Oh my aching back!!

How many times do you hear a pregnant Mom say that? For me, that carries on into nursing, many times for the first few months my shoulders and upper back will ache from holding my little one to nurse. My sweet husband gives me many back rubs during those long months of pregnancy and nursing.

I was intrigued when I read a review of the Spoonk Rider Acupressure Mat, and I was excited to be sent one to review. I have always been a firm believer that our bodies have pressure points that help relax us, and even help heal our bodies to some degrees. My sister is currently going to have Acupuncture treatments each week, and has found help from them.

The Spoonk Rider Acupressure Mat has 6,210 small spikes that provide equal pressure on your body. Simply lay on the mat on the area that you are wanting to treat, and allow the mat to stimulate blood circulation and relax muscle tension.



The Spoonk Rider acupressure mat is an all-natural product. It consists of a 100% cotton cover, recyclable non-toxic ABS plastic spikes, and natural foam created with Variable Pressure Foaming™ technology. I was very impressed that there was no smell of plastic at all when I took the mat out of the box. There is no off gassing at all.

I have used the mat at night when I go to bed. The first time I used it I became dizzy, which seems to be common as they give instructions to stop using it when it makes you dizzy. So it must be working! Last night my varicose veins were really hurting in my leg, so I laid on the mat to try and get the blood circulation going better. The pain did stop after a while! I was amazed over the list of what they claim the mat can help:

Improve blood circulation
Boost energy
Achieve deeper sense of relaxation
Ease muscle tension
Reduce back, neck, hip and joint pain
Release endorphins Increase oxygen flow Induce and deepen sleep
Improve digestion
Strengthen immune system
Slow aging
Stimulate libido
And much, much more

I do have to give a disclaimer that I am not in support of some of the pictures they use for advertising purposes. Anyone who reads my blog on a regular basis knows that I'm a modest Mom, and I'm not ashamed about it! Also, while I am a believer in Acupuncture, I very much balance it with the word of God. Many times you can swing to far into alternative medicine and start believing in healing your inner spirit, etc. and I do not believe in anything that is related to a New Age philosophy. That being said, I think this mat could be a big help for those that struggle with neck pain, back pain, etc.

Buy It!
You can buy a Spoonk Rider Acupressure Mat for $69.00 dollars.

Win It!
One of my readers will win a mat! To enter, go to the Spoonk Space website and tell me which color of mat you would prefer.

EXTRA ENTRIES!

NOTE: THERE ARE NEW WAYS TO EARN EXTRA ENTRIES!!
You can do any of these things for an extra entry. Make sure to leave a separate comment for EACH thing you do. If you currently follow us in one of these ways, that still counts as an extra entry, even if you did it a while ago. Just make sure you are still following us in that way (i.e via email, facebook, etc.).

1- Subscribe to our blog via email.

2. Follow us on our blog using Google Friend connect!

3. Follow us on Facebook and leave a comment letting us know.

4. Share about this giveaway on your Facebook page, and leave a comment with the link.-earn 2 entries!

5. Follow us on Twitter and leave a comment letting us know you follow!

6. Blog about this giveaway and leave the link.-2 extra entries (leave two comments saying you did this).

7. Place our NEW Modest Mom button on your blog (please replace the old one you might have) and earn TWO extra entries for doing so!

PLEASE leave a separate comment each time you do one of the above. The comments are closed on this post, just use the form below to enter. We never share your email addresses with anyone, which is why we use the form to keep them private!

This giveaway will end Wednesday, November 3 at midnight, and a winner will be posted the following morning. We will notify the winners and they will have 36 hours to respond! Open to US Only.

This was not a paid post and my honest opinions were used. The opinions are solely my own. Thank you to Spoonk Space who supplied the product for the review and giveaway.

Do you need a better schedule?

