The Intentional Thrifter: Clothes with character, and a book of characters

Half the fun of thrifting is finding things that are slightly different from either your own or everyone else's. But the real winners are the ones that mix well with what you already have. (In clothes, or anything else.)

Two recent clothes finds: a long plaid jacket that is as comfortable as an old flannel shirt.

A pair of tweed trousers. They're a mix of brown and grey, more on the brown side. I like them with the shoes I found earlier (photo below).

And a helpful book. This was originally titled Bunyan Characters--1st Series, and you can read it online here.

From the archives: Grief, loss, and flattened faith

First posted March 2013; edited slightly

I recently read a Globe and Mail essay that left me both aching for one hurting soul...and wondering how Jesus would respond to his pain.  

The author said that although he believed that his Christian faith was solid, he got the wind so knocked out of him by the senseless death of his mentor that, within another year or so, he had "stopped" being a Christian.

I don't know this person, so I can't guess how deep his faith went, or the amount of grief he had to deal with.

But if the same logic applied to all Christian believers, then there would have been no Christian believers.  Ever.  Because that's exactly what happened on Good Friday.

Of course the disciples had the Resurrection to boost them up, a few days later, just as we have the promise of eternal life.  But all the same, would they ever forget the grief, failure, abandonment, betrayal that that Friday meant?  Yes, they saw Jesus alive--but did that end all their questions about the God who allowed His Son to suffer?  

If the same logic applied to me, my faith would either have been still-born...or killed off as well.  In some ways, it has died, more than once, through sin, stupidity, apathy, failure, disappointment, discouragement, betrayal.  (Sometimes other people's, sometimes mine.)  I've seen Christians I trusted charged with criminal acts.  I've known others who should have been and weren't--which was worse.  I've seen Christian marriages, those that were an example to me, fall apart because of addictions; and ministries break apart over greed and power struggles.  I've often felt, like the author of the essay, that if we lose whatever or whoever most symbolizes Christ to us, then is there a point to continuing?

It seems that the body of Christ, once again, failed to see, to offer support and help where it was most needed...or maybe it was there, and this grieving Christian just didn't see it or couldn't receive it.  I don't know.  But after the last friend has gone, the last mentor or reason to stay in the church has been taken--each Christian is still on his or her own journey.  Whether with welcome (or unwelcome) company, or alone for a stretch, the road is our own.  If that sounds like something from The Pilgrim's Progress, that's exactly what's on my mind, because that "Christian" had a mentor and best friend senselessly taken from him as well...and yet he continued on, I think, in part, to honour the memory of one he had loved.  And for a much greater reason: because it was his journey.

They therefore brought [Faithful] out to do with him according to their law; and first they scourged him, they they buffeted him, then they lanced his flesh with knives; after that, they stoned him with stones, then pricked him with their swords, and last of all, they burned him to ashes at the stake.  Thus came Faithful to his end.

Now, I saw that there stood behind the multitude a chariot and a couple of horses waiting for Faithful, who (so soon as his adversaries had dispatched him) was taken up into it, and straightway was carried up through the clouds with sound of trumpet the nearest way to the Celestial Gate.  But as for Christian, he had some respite, and was remanded back to prison; so he there remained for a space.  But He who overrules all things, having the power of their rage in His own hand, so wrought it about that Christian for that time escaped them, and went his way.  And as he went, he sang, saying:

"Well, Faithful, thou has faithfully professed
Unto thy Lord, with whom thou shalt be blest.
When faithless ones, with all their vain delights,
Are crying out under their hellish plights.
Sing, Faithful, sing, and let thy name survive;
For, though they killed thee, thou art yet alive."

Books finished July to October 2017

Favourite book read since July:

Renaissance: The Power of the Gospel However Dark the Times
Guinness, Os

Runners-up:

Books, Children and Men
Hazard, Paul

The Abolition of Man
Lewis, C.S.

A Touch of the Infinite: Studies in Music Appreciation with Charlotte Mason
Hoyt, Megan Elizabeth

Pretty interesting:

Christian's Children: The Influence of John Bunyan's the Pilgrim's Progress on American Children's Literature
MacDonald, Ruth K.

Could have left at the library:

What to Wear for the Rest of Your Life: Ageless Secrets of Style
Gross, Kim Johnson

And the rest:

A World Lost (a short novel about his character Andy Catlett)
Berry, Wendell

Slave to Fashion (about the movement to create justice in the fashion industry)
Minney, Safia

Precious Lord, Take My Hand: Meditations for Caregivers
Beach, Shelly

Revolution in World Missions
Yohannan, K.P.

Little Women (Little Women, #1) (re-read)
Alcott, Louisa May

The Man in the Queue
Tey, Josephine

Organize Tomorrow Today: 8 Ways to Retrain Your Mind to Optimize Performance at Work and in Life
Selk, Jason

Quote for the Day: They can stop sneering now

"Cowper said, forty or fifty years ago, that he dared not name John Bunyan in his verse, for fear of moving a sneer. To our refined forefathers, we suppose, Lord Roscommon’s Essay on Translated Verse, and the Duke of Buckinghamshire’s Essay on Poetry, appeared to be compositions infinitely superior to the allegory of the preaching tinker. We live in better times; and we are not afraid to say, that, though there were many clever men in England during the latter half of the seventeenth century, there were only two minds which possessed the imaginative faculty in a very eminent degree. One of those minds produced the Paradise Lost, the other the Pilgrim’s Progress." ~~ Thomas Babington Macaulay, "The Pilgrim's Progress and John Bunyan"

(It's a great essay. You can read the whole thing at that link--just scroll down and click to view it.) 

