Weekly Wrap-Up: The One with the New Book

Check it out! It’s the last Friday of January. We’ve survived our whole first month back to school after Christmas break. I read on someone’s blog this week that they look at the start of January something like the beginning of a new school year after that long Christmas break.

That’s really how it’s felt for us, especially this year since we started a totally new curriculum when we resumed in January. And it’s been a great “new” school year!

Today has been really fun. We managed to stay caught up, so it was to be a light school day for us. That’s good because Josh’s best friend’s dad, from whom we bought the drums for Christmas, came over to give Josh his first semi-official drum lesson.

Then, later, one of my closest friends came over to help Brianna sew a cloak she’s been wanting to make for weeks. She bought the material with her Christmas money, but I know nothing – nothing – about sewing.

So, we’ve had music lessons and home ec today. It’s been electives day. It’s really been great. It feels like just the sort of relaxed, following-their-interests kind of homeschooling day that I often envision, but which doesn’t – at least at my house – always come to pass.

You may notice the lack of photos in today’s post. {sigh} I have completely fallen off the Project 365 wagon this week. I have felt so uninspired. I’m not giving up, though. I guess it’s really not a true Project 365, but I’m going to endeavor to do better next week.

My lack of interest in photography may be directly related to the fact that I have been totally engrossed in a new book that came in the mail on Tuesday. I reviewed (and loved) the first book, Fairer Than Morning, by author Roslynn Elliott, so I jumped at the chance to review the sequel, Sweeter Than Birdsong.

I loved it! I read it in three days…it would have been two if I could have held my eyes open a little longer last night. I’ll post the review soon, but if you don’t want to wait, I highly recommend it.

Those are the highlights of my week. How was your week? Be sure to post about it and sign up with MckLinky. If this is your first time to join us, be sure to read the Weekly Wrap-Up guidelines. You can also follow the guidelines link to grab the banner code.

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Review: Four Letter Words

Have you ever found yourself in a situation where you were being called upon to defend your faith, but found yourself tongue-tied and unsure of how to do so? I imagine, if you’ve been a Christian longer than about 24 hours, you probably have.

Four Letter Words, by Bill Giovannetti addresses many of today’s cultural arguments against the Christian faith and offers suggestions on how to combat them with the truth of God’s Word.

“Thou shalt tolerate every opinion... except the Christian's. Today's postmodern ‘prime directive’ leaves many followers of Jesus tongue-tied. In the global village, isn't it unreasonable, and even dangerous, to suggest that the Bible has a monopoly on truth?

The church needs a new breed of Christ-follower. We need Christ-followers who are alert to today's touchy ideas, the truths that fire up more heat than light. We need Christ-followers who can make a clear case for the Bible's worldview; who are ready to help our friends think through their beliefs; who can recognize inconsistencies and challenge them; and who can do all of this with humility, confidence, humor, and love.

Four Letter Words looks at such topics as:

• The inerrant truth of the Bible
• Science vs. the Bible
• Why is there pain and suffering in the world?
• Should Christians be so judgmental?
• Is Hell real?
• Sexuality and purity in today’s culture

Containing a discussion guide, Four Letter Words is billed as being a great choice for small groups, personal study, college and campus groups, and youth groups.

Because of this, I thought it might make a great read for my sixteen-year-old daughter. However, I found it often difficult to read and follow the author’s thought process, so I know she would struggle with comprehension, as well. It wasn’t as conversational a writing style as I would have hoped.

I think it would probably be good for an adult study group and especially good for college-aged groups since that seems to be an age that thrives on ferreting out their own personal belief system and enjoying a healthy debate.

The fact that the book is interactive and QR enabled (if you don’t know what that means, you’re as behind-the-times as I am and probably don’t have a smart phone…ask your teenager), will no doubt make it even more appealing to college-age readers.

About the author: Dr. Bill Giovannetti is a professor at A.W. Tozer Theological Seminary and the senior pastor of Neighborhood Church of Redding. An experienced speaker and author, Bill informs the mind in ways that touch the heart. He enjoys life with his wife and two kids in northern California. For more information about Bill and his other books, visit  http://maxgrace.wordpress.com and http://fourletterwords.org.

