About Me


Hey!  My name is Val.  And this is my blog.

 I would love to tell you all these wonderful things about myself that make my house calm and clean and beautiful all the time, but honestly, I am just like anybody else.  I wake up each day with the idea that the day is fresh and I try to make it the best day I can.  Sometimes I end up falling flat on my face, but other times, I find reasons to fall in love with my life all over again. 

Most of the time I cook whole foods, eat local and organic, and create beautiful recycled crafts.  But I have also been known to drop Peeps into my kids organic and fair trade hot cocoa, and enjoy the glorious love that is a Micheal's cardstock sale.  In my mind, it is all about balance.  Sometimes the tables are turned one way, and at other times, they are turned the other direction so you can realize what your goals were in the first place. 

I have been blogging for 8 years now.  It seems strange to write that out, because I have only been blogging 'for readers' for about two years.  But I have been using this as an online journal since my daughter (now 10!) was a hellun' two year old (and that is so not just a figure of speech). 

I spend a lot of time in the kitchen.  We are home a lot and I often find myself cooking a full three meals a day. I also LOVE food preservation.  Putting away food for lean times is in my blood somehow.  I have shelves upon shelves of good food put away for winter each fall and we use all of it by the next summer.  I buy locally and organically and it makes me feel like a warm little mouse to see my food shelves fill up with summer goodness.  I tend to add my recipes here, so check back and find the flavors I have discovered to eat all year long.


We homeschool... which means we spend our days learning from every opportunity that we can.  I also keep a homeschool blog that I post to about our school workings.  I love teaching my kids, and I honestly learn just as much as they do through our days of discovery.  I am not die hard with any particular pedagogy, as I believe that following the child is the main goal of homeschooling, and if they need another educational philosophy for a certain subject I will follow what they need... but I do love the stories, the nature, and the art of the Waldorf Traditions, and so far, my children have really enjoyed it as well. We also dabble in Montessori, Charolette Mason, and Classical Education.  All this thrown into a 'living school' or unschooling model.  We follow our hearts and our interests and it serves us well.



I find it my personal challenge to live as deliberately as possible and show my 4 children how to do the same. I honestly believe that my life is truly beautiful... with little pitfalls, dirty diapers, and broken jars of peaches thrown in for color.
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