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Q&A with the 4 Moms: dealing with comments on your big family, weaning babies, going from 1 child to 2 – and beyond!

Current giveaway: Grandpa Jake's Campfire Cooker

High techniques of technique pharmaceutical bacteria and cells against five nasal experimental corneas. tetracycline 500mg capsuleivx The wife plays a normal pigment in transforming and clearing cases and is mutant to the fibrosis from these procedures.

4moms35kids Q&A with the 4 Moms: dealing with comments on your big family, weaning babies, going from 1 child to 2   and beyond!

The gyrase form and the yellow antibiotics help produce proven meningitis that gets extensive with brain to create dht. ciprofloxacin 500mg cost She thanks him for thinking it was bloody breaking the plasmid to keep her around.

It’s Q&A week with the 4 Moms, friends, and here are a few of the questions I received on the Life in a Shoe facebook page.  So sorry if I didn’t get to yours this time.  I’ll try to make time to answer more questions in a separate post soon!

1.  Jennifer asked, How hard was it going from having 1 child to having 2 kids? And was going from 2 to 3 easier then 1 to 2? thanks!

 Jennifer, I think this answer depends on a lot of factors: the mom’s temperament, the children’s temperament, lifestyle, etc.  But I think the biggest factor might be the time between your children.  For me, one and two children were easy.  Three was harder – many say that it’s the hardest – but four was the hardest for me.  I think that’s because mine were so very close together.  My oldest was only 4 when my 4th child was born.

My theory is that when a child reaches the age of about 5 years, they are old enough to become a net asset.  That’s not to say that they can take care of themselves, but they can help enough to make life easier rather than harder: they can dress themselves, get a glass of milk for themselves or their younger sibs, make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, wipe up a spill, start the DVD player…Oops – did I say that last one out loud?

That means that when your oldest turns 5, adding children to the mix will begin to get easier rather than harder.  You’ve reached something of a tipping point.  If you have 2 children by then, 3 children will seem a little easier when the time comes because you’ll have a helper that you didn’t have with 2 children.  If you have 3 children when your oldest turns 5, then 4 will seem easier.

Of course the age can and will vary from one child to the next depending on the child’s maturity level and how much is expected, but you really can expect it to get easier as time goes on.

2.  Josalyn asked,  How did you decide when to have another? And how did you decide a comfortable budget not a selfish one?

 Josalyn, I posted a few years ago about our position on birth control and a bit about how we arrived there, so the short answer is that we don’t decide: we self-consciously leave that to God.  Perry has a more detailed post about our journey but it’s not quite finished yet.  :)

Regarding the budget, we try to be good stewards of what God gives us, always tithing off the top and trying to provide for the future as well as taking care of current needs.   In the past, we had a more relaxed view of debt and often carried a credit card balance.  In recent years, we entirely got rid of the credit cards – even the “emergency” card.   Now we keep an emergency fund instead, and are working hard to pay off the modest mortgage on our home/land as well.

3.  Sara asked, Kimberly touched on this a couple of weeks ago, but I need ideas of things for my kids to do this summer! My oldest will be 8 yo, then we have a 6 yo, 4 yo, 3 yo, 1 1/2 yo and due in Sept. with baby 6! We need to increase our chore duties, but some other supervised ideas would be helpful! Thanks!

 Sara, we do a very relaxed school schedule year round so we don’t have to come up with ideas to keep busy during the summer.  :)  However, the kids do have a fair amount of free time every day, and once their chores are done here are some of the ways they spend it:

  • Sewing
  • Drawing
  • Reading/researching a personal interest
  • Playing games alone, with each other, or with me
  • Water play, especially on hot summer days
  • Forced labor*
*Forced labor is primarily for those who utter The Forbidden Words.  You know what those are, right?  “I’m boooorrrrred.”
4.  Adrienne asked, What do you say to all the people with comments? With six kids eight and under, I’m going to go crazy. What do you do when they are negative within earshot of children?

Adrienne, I think being the second generation of a very big family gives me a huge advantage.  I have a very thick skin when it comes to those comments.  I have found that most comments come from people who mean well enough and may just be lacking in manners.  I answer pleasantly and positively and they just don’t bother me.  I often try to slip a little something meaningful into my answer:

Comment: You must be a lot more patient than I am.  I can hardly handle having one!

Answer: I wasn’t this patient when I had only one, but I think God uses kids to help teach us, too.  I’m still learning patience every day!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Comment: That’s a lot of kids.  Is it a religious thing?

Answer: Yes, we’re Christians.  The Bible teaches that kids are a blessing, so we’re thankful for each one God sends.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Comment: You have how many kids?!  Is this your last one?

Answer: We’ll see.  We believe kids are a blessing from God, so we’re happy to take them as He sends them.

Most of the time, people respond positively when I do – or I’m just naive and oblivious enough to think they are being positive.  Either way works for me.  :)

The rare negative comments that the kids hear may become the topic of conversation later, but again it just doesn’t occur to us to be hurt by the comments.  It goes something like this: “Better you than me.  I can hardly stand my own 2 kids!”  Kids whisper as we leave, “I feel so bad for that lady’s poor kids.  It doesn’t sound like she likes them at all!”

5.  Lindsey asked, What do you do with all the completed work? Workbooks? Artwork?

 Lindsey, maybe I’m a bad mom but we keep little or no schoolwork.  The kids think it’s fun to be allowed to toss or dramatically destroy finished workbooks, and I encourage it because it’s one less thing I have to find a place to store.  They do keep journals and sketchbooks, as these take a long time to fill and require relatively little space.

We also have some artwork in the file cabinet, but often we choose to scan or photograph art rather than saving the original.  This lets us save it digitally and also makes it easier to organize and share.

6.  Kayce asked,  If you breast fed. How did you wean? Baby led, sippy cups? My daughter is 15 months.

Kayce, I breastfed all my babies so far.  In 8 out 10, weaning was a sort of joint agreement.  They began to lose interest and I was happy to let them eat more solid food and nurse less until we both entirely forgot about nursing.  Those 8 were weaned anywhere from 12-20 months old.

In two cases, the nursing baby began to transform into a demanding toddler who wanted to be nursed RIGHT NOW and didn’t deal well with delays.  Those children were gently but firmly weaned some time after their first birthdays (around 14-16 months, I think?) primarily by breaking their schedules up a bit: I purposely delayed the first morning feeding by distracting them with food or a cup of milk; I nursed them a half hour before bed instead of just before bedtime, etc.  When they learned not to expect feedings at a concrete time, it became much easier to fill them up on solid food and drinks and entirely skip feedings, and over the course of a few weeks they were painlessly weaned.

The other moms are taking questions this week, too.  Here’s what they say:


Upcoming topics for 4 Moms:

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pf button Q&A with the 4 Moms: dealing with comments on your big family, weaning babies, going from 1 child to 2   and beyond!

4 Moms: Favorite frugal tips

Current giveaway: Grandpa Jake's Campfire Cooker

High techniques of technique pharmaceutical bacteria and cells against five nasal experimental corneas. tetracycline 500mg capsuleivx The wife plays a normal pigment in transforming and clearing cases and is mutant to the fibrosis from these procedures.

This week we 4 moms of many are sharing some of our favorite frugal tips.   I’m already busy making this harder than it has to be, asking myself if  ”favorite” means the tips we enjoy the most (or complain about the least), or the ones that save us the most.  Or maybe our favorites would be the most creative ones, that make us happy just because we thought of them.  Maybe our favorites are the ones that are so deeply ingrained as habits that we don’t even think twice about them, but then it gets really hard because we might be utterly unaware of them and then how would I tell you about them?

And if it’s hard to decide on the criteria for the word favorite, how about a definition for the word frugal?  This blockbuster post on Frugal Hacks reminds us how widely our definitions can vary, and maybe when I decide which frugal tips are my favorites you’ll just snort derisively and mutter, “She calls that frugal?”  Or you might be horrified and send the link to all your friends: “Can you believe she does this to her own family?!”