Bill is celebrating the new Kindle edition of Four Letter Words (for only $4.99)! He’ll be traveling coast to coast over the next few weeks on this virtual book tour and he's celebrating by hosting a great giveaway!

Click here to find out how you can win two gift certificates to Amazon (in the amount of $50 and $25) and free downloads of his yet-to-be-released title, Recession-Proof: Living a God-Blessed Life in a Messed Up World. Or click to get the whole scoop.

Read what other reviewers are saying.

I received this product free for the purpose of reviewing it.  This post also contains affiliate links. The thoughts and opinions expressed are my own. Your experience may vary.  Please read my full disclosure policy for more details.

Activities for Toddlers and Preschoolers

It’s been a long time since I’ve written about keeping toddlers and preschoolers occupied because that’s not my season of life anymore. However, it’s still a question I hear frequently in homeschooling circles, though the quandary isn’t unique to homeschoolers.

In fact, the question came up recently on the Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers Facebook page. There were several suggestions offered, including what used to be my go-to page for preschool and toddler activities, Paula’s Archives’ Preschool Activities page.

I offered some learning activity suggestions back when my niece was joining us for school, but sometimes you just want something fun and productive that your little one can do fairly independently. Here are some suggestions:

Pipe cleaners and a strainer. (Follow the link for four other toddler-friendly activities)

Poking pom-poms into a milk jug. This used to be a favorite activity among the kids in the home daycare Brianna attended as a toddler. The daycare mom would cut flaps into the sides of the milk jug so that pom-poms were easy to remove.

Create an I Spy bottle. (Maureen, from Spell Outloud has tons of other great ideas on her blog.)

Create a rice (or bean) box. (These are also known as “sensory tubs.” Follow the link for a wealth of photos for the visual-learners like me.) These can be really messy – but so much fun! – so be sure you’ve got a spot for it that can be easily swept. It can be even more fun if you color the rice.

Host a busy bag swap. I so love this idea! I wish I’d heard about it when my kids were younger. It would make a great moms group activity and it’s a great way to save money putting the bags together since things tend to be cheaper when you buy in bulk.

Lacing Cards. Remember the little heavy cardboard, shaped cards you used to play with as a kid? They had the shoestring that you laced in and out of the holes? It’s easy to make your own lacing cards with some heavy cardboard and a hole punch or an awl.

Play-doh is always popular with toddlers. It’s relatively inexpensive, but it can still be fun to make your own.

Cutting straws is a fun activity for preschoolers and good fine-motor skills practice. It probably doesn’t make a good independent activity, though, if you like the length of your child’s hair.

Fishing with homemade magnet fishing poles was always a huge hit with my kids. Just get some dowel rods and attach round magnets to them with twine. Then, provide metal items for which to fish – this can be as elaborate as fish shapes with paper clips attached or just a plastic bucket with some metal items and some plastic ones. The latter is a fun opportunity for preschoolers to explore what sticks to magnets and what doesn’t.

Finger painting. Some fun mediums include pudding, baking soda, and shaving cream. It can also be fun to make a colored gel, double-bagged in a gallon size zip-lock bag – just use a little hair gel and food coloring.

Clothes pins can be used for dropping into a wide-mouth jar (such as a milk jug with part of the top cut away), clipping onto a cardboard box or even as an alphabet matching game for older preschoolers.

String beads or cereal. Another great fine-motor skill activity, kids always seems to enjoy stringing beads or cereal and, of course, if you use cereal, this provides a convenient snack, as well.

Stacking boxes. Old cereal boxes or oatmeal containers work well for this. They don’t even have to be old or empty, if you don’t mind re-shelving them when your child is through playing.

Some other great places for ideas for keeping toddlers and preschoolers productively busy include:

• Toddler’s Busy Book by Trish Kuffner
• Keeping Your Preschooler Occupied

What are some of your favorite resources for keeping little one happily occupied?

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The Homeschool Showcase and Stuff

Did you stop by expecting to see the Homeschool Showcase today. Um, yeah. Um, oops. So, apparently, I failed to update the listing after the last Homeschool Showcase edition and no one was able to submit their posts.