I am so excited that Amy from Blogging With Amy finally has her new e-book released! Tell Your Time: How To Manage Your Time So You Can Live Fulfilled" is an e-book about how to order your days better. I have been reading tidbits of her blog whenever I find the time, and I have been impressed with what I have read. Amy is Money Saving Mom's assistant and I have heard nothing but rave reviews from Crystal on how much this system has helped her order her days!

I just ordered my e-book, and I can't wait to sit down and read it-after school has finished that is! Today ONLY you can get this e-book for the special introductory price of $5.00. Just enter YAYFORLAUNCH at the checkout to take advantage of this deal! It normally will be priced at $12.00. I don't know of many Mom's who are satisfied with how their days go, especially homeschooling moms. If you are wanting to improve your days, hurry over and purchase this! It ends tonight at 6:00 CST.

Moby Wrap Review and Giveaway

I love carrying my babies. It is very satisfying to be able to snuggle a little one, while being able to get work done around the house at the same time! I bought my first carrier with my second child, and I will always be grateful that I did!

There are several different types of Carriers available, the frame carrier, the pouch carrier, the asian type carrier, and the wrap carrier. I think the first company that comes to mind for a lot of people when a wrap carrier is mentioned is The Moby Wrap Company. They seem to be extremely popular, probably in part because of their affordable price, and their great quality!

When Olivia was born a friend let me borrow her wrap to snuggle her in. It was very helpful during those first months when she was to little to go into the ergo, and just needed to be help a lot. While it was a challenge at first to learn how to wrap, I watched several you tube videos, and quickly got the basics down. I do not claim to be highly skilled at wrapping by any means, but I think almost anyone can learn it after watching the instructions.

The Moby Wrap Carrier is made out of 100% cotton, and basically it is a long stretchy piece of fabric that you use to wrap around your baby, your back and waist to keep your baby secure and happy without you using your hands to hold the baby. The wrap is designed to be used with a baby up to 35 pounds.



I was sent the Organic Moby Wrap to review, and I love the color of the eggplant wrap! Olivia has enjoyed getting to face out to see everything, and I have enjoyed getting to try something different. While my favorite time to use the Moby is the first few months of a babies life, I can see how if you were very good at wrapping you would continue it through toddler age. The great thing about the Moby is that you can even nurse in it!

Wearing your baby is the latest craze-for good reason. Women have been wearing their babies for hundreds of years, and I'm thrilled to have such good quality items available to use for my babies! I love how safe and calm my babies are when I carry them in a carrier.

Buy It!
You can buy a Moby Wrap for $39.95-$69.95

Win It!
One of my readers will win a Moby Wrap that retails for $39.95! To enter, go to the Moby website and tell me which color you would like.

EXTRA ENTRIES!

NOTE: THERE ARE NEW WAYS TO EARN EXTRA ENTRIES!!
You can do any of these things for an extra entry. Make sure to leave a separate comment for EACH thing you do.

1- Subscribe to our blog via email.

2. Follow us on our blog using Google Friend connect!

3. Follow us on Facebook and leave a comment letting us know.

4. Share about this giveaway on your Facebook page, and leave a comment with the link.-earn 2 entries!

5. Follow us on Twitter and leave a comment letting us know you follow!

6. Blog about this giveaway and leave the link.-2 extra entries (leave two comments saying you did this).

7. Place our NEW Modest Mom button on your blog (please replace the old one you might have) and earn TWO extra entries for doing so!

PLEASE leave a separate comment each time you do one of the above. The comments are closed on this post, just use the form below to enter. We never share your email addresses with anyone, which is why we use the form to keep them private!

This giveaway will end Wednesday, November 3 at midnight, and a winner will be posted the following morning. We will notify the winners and they will have 36 hours to respond! Open to US Only.

This was not a paid post and my honest opinions were used. The opinions are solely my own. Thank you to Moby Wrap who supplied the product for the review and giveaway.

CSN Store Review

As a busy Mom, I find myself ordering more things online. Now that I'm homeschooling on top of having four children, my time is limited to go running around all the time! I used to go garage sailing a lot, and even that has scaled way back!

