5 on the 5th - February 2015

 Five on the Fifth for February Fifteen -- try saying THAT ten times fast!  I enjoy reading blogs as much as I enjoy writing here, so I'm sharing my five favorite reads from other bloggers this past month!

 1.  All I Need to Know in Life I Learned from Musicals from JENerally Informed

A light-hearted look at musicals and the lessons they teach us. I would add to her list The Wizard of Oz - because let's face it, the right shoes will open doors!

2. My Totally Selfish Reason for Taking My Kids to Disney from Oh Honestly

I loved this post.  We are HUGE Disney fans  (and let's just say one of the boys was a stowaway souvenir from there and Elias was on the short list for a middle name).  I have LOVED being there at all ages and seeing how the kids reacted - from several infants wide eyes at the sea of people to the time Jude shared his cereal with an unsuspecting Princess Aurora to a little girl wanting to BE Princess Aurora.  Not long ago, Jude spent half an hour sobbing in frustration because he wanted to see a particular show and it took us nearly twice that to figure out what he was saying, and then promptly crawled in my lap and fell asleep from the effort.  (Yes, I woke him up in time to see "The Beast show with the candle guy," and Beauty and the Beast Live is now a must-see every trip.)

3.  10 Ways to Live in the Moment from Vibrant Homeschooling

It's easy to get caught up in the big picture and lose sight of right now.  These are some great ideas for not getting overwhelmed - my favorite is to remember to break things down into small, manageable chunks.

4.  Low Carb/Sugar Free Chocolate Coconut Bars from the Nourished Caveman

With a bit of tweaking for Celia, we've turned these into one of her favorite treats, and a yummy way to get her daily dose of coconut!  (It's looking like she's going to get to keep coconut as a safe food!  WOOO!!)

5. H is for How to Get There from Through the Calm and Through the Storm

I'm loving Cristi's "Years Ago" series where she shares stories from her family.  She's not chronicling  the big-event tales, but is sharing the smaller, more easily overlooked memories.  This installment is a memory from when the Air Force sent her family to Germany and they wanted to take advantage of being able to travel through Europe in their free time.

Come on over to Ben and Me to join the party!

©2012- 2015 Adventures with Jude. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://adventureswithjude.com

5 on the 5th - December 2014

 I'm joining up with Marcy at Ben and Me for her "5 on the 5th" linkup.  The idea is to shine a light on five blogs/posts that you've particularly loved.  What inspired me this past month?

1.  Five Tips for Better Images from Do Try This At Home.  I admit to being a very amateur photographer - I have a good camera but don't play with it as much as I'd like to.  Since we're almost to New Year's and thinking about resolutions, I'm considering "Get out of your point-and-shoot rut" for one of them.


2.  Once I take my pictures, I like using Lightroom to edit them.  They never come out of the camera looking the way I see the image in real life, and some subtle editing can really bring them back to life.   4 Tips for Efficient Editing in Adobe Lightroom from The Life of a Crafty Wife has some great ideas.  I tried her first tip - marking the ones I liked and sorting from there - and it definitely made editing and saving go more quickly.


3.  Learning American History through Movies from Heart of Wisdom blog has a FANTASTIC list of movies for every era of US History.  Some are for older students only (and flagged if they have more restrictive ratings - PG13, R, etc.), but I think this is going to be a great resource for Jude.  He loves history, and soaks up video-based presentations. 


4.  FREE Christmas Worksheets from Mrs. Karle's Sight and Sound Reading.  Jude and I are trying something new this month - "Christmas School"! All of our lessons have had a Christmas theme - we're working on a Nutcracker Lapbook, and some holiday-themed Math worksheets, and these color-by-word sheets are a great for rounding off our studies.  (Bonus:  there are some color-by-letters for Damien to work on, too!)

5. I recently read How 936 Pennies Will Forever Change How You Parent at From Famine to Foodie.  I admit to tearing up, because "time flies" has hit hard this week.   Luke found a stack of college advertisement letters that came while we were on this vacation; the baby-faced Damien I had tucked in woke up from a nap, and suddenly looked like the "big boy" almost-kindergartener he is.  I'm not about to go out and get a jar of pennies for each child, but reading this really brought home how when they're newborns, we think we have all the time in the world, but in reality - they'll be grown before we realize.




Come join the party!









©2012- 2014 Adventures with Jude. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://adventureswithjude.com