It's Almost School Time

In just two more weeks, we will be starting school again! Originally we were going to start in just one week but then we got the opportunity to take a vacation... so using our perk of homeschooling, we bumped school back a week.

I have just two weeks (one really since we will be on vacation for the second week) to get everything prepped and ready. I could just leave everything as it is (as I use a "open and go" curriculum...mostly) but I like all my ducks in a row for the whole year. So I need to sit down and finish writing up our lesson plans for the 36 weeks that we will be doing school.

Curious as to what we will be using for school this year? We are changing a few of our curriculum choices this year. Not because what we used last year was bad; I just wanted to try out a new curriculum that is more Bible based.

Here's what the boys are using this year.

Ransom - Kindergarten

Bible – Heart of Dakota

Math: Singapore Primary Mathematics 1A & 1B US Edition

Science: Heart of Dakota

History & Literature: Heart of Dakota

Phonics/Reading/Writing: Progressive Phonics Beginner and Intermediate Books

Logan - 1st Grade

Bible – Heart of Dakota

Math: Singapore Primary Mathematics 2A & 2B US Edition

Science: Heart of Dakota

History & Literature: Heart of Dakota

Phonics/Reading/Writing: Progressive Phonics Advanced Books and Heart of Dakota’s Emerging Readers

Those are our basic subjects. Other subjects such as art, health, P.E., and character building/manners I take more of an unschooling approach and just incorporate them into our lives as they fit in naturally. It will not always be this way. Eventually we will do a more structured curriculum for some of these subjects but for now the kids are in elementary and do not necessarily need curriculum for these subjects.


Wherever you see "Heart of Dakota" this is in reference to the core curriculum that we will be using. This core curriculum is an "open and go" curriculum meaning everything is pre-selected and planned for you. I choose to do some different curriculum pieces (like our phonics) and such but essentially Heart of Dakota is the bulk of our curriculum. As the boys are only one grade apart, they will be doing the same core but with their own grade level books for the subjects that need it such as math and language arts. For those interested, we are using Heart of Dakota’s Beyond Little Hearts for His Glory this year for my Kindergarten and 1^st grade boys.

Fluffy Mail

Fluffy Mail.

It's this wonderful term that we, cloth diaper mamas refer to when we are getting or expecting more cloth diapers in the mail. I actually never buy cloth diapers anymore. I bought my set when I was pregnant with Everly and I was done. Ok...I may have bought one or two new shells because I just "had" to have a gray diaper and a teal diaper...

Even though I do not buy diapers very often, we still seem to get our fair share of fluffy mail. I sometimes get diapers when I win a giveaway. Giveaways are totally worth it by the way! Check out my pinterest giveaway board to see how much I've won. (I like to keep track, what can I say) However, most of the time, I get fluffy mail because I am working with a sponsor for my other blog. I occasionally do giveaways and reviews on The Pistachio Project and since cloth diapers are very much a part of being crunchy, they are quite a frequent product that I get to test out.

I had received a package from Vitacost today. Just my standard monthly grocery stuff. (I buy most of our personal products and natural foods from Vitacost. If you've never tried Vitacost, you should! They are 30-75% cheaper than anywhere. They generally beat Amazon even! If you've never used Vitacost then you should check out this referral link, you'll get a free $10 for your purchase. No strings attached. If you bought a cheap enough product than you could pay absolutely nothing. It's worth giving it a try!)

 Back to the point of this post.... When Everly saw me open the Vitacost package, she asked, "Diapert?" (don't ask me why she's decided there's a "t" at the end but that's how she says diaper). "No girly, no diaper." She is apparently as excited about fluffy mail as I am. In fact, a month ago when I got some giveaway diapers, she confiscated the box and took ownership of her diapers.

Later this afternoon, I received another package. This one I had been expecting. I am working with a sponsor on my blog for a giveaway and she was sending me a diaper to review. Everly now knows that when I check the front door, it's for a package. "Ackage?" I grab the package and bring it inside. She follows me to the kitchen where I begin to open the package. "Diapert?" "Yes, Everly a new diaper."

I probably got to look at that diaper for a full 5 seconds before she demands it from me. "Daipert, Everly? Diapert, Everly."


Fine have your fluff, little girl.

A Wee Bit About Us

As this is a blog about my family, I figure it would be a good idea to include a bit of a biography about us.

Since I'm already using our first names on this blog, I think I will skip the last name...just to be on the safe side.

This is my family. I will admit, this is a rather old picture of us. It's almost a year old in fact!


Husband, Daddy, Pastor... this is the man I married 9 years ago and I have never regretted that decision. Justin is one of the best men I know...ok I'm biased, he IS the best man I know. He is the one who has been perfectly picked out for me. As he is my husband, he is naturally the father of our kids. Most people who first meet him, would never expect that he's married let alone has 4 kids. I'm not sure why that is... However, is a wonderful father. It's hilarious to hear the kids yell "Daddy" when they hear the front gate open. Justin is also a pastor. We are planting a church here in Seattle and it seems to be going well. It will be interesting to see how things go over the next few years.



