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We will find out what solitude and silence have to tell us. We will hear the lessons in the stillness. We will be grateful for all that we have. We will be grateful for the time together or the time alone. We will do it imperfectly. We will pray and grieve and grow and heal. We will acknowledge what we take for granted. We will make lasting changes. We will dig deeper and find new reserves of empathy and patience and grace — for each other and ourselves. We will know who our tribe is and we will say, “I love you, thank you for being you, thank you for being my tribe,” even more fervently and often than we already do.

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You will need:

100ml glass spray bottles
witch hazel
100% pure vegetable glycerine
essential oils (optional) I use Eden’s Garden brand.

Making your own hand sanitizer spray:

1. Add 10 drops of lavender oil, and 5 drops of fighting five or Theives oil to the bottle(s).

2. Fill each bottle 75% full with 91% isopropyl alcohol.

3. Add 1 tablespoon witch hazel.

4. Add 1 teaspoon vegetable glycerine.

5. Put the sprayer lid on, shake well.

When using it, use a liberal amount and follow the techniques for hand washing making sure to get the tops of your hands, fingertips, nails, thumbs, in addiction to your fingers and palms.

Stay healthy, everyone. x

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My daughters are in first and third grade, respectively, and my son is preschool age. The girls follow a pretty structured curriculum and my three year old has a selection of coloring books, etc. while we’re doing our work – mostly he just plays with his toy cars.

If your child’s school is “only” closed for two weeks, I personally would encourage you to not put any pressure on yourself to come up with lessons or a curriculum. Read as much as you can with your kids! There are so many great resources for crafts and projects! My good friend, Amanda, has some wonderful ideas on her blog. (I’ll highlight some specifics below.)

Also, now is a great time if you’re lucky enough to live somewhere with access, to spend time outside. Fresh air, social distancing, vitamin D. Nature heals so much and offers so much “scope for the imagination” as Anne of Green Gables would say. As hard as it is we try to limit screen-time as much as possible – this goes in phases for us, but as of right now we are only having screen time after 5 pm. It makes our kids so grumpy so it ends up backfiring. We LOVE the Overdrive/Libby app which allows you to check out kindle or audiobooks via your local library.

I know many of you will be needing to work from home, and I too have times I need to work and my husband also works from home. It can be really challenging and honestly we find that having clear boundaries, “I am working right now,” is helpful and after a bit they find their own thing to do.

Finally, one thing I can’t recommend enough is getting up early. I set my alarm for 5-5:30 in the morning so I can wake up, have a cup of tea, do some writing or reading in silence. Doing this is not easy for me, but it has become an essential part of my routine (which I’ll include below too). Sometimes I ignore my alarm and opt for that extra hour of sleep, but I really try to get up every weekday morning before the kids. I am such a better version of myself: more patient, more cheerful, more… everything, and our days together go so much better.

CURRICULUM WE USE:

Handwriting and Typing: Learning Without Tears
Math: MATH-U-SEE
History: Story of the World by A Well Trained Mind (can also be found on Amazon)
Language Arts: The Good and The Beautiful
Nature Study: Exploring Nature with Children by Raising Little Shoots
Reading and Spelling: All About Learning
Women’s Studies: Goodnight Stories for Rebel Girls Vol.1 and Vol. 2
Workbook: Scholastic Workbooks (for the appropriate grade)

Our Homeschool Routing and Schedule have changed over time, adapting to what works best for us. Mainly what I have found is that if we are frustrated (myself or the kids) then something in the routine needs to change! Our routine includes chores for which I mostly use resources from my friend Amanda (again, will link below). I try to follow an “inhale/exhale” rhythm in our days. Inhale activities fill us up, exhale activities feel a bit more… draining of out energy. For every “exhale” activity or lesson, I try to follow it with an “inhale” activity like reading aloud, a quiet chore, Cosmic Kids Yoga (for the kids) or Yoga with Adriene for me! On a side note I have always loved the Tracy Anderson Method for a challenging workout – I’ve been doing her method on and off for the past ten years and never tire of it… and it never gets easy. Her original Mat Workout is a great place to start!

