TOS Review: Almanzo Wilder: Life Before Laura

As a child, I grew up reading Little House on the Prairie books and watching the TV shows. I loved it! I remember waiting for the show to come on TV everyday.

When I heard about an upcoming review about Almanzo and Laura from Legacy Documentaries, you can imagine how I felt. My bugs have all become fans of these books and shows, so when we had the opportunity to review one of two DVDs , we were ecstatic!!! We chose Almanzo Wilder: Life Before Laura.

Dean Butler is actually the executive producer, the actor who played Almanzo Wilder on the TV show. It tells the story of Farm Boy, one of the books in the Laura Ingalls Wilder series.

This documentary takes you back in time to Almanzo's childhood about his life in New York.

Almanzo Wilder was born in 1857 when America was in the Great Depression. He was raised to be a hard worker and was taught to do everything himself, not to depend or rely on anyone else. I really like how it focused on hard work and discipline. It also showed how much respect he had for his parents. These are traits that I think every parent wants to instill in their child/children. My husband and I work very hard everyday to instill these traits into our children.

This documentary touched on so many different topics. From how food was prepared back then, from whole foods not processed like today to Morgan horses.

We thoroughly enjoyed this documentary. We, as a family, watch many episodes of Little House on the Prairie that we have purchased on DVD. We also have the entire Laura Ingalls Wilder book series and in the near future, plan to do a Unit Study on the series. This DVD will just add more information and enjoyment to our DVD library and school studies.

Almanzo Wilder: Life Before Laura DVD sells for $21.95. It is 53 minutes long and is appropriate for all ages.

Go see what other crew members had to say about these awesome DVDs.

Circle Time Review!!!

As a Schoolhouse Review Crew member, I had the opportunity to review Circle Time: Plan the Best Part of Your Homeschool Day, from Preschoolers and Peace.

This ebook I received is 33 pages and has so much insight, tips and ideas from other moms that have used it. Kendra, the author, discusses strageties for accomplishing things you want to get done during this time.

Introduction

Planning a Circle Time That Works for You

How to Get Your Kids on Board

Questions From Moms Like You

Words of Wisdom from other Moms who do Circle Time

Resources, Activities and Ideas

Printable Planner Sheets

This is a great book! Once I finished reading it, I was truly excited. It helped me with more ideas and how I could really improve our upcoming school year in a couple of weeks. We are almost ready to start our new year, so I was happy to have time to try this out. Well, I think it is something we will really enjoy and I am really excited to see how this will work for us. So far so good. I have to say I think since we started with this, it has become everyone's favorite part of the day.

One of the topics was having the older children teach and help out with certain topics. That gave me an idea. Since I will be giving birth to our sixth bug in about four weeks, I thought this would be perfect for the older two bugs. I am still trying to decide what I want them to be in charge of . I am sure with the help of this book, we can come up with something.

I really enjoyed this sweet, short read. This is a great resource for anyone with littles or just needs a little help.

This ebook sells for $4.99.

If you would like to see what other families are saying about Circle Time, head on over to the TOS Crew.

Couponing Made Simple.....Molly Crew Review

Are you one that wants to use coupons but really don't know how? I have the solution, Couponing Made Simple by Christi the Coupon Coach. The Molly Crew had the opportunity to review this product. Her books sells for $18.00 or $4.99 for the ebook.

Christi is a homeschooling mom of 4 and has been couponing for years. Her book teaches you how to use BOGO coupons (Buy One Get One Free), and how to "stack". This is what she calls successful couponing.

In her book, she shares a step-by-step process:

1. Buy Newspapers

2. Sort Newspapers

3. Find the Deals

4. Make Coupon Matches

5. Organize for Coupon Run

6. Shop and Save

7. Wrap Up at Home

8. Celebrate & Share

Here are the contents in her book:

1. Success Stories

2. A New Way to Shop

3. The Language of Couponing

4. Organization System

5. Step-by-Step Process

6. Tips & Tools

7. Couponing Ethics

8. Networking & Communicating

9. Bonus Section

10. Beyond Couponing

When the book arrived, I thought I would be overwhelmed by it but when I started reading it, I really enjoyed learning about the process which made it very simple to understand. She has so many ways of using coupons.

How it worked for me:

We live in a small town and the one newspaper that is available to buy has no coupons in it, not even on Sunday! So, I went online and found various websites where I could print coupons. After that, I went around town collecting all of the sales papers. When we put our minds and energy into this, we save anywhere from around $8 - $10 each shopping trip. That's not much compared to Christi but I am hoping to learn more and more each time and one day walk out saving 68%  or more like Christi.

My final thoughts:

If you want to learn how to coupon and don't have the time to figure it all out on your own, you may want to look into purchasing Chrisit's book. She has done all of the work for you! I am looking forward to learning more and more from her. I just scratched the surface!

I really like the best and last deal she says we will ever find. The deal of the universe----- SALVATION IN JESUS CHRIST!!!

Check out what other crew members had to say about Christi the Coupon Coach.

Couple of recipes

Here are two yummy recipes! I have no pictures because my computer and photos will not cooperate!

The first one is one of my favorites during the summer. I always make this one when my tomatoes start coming in and ripening on the vine.

The second one is also a summer recipe. It calls for yellow summer squash.


