

I just discovered a great place to see some other homeschoolers doing what they do best. Yeppers - homeschooling! I am glad that other homeschoolers are showing off. With these home school videos, now I know our family is normal. LOL Go check it out!
Home School View Tube

Should I Quit

All of you know that I haven't been posting here like I should. I am just doing other things and don't want to spend so much time talking about what I want to do or what I've been doing or even what I'm gonna do...
I just want to go and do it. That's what has me thinking that maybe I should just quit. I mean quit blogging. No - not forever - just for a little while. Haha...that's pretty much what I've done. Well to some extent anyway.

Here lately I've been...
outside more
enjoying home school
raising a baby squirrel
doing more with freecycle
planning and planting a winter garden
enjoying our 3 boys

Working Outside

For the past 2 days I have found myself working outside. I love it! I have somehow changed in so many ways but all the same I haven't changed at all. One of the many ways that I have changed is that I have quit smoking. I'm not kiddin! In March of this year I gave up the nicotine. I am so thankful that I quit smoking.

Today we had lunch at church. We call it "Dinner on the grounds". We have dinner on the grounds every 5th Sunday. There sure are some delicious pots of food there! I am looking for 2 recipes this week, so if anyone has these delicious recipes tucked away somewhere, please share. The recipes are Buttermilk Salad and Pea Pickin Cake.

4 Rules of Fractions

4 Rules of Fractions

From: sbishop2, 10 months ago

4 Rules of Fractions

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: fractions mathematics)

The four rules - adding, subtracting, division and multiplication - with fractions


SlideShare Link

We Survived

My goodness...It sure does seem like I get started here and something happens and I end up a good ways behind. Who knows why?! Yes, we survived the storm. Oh gosh, schools were closed, businesses were closed and on and on. Rain! That's what we got. I am so thankful that we got lots and lots of rain from the hurricane.

Now I'm off to never-never land to loose myself again. I'll surface again soon and tell you something exciting.

Squirrel - he is doing wonderful! His eyes are open and he is eating (lots) and he is just wonderful. We decided not to call him Freedom II. He is officially Houdini.

Storms a comin

It's that time of year. It's been that time of year for a couple of months. Hurricane season! We live inland so we don't run around boarding up the windows and hunting higher ground. Our biggest concern is tornado's that spawn from hurricanes. We generally loose power for a couple of days and get lots of rain. I will say that we sometimes get some pretty high winds. Hmmm...that sounds like we get the hurricane. I guess we do. We generally keep our yard and barn area tidy but when a storms a comin we make sure that things are tied down. Anything that can fly around in high winds gets tied down. So much damage is caused from things that get thrown around in the wind of a storm.

This morning the boys woke me up for church with a surprise. The surprise...another baby squirrel. He was so cold when the boys first gave him to me. I was concerned that he wouldn't warm up, but he did. His eyes are closed, but if you look real close you can see a little bit of his right eye trying to open. By Wednesday or Thursday his eyes should be open. I'm having a difficult time getting him to eat (not really eat but drink his milk). Superman reminded me that it took a couple of tries on Freedom (our first baby squirrel) before he was really active at meal time. You can look back to a year ago and see our first little squirrel. I think we'll name this one Freedom II.

Getting Outside

Yesterday and today I found myself outside. I did - Really!

There have been a lot of changes in my life. We have met our first anniversary with the boys. Can you believe it has already been a year. From no kids to 3 kids all at once was certainly a different world than what we were used to. Our world turned upside down! We wouldn't change it for the world. We love the boys as if they were our own. Ha - they are our own and they have been for over a year now.

Since I quit smoking (almost 5 months now) I haven't been at the computer as much. And for some reason, I don't even know what I've been doing. LOL It's ok though because life is good and getting better. Yes, you are gonna get to hear all about it. I know, I have catching up to do and lots of pictures to show. I'll get to it!

Is This Too Much

I was just wonderin if this template is too much. I really kinda like it but I think I need to play around with it a little and get it just the way I like it. I know I have to be careful and not zap it all. LOL

Today was a wonderful day! I just love the water and the sun!

Messed Up

I have cleaned way too much house and messed up! I am almost sick about it. Somehow I feel like I have thrown the baby out with the dish water. I'll fix it - I know I will. Yeah - just look at the page. It's horrible and dull and ugly and...messed up.

Cleaning House

Over the next few days or weeks or however long it takes me, I am cleaning house. I don't mean here at home (even though I need to). I mean I will be cleaning my blog. Karisma has pointed something out to me that I should have realized a long time ago. Thank you Karisma for stepping on my toes...LOL!

You Want Me to Pay What?

Yeah - you read it right...You want me to pay what - as in how much? Do you feel sometimes like you are just paying for nothing? I feel that way lots of times. If you do the math and figure things out, you will come to realize that yesterday was my birthday. I know...I really am old as dirt. But it's ok - I feel better. Ha Ha!!!

I had no plans on celebrating my birthday in any certain way. As a matter of fact...I just wanted it to be quiet and peaceful. Now that I look back on it, I guess it wasn't as bad as it could have been.

I had a doctor appointment for my wrist. I dropped the boys off at one of our church members houses for a little project they had planned. Hugs and kisses bye and I'll see you in about 2 hours. 2 hours - yeah right. It was more like 4 hours.

My doctor appointment was pretty much like I thought - just a small co-pay and a very painful shot. Then off to some other place to get a brace made. I am not kidding when I tell you that when they told me the price that I would have to pay, that I got very sick to my stomach. The bad part - I couldn't even go outside and smoke! The good part - I don't smoke! Over 4 months now! The brace, $280 with my insurance. I called Superman and told him and he talked me into not throwing up. I didn't have the brace made because that price is ridiculous. I was thinking that I had some Popsicle sticks at home that I could mix with a little bit of tape and come up with a brace.

So if you can imagine me sitting here telling you this with Popsicle sticks and tape covering my right wrist. When someone sees it they just ask what happened and I smile when I tell them that one of our science projects failed.

Looking Back

Yesterday as I was enjoying the company of Granny Karen, she very casually pointed out to me that maybe just maybe I need to look back. Looking back is what I have been doing since she mentioned that to me. We have certainly come a long, long way. It seems as though every day brings a new challenge for me. I think that is because of what I have started doing. I'm not gonna break all out and start bible thumping on ya (not today anyway) but I am seeking God.

Are ya freaked out?! LOL I really am seeking God. Some people think omyshehaslosthermind.

Ok - so I have lost my mind. Not really, I am just walking a different path in my life.

I do have lots and lots of thoughts going on in my head and lots of things that I need to sort out. Don't give up on me, I'm here behind the monitor just sortin things out til the time is right for me to just bust on outta here.