Right now our routine works as follows:

MONDAY

morning tasks: get dressed, brush hair, brush teeth, make bed, quick tidy
read aloud
*
activity**
lunch
handwriting (4 pages)
history
reading
spelling
clean school table, chore wheel
FREE TIME
evening tasks: fold and put away laundry, put away bin, quick tidy, pajamas on, brush and floss teeth

TUESDAY

morning tasks: get dressed, brush hair, brush teeth, make bed, quick tidy
read aloud*
math (1/2 lesson)
poetry
art***
language arts
clean school table, chore wheel
lunch
activity**
FREE TIME
evening tasks: fold and put away laundry, put away bin, quick tidy, pajamas on, brush and floss teeth

WEDNESDAY

morning tasks: get dressed, brush hair, brush teeth, make bed, quick tidy
read aloud*
handwriting (4 pages)
reading
spelling
lunch
history
science
clean school table, chore wheel
FREE TIME
evening tasks: fold and put away laundry, put away bin, quick tidy, pajamas on, brush and floss teeth

THURSDAY

morning tasks: get dressed, brush hair, brush teeth, make bed, quick tidy
read aloud*
math (1/2 lesson)
activity**
lunch
language arts
clean school table, chore wheel
FREE TIME
evening tasks: fold and put away laundry, put away bin, quick tidy, pajamas on, brush and floss teeth

FRIDAY

morning tasks: get dressed, brush hair, brush teeth, make bed, quick tidy
read aloud*
make up work
scholastic workbook (6 pages)
math test page
clean school table
chores: clean room, clean bathroom, pick one chore from chore jar
evening tasks: fold and put away laundry, put away bin, quick tidy, pajamas on, brush and floss teeth

OUR ROUTINES:
Kids Version: HOMESCHOOL ROUTINE
My/Mom Version: HOMESCHOOL ROUTINE – PARENT

* Each morning we read aloud a few chapters from a book. I like doing series like The Redwall Series or the Little House on the Prairie Series, etc.

** Where I have put activity is normally when we have an class with others or community activity which we will not be doing for the time being. We also do one day a week with our nature study group, which is why I leave our Friday so light. We also won’t be doing that for now.

*** For art we love to use this book called 30 Days of Watercolor (we just do lessons as we go, not following 30 days), or we pick one artist like Frida Kahlo, Van Gogh, or Georgia O’Keeffe, learn all about them and do paintings like theirs, watch videos about them, etc. It’s so much fun! (Below is a photo of the girls’ self portraits a lá Frida.

The chore wheel I refer to is here!

OUR HOMESCHOOL HAPPINESS RULES:
HOMESCHOOL HAPPINESS RULES!

GIRLS WEEKDAY ROUTINE

RESOURCES:

1. You probably already follow my good friend Amanda (@mamawatters on Instagram), but her blog, HOMESONG, has SO many great crafts, home projects, nurturing routines, and so much more. I use her Weekly Cleaning Rhythm PDFs to keep our home care routine going.

Original: CleaningPrintableHS(1)

Customizable Version: PDFCustomWeeklyCleaningRhythm(1)

2. My other friend, Bethany (@cloisteredaway on Instagram), has a GREAT homeschool blog! Bethany has been a guiding source to me both through her blog and through our friendship offline over the years as I’ve navigated the homeschool world. She has incredible ideas, resources, and experience! I can’t recommend her blog enough!

Final thoughts as you being this journey whether it be for the next two weeks, the next six weeks, the rest of this academic year, or for the foreseeable future: relax, take breaks as needed, take the day off, you’re doing a great job, you’re doing enough, there’s a lot of time, give yourself grace, be kind to yourself, your kids are capable of more than you imagine, breathe in, breathe out.

With love,
Kacie

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LAVENDER LAUNDRY SOAP

Ingredients.
4 cups washing soda
2 cups baking soda
1 cup Epsom salt
4 bars pure Castile lavender soap (you can use any scent you like!)
4 cups borax

Directions.
Using the grater attachment for your food processor, grate two bars of soap at a time. Transfer the grated bits to a large bowl. Once all the soap is grated, swap out the grater for your standard food processor blade. Return the soap to the processor and pulse until it’s blitzed and fine.

In a large bowl combine the washing soda, baking soda, Epsom salt, borax, and soap and stir until well combined.

Transfer to airtight jar(s).

Makes about 12 cups. I use about 1/8 – 1/4 cup of detergent per load depending on the size and how dirty the laundry is.

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Now, I’m not exactly sure what to share here, what my voice might sound like, or what stories or recipes I might share. It feels like so much has changed, so much has happened, and I’m different from the person I was when we moved to England, and am changed even from when we left England and set out for our travels that eventually led us back to Oregon, back to our home – sitting on the same couch, cooking in the same kitchen, cuddling the same kitty, sleeping in the same bed that we left three and a half years ago. We’re playing with old friends and visiting old hiking trails. It’s surreal to feel like nothing has changed when so much has. In many ways it still feels like we have one foot in England which is maybe why I feel so disjointed and uncertain in life and in words.

