107 Books to Read Before Age 7 (FREE Printable List!)

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107 Books to Read Before Age 7 (FREE Printable List!)

Wow! Have you looked lately for books for your little ones and been completely overwhelmed? There are SO many- and how can we know they are good books that are of high literary quality and don't counter with our beliefs and family culture until we've bought them? My sweet friend Hayley and I wanted to combine forces and share a powerful list of 107 books that we feel like every child should have read to them (or read) before age 7.

Many lists like this include a majority of chapter books or books for children with longer attention span. We have many of those, but rest assured that this collection also includes shorter picture books with gorgeous, engaging illustrations and fewer words per page.

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28 Ways to Keep Your Toddler Busy {FREE Printable List!}

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28 Ways to Keep Your Toddler Busy {FREE Printable List!}

Our littles ones can stay soooooo busy... right underfoot... all day long. Or even worse, when they disappear for a moment and get super quiet! Oh no! Rarely does that end up a good thing (sharpie vs the wall, anyone?) 

Through parenting four kiddos, I've found that the best way to keep a toddler busy without pulling your hair out is to integrate them INTO your day. Sometimes, we tend to default to building our day, our schedule, our home environment around the child. This bring everything down to their level. Sometimes, it has the unintended consequence of bringing US (and our behavior) down to their level too. EEEK! 

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How to Cultivate the HABIT of JOY

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How to Cultivate the HABIT of JOY

We make THOUSANDS of small decisions daily, my friend. 

  • Should I get out of bed?
  • Should I work? 
  • Should I cook breakfast?
  • Should I shower?
  • Should I drive safely?
  • Should I respond to this text?
  • How should I respond to my husband?
  • When should I respond to my whining child? 

Opportunities to decide come relentlessly. We make so many in a day that we develop habits to overcome the overwhelm of the constant thinking required for all of these decisions. We don't think through EVERY single decision. At some point, we made a decision in the past, and it went well, so we settled into following those ruts so that we no longer have the stress of having to make that decision every single time. Our habits help us cope with the magnitude of the everyday. 

Basically, we set our lives on auto-pilot, and we do this despite the fact that our habits (pre-decided decisions) change our lives.

Our habits don't just CHANGE our lives; they ARE our lives.

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Confession: I Am NOT an Encouraging Mom

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Confession: I Am NOT an Encouraging Mom

I've recently admitted that I yell at my children... and it's all because I'm lazy. I'm confident I'm not alone in that, and so far the internet hounds have not come baying at my door. So, just to be fully transparent, I thought I'd also confess that I'm also not an encouraging mom like I once thought myself to be. And this realization has hit my like a ton of bricks.

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The Secret Hidden Inside Contentment

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The Secret Hidden Inside Contentment

Joy, joy, joy- count it all joy. Choose joy. Joy has become a chant of the faithful as the ultimate side-effect of living a Christian life. John Piper refers to it as Christian hedonism in his book, Desiring God. 

But what IS this pursuit of joy? How do we tackle it in the rough seasons- the desperate seasons- the I AM DONE seasons? How do we even get started pursuing it? For Pete's sake- where is the joy!?! 

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I Yell Because I Am Lazy

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I Yell Because I Am Lazy

How many times do I become sinfully angry with a child because they need my hands-on redirection, and I don't want to walk across the room? How many times do I raise my voice when I should have just raised my bottom off the seat I was in? How often have I lost my patience when I simply didn't want to be bothered from the comfort of whatever I was doing at the time? 

Let's get really honest. What are some of my greatest failings as a wife and mother? 

  • I am quick to anger. 
  • I yell in my anger. 
  • I am impatient. 
  • I want things to go the way I wanted or expected them to. 

What are some traps I commonly find myself snared in? 

And so what do these sins and these traps have in common: laziness. Put another way: I often lack the self-discipline to do what I ought to do rather than what I feel like doing. 

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Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Math-U-See {Even through High School!}

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Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Math-U-See {Even through High School!}

I’m so excited to share this review with you! This is the ONE curriculum that I have never once been tempted to stop using! I tend to get my head turned by shiny, new homeschool curriculum. It’s so much fun to try new things, and there are always new products coming out that I can’t wait to check out. But not when it comes to math.

When I first started homeschooling, one of my mentors gave me some great advice. I was sharing with her how I worried that I wouldn’t be able to give my kids a strong math education because I had struggled so much with math in school. Her advice was to find a program that had a good reputation, that suited my teaching style, and that my kids didn’t hate, and then stick with it all the way through. Her reasoning was that the best way to avoid gaps in math knowledge is to use one program from beginning to end...

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How to Homeschool Preschool {with no regrets!}

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How to Homeschool Preschool {with no regrets!}

There's nothing as delightful (and challenging!) as educating our little ones at home. Some of us homeschool preschool and intend to be "long haul" homeschoolers. Others may plan to send their child to school later, but want to make the most of their days with their sweet babes. As a Mama of 4 with 2 toddlers underfoot, I've had some experience in preschool and "toddler school". I've made many mistakes, but I've also learned some valuable lessons that help me approach educating my two little ones with a "no regrets" mentality.

Here are 5 tips to approach those early years that you won't regret!

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The REAL Reason Behind Your Homeschool Slump

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The REAL Reason Behind Your Homeschool Slump

It's  January... which means we are all on a downhill slide. The busyness and craziness and fun of Christmas has all been quieted, and we are left to our own devices (often trapped inside from the frigid temps). If you're like me, this anticlimactic time following the depths of winter as we roll past the New Year can usher in boredom, exhaustion, and cabin fever. We oftentimes enter what's now commonly referred to as a "slump" in our homeschool year.

But why? Is it fully triggered by gloomy weather and post-holiday blues? I suspect there's something else lurking beneath this battle almost every homeschool Mama faces each year...

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What happened when I stopped being "on fire" for God...

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What happened when I stopped being "on fire" for God...

I came to slowly know Christ just over a decade ago. He came to me in the darkest period in my marriage and let me know that despite having failed in every way imaginable, that I was still loved. He humbled me and brought me into his fold where I have safely and confidently resided ever since. Since my marriage to Christ, we've been in a sweet honeymoon period- for literally a decade. Jesus saved me from myself and let me know I was loved without fail when I was absolutely unlovable. He changed my heart, my mind, my priorities, my perspective, my marriage, my parenting- literally almost every ounce of me has been made new in Christ (except my potty-mouth, but he's still working).

I have passionately loved him for it and pursued him with fervor- most of the time. Some of the time, I have not. Some of the time, I am overly confident that I can handle things on my own. Some of the time, I feel like everything is going fine, and I don't need him quite as much. Some of the time, I forget just how sinful I truly am.

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