A great collection of Christmas decorations and winter seasonal decor the whole family can make.

Celebrate the season with these decorative snowflake window clings.

A holiday package of simple activities and family rituals that will make your season bright.

Get recipes for your favorite holiday cookies and ideas for your gingerbread houses. Decorate Christmas cookies and gingerbread men with your kids and enjoy the festive season!

A great collection of Christmas decorations and winter seasonal decor the whole family can make.

Mini phyllo shells, ready-made and smartly ornamental, are the secret here. Simply fill them with this delectable sour-cream-and-taco-seasoning-mix dip, and garnish.

Whip up these tasty treats to celebrate the season.

I keep seeing stories about homeschooled college football star and Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow.  The prospect of competing in high school sports, scouting, and having a professional sports career are not concerns for our family.  But, sports are a consideration for many families considering homeschooling, especially as families consider homeschooling high school. In some states, homeschoolers are able to play on local public school teams.  In other states certain homeschoolers are fighting to change laws to allow homeschoolers to play.  The public school bureaucrats, of course, don't want private homeschoolers playing on their teams.  My personal opinion is that I don't want anything the government schools have to offer.  With "free" goodies comes control and government control of my home school would be an anathema.  The good news is that the options for private sports training are many and varied.  Private and amateur leagues abound in most metro areas. For example, the Oklahoma Christian Home Educated Football Association is a nonprofit Christian athletic organization established to serve homeschool families in Oklahoma City and the surrounding areas.  Although the public schools may have larger programs for traditional team sports, we live in a new world order of sporting.  Baseball and American football are not Olympic sports.  (Baseball and softball was voted off the 2012 Summer Olympic Games in London.)  The internet provides a medium for acquiring the best training information regardless of your locale.  So, if it’s the training, discipline, team experience, or personal confidence that you are hoping sports will help provide your children, homeschooling is still the best option... if your children love the Lord, sports is just another avenue where these positive character traits can be a good witness. Let's pray that Tim Tebow can continue to be a good witness for the Lord and homeschoolers.  Here is some Tim Tebow biography from Wikipedia: Timothy "Tim" Richard Tebow (born August 14, 1987) is an American football quarterback for the Florida Gators. He was the first college football player to both rush and pass for 20 touchdowns in a season and was the first sophomore to win the Heisman Trophy. Tebow played quarterback for Nease High School in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, where he became a Division I-A recruit and ranked among the top quarterback prospects in the nation as a senior. After a tight recruiting battle, he chose to attend the University of Florida over the University of Alabama. Tebow, being a dual threat quarterback adept at rushing and passing the football, was used in his freshman season largely as a change of pace to the Gators' more traditional quarterback, Chris Leak. His contribution in the 2006 college football season was as a key reserve who helped the Gators win college football's national championship game for the first time since 1996. As a sophomore in the 2007 season, he became the Gators' starting quarterback and broke the Southeastern Conference records for both rushing touchdowns and total touchdowns accounted for in a single season. In addition to the Heisman Trophy, his performance in 2007 also earned him the Maxwell Award as the nation's top football player, the Davey O'Brien Award as the nation's best quarterback, and the James E. Sullivan Award as the nation's most outstanding amateur athlete in any sport. Tebow was born on August 14, 1987 in the Philippines to Bob and Pam Tebow, who were serving as Christian missionaries at the time. While pregnant Pam suffered a life-threatening infection with a pathogenic amoeba. Because of extremely strong drugs used to bring her out of a coma and to relieve her dysentery, the fetus had experienced a severe placental abruption. Expecting a stillbirth, doctors recommended an abortion to protect her own life. She carried the baby to term, and both mother and child survived. All of the Tebow children were homeschooled by their mother, who worked to instill the family’s deep Christian beliefs along the way. In 1996, legislation was passed in Florida allowing homeschooled students to compete in local high school sporting events. The law specifies that homeschooled students may participate on the team of the local school in the school district in which they live. The Tebows lived in Jacksonville, Florida, and Tim played linebacker and tight end at the local Trinity Christian Academy for one season. Tebow's preferred position was quarterback, but Trinity football team's offense did not rely on passing the football, so he began to explore his options to play for a new high school. He decided to attend Nease High School, which under head coach Craig Howard was known for having a passing offense. With the rest of his family living on a farm in Duval County, Tim and his mother moved into an apartment in nearby St. Johns County, making him eligible to play for the football team at Nease. His performance soon began to turn some heads, and led to a minor controversy over him being a homeschooled student that chose for which school he wanted to play. As a junior at Nease, Tebow’s stock rose as he became a major college football quarterback prospect and was named the state of Florida's Player of the Year. He would repeat as Player of the Year in his senior season. One of his highlights as a high school athlete was finishing a game on a broken leg. During his senior season he led the Nease Panthers to a state title, earned All-State honors, was named Florida's Mr. Football and a Parade All-American. Tebow finished his high school career with 9,810 passing yards, 3,186 rushing yards, 95 passing touchdowns and 62 rushing touchdowns. He played in the U.S. Army All-American Bowl Game in San Antonio, Texas which features the top 78 senior high school football players in the nation and is shown nationally on NBC television. Tebow was considered one of the nation’s top recruits and was the subject of an ESPN “Faces in Sports” documentary. The segment was titled "Tim Tebow: The Chosen One", and focused on Tim’s homeschool controversy and missionary work in the Philippines, as well as his exploits on the field of play and the college recruiting process. Tim Tebow was also featured in Sports Illustrated on the “Faces in the Crowd” page. In 2007 he was named to FHSAA's All-Century Team that listed the Top 33 football players in the state of Florida's 100 year history of high school football. Despite having family ties to the University of Florida, where his parents first met as students, he remained open-minded during the recruiting process and became very close to Alabama coach Mike Shula. After careful consideration he decided to play for Urban Meyer's Florida Gators. One of the reasons he chose Florida was because of Meyer's spread option offense, an offense for which Tebow was deemed a prototypical quarterback. Tebow spent the last three summers before enrolling at the University of Florida in the Philippines, assisting with his father's orphanage and missionary work.