The weekend before last… or maybe it was the weekend before that… we went for a short hike at a nearby falls. It had rained a bit and the trail was sticky with mud in parts. As we walked along Roux whined, “Mama, I’m sick. I has a fever! I don’t feel well. I want you to carry me.”

“You’re fine, buddy,” I told him. “Let’s go!”

And he went, and we climbed up rudimentary stairs, and picked up giant, decaying maple leaves, and threw rocks of bridges, and hollered into a cave, and touched massive stumps that had been scorched and blackened by the Eagle Creek Fire in the early fall of 2017. The trail had been closed since the fire ripped through the forest, just reopened just in time for our return. It’s one of our favorites. Abandoned but familiar.

We hiked and we had lunch, the girls clamoring up onto a mossy rock below the falls to eat their sandwiches, pickle slices, and Halloween candy dessert. By the time we drove home with our kids’ muddy shoes in the back of the car, Roux was sniffling. By the time we got inside, changed out of our muddy clothes, and washed our muddy hands he had a fever of 101.7.

We’ve spent the last weeks mostly huddled up at home, mostly in our pajamas, mostly on our own, pockets full of tissues and emptying the medicine cabinet of cough syrup. This unintended but welcomed hibernation, maybe in part, is what’s led me back here. In assessing things it became clear that these past weeks have been the first truly still and quiet weeks we’ve had as a family in nearly a year, and in spite of the sniffles it felt good to be still and quiet. In the quiet moments of tending to coughing kids, and wiping noses, and making chicken stock I could feel words nudging at me – words that had been previously been buried in still-not-unpacked boxes, and amongst the thousands of travel photos waiting to be edited, exported, and archived. They hummed louder than the humidifier, more insistent than they’d been in a long while.

So, here I am, hoping to keep the words flowing for anyone who’s still out there reading this.

The post ABANDONED BUT FAMILIAR appeared first on WITH LOVE.

The caravan was recovered by police, damaged and missing all of our personal belongings – all of our clothing, the children’s toys and treasures, our bedding, our books – all things of little value to the thieves, but things that meant the world to us as they were going to accompany us as we took our kids to see a little slice of the world.

We made the hard decision to sell the damaged caravan back to the dealer. It would have taken too long to fix, too much money to rebuild exactly what we’d lost, and we had moved out of our home in order to take the trip and no longer had a place to live while the repairs took place.  Besides that, the caravan didn’t feel like ours anymore. It had lost it’s sweet, cozy feeling that had comforted us and been our base on other wonderful adventures. We didn’t want to go into this special time as a family feeling anxious that something like this could happen again.

We’ve spent the last two weeks trying to grieve the loss of our original dream, navigate insurance, come up with a new plan, and rebuild the basic necessities for a family of five. With our meticulously planned dream trip changed, we now simply hold a ferry ticket that will get us to France, and no other plans of where, how, or what exactly we’re going to do. But we’re together, we’re healthy, and we’re determined not to let the actions of a few terrible people deter us from fulfilling a new – if yet unknown – dream.

Many friends and family have extended support to us in the form of clothing, donations, and an endless flow of love and encouragement. We decided, after careful consideration, to set up this Go Fund Me, as there are so many of you who still want to help. Please know that your cheering us on, your love, and your words of consolation and support are more than enough, and that every small contribution is humbly and gratefully received.

For months now the first line of my Nana’s favorite Irish blessing has been with me, and they were with me on my birthday morning when we woke up to discover our caravan was gone: “May the road rise up to meet you.” Our family trusts in these words, and we know that everything is going to be okay. Thank you for being a part of our community, for extending your hands to help us up, and for being a part of getting us back on the road.

https://www.gofundme.com/on-the-road-again-2019

With love,
Kacie

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Across from me in the living room is a big stack of boxes, 14 in total, also sealed up with packing tape, ready to make the trip back to America. We won’t be joining our boxes until mid-summer, but we are moving out of this rental house in just a couple of weeks. We’re moving into my friend Jo’s house near Hampton Court Palace to live for a while – we house sat for her once before, back in the spring, and cared for Bette, her then kitten. From her house we’ll take off on our travels which will consist of three months in Spain, Portugal, Italy, and France, and then another six weeks in England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, and then we’ll come back here before we move back to America.

