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Mommy Secrets, Boise, ID (2025)

10/21/2019

This week my husband and I are going away on a all expense paid trip for our anniversary from my company for our 15th anniversary. It’s the first time we’ve been without kids for longer than 24 hours ever. We are so excited and I was planning to get everything in order this weekend but things went a little differently than planned when a crazy storm blew through. We had a really strong storm blow through that wrecked havoc on our property. It blew our coop over, snapped a tree in our orchard off, ripped the roof off one of our little goat barns, and blew buckets down our street. It was crazy. The big boys and dad worked hard to get everything back up and repaired. I stayed inside and made them chicken and dumplings and oatmeal raisin cookies. Notice the sky in these pictures? It’s crazy how beautiful it gets outside after a storm. After this weekend, today I will be running around like a crazy woman getting everything in order.

10/16/2019

This is sweet Patches that was born this spring on our homestead. If you scroll back through my magazine you will see her right after she was born. I love sheep so much! They are such beautiful, peaceful animals. Owning them has also given me such a deeper understanding of the Biblical parables. She has the most beautiful fleece. The giveaway that is up now includes a skein of yarn from her aunt. We raise Icelandic’s here for their fiber and their meat. It is about to be breeding season, which is exciting because it means spring babies are coming! We move them all with a ram this weekend!

10/15/2019

Anyone else have tweens in the house? This is my second oldest and he just turned 10 this past spring. In between the ages of 10-12 so many things happen so quickly. They shoot up in height, the attitudes arrive, and their faces start to change. It’s like you can SEE them changing every day. They are lost somewhere between boyhood and manhood and I wish I could just slow time down. Here he is with his nerf gun in the shot as a reminder of the little boy he still is and yet he’s got on his backwards hat and feet on the counter like a man in training memorizing one of Ronald Reagan’s speeches. Such a juxtaposition of the two stages of life.

10/14/2019

🏡 👩‍🏫GIVEAWAY🏡👩‍🏫
Fall is in full swing and many of us are feeling in need of a pick me up. I’ve partnered up with some of my favorite homeschool mama accounts to offer one mama this amazing kit of our favorite mama comfort gifts. One winner will win:
🛋 A Cozy Blanket
📖 The Call of The Wild + Free Book
📖 Teaching from Rest
📔 Gratitude Journal
✏️ Colored Pencils all for yourself
🧶 A skein of 100% wool yarn from a homeschool family’s farm
💎 An Essential Oil Diffuser Bracelet
🛁 Handmade Soap and a Bath Bomb
🚿 A Relaxing Shower Steamer
☕️ A Beautiful Mug
🍵 A Box of Organic Peppermint Tea
🍇 An Elderberry Syrup Kit

To enter check out my account on Instagram at .

10/11/2019

along with several rotating cohosts have teamed up to bring you . So grab your likely lukewarm drink, take a break at the messy table, and join us to meet some awesome mamas!
‍👩🏾👩🏼‍🦰👩🏽
We can read ALL the blogs but nothing is quite like real conversations with real people. Being able to ask questions and gather ideas from women is invaluable. That's what this is all about!
📚 📚📚
This loop will happen every Friday at 11 am EST hopefully to get your through your last few hours before the weekend. We hope you find support, encouragement, and make new friends. Aren't you glad that community building can happen right here, on Instagram wherever you are?
📝📝📝
Send a DM if you’re interested in participating as a co-host. We would love for you to co-host, so don't be shy!
🙋🏼‍♀️🙋🏽‍♀️🙋🏻‍♀️
1. Check out my squares at and follow along if you find yourself inspired.
2. Read my question and answer. Check out other answers left in the comments.
3. Head over to to continue the chat loop. More amazing homeschool moms are waiting for you!
QUESTION: What are your favorite educational shows or series on streaming services (Hulu, Netflix, YouTube, etc.)?
👩🏻‍🏫👩🏿‍💻🦸🏼‍♀️

10/10/2019

Do any of your children have a special bond? I love how homeschooling fosters such deep sibling relationships (the good and the bad). My oldest and my youngest are 7.5 year apart and have the sweetest bond. We went to the pumpkin patch yesterday and the boys were told they could bring home any pumpkin they wanted as long as they could carry it. My boys rushed off the hayride in a fury and I couldn’t locate my littlest for a quick second. I look across the field and see him with my oldest who was helping him pick a pumpkin before he picked his own. I caught just the tail end of the interaction and couldn’t take a picture fast enough, but he was bent down on his level explaining that he had to carry it. Having all boys means there is lots of fighting, lots of messes, and lots of smells but moments like this make it all worthwhile. When we found out my youngest was another boy, my oldest cried he wanted a baby sister so badly, but I think he ended up loving his smallest brother more than he ever imagined.

