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If you haven’t yet, check out our YouTube video of the bath bombs we made!

Kid safe, all natural, cheap and easy! We even put surprises in them! So awesome!!!

Howie was not as impressed but I think once he gets a fizzy bath of his own, and feels his luxuriously soft skin he will change his mind! I’m kidding- I don’t know if these are even pet safe. He’d probably freak. I love him too much to torture him!

Here’s the recipe:

1 cup Baking Soda

1/2 Cup Citric Acid

1/4 Cup Bentonite Clay

1/4 Cup carrier oil (I use avocado oil- coconut makes me break out)

Mix up the dry, add the wet, cram it into a cupcake tin, leave it over night. Then, plop plop fizz fizz. Joy!

👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇

👉Here’s the video: Da Bomb! Bathbombs!! 👈. 👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆

You can add essential oils and some of the recipes added food coloring. I’m not loving the idea of food coloring in my bath or in Natalie’s blonde hair…. so I’m looking into some mica powders that people use to tint homemade makeup.

We mixed the powders all together then put the essential oils in the 1/4 cup of oil and then poured it out about a 1/4 at a time while mixing the powder with a spoon. When all the oil was added we mixed it more with our hands, until it stuck together and was well blended.

The consistency was pretty fragile, we smashed handfuls into a cupcake tin, as much as we could press into one. It made four large cupcakes worth, but next time I would probably use the smaller cupcake tins.

Then we let them sit overnight. In the morning they were hard, not like rocks or anything, but maybe more like dirt bombs. Like I wouldn’t want to drop one but they slid out of the tin in one piece.

In the tub they were really cool! They fizzed right up!! I say they could be smaller because the bath bomb to bath water ratio was pretty potent. It also left a pretty decent ring and residue in the tub after draining.

But, using a damp washcloth it easily wiped out and I am pretty sure the tub is cleaner now. 🤷‍♀️ Win/win for me!

Plus, you’re all getting bath bombs for Christmas now!

A grandmother is a little bit parent, a little bit teacher, and a little bit best friend. Unknown

We shared so much, and every now and then I would post about it. Click the photo for a collection of those posts over the years:

Last year at Christmas we didn’t buy gifts.

We bought one pink matchbox car set for Natalie. She was just three, and had only asked Santa for a small, pink, toy car. She still treasures it.

We made tree ornaments with her school pictures for the family. She loved being involved in helping. She was able to practice using paint and glue, and she even wrote the letter N on some of them.

Instead of fighting traffic, battling crowds, and calculating discounts: we sat in our kitchen with the warm smell of cinnamon ornaments baking in the oven.

Instead of fighting with our screaming, sobbing, snot-nosed toddler who would rather get swiped up by a stranger than sit safely in a shopping cart: we got to play with cookie cutters and paint and glue. (I do like the added security of letting her be the most annoying, disgusting, and distressed little brat in the store. If I was a kidnapper, I’d go for the nice, clean, quiet kids)

Instead of slyly looking at the neighbors through the stealth-slots in our window blinds, wondering which terrible soul stole the soggy, dirty, snow-soaked Amazon box off our front porch: we were putting that fake fire place scene on the tv so we could string popcorn garland like the high-class.

And when the family Christmas gatherings came around last year, Natalie was SO proud of her creations! It was definitely special to see her give away those ornaments that she so lovingly made. I can’t imagine she would have been nearly so joy-filled to hand out gifts we dug out of clearance shelves and bargain bins during a hunger and stress-induced shopping-day rage.

It felt good that we didn’t have to stretch budgets or open credit cards. It felt good that we didn’t have to run out for tape on Christmas Eve to wrap up the last presents. It felt good that we didn’t have to clean up boxes and paper, or look for batteries, or try to find receipts on Christmas morning. And if felt good knowing I was prepared to have the most relaxing and stress-free Christmas ever!

But I wasn’t prepared for the bad feelings. There was a lot of guilt. I felt bad that my child wouldn’t wake up on Christmas morning to a room, filled, floor-to-ceiling with sparkling boxes covered in bows. I worried that her friends would talk so much about all the gifts they got. I wondered how she would feel to have only gotten one measly present.

I realized how much I was doing at Christmas out of a sense of obligation, and even out of resentment at times. I realized how much the consumerism and advertising campaigns actually affected me. Seeing the commercials, t.v. shows, Facebook posts, and Black Friday sales really did somehow make me feel like I should buy stuff. Part of me even felt like if I wasn’t buying stuff, then I must not be a true Christian/American/Woman/Human; and they never stopped.

