Welcome!
So glad you found us! Step inside our gates and let me tell you a little bit about us and why we ventured into blogging. Please note: We are currently working on site design here at VanCastle–making things fresh and new! Please bear with us!
My hubby and I decided to start a blog to share parts of our lives and experiences that might resonate with, encourage or even help others. We decided on the name VanCastle using part of our family’s name and to reflect that no matter what or where our home is, it will always be our castle. Our castle currently consists of six of us so– we’re a lively bunch! Never a dull moment!
You will see content revolve around our main topics that are discussed below. They are: Homeschooling, Homemaking (Castle Keeping), Faith & Family, Disabilities & Special Needs and Adventuring. We will still be blogging even though the blog now has it’s own page. I’ve been very busy behind the scenes creating new content and digital products to help YOU run your castle more smoothly. After all—Your Home is Your Castle, Treat It Like One!
Please check back often or…better yet SIGN UP below to join my mailing list so you can be notified of new content or giveaways right away. I hate email spam as much as anyone so that’s why I plan to only have one to two emails a month. Clutter is clutter….even in your email inbox!
Don’t forget to check your email to confirm your subscription!
Our Usual Topics...
Homeschooling
We’ve been rocking the homeschooling gig since 2006 and still going strong. Everyday is a learning opportunity around here; We learn patience, resilience, persistence and sometimes even grace. The kids? They learn numbers and writing and stuff. (Ha!) I hope to help those who are new to homeschooling with encouragement and hopefully a few bits of wisdom I’ve collected on my journey so far.
Castle Keeping
This really is a lost art. I have found many things that helps our cleaning schedule and ways to control clutter. I’m no Marie Kondo or Flylady, but I hope to inspire stay-at-home moms (or even working moms too!) on how to treat your home like a castle. Before I get burned at the stake, keeping up a home doesn’t mean mom does it all. The home is a family place and all who live in it are expected to take care of their piece of it.
Faith & Family
Hubby and I are disciples of Christ and our faith is a centerpiece to just about everything we do so you will see references to it quite a bit. We aren’t perfect in our walk and stumble often, which is of course why we need our Savior in the first place, right? I will share some of my favorite faith-based resources and motivate the Christian mom who may be just trying to make it from day to day.
Disabilities & Special Needs
Over 10 years ago, our son was born extremely premature and was diagnosed with Down Syndrome shortly after. A few years later we received an Autism diagnosis, along with some other diagnoses related both. My wish is to share what I’ve learned so and hope those of you who walk this life will share your knowledge too! I’d also like a place to document and share our triumphs along the way.
Adventures
This is a wide range of our interests and hobbies even though we’re a pretty tech-heavy family. Hubby works from home as a software developer and provides web hosting services. My son, along with learning to code in Python, has taught himself to make 3d graphics and programed a Raspberry Pi to do all sorts of cool things.
Photography is another hobby of ours, so you will no doubt see our work posted here and there. Our current camera of choice is a Nikon digital SLR. One of my goals this year was to actually read the manual for our camera and take a course in photography.
RC cars, video making and editing, traveling, table top gaming and geocaching might also make appearances on the blog from time to time.
That about wraps up what you’ll see here at VanCastle. We like to share what we’ve learned on just about every front of our lives and I’d love to have you follow along as we go!
Hope to see you back!
—Deb