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Back to School Lunch in a Jar: Supplies You’ll Need

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Ready to discover great Back to School Lunch ideas that you can make and pack in jars? It’s time to get your supplies ready!

Why pack lunches in jars? Let me count the reasons:

  1. Packing lunches in jars means you can make great food ahead of time, then grab it from the fridge and take it in a hurry.
  2. Jars protect food from becoming smashed in a lunch box.
  3. Jars are see-through, so you can discover your options with a quick glance in the fridge.
  4. Glass is safe for food storage, so you don’t have to worry about dangerous plastics.
  5. Jars are reusable, so you’ll save all kinds of money in the long run.
  6. You can purchase jars in all sizes, giving many options to put together a perfect lunch box!

I think it goes without saying that jars are cute and beautiful and pretty and delightful. Indeed, I really love jars. :)

Back to School Lunch in a Jar: Supplies You’ll Need

I have jars in a variety of sizes, which comes in very handy depending on whether I’m packing tiny jars with dips for veggies or bigger jars full of soup. Here are my top suggestions for jars to use to pack lunches:

These Basic 8-Ounce Jars are a common household item. They are great for baking quick bread, and for packing berry parfaits and any number of small lunch items.

These 8-ounce jars (with regular lids) are short and squat-y. They are wonderful for packing sliced fruit, homemade pudding, cooked meat chunks, and much more.

I LOVE these tiny 4-ounce jars for packing fruit or veggie dips!


It’s hard to tell the size in the picture below, but these 16-ounce wide mouth jars are a favorite for packing main dish items and salads in lunch boxes.

Wide mouth jars make eating directly out of the jar so much easier! They are also easier to clean. I have a set of these 8-ounce wide mouth jars and use them all the time for packing fruit salads and other side dishes.

My favorite, favorite (because obviously I can’t decide which jars are my favorite) are these 8-ounce wide mouth jars. They are so handy for packing, well, just about any side dish item in a lunch box.

For both wide mouth and regular jars, I keep a supply of these plastic lids. They are the best! Check out wide mouth plastic lids and regular plastic lids.

Did you try Baking Quick Bread in Jars? So fun! We’ve got 10 super fun Lunch in a Jar ideas to share this month – perfect for your Back to School lunchbox! Subscribe here so you won’t miss a post!

Some of these links are my affiliate links.

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Back-to-School Lunch Box Cards ~ New Free Printable

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In celebration of all the back-to-school fun this time of year, we made another set of Lunch Box Cards for you to download and enjoy. Print these, cut them apart, add your own personal message, then place them in your child’s lunch box. Home school? Place these cards under a lunch plate or inside one of the books your child is currently reading for a fun surprise. :)

Free Download - Lunch Box Cards

Download Free Printable Back-To-School Lunch Box Cards

Here are two more free sets of fun Lunch Box printable cards to grab.

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After School Snacks to Have on Hand

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Even though we homeschool, I still need to have after school snacks on hand. After all, we’re hungry after we’ve finished our school day too!

Here are the snacks we like to have on hand to make our afternoons run more smoothly – especially if we’re heading out to soccer games in the evening!

After School Snacks to Have on HandYum

First, here are some little-to-no prep snack ideas:

  • Summer Sausage
  • Lunch Meat
  • Leftover Ham
  • Variety of cheese
  • Carrot Sticks with Ranch or Hummus
  • Cucumbers
  • Celery and Peanut Butter
  • Sweet Peppers
  • Olives
  • Pickles
  • Apples
  • Grapes
  • Bananas
  • Oranges
  • Strawberries
  • Blueberries
  • Cantaloupe
  • Raspberries
  • Pineapple
  • Peanuts
  • Almonds
  • Cashews
  • Crackers
  • Bread and Butter
  • Peanut Butter Honey Toast
  • Chips
  • Guacamole
  • Salsa
  • Smoothies
  • Popcorn

And if you have time to make or bake a fun recipe, here are some of our favorites!

  1. 4-Ingredient Chocolate Crunch Bars
  2. No Bake Cookie Cups (5 minute prep!)
  3. Cream Cheese Salsa Dip (2 ingredients!)
  4. Pineapple Coconut Quick Bread (blends together fast!)
  5. Parmesan Crisps (so easy you won’t believe it!)
  6. Sweet and Salty Almonds or Pecans
  7. Chocolate Cheesecake Fudge
  8. Creamy Italian Veggie Dip
  9. No Bake Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars
  10. Honey Sweetened Flourless Peanut Butter Bars (3 ingredients!)
  11. Easy Cheesy Popcorn
  12. 3-Ingredient Peanut Butter Honey Rice Krispie Treats
  13. Homemade Chewy Granola Bars

It’s fun to have something homemade to treat the family with after a full day of learning!