Everyone in my family is fighting off a nasty cold. I imagine we caught it at church last week. It’s hit everyone except Dad. I think he’s hoping he catches it so he can play hooky for a few days. We rarely get sick in our house since we changed our eating habits three years ago. I even had to look up our favorite chicken soup recipe that everyone likes when they’re sick. I hadn’t made it in a very, long time. This is our version of cold medicine. I try not to give my family any over the counter medications unless it is really necessary. With the newest recall on Dimetapp and other phenylephrine products, I’m thankful I don’t. Sometimes we tend to overmedicate our bodies instead of letting it heal itself. Every sniffle and cough does not need to be medicated. If the cough is so bad that it is keeping my kids up all night I will use a cough syrup. I also like to use Vicks Vapor rub on their chests to help clear up some congestion. I use extra pillows and prop them up so they have better drainage while they sleep. It helps my little ones sleep better. So, I thought I would share my chicken soup recipe. It’s nothing magical, but it is the ultimate comfort food when you’re sick. Chicken Soup - Cold Medicine 1 whole chicken 1/2 cup water 2 tbsp black peppercorns 2 bay leaves 1/2 cup whole, baby carrots 1 whole onion, chopped into quarters 1 celery stock, chopped Place all in a crockpot and let it cook overnight on low. Next morning, remove chicken and let it cool. Shred the chicken and set aside half of it for another meal. Strain the chicken stock, discarding all the remaining veggies and place strained stock into a large pot. Add veggies of your choice and the shredded chicken I like to add: whole baby carrots red potatoes snow peas shredded cabbage broccoli cauliflower spinach (added right before serving) cilantro garlic Italian seasoning salt and pepper Bring up a boil, then bring down to a simmer and cook until the veggies are tender. I always add the quick cooking veggies after the potatoes and carrots are tender so they do not get overcooked.  There was an actual study done on chicken soup as a remedy for colds. They concluded that chicken soup has anti-inflammatory benefits. Grandma always knows best. Post from: Homeschool Fitness Coach

