Blogmas {2019} Day 2| My Favorite family Tradition

| marionlovenotes

Hey friends!

Happy blogmas day 2! Today I’m going to share with y’all my favorite family Christmas tradition, which is picking out the Christmas tree.

This is one of the few things that we do together as a family. The first week of December we pick a family own Christmas tree lot to buy our tree. This is another way for giving back to our community. I think it’s so important to support small family own businesses.

Their family offered us cookies and we sat beside their cozy firepit sharing or life stories. It was so nice to be able to learn about other people.

Later on that night Ken brought the tree up and we screwed the tree into the tree base. I absolutely love the smell of a fresh Christmas tree.

Tripp and Ken were having a good time wrestling on the floor after the tree was put up. These are these the type of memories that I like to keep in my heart forever.

Tripp was so sweet and vacuum up all the pine needles up for his Mama.

Yesterday was beautiful! I shared with y’all my favorite Christmas family tradition now its time to share yours. Leave a comment down below and tell me what your favorite family traditions are.

xo,

Marion

Blogmas {2019} Day 1| My Christmas Coffee & Tea Station

| marionlovenotes

Happy blogmas day 1 friends!

I thought we will start blogmas out my sharing my Christmas/ winter themed coffee and tea bar. I’m a huge hot tea drink all year long, however in the winter months coffee seems to always be a top choice of beveragein the mornings. My favorite drink to make is a hot White Chocolate Mocha, I’ll have to share ther recipe with y’all soon.

I absolutely LOVE the way my little bakers rack turned out this year. The only new items that I bought were the mini flock trees ($3 each at Target). Everything else I shop my own Christmas decorations and home to pull this look together.

I’m very into traditional red, white, green, gold Christmas colors. The tray behind my Rae Dunn pieces was from the At Home store a couple years ago. I recorded a vlog this morning talking a little bit more detailed about my set if you are interested in watching.

I hope y’all enjoyed my blogmas post for today. Let me know what’s your favorite Holiday drink. I’m always up to try something new.

xo,

Marion

Welcome to Blogmas 2019!

| marionlovenotes

Hey friends!

Its the third day of December and I just now decided to do blogmas here on my blog. I will be posting almost daily my family’s Christmas and Kwanzaa experiences. I love the idea of sharing a little bit of our Christmas and Kwanzaa magic here on my blog.

I was very much so inspired to go ahead and start posting on my blog after watching Jen on Pretty Neat Living vlog. She talked about not waiting for her blog posts to be perfect or pinterest looking worthy.

Another reason why I was so discouraged to post anyone is to be completely honest I felt like it was a waste of time. I don’t have a large following on any of my social media platforms. I don’t have people commenting on any of my posts (I know first world problems). But then I remembered that I’m doing this for me and not for anyone else.

So here I am posting my family’s Christmas and Kwanzaa experiences with y’all. I have a lot I want to share (mostly my holiday decorations & recipes). This is our second year celebrating kwanzaa as a family. I bought my first Kinara from an Etsy shop called Ashakiwood 🤗 its gorgeous and can’t wait for it to get in the mail. We will talk about that on another blog.

I have so much I want to share but we will save that for another blog post.

xo,

Marion

Updated Toddler Learning Play Space Organization|Fall 2019

| marionlovenotes

Hey friends!

I’m giving y’all TWO blog posts in one night sense I have not blogged in such a long time and apparently still awake 🤷🏾‍♀️. I also uploaded an updated vlog of what my home school space looks like right now. In that vlog (link at the end of this blog post), I also share with y’all my future plans for Tripp’s play corner.

I absolutely love our little homeschool learning space. It works perfectly for us and there is enough space for another friend to join too. I wanted to share our happy corner to show other parents that you don’t need a “homeschool room” to do homeschool. My little corner can be turned into a kindergarten or a high school learning space. If you stick with the basics and don’t get overwhelm with what others have you will be successful. I hope this inspires you to look at your home differently and incorporate a learning space for your child(ren).

I decided to write a quick blog post, to share with y’all some of the links to the items that were mentioned in that vlog. You know I always LOVE to share pictures of my little guy 🥰. So if you are interested in any of my homeschool or play space must have items check out the list below.

Before I share the list a lot of the items were purchased at the Target bullseye aera and the Dollar store at the beginning of the school year. Those items I will not be able to link. Its so important to shop early and think ahead when it comes to school supplies.

Okay so those are the items that I can remember that have links for. Let me know in the comments if I missed any in the comments below and I’ll do my best to add them.

What did you think of my updated learning space? Let me know in the comments below.

XO,

Marion

Toddler Homeschool Routine

| marionlovenotes

Good evening friends! How have you been? Yes it’s been awhile sense I wrote a blog post, but it’s been busy and sick over here in Marionland.

Today I want to discuss my toddler homeschool routine that has been working well for my family. If you are new to the my blog, WELCOME my name is Marion and I have a two year old son who I stay home with part time. I’ve done a bunch of homeschool related blog posts already here on this blog and would LOVE for y’all to check those out.

I like to keep things simple for my son and encourage a lot of play through learning versus having him do a bunch of sit down work. I have our monthly goals and daily activities written on a white board but we don’t follow them to a “T”. I rather use it as a guide to help us stay focus, and remind me of the various activities that Tripp and I can do.

The main things that we do almost everyday is;

Circle time:

  • Morning message
  • Calendar
  • Learning basket
  • Songs (months of the year, days of the week, ABC’S, and colors)
  • Bible story & prayer
  • Educational activities (math, literacy, and hand writing)
  • Art

Outings/ Field trips:

  • Library
  • Trampoline park
  • Park & nature walk
  • Children’s museum
  • Music class
  • Playdates
  • Indoor playgrounds

I’ve talked about what exactly Tripp and I do for most of these activities listed above in pervious blog posts, however I’m more then willing to do an updated blog post if y’all are interested. I could go over everything in one post, versus doing several little posts.