Bonus: Here are 40 fun snack recipes that include peanut butter.

Want more? Here’s our 227 Healthy Snack Ideas eBook!

I also like to keep snacks like this on hand to grab and go to soccer games:

What are your favorite snacks to enjoy as After School treats?

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10 Favorite Back-to-School Crock Pot Dinner Ideas

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Need some Back-to-School Crock Pot Dinner ideas? Here are my favorites!

Yum

It’s time for me to get organized. Back to school at our house means much more than “get your pencils sharpened.” I usually consider this time of year “Back-to-Soccer” season and brace myself for the crazy that comes with it. Matt coaches our York College women’s team so usually in August I smile at him and say something like, “Whelp, see ya in November.”

Elias (who moved into the college dorm over the weekend; I’m not ready to talk about it, ha) will be playing on the YC men’s team. Malachi (15) will referee as many rec-league and club team games as he can. And Brayden (6) will play on a rec-league team. I try to pack everyone up and go to as many home YC games as I can, plus of course, I’ll be Brayden’s biggest cheerleader.

Awwww. There’s Malachi, back in his baby-soccer days. Now here we are again with our new set of Littles!

I’ve done this soccer-mom-wife life for so many years now that I know full well what it’ll be like. And as much as I know that it will be challenging as it always is (especially now that we’ve got so many little ones again!), may I just say this very loudly:

I AM SO THANKFUL SCHOOL IS STARTING and that WE GET TO HAVE A SOCCER SEASON!!!!

Last spring, we weren’t sure, you know? In early March, we sent all of our beloved college students home with barely a good-bye. We trudged through quarantine like so many of you did, wondering when or if life would ever be back to normal.

I’m not sure we can call everything “normal” yet, but praise God, students are moving back and soccer season is happening.

So as I celebrate this and also get ready for a very busy season, I’m putting these Crock Pot Dinner Ideas in my back pocket to make our mealtimes easier! These 10 ideas are the recipes I tend to fall back on first…

10 Favorite Back-to-School Crock Pot Dinner Ideas

  1. Crock Pot Chicken Soup with a Kick
  2. Hawaiian Crock Pot Chicken
  3. Overnight Saucy Crock Pot Chicken
  4. Overnight Melt-in-Your-Mouth Beef Roast
  5. Crock Pot Pizza Casserole
  6. Barbecue Beef Roast
  7. The Simplest White Chicken Chili
  8. Cheeseburger Noodle Crock Pot Dinner
  9. Hearty Bean Casserole (which can be made on the stovetop, but is perfect to make ahead and keep warm in a crock pot until dinnertime!)
  10. Crock Pot Fajitas

All of these recipes require almost no work or prep time. That’s why I like these best!

Oh, and if you like simple recipes like this, you will love our Simple Real Food Recipes Cookbook. These are my go-to recipes now!

What does your fall season look like this year?

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Back to School Routines – How to Make them FUN this year!

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Whatever school looks like for you this year, might I suggest that you continue some of your normal back to school routines? You can most definitely still have a lot of fun with this. Here are some ideas!

This post contains pictures of my grown-up kids back when they were little. Remember these guys?!

We’re starting our 18th year of homeschooling. Every year before we officially begin a new school year we:

  1. Order books and basically have an unboxing party when they come in! (Read: excitedly spread books and materials ALL OVER THE FLOOR. This is one mess that mom doesn’t care about and most certainly contributes to.)
  2. Make school supply lists for each kid and go shopping together – and yes. I make them pose in the school supply aisle for our annual picture. Then we go out for a fun lunch. (Said lunch used to include free kids meals which made the final bill very small. Now? I don’t want to talk about it.)
  3. Have a special prayer time the night before our first school day.

Numbers 1 and 3 can easily be accomplished even with COVID. We’ll have to get creative about accomplishing #2 – but WE WILL DO THIS IN SOME FORM. I love this family tradition too much to nix it.

Back to School Routines – How to Make them FUN this year!

Consider what your family typically does in the weeks before a new school year starts. While some of you may be distance learning or homeschooling for the first time this year – if at all possible, still do your traditional back to school “things.” I’m guessing your kids are longing for some sort of “normal” and most certainly they need something to look forward to if you’ve all been stuck at home for months and months. Here are some ideas:

Shop for clothes.