I always thought there should be country wide protests against government on tax day -- at least until all involuntary taxation was eliminated.   When someone suggested I attend a "tea party" my reply was something like "been there, done that... what's the point?"  True, I was a member of Young Americans for Freedom and a long-time pro-life activist, so protesting is in my blood.  But, in the last few years I have soured somewhat on street activism, at least for myself.  Then I realized that our local tea party was on tax day... tax day!  Now it made sense. Here is my tax plank from my only run for public office some ten plus years ago: "All involuntary taxation is equivalent to armed robbery and is immoral. I support any measure that relieves the burden of taxation from the individual and family. Furthermore, I support any tax relief measure that promotes and protects the Christian family. For example, two-parent single-income families should be exempt from state and federal income taxes. Families without children in public schools should be exempt from all property taxes. And, tax credits for children should start at conception." So my son and I ventured out this afternoon... it wasn’t exactly Boston Harbor in the dead of night or under the threat of execution for sedition... but I was impressed with the turnout in our sleepy seasonal retirement community.  Two thousand plus patriots of diverse backgrounds. Never have I heard so many cries against "socialism" from average folks.  A number of people came up to my son and said they were there "for his future".  The realization that he was homeschooled answered with enthusiastic "God bless you" from strangers.  And everywhere God fearing people with a true love of liberty. I do not get the sense that these protests are just Presidential election whiplash as some would suggest -- most of the people on the street seem to realize that we simply traded one flavor of socialism for another.  The left will dismiss these protests as irrelevant and reactionary right wing tantrums.  Perhaps the left dismisses them at the peril of their own political power.   This grassroots movement is perhaps the beginning of something far more profound and lasting, perhaps the grumblings of a revolution. I hope my son can someday tell the tale to his grandchildren of when the tide was turned against the steady creep of collectivism and tyranny.  And, I hope it is a tale of a democratic people peaceably taking individual responsibility and flexing the machinery of republican government to refresh the tree of liberty.  Let’s all help to prove Thomas Jefferson’s adage wrong: "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is it's natural manure." To paraphrase Franklin, we have a republic, let's keep it.