It was also pretty hard to accept gifts from people without delivering a gift in return. And I questioned my own motives. Would I have actually bought a gift for someone if I knew they weren’t returning the favor? I thought about how they worked so hard, and earned money, and traded their time, to go buy gifts, and wrap them, just for me. I felt very selfish accepting those gifts. I wondered if they really, didn’t believe us that we were not buying gifts and if they had some secret expectations that we planned to surprise them or something; because what the hell kind of church dwelling Christian doesn’t buy Christmas presents?! Not even for their own child?

In a couple weird ways it also felt selfish to want to buy gifts. A lot of my motivation to buy gifts was to combat the guilt, and to fulfill the sense of obligation that I had over the whole thing. And it was eye-opening to notice how often I saw something and wished I could buy it for a loved one; yet only thought of how it would feel for me when they opened it, not how it would make them feel. The true spirit of Christmas giving was harder to find inside of my heart than I had expected.

This year, as we see people starting to post about Christmas shopping and the market starts shifting to the holiday season, my husband and I are getting excited.

We won’t exchange gifts. We will exchange smug looks when people start complaining about the stress of the holidays –because our stress is a different kind. It feels more like progress than pressure.

And this year, as we work through the feelings of obligation and guilt that consumerism has created about the holidays we will dig deeper into our faith, grow stronger in our selves, and hopefully experience the true meaning of Christmas that has been so shaded by the world.

This was the first blog post of Bold Courage. Fearless Love. published probably about two years ago but somehow lost in the WordPress mystery land of do-it-yourself-ness.

Bold Courage. Fearless Love. Everlasting Joy. is a story about living with intention and purpose. I am a spiritual christian, a wife to Nick, a mom to Natalie, a caretaker to Grandma, a left-handed, o-neg, E/I NTP,  ADHD, rogue lawyer, realtor, idea slinging writer. 

Right now I live my live with a 94 year old and a 3 year old. It’s a world where Mary Poppins and the Golden Girls meet. And I love it. Hands down, I could listen to toddler gibberish and eat ice cream with Grandma every single day for the rest of my life.

Sadly, I won’t get to do that.

One keeps moving faster, growing stronger, learning more, and looking to the future.

The other keeps moving slower, growing weaker, forgetting more, and looking to the past.

Time with both of them is fleeting and precious to me.

The reality is that this won’t –it can’t- last forever, and nobody can pay me to miss this.

BUT- nobody will pay me to do this.

My personality, my situation, and my purpose require uncapped income potential, unlimited control over my time, and the ability to do something I love. 

I don’t have enough time to trade for dollars, and there aren’t enough dollars to make me. I won’t settle for less than freedom. 

So, I started this blog as an experiment in passive and residuary income; the complete opposite of trading time for dollars.

But really, I’m just telling stories. Really good, tear jerker, laugh out loud, move you to action stories. 

And sometimes, boring run of the mill, “OMG another gluten free tragedy happened in the Schmuck household,” stories. Toddler. Grandma. Gluten Sensitivity is all the rage. Poop happens here. And yes. Our last name is Schmuck. Have a good laugh. I’m also a lawyer. So yeah, great jokes in my life all around.

Bold Courage.

Fearless Love.

Everlasting Joy. 

Bold courage is what it takes to look your parents, your friends, your facebook profile, in the eye, and say, “Yeah. I did go to law school. I did pass the bar. That’s great. But I hate it. So I quit.” I am in the process of going rogue and making the practice of law happen on MY TERMS.

Fearless love is what it takes to say, “I really want to be a stay at home mom and I think it would be cool to have Grandma come live with us so I can take care of her, too.”

Bold courage is what it takes to clip a 94 year old’s toenails.

Fearless love is what it takes to turn her embarrassment into a mani-pedi with her great granddaughter.

Bold Courage is what it takes to put this story out there into the world with the faith and hope that it would manifest the results I wanted. 

Fearless Love is to put the story out there anyways. 

Grandma and Natalie are daily, physical reminders of the passage of time. Life is short you guys. Just do what you want. Live in joy. And share it.

Be bold. Have courage. Be fearless. Have love. Create hope and be a picture of everlasting joy. 