Even if your kids don’t need as many school clothes this year. Even if you can’t actually go to the store. Online shopping works. New shirts are fun. And the excitement of picking out some new items as a fresh school year begins may be a nice pick-me-up for your kids!

What about picking out new school supplies?

A new school year means new pencils. Folders. Notebooks. Make a list of what each child needs, even if the list is minimal, and let them be a part of choosing their new items if possible. Perhaps find a fun basket or tray to house all of their supplies. Maybe set up an inviting schooling area in your home.

Something for lunches?

If your kids are used to packing a lunch every day for school, but will instead be eating lunch every day at home, I think it’s a nice idea to allow them to suggest some fun lunch items they might like as a new school year begins. Hopefully, this will double as a win for the parents who likely need some easy lunch foods ready to grab out of the fridge as you all settle into a new routine!

Ah, the extracurriculars…

Many of them are canceled for the fall. So is there a way you might be able to organize something active and safe for the kids in your neighborhood? Or at the very least, make a plan for your family to do something active and creative together in the afternoons or evenings. If your kids are into music or drama – come up with says to sing and act. Make videos. Play charades. Be intentional. Have fun.

The last hurrah

Our family has had this tradition for 17+ years and by golly, I’m going to figure out how to keep it going this year too. (Why yes I do plan to make Asa drive from out of town to meet us for this. Even though he’s done with college. Even though he’s fully adulting with a full time job and a retirement plan. I’ll buy him something for his work or for his house?? Whatever gets him here.) :)

As I mentioned above, our tradition is that every year we make a list of school supplies we need, go shopping together, then eat lunch at Runza, our local favorite fast food restaurant. Since we almost never eat out, this is always a huge treat.

It’s worth noting that our years of school supply shopping have gone from crayons and glue sticks to college dorm rugs and trashcans and…back to crayons and glue sticks. This year we’ll be shopping for both (school kids 1st grade through college senior!!).

Can we actually make this last hurrah happen? Taking our huge tribe to the store for shopping together this year may not be an option. So I’m brainstorming for how we can still shop together somehow. Runza is a given, because at the very least we can go to the drive thru and eat our food together at home. Hmmm….

That little baby looking at his kindergarten school list is heading to college in one week.
I’m not crying. You’re crying.

Start a new tradition!

So this year is different. That doesn’t mean it’s bad. Be an example to your kids by letting them know how excited you are about some of the fun changes this year brings! Brainstorm with your family for ways to celebrate this new school year – different though it may be. Ice cream for dinner the night before school starts? Popcorn and prayer time as you head into a new year? New pajamas for everyone for the first day of homeschool? Vote on a homeschool mascot? Be creative – have fun!

Here’s to a great new school year!

God is biggest. And because of this, we can count on many great blessings as we head back to school!

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How Do I Start a Homeschool?

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So you think you can start a homeschool? Enjoy this article from Tasha!

How to Start a Homeschool

By Tasha Hackett

Going back to school looks different this year. In light of everything going on in the world, many are choosing to homeschool. You may be sick of hearing about it! What are schools going to do with the COVID situation? Do we homeschool because we want more protection in the school or because we want everything to go back to normal? Even parents who never wanted to homeschool their kids, ever, are looking into homeschool. If you’re a seasoned homeschooling family, go ahead and forward this article to someone needing encouragement. 

Where Do I Begin for Homeschool?

So let’s say, hypothetically, that you wanted to homeschool your kids this year. You may be asking, “How do I even start? Where should I begin? What do I do first?” 

There are amazing resources everywhere and I know it can be overwhelming. I’ll break down the essentials of homeschooling for you in a few simple steps. 

Legal Steps to Take Before You Start a Homeschool

First, make sure you’re going about it legally. You are not allowed to simply buy a few books and tell your friends you’re homeschooling. Your kid will be just fine, but the government frowns upon that and you could get into trouble. (Most likely your local school will call you and find out what’s going on, and then they will tell you to do what you should have done and say, “Tisk Tisk.” But let’s avoid that.)

Go to hslda.org/legal (Home School Legal Defense Association) and find out what specific laws are required in your state. Some states require yearly testing, others just want a signature. For Nebraska, we signed a form, named our school, and filled out another form with our local school–including putting birth certificates on file. You can have fun with this and name it something creative and inspiring like, “Sunshine Unicorn Lollipop and Rainbows Happy Homeschool” or “Hackett Academy” or you can move right along and be amazingly simple: “Coppinger Homeschool.” This is not a game-changer and the government doesn’t care. 