10/09/2019

Meet Kali. “Ranch-wife, boy-mom, natural health & wellness advocate, and fitness lover! Cooking clean meals for my family brings me joy, intense cardio gives me life, and finding natural alternatives for our health and wellness is my jam!

👆🏻👆🏻 That’s always been me. I’ve always been healthy. At least that’s what I’ve always thought. Except I...

1) Only pooped every couple of days (ouch)

2) Popped Zantac like it was candy because of my GERD

3) Had 3-4 meltdowns a week while getting dressed for work in the mornings and my clothes not fitting

4) Ate a sleeve of Oreos before bed every night (with milk, obviously) because the craving was that intense

5) Had no desire to be intimate with my handsome husband whom I loved more than anything

6) Googled “signs of being bipolar” every now and then because the mood swings were getting out of hand

7) Lived on Midol for five to seven days every month because of how terrible my cramps would get

😎 Had to sit down due to the room spinning in circles daily

9) Put my babe down for naps earlier than necessary because I needed a nap more than he did

👆🏻👆🏻 Y’all, my body was literally screaming IMBALANCE. I just didn’t know it! I thought all of that was normal! Well, it was MY normal. Until it wasn’t.. 💕”

Kali started taking the supplements that changed my life too and now...

“Life since incorporating these products into my already semi-healthy lifestyle is good. I mean REALLY good. My husband has his wife back, my son has his mommy back, and most importantly - I have myself back. Trust the process, y'all. This stuff really does work.” It just not normal to feel sick, tired, and grumpy all the time! Get your gut in order and be amazed at how amazing you feel!

10/08/2019

The Kindness Jar has been fully operational for a few days. We have been having some issues with kindness lately and I had run out of ideas. A mentor in my life gave me this idea. The jar is filled with about 50 acts of Kindness. Each time they are unkind to a sibling they must choose something from the jar. So far, it has worked quite well. There has been some unhappiness about the act they pick but once they do it they are always happy and feeling better about themselves and their sibling they were unkind to. Later today I’ll open some of the activities in my stories to give you an idea of what I wrote down.

10/07/2019

Quality time and being outdoors are my love languages. I am realizing from the book Wild+Free from andfree.co that I have been reading that they are essential to the positive growth of my children as well. It is so easy to get caught up in schoolwork, chores, sports, and activities that I forget to make this a priority. And then I wonder why everyone is miserable. This past Friday my husband and I decided to change that. We grabbed a bag of marshmallows, postponed the dinner dishes, put a fire in the fire pit, and watched the sunset in our backyard. The conversations, laughs, and relationship building that took place would never have taken place around the dinner table. We vowed to make this sort of thing happen more frequently. It has spurred so many conversations about how and why we do what we do with our boys. What are your family’s favorite outdoor activities to do together?

10/04/2019

along with several rotating cohosts have teamed up to bring you . So grab your likely lukewarm drink, take a break at the messy table, and join us to meet some awesome mamas!
‍👩🏾👩🏼‍🦰👩🏽
We can read ALL the blogs but nothing is quite like real conversations with real people. Being able to ask questions and gather ideas from women is invaluable. That's what this is all about!
📚 📚📚
This loop will happen every Friday at 11 am EST hopefully to get your through your last few hours before the weekend. We hope you find support, encouragement, and make new friends. Aren't you glad that community building can happen right here, on Instagram wherever you are?
📝📝📝
Send a DM if you’re interested in participating as a co-host. We would love for you to co-host, so don't be shy!
🙋🏼‍♀️🙋🏽‍♀️🙋🏻‍♀️
1. Check out my squares nmamaem and follow along if you find yourself inspired.
2. Read my question and answer. Check out other answers left in the comments.
3. Head over to to continue the chat loop. More amazing homeschool moms are waiting for you!
QUESTION: How has your homeschooling approach and philosophy changed over the years? If you are new to homeschooling I’d love to hear how you decided on your approach and philosophy ☺️
👩🏻‍🏫👩🏿‍💻🦸🏼‍♀️

09/30/2019

This weekend we repainted the chicken coop. Swipe to see before. We are officially rid of all the “poop brown” paint 😂 When we moved into our house it was painted this brown color and we painted the coop to match it when we built it. My husband built it himself after I gave him a design. We chose to paint it the accent color of our house that we repainted last year. Swipe to see it on our house. Picking paint colors seriously stresses me out, even for something as simple as a chicken coop! I am so glad to be rid of the ugly brown completely now! The kids were all thrilled when we bought them cheap paint brushes and let them help. It was a fun family project even if my@toddler got more paint on himself than the coop.