I keep seeing stories about homeschooled college football star and Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow.  The prospect of competing in high school sports, scouting, and having a professional sports career are not concerns for our family.  But, sports are a consideration for many families considering homeschooling, especially as families consider homeschooling high school. In some states, homeschoolers are able to play on local public school teams.  In other states certain homeschoolers are fighting to change laws to allow homeschoolers to play.  The public school bureaucrats, of course, don't want private homeschoolers playing on their teams.  My personal opinion is that I don't want anything the government schools have to offer.  With "free" goodies comes control and government control of my home school would be an anathema.  The good news is that the options for private sports training are many and varied.  Private and amateur leagues abound in most metro areas. For example, the Oklahoma Christian Home Educated Football Association is a nonprofit Christian athletic organization established to serve homeschool families in Oklahoma City and the surrounding areas.  Although the public schools may have larger programs for traditional team sports, we live in a new world order of sporting.  Baseball and American football are not Olympic sports.  (Baseball and softball was voted off the 2012 Summer Olympic Games in London.)  The internet provides a medium for acquiring the best training information regardless of your locale.  So, if it’s the training, discipline, team experience, or personal confidence that you are hoping sports will help provide your children, homeschooling is still the best option... if your children love the Lord, sports is just another avenue where these positive character traits can be a good witness. Let's pray that Tim Tebow can continue to be a good witness for the Lord and homeschoolers.  Here is some Tim Tebow biography from Wikipedia: Timothy "Tim" Richard Tebow (born August 14, 1987) is an American football quarterback for the Florida Gators. He was the first college football player to both rush and pass for 20 touchdowns in a season and was the first sophomore to win the Heisman Trophy. Tebow played quarterback for Nease High School in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, where he became a Division I-A recruit and ranked among the top quarterback prospects in the nation as a senior. After a tight recruiting battle, he chose to attend the University of Florida over the University of Alabama. Tebow, being a dual threat quarterback adept at rushing and passing the football, was used in his freshman season largely as a change of pace to the Gators' more traditional quarterback, Chris Leak. His contribution in the 2006 college football season was as a key reserve who helped the Gators win college football's national championship game for the first time since 1996. As a sophomore in the 2007 season, he became the Gators' starting quarterback and broke the Southeastern Conference records for both rushing touchdowns and total touchdowns accounted for in a single season. In addition to the Heisman Trophy, his performance in 2007 also earned him the Maxwell Award as the nation's top football player, the Davey O'Brien Award as the nation's best quarterback, and the James E. Sullivan Award as the nation's most outstanding amateur athlete in any sport. Tebow was born on August 14, 1987 in the Philippines to Bob and Pam Tebow, who were serving as Christian missionaries at the time. While pregnant Pam suffered a life-threatening infection with a pathogenic amoeba. Because of extremely strong drugs used to bring her out of a coma and to relieve her dysentery, the fetus had experienced a severe placental abruption. Expecting a stillbirth, doctors recommended an abortion to protect her own life. She carried the baby to term, and both mother and child survived. All of the Tebow children were homeschooled by their mother, who worked to instill the family’s deep Christian beliefs along the way. In 1996, legislation was passed in Florida allowing homeschooled students to compete in local high school sporting events. The law specifies that homeschooled students may participate on the team of the local school in the school district in which they live. The Tebows lived in Jacksonville, Florida, and Tim played linebacker and tight end at the local Trinity Christian Academy for one season. Tebow's preferred position was quarterback, but Trinity football team's offense did not rely on passing the football, so he began to explore his options to play for a new high school. He decided to attend Nease High School, which under head coach Craig Howard was known for having a passing offense. With the rest of his family living on a farm in Duval County, Tim and his mother moved into an apartment in nearby St. Johns County, making him eligible to play for the football team at Nease. His performance soon began to turn some heads, and led to a minor controversy over him being a homeschooled student that chose for which school he wanted to play. As a junior at Nease, Tebow’s stock rose as he became a major college football quarterback prospect and was named the state of Florida's Player of the Year. He would repeat as Player of the Year in his senior season. One of his highlights as a high school athlete was finishing a game on a broken leg. During his senior season he led the Nease Panthers to a state title, earned All-State honors, was named Florida's Mr. Football and a Parade All-American. Tebow finished his high school career with 9,810 passing yards, 3,186 rushing yards, 95 passing touchdowns and 62 rushing touchdowns. He played in the U.S. Army All-American Bowl Game in San Antonio, Texas which features the top 78 senior high school football players in the nation and is shown nationally on NBC television. Tebow was considered one of the nation’s top recruits and was the subject of an ESPN “Faces in Sports” documentary. The segment was titled "Tim Tebow: The Chosen One", and focused on Tim’s homeschool controversy and missionary work in the Philippines, as well as his exploits on the field of play and the college recruiting process. Tim Tebow was also featured in Sports Illustrated on the “Faces in the Crowd” page. In 2007 he was named to FHSAA's All-Century Team that listed the Top 33 football players in the state of Florida's 100 year history of high school football. Despite having family ties to the University of Florida, where his parents first met as students, he remained open-minded during the recruiting process and became very close to Alabama coach Mike Shula. After careful consideration he decided to play for Urban Meyer's Florida Gators. One of the reasons he chose Florida was because of Meyer's spread option offense, an offense for which Tebow was deemed a prototypical quarterback. Tebow spent the last three summers before enrolling at the University of Florida in the Philippines, assisting with his father's orphanage and missionary work.