Promise me you will not freak out when the form asks you complicated questions and use fancy words like “the scope and sequence” of your curriculum (don’t make this answer complicated) and ask you to “provide instruction in language arts, mathematics, science, social studies, and health.” I’m telling you not to be threatened by this type of chatter.

What they want to know is simple: Are you going to teach your kids and take them outside and go for walks and let them know what’s going on in the world? Yes? Good. Next. Play around on the HSLDA website, there are lots of goodies there that are helpful for beginners. Just don’t get lost in the weeds. 

So we’ve covered the legal aspect of homeschooling, now what? 

Now the real Homeschool fun begins: Curriculum!

This is where every family has their own opinion and some will fight to the death for Saxon Math and A Beka Language Arts. We love the curriculum book packs from Beautiful Feet Books and Sonlight. But we also use a hodgepodge of other resources. For Preschool/Kindergarten, Learn Your Letters, Learn to Serve is a golden standard.

For peace of mind, you can purchase an all-inclusive curriculum pack from a huge variety of Homeschool publishers. This is a great option if you are nervous and want to make sure you have everything covered. But seasoned homeschoolers may tell you this is unnecessary. 

Essentially: Pick something and run with it and then be flexible. You’re allowed to change your mind if you hate it. But you might love it. 

Homeschooling a Kindergartener 

Just have fun! This is the year they should learn to love learning and love school. This isn’t the time to bog them down with busy-work (unless they really love worksheets, and some children do.) I would not recommend an expensive math curriculum for Kindergarten or 1st grade. Kindergarten math means counting and shapes and patterns, learning the days of the week and months of the year. Kids do not have to learn how to read in Kindergarten unless they are inclined to. 

Multiple studies have proven that accelerated learning in the early years (before seven) DOES NOT increase reading ability, grades, or advanced placement in the later years, and can in fact have the opposite result. (Read any of the homeschooling books by Dr. Raymond Moore for more information on this.)

Legal boxes checked and homeschool books picked out, now what?

You will have to decide what works best for your own homeschool. No one is an expert in your kids the way you are. My habit is to set aside time each morning for school, Laura does much of hers in the afternoon. 

Protect your mornings (or whatever time you have set aside for school). Set aside certain hours for school work and protect that time. Don’t answer the phone, don’t play on social media. Turn off the TV. Don’t schedule dentist appointments or random park dates or lessons during your school hours, within reason. (Remember how we’re still being firm… but flexible?)

Make a plan and be consistent, but relax if things need to change. If mama is stressed, everybody is stressed. Protecting your mornings doesn’t mean you must be a rigid taskmaster. 

homeschool schedule

A Sample Homeschool Schedule to Start With

Our homeschool day will look something like this but yours may be entirely different: 

6:00 AM Mom awake and prepare for the day. 

7:00 AM Kids wake up. (We have a rule they may not come out of their rooms until 7 AM)

7-8:00 AM Dad off to work. Breakfast for all. Daily chores and general clean up.

8-9:00 AM Morning Time (We start our homeschool day all together, with the baby on my lap and the others sitting on the couch with me. Memory work, poetry, singing, check calendar to what’s happening the rest of the week.)

9-11:00 AM Other book subjects. Language, Math, Reading, (Baby will have a morning quiet time in crib from 9-10, toddler will play. Small snack at 10.) 

11 – 1:00 PM Free play for kids. Lunch. More play and chores if needed. 

1-3:00 PM Quiet Time. (May play quietly alone. Read, write, draw, etc. This is life for a family with littles home together all day.) 

3 – 5:00 PM Snack and then outside play. 

5 – 7:00 PM Dinner and Chores.

7-8:00 PM Bedtime routine with Dad

8 – 10:00 PM Mom and Dad hang out.

You Can Start a Homeschool! You Got This! 

book activities

When I first started, even though I was homeschooled as a kid, I felt lost trying to figure it all out as a parent. But really, you’ll be okay! Fill out the legal forms, choose a few basic books/curriculum, and arrange a generic daily schedule. Boom. Done. 

You’re Not Alone

We have many resources available right here on this site. You’d be surprised how much support there is for homeschooling once you start looking! If you’re feeling lost and afraid, remember that there are thousands of others faced with making the same decision you are. Chin up!

Be sure to share this article for all your friends who are struggling with this same decision; a basic step-by-step plan is a great way to calm your nerves.