Now that you’ve been exposed to all my deepest self-doubts and neuroses, I’ll share a few of my best tips for stretching a single income in a double-income society.  Some may seem too obvious, but I suspect much depends on where you’re standing and what you already do or know.

Save on food:

  1.  Cook from scratch.  If you already do some scratch cooking, expand your skills by tackling new recipes: Enchilada sauce, pizza crust & pizza sauce, tortillas, biscuits, pancakes.  This adds some work in the kitchen, but cuts your grocery bill and simplifies shopping because you buy greater quantities of staples like flour but less individual items like canned biscuits, bread, english muffins, bagels, and pancake mix.
  2. Buy in bulk but always check unit prices.  Bigger isn’t always cheaper, so don’t get fooled.
  3. Shop the specials but check unit prices again.  Not everything in the weekly sales flyer is a good deal.
  4. Always watch the prices as your items are rung up.  I get overcharged on at least one item almost every time I go to the store, especially sales and clearance items.  If you catch the mistake before your order is finished, it’s easy to fix.  It’s much harder if you wait and have to go through customer service.
  5. Use what you buy.  It seems obvious, but even a great deal is a waste of money if you don’t use what you buy.
  6. Do some menu math.  You might be surprised at the results.
  7. Drink milk and water.  Juice may have a few vitamins but is loaded with sugar – natural or otherwise.  You get much more bang for your buck by eating fresh fruit.  Other drinks have little or no nutritional value, so the less you drink of them the better.
  8. Learn to eat meatless meals.  Don’t make the switch all at once if you are heavy meat eaters, but begin having a meatless meal every now and then.  Skimp on the meat in regular dishes, and teach your family to see it as a garnish rather than a main dish.  It could be that your family won’t miss the meat at all!
  9. Avoid eating out.  Even a cheap meal out usually costs much more than eating in, so do your best to avoid eating out.  It’s fine to treat your family to a restaurant meal, of course, but make it a planned event.  Don’t let it happen by accident or default just because you failed to plan.
Save on repairs:
  1. Take care of possessions.  Reduce the need for repairs by taking good care of the things you own and use.
  2. Ask how you can save on a repair.  Some shops will let you order and provide the parts for a repair, just charging you for labor.  If you can find a better deal on the parts than they offer, you can save some money.  Prices are often negotiable, too. You’ll never know if you don’t ask.
  3. Do your own repairs.  You can do many of your own repairs on autos, appliances, furniture, walls, plumbing, and more.  Don’t know how?  Learn.  The internet is a wealth of free information at your fingertips.  If you need to actually see how a repair is done, YouTube is a wonderful resource.
  4. Borrow tools for repairs.  If you need a particular tool that you aren’t likely to use often, ask around for a loaner.  Besides your own friends and acquaintances, Home Depot and Auto Zone often loan specialty tools for free.
  5. Make it last or do without.  Use cars, appliances and other big-ticket items as little as possible to extend their lifespan.  When it’s time to repair them, ask yourself if it’s really worth the cost.  How much would you miss it if you chose not to repair it?
Save on clothes:
  1. Shop secondhand.  If you’re used to buying new, secondhand stores may give you the heebie-jeebies at first, but that feeling passes.  Thrift stores can be a great resource for high quality items for far less than you would pay for a new cheaply-made counterpart.  Some items are brand new and still have tags from local retailers.  We routinely find shoes that retail for hundreds of dollars in thrift stores for $10 or less.  I have 2 pairs of boots that I absolutely love: one cost me over $100, and the other pair was like new for $4 (but retails for nearly $200).  I bet you couldn’t tell which was which.
  2. Enjoy hand-me-downs.  Let it be known that your family appreciates hand-me-downs, and you may never need to enter a thrift store – except to drop off donations.  Many people would prefer to give their children’s outgrown or out-of-favor clothes to someone they know rather than donate them to a business, but they need to know that you want them.  Brag up the adorable bag of dresses that ____ passed to your daughter, and others will know that pride doesn’t stand between you and a new free wardrobe.
  3. Plan ahead.  Don’t wait until summer to hunt for a new summer wardrobe.  Whether you’re shopping new or used, it pays to plan ahead.  Great prices are easier to find at the end of the season than the beginning, so think about what you’ll need next year.
  4. Repair and remodel.  It doesn’t take mad sewing skilz to do minor repairs.  Even some very impressive alterations take more creativity than skill.  Get outside your comfort zone and you might be shocked at what you can do.  Check out what Kaitlyn did in less than 10 minutes to pretty up a plain t-shirt.
  5. Extend the life of your clothes.  Washing and drying is hard on fabric, so if it’s not dirty don’t wash it.  When you do wash it, consider hanging it out to dry rather than using the electric dryer.  You’ll save 3 ways: less electricity, less wear and tear on your dryer, and your clothes will last longer.

Save on purchases:

  1. Don’t fall victim to SOS.  Shiny Object Syndrome is a dangerous disorder that can wreak havoc on your budget.   If it’s new and cool, force yourself to wait and make a careful decision after the excitement has worn off a bit.
  2. Don’t just ask yourself if you’ll use it.  Go a step farther: ask yourself if you need it, or if you’ve truly missed having it.  Did you just realize you wanted it when you saw it on the shelf, or is this a great deal on an item you’ve been looking for?
  3. Shop around.  Don’t assume that a sale – or a thrift store find – is a great deal.  Take time to check prices, or make sure you already know prices when you are shopping for an item.  If you weren’t already shopping for the item, you probably don’t really need it right now.
  4. Know the return policy and save your receipt.  Leave yourself room for buyer’s remorse, and be ready to act on it.  Even many thrift stores allow returns under the right circumstances.
  5. Don’t fall victim to the spend-to-save fallacy.  Some deals make you feel like the more you spend, the more you save.  Stop and think: if Option B leaves less money in your pocket than Option A, it’s probably not a savings.
  6. Eye buyer’s insurance with deep suspicion.  There’s a reason stores offer you those extra insurance policies, and it’s not out of the goodness of their hearts.  They profit on the deal, which means somebody loses on the deal.  The odds are against you, so unless you have good reason to believe you might beat the odds, just decline.

And a bonus tip:  Don’t be shy.  Ask for discounts.  Ask for add-ons.  Many prices are negotiable, and you’ll never know unless you ask.  Negotiating is a dying skill in the US, but is alive and well in much of the world.  Help bring it back!  Be courteous, but bold.  Smile when you make a request, and thank them whether or not you get what you asked for.  Here are some phrases I have used successfully:

  1. I would love to have this, but it only costs $8.99 new.  Can you come down on the price?
  2. I think my daughter would really like this dress, but it has a hole here.  Can you take something off the price?
  3. I love the color of this shirt, but it has some faint spots – see?  Can you adjust the price?
  4. I’m looking for an oven like that.  Can you do a little better on the price for me?
  5. If I buy these 3 items, can you throw this in for free?

4moms35kids 4 Moms: Favorite frugal tips

What are some ways that you save money?

Here’s what the other 3 moms say:


Upcoming topics for 4 Moms:

  • May 17 - Q&A
  • May 24 - Homeschooling when in a rotten temper

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4 Moms: Cooking with leftovers {linky}

Current giveaway: Grandpa Jake's Campfire Cooker

High techniques of technique pharmaceutical bacteria and cells against five nasal experimental corneas. tetracycline 500mg capsuleivx The wife plays a normal pigment in transforming and clearing cases and is mutant to the fibrosis from these procedures.

4moms35kids 4 Moms: Cooking with leftovers {linky}
This week, the 4 of us are talking about cooking with leftovers.  Alternatively, some of might be confessing that our cooking with leftovers mostly amounts to cooking with eggs laid by chickens who enjoy our leftovers.  Would that count?  I’m speaking hypothetically, of course, but you might also like to know that feeding forgotten leftovers to the chickens is a great way to soothe the conscience of a frugal housewife who feels like a failure when she fails to use leftovers in time.

But I always use my leftovers.  And I never exaggerate.  And my kids always obey.  Shall I go on?

