Balancing Diapers and Deadlines from Lisa Tanner Writing ~ a TOS review

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This is my last review of the 2018 year and its a good one! I don’t know about you, but I am a busy mom. Most of us moms are. I start my days early and end them as early as I possibly can, because I am tired by 8pm. While I do not work outside of the house, I am busy running our household and homeschooling my children in the process. Today I want to share with you a fabulous resource for work-at-home moms: Balancing Diapers and Deadlines from Lisa Tanner Writing.


Homeschooling is work. It takes effort and organization. So, while I don’t physically step outside of the walls of my house to “work”, I do consider homeschooling my daily job. Thats why I was excited to get to work through this new course from Lisa Tanner, a fellow CrewMate. She wrote this course to help busy moms balance our household responsibilities with while working from home.

This course has 30 lessons that are broken down into 8 smaller bite-sized units:

 • Welcome to Balancing Diapers and Deadlines

 • Building Your Foundation with the Basics

 • Minimize Your Decisions

 • Minimize Your Decisions: The Annual Meal Plan

 • Sustainable Growth

 • Growing a Business with Your Kids Around

 • Boost Your Productivity

 • Closing Thoughts

Each unit is full of tips and ideas to help you manage your home while growing your business or work opportunities. Wishing each lesson there can be worksheets and action steps to help you reach the goals set out in the lesson. The lessons are easy to read and not long at all. In fact, some units can be completed in one sitting.


One section that I found especially helpful was on meal prep. Every single day, when I pick up my girls from a long day of training at the gym, they ask the dreaded three words that make me cringe…”What’s for dinner”? I struggle to come up with fast, yet healthy meals to feed my growing athletes.

It’s daunting sometimes, but they have got to eat so that means I need to carve out the time to cook. This section helped me realize that I can just have the kids pick out their favorite meals and then I can make sure they are balanced and healthy. This unit has a download of meal plans that I loved! I printed it out and used it as a guideline for our family as well as taking one weekend to sit down and make a list of seven of each child’s favorite foods to eat for dinner. When we were looking a little skimpy on the vegetables, I added them in too. I have since made a rotation of the kids favorite meals and which of those meals my older children can help cook. Because I realize I can’t do it all.


Overall, I am especially happy to have had a chance to work through Lisa Tanner Writing Balancing Diapers and Deadlines course. I still have a few units left to complete but I feel it provides work at home mom productivity tips that are helpful to everyday moms just trying to get through the day. So be sure to check it out even if you don't have babies in diapers, there is something for all! Check out what my CrewMates thought of this course by clicking the banner below.

Company ~ Lisa Tanner Writing 


Product ~ Balancing Diapers and Deadlines 

 Format ~ text-based online course 

 Price ~ $50.00

 Ages ~ for Mom’s

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© 2008 - 2018 A Stable Beginning. All rights reserved. All photographs, text, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission of the author. 

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Wordless Wednesday

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 http://astablebeginning.com

Math-Whizz ~ a TOS review

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Math! It can strike fear within a person like nobody’s business, whether it be on the account of the parent or the student. Many people struggle or don’t feel as confident with teaching different levels of math so It’s nice to have a helping hand. You get just that with the Math-Whizz from Whizz Education. Using this online homeschool math program it is like having a private math tutor working with my daughters on their math skills.

Getting started is quite simple. First, to ensure that your student is placed into the proper level, the program requires the student to take a placement test. The series of assessments will help target your child's math age. The assessment is long but it is thorough.

Once you get through the assessment the child can get into their dashboard where they can decorate the room however they want. I love that is theme based and with holidays you get different things. For example, a pumpkin just showed up one day in October when the girls logged in.

Ideally, to get the most from the program your child should be logging on and using the program at least 30 minutes a week. There is a tracking bar on the dashboard so that the child can see how much time they have spent weekly. We have been using Math-Whizz  from Whizz Education to our supplement our regular math curriculum.

With this I was able to identify and address the learning gaps in my 6th grader, Montana, and 3rd grader, McKenzie, math skills. I love that they were each given a math age so I can really see where they are. I will say I was initially disappointed with each girls “math age” because it was lower than what I expected. McKenzie, who is 9, has always excelled in math. Numbers and number sense comes easy for her. Montana, my 12 year-old, on the other hand does well at math but she has to work at it. However, I think it is right on target for Montana and maybe a little skewed for McKenzie. I kept my thoughts to myself and just pressed on with where they both were at. 