When viewed through the lens of missing family and friends it feels like our time here has gone so slowly, but then of course through the lens of passport stamps and adventures and time as gone by quickly. We feel ready to head home this summer, ready for family and friends, ready for Mexican food, ready for hugs, ready for time with our cat who has been so well cared for by friends why we’ve been away, ready to be back in our community.

When we moved here the homesickness was so intense, we sort of had to stop thinking about “home” so much. We had to put both our feet down here and be here. But now, with the end of our time abroad in sight, we’ve begun to let ourselves thing about home again, and what that really means.

So that’s our future, and for now I’m sitting here among the boxes and the borrowed tree getting ready for Roux’s 2nd birthday this weekend, a quiet Christmas with just us, and then Gigi’s 8th birthday – and then we move out and on. Once we’re settled at Jo’s house I will post more often, sharing photos from the last couple of seasons, and plans for things to come.

Today I have a recipe for you: Sweet and Sour Tofu and Mushrooms. This has become a regular lunch for me in these past winter weeks. It’s simple to make and so satisfying this time of year. Best enjoyed with a steady rain and a good book – which for me are mostly travel guides these days.

CRISPY SWEET AND SOUR TOFU and MUSHROOMS

Ingredients.
1/2 cup Chinese vinegar
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
2 tablespoons soy sauce
10-12 medium crimini mushrooms, thinly sliced
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons minced fresh ginger
14 oz firm tofu, cubed to about the size of dice
1 cup corn starch
vegetable oil
toasted sesame seeds
thinly sliced scallions
4 cups cooked Jasmine rice
Sriracha (optional)

Directions.
In a liquid measuring cup, combine the Chinese vinegar, brown sugar, and soy sauce. Stirring until it’s combined and the sugar has mostly dissolved. Set it aside.

In a large non-stick skillet, heat a couple tablespoons of oil over medium high heat. Sauté the mushrooms until they are golden brown. Reduce the heat and add in the garlic and ginger and sauté until fragrant – about one minute. Don’t let the garlic or ginger brown or burn. Set aside in a medium bowl.

Place the corn starch in a separate large bowl, toss the cubed tofu in the corn starch to coat.

Heat about three tablespoons of oil in the skillet over high heat. Working with about half of the tofu at a time, shake the excess corn starch from the cubes and add them to the hot skillet. Fry until all the sides are light-medium brown and crispy. Using tongs transfer the tofu to the same bowl with the mushrooms. Cook the second batch of tofu the same way. Carefully drain any remaining liquid from the skillet and wipe clean.

Replace the skillet over medium high heat, add back in the mushrooms and tofu along with the vinegar, sugar, soy sauce mixture. Sauté, stirring pretty constantly until the mixture reduces and the mushrooms and tofu are coated with a thick, caramel-like sauce.

Pour the tofu over rice, sprinkle with lots of toasted sesame seeds, scallions, and a bit of hot sauce. Enjoy while piping hot.

Serves 2.

PRINTABLE RECIPE:

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We caught the ferry early in the morning, and spent our first night in Holland…

Our second night in a rural part of northern Germany…

And our third night at an amazing in-the-middle-of-nowhere farm in Denmark…

By day four we were on our way across the water from Denmark to Norway…

We spent our the following couple of nights at a magical campsite just a couple hours into Sweden. We woke to sunshine, the clanging of sheep bells, and our Lulu’s fifth birthday which was spent splashing in the water beyond the campground, roasting “s’mores”, doing laundry, and taking much needed showers…

The following day we drove up into Hardangerfjord, settled ourselves in at a stunning campground where we ended up spending a week. We’d only planned to stay there a couple of nights, but our car had other plans. It’s a long story, but in short: a simple seal that needed replacing proved impossible to diagnose in rural Norway – so we were “stranded”. In the end, I’m glad we were. There were parts of Norway and friends in Sweden we didn’t get to see, but we had a lot of wonderful, quiet family time in this beautiful place…

We got a rental car and spent some time adventuring by ferry, but each night we’d come “home” to the campground where we’d draw, and read Harry Potter, and cook dinner, and sleep to the sounds of the water.