Subscribe for more homeschool, homemaking, and simple meals encouragement.

Blessings on your new homeschooling adventure!

homeschool momTasha Hackett, friend of Laura, is a second generation homeschool mom x4 living in the heart of Nebraska. She spends her free time, (haha, she has no free time), reading and writing Christian Romance novels, and DIYing anything that needs done. She’s a huge promoter of being debt free. Laura is still here! Tasha is only a contributing author a few times a month. You can find Tasha @hackettacademy and on Laura’s IG account @heavenlyhomemaker. 

 

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How I’m Organizing our Homeschool Days

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I’ll share today about how I’m organizing our homeschool days. But if I’ve learned anything during the past 18 years of homeschooling, it’s that flexibility is key!

In many ways, as I sat down to write this post I wondered if someone else could write it for me. :) How exactly am I supposed to organize our homeschool days? Our high school sophomore can do most of his work on his own (if I help him stay organized with these planners). But our first grader needs almost constant direction. Meanwhile, our babies have turned toddler and well, they are busy.

I considered doing all of Brayden’s school work with him during the babies’ afternoon nap. But I need part of their naptime to:

  1. Do my blog work.
  2. Breathe and have a little downtime after a very full morning.

I prayed about this quite a bit, because who’s better to offer direction on what seems to have no solution but the One who gave us all these kids in the first place? So here’s what we’re looking at for our 2020-21 school year:

How I’m Organizing our Homeschool Days

1. Kid Folder Solutions

I created a very simple but brilliant folder solution for both Brayden and Malachi. Before a new week begins, I’ll fill the boys’ folders with work for the week ahead. This means that if it’s a printable, I’ll print it and put it into the folder. If it’s from a workbook, I’ll tear it out and put it into a folder. Instead of asking Brayden to “go get your math book” then “go get your handwriting book” then… I’ll simply have him get out the days’ folder and everything we need will be in one easy place.

(Club Members will find this printable pack of resources in both the “Printables Collection” section and the “eCurriculum” section of the membership site. Come and get it! Get yourself organized. Work yourself out of a job.)

Also – I’m using the Homeschool Planners here for both Malachi (10th grade) and for myself. He needs a list to work off of to help him stay focused. And I need plans out of my brain and onto paper. These planners reallllly help us both!

I actually experimented with this idea during the summer before officially beginning our new school year, just to see how it would work for all of us. BRILLIANT!!! I’m loving this so far!

Which leads me to…

2. Printables and workbook pages are working for us.

They haven’t always, because my boys all tend to prefer hands-on learning. But I’ve found that it’s working well right now to have simple math, handwriting, and enrichment pages ready to pull out of each day’s folder (fresh pages go in the right pocket, completed pages in the left).

Brayden and I work on these at the kitchen counter in the mornings after the babies have had their breakfast and are content to play (and make a monster mess) in the living room while we work. I can watch babies and help Brayden at the same time, mostly. This is actually helping Brayden learn to already become an independent learner, which is very good for him.

(You can read more info about all of the printables and worksheets we have here.)

Once the babies are bored with playing in the living room and Brayden has worked his way through as much as possible…

3. Brayden takes a worksheet break and we move on to free play.

Since the weather is so nice, we use this time to take long walks. The babies love strolling with us and are content for at least an hour! So they stroll while Brayden and I walk and learn. We’ve discovered new kinds of flowers, caterpillars in cacoons, varieties of train cars, food people have growing in their gardens, construction workers and machines — everything can be educational! And while we’re walking, we are talking (non-stop, ehem) and learning.

Once winter hits, these times of walking-and-learning will end. But we’ll find new ways to explore and learn, no doubt!

Smoothies for the road are highly recommended. :)

We play more, we have lunch, we check on how Malachi is doing with school work and video editing work (he is working remotely for Asa!)

4. After the babies go down for a nap in the afternoon…

Brayden and I sit and read. History books, read-alouds, and Bible. This takes about 45 minutes, then Brayden has some screen time while I get some blog work done (and drink coffee, obviously).

Our little experiment has worked well so far, and hopefully this will be our basic structure for the upcoming school year. But again – flexibility is key. We have no idea what this school year will bring. So we’ll make adaptations as needed.

What is your upcoming school year looking like at this point? Know that I am praying for all of us as we head into many unknowns this school year. :)

P.S. If you haven’t yet, please consider joining us here. You will love the useful resources!!

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Back to School Looks Different. Might this help?