09/27/2019

along with several rotating cohosts have teamed up to bring you . So grab your likely lukewarm drink, take a break at the messy table, and join us to meet some awesome mamas!
‍👩🏾👩🏼‍🦰👩🏽
We can read ALL the blogs but nothing is quite like real conversations with real people. Being able to ask questions and gather ideas from women is invaluable. That's what this is all about!
📚 📚📚
This loop will happen every Friday at 11 am EST hopefully to get your through your last few hours before the weekend. We hope you find support, encouragement, and make new friends. Aren't you glad that community building can happen right here, on Instagram wherever you are?
📝📝📝
Send a DM if you’re interested in participating as a co-host. We would love for you to co-host, so don't be shy!
🙋🏼‍♀️🙋🏽‍♀️🙋🏻‍♀️
1. Check out my squares and follow along if you find yourself inspired.
2. Read my question and answer. Check out other answers left in the comments.
3. Head over to to continue the chat loop. More amazing homeschool moms are waiting for you!
QUESTION: I am working on building my library and would love some book suggestions. I know I need books on inventors, explorers, history after the 1800s, and space. What are your favorite books you own in your library? Bonus points if they cover the above topics!
👩🏻‍🏫👩🏿‍💻🦸🏼‍♀️

09/27/2019

We let the chickens back in the orchard this week. Our first season we made a homestead rookie mistake and let them have access all year. They ate all our fruit 😠 Their run area is completely dirt after the summer so they were thrilled to have lush green grass again. Do you have chickens? Confession: they are my least favorite farm animals and I think they are gross. However eggs and chicken (meat) are a necessity in our house so I put up with them.

09/24/2019

Do you have any acorn squash recipes you love? This weekend we picked a wheelbarrow full of them. I need ideas! Picking squash made me realize fall is really here! Fall is my favorite. Growing up in the south it always felt like fall was two weeks long. Since moving to Idaho I love the four full seasons. The sun was so bright and the garden still so green I just had to take this picture. I love our property so so much.

09/23/2019

In my stories on Friday I shared a little update on how much we are loving history. We made a huge curriculum shift this year and we have really loved it so far. You can see my story from Friday in the Ambleside highlight on my profile. I have also included some pictures of his narrations. My son listens to me read and begins to draw something he sees in his mind while I read. When I finish reading he tells me his narration as well as what he drew. When I first started looking at these books I was a little nervous about them being too difficult or boring for him but it has truly amazed me how much he can pick up when we read just small increments at a time. I have also been amazed at his narrations. This curriculum has been such a delight for both of us.

09/12/2019

Lezlie was a skeptic too...
“My name is Lezlie Andrew and I’m a homeschool mom to four kids ages 12, 8, 4 and 2.

I’m the very proud wife of a pastor & musician. Our days are crazy and hectic, and I can’t image it any other way! I love alternative holistic ways to keep my family healthy. That being said, I’m a huge researcher and had become an even bigger skeptic when it comes to ingredients (especially in supplements). In a span of 11 years I carried and birthed three babies and adopted one. I found that my focus was solely on my loved ones and that my health was seriously lacking. I suffered from thyroid and hormone issues, severe eczema, fatigue, chronic joint pain, anxiety & depression, and was about 100lbs overweight. I was only 32 years old! Along with that, my oldest daughter had food intolerances and digestive issues. Not to mention with four kids, we were constantly picking something up and then passing it around for months. We had tried everything. Elimination diets, extra supplements and vitamins, and essential oils. Despite trying to be natural, and get my kids healthy, we seemed to still be struggling with our health issues, and just seemed to be missing something.
When I had a close friend mention the products I will share with you tonight, to say I was skeptical, is an understatement. The only reason I tried it was to say I had, and knowing I could get my money back when it didn’t work. I joined as a closet user, and was never going to share anything. Well, here I am, and I want to shout these products from rooftops! I no longer suffer from any of the things I mentioned above and I've seen my entire family benefit greatly from these products! I don’t feel like I am living in the mom fog, tired and rundown. I don’t binge on cravings after the kids go to bed. And BEST of all for this momma, my daughter is thriving and when we do pick up germs, we have gotten our immune systems healthy enough to fight it off so much quicker. Oh, and did I mention I've lost a total of 85lbs?! My only regret is not paying attention to gut health sooner, and realizing just how many issues there are that are connected to it!”

09/12/2019

I got so many messages yesterday from my stories asking where we lived. We live in a tiny rural town in SW Idaho an we love it. We live in the valley so our weather is mild. I like to say our weather is magical because we have four equal seasons with no extremes: 3 months of each. Summer happens to be my least favorite so when fall begins to show it makes me so happy. This is the view from our backyard, we live at the base of the Owyhee Mountains. What do you love about where you live?

09/10/2019

Does your family go on weekly nature walks? They have quickly become my favorite activity of the week. The fresh air, the walking, the intentional effort of noticing creation. All of it is just so good for the soul. Here the boys are watching little fish in a lake. We need to figure out a way to get the observations into our nature journal that’s something we haven’t done yet. Any tips? We have flowers and leaves in the flower press and pictures of animals we find but we have not found the time to record what we have discovered yet.

Mommy Secrets

10/21/2019

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