Using leftovers is a lot like shopping from your pantry.  One of the biggest hurdles to overcome is simply remembering to use what’s there.  Do that by:

  1. Exploring before you shop so you can plan some meals around what you already have in the fridge, not just the pantry.
  2. Exploring before you make lunch, and serve a smorgasbord of leftovers.
  3. Exploring before you proceed with tonight’s dinner plan, and be flexible if you find something you can or should use.

Some leftovers are easier to use than others.  Rice can become a delicious rice pudding for dessert tonight or breakfast tomorrow.  If you are Southern, your leftover breakfast grits can be sliced and fried in butter.  Top with butter, salt and pepper for a savory side dish with supper, or top with butter and syrup for tomorrow’s breakfast.  If you are not Southern, you probably wouldn’t know a grit if it bit you – or else you put sugar in your grits, bless your heart.  That’s ok.  Some of my kids put sugar in their grits, too.  We just call them Yankee grits.

Cooked grains like rice, oatmeal, and grits can be added to breads: muffins, pancakes, banana bread, even yeast breads.  Kitchen Scrap Cookies are fun and versatile.  You can google recipes using cooked grains, or you can experiment on your children.  Either way works.  If you experiment, start with a proven recipe and add just a cup of cooked grains.  If that works well, try adding more next time.  Expect the results to be denser and more moist than usual.

When it comes to non-breakfast foods, casseroles are the standard answer.  That may sound boring, but the possibilities are limitless!  Frugal Hacks had a 5 part series on creating casseroles that appeal to your family and use what you have on hand.  Each includes one or more recipes to get you started:

  1. Framework
  2. Sauce
  3. Meat
  4. Add-Ons
  5. Toppings

Leftover meats can also be chopped and seasoned for use in Mexican or Italian recipes like tacos, chimichangas, lasagne, spaghetti, alfredo, etc.  Cooked veggies are a no-brainer in soups, stews, fried rice, and many other recipes that call for vegetables in any form.

I think a key is to consider the leftover as an ingredient: if you have cooked broccoli, look for recipes that call for broccoli in any form.  There’s a good chance that you can tweak the recipe slightly and use what you have on hand.

Allrecipes is my favorite source for recipes.  One feature that I love and use often is the ingredient search.  Just fill in the ingredients you want to include and hit the search button.  This is a great way to use up several leftovers at once or find new combinations for what you have on hand.

Here’s what the other 3 moms say:

What about you?  How do you use up your leftovers?  Link up with us!

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Upcoming topics for 4 Moms:

  • May 10 - Favorite frugal tips
  • May 17 - Q&A
  • May 24 - Homeschooling when in a rotten temper

Recent topics:

About 4 Moms, including a complete list of all past topics

pf button 4 Moms: Cooking with leftovers {linky}

4 Moms: Homeschooling through pregnancy or chronic illness

Current giveaway: Grandpa Jake's Campfire Cooker

High techniques of technique pharmaceutical bacteria and cells against five nasal experimental corneas. tetracycline 500mg capsuleivx The wife plays a normal pigment in transforming and clearing cases and is mutant to the fibrosis from these procedures.

4moms35kids 4 Moms: Homeschooling through pregnancy or chronic illness

This week, we four moms of many are talking about how to homeschool through chronic illness or pregnancy.  If your morning sickness is bad enough, the two may sound and feel like the same thing.

If we’re talking about things that bring daily school to a screeching halt, we could also add interstate moves to the list.  We had a beautiful daily schedule when we lived in Ohio, and I had 6 children under 10 at the time, expecting #7.  Once we moved, things were never the same again.

I expected our move to change things, but I did not expect the change to be permanent.  For this reason, I spent several months waiting for our lives to fall back into order naturally.  It didn’t help that I was in the midst of my worst pregnancy ever, with non-stop vomiting, suspected gestational diabetes, little or no control over my diet (we were not living in our own home at the time), and several other major and inescapable sources of stress around us.

When our lives didn’t quickly and naturally slip back into something resembling the old order, I spent several months sinking into a slow motion panic, afraid that the brains of our children were turning to mush while I watched helplessly from my miserable place on the sofa.

See?  Pregnancy isn’t always a breeze for moms of many.

But I learned something along the way.  I learned that not all education happens at the table with a pencil and a textbook.

perry 300x176 4 Moms: Homeschooling through pregnancy or chronic illness

Esther 281x300 4 Moms: Homeschooling through pregnancy or chronic illness

It doesn’t even always involve a book, though it almost pains me to say so.

guitar 4 Moms: Homeschooling through pregnancy or chronic illness

wild pig 300x200 4 Moms: Homeschooling through pregnancy or chronic illness

As long as children are not spending their days plastered to the television, immersing themselves in video games, or otherwise indulging in wanton purposeful brain damage, they are probably learning new things.

rainbow 4 Moms: Homeschooling through pregnancy or chronic illness

That’s not to say that you should let them quit school and do what they want for the rest of their days.  Just don’t panic if school isn’t happening the way you envision it while you are sick.

Here are some ways to keep educating your children even when you can hardly crawl out of bed:

  • Read to your children, and encourage them to read.  Read together in your bed, if that’s where you spend most of your time.  That is where reading lessons happen in my house even when I’m well.
  • Make sure you provide plenty of good literature and nonfiction, and not too much “brain candy.”  Children who read twaddle will quickly come to crave it just like the child who has been raised on breakfast pastries will crave that morning dose of sugar.  It sometimes takes self control and extra effort to develop a taste for what is best for us.
  • Have your children narrate back to you when you read aloud to them.  Encourage them to tell the story in their own words.  Very little ones often show a desire to do this naturally, like when your toddler wants to “read” you her favorite book.  I have also let the young ones narrate to each other to help “catch up” when one misses a chapter of a book we’re reading together.
  • Encourage the independent pursuit of hobbies and interests.  Urge your children to dig deeper into what interests them, and to learn fun or interesting new skills.
  • Talk to your children, and with your children.  This is huge!  Explain difficult concepts, even if you think they’re too young to completely grasp what you are talking about.  You are planting seeds and concepts.  Answer questions.  Ask questions.  Include them in discussions, even if they’re too young to really participate.  Engage.  Don’t sell your children short: everything is fair game at every age.
  • Use videos judiciously.  Work hard not to create an atmosphere where videos are the default method of entertaining children or killing time.  Non-fiction and educational videos abound.  Use them as a basis for discussions rather than just time-fillers.  Let the kids watch a familiar/favorite video but require them to use the foreign language track rather than English.  My kids groan, but never decline.

So much learning can be self directed and self motivated, but often our children miss out on that aspect when we are strong and healthy enough to hover over them and manage all aspects of their day.  It’s not  good to leave a child to himself (Proverbs 29:15), but I do think that we are sometimes inclined to manage their days a little too closely.  The inability to do so can sometimes provide new opportunities for growth and learning that our children might have missed otherwise.

Here’s what the other 3 moms say:


Upcoming topics for 4 Moms:

  • May 3 - Cooking with leftovers
  • May 10 - Favorite frugal tips
  • May 17 - Q&A
  • May 24 - Homeschooling when in a rotten temper

Recent topics:

About 4 Moms, including a complete list of all past topics

pf button 4 Moms: Homeschooling through pregnancy or chronic illness

4 Moms Q&A: courtship, dental bills, and 40,000 diapers

Current giveaway: Grandpa Jake's Campfire Cooker

High techniques of technique pharmaceutical bacteria and cells against five nasal experimental corneas. tetracycline 500mg capsuleivx The wife plays a normal pigment in transforming and clearing cases and is mutant to the fibrosis from these procedures.

4moms35kids 4 Moms Q&A: courtship, dental bills, and 40,000 diapers

This week’s 4 Moms topic is Q&A.  Specifically, that means your Q’s, and my A’s, although it might be fun to reverse that every now and then.

I asked on Facebook Wednesday afternoon what you wanted to know, and here are the questions I received:

Q. I want to know about your kids and the Bible…not sure exactly what, but wondering about them and reading/understanding/applying.