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To say that “back to school looks different” this year is kind of an understatement. Even for those of us who have homeschooled for a very long time, it looks different. Will there even be field trips, co-op days, our regular P.E. group days, etc? :(

But for some of you, the changes surrounding the upcoming school year are even more difficult. For those of you who never intended to homeschool and have chosen it for this season. Or those who are planning to do distance learning at home through your local school. Or those who are cautiously sending your kids to the school building knowing that things will look much different than normal. I’m proud of all of you for choosing what is best for your family during this season.

And teachers?

Oh, teachers. Those who love their classroom because of the dear students who fill it and learn inside its walls. I am really sad for you as you’ve endured so many changes in both your career and in your life. And I admire you. You’ve had to make so many adaptations and have worked harder than most of us realize. YOU HAVE ROCKED THIS. I’m amazed at you.

I have a hunch that classroom teachers long for normalcy more than the rest of us – and that’s saying something. Well anyway, this post is intended to be one of encouragement and hopefully lots of help too! Let me head in that direction now, but I couldn’t do that without first acknowledging the pain and challenges that put us all here in the first place.

“Back to School” Looks Different

While none of us are walking the exact same path (and aren’t we glad that God has different and perfect plans for each of us!!) – what I’ve seen for almost everyone is that our plates are all just a bit more full than they used to be.

It’s funny, isn’t it? There are fewer places to go and perhaps not as many outside commitments with so many activities and events canceled. But at home? Well, the cancelation of outside events means that we are all home more, which can make our work at home much bigger than it used to be in some ways.

For instance, if everyone is now working from home and schooling from home, the house gets messier and more meals and snacks need to be made. Take it from a long-time work-from-home-and-school-the-kids-from-home mom. The messes are real and frequent and the hunger is real and constant!

If you’re used to grabbing lunch at a restaurant during a lunch hour and counting on your kids to eat at the school cafeteria – suddenly you need to figure out lunches at home. If snacks used to be eaten in the car on the way to sports practice after school – suddenly snacks are requested every afternoon just about the time you thought you’d catch a five-minute breather.

Thanks for the encouragement, Laura.

Hmmm. I told you this post was intended to encourage, but here I am pointing out more changes and harder work!

But wait. I do have encouragement and help and resources! I have so much encouragement you won’t even believe it. (Really, I do.)

First of all, there’s this:  While almost everything around us has changed, GOD HASN’T GONE ANYWHERE. He knew this was coming, He has been at work all along, and because He is a God of good plans for all of His people, He is constantly at work to teach us more about who He is and how He loves us. God is bringing so much good to all of us during this time! Do you see it? Do you recognize it? Just think about all the good God has done during these past months of change and trial. HE IS SO GOOD.

(And yes, even if we’ve experienced extreme hardship during this time, He is still good, still at work, and still working out His good plans. Hardship is how we learn more about who He is. I know this. I’ve experienced this.)

Here’s where I’m hoping to help.

All I’ve been able to think about recently is how I can help and what I can offer. I have 12+ years of resources here at Heavenly Homemakers, and I put the best of them all in our Heavenly Homemaker’s Membership Club site. But I kept thinking that I needed to add more. More to help us all as we figure out more meals at home, more snacks at home, perhaps more about schooling at home, and all the planning and organizing that comes with this new journey we’re all on (different as it may be for each of us).

First, let’s talk about Menu Planning.

What I felt was the biggest need for most of us is figuring out food (or maybe that’s simply where my brain always goes because I love everything about food). How can we all feed our families well without having to:

  • reinvent the wheel
  • spend more time than necessary
  • or work harder at something that we don’t all love to do?

Our membership site already offers an entire year’s worth of Simple Meals packets ($52 value). But I knew we needed more. So the packets are still there, but instead of leaving the section as it was, only offering pre-made menu plans and grocery lists, I exchanged this section:

With THIS:

It’s an entire page filled with Menu Planning Resources now!!!!!

It includes:

  • 52 weeks worth of Simple Meals planning packets (like it always did) and also…
  • Our exclusive Recipe Search Bar – so you can type in any ingredients you want to use and find recipes that work with those very ingredients – incredible!
  • A brand new packet of printable and practical Menu Planners for you to fill in and use in any way that works for YOU.
  • Cheat Sheets!! (These are my favorite new resources!!) These cheat sheets are filled with lists and links that include 100’s of ideas for Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, and Snacks! So instead of thinking on your own and spending a lot of time scrolling and reading and brainstorming, you can simply pull up these Cheat Sheets and skim them to get all kinds of wonderful, simple, tasty, real food ideas!