Yeah, oops.

I guess since that’s the first time I’ve ever done that, I can be forgiven, right? Unfortunately, it’s been such a busy weekend, that I didn’t even realize what I’d done until I sat down to put this week’s Showcase together late Sunday night – way too late to do anything about it.

So…please submit your posts for the next Homeschool Showcase, which will be back on its regular week, February 6. Showcase submissions will be due by 6 PM EST, on Friday, February 3.

photo credit

In the meantime, I’m writing at a couple of different places around the web today and I’d love to have you visit me. You can find me at The Homeschool Classroom today giving you lots of do-it-yourself lunch ideas for your kids. This is something that became a part of our school week this past summer and has continued to work well for us into the school year.

I’m also sharing tips for setting up a home management binder at In a Nutshell. Stop by and weigh-in on some of your favorite additions to your own home management binder, if you use one, or find out how to easily set one up, if you don’t.

And, finally, be sure and pray for me today that I don’t lose my ability to find my way to the bathroom within the next ten years. *sigh*

Weekly Wrap-Up: The One With All the Weather Stuff

Happy Friday! We’ve had another great week here. Although school has gone smoothly, I am looking forward to the weekend. I’m ready for some downtime…and there is the little matter of a small mountain of laundry that needs to be caught up.

It’s been another enjoyable week with our much-loved new homeschool curriculum. We finished our first read aloud, The Courage of Sarah Noble, and have moved on to the next one, The Mathclock Gun. We just started it today, so the jury is still out on it, but we enjoyed The Courage of Sarah Noble.

Day 14 – P365 (Megan bought the dogs this huge dog bed at Costco last weekend. They love it! Penny has only removed her lazy butt from it long enough to eat and go out since last weekend.)

Today we got to try out Trail Guide’s built-in Friday catch up day for the first time. The girls and I got our hair cut on Thursday and I got mine highlighted. I should post pictures, but that will have to wait until a day when I’m wearing make-up. Other than race pictures, when the pride of running overcomes the vanity of needing make-up, I don’t feel a strong need to post naked-face pictures for the whole Internet.

Day 15 – P365 (Gus, on the other hand, prefers to sleep hugged up on the stairs. I think he thinks he’s in a tree or something.)

So, anyway, we got a bit behind on Thursday, so we played catch-up today. It worked out great. We did the important Friday stuff and skipped the “if you have time” stuff, so that we could complete the work from Thursday. We got everything done, with no complaining, in time for me to get my grocery-shopping done before supper.

Nice.

Day 16 – P365 (Labeling a map of the colonies, by ethnic group.)

The science focus for this unit is weather. This week, we made a whole weather lab – well, an anemometer and a weather vane, at least. I’ve got to get the clay needed to fix our barometer and we’ll be all set. Now, in addition to temperature, rainfall, and clouds, we can measure wind speed and direction.

You may recall that we tried an anemometer before with the science curriculum we were using (and enjoying), but didn’t have much success. The one we made this week works great! It’s built more like a pinwheel, so it catches the wind and spins easier. I love that Trail Guide to Learning includes photos of each step of its projects, along with detailed directions. I’ve come to the conclusion that I am a very visual learner.

Day 17 – P365 (Anemometer…made from a Honey-Nut Cheerios box in lieu of the required paper plate. Very colorful, no?)

Although there was a slight breeze today, there wasn’t enough wind to spin the anemometer. We didn’t think that there would be enough for our weather vane to work either, but there was. Thanks for our really cool weather equipment, we know that there was a slight breeze blowing from the south today.

In other news, I knew that I missed one day of Project 365 – I just wasn’t feeling inspired that day and didn’t want to take a photo just to be taking one. I didn’t realize that I’d missed two days, though. Oops! I’m still going to keep plugging away, though. I figure, even if I miss a day now and then, I’ll still have more photos at the end of the year than I will if I quit, right?

How was your week? Be sure to post about it and sign up with MckLinky. If this is your first time to join us, be sure to read the Weekly Wrap-Up guidelines. You can also follow the guidelines link to grab the banner code.

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