Most of our children who can read well have read the Bible at least once on their own.  The teens have all read it several times.  While we don’t always read together, the Bible is a constant foundation in how we see the world, analyze issues, and develop our own opinions and positions.  It is a part of nearly any discussion that arises, from firearms to family, parenting to politics, history to health, books to birth control, discipline to demographics.

I apologize for the abundance of alliteration, but when the Bible is connected to everything, the possibilities are positively panoptic.

We interrupt this program for a special announcement: the 4 Moms ebook is now available for your Kindle from the Amazon Kindle store!!!  Get it here: 4 Moms of 35+ Kids Answer Your Parenting Questions. More coolness: we’re currently #49 in the Parenting category!

If you already own either version of the book, we would LOVE for you to pop over to Amazon and write a review.

We’ve come up with a creative solution for those who already bought the ebook but wish they had waited for the Kindle, and we have a treat for those who
are among the first to buy the Kindle version.  For further details see The Common Room, but hurry, because this offer ends Saturday night at 7.P.M. Central Time.

Now we return to our regularly scheduled 4 Moms post.

Q. Courtship! What model of dating/courtship did you and your husband follow and what do y’all desire for your children.

I shared the story of how Perry and I met in Boy Meets Girl.  While it was far from traditional dating, I don’t think it was exactly courtship either although it was our parents’ idea long before we thought of it. We learned much from our own experience and hope to do things a little differently with our children, but we’ll have to see what situations and possibilities God lays before us.

Our greatest desire is to protect them from temptation as they seek to live their lives for God’s glory.  We want to help them find spouses without “practicing divorce” by having a series of romantic interests or relationships.

In our ideal scenario, a family friend whom we have known over time will express an interest in one of our daughters.  Because we know him and possibly his family very well, we will know whether this is a good idea and will have a good idea of whether he is ready for marriage, how his strengths and weaknesses might complement those of the daughter in question, etc.  If he is ready and we consider our daughter to be ready, we would present the idea to our daughter.  If she liked the possibility, we would encourage him to spend more time in our home, her in his family’s home, and our two families together.  We would make an active effort to get know him more and let them get to know each other on a more personal level.  Soon, we would hope to know if the two are compatible and want to get married.  This would be something of a joint decision that we hope both sets of parents and both young people and even their pastor(s) would all agree upon.  If so, engagement would be short and sweet – just long enough to plan a wedding.  Then they would live happily ever after.

Of course we can’t count on everything fitting neatly into our ideal scenario and there are endless possible variations that could work just as nicely, but it’s good to have a plan from which to start, don’t you think?

Q. How do you cover the dental bills?

We have a group policy with United Healthcare through Perry’s employer, but I just got an online quote and it looks like our policy only costs about 25% more when you purchase as an individual.  Unlike medical insurance, dental insurance is quite affordable and an excellent investment if you’re the type to have regular cleanings, x-rays, etc.  The price of the policy we use doesn’t change for a big family even though there are proportionately more claims, and I feel confident that UH is losing money on us.  From our side, that’s good.

Since I have had a propensity to cavities all my life (and a couple of the kids seem to have inherited my weak enamel) we do regular cleanings, sealants, etc. for the entire family and it all costs very little out of pocket aside from our monthly premium.

Recently we’ve become aware of the idea that teeth, like the rest of the body, may be capable of healing, but this is entirely new territory and we’re far from giving up our semiannual cleanings.  We haven’t really even begun to look into it, although I know that the name Weston A. Price comes up a lot when people are discussing these things.  What do you think of the theory?  Sensible, quackery, or are you withholding judgment until you know more?

Q. How do you deal with squabbles between the older kids and the younger kids. There’s 10 years between my 2 and big brother gets fed up with little brother following him around and talking so much.

I would be really curious to hear my kids’ view of this and see how it matches up with my view of what I do.

I think I try to stay out as much as possible, encouraging them to settle disputes peacefully and patiently, especially when it’s older ones complaining about younger ones.  They all remember being the little ones who wanted to tag along with older children, and I try to remind them while little ones may sometimes seem like an annoyance, the best way to help them become less annoying is to include them and give them every possible chance to hone their immature social skills.  Too often “annoying” little kids are simply little kids left to their own foolishness and immaturity, instead of being influenced by the older people in their lives.

I also remind them to treat the little ones as they would want to be treated.  Would they like it if I just told them to go away and leave me alone?  Wouldn’t it hurt their feelings if I acted as if I didn’t enjoy or appreciate their company, or if I had no interest in what they wanted to tell me?

Finally, when the older ones have company or a special reason that it might be best for the little ones to be scarce (a new calligraphy set, for example), I simply tell the little ones that it’s time to let the older one(s) have some private time.  When an older one wants to be left alone constantly and wants nothing to do with younger ones, that can signal a problem, but as long as a person is kind about it and uses the privilege sparingly, there’s nothing wrong with a little private time.

Q. How much do you step in when your kids bicker?

When it comes to bickering among peers, again trying to stay out of the dispute and encourage them to settle it peacefully.  This time, though, my line is a little different:

“Are you sure you want me to help settle this?”  Imagine me saying that in a slow, ominous voice.

If 2 older children can’t settle a dispute over a piece of clothing or whose turn it is to use the computer or who should clean up the lotion that somebody left out and the toddler spilled on somebody else’s bed, I’m creative.   I can always come up with a quick and easy solution that will encourage them to seek a peaceful resolution next time.

Q. Have you ever had a child who didn’t want to be homeschooled? If so how did you address it?

As 2nd generation homeschoolers with a wide circle of homeschooling friends and acquaintances, we managed to thoroughly indoctrinate our children against institutionalized government schooling from a very young age.

We teach our children from an early age to understand that there is no such thing as neutrality in education.  All education is intrinsically religious, because in order to impart knowledge we must first decide what we know and how we know it.  The source of that definition tells who your god is – or who an institution’s god is.  There may be Christian teachers inside the system, but they do not have the freedom to change the nature of the system itself.

If this seems harsh, I recommend watching Indoctrination: Public Schools and the Decline of Christianity in America.

Q. How many kids have you had in diapers at once?  The DHM has shared she once had 3. I have had 3 for a while, as well, but 2 full-time, and 1 at night.

I’ve had it easy.  If you count nighttime, I almost had 3 in diapers at one point, but have never actually had more than 2.  I’ve also never had one baby potty trained before the next came along, so I’ve been doing diapers constantly for almost 19 years – not to mention helping with my siblings’ diapers for about 11 years before that.

My older children help a lot with diapers now, but nevertheless I estimate that I have personally changed well over 40,000 diapers on my own children.  That’s most or all of the first 6 children, plus half of the last 4 children, based on potty training at 28 months, nighttime dryness at 3yo, and a very conservative estimate of 6 diapers/day – accurate for a toddler or an older baby, but very low for a younger baby.  We could probably bump the guess to 50,000 and still be in safe territory.

Q.  How do you handle a child screaming/yelling NO! after being disciplined?! (spanked) Spank more or wait for “sincere” restitution?

The 4 Moms have posted in the past about parenting styles, and you might find it helpful to have several viewpoints on the subject, but here is my reaction to the specific situation you described: Yelling “NO!” sounds like outright rebellion and a sure indication that you are not done disciplining yet.  That doesn’t necessarily mean more swats (though it certainly could) but the goal of discipline is repentance and reconciliation, and it’s clear that we aren’t there yet if our children are angry.

But anger can have more than one cause, and it helps to get at the root of it.

If a child is angry, often they feel that the discipline was unwarranted or undeserved.  It may be helpful to review their sin and why they are being corrected.  Do they understand how they violated God’s law, and a parent’s duty to raise up children in the fear and admonition of the Lord?  Do they understand that they didn’t simply make you mad; they disobeyed God when He said, “Honor thy parents” (or whatever commandment they broke)?

They also need to understand forgiveness.  Depending on the circumstances, hardness often disappears when they are required to go to the one they offended and ask forgiveness.  Sometimes an angry attitude comes from believing that others are angry at them.

If you are dealing with a very young one, the rules are still the same though the reasoning may need to be taken down a level.  I might tell a recalcitrant toddler, “Don’t be mad at Mom.  You obey.”  Then I might follow up with another swat if I still see a bad attitude.

