Current Beauty Favorites

I am by no means a beauty guru, but I have found products that work well with my maturing skin. 

I'll go over what little skincare I do first. The first product I use is Elemis Pro-Collagen Cleansing Balm. I like that this product melts my makeup off. To go along with this, I really enjoy using the Wonder Cloth. It works like magic! You simply run the cloth under water and then wipe off your make up. Once you run the cloth back under water the makeup disappears. I have found after I washed mine that the makeup no longer washes away. 

Another cleanser I absolutely love is Kiehl's Rare Earth Deep Pore Daily Cleanser. This makes my face feel so smooth.

After I cleanse, I apply the L'oreal Age Perfect Cell Renewal Midnight Hydrating Serum. I love the way it smells and feels. I am not sure if it really produces results, but I continue to use it in my routine.

After I apply the serum, I use Neutrogena Rapid Wrinkle Repair Retinol Regenerating Cream. This is my first time using a retinol cream and thank goodness have not had any issues. I've only been using it once a day, but plan to try to bump it up to twice daily as recommended. I've noticed while doing this routine, I do not wake up with sleep lines on my face. I'm not sure if the products are actually working, but I do like how my face feels after using them, so I continue.

Another product that I love is from Good Habit Skincare, and it is the Bright Bright Baby Glow On Oil Exfoliator. I don't use this every day, but when I do use it, my face feels buttery smooth.

I do plan to add a sunscreen and essence water to my routine at some point, but for now these are all the products I use.

The next product I have been loving is the Elf Halo Glow. This product evens out my skin tone just like a foundation would but doesn't give full coverage like foundation. It is great for a no makeup, makeup look. 

My favorite foundation is no longer available, and I am so sad! I decided to give Fenty Beauty a try and got the Pro Filt'r Hydrating Longwear Foundation. I instantly fell in love with it. I went back to try and get more only to find it was no longer available. Fenty Beauty replaced it with a skin tint. I guess it's back to the drawing board to figure out the best foundation for me.

These are the products I have been loving for now. I plan to update as I find other products I love just as much. These products, with the exception of Fenty Beauty, can be found at Ulta, Walmart, or Target.

We Lost Our Home

My original purpose for this post was to talk about my oldest niece moving out for college. Plans have changed and I'm now talking about Maddy and I moving.

We've rented our house for the last ten years. It's by no means anything fancy, but it was home. We have been working on becoming debt free in order to buy a home. My landlord texted me to let me know our house had been sold and gave me the new owners information. That was no big deal because our home had been sold before with no problems. Little did I know.

I received a letter in the mail from a lawyer to inform me I had thirty days from the date of the letter to move out or legal action would be taken. By the time I got the letter I had twenty-seven days to figure out where we were supposed to live. The housing market has been horrible, and rent has skyrocketed. Not to mention most places do not accept dogs. I was in a state of panic. How could this be happening? 

The only option I had was to move in with my parents. 

I found out from my neighbor that the new owner planned to live in our house. My thoughts were, "You kicked a single mom out of her house so you could live in it?! What kind of person are you?!" Obviously, that was during my anger phase of grief lol.

On our last night home, we sat on the floor; our couch had already been moved and we watched the last episode of Gilmore Girls. I thought it was fitting for a couple of reasons. One, I wanted to cry my eyes out and every single time I watch that episode that is exactly what I do. The second reason is it is about Rory getting her first job and leaving her hometown. It was just the perfect episode for our situation. 

It's too soon. If I stop to think about you leaving now, I'll fall apart. It's too soon." - Lorelai Gilmore

I can now share pictures of our house since we no longer live there. Again, it's nothing fancy or great, but it was home. We miss it, but we also know we will love our new home, wherever that may be.

Christmas was our favorite. Our house looked so pretty in our opinion.

We are looking forward to the day when we are posting about our new house. 

2022 Homeschool Curriculum

 It has always been helpful to me seeing what other people choose for their curriculum each year. I thought I would share our curriculum picks for the 2022 - 2023 school year. 

