Kimber's Navy Family

  Now that my husband has completed power school, I have been wanting to write a blog post on the experience from my perspective. I have found that the blog " (Very) Unofficial Submarine Officer Pipeline Rundown " has been useful during our trek through the pipeline. My husband went through power school and prototype when he first joined the Navy, before I met him. This was his second time going through power school, last time enlisted, this time officer. I think he had an idea of what to expect from power school, but I had no idea... The blog post " Navy Nuclear Power School Rundown " helped some and from conversations with my husband I knew there would be long hours studying. However, living something is very different than hearing about it. So what can you expect from power school? First of all, there are some long, long, long, long hours. Long hours with no cell phones since they cannot bring their cell phones into the school house. If you have to get a ...

I've received several emails and Facebook comments lately regarding homeschooling preschool. I wrote a post called " Homeschooling 5-year old preschool ." I feel 5-year old preschool was different from his previous years of preschool because he was technically old enough to be a kindergartner, but we decided against doing kindergarten that year. Instead we did another year of preschool with him, just with a more focused direction; he is a child that loves order, structure, and routine. When considering preschool, there are many different schools of thought. Some really focus on early learning and some focus on play based learning and some on "unschooling." I don't like labels, so I will just describe our thinking when it comes to preschool. I think preschool should be fun. I think it should be play based learning. I think that preschool should focus on character building and how to interact with others. I think it should build a child's confidence ...

We have started our oldest son's kindergarten year. I was a little nervous about starting kindergarten, not that I felt it would be hard, but that it is the first year that actually "counts." I put counts in quotations because there seems to be some debate in the South Carolina homeschool circles about whether or not you need to join an accountability group for kindergarten. I prefer to error on the side of caution, so I joined an accountability group for kindergarten. Thus, for us, this is the first year that counts. (Check out HSLDA for homeschooling laws: link to South Carolina homeschooling laws .) I really like this post by Simple Homeschool called " The truth about preschool ." The post is about homeschooling preschool and how most of preschool lessons are learned organically. I loved it and totally agree. I wrote a post awhile ago called " Homeschooling 5-year old preschool ." I think it is really important at these ages for school to be f...

    Motherhood is challenging to navigate. There is so much out there on, well, everything.   "You must buy this!"   "If you want your baby to grow up feeling loved, do this..." "Remember to always speak this way." "It's the little things that count." Even on this blog I talk about how I do things and about the products that I have liked with our boys. But that's what they are: things that I liked. That doesn't mean that you will like them or that you should parent how I do. It doesn't even mean that you should do things how I do. I'm talking about things that work for me and my family. Why? Because I like reading about how other people do things. I like talking to other people and finding out about how they solve some of the more difficult challenges of motherhood, how they fix the small and big stuff. I like hearing other people's family schedules. I like knowing that I am not the only one ...

Since we've brought our 4th child home, I've been wanting to write a blog post about our stroller. Recently I wrote a blog post called " Stroller shopping checklist " that helps you find the right stroller for your family. In it, I also give the reasons as to how we ended up investing in the Baby Jogger City Select with the second seat . I've already written several blog posts on our stroller, the first being " I love my stroller ." This stroller has also made it on my must-have lists, the most in detail being " Can't buy me love " and " 0-2 years old twin: must haves ."  In the post " Stroller shopping checklist ," I explain why I am so passionate about having a good stroller that fits our family's lifestyle: I was so nervous about how I would manage a toddler and twins and having a stroller that suited our lifestyle helped make that much easier for me to handle on my own. I know that sounds really corny,...