And here’s a little peek at a few of our new printable menu planners. Some of them allow you to only plan meals and snacks, like a regular menu planner. Others give you the option to plan your entire day – with appointments and to-do lists and oh yeah, your menu plan too! That’s my favorite planning page – so I can plan my entire day from school to appointments to meals all on one page!

And what else did we add to the Heavenly Homemakers Membership Site?

More Homeschool Resources

While we already offered an entire section of Homeschool Encouragement articles:

And we already included a huge selection of homeschool curriculum and printables and materials:

But we just added more. And we had in mind everyone from veteran homeschoolers to new homeschoolers to online distance learners and classroom teachers!

Here’s what’s new:

We created over 50 printable enrichment pages.

While I love our Sonlight curriculum, I always also have files on my computer full of activities and worksheets and printable books I can use to encourage further learning and fun for my kids. The goal for these sheets, also, is to give my kids activities that they can work on in their own time, without much help from me – hopefully!

These printables cover subjects from math to science, to English, to reading, to social studies, to brain stimulation.

Homeschool Planners

We also created and added a packet of Homeschool Planners to our Club Membership site. This includes planners for both students AND parents!

Here’s a little sample of what some of the planners look like:

And the simplest but perhaps my favorite…

Kid Folder Solutions

This is how I’ll be organizing our boys’ school work for this year. The idea is simple and that’s what I love about it. This will help them (from 1st grade to 10th grade this year!) be more independent plus it will keep all of their work in one place. I love this! Club Members, check out Kid Folder Solutions in both the “Family Learning Printables” section and the “eCurriculum Collection.”

$50 added to our $1,000+ worth of resources!

So in summary, while our Club Membership site already includes well over $1,000 worth of helpful resources, we just added over $50 more! Club members enjoy:

  • all of our eBooks and eCurriculum
  • our beautifully organized recipe section,
  • a page full of Kitchen Tips
  • a page full of Family Tips
  • a page full of Homemaking Tips
  • loads of Homeschool Encouragement
  • and now a fantastic new Menu Planning Resources page!
  • Plus we’re slowly adding articles to our Foster Care and Adoption Journal if you’d like to follow along. :)

Join our Heavenly Homemakers Club!

We’d love for you to enjoy all of these resources and more. :)

Already a member? Go check out all the new resources we added!! Read to join?

 

Get even more details about what our Heavenly Homemakers Membership Site offers here.

 

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Homeschooling Older Kids and Teenagers – Members Only

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Many have requested that I share what life is like for our family now that our kids are older. What is our homeschool routine? How is it that as the kids got older and more independent, Mom actually got busier? What does a day in our life look like?

So one day, I took pictures and notes all day long. I’ve documented our Wednesday as best I can. Why that particular day? I chose it because I finally remembered the post request this morning and decided to started taking pictures (and you thought I was so organized). You’ll notice that most of the pictures don’t include the kids. It’s a teenage thing and I respect it. I now present to you over 20 {mostly} kidless pictures.

First I’ll fill you in on who we are – then I’ll share the specifics of our life today:

To give you perspective, when I wrote this, our older boys were now 18, 15 (almost 16), 14, and 11. (This was before we began foster care and adoption!)

Asa (18) was a college freshman, living on campus at our local Christian college and juggling a very full academic and social life. Justus (15) was a high school sophomore; Elias (14) was an eighth grader; Malachi (11) was a fifth grader. So in summary, we had one in college, one in high school, one in middle school, and one in elementary. (And I question why I can’t keep up.)

So here we go. A day in the life of homeschooling teens and older kids!

Family Christmas Pic

For me, today began as it usually does with a cup of coffee and my Bible. I got up later than I meant to (whatever though, I needed sleep) – so that cut into my quiet time as Matt got the boys moving for the day.

life1

The boys are typical teenagers, which means the first thing they like to do in the morning is grab their ipods and phones from the living room table to see what they missed while they were sleeping. Sometimes I hate ipods and want to run them over with my car (like when the boys are so zoned into them they don’t hear me telling them to load the dishwasher or that the house is on fire). But this is our culture and this is how they keep up with their people and make plans, so I try to be okay with this (while still setting boundaries). After a few minutes, ipods stayed in the living room as the boys headed to the kitchen to find breakfast.

life2

Everyone warmed up their own leftover French toast or pancakes and grabbed applesauce and/or blueberries. Matt read to us from the book of Romans as we ate. Today we ate in a hurry because Justus and Malachi had to be at their piano lessons at 9:00.

life3

Teeth brushed, the two boys packed their piano books along with some school work so that while one boy was having his lesson, the other boy could read or do English. In the meantime, Elias tried to sneak back onto his ipod (as I pictured it being crushed under the van tire) and then got scooted upstairs to do his English lesson. Then, since he was the only boy home, he got on the computer to do his Algebra.