This program has brought out the competitiveness within my girls. One day they Were on the program unbeknownst to me for over an hour racing to get a snake. McKenzie ended up winning the snake first but let me tell you it was intense. Overall, I feel this is a complete and thorough math program that rivals other computer based programs.

I am pleased with the instruction that both Montana and McKenzie have had access to as we fill in any learning gaps. I also love that this is a portable program. We start up traveling for gymnastics competitions and the girls will each be able to access the program on their iPads while we are away from home. Especially since my van has wifi capability, learning will definitely be on the go!

Be sure to check out what my 29 other Crewmates thought of the Math-Whizz program by clicking the banner below.

Company ~ Whizz Education

Product ~ Math-Whizz

Format ~ online

Price ~ $12./mo, additional children $9./mo; $124./yr, additional children $90./yr

Ages ~ elementary and up

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© 2008 - 2018 A Stable Beginning. All rights reserved. All photographs, text, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission of the author.    

http://astablebeginning.com

Wordless Wednesday

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© 2008 - 2018 A Stable Beginning. All rights reserved. All photographs, text, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission of the author. 

 http://astablebeginning.com

Wordless Wednesday

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© 2008 - 2018 A Stable Beginning. All rights reserved. All photographs, text, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission of the author. 

 http://astablebeginning.com

Heading into week 9

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It’s Saturday friends!

                                                                                                                photo credit to Mikayla

This should have been the completion of our 9th week of the 2018-2019 school year however, the children and I needed a break. More so me as I was burning the candle at both ends so to speak. So, last Friday I made the executive decision to take this week off and it has been just what I needed to regroup.

Now, we did still attend co-op on Wednesday this week and Mikayla and Montana still are working on their History co-op assignments but we just did a little each day. McKenzie is also working on a new math program called Math Whizz. My expectation was that she would just work 15-20 minutes a day, but she has chosen to stay on it for 45 plus minutes each day because she enjoys it so much. I'll be posting our review in November so be on the look out for that.

Next week we will begin week 9 of school and continue with our scheduled lessons until Dec.21st! Well, we may adjust the ending date by a few days because we just received the girls competition schedule and we have an out of town meet the weekend of Dec. 21st. Once we get our session times I will be able to adjust our schedule accordingly so that everything is done before we leave. 

Speaking of gymnastics, McKenzie has her Level 5 test out meet in mid-December as well. So excited and proud of this girl as she trains hard and checks off her goals. We had a bit of a scare this week and had to get an x-ray on her ankle because she has been complaining about it. Thankfully, it is just a mild sprain! She needs to have a well child check up within the next few weeks because in 5 months she has only gained 1 pound. And I am sure that that 1 pound is muscle. Now, that is normally a good thing, but for her it is a signal that her body is not working at optimal condition.

As we head back into our next 9 10 weeks of school we are tweaking our curriculum to fit our needs better. Madison and Micah have no changes to their course loads but here are a few of the changes we are making at each grade level for the other girls.

Mikayla ~ 10th:

Writing: Essentials in Writing 10

Vocabulary: Words on Wednesdays, Vol.1 and Vol. 2, Ultimate Differentiated Vocabulary Activities

ACT Prep: Magoosh ACT *Mikayla will take her first test on Dec.8th and then we will have a baseline of what she needs to study to improve on. She will not be able to test again until July 2019 because we will be traveling for gymnastics and college/high school graduations for her older sisters. 

Montana ~ 6th:

Writing: 6th grade writing bundle

Vocabulary: Daily Doodle Vocabulary

McKenzie ~ 3rd:

Literature: Instructional ~ All About Reading, Lv 3

                At-Level ~ 3rd Grade Reading Comprehension

                Fun reading ~ Sonlight Readers 3

Phonics/Spelling: I thought about changing McKenzie’s spelling/phonics but I have decided to stick with what we use, Rod & Staff, and give her more hands-on learning. She is excited about this switch because she likes doing centers.

With these slight changes I am hoping to streamline better and get things done. Because the best curriculum is one that gets used, right? Have you made any changes to your curriculum line up? I would love to hear what you have planned out.

©2008 - 2018 A Stable Beginning. All rights reserved. All photographs, text, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission of the author. 

 http://astablebeginning.com