One store that is helpful to know about is the CSN store. They have lots of different products, and many of them ship for free!

Some things they have are:


This really pretty ottoman coffee table. Wouldn't that look lovely sitting by a black couch?




Or how about this adorable doll stroller for your little girl?




This fantastic Le Creuset Skillet looks wonderful to use! I have yet to have a pan from this company, but someday I hope to!



With the holiday season coming up, it is a good time to start looking around for good deals online. Definitely keep CSN store in mind when you are buying things online!

This and That....

I have several different companies that I wanted to share with you all, so I thought I would just combine them all into one great post! Some of these companies offer services I use all the time, and others offer products that I thought looked so great I wanted to share it with you!

1.Learn Your Letters, Learn to Serve

When things seem to be falling apart...

Don't lose heart...when all around you things seem to be crumbling, and everything around you seems to be black clouds, don't give up.

Even when your daughter is running around for hours upon waking up still in her diaper that she slept in, lunch is crackers and cheese, it takes you all day to clean the house because you are tired and discouraged, DO NOT GIVE IN!

I miss my Mom a lot. Days like today (as described above) are difficult. I have a hard time bonding with my children and experiencing their childhood joys and sorrows, as I just want to go bury my head and cry myself. Then I heap guilt upon myself because I tell myself I'm not being a good enough mother.

Sorrow is natural. Tears are not to be frowned upon.

"To Everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven;

A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance." Ecclesiastes 3:1,4

But guilt is not natural. The Guilt that can come upon us as Mothers most of the time comes from Satan. I was putting my children to bed tonight, and my five year old son told me that Satan mixes things up for us in a mixing bowl. He makes it look good, but will throw in just a little lie, but we take all of it because it looks good or tastes good. I was amazed thinking he came up with that by himself, until I remembered my husband had spent time doing devotions with them while I fixed dinner. :-)

That is a good thing for all of us to remember. How many times do we fall prey to the temptations of the adversary-"Go ahead, yell at your son, he deserves it." "It's OK to be discouraged, what do you have to be thankful for anyway?" Satan loves to whisper these things in our ears, but we must stand strong. We must be victorious.

I think all to often we think of life being perfect if we are victorious. I just read this quote from "The Mom Walk" by Sally Clarkson:

"As Contemporary Christians, we so want our life to be like Cinderella's-and she lived happily ever after. We want rewards-now! We want prosperity and ease of life-now! We want answered prayer and blessed families and peaceful years-now!"

And yet we know that living for Christ does not always bring those Cinderella moments. It can bring raw, heart breaking moments that test our strength, and show our true devotion to God.

I choose to stand triumphant.

Oh not through my strength. But in the strength of my Lord. He is only the reason that I am able to still be doing my daily tasks, and finding joy in life with my precious Mom not here with me. I praise Him for the peace He has brought into my life, and trust that He will see me through all the other refining moments He brings into my life.

Our winner!

The winner of the Simply Phonics E-book is:

Angie! (dangiebrady@)

Congratulations! I will be emailing you the e-book shortly!

Happy Anniversary!

Today, I married the man of my dreams 8 years ago. I have not ever looked back, or regretted that day, but instead keep counting my blessings in the fact that I married such a wonderful man! Sean is incredibly patient, and a wonderful leader in of our home.

Some things that I love about my husband are:

His determination to provide for our family....

What a absolutely awesome Dad he is to our four children! I could not ask for a better Father to my children...

How he tucks the children in bed at night for me, as he knows I'm so tired by then...

His sweet notes I find once in a while...

His knowledge of the scriptures and how hard he tries to study and learn more...

His kisses! We waited until our wedding day for our first kiss, and it was worth the wait!

How he supports me in homeschooling our children, and constantly encourages me to keep going, and try again when I fail.

His support and loving hugs when my Mom passed away...how he still listens to me ramble on about my Mom, and how I wish I could tell this or that to her.