Try these, I promise you will not be disappointed!

Tomato-Leek Pie

1 pie crust

2 red tomatoes

2 yellow tomatoes

1 green tomatoes

1 leek

2 tablespoons of butter

1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese

1/2 cup mayonaise

1 egg

Salt and Pepper

Bake pie crust at 450° until golden brown. Slice tomatoes, place on paper towels, sprinkle with salt and let sit for 20 minutes. Slice the leek and saute in butter. Layer leek on bottom of crust. Top with tomatoes. Mix mayo, egg, cheese, salt and pepper. Spread on top and bake at 375° for 30 minutes.

Yellow Squash Pie

1 cup evaporated milk

2 eggs

1/2 cup honey or 3/4 cup sugar

1 teaspoon cinnamon

2 cups cooked squash

1 unbaked pie crust

Cube and cook squash. Cool. In blender, blend milk, eggs, cinnamon and honey. Add the cooked squash and blend together in blender about 2-3 minutes. Pour into unbaked pie crust and bake on 400° for 10 minutes, then 350° for 35-40 minutes or until set. Set.

Moving Beyond the Page - Tornado and Amazing Weather - Schoolhouse Review

We received a Language Arts Study and a Science Study from Moving Beyond the Page. It is a literature-based curriculum. This curriculum works well for children that are hands-on learners. They sell complete curriculum and also individual units so you can pick and choose what studies you want to do.

We chose the Language Arts Unit Tornado and the Science Unit Amazing Weather. They can be used separately but are designed to be used together. These units are designed for ages 7-9 and include everything you need for a full study.

We received the physical book for Tornado. The set included the book, Tornado, How the Turtle Got It's Shell and the teachers guide.

The teachers guide is a spiral bound book with lesson plans and student worksheets for you children to work through as they read through the story. There are daily activities listed that you will do for that days lesson.

We received the online access for Amazing Weather. This unit includes the teacher guide (online), On The Same Day in March  
book and Weather and Climate - Geography Facts and Experiments book and a boiling point thermometer. For the student worksheets with the study, I would go online and print the pdf pages for each lesson. With the online access, you can print as much or as little of the pages as needed.

The printable online units seem like the more cost-effective way to go if you are wanting to use this curriculum with multiple students.

The physical unit for Tornado is $24.97 and there is also an online unit available.

The online unit for Amazing Weather is $29.91 and there is also a physical unit available.

Our Final Thoughts

We really enjoyed both of these units. They are really exciting. The teacher's guides are well laid out and easy to follow. All of the  bugs participated in these studies as much as they could. The were always excited to hear what would happen next in the Tornado book. I can see us using Moving Beyond the Page more often. I will be using the online version for our family for everything, that way, everyone can enjoy doing the worksheets. I highly recommendced this curriulum, especially for those who want full inclusive science, language arts or social studies.

Go see what other crew members has to say about Moving Beyond the Page.

Baker Publishing Group~~~Lily Lapp Books (Schoolhouse Review Crew)

If you and your family are looking for some wholesome, fun reading, then look no further! Life with Lily and A New Home for Lily, published through the Baker Publishing Group are just what you are looking for.

Members of the Schoolhouse Review Crew were asked to review these two wonderful books, the first two books in a series,  about a little girl growing up Old Order Amish.

We really enjoy reading Amish fiction books. Every two weeks we go to a Mennonite farm to buy raw cow's milk and raw cream. Although the Amish and Mennonite are different in ways, they also have some similarities. We have really enjoyed making friends with this Mennonite family. They are very genuine and plain people.

The first book, Life with Lily, she lives in upstate New York on an Amish farm and has many adventures along the way, including a new baby brother and starting school. There is always an adventure waiting to happen for Lily, plenty to do and people to love.

In the second book, A New Home for Lily, she moves to Pennsylvania, which means having to adjust to a new school, new friends and a new Amish community. She also meets the most annoying boy in the world, Aaron Yoder! Along this journey some things are good like exploring an attic full of adventure!

One of the authors of these books, Mary Ann Kinsinger was raised Old Order Amish. She started a blog, http://www.ajoyfulchaos.blogspot.com/, after she and her husband decided to leave the Amish church. Here she shares her journey from a happy little Amish girl to where she is today.

My oldest bug read these two books for this review and really enjoyed them. She would talk to me each and every night about what she had read that day. When I asked her how much she liked or disliked these books, she said, "Mom, I only have one word to describe them, AMAZING!"

The books are available, paperback or ebook form for only $12.99 each. They are very high quality books.

The ages are 8-12, according to the publisher but in our opinion, these would be great for all ages. These books would make a great family read-aloud. We highly recommend these two books.

There are two more books in The Adventures of Lily Lapp series coming. A Big Year for Lily and A Surprise for Lily.

Go see what other crew members had to say about these awesome books.

potatoes.......

Everyone harvesting the potatoes this past Saturday morning. We didn't have quite the crop we were wanting but it is always a blessing to have any!

Dad on tractor!

Almost everyone pitching in!

Big Boy taking a break from the heat!

Little Bug taking a break with Mom and Red Bug!

Well, here are the potatoes we have been waiting for. Not many, but we will be thankful and enjoy!

God Bless!