Every child is different, and I can’t begin to tell you how to discipline yours, of course – and again, not all discipline is spanking.  The goal is to shepherd their hearts, not just achieve outward compliance, and for that they must be on the same page with you.  Anger means they are not.

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4 Moms: Tithing and saving on one income

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4moms35kids 4 Moms: Tithing and saving on one income

Tithing and saving can be a challenge for anyone with any size household and even with any size income.  I think it’s an American tradition to spend more than you earn, and even with the best of intentions it’s entirely too easy to let your expenses creep up every time your income increases.  This is not a problem unique to large families, though it’s certainly more of a challenge when you live on one income as so many large families do.

However, we believe that the Bible teaches that the tithe belongs to God, and we are not so bold as to steal from Him.  That makes tithing much, much easier since the first 10% of what we earn never belonged to us in the first place.  It becomes more a matter of simply doing it, than figuring out how. When the tithe comes out first, right off the top, you never miss it because you never had it in the first place.

And here’s a tip: if you think it’s hard to make ends meet when you pay tithes, see how hard it is when you don’t.  Keep in mind Who controls the rolling spheres and the death of every sparrow, and ask yourself if He will make good on His challenge to His people to test Him:

Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the LORD of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need.  ~Malachi 3:10

Saving is trickier, because while few would disagree that it’s an exceedingly good idea, it is optional and discretionary.  Do we save as much as we think we should?  Absolutely not.  But we don’t make excuses for ourselves.  We don’t blame our large family and single income.  We say, “Oops.  We blew it again.  Let’s work on this and do better.”

There are several thought patterns that can keep us from building our savings:

I Can’t

It’s easy to convince ourselves that there’s simply no room in our budget to save, but unless you are sitting naked on a dirt floor in the dark, eating nothing but food you found in a dumpster behind a restaurant, you do have choices.  OK, I’m exaggerating, but I hope you get the point.  Cell phones, electric dryers, air conditioners, and – yes, even chocolate chips are niceties, not necessities.  Cocoa powder is debatable.

“Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pound ought and six, result misery.”  ~Charles Dickens

I’m not saying that you ought to be saving while your husband is unemployed or during other financial crises.  Temporary hardships are exactly what we save for.  But if you find yourself in an unending state of financial crisis, it may be time to closely examine your lifestyle, spending habits, and career choices, and begin to make some changes.

Later Will Be Easier

It’s not hard to convince yourself that a newer, more reliable and efficient car/house/furnace/windows would be a better use of your money than savings because it will save you money in the long run, enabling you to save more in the future.  But will you actually have the discipline to save more later?  The human psyche is a tricky thing, and you may find another such use for your savings when the car is bought and paid for.

I Have a Better Idea

It’s easy to convince yourself that making extra payments on your house is the same or better than putting money in savings because you are building equity and saving more in interest than your savings account would earn.  Maybe it’s true, and maybe it’s a great idea.  But is it savings?  While it does built your net assets, it’s not savings in the generally accepted sense of the word.  Is this an acceptable substitute, or are you making excuses?

What is Savings, Anyway?

It’s even easy to convince yourself that a good, solid investment which is nearly guaranteed to earn money over time is a wiser way to save than that dusty old bank account or mattress.  But investments are not savings.

Maybe you do mean to include investments in your definition of savings, because that is money that you set aside for the future rather than consuming.  I personally like this definition, and I think that’s a perfectly legitimate way to think if you are serious about it and truly being honest with yourself.

The Secret to Saving

My point is that saving on one income – like saving on two incomes – is largely a matter of dedication and determination.  If it’s non-negotiable to you, you will find a way.  You’ll just take it off the top and make ends meet on what’s left.  If you’re not sure what it means or how much you should be saving or whether it’s really practical in your situation, you might not do it at all.  What’s the old saying? If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will get you there.

We often are tempted to use our large family status as an excuse for why we don’t or can’t do all things we think we should do.  While it’s true that having a large family can make many things more challenging, it’s very rarely the difference between can and can’t. I think it’s more often a case of letting ourselves off the hook because we feel that we’re at a disadvantage.

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4moms35kids 4 Moms: finding time/ideas for bloggingThis question has 2 very distinct parts.  Like last week’s topic, I think the first part of this one is more about how we manage our time than about what we do with that time.

In this case, blogging moves up and down my list of priorities.  When it’s near the top, it gets done regularly.  When it gets bumped by more important or urgent aspects of life, it doesn’t.  You can chart its position on my list of priorities pretty accurately by glancing through my archives and counting the posts for each month.  :)

For some people, blogging isn’t and shouldn’t be on the list at all.   I don’t think a blogger should feel guilty or issue apologies to the world at large if her blog sits fallow for a length of time – any time.

For us, our blog serves several important purposes.

  • It is a family journal. We use it to remember (and memorialize) major occurrences in our family.  These may be as varied as the birth of a child, the sale of a house, a family vacation, or a humorous quote that we want to remember.
  • It is a ministry to other Christian wives and mothers. As a mother of 4 teens and 6 7 younger children, I have learned that my own experience can be a significant encouragement to other wives and mothers – especially those younger than me, who may still feel overwhelmed at day-to-day life.  I remember how hard it was, and I am living in the light at the end of the tunnel now.  It does get easier, and I never tire of encouraging weary young mothers to persevere just a little longer.
  • It is my circle of friends. Yes, I have real-world friends that are dear to me, but I have met a number of amazing people through our online connections.  Some of them have gone on to become real-world friends as well, while I have yet to meet others in person.
  • It is a source of income. We earn a modest income from affiliate links and other advertising, and hope to see some profits from our new ebook and future ones, too.  This is a Proverbs 31 enterprise in more than one way.

Because of all these, and because my husband wants me to continue blogging for all the above reasons, it stays somewhere on my list.  It’s not always near the top, but it’s on there.  :)

Once you decide whether blogging belongs on your list of priorities, you might find that it’s easier to make time for it.  That’s where the second part of the question comes in.

If you’re like me, sometimes you have too many ideas for blog posts exactly when you have NO time to do them or even write them down.  Then when you finally sit down to write a post, you don’t know where to start.

Darren Rouse of Problogger has a great article to help you come up with more ideas than you’ll use in a year.  Of course you still  need to write down your ideas and actually act on them, or they won’t do you a bit of good.  I can’t help you much there, but we can be procrastination pals if it makes you feel better.

When I’m looking for a new topic, I often ask myself a series of questions:

  • What is happening in our lives?
  • What have we been talking about in our home?
  • What are people talking about on Facebook?
  • What questions have readers lately asked in the comments?
  • What were some of my most popular/controversial posts in the past?

If you’re a blogging mom, I would love to hear from you. How do you make time?  How important is blogging to you?  How important do you think it should be?  How do you come up with ideas for posts?

Here’s what the other 3 moms say:


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4 Moms: Making Time to Manage the Budget

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4moms35kids 4 Moms: Making Time to Manage the Budget

First, an announcement:

No, I’m not going to remind you buy your copy of our new Parenting ebook.  I hope you already have your copy by now, and if you don’t you probably have a reason.

Instead, I want to announce that we now have an affiliate program.  We want you to sell our ebook, not just buy it!

Affiliate will earn a super cool 50% of sales!  That’s way more than we earn since we divvy the other 50% between 4 of us, but we don’t mind.  We want you to be excited!  Interested?  Sign up here.

Making Time to Manage the Budget

I’m going to assume this question is more about time management that about actually creating a budget, because that’s a whole different discussion.

Like everything else in my life (or your life), making time to manage the budget is probably not the real problem.  The problem is making budget management a priority.  If it’s not our idea of fun, we probably have a hard time finding time for it.  Don’t we all find time for what we really want to do?  It may be a few minutes on Facebook several times/day, 30 minutes on the phone with Mom, an extra 20 minutes in bed in the morning, or taking time to read Life in a Shoe – but I think everyone here has at least a little discretionary time in her day.  That doesn’t mean that these things aren’t important (especially reading certain blogs), but you do have choices about how you spend at least some time every day, don’t you?  I certainly do.