I always thought there should be country wide protests against government on tax day -- at least until all involuntary taxation was eliminated.   When someone suggested I attend a "tea party" my reply was something like "been there, done that... what's the point?"  True, I was a member of Young Americans for Freedom and a long-time pro-life activist, so protesting is in my blood.  But, in the last few years I have soured somewhat on street activism, at least for myself.  Then I realized that our local tea party was on tax day... tax day!  Now it made sense. Here is my tax plank from my only run for public office some ten plus years ago: "All involuntary taxation is equivalent to armed robbery and is immoral. I support any measure that relieves the burden of taxation from the individual and family. Furthermore, I support any tax relief measure that promotes and protects the Christian family. For example, two-parent single-income families should be exempt from state and federal income taxes. Families without children in public schools should be exempt from all property taxes. And, tax credits for children should start at conception." So my son and I ventured out this afternoon... it wasn’t exactly Boston Harbor in the dead of night or under the threat of execution for sedition... but I was impressed with the turnout in our sleepy seasonal retirement community.  Two thousand plus patriots of diverse backgrounds. Never have I heard so many cries against "socialism" from average folks.  A number of people came up to my son and said they were there "for his future".  The realization that he was homeschooled answered with enthusiastic "God bless you" from strangers.  And everywhere God fearing people with a true love of liberty. I do not get the sense that these protests are just Presidential election whiplash as some would suggest -- most of the people on the street seem to realize that we simply traded one flavor of socialism for another.  The left will dismiss these protests as irrelevant and reactionary right wing tantrums.  Perhaps the left dismisses them at the peril of their own political power.   This grassroots movement is perhaps the beginning of something far more profound and lasting, perhaps the grumblings of a revolution. I hope my son can someday tell the tale to his grandchildren of when the tide was turned against the steady creep of collectivism and tyranny.  And, I hope it is a tale of a democratic people peaceably taking individual responsibility and flexing the machinery of republican government to refresh the tree of liberty.  Let’s all help to prove Thomas Jefferson’s adage wrong: "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is it's natural manure." To paraphrase Franklin, we have a republic, let's keep it.

I love the winter. I love the smell of cold weather, the logs on the fire, the hot cocoa with family, and the stars shining through the bare trees.What I DON'T like however, is how freezing cold I always stay throughout the winter!Thanks to Jen at Mott Chrochet Gifts, my hands are toasty warm this season!She sent me these amazingly beautiful fingerless gloves. They are black (which matches positively EVERYTHING in my closet!), and they are not scratchy, but just snuggly! I get comments and compliments on them everywhere I go! I went Christmas shopping this year for my mother and father in Eddie Bauer. I bought my mother some of these exact gloves for $30, but Mott Crochet sells them for a fraction of that!Stop by her shop and check it out! She sells out of her inventory instantly, so you might have to go into the SOLD items to view her work!She is offering one reader of Mingle Over Mocha a $10 gift certificate to her store! You will soon be styling in your OWN fingerless gloves!To enter, please do any or all of the following items. The "Mandatory" item(s) must be completed before getting any additional credits from the "Optional for Extra Credit" section.Mandatory:• Visit the Mott Crochet Gifts Etsy site by clicking HERE, and leave a comment (BE SURE to include? your email address in case you win!!? Sometimes, people never get their prize, because I can't find their email address!!) telling me what you love the most! Optional for Extra Credit:• Subscribe to this blog HERE, and comment that you do.• Follow this blog HERE, and comment that you do.• Post about this giveaway on your blog, and comment with a link to the post!• Become a fan of this blog on Facebook by clicking HERE, and comment that you do.• Email this contest out to your friends, and copy me on it at vaagen@bellsouth.net ? • Follow me on Twitter? HERE and ReTweet THIS.? ? Comment below that you did! You can retweet this contest every day for extra entries- simply leave a comment each time you tweet!• Invite friends to follow Mingle Over Mocha on Facebook, and comment that you did!The winner will be chosen by random drawing on http://www.random.org/integers/ on December 20th at 6pm.Thank you to? Mott Chrochet Gifts? for donating the free fingerless gloves for my review!! I was not compensated monetarily for this review, or for any reviews or giveaways on my blog site. All reviews are provided after I receive a free or donated product from the publisher, manufacturer, or PR company. Reviews are written from an unbiased point of view. Only business relationships exist with those who provide products for review. The Author of Mingle Over Mocha is not responsible for your difference in opinion or happiness with this product, or your safety when using this product. Thank you for coming to Mingle Over Mocha with Anna!

