The Orange Rhino Challenge.....and a Medicated Mom?

It didn't take much for me to realize, that I yell entirely too much. It's a daily thing. I yell at my kids for "misbehaving", for fighting, for not paying attention during our homeschool lessons, for "being annoying or whiny".

I yell at them all the time......I hate this about me.

Late last night, I happened upon an interesting website, called  Theorangerhino.com. It is written by a mom, who yelled too much. It's amazing!!! She challenged herself to a year, with NO YELLING!!! And she did it! Then she wrote a book about it and challenged other parents to go any amount of time, without yelling at their kids!

The theory, is that we don't take the time to realize that, when we yell, it's generally NOT because we're angry with our kids. Typically, our kids behavior is just the trigger that sets us off. We're really just stressed about life, tired, or angry with some other adult. Our kids just happen to come under fire and it's so unfair to them.

 For me, this challenge is sheer brilliance. I am so excited to start! I imagine it won't be easy, as yelling has been part of my parenting for my 9 years as a parent. But I'm determined to do this, More determined than I have ever been about any diet or attempt to quit smoking (which, I'd like to note, I have been smoke free for over 18 months!). This is something I HAVE to do, not just for my babies, but for me too!

SO! Wish me luck folks! Today is Day 1 of my Orange Rhino Challenge.......anyone care to join me?

Check out the site and then commit to quit yelling!!!!

She might be a hypochondriac......

The conversation I just had with my Bitty girl (6 year old).

(A commercial for lice shampoo is on)

Bitty- "Mommy, I needs that"

Me- "No sweetheart, you don't"

Bitty- "YES I DOES!! My head is so itchy!"

Me- "Baby, that's not for an itchy head"

Bitty- "Well, what's it for then?"

Me- "It's for icky bugs in your hair, you don't have those"

Bitty- "YES I DOES!!! It's so icthy! I can feel them crawling everywhere. MOMMY I NEED THAT!!"

So needless to say, my daughter is convinced that she has lice and that I need to buy her the shampoo to rid her of them. Awesome.

The Medicated Mom's Guide To- Planning a Homeschool Curriculum

When I decided that I wanted to homeschool my children, I had no idea how how much work was going to be involved. Now that I've gotten my hands into it...... it's A LOT of freaking work! I've spent the past 3 months planning for this school year, but when I look at everything, I am no where near ready! But as of today, I'm okay with that!

I'm going to assume that at least one of my readers, is a homeschooler. I'm also going to assume that this one reader is struggling to plan for this year. For that reader, I have some advice!!

WINE!! You'll need lots of wine and a sense of humor.....and maybe a Xanax or two.

That's it. That's my advice for properly planning how to educate your children. Wine, Xanax and a few giggles. I'm kidding!!

Truth is, I don't think that spazzing is going to help my situation at all, so I've decided to take a step back, take in a few deep, cleansing breaths (and a couple glasses of vino) and focus on the following:

-Putting together a secular curriculum that works best for our home.
-Setting up a schedule for school time.
-Gathering materials and preparing for our school year!

That's my plan for the rest of this month. Next month I'll put it all together and hopefully, be ready to start.  I'll update my progress as I go. For now, I'm going to let this ambien kick in and drift off to sleep!

I want to share a few links to some sites that I've found pretty helpful thus far. Hope you find them helpful as well!!

TeachersPayTeachers.com - A great source for worksheets and other materials. Made by teachers, for teachers!

lesson plans at Lakeshore Learning - Free lesson plans for preschool thru 5th grade!

1st Grade Curriculum- An entire 1st grade curriculum.....for FREE!

ReadWriteThink -Lesson plans and activities for reading. 

Monthly Activities & Resources - Themes and activities for each month!

Vocabulary Lessons for Grade 1 - Online vocabulary lessons.

Free Online Spelling  - Interactive spelling lists and test for grades 1-8. 

1st grade worksheets -Printable worksheets for 1st graders...that are FREE!!! 

Hope some of this helps! I'll post whatever else I come across that appears to be useful.