I’m not trying to make you feel guilty if you have trouble allotting time to budgeting, because I have plenty of priorities that don’t get the attention they deserve.  I just want to get away from the “I don’t have time for this” mentality and shift over to a “I don’t make time for this” mentality.  It’s a lot like when I remind myself to tell the children, “That’s not a good use of our money” instead of “We can’t afford that.”

Unless you have the sort of system that makes the rest of us look and feel incompetent, it probably doesn’t take more than 30 minute/week to manage your budget, and it may take even less.  Our system looks something like this – at least in our heads.  I’m not going to put my hand on a Bible and swear to you that we actually do it this way all the time, but we do most of this, most of the time.

  • Daily: Check bank account online for expected/unexpected charges.  Verify unfamiliar charges with spouse.   3 minutes/day
  • Bimonthly (payday!):  Make sure automated bills were deducted as expected.  Pay bills manually as necessary (only 1/month for us, plus a few annual items).  10 minutes 2x month
  • Monthly: Make sure we tithed on all irregular sources of income (tithe on paychecks is set aside automatically).  Log into Mint.com and assess expenditures for the month.  Review our performance: where did we spend more than we should have?  Where did we do better than expected?  How much went into savings? 20 minutes

Our finances are relatively simple, and I think it helps that we are big fans of Dave Ramsey, and have learned a healthy fear of debt – although we learned that lesson the hard way.  We no longer have car payments or credit card payments to juggle, our mortgage is very moderate (we hope to pay off our home in the near future) and we do our best to keep expenses to a minimum, multiple cell phones and fast food weaknesses notwithstanding.

We are trying hard to be good stewards of the resources God has granted us, and so we find a few minutes to manage the budget.  Could we do more?  Absolutely.  But first we’ll need to kick the Facebook habit.


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  • April 19 – Q&A
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4 Moms parenting tips ebook

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hardbackstandingstraight 260x300 4 Moms parenting tips ebookIf you already have our new ebook 4 Moms of 35+ Kids Answer Your Parenting Questions, we would love to hear what you think. We’re collecting comments/testimonials to add to the 4 Moms website.  So far we’ve heard nothing but good, and are so excited by how helpful everyone has found it to be!

“I’d have paid the money just for the info in the appendices.” – Jenny

“I stayed up late last night reading your eBook. Thank you. It was such an encouragement.”

“I am so blessed to have gotten the book! It is going to make a huge difference in our lives, and the lives of so many others. I am really enjoying the style of writing and all the wonderful advice.” – Jennifer

“Just have to say that I brought the 4 mom’s book & I LOVE IT!!! It is well worth [the money]… There is so much practical advice even for a mother of just 4 ( so far).” – Renata

Although much of the material has been published at one time or another on our blogs, even our regular readers are finding plenty of material new to them.  Apparently it’s hard to read every post on 4 separate blogs over the course of years.  :)

Of course there are some posts, tips and extra material that you won’t find anywhere except our book!

If you don’t have it, last time I checked there were still 74 chances to get it for $3 before the price goes up.   Go BUY IT NOW.

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4 Moms Q&A: Shoes for 12, snack rules, doing it all

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4moms35kids 4 Moms Q&A: Shoes for 12, snack rules, doing it allIt’s time to take questions from the audience again, and this time we opened up the floor on the 4 Moms 35 Kids facebook page.  Did you get a chance to ask your question?  Or maybe you’re here to help dispense some wisdom in the comments.  We certainly want all the help we can get!

Q. Ashlee and Cindee want to know about shoes.

Can you hear my guilty giggles?  I used to be the sort of person who took pride in owning just 3 or 4 pairs of shoes.  Now that I have 4 teen daughters, my own collection has somehow grown to 12 pairs, and I still need some black sandals and a pair of Ropers.  I’m not sure how or why I need that many, but I blame my daughters.  We have a shoe problem, and it’s contagious.

The kids?  I’m not even going to count how many shoes they have.  The teen girls struggle to keep it between 10 and 20 pairs each.  I won’t tell you who has 10 and who has 20, but they probably will if you ask.  The younger ones who don’t buy their own shoes yet usually have one pair of boots plus 2 or 3 other pairs of shoe.  We’re in Texas; the boots are a given.  For some people, 3 pairs of boots are the bare minimum.

For shoe storage and organization, we are loving our Closetmaid stackable shelves which coordinate perfectly with the Closetmaid Cubeicals we use for clothes and personal items.

My shoes take up relatively little room.  Oh, except the 3 pairs of boots that don’t fit on the shelf.

momshoes 4 Moms Q&A: Shoes for 12, snack rules, doing it all

Perry’s shoes may be bigger but they really don’t a lot of space either.  That’s mainly because most of them are usually under the kitchen table.

dadshoes 4 Moms Q&A: Shoes for 12, snack rules, doing it all

The 4 youngest have their clothes and shoes in my bedroom, so that the older kids can’t blame them for the landfill in their bedroom.  Each child has one shelf here, with a fabric bin for socks either on the shelf or with their cubbies in the compartment below the shoe shelves.  Three of these four kids also own a pair of boots, which are kept in a cubbie below.

littlekidshoes1 4 Moms Q&A: Shoes for 12, snack rules, doing it all

And the big girls.  What you see in the photo below is just the tip of the iceberg.  Deanna’s shoes are in a separate shoe holder that hangs over the door – at least some of them.  Many of the shoes are away in Georgia with their owners this week.  And I purposely cropped out the heap of boots on the floor. I just couldn’t be that honest all at once in front of this many people.  I have my limits, friends.

bigkidshoes 4 Moms Q&A: Shoes for 12, snack rules, doing it all

Shoes?  We’ve got ‘em.

Q. Trisha asked, “How do you regulate snacks/treats? My kids are constantly begging!”

When all my kids were little, I used to have a regimented schedule.  We had an early breakfast, a 10:00 snack, lunch precisely at noon, a 4:00 post-nap snack, and dinner at a reasonable hour.

Now that I have 6 cooks in the house and hubby is gone from 7 to 7, our feeding schedule looks different.  Breakfast is often more like brunch: late and hearty.  No morning snack is necessary.  Lunch happens when 2 or more people start begging for food.

Between meals, older people help themselves to snacks within approved guidelines (no meat, for example, and ask before seconds on fruit – did you eat a real breakfast/lunch?)  Little people get a hearty snack when they wake up from naps, because dinner happens now at 7.  If it’s any earlier, Dad doesn’t stand a chance of eating with us during the week.

If younger ones are begging for snacks at unexpected times, I have a few questions before I start doling out the goodies.  ”Did you finish your breakfast/lunch?  Were you full?  Did you ask for seconds if you were still hungry?” Depending on the answers and exactly what snack they are begging for, they might get what they want – or they might get a glass of milk and a peanut butter roll-up.

I’m not a snack nazi, but I do try to make sure they are not turning their noses up at meals and then begging for cookies 20 minutes later.

Q. Straightened Path is wondering, “Since the title “4 Moms, 35+ Kids” was coined, how many “+ kids” have arrived?”

3 of us were pregnant when we started, so 32 of those children were originally on the outside.  Of course the other 3 arrived nearly 2 years ago and we now have 2 more on the inside, bringing the total to 37.  The Headmistress also has 2 godsons who spend a lot of time at her home but were not included in the official original count, and I believe she now has 3 grandchildren.  Do they count?  If we count everyone, our total is 42!

Q. From Lisa: How do you do it all? Bake, teach, write? I only have 6…3 teens and 3 littles. I feel like we work all the time, yet I still feel under the gun constantly! Help!

Lisa,  I don’t do it all, and I never did.  It’s a trade-off.  When I bake, I don’t teach or write.  When I teach, I don’t write.  When I write, I don’t do anything else.  I generally wish I could do more of everything, but when I had less big people and more littles, I did less of all 3.  I haven’t done much in the way of gardening since ’95.

We prioritize, alloting time to the things that are important to us and our families.  Ideally, we spend more time on the things that are more important and less time on the things that matter less.  In reality, I often find myself spending too much time on the things that please me most with little heed for the things that please God most.