I used the quiet time to start writing this post, then shopped online to order Justus’ birthday presents and made a grocery list.

Matt took his truck to have the tires worked on, and they finished just in time for him to pick up the boys from piano. Good thing since I was still in my jammies. ;)

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Once home, Justus went straight back to the school computer to work on his music. Malachi and Elias started playing soccer in the living room. (It’s winter. I don’t own knick-knacks. THEY WERE GETTING ALONG. Carry on, boys.)

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life11

What? Don’t you have a soccer goal by your front door?

I sent Elias in to empty half the dishwasher. Malachi played the piano for a while, then I sent him off to do his reading. Elias and Malachi began working on a video project together, while still getting along. Justus was working on Geometry on the computer. I finished tweaking an article to send into our local newspaper (I write a weekly column) and suddenly needed food. It was only 11:00, but I am always hungry for lunch earlier than anyone else. (I eat an earlier breakfast, plus I’m more of a five-meals-a-day kind of eater.)

life10

I warmed up Taco Soup and got out guacamole, carrots, and clementines.

life14

Around noon, everyone else was hungry too, so they dug in. They chose kiwi instead of clementines. While they ate, I read aloud from our latest missionary book.

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life16

Lunch over, I had to head to Walmart to get ink for my computer. I grabbed some price-match items while I was there, then ran to pick up Malachi’s buddy to hang out for the afternoon. While I was out, Justus completed his Physics and did some English and History reading. Elias read English and Science. Malachi completed his math assignment.

life17

Once I got home, Justus finished cleaning out the dishwasher, Malachi loaded it with dirty dishes, and the rest of us put groceries away.

life20

At 1:55 Matt, Elias, Malachi, and his friend headed out the door for an indoor soccer session. On the way, they dropped Justus off at the college campus for the 2:00 MWF Psychology class he’s taking. (You can read here about how we get dual high school and college credits for our kids.) I settled in for exactly 45 minutes of quiet work time before I needed to leave to pick Justus up from his class.

Everyone was back home by 3:15. I spent a silly amount of time on the phone tracking down a package that hadn’t been delivered. The boys found snacks to eat. Elias and Justus did their Spanish lessons on the computer. Malachi hung out with his friend. I closed my office door to write this post. :)

I checked on the boys a while later and found the door to the back room closed up tight. Why?? Usually it’s open a crack, but when it’s closed like this, it usually means “I’m recording so don’t walk in until I’m done or you’ll ruin everything!”

life4

What are the boys working on in there? Well, Justus and Elias currently have four big music/video projects they are working on with their church friends. Our church is hosting a Youth Rally coming up in February, and videos are a must; plus the boys need to complete some videos for LTC – a leadership event coming up in April. They’ve spent hours the past few weeks (some on their own and some with as many from the youth group who can help out) writing lyrics and scripts, creating beats and tunes, recording voices, videoing the action, and editing their work to put it all together. I can’t tell you how much I love them doing this.

life22

I snuck into the room later to take a picture of what is our “recording studio”/school-computer room/Matt’s office/guest room. The boys invested in that fancy microphone you see there, and Matt and I got them the mic stand and pop filter for Christmas.

The rest of the afternoon passed with me hiding in my office trying to get some work done. I hollered out at one point for each boy to scrub four potatoes for dinner. I came out of my office around 5:00 and made a big pot of Potato Soup. I had the boys work together on sides of sweet peppers, olives, raspberries, and pickles.

We headed out the door at 6:20 for Wednesday evening Bible study. At 8:15 we were back home, joined by a young couple who is getting married this March. Matt and I visited with them (pre-marital counseling/mentoring) until around 10:15. During that time the boys were sent upstairs to fold and put away the huge laundry pile. Once they finished that, they hung out in the back room and watched netflix until 10:00 when we headed them up to bed.

life12

Now it is 10:54 and I am wrapping this up and calling it a day. Thursdays usually require a little less running around compared to Wednesdays, though the two middle boys have basketball practice tomorrow night. Never a dull moment!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!