I love you honey! I look forward to spending the rest of my life with you!

Review & Giveaway: Simply Phonics E-book

I love old fashioned pictures! Whenever I see a schoolbook that has been published recently with old fashioned pictures, it always grabs my attention. When I ran across Shoelace books,

I was curious to see what my children would think of a old fashioned phonics book.

Lauri Hicks is the author of the Simply Phonics books. She is a homeschooling mother herself, who has studied many methods of teaching, one of which my personal favorite-Charlotte Mason. Here is what she wrote to me about this program:

"I used the McGuffy readers in my homeschool, I studied the Charlotte Mason method and many others. I searched methods to teach myyoungest and last two children. Before that, I bought curriculum that was so "busy, busy." I wanted something a little less troublesome --

no teacher's manuals, user friendly, and got the job done. Simply Phonicsis based on "what worked for my kids." I searched the really old programs and found some pictures and techniques and brought them up to date. It was a work in progress for several years. Simply Phonics can be used with any "method" you choose to use in your home or school."

I printed off the first 15 pages or so, took my two oldest boys outside and we started

working through the book. They loved it! Every letter has a key sentence, for example:

A-When baby wants an apple, he says /a/, and /a/a is the first sound of "apple."

The pictorial alphabet contains sweet old fashioned pictures, and then it leads into the

letter M-for Mother Cow. There is a little story about the mother cow, and you practice

saying the sound that mother cow makes. The whole E-book contains sweet pictures

and stories like that! I am delighted with it, and look forward to working through the

rest of it.

Book 1 includes: Letters A-Z, ck, ch, sh, ng, oo, ow, ou, oy, oi, ee, ss, ll, th, qu

There are three volumes of the Simply Phonics Books, and even if you do not

homeschool, this would be a useful tool to help your child learn their ABC and

phonetic blends better!

Buy It!
You can buy Simply Phonics E-book for $24.99.

Win It!

Shoelace Books has offered to give away a copy of Simply Phonics to a reader! To enter, go to Shoelace Books and tell me one other e-book that looks good to you.

EXTRA ENTRIES!

NOTE: THERE ARE NEW WAYS TO EARN EXTRA ENTRIES!!

You can do any of these things for an extra entry. Make sure to leave a separate comment for EACH thing you do.

1- Subscribe to our blog via email.

2. Follow us on our blog using Google Friend connect!

3. Follow us on Facebook and leave a comment letting us know.

4. Share about this giveaway on your facebook page, and leave a comment with the link.-earn 2 entries!

5. Follow us on Twitter and leave a comment letting us know you follow!

6. Blog about this giveaway and leave the link.-2 extra entries (leave two comments saying you did this).

7. Place our NEW Modest Mom button on your blog (please replace the old one you might have) and earn TWO extra entries for doing so!

PLEASE leave a separate comment each time you do one of the above. The comments are closed on this post, just use the form below to enter. We never share your email addresses with anyone, which is why we use the form to keep them private!

This giveaway will end Tuesday, October 14th at midnight, and a winner will be posted the following morning.We will notify the winners and they will have 36 hours to respond! Open to US Only.

This was not a paid post and my honest opinions were used. The opinions are solely my own. Thank you to Shoelace books who supplied the products for the review and giveaway.

A peak at what is to come!

What excitement! When I saw the package on my doorstep I was thrilled. New fabric, but not just any fabric. Yummy Darla fabric! We are going to start carrying designer fabric for the maternity and women's skirts at The Modest Mom! And it comes just in time-very soon there will be some new styles of maternity and women's skirts coming! Pictures from the photo shoot will be coming next week hopefully...

We have a Winner!

How exciting! We have a winner for the Canning & Preserving book by Ashley English. Using Random.org the winner is:

Nicole: craftysoprano@

I hope you enjoy your new book!

Halloween-Trick or Treat?

