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2,000 subscribers. You guys are awesome. I know that might not seem like a lot in the grand scheme
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of things, but we are going to celebrate the little milestones here with a question and answer video
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and a giveaway. Well, hey, you guys, welcome back to my channel. Like I mentioned, this video is
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going to be a question and answer video. I haven't done a video quite like this. I asked you guys to
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send me some questions on my community chat the other week, and a few of you did. So I'm going to
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answer them. And I love celebrating little milestones. Since I recently hit 2,000 subscribers
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on my channel, I wanted to do a small giveaway for you guys. So stick around until the end of
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the video and I'll share that with you, what I'm giving away and how you can enter. I think you'll
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like it. In case you happen to be new here, I'm Sarah. This is my channel, Blessed Homeschool
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I'm a homeschooling mom of four kids, ages 12, 10, 10, and five. So next year I will have a seventh
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grader. My twins are going to be in sixth grade and my little one will be in kindergarten. Let's
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jump right into the questions. I've got them right here. I wasn't sure what you guys would ask or what
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kind of questions I would get. There were definitely a mix of things. So here we go. Question number one
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how did you begin YouTube? What would you say to someone wanting to start their own homeschool
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YouTube channel? I kind of joke in saying that I began YouTube kicking and screaming. I honestly
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did not want to do it. And sadly, it was really my own insecurities holding me back. That and the
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reason that I thought it was super complicated and just too much to figure out. I didn't know
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anything about recording videos for YouTube. I thought I needed fancy equipment. I had no clue
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how videos were edited. I honestly thought it was something I would never do. Well, I should know
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better than that, right? Because it seems like every time I think I am not going to do something
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that's exactly the direction the Lord leads me. I wasn't going to homeschool. I wasn't going to
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start a blog, wasn't going to do YouTube, but the way he directed my different paths of my life and
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took me to these opportunities is just incredible to me. And he gets all the glory for the fun that
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I get to have now doing this. So all that being said, I have been blogging since 2021. And with
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that has come working with some different homeschool companies for reviews or promotions
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but it was always done online through my blog or email newsletter. And then I started having a
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couple of requests to do short video reviews. Companies were asking me about them and I figured
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maybe this was something I should at least look into learning how to do. So my husband helped me
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figure out how to set up my equipment, which is really just my iPhone and a tripod, sometimes a
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ring light when the lighting is bad, but that's it. I found a video editing software and started
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playing around with it and discovered that I actually did really enjoy doing this. It's been
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something new for me to learn and grow in. And it's kind of become a little extension of what I
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do on my blog, which is basically just sharing advice and encouragement with other homeschool
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moms, doing curriculum reviews and all those things. So this is just been a new way. And this
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new way has surprised me in that it's so much more personal in the sense that you all are such an
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awesome community here. I truly love interacting with you guys and getting to know many of you
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through chatting here. And that has been a big unexpected benefit. So for someone wanting to
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start their own YouTube channel, I would say, why haven't you started already? If you have your heart
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you know, you have it on your heart to do it, go for it. I let a lot of things hold me back and
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keep me from this at first. But honestly, the best thing to do is just to take that first step
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record that first video and do it, do it with the understanding that your first videos probably
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won't be very good, but that's okay. They don't have to be because probably not many people are
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going to see those first videos. But as you continue to learn and grow and share your voice
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you will find people that can relate to you that resonate with you. And that's a great thing about
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YouTube. Now you'll have to let me know if you have any more questions specifically about YouTube
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I would be happy to answer those in the comments and help you out. If, if I can, if this is
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something that's been on your heart to try or to begin. Okay. Question number two is about exercise
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How do you motivate yourself to exercise? I can conquer everything else, but exercise
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This is a good question. And there are a couple of things that I do to help
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me motivate myself. Uh, they may or may not help you, but this is what I found works for me
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First thing is that I sign up for things. So the marathons that I run, if I sign up, I'm committed
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Signing up gives me that motivation to print out that training plan. And when I have that concrete
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training plan in place, it's much easier for me to crank out the workouts because I'm a box
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checker. I want all the boxes checked off. So signing up for things, having that end goal
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knowing what I'm working towards really helps. And it doesn't have to be a race. It could be
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signing up for a workout plan or a challenge on my Less Mills On Demand app. Or in the past
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I've signed up for bootcamp classes with friends, or even just booking a date to go work out with
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somebody, you know, putting that on my calendar or just writing in a plan each week on my calendar
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All those things are super helpful to me. The second thing I'll say is that there really is
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this mindset shift that you kind of have to make. You have to kind of just tell yourself to stop
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making excuses. There are so many things that can take up our time during the day, but there's
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typically not many days that I absolutely can't fit in even 30 minutes of some sort of exercise
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There's just not. So you build that consistency by just doing it, not making excuses. And I also
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realize that I feel so much better when I do work out, which is a great motivation. So just do it
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Motivation will come and go, but it's all about doing the thing when you don't feel motivated