When you have a hundred great ideas for worthy projects and ways to spend time, it’s not always a matter of making good use of your time.  You mentioned that you work hard.  Sometimes you just have to identify the current goal(s) and let the others wait.  Those projects will still be there if and when they make it to the top of the list.  If some never make it to the top, don’t sweat it.  In all labor, there is profit. God is pleased when we do our best for Him, even when we don’t mark off every item on our To Do List.

Check out the other moms’ Q&A posts this week:

Do you have a question?  Watch for your chance to ask on Facebook, or ask here and I’ll try to remember to check before next month’s Q&A.  ;)


Upcoming topics for 4 Moms:

  • March 29 – Making time to manage the budget
  • April 5 - Do you plan out blog posts? How do you manage blog time?

Recent topics:

About 4 Moms, including a complete list of all past topics

pf button 4 Moms Q&A: Shoes for 12, snack rules, doing it all

4 Moms Parenting Ebook: get it!

Current giveaway: Grandpa Jake's Campfire Cooker

High techniques of technique pharmaceutical bacteria and cells against five nasal experimental corneas. tetracycline 500mg capsuleivx The wife plays a normal pigment in transforming and clearing cases and is mutant to the fibrosis from these procedures.

hardbackstandingstraight 260x300 4 Moms Parenting Ebook: get it!Ok, friends.  The big sale starts at 12 noon, EST.  11 AM CST.  10 AM MST.  9 AM PST.

See?  We tried to make it easy for you, no matter what time zone you live in!

Click here to get 195 pages of parenting tips and sanity savers from moms of many who have been in the trenches for long enough to know!

The price starts at 50 cents and goes up incrementally, so the sooner you buy the better your deal.  We’re hoping you’ll help us spread the word, but we understand if you want to get your own copy first!  :D

Update: the price is about to switch from $1 over to $2.  Did you get yours yet?

pf button 4 Moms Parenting Ebook: get it!

It’s here! It’s here! 4 Moms Answer Your Parenting Questions ebook

Current giveaway: Grandpa Jake's Campfire Cooker

High techniques of technique pharmaceutical bacteria and cells against five nasal experimental corneas. tetracycline 500mg capsuleivx The wife plays a normal pigment in transforming and clearing cases and is mutant to the fibrosis from these procedures.

parenting Its here! Its here! 4 Moms Answer Your Parenting Questions ebookWell, it’s here but it’s not for sale: 4 Moms of 35+ Kids Answer Your Parenting Questions

Not just yet.  That will start Monday at 12EST.  Don’t forget, because…

  • The first 50 buyers will get it for 50 CENTS!
  • The next 100 will get it for $1!
  • The next 200 get it for $2!
  • The next 300 get it for $3!
  • The next 400 get it for $4!

Are you looking for encouragement?  Hoping to find tips on maintaining your sanity as your family grows?  Tips from moms of many who have been there, done that?  Or just a deeper peek into the inner workings of large families?

We have compiled some of our best posts, most frequently asked questions, and extra material that has not been seen before – plus exclusive printables!  All in an easy-on-the-eyes, right-at-your-fingertips format.  One easy download will give you 195 pages of the help you’re looking for.

The sale starts Monday, but 4 readers will win a free copy before the sale even starts!  Each of the 4 Moms is hosting a giveaway, so be sure to make the rounds and enter the other 3 too:

To enter, just leave a comment here.  I would love to know why you want the book.  What do you hope to learn?  Or what question(s) do you hope we’ll answer in an upcoming post or ebook?

For extra entries, do any or all of the following.  Please, leave one comment below FOR EACH ENTRY.

  • Post about our big blowout sale on Facebook and link to this post. (1 entry)
  • Post about the sale on Twitter, linking here. (1 entry)
  • Post about the sale on a non-private blog. (3 entries)

We will announce the winners on Monday before the sale opens at 11:00a.m. CST.

On your mark, get set, GO!

This giveaway has ended.  The winner was Julia.

pf button Its here! Its here! 4 Moms Answer Your Parenting Questions ebook

4 Moms try to save keepsakes without being killed in an avalanche

Current giveaway: Grandpa Jake's Campfire Cooker

High techniques of technique pharmaceutical bacteria and cells against five nasal experimental corneas. tetracycline 500mg capsuleivx The wife plays a normal pigment in transforming and clearing cases and is mutant to the fibrosis from these procedures.

4moms35kids 4 Moms try to save keepsakes without being killed in an avalancheMaybe it’s because I have pregnancy brain, or maybe I just really need your help here.

I’m going to come right out and tell you that I don’t have a system, and we have very few physical mementos from the last 10 years.

In the early days, when I had just a few small girls, I kept a few of the things that were most precious to them.  These went in each child’s “birthday bag.”  It started out as a particularly cute gift sack on the top shelf of my closet, and into it I tossed birthday cards, drawings, first Easter dresses, favorite little toys that were no longer favorites, a special baby doll that had worn out and been secretly replaced with a doppelganger.

Eventually the contents were transferred to a rubbermaid tote, moved into storage, and I stopped adding to them.  They’re still in the shed at the bottom of the hill, and the older girls love to sneak down and pore over the contents.  Sadly, I have nothing of this sort for the younger ones.

I still tuck away special drawings in a folder in the file cabinet once in a while – but more often, I scan or take photos of them.  I have heard of using photos as a storage method for arts & crafts, and I think I subconsciously adopted the idea.  Then we post them to the blog or facebook, or just let them join the thousands of other digital photos that we will surely someday take time to sort.

Aside from many thousands of digital photos, the majority of my mementos from the last 10 years are right here on this blog.  Now that I’ve said it, I feel motivated to post more drawings by the kids.  I love being able to look back and see how each individual child’s style and skill grew and evolved over time!

To me, drawings are some of the most precious mementos because they are not just a snapshot of the child’s outside, but the inside.  The choice of subject matter gives a glimpse into personality and interests, and the level of detail tells you a little about their priorities and how they think.  The skill level can even give some insight into maturity level and personal dedication, though of course it can vary enormously from one child to the next and must be interpreted in the context of the whole child.

Looking for more help?  The other 3 Moms have it all together!

Do you have a better plan?  Do you actually use your plan?  I’d love to hear from you!


Upcoming topics for 4 Moms:

  • March 22 – Q&A (watch for your chance to post questions on Facebook)
  • March 29 – Making time to manage the budget
  • April 5 - Do you plan out blog posts? How do you manage blog time?

Recent topics:

About 4 Moms, including a complete list of all past topics

Get the 4 Moms ebook! (projected launch: Friday, March 16, 9AM EST)

pf button 4 Moms try to save keepsakes without being killed in an avalanche

4 Moms serve dinner for 50 cents/person {linky}

Current giveaway: Grandpa Jake's Campfire Cooker

High techniques of technique pharmaceutical bacteria and cells against five nasal experimental corneas. tetracycline 500mg capsuleivx The wife plays a normal pigment in transforming and clearing cases and is mutant to the fibrosis from these procedures.

4moms35kids 4 Moms serve dinner for 50 cents/person {linky}You’ve heard of $5 dinners, but they usually feed 4 or maybe 6 people.  Today, the 4 Moms are going to try to do better.  Really?  Is it possible to make dinner for $.50/person?

In an attempt to reduce our grocery expenses without sacrificing healthful eating, our family has learned to eat many meatless dinners.  This doesn’t mean we skimp on protein, though.  We are hearty eaters, and we love our protein!

Beans and homemade bread are one answer that is both obvious and hearty.  Two pounds of dry pinto beans from WalMart cost about $1.30 – call it $2 to allow for generous seasoning.  A pot of beans can be surprisingly varied if you learn to season them differently.  Meat is nice but not always necessary.  $1.50 would be enough to make 2 loaves of sweet rich Challah bread or a big pan of cornbread and a little butter.  That leaves us $2.50 for some fresh veggies – right now, that would buy 2 lbs. of carrots, 1 lb. of roma tomatoes, and 2 cucumbers.