The American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress is kicking off 2022 with the much-awaited third season of “America Works,” a podcast series celebrating the diversity, resilience and creativity of American workers in the face of economic uncertainty. The new season, launched today, features riveting stories from a teacher and workers at a circus, a meat plant, a vineyard, and a now-closed Boeing factory, among others.? The eight-episode series, part of the American Folklife Center’s ongoing “Occupational Folklife Project”, aims to introduce listeners to a diverse range of voices and perspectives within the changing American workforce. Each 10-minute episode includes workers whose narratives add to the wealth of our shared national experience. The first episode is available on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher and at? loc.gov/podcasts.? Subsequent episodes will be released each Thursday through March 10, 2022.Click here for more information.

Library of Congress Announces Fall 2023 Concert SeriesBrazilian jazz pianist, composer and vocalist Eliane Elias kicks off the fall 2023 season of Concerts from the Library of Congress on Oct. 13. The series presents a diverse lineup of chamber music and jazz concerts in the Library’s Coolidge Auditorium, along with conversations with musicians and composers, educational projects, and curated displays showcasing collections from the Library’s Music Division. Events are free and open to the public. Patrons can register to attend events on the Concerts from the Library of Congress website. Due to upgrades to the Library’s event registration system, spring 2024 events will be announced separately in December.Click here for more information. You are subscribed to Latest News from the Library of Congress.

Let’s talk about physical exercise for our homeschooling kids during winter. Does your family spend most of the winter class time indoors? If so, getting some physical exercise is important to burn off some of that energy! Let’s look at some traditional and not-so-traditional ideas of ways to keep active during the long winter season....

Season 4 of the popular Jesus show, now in theaters, takes a turn for the serious. CT reports from its premiere and press junket in LA.

The pollen count is sky-high. You're sneezing, your eyes are itching, and you feel miserable. Seasonal allergies are real diseases that can interfere with your life. The FDA regulates prescription and nonprescription medications that offer allergy relief.

The writer of the best-selling children's book series The Wingfeather Saga hopes season 2 of the television adaptation “will be taken as a story first.”

Oregon Spice Company, Portland, OR is recalling Johnny's Parmesan Garlic Seasoning 5oz because it may contain undeclared sesame. People who have an allergy or severe sensitivity to sesame run the risk of serious or life-threatening allergic reaction if they consume this product.

Baron Spices, Inc. of St. Louis, MO is recalling 708 units of Blues Hog Sweet and Savory Seasoning, because it may contain undeclared Soy and Wheat allergen. People who have an allergy or severe sensitivity to Soy and Wheat run the risk of serious or life-threatening allergic reaction if they consum

Oregon Spice Company, Portland, OR is recalling Johnny's Parmesan Garlic Seasoning 5oz because it may contain undeclared sesame. People who have an allergy or severe sensitivity to sesame run the risk of serious or life-threatening allergic reaction if they consume this product.

Oregon Spice Company, Portland, OR is recalling Johnny's Parmesan Garlic Seasoning 5oz because it may contain undeclared sesame. People who have an allergy or severe sensitivity to sesame run the risk of serious or life-threatening allergic reaction if they consume this product.

Baron Spices, Inc. of St. Louis, MO is recalling 708 units of Blues Hog Sweet and Savory Seasoning, because it may contain undeclared Soy and Wheat allergen. People who have an allergy or severe sensitivity to Soy and Wheat run the risk of serious or life-threatening allergic reaction if they consum