"What is everyone is doing as alternatives for Halloween? We've decided not to take our daughter out Trick or Treating or anything else like that, but our church stopped having their Fall Festival that they used to have on the same day as Halloween so now I'm kind of stuck for ideas!"-Mindy

A reader emailed me the above question, and seeing how Halloween is coming soon, I thought it would be a good time to share how my parents raised me concerning this day.

Being a Christian affects every aspect of my life. From wearing jewelry, to the music I listen to, and the holidays I observe, everything must come under scrutiny of asking myself, "Is this God honoring?" Halloween is no exception, and so I ask myself, what is the good of Halloween? What could be honoring to God concerning Halloween?

Even a quick study of the day will uncover the origins of Halloween; those origins are troubling to say the least. I found the following quote from a website on the origins of Halloween: "Halloween has long been thought of as a day when the dead can return to the earth, and ancient Celts would light bonfires and wear costumes to ward off these roaming ghosts." That doesn't exactly sound like a day I want to participate in, as we all know that the dead will be raised from the grave when our Lord and Savior returns! They will not be coming back as ghosts to haunt us!

The reader above asked for ideas of how to observe this day if you don't want to go trick or treating. My thoughts? It's just another day. Nothing special is called for. I honestly don't see a need to teach our children that we have to give them something fun to do instead of going trick or treating. I was always taught that Halloween's origins was a wicked thing, we don't observe it, end of story. When we lived in the city, a lot of the time we would turn off a lot of lights in the house and just watch a movie, read a family book, etc. so we didn't have to deal with people ringing our doorbell. Our parents didn't want us as little children to see some of the awful costumes that would show up at the door. Other than that, it was just any other day.

Both of my boy's birthdays are in October, and one is quite close to the 31st. Last year we had their birthday party on Halloween, as it was the only day that would work for family! As other people were walking down the street trick or treating, we were outside in the front yard playing games with the children. We had a few stares, as I'm sure people were wondering why we were not dressed up!

Children think they are getting a treat when you dress them up, and take them out to get candy. What child wouldn't want that? But really you are falling into a trap. You are allowing them to take part in something that from it's roots up is grounded in evil.

I think the most important thing we need to pass on to our children concerning Halloween is this- As Christians, we have no need to fear the evil costumes, and the dark things that go on around this time.

"For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."-Romans 8: 38, 39

As parents, if we are calm and at peace at Halloween time, our children will pick up on that. But if we are fearful of the wickedness that goes on and show it, our children will learn to grow up being afraid also.

That being said, be careful of the "high and mighty" attitude concerning stepping away from Halloween. Sadly, many times when we step back from doing something like the world, it easily lends to a haughty attitude towards those who do participate.

If your family desires this could be a time to reach out to others and share the gospel. Our family has not done this yet, but I've heard of an excellent way to reach out to others during this time. Go ahead and open the door to all the little children, but instead of candy hand out some fruit and a scripture tract! Another idea we heard for adults is to go door to door trick or treating but when someone is trying to share candy with you that is an opportunity to share a tract with them and share that God loves you.

What does your family do on October 31? What ideas can you share for alternatives to the common Halloween practices?

Winners Announced!

I think everyone has anxiously been awaiting the announcement of the winners! The last two giveaways ended on September 30th, and they are the ERGO baby carrier, and the Nursing Nightgown.

There were LOTS of entries for the ERGO, try 674 entries for a guess at how many! Number 68 was the blessed winner from Random.org and her name is:

Lonnita Maxie-Carter (newcarter08@) CONGRATULATIONS! I hope this will be a huge help to your Mommy life!

The winner of the nursing Nightgown is:

Sarah (radharas@)

You will both be getting emails from me with further info! Winners must respond in 48 hours, or I will move on to someone else.

Have a blessed Sunday! Our Sabbath Day will be spent going to church, holding up signs for a Right To Life Rally, and I will possibly start attending choir practice for a Messiah Performance. Busy Times!