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That'll help you build that consistency. Question number three, what system do you use to file or
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organize all of your homeschool related items for paper documents, online documents, and curriculum
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books? So I'm not sure if this question is about storing during the homeschool year or at the end
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of the year. I'm going to assume end of the year. So I use file boxes to store pretty much everything
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Right now I have one for every year. So we're going into what our eighth year next year, but
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I've got quite the collection going of boxes and it's going to be really hard for me to get rid of
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stuff one day, I think. But yeah, file boxes for all of the paper and workbooks and the things that
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I want to hold on to. I'll try to find a link to the boxes I use and leave it in the description
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But like I said, I will typically just use one or two bins per year. And then I use hanging
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file folders inside for my kids' paperwork. When I used BJU Press Curriculum, we had a lot more
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papers and workbooks to keep than I currently do. So I needed a couple of boxes and would use
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a different hanging file folder for each subject to keep all the papers organized. It's probably
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overkill for stuff I'm just storing away, but oh well. This year I have a box and a hanging file
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folder started for each of my kids. And I've been using that to stash papers in this year that I
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want to keep or papers that represent some of the good work that they've done. During the year
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I use binders to store their work. For example, we have an entire binder we've been building this
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year with our My Father's World curriculum. So I will just put that entire binder into the storage
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box at the end of the year. Same with any workbooks, those will just go into our yearly box
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If there are any loose papers, I will decide whether or not I want to keep them at the end
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of the year. And then those will go in my kids' file folders in the storage box
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And then the storage box just goes in a closet or in the basement. Any curriculum books that I want
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to keep because I think I might use them or pass them along to a friend, those will either go on
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a shelf or I'll put everything in another box or crate or something to store it. Otherwise
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I will take things to our local homeschool library because they do consignment there
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For online documents, I have a Google Drive folder set up for each of our homeschool years
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and a folder in there for each of my kids. So my kids each have their own Google accounts that
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we've set up. So it's really easy for them to share documents or projects with me that they've
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done online. And I can then just file those by homeschool year and by kid in the Google Drive
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All right. Question number four was about second grade curriculum ideas. What are your second grade
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curriculum ideas? When my oldest son was in second grade, we used Adventures in U.S. History from My
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Father's World. Loved that curriculum, so I absolutely recommend it. We had a lot of fun
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with it. His second grade year was the year I believe we also began introducing Latin
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So we used Prima Latina from Memoria Press. And I also remember that we used All About Reading
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and All About Spelling with him rather than what My Father's World recommended at that time
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We also were using Singapore Math back then. I liked all of it. I didn't have any major issues
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with any of that curriculum that we used. Now, the next year, my girls were in second grade
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and that year was when we switched to BJU Press, and I used their complete second grade curriculum
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for them. We used the online video lessons. There were a few reasons that I switched to this. I'm not
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sure I'll get into all of it now. It absolutely wasn't because of any issue we were having with
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what we've been using, but I love BJU Press. Looking back, I think I would have stuck with
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All About Reading and Spelling for my girls, but there was a lot that I loved about that BJU Press
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second grade program as well. So those are the things that I can suggest from personal experience
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With my little one now, he's going into kindergarten, so we've got a couple of years
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until second grade comes around again. Who knows what might be on my radar at that point, so
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we'll see. Question number five was from Gerilyn, my friend Gerilyn from our homeschool table
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You are so perceptive. This question made me smile because when I said this in a video, I
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knew what I meant, and then you made me realize it probably didn't come out quite right or very
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clearly. So I'm going to clarify. She asked, you mentioned in your kindergarten video that you
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taught your oldest kindergarten and that this would be your second time teaching kindergarten
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Did you teach your twin daughter's kindergarten or did they do something else? This is probably
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going to be really confusing, so I apologize in advance. Just hang with me. It's so funny because
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I don't really think about having taught my twin girls kindergarten because they've honestly kind
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of come alongside my son and the curriculum that I chose for him in the beginning. Certainly they
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went through the kindergarten age, but I never really did a formal kindergarten curriculum with
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them, or I never really thought of it as kindergarten. That sounds really weird, but
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what I mean is that, okay, I used my father's world kindergarten, God's creation from A to Z
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with my oldest son. My girls were preschool age at that time, and I didn't use a formal
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curriculum with them. We instead did some, you know, we did some structured things, but they also
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followed along when they could with what my son was doing. So when my son moved to first grade
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he moved into using my father's world learning God's story for first grade, and it was kind of
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the same thing. My girls would have been kindergarten age then, but they did a lot of this first grade
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curriculum with us to the best of their abilities at the time. And I also did use all about
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reading with them, and we started using Singapore math. The Singapore math was actually a kindergarten
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level curriculum, so they were in kindergarten. I guess I taught kindergarten, but the lines can
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get kind of blurry in homeschooling, right? So to clarify, I think when I said that this would be my