Natalie is 4. She loves Cheetahs and saw a display about endangered animals at an art show. She saw that Cheetahs are “in danger” and wanted to race to Africa to save the Cheetahs from the danger -right away! She even cried on the way home from the art show because Dad was out of town- she assumed we would be leaving for Africa immediately to save the Cheetahs from the danger! She said we could just bring them to our home where they would be safe from danger. I explained we can’t do that, but there are people who work to protect the “endangered” Cheetahs and we could help raise money they need. Natalie was on board for ANYTHING we could do to help the cheetahs. (And I think she was also a little relieved knowing she didn’t have to go all super-hero status that day and face dangers!)

I found the Cheetah Conservation Fund and decided to do a 40 day campaign leading up to International Cheetah Day, to get attention. We are working with her cousins to write a children’s book about a Cheetah cub who wants to run fast like her mother, but is told she’s too little and will never run as fast as her mother. It will have some detailed scientific facts about Cheetahs and will incorporate some faith based principles and personal inspirational stories from people who have been told they had limits but became limitless. We are also planning to do a vendor booth selling crafts like hair bows, slime, excavation kits, and homemade educational games.

I haven’t worked any numbers but I am thinking we will donate about 1/4 of profits to the Cheetah Conservation Fund. I want to keep some of the profits to ensure I can give my time to this and not have to worry about expenses. That way we can grow the project, or start another type of business for kids to learn about entrepreneurship. Or we can start some kind of project to assist moms who want to stay home with their kids but can’t. Or maybe we can start a school based on directs learning theories. Or maybe build a nursing home that incorporates the community and children as a core part of its operations. I don’t know. But I do know with Bold Courage and Fearless Love that anything is possible.

“What’s the vision for your blog?” It was a really good question. But I didn’t have a good answer.

I do have a vision.

It’s of me being awesome, happily walking in faith and sharing it, while also having a law firm, selling houses, starting small businesses, doing exercise, smelling essential oils, partnering in an Amazon fba, cooking in cast iron, and homeschooling a kid that eats fresh organic lettuce for breakfast every day.

The reality?

Where I am, – isn’t quite the God fearing, lettuce gobbling, homeschooling mom, picture of entrepreneurial perfection that I wish I was.

To be honest, and completely unguarded, I am:

• a girl on a de-clutter and organize mission of perfection- despite being overwhelmed in softly medicated adhd, messiness, lateness, forgetfulness, and lacking most basic executive functions;
• a licensed attorney with a passion for bringing affordable, accessible legal help to the world- yet I am severely conflict avoidant and terrified of commitment;
• a doting stay-at-home mom who is a very distracted, working, semi-employed professional realtor.  I am also addicted to the internet and still always ignore calls from local numbers I don’t recognize;
• an unschool/homeschool advocate/wannabe with a great respect and desire to be involved in our local public school system;
• obsessed with reading and studying in all things related to growing in faith, person, marriage, business, and community but I still have an obvious, chronic and debilitating problem with procrastination and sleeping late;
• deeply committed to using non-toxic cleaning and personal care products but I spray copious amounts of toxic bug and spider killing spray. Everywhere. All the time;
• a hugely motivated and inspired visionary with multiple, viable business ideas and plans for progress but I suffer from cyclical bouts of debilitating pain, fatigue, and hopeless depression that basically destroys everything I work for each month;
• a sugar-hating, clean-eating, we-don’t-have-a-microwave millennial-ish idealist with an addiction to Oreos, boxed Mac and Cheese, and anything gluten- even though it always makes me feel like crap;
• a yoga bending, meditating, lavender oil huffing hippie with a deep connection to my red-neck, two-track, mud-hole heritage and I do find the occasional ice cold can of Busch Light in a hot shower to be deeply relaxing. (I honestly thought I invented the concept of “shower beer” but actually, a lot of people beat me to it.)

So once I thought about it, the vision of this blog isn’t about sharing the things I am interested in becoming. It’s not about presenting the image of perfection that I most certainly am not. (Yet)

The vision of this blog is of sharing the raw and real thoughts and feelings about the demons we battle with.

It’s a vision of sharing the honest and vulnerable experience of learning to persevere.

It’s a vision of sharing the exciting milestones of growing in faith with laughter, love, and joy while recognizing and being open about the doubt, pain, hard work, and disappointment that it takes to get there.

The vision of the blog, and this community, is to start an open and unguarded conversation about the gap between who we really are and who we really wish we were.

The vision of this blog is to look at that gap and know that the gap makes us what we are.

We are:

Bold enough in Courage that we keep going, despite our shortfalls and imperfections; and

Fearless enough in Love to trust that those shortfalls and imperfections are part of God’s perfect creation in us. And that will never fall short.

We are, Bold Courage. Fearless Love.