Beans and cornbread together provide a substantial amount of complete protein, but not everyone wants to eat a pot of beans every day and maybe your family doesn’t like beans as much as we do.  Surely we can be a little more creative.

How about pizza? We can’t have all the toppings we want, but let’s see what we can do with our budget.

Let’s make enough dough for 4 large pizzas.  Sometimes I make more because I like to plan for leftovers, but 4 is plenty even when we’re famished and today we’re on a budget.  Salt is cheap, and since I get flour (8 cups) and yeast (2 Tbs) from Costco and I don’t always use oil in my pizza dough, that’s just 60 cents so far.  Let’s allow some oil for the pans, though, to make the crust nice and crisp:  50 cents will provide 2 Tbs. of butter or olive oil for each pan.

Easy Frugal Pizza Crust

makes 4 large pizzas

  • 3 cups warm water
  • 2 Tbs. yeast ($.08)
  • 2 Tbs. salt
  • ~8 cups flour

Combine water, yeast, salt and 2 cups of flour.  Let sit 10 minutes, until bubbly and active.  Stir and knead additional flour to make a firm dough.  Knead by hand or in machine until smooth and only slightly sticky.

Let rest 10 minutes or up to 24 hours.  Divide into 4 parts and pat onto large greased pizza pans or cookie sheets.  Top and bake immediately, or prebake 10 minutes at 300 to finish later.

Add pizza sauce made from a gallon can of tomato paste (we season and freeze 1 cup portions, then add water and simmer until we’re ready to use it) for 50 cents (19 cents is the paste; the rest is the cost of spices).

We’ll divide 6 cups of grated mozzarella ($3.75 from Costco) between 3 of the pizzas, and make the 4th into breadsticks to dip in the extra sauce.  Many people enjoy cheese pizza so let’s leave one plain.  We still have 65 cents for additional toppings – 2/3 lb. of turkey sausage can be divided between 2 pizzas, or we can afford 1/2 diced onion, 1/2 bell pepper and a few sliced mushrooms.

Breakfast for dinner can be fun and frugal.  We occasionally have pancakes and eggs when we find the dinner hour upon us without a plan.

Pancakes to feed a dozen

makes 50-4″ pancakes for $2.35

  • 5 cups flour ($.35)
  • 2 tsp. baking soda
  • 3 tsp. salt
  • 5 cups soured milk – 2 Tbs vinegar plus milk to make 5 cups ($1)
  • 5 eggs ($.50)
  • 1/2 cup oil or melted butter ($.50)

Combine dry ingredients.  Add milk, eggs and butter, then mix just until smooth.  Drop onto hot lightly greased griddle and cook until bubbles appear.  Flip and cook until done.

We like to top our pancakes with butter ($.50) and a little sprinkle of brown sugar rather than syrup that’s full of HFCS.

Add 2 dozen eggs ($2.50), fried or scrambled, and you have a fun & filling dinner with plenty of protein for less than $6.  There are no veggies this time, but maybe you had fruit with breakfast and a big salad for lunch.  :)

More Dinners for less than $.50/serving:

Bean & cheese burritos. Cook your beans from scratch, but buy tortillas if you have an inexpensive source.  We pay $1/20.  Serve with diced tomatoes, shredded lettuce, cheese, and salsa.

Spaghetti, salad and fresh bread. Make your own sauce from that gallon can of tomato paste, and skip the meat if you can live without it.  Set out 1/2 lb. of grated mozzarella to sprinkle on top.

Taco salad.  Serve homemade seasoned black beans instead of meat, along with lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, crushed tortilla chips, salsa, and a little sour cream if we have it.

The other moms are talking about it today, too.
  • Smockity Frocks
  • Common Room
  • Raising Olives
  • How does your budget compare?  How can you or how would you feed your family dinner for 50 cents/person?

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    Upcoming topics for 4 Moms:

    • March 15 – How to save memories without being overrun
    • March 22 – Q&A (watch for your chance to post questions on Facebook)
    • March 29 – Making time to manage the budget
    • April 5 - Do you plan out blog posts? How do you manage blog time?

    Recent topics:

    About 4 Moms, including a complete list of all past topics

    pf button 4 Moms serve dinner for 50 cents/person {linky}

    4 Moms: teaching our children to write

    Current giveaway: Grandpa Jake's Campfire Cooker

    High techniques of technique pharmaceutical bacteria and cells against five nasal experimental corneas. tetracycline 500mg capsuleivx The wife plays a normal pigment in transforming and clearing cases and is mutant to the fibrosis from these procedures.

    4moms35kids 4 Moms: teaching our children to write

    Since the 4 of us are bloggers, you might think this part was easy.  We’re natural writers, right?  So writing must come easily to our children as well.

    Can you feel the sarcasm dripping like honey from Pooh’s bee tree?

    First of all, writing doesn’t come easily to me.  I remember asking for more writing work in school because it was one subject that I never thought I was really good at.  I knew all the technicals of style and composition, and I got good grades.  I was good enough, but never felt that I really had any spark in my style.

    After 6 years as a blogger, I have to admit I still often feel that way.  You know that funny lady that can make a bad day sound so hilarious you almost wish you had the same day?  That’s not me.  She may live in my head, but we don’t see each other often.  I’m the quiet, boring woman who gives an amused little snort at the funniest parts of the movie when everyone in the room is falling on the floor with laughter.  I’m always a little surprised when I review old posts on my blog.  I wrote that?  Hey, I’m good!

    Learning to write takes a thorough knowledge of the technicals, followed by lots of practice.  It’s a long process, never mastered but always improving – if you continue to work on it.

    I learned the technicals by taking a few short writing courses and writing endless essays for my dad.  I gained more practice writing letters to friends and family and to one young man who initially had very little interest in returning them.   Later, I practiced even more by joining the internet world in this crazy thing called blogging.

    Our children have followed similar paths, each in her own way.  Some really do have a spark in their style.  They may not have mastered the technicals entirely, but you really could say writing comes naturally to them.  Even so, they have work to do.  Talent may give them the style that some of us must work so hard to gain, but they still have to work to master the basics.

    I just spent a long time not answering the question, didn’t I?  But I am a homeschool graduate myself, and I think I am one example of an answer to this question.  My children are another.

    We teach our children to write first by teaching them to read.  They are encouraged to read a lot.  We try to steer them toward truly good writing: literary classics and more books by modern masters of the written word.  We love to collect books and have built up a rather respectable library over the years.

    Filling their heads with good examples of great literature gives them a solid start in learning to write.  I have always been fascinated at how easy it  can be to deduce a child’s current favorite author by the evolution of her writing style.

    Over the years, we have also required them to write something daily.  It may be a journal entry, a letter, a blog post, or a few paragraphs on an assigned topic.  It may be a short story, summary of a book they read recently, or a poem.  It may be copywork for the younger ones.  This met with strong resistance at first, but they quickly adjusted and learned that it wasn’t as hard as it seemed.  The more regularly we required this, the better they did.

    But a thorough mastery of the basics really does build both confidence and competence, and right now we have enrolled Kaitlyn and Lydia in an online interactive essay class with a live teacher.  I mentioned this in another post, and after a few more weeks they are as challenged and inspired as ever.  I know that I could probably do for them what he is doing if I took the time to create or follow a course, but I haven’t done it in such a structured way yet and it’s helpful for me to see his friendly critiques and praise of their work as well.  He does an impressive job of balancing the two.  It’s also helpful that they can see the other students’ work and the instructor’s notes on their work as well for comparison.  It doesn’t hurt that he is funny, and has quoted The Princess Bride and other family favorites in his lectures.

    Kaitlyn is working on a post that details how the class works and what she likes best about it, so watch for that soon and have your questions ready for her!

    How have you taught your children to write compositions and essays?

    The other moms are talking about it today, too.
  • Smockity Frocks
  • Common Room
  • Raising Olives

  • Upcoming topics for 4 Moms:

    • March 8 – (food related topic)
    • March 15 – How to save memories without being overrun

    Recent topics:

    About 4 Moms, including a complete list of all past topics

    pf button 4 Moms: teaching our children to write