Unless we are sick or the weather is really gross I make it a point to go outside at least once a day. I found local mom groups on Facebook that I try to meet up with at least once at week. Above 👆🏾 shared our favorite places that we like to go have fun at during the week. On Thursdays we try to meet up with a close friend at their house, or they will come over to our house to play. I think its good for Tripp to learn how to share his own toys, and how to share other toys when he goes to his friend house.

That’s pretty much it! That’s our toddler homeschool| routine. Nothing fancy or over the top. Line I mentioned early in this blog post, I like to keep things simple. I hope you enjoyed this blog post. Please consider subscribing to my blog so you can be notified via email when I upload another blog post. I promise I won’t brother you too much. LOL What’s your homeschool routine? Let’s share ideas in the comments section below.

xo,

Marion

Formal Fall Tablescape

| marionlovenotes

Good morning y’all!

Today I’m sharing my formal Fall tablescape. If you follow me on YouTube or Instagram you have already seen this beautiful tablescape that I created. I get so inspired by all the beautiful designs that I see on Instagram that I just had to create my own master piece.

There was two ladies that I follow who inspired me the most; Casa Watkins and Christina from the DIY mommy blog. I absolutely love their bohemian style and their use of variety colors in their homes.

I personally like to use more traditional colors during the holidays. On my tablescape you will see more oranges, reds, greens, and golds.

This year I also decided to participate in Christina’s 2019 Fall & DIY Challenge! I love doing collabs with other people and was super excited about sharing my Fall Decor with everyone. This was an open challenge so anyone could join in. This was good for me sense I have such a small following 😭😂 on social media.

If you are interested in seeing what I came up with watch my vlog below. I would love it if y’all subscribe not only to my blog but also to my YouTube channel.

What did you think? I love that I was able to create my own napkin rings and majority of the decorations that I used were already in my collection. Leave me a comment below letting me know what was your favorite thing about my fall tablescape.

Thank y’all so much for coming over to my blog! Please come by next week to see an update on how its going with my son’s tot school!

xo,

Marion

Super Easy Peanut Butter Cookie Recipe

| marionlovenotes

Peanut Butter Cookie Recipe

Ingredients:

1/4 cup of crunchy peanut butter

1 cup of peanut butter

1/2 cup of white sugar

1/2 cup of brown sugar

2 tablespoons of coconut oil

1 egg

1 teaspoon of Molasses

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 325 degrees

Mix all ingredients together in a mixing bowl.

Put a out 1 tablespoon worth of cookie dough ball on to a non stick cookie pan.

Bake in the oven for no longer then 15min.

*I like to add a little flour to mixture to help to mold the cookies. The cookie dough is very sticky, so you might want to cover your hands with flour to help mold the balls too.

I hope you enjoyed watching my Fall bake with me vlog. I was kind of all over the place but hopefully you were able to be entertained and inspired to get in your own kitchen and start baking some delicious food this Fall.

xo,

Marion

Rae Dunn Lemon Summer Kitchen Decor

| marionlovenotes

Hey friends!

How are y’all doing today? Today I’m sharing my summer kitchen decor. I’m seeing so many fall decorate with me on YouTube lately, however I’m still enjoying my summer decor . If you have been following me for awhile you know summer is my favorite season.

However while it’s still officially summer I want to show y’all what my summer decor looks like. I recorded a vlog showing y’all my summer decor and my thought process as I’m decorating. I also show y’all my updated Rae Dunn collection. I don’t go hunting for Rae Dunn everyday or go to store openings. I’m a busy mom of a toddler so my Rae Dunn hunting is very limited. This past Mother’s day Ken was very sweet and bought me some Rae Dunn pieces.

I have a list below of the various decor items that I can find links for. All of the Rae Dunn items were found at Marshalls or Homegoods. I get my decorative lemon platters from Homegoods. Let me know if you see something in the vlog that I forgot to link.

Wire Glass Drying Rack

Glass Mason Jars

Ice Bucket

*I couldn’t find the exact one I have but this one is similar.

Greyson Dinning Chair

Dinning Table

*They no longer sell the Greyson table that I currently have. This table from World Market is a close match to the one that I have.

Rustic Wooden Mug Rack

What do y’all think? I love how my kitchen looks. I ended adding some lemons to my decor and I also found the Happy Rae Dunn mug with the yellow interior after I filmed that vlog. I have some pictures below to show y’all. How things are looking now.

I will be taking a short break from the blog while we go on vacation to Jamaica!!!! When I come back I will continue my 2019 Back to School Series.

xo,

Marion

Affordable Toddler Curriculm Resources

| marionlovenotes

Hey friends!

Today I want to share affordable resources that you can use to help start your own homeschool journey. I like to primary use play learning activities with my son.

My favorite places to shop for fun learning activities would be

*Target Bullseye Spot

It’s best to go in the beginning of August when the back to school stuff gets put out.

*Teachers Pay teachers website

If you type toddler activities a bunch of affordable activities that you can download for your toddler. I like to print activities out and laminate them, so we can use them multiple times.

*Etsy

Etsy has a lot of educational shops with beautiful curriculum painted pictures. Below are a list of my favorite educational budget friendly shops to get things from.

StephHathawayDesigns

LetsPlaySchool

*This Reading Mama blog

She has amazing FREE printables that you can use with your toddler.

I hope y’all like my list of affordable toddler learning activities that you can use in your home. If you know of different blogs or other resources please leave them in the comments below. I recorded a vlog this morning showing y’all some of the resources that I use with Tripp.

Thank you again for visiting my blog.

xo,

Marion