We took an unexpected detour to Bergen, where we spent five days walking the hills, beating the heat with ice cream and leaping into the water (okay, that was just me), and meeting new friends before flying home (our car and caravan followed by boat thanks to recovery insurance), and the seal was fixed in twenty minutes at a garage in England. Not ideal, but honestly, the trip was (nearly) perfect just the way it happened…

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One thing we talked about a lot this year was the importance of sitting down at the table with our families, friends, and maybe even strangers. To share food, connect, and talk, to use servings of Sour Cream and Seedy Mustard Mashed Potatoes, peeled layers Garlic Miso Butter Flake Rolls, hearty and rich helpings Breakfast BLTs on bouncy Classic White Bread, offers of bold and fragrant Baked Camembert with Blackberries and Rosemary, sips of delightfully tart Cardamom Cream Soda, and scoops of Charred Scallion Dip to transmit love to those other souls at the table. Her passion for connection, for feeding others, and for serving a table full of people is inspiring and heartfelt – and so needed in this particular cultural season.

I tested and fell in love with at least 40 of the recipes in this book, I made everything I could given my access to kitchen appliances and groceries here in England. One of our very favorites is the Roasted Potato & Cauliflower Burrito. It sounds… not that exciting, but let me tell you, it’s delicious! The potatoes and cauliflower are sprinkled with cumin seeds, cider vinegar, and fish sauce and roasted to a caramelized, fragrant crisp. A tart and spicy cream sauce that includes lime juice, chipotle, garlic, cumin, Dijon, and more fish sauce is slathered over the tortillas. If that weren’t enough there’s also the corn and herb salsa (the recipe for which didn’t fit on the page of the book, but I have it here for you)!

I can’t wait to get my hands on Let’s Stay In, I already know it will become one of my oil spattered, dog-eared favorites.

2 large potatoes, cut into roughly 1/2-inch pieces
1 head cauliflower cut into small florets
4 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
1/4 C extra virgin olive oil
1/4 C apple cider vinegar
2 tsps cumin seeds
2 1/2 tsps sea salt
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 Tbsp fish sauce

Burrito Sauce

1/2 C sour cream
2 Tbsp mayonnaise
1/2 tsp chipotle powder (use less if you don’t like heat)
1 garlic clove, minced
1/2 tsp fish sauce
1 Tbsp lime juice
1/4 tsp sea salt
1 tsp Dijon
1 tsp ground cumin

Corn and Herb Salsa

2 cups corn kernels (thaw completely if using frozen)
1 jalapeño, finely diced
4 scallions, white and green parts sliced
1 Tbsp olive oil
Zest of 1 lime
1 Tbsp lime juice
1/2 cup cilantro
1/2 tsp sea salt

To Serve:

1 can drained and rinsed black beans
6 to 8 large flour tortillas

For the vegetables:

Preheat the oven to 425°F

Combine the potatoes and cauliflower in a large bowl. Then add the olive oil, cider vinegar, cumin seeds, salt, pepper and fish sauce.
Toss everything to combine well.
Roast on a large sheet pan for about 45 minutes or until the vegetables are tender and deeply colored.

For the burrito sauce:
In a small bowl combine the sour cream, mayonnaise, chipotle powder, garlic, fish sauce, lime juice, salt, Dijon, and cumin. Stir well to combine.
This sauce will keep in the fridge for up to 1 week.

For the corn salsa:
In a medium bowl combine the corn, jalapeño, scallions, olive oil, lime zest and juice, cilantro, and sea salt.

Assemble:

The post LET’S STAY IN BY ASHLEY RODRIGUEZ appeared first on WITH LOVE.

“For the past two years we’ve been living abroad, having moved to a small town outside of London when I was pregnant with our third child. We were drawn to Europe from the Pacific Northwest by the lure of collecting passport stamps, and a desire to show our kids new food, art, scenery, and cultures. When our son was just a couple weeks old, we applied for his passport and soon started filling it, and ours, with those stamps. We’ve hiked around beautiful lakes and eaten Cornish pasties in England; climbed peaks and fortress steps in Salzburg; sipped beers in Belgium, and eaten ice cream in Amsterdam; wandered by Picasso and Gaudí in Barcelona; and splashed in Norwegian fjords. For much of that time with our baby happily observing, snoozing, or nursing in our Solly Wrap.
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Traveling with our kids was always something we dreamed of, an idea that we valued, and with a lot of hard work we were able to make a reality. Traveling with children is not always easy, but it’s always worth it. I keep that in mind as a mantra as I plan our greatest adventure yet – a six month long journey that will take us through Europe, Great Britain, and across the United States back ‘home’ … though we’ve learned that home can have so many definitions and nuances: a cozy place to sleep, a fragrant baguette, a familiar book, or a wrap that holds your baby close and secure in an unfamiliar, exciting place.”

Music: Nothing Much by My Bubba

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