How to clean your oven – in minutes!

Leave a Comment / At Home, Homemaking

How on earth do ovens get so dirty? I get that sometimes we spill or a dish might bubble over, but the door? Why does the door need to collect anything and everything that goes inside the oven?

I have tried SO MANY CLEANERS over the years trying to get my oven to look even remotely clean. I tried using the self cleaning option using the recommended method for our exact model. I tried the baking soda and vinegar method. I tried heavier duty cleaners that left me with a headache and a stinky house. No thanks!

I knew there had to be a better way out there so I did the hard work for you to make sure that this is the method that will work with astonishing results and none of the chemical headaches from harsher cleaners.

My Completely Honest Review of the 2019 Ultimate Homemaking Bundle

Leave a Comment / At Home, Faith, Family Life, Freebies and Deals, Product Reviews

Spring has sprung and with it our desire to whip our homes into shape after keeping them closed up all winter. Ultimate Bundles knows this and wants to help you make homemaking easier. Each spring they introduce a new Ultimate Homemaking Bundle and today is the day it is open for purchase!

This review is going to go over the nitty gritty of what the Ultimate Homemaking Bundle is and how it can help (or not help) you. I want this to be an honest review so I’ll be covering who this bundle is for, who shouldn’t buy it, my favorite products, and my final impressions.

10+ ways to build a strong family foundation

Leave a Comment / Family Life, Parenting

We sat down at the parent-teacher conference and expected to hear about our child’s progress since the last meeting. We are used to hearing that our child is helpful and kind, a good student, and a joy in class. What we didn’t expect to hear was how much the teacher loves hearing about all the family things we do. The teacher raved about our child explaining birthday traditions, visits from extended family, and chore systems.

What? That’s what it’s impressive about our family?

The teacher explained that many students these days don’t have such strong connections with their families. Everyone is so busy with their own schedules that time as a family unit gets ignored. And if they do get time together? It’s not really all that together. They exist in the same physical space but the connection aspect is missing.

Even a simple idea like choosing a birthday meal was foreign to some kids. These traditions that our family took for granted as normal life were creating bonds between us that will keep our relationships strong.

Now don’t think we have it all together. Heck, there are days I wonder if anyone likes anyone in this house! But then I step back and see one kid pat another on the back for doing a good job, or offer to help someone with a difficult task, and I realize that maybe we aren’t screwing everything up. My prayer is that the foundations we are laying down now with these intentional acts will continue to build on one another so our family can stick together in any storm that may come our way.

The Best Books for Mother's Day Gifts

4 Comments / Book Reviews, Lifestyle, Product Reviews

I vote for a new category in gifts for moms. Whether you need ideas to give your husband and kids, need ideas for your own mom, or want to get a gift for a special mom friend in your life, give a book.

Books have the opportunity to speak life into us. They open our eyes and ears to new ideas, perspectives, and people. We can discover new ways to approach a problem, hilarious stories, and how we aren’t not so alone in our experiences.

I vote we gift more books. Print books, eBooks, audiobooks, doesn’t matter. Toss them around like confetti and let them inspire the moms around you.

I’ve pulled together some of my favorite books for gifting to moms. These books cover a variety of topics but any of them could be perfect for a mom in your life. I wish I could wrap up a stack and gift them to all my favorite moms – but unfortunately I need to feed my family 😉

Pepperoni Pizza Twists {recipe}

2 Comments / At Home, Recipes

These Pepperoni Pizza Twists might be a kid-approved dinner, but parents will love how easy it is to customize to everyone’s tastes! Use homemade pizza dough or your favorite store bought brand in a pinch. Serve with warm pizza or marinara sauce and some veggies for a dinner everyone will love.

Update on 2019 Goals – March

Leave a Comment / At Home, Goal Setting, Lifestyle

Once again a month flew by. It didn’t help that we faced multiple winter storms that seemed to wipe days off the calendar as we watched them approach. And by we I mean both the collective “we” of the area and me – Micah does not watch the weather the way I do. I have some weird fascination with watching radar and knowing the forecast 🙈

But now we seem to be inching toward spring. Our snow mountains are shrinking and we can actually see [wet, muddy] grass showing up in random patches. I’ve even gone outside in short sleeves to get the mail and haven’t turned into a Katie-cicle! I’m ready for flowers, bike rides, and chalk drawings in outfits that don’t include heavy coats and frozen fingers.

Large Family Grocery Budget: How we feed our family of 7 for under $400/month

2 Comments / At Home, Meal Planning

The family grocery budget wasn’t really a conversation I ever had with my parents growing up. I remember cutting coupons with my mom and her envelope that she brought to the store. I remember treating grocery shopping like a treasure hunt for the items on the coupons. But the actual numbers? Those were never talked about.

Now that I’m a mom, my kids probably think I spend too much time talking about our grocery budget! I want them to understand that the food we costs money and that in order for our overall budget to work and allow me to stay at home with them, we need to pay attention to what we spend as a family on our groceries. I want them to leave our home knowing how to plan meals, make a grocery list, and budget appropriately.

But how do we get to the point of creating not only a meal plan and grocery list, but also a reasonable family grocery budget?

50+ Bible Verses to Pray Over Your Husband

21 Comments / Family Life, Faith, Freebies and Deals, Marriage

How do you pray for the people and relationships in your life? We pray over our marriage every night and we each pray for each other, but these are regular prayers with our own words. Nothing wrong with that at all, but do you ever pray using scripture?

I searched and searched and while there are hundreds, if not thousands of verses you can use as prayers, I wanted to pull out a manageable number. I started with about twenty verses but as I searched I came across more and more that really spoke to me and I knew I needed to expand my list. As I wrote each verse as a prayer I inserted Micah’s name and could feel the power these prayers can have. God’s Word is living and active – it’s no wonder I could sense the Spirit moving in me!