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second time teaching kindergarten, I was thinking it would be my second time using this specific
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curriculum. So with my son going into kindergarten, we're using my father's world again
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and my second time feeling like we're doing a full kindergarten program. Is that more confusing
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than what I originally said? I don't know, but that's all I got there. All right, next question
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was how do you, how do you homeschool multiple children that are five years apart? This can
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definitely be tricky, but there are some things that I think make this easier for me. For one
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I try to choose curriculum that's pretty open and go. So when I have to transition from one
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child to another or one part of the day to another, it's fairly simple. Also my big kids
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are at the point that they have quite a bit of work that they're able to do on their own right
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now without my help. So while they're doing independent work, it gives me time to work with
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my five-year-old. Having systems in place, a rhythm to our day, so my kids know what to expect
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really helps keep things flowing and running smoothly as well. And also just using curriculum
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that allows us to work together when possible is such a big help. That's one of the reasons that I
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love my father's world so much is they make it very easy to bring all the kids together for much
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of the learning. So for example, the curriculum we're going to use for science next year is
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actually a curriculum that you can use for kindergarten through sixth graders. So I'm
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going to be able to teach my five-year-old alongside his big sisters. And there are many
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homeschool curriculums out there that are written in ways that they can be used with multiple kids
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of multiple ages. If that's something that would work well for you, typically kids are going to
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need their own math and language arts though. Those are usually subjects that are harder to
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teach together if you have different ages, but if you can combine other things, it helps a lot
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Question seven is a tricky one for me. Someone asked, how do you homeschool a deaf child
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specifically teaching them how to read? I have to apologize for not getting back to you sooner
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on this question. Honestly, it's not something that I have expertise in or am familiar with at
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all. So I'm not sure that I will be the one that can give a good answer on this. I did reach out
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to a friend who I know does interpreting and sign language. And she also said, this is a hard one
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to answer because it can vary greatly based on whether the child knows how to sign, read lips
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or use their voice, or what kind of communication you're already doing with them. I just don't know
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So I'm not sure if anyone watching this has some experience in this area. It would be amazing if
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there was someone who knew of a resource or could leave a comment sharing something that would be
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helpful or a direction that someone could look or they could begin to look if they have questions
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about this topic. All right, we are down to the last question. What are some of your favorite
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homeschool resources for curriculum planning? I have to admit, I'm not sure if this is talking
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about planning our curriculum over the years and kind of knowing what we're going to do long-term
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or if it means planning day to day, week to week in our homeschool. If it's long-term
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I don't use much except a notebook and a pen, maybe a notes app on my phone to keep track of
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things that I want to do in upcoming years. I will need to start thinking about long-term
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planning more as my oldest is nearing high school, but I'm not all the way there yet
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In planning day to day, it's got to be Homeschool Planet, hands down. It's made my curriculum
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planning so much easier and less stressful, and it's really easy for my kids to use too
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I have a couple of videos out about Homeschool Planet, and I have a new one actually that I'm
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going to be working on in the next couple of weeks, but if you are looking for a planner for
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the upcoming school year, I highly recommend giving it a try. I'm going to leave a link for
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a free trial in the description below, so definitely check it out if you don't use
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Homeschool Planet already. Okay, you guys, that is it for your questions. Like I said
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I wasn't sure what to expect. I thought maybe you might throw out some more personal questions, but
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I think you did pretty good, and I truly appreciate you putting these questions out there for me to
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answer. Please feel free to leave any more in the comments. Now, before I go, let's talk about that
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giveaway to celebrate the 2,000 subscriber milestone here on my channel. I am really
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excited to give this away to one of you. This is a Bible study written by a sweet gal that I know
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through Bible study fellowship. It's called His Unified Word, a 40-day study through themes
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in the Old and New Testaments. Laura Waymack is the author. What I love about this Bible study is
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that it takes you through the themes of the Bible, the storyline from the beginning to the end, and
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it shows how it's all connected and how Jesus is the fulfillment of all of the themes. I don't know
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about you, but when I was growing up, I thought that the Bible was simply a collection of stories
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I had no idea how it all fit together or that it actually all fit together. No idea that the word
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was truly unified from the Old Testament to the New Testament. No idea how Jesus was seen in the
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shadows of it all. It's so beautiful. So maybe this would be a blessing for you to see or learn more
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deeply, or maybe you can think of a friend or family member that would really benefit from this
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It is a 40-day study, so it's perfect to use for a summer Bible study, and I can't wait to bless
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someone with it. To enter, simply leave a comment on this post and let me know if you would use the
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study for yourself or gift it to a friend. I will draw a winner from the comments next week, and I'm
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also going to leave a link to this book in the description below so you can check it out and
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learn more about it. Thank you so much for being here and for watching today, and a big thank you
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to all of my subscribers who have helped me reach this fun milestone. I will see you next time