Ah, me... What am I supposed to say? I'm a 29 year old mama who got married pretty young (20) had my first baby at 21 and proceeded to have more kids... 4 kids in only 6 years! I've always wanted to be a mom (particularly a stay-at-home mom) and I've been blessed to be able to be one. I'm also a crunchy mama which for those who do not know, means I'm natural, green, eco-friendly, non-toxic, hippie, granola... take your pick. This has been incorporated into a large part of who I am. Just like being a mom can greatly describe a person so does being crunchy (at least for me). I'm also a homeschooling mom. I was homeschooled form 4th - 12th grade and I am now doing the same for my kids. Hmmm that's a lot of mom descriptions... I think being a mom removes a lot of hobbies... lol. Ok maybe it doesn't removes them but being a mom definitely changes your priorities. I also blog (umm obviously) not just here on In Ordinary Moments but on another blog, The Pistachio Project which is a solely crunchy/green blog. Feel free to check it out but I warn you it's "extreme" at least it appears so to many people.

Logan is my 8 year old; my oldest. He is my headstrong, opinionated, bossy, extremely social first born (as many first born's tend to be). He seems to be taking after his dad in that he loves to play video games and is already an avid reader. He is the type of kid who can pick up and understand anything in just a matter of minutes. Seriously, teaching this kid school has been easy. He's already a grade ahead in most subjects! He must have gotten that intellect from his father, that is certain. I am bright in my own way but Justin and Logan have a sponge for a brain; they suck up knowledge and retain it like there's no tomorrow.

 Ransom is 7 years old (yes that's right, he's only 12.5 months younger than his brother). Almost as social as his brother but with a quieter side. He's the one that needs you to put time into his life. Not that any of my kids do not need that time but Ransom is the one who needs to have that quality time. Perhaps it has to do with being the second born and practically living in his brother's shadow, I don't know. I do know that it means he's the one who just wants to be around you or for you to look at what he's made.





Everly is 4 years old now. My first girl. Thank goodness too because I was starting to be greatly outnumbered! She is our adorable little girl that everyone seems to go gaga over. We had our moments of clinginess but she is starting to turn out just as social as her brothers and just as vocal (probably more so) as well.






Verity is our baby fourth born. Now 2 years old, this little girl is a perfect addition to our family. I don't know if it's because she's #4 or if we just got lucky, but she is by far my mellowest kid. She's almost always happy and easy going with the exception of a terrible two tantrum here and there.

How To Follow This Blog

I'm sure many of you are not super familiar with the blogging world, so I thought I'd give some pointers about how you can keep up to date with this blog.

There are three ways you can follow this blog.

1) Manually
You can occasionally remember to pop by and manually enter the website address every time you want to check out the blog. This does come with a down side of sometimes missing posts if you forget to check in for a while.

2) Via Email
You can subscribe via email. This will allow you to get emails every single time I make a new post. It will simply automatically be delivered to your email.

3) Via RSS
If you follow blogs already (and even if you don't), you can follow this blog via RSS. An RSS feed  simply collects all the new posts from all the blogs you read and stores them for you. I use Bloglovin' but there are others out there. (to get an idea of what my personal reader looks like, check out the photo to the right. As you can see, it has a list of the new posts that are up for me to read. On the left side, I also have all the blogs categorized by topic, what you cannot see is that I probably subscribe to over a hundred blogs...) This format is convenient if you like to follow other blogs as it will keep all the new and unread blog posts in one spot, so you can read them all on one page (as oppose to clicking on each and every blog)







To subscribe via #2 or #3 all you need to do is click the "Subscribe" button on the right side bar.
This will take you to a page that looks like this:

If you want to follow via email just click on the text that says "Get In Ordinary Moments delivered by email" this will take you to a screen where you can enter your email address and you'll be go to go.

If you want to follow via RSS then simply click on one of the buttons that are located under the "...with web-based news readers" text. If you do not see your RSS reader of choice simply click the drop down menu that is located right below.

So there you have it. You now know the different ways you can follow this blog. I hope this helped!

I'm Finally Doing It

I am finally doing it. I am finally starting a family blog. It's not that I want to blog more... I think I get enough of my blogging desires out on my other blog, The Pistachio Project. However, I have friends and family who live far away or are just not on Facebook so I've decided a great way to keep everyone in the loop (even a bit more thoroughly than Facebook) would be to start a family blog.

I don't think there will be any real rhyme or reason to my posts. I'm sure their will be pictures, quotes, milestones and that sort of thing. I do also want to maybe do a few posts that will take a look into why we do some of the things we do. As I assume anyone who is reading this knows, we are a crunchy family and on top of that we are also a Christian family. Both of those distinctions means that we practice some things that many find are out of the ordinary. Instead of keeping everyone in the dark about the what's and why's, I think it might be best if I include some explanation posts every now and then...but you can tell me what you think about that idea...

Let the family blogging madness begin. Be prepared to get overloaded with info and photos of my family.