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Book Review: The Afterlife of Holly Chase
I am not even gonna pretend on this one. If you are only going to read ONE book this Christmas Season, it should be THIS one!! The Afterlife of Holly Chase by Cynthia Hand is a modern CHRISTMAS CAROL retelling and I could NOT put it down!!! My homeschool group is learning about Dickens and A Christmas Carol this month, and so I just sorta FELL into this book by accident while searching for a book that would interest my high school girls. Before I even assigned pages to read, one student already finished the book AND LOVED IT!! And I downloaded it to pre-read before my students got it…
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Create a SIMPLE hot chocolate station in minutes!!
Christmas is coming in hot this year!!! I am still sneaking Halloween candy out of the pantry after the kids go to sleep and I am WAY behind on putting up the Christmas tree and buying Christmas presents. But whether I am ready or not…HERE IT COMES!! As my kids get older and the Christmas magic is tougher to create, I have tried to add in little bits of joy each day…ANYTHING to add a bit of Christmas cheer and extra goodness to each day leading up to Christmas. This year, I decided to create a simple little hot chocolate station for the kids to enjoy. These days it can…
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Simple 3 Ingredient Pumpkin Cake
There has been ONE autumn recipe that has been a staple in our life for YEARS!! It is yummy, tried and true, and COMPLETELY simple. I didn’t think that this 2 ingredient pumpkin cake could get ANY better…but this year…IT DID!!! You can still find the original recipe HERE and trust me…you will want to add that one to your fall baking line up too. BUT now…say hello to 3 INGREDIENT PUMPKIN CAKE!!! Which one is better?? The original recipe will still be my go to pumpkin cake recipe. It can be made into muffins, cookies, bread, and cake, but this new version is MUCH more decadent. So to amp…
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Simple Air Fryer Apple Pie
It might not TECNICALLY be fall yet…but in MY mind, summer is long over and it is time to bring on the apples, pumpkin spice, and crunchy leaves…YES PLEASE!!! I am already in FULL ON apple baking mode. Good thing it is almost hoodie season too…cause the summer body I never got this year is ready for big fluffy sweaters and Christmas cookies…and of course some yummy air fryer apple pie…yummmmm!!!! I started off the baking season with this yummy air fryer apple pie and it was a GOOD choice!! Yummy apple goodness, flaky sugary crust, only 2 ingredients, and ALMOST zero effort or baking skill required…MY KIND OF RECIPE!!!…
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Cherry Picking: The BEST EASIEST restaurant style salsa!!!
Holy Toledo…summer came and went in a dang flash!!! I had SOOOOO many big plans for this summer and…well they are still in the planning stage…haha!! Oh well…There is always NEXT year:) What is new this week?? What is happening at Orchard Slope?! Well we are getting ready for BACK TO SCHOOL over here if you can believe it!!Even though it is 100 degress outside, FALL IS ON THE WAY!! Over on Instagram this week I shared a super fun and easy BACK TO SCHOOL TABLE idea. How cute are those apple plates??? I often worry that my kids are getting too old for cute crafty things, but my teen…
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Book Review: The Winter Guest
Being a homeschool mom has many benefits, but one downside is my lack of solo time. I spend 24 hours a day with my kids…which is GREAT…but also often makes me wanna pull out all of my hair and hide in the pantry with a bag of chocolate chips. It also GREATLY limits my personal reading time. In the last year I have read LOTS of books aloud to Ethan about dragons and Camelot and talking mice. AND I have read Little House on the Prairie and Heidi again for the first time in YEARS. BUT at the end of the day, I was starting to feel the need for…
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The softest chocolate chip cookie recipe
Wanna know the SOFTEST chocolate chip cookie recipe???? These cookies will not disappoint and will keep your cookies NICE and soft FOR DAYS!!! There is JUST something about a warm chocolate chip cookie that NEVER gets old. No matter what new cool thing comes out…I will NEVER stop loving the good old standby cookie. AND the best part is that there are about 10 million different recipes to try. BUT the one I ALWAYS go back to is this one with a super secret ingredient that makes these the softest gooiest cookies AND keeps them nice and soft for up to a week.!! BECAUSE there is nothing worse than a…
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Tips for decluttering your closet TODAY!!
If there is ONE thing that most people all have in common, I think it is STUFF!! We all have it…most of us have too much of it…and we are always trying to find ways to deal with it. While on vacation, I realized that my closet at home needed to be more like my suitcase…only filled with items I COULD and WOULD wear. This led me to a deep clean and declutter of my closet to make it more usable, less cluttered, and WAYYYY more peaceful. You can watch how I did it and WHY in my most recent Youtube video!! Make sure you subscribe to my Youtube channel…
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Caramel Apple Dump Cake
You guys…it is BARELY Fall-ISH weather and I am already craving ALL of the warm gooey winter treats. SOOOOO it is time for me to officially enter the hoodie and leggings portion of the year I guess. During camping season I was REALLY itching to make a Dutch oven peach cobbler (or dump cake), but never got around to it. THEN I decided to try some APPLE recipes since it is THAT time of year. THEN I had a caramel apple the other day and BOOM…my brain was like…I bet a caramel apple CAKE would be AMAZING!! AND guess what…IT IS!! Say hello to Caramel Apple Dump Cake. OK…so let…
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THE PINK STUFF
You know all those cool products that pop up on TikTok that you just cannot believe that you ever lived without?? NO….REALLY!?!! Haha….me either. I actually do not even HAVE TikTok, yet SOMEHOW I see these videos and then find myself sneaking off to Amazon to purchase a random cleaner called THE PINK STUFF!! I watched people cleaning ALL SORTS OF DISCUSTING STUFF with this cute little jar of pink cream…and I jumped right on that bandwagon REAL QUICK!!! SOOOO first off, what the heck IS the pink stuff??? Well I am not a scientist, so I don’t actually KNOW, but I DO know that it smells a bit like…
