Julie Naturally
healthy, natural living for Christians
Since I don’t believe in teaching little kids to write, we often do formal writing instruction a bit late. Narration and oral storytelling naturally lead to better compositions when kids are older. But, sometimes middle schoolers and teens need a bit of help with some of those mechanical skills such as tricky spelling and homophones, …
Generally, I don’t really like Bible studies for kids. I feel that they often make Jesus look like a nice man who helped people and Biblical history look like a Saturday morning cartoon show. My own children have told me that they find many programs ask obvious, silly questions. So, when I found these inductive …
When my children were younger, one of my favorite places was the library. We regularly brought home stacks of books, as I’m sure your family does, too. Sometimes, I had a list compiled from browsing catalogs and recommendations. But other times, I just did a library search and wrote down call numbers when I got …
Planting a garden with kids can be one of the most rewarding ways to teach them about plants. It provides a custom made nature study experience and it offers many other benefits as well. For example, planting a vegetable garden can help children appreciate their food more. And, that is probably the most common type …
When we share facts about plants for kids, we often start out with dry, boring stuff like how to define botany. Unfortunately, that’s how most textbooks present plants. But, that’s not how to teach kids about plants. I certainly didn’t come to love plants because of the diagrams and hard to pronounce vocabulary words. In …
One of the great things about summer is the abundance of plants. It seems like the trees suddenly sprout leaves from one day to the next. But, the first signs of life are our lawns turning green and then, the flowers. Tulips, daffodils, lilies…their bright blooms fill us with joy and hope. Our green friends …
We know our kids should spend more time outdoors in the warmer months, but sometimes it’s hard. It can feel like pulling teeth to get them to get off their devices to spend some time in nature. After all, teens may spend as much as nine hours a day looking at screens, according to the …
Have you ever tried to define botany for your kids? How did that go? Did you get the eye roll? And then did you say, “But you need to learn this! Hey, I’ll try to make it fun. Here’s this cool curriculum I found.”? I bet you got a reluctant, “Ok.” And what kid wouldn’t …
What does your family do for Mother’s Day? Do they treat you like a queen, take you out for dinner, and clean the house for you? How about offer you a box of chocolatey goodness with all its chocolate benefits? It’s definitely fun to be pampered for the day when you’re usually the one taking …
Since my kids are all teens and young adults now, a lot of newer homeschooling moms (especially this past year! LOL) ask for my advice. But, some of the things that I used to recommend aren’t available anymore. So, I look for writing websites for kids as well as printed materials that I think are …
Right now, I have one child in high school and I have graduated two children. My youngest is finishing up middle school. Since I have all this experience, you’d think I’d have all the high school science stuff figured out by now. The truth is that each child did high school a bit differently. And …
When my children were smaller, we belonged to a different church. In that church, one of the congregants was deaf. So, an interpreter stood at the front of the church each Sunday, signing what the pastor said. It fascinated me to watch her hands move and her face change as she helped the deaf person …
I live in northern Illinois, where right now, there is close to two feet of snow on the ground! It’s been a while since we’ve seen so much snow, but hey, we shouldn’t be surprised. The Arctic Jet Stream often blasts us with some deep freeze temperatures and brings a LOT of snow with it. …
I love chocolate. I bet you do, too. It seems to be the treat for everything: chocolate hearts for Valentine’s Day, chocolate bunnies at Easter, chocolates for Mother’s Day, and chocolate bars for summertime s’mores. Oh, and let’s not forget chocolate chips, chocolate cake, chocolate mousse, chocolate milk, brownies….need I go on? Even though chocolate …
Let me start by saying that I do not advocate teaching young children composition skills. Teaching young children how to write often has nothing to do with writing per se, but it has more to do with their enthusiasm for reading and narrating. So, as I talk about writing activities, I am talking about how …
This school year has been a bit crazy. I usually do a lot of hands-on stuff with my kids, but my remaining two students are teens now. It’s bittersweet. My youngest still builds things, especially mechanical things. But, our homeschool journey has morphed into more independent work. Sometimes, we use science games, but he and …
I’m always looking for new ways to engage my kids in learning. This is even more true now that they are older. They aren’t interested in crafts anymore, but I still want relevant, fun ways to practice and learn. One way that I engage my teenage son is through STEM subscription boxes. Yes, they do …
First of all, winter doesn’t have to keep you cooped up inside. There are plenty of things to see in the winter that are harder to see in summer when trees are full of foliage. Even so, most animals hibernate, birds migrate, and trees and plants go dormant or die. So, maybe you might need …
Do you have your winter herbal medicine chest all stocked? I hope you don’t have to use it. Even though the cold weather seems to bring more illness than at other times of the year, it doesn’t have to be that way. You can learn some preventative measures for how to stay healthy in winter. …
As I’ve talked about before, I don’t think that college is for everyone. But, if your teen wishes to pursue a career that requires college, I definitely recommend high school dual enrollment. It is one of the excellent college options to reduce cost and get a head start. In fact, my oldest two (who have …
When my oldest children were younger (they are adults now), I incorporated many different educational experiences into their homeschool. These sometimes included computer games. At that time, it was things like Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?, Reader Rabbit, Clue Finders, and Zoombinis. Nowadays, those games are not readily available and everything is online, …
Many homeschooling families feel a bit lost without a planner or schedule. Using these tools is a form of goal-setting. But, we often fail to see why goals are important in other areas. We make vague goals that are really only dreams. Or, another popular idea these days is making a bucket list of things …
Well, it’s that time of year again. It’s time to ponder what went well over the past year and what didn’t. After the flurry of activity, I like to spend New Year’s thinking about what I’d like to accomplish in the next year. But, how to set goals that will rock the new year? I …
When you’ve been in the habit of stuffing your emotions with food, it can be hard to reverse that trend. But, the toll it’s having on your emotional, physical, and mental health probably frightens you. Then, feeling bad, you eat more to try to feel better. It’s a vicious cycle that cannot be broken with …