Our main curriculum is My Father's World, and we will be working through 1850 to Modern Times. Maddy is most excited about the U.S. History cookbook we will be using. My Father's World is very heavy in reading material. This year we are going to cut out a few of the extra readings. For bible she will be going through a book called A Young Person's Guide to Knowing God and Tales of Persia. History will be a combination of American History and Story of the World. Geography will be focused on map work. Science will be Science in the Atomic Age and she will complete labs each day.

We typically use BJU for English but decided to try Abeka. BJU English included a separate writing book. We did not need writing as we typically use IEW. After researching it appeared most curriculums would include writing. We decided we would try Abeka for writing as well and drop IEW. What I like about Abeka's program is it seems to be more student led instead of teacher led. She will be able to complete the assignments independently and I will just check her work.

The Abeka English curriculum also comes with spelling and vocabulary. 

We are sticking with the art program we used last year, Artistic Pursuits. She did not complete the first book last year, so we will finish book one before moving to book two. She is very excited about book two because she will be working with pastels and color. Book one mostly works with graphite pencils and black ink.

She will stick with Teaching Textbooks for math. She absolutely hates math, but out of everything she has tried she likes this one the best. We have talked about trying others just to see, but she has been very adamant that she wants to stick with Teaching Textbooks. As long as she shows she understands the concepts and her grades are good, we will continue with this curriculum.

She will also be finishing up La Clase Divertida for Spanish. We typically take two years with Spanish before moving on to the next level.

Rocktoberfest

 This is a really late post. We went to Rock City's Rocktoberfest on October 27, 2019. We've been to Rock City several times, but mainly during the Christmas season. We really enjoyed it and planned to go back more often. 

The views during this time of year were incredible. 

There is a swinging bridge at Rock City. Maddy has never gotten to go on it because it's closed during the Christmas lights. She went on the swinging bridge while I went on the solid bridge lol. 

It's tradition every time we go to Rock City for Maddy to get ice cream. We started this tradition when she was close to two years old.

We really enjoyed doing something we had never done before. It's so easy to take whatever city you live in for granted. We hope to continue finding new things around town to do.

What Are We Waiting For?

 We had the privilege of attending For King & Country's What Are We Waiting For tour. It was such a fun night! 

There isn't much to talk about. I took tons of video clips, but I am having problems getting them to upload. 

                                       

This was our first time at the Civic Auditorium and Coliseum. We took the day off work and school and spent the day in Knoxville, TN.

If you want to see the video clips you can find them on my blog's Instagram, @ourmemoriesandmoments. I will save them in the highlights under for King & Country.

It's Not Over Yet

 It's Not Over Yet is the first For King & Country song I remember hearing. It wasn't something I chose to do on my own, but something God pointed me to. 

I remember the day as if it were yesterday. I was going through a really rough time in life; one of those moments you think you will not make it through. I prayed and prayed, and God assured me He had everything under control. In this particular moment, it didn't seem as if He did. Maddy and I had been visiting my grandmother and were on our way home. I was looking forward to turning on my iPod and singing my heart out. God had other plans. As soon as I turned on my iPod it died. I ended up turning the radio on. God told me to listen. The words it's not over yet just kept repeating. As I listened to the song I started crying. I knew God was talking to me through this song and I needed that more than ever. 

I am so thankful my iPod ended up dying that night because I was given a song that reminds me that it's not over and there is hope. God can and will do the impossible. 

What I'm Watching March

 I didn't do a good job of keeping up with everything we watched in March. Here is what I can remember.

• 127 hours
• Grey's Anatomy - we finally got caught up, woohoo!!
• Gilmore Girls
• Dirty John
• Station 19
• Free Guys
• The Desperate Hour
• The Meddler
• Nicky, Ricky, Dicky, & Dawn
• Nick of Time
• Into the Storm
• Within
• Rescued by Ruby
• Little House on the Prairie
• Scream - the original
• Scream - the new one
• 13 Minutes