Quote for the Day: What Rebecca Read

A thrill of delicious excitement ran through Rebecca's frame, from her new shoes up, up to the leghorn cap and down the black braid. She pressed Mr. Cobb's knee ardently and said in a voice choking with tears of joy and astonishment, "Oh, it can't be true, it can't; to think I should see Milltown. It's like having a fairy godmother who asks you your wish and then gives it to you! Did you ever read Cinderella, or The Yellow Dwarf, or The Enchanted Frog, or The Fair One with Golden Locks?"

"No," said Mr. Cobb cautiously, after a moment's reflection. "I don't seem to think I ever did read jest those partic'lar ones. Where'd you get a chance at so much readin'?"

"Oh, I've read lots of books," answered Rebecca casually. "Father's and Miss Ross's and all the dif'rent school teachers', and all in the Sunday-school library. I've read The Lamplighter, and Scottish Chiefs, and Ivanhoe, and The Heir of Redclyffe, and Cora, the Doctor's Wife, and David Copperfield, and The Gold of Chickaree, and Plutarch's Lives, and Thaddeus of Warsaw, and Pilgrim's Progress, and lots more.--What have you read?"

"I've never happened to read those partic'lar books; but land! I've read a sight in my time! Nowadays I'm so drove I get along with the Almanac, the Weekly Argus, and the Maine State Agriculturist.--There's the river again; this is the last long hill, and when we get to the top of it we'll see the chimbleys of Riverboro in the distance. 'T ain't fur. I live 'bout half a mile beyond the brick house myself."

Rebecca's hand stirred nervously in her lap and she moved in her seat. "I didn't think I was going to be afraid," she said almost under her breath; "but I guess I am, just a little mite--when you say it's coming so near."

~~ Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm

Wednesday Hodgepodge: A recipe for contentment

1. When you think about your future what do you fear most? Hope for the most?

"He that is down needs fear no fall,
He that is low no pride;
He that is humble ever shall
Have God to be his guide.

I am content with what I have,
Little be it or much;
And, Lord, contentment still I crave,
Because thou savest such.

Fulness to such a burden is
That go on pilgrimage:
Here little, and hereafter bliss,
Is best from age to age."

~~ John Bunyan, The Pilgrim's Progress (Part II)

2. September is National Chicken Month. How often is chicken on the menu at your house? What's a favorite dish made with chicken? What's something you're a 'chicken' about doing or trying?

We used to have chicken quite often, but lately it's been expensive. Sometimes Mr. Fixit buys a whole small chicken and we do it in the slow cooker, with a little seasoning or maybe barbecue sauce. Lydia had a friend here for dinner on the weekend and I made Ten Napkins Sticky Chicken, something we hadn't had for a long time but that everybody likes.

You could say I am a chicken when it comes to climbing high things or going too close to the edge. Like on apartment balconies, ahem. I prefer to admire the view from inside.

3. What are three things you don't own but wish you did?

That's an interesting question. Here's Mr. Fixit's list:

"A garage with a hoist, and a 1969 Nikko amplifier."

Here's my list:

My Samsung tablet is going to need replacing soon, so that's on my wish list.

If I ever take another more-than-overnight trip, I would like to have one of the newer-style bags with a handle and wheels.

But honestly...there isn't much else. When I went to Toronto last week, I had half an hour to stroll through the big-name stores we don't have here, before heading to the subway station under the mall. When I was younger, going to that mall with my parents was a rare and special treat. Even when I lived in the city as a student, I enjoyed browsing through the shops full of things I couldn't afford.  This time, I left there thinking, "I'm glad I already like my own things." (And that wasn't just because I was heading to the Tiny Wardrobe Tour.)

4. Would you rather be a jack of all trades or a master of one? Elaborate.  If you answered one, which one?

Mr. Fixit says "Master of electronics." Which I think he is already, but he's also handy at other things.

Me...I'm not sure how to answer that. Definitely not all trades, maybe good at a couple.

5. Ketchup or mustard? On what?

Ketchup: mixed with brown sugar, baked under Leanne Ely's Upside-Down Meatloaf.

Mustard: on Oktoberfest sausage on a bun.

6.  Insert your own random thought here.

I just finished re-reading Little Women, the first part. (Like The Pilgrim's Progress, there's a lot of argument over whether you include the second part in the general title.) It wasn't a book I loved when I was growing up, although I think I did plow dutifully through it once, along with Eight Cousins and Jack and Jill. I was more of an Anne fan. This time through, I was looking for different things; and I was surprised at a few details that don't usually make it into filmed versions. The long serious conversations, mostly. The mailbox in their back yard--Alcott seemed to love that kind of detail, and there was a similar setup in Jack and Jill, where they sent "things" (we are not given all the details) in a basket across a clothesline. I also liked the picnic with their British counterparts, where every character contributes the next part of an ad-libbed story. It was a clever way for her to reinforce each one's traits and point of view.  Again, it's the sort of scene that comes up in Jack and Jill (a lengthy play-by-play of their debating society meeting and then a dramatic performance), and in An Old-Fashioned Girl (a detailed description of the conversations at a young working women's lunch). Conversations and long descriptions of what games they played or who did what on stage are the sort of thing abridgers like to axe...too long, don't move the plot...but I think they sometimes show the author at her most relaxed, and they give us some unintended but genuine "peeps" into what people of the time did and thought--when they weren't trying to be too high-minded.

Linked from The Wednesday Hodgepodge at From This Side of the Pond.

From the antiques market

We went to the antiques market, for some fun on Family Day. A lot of the booths had special sales on, so the place was pretty crowded. Ponytails bought records. Lydia found a teacup. Mr. Fixit bought a Polaroid camera. I was searching for one book but didn't find a copy there; but I did bring home a 1940's Pilgrim's Progress, and Herbartian Psychology by John Adams. You can read Herbartian Psychology on archive.org; it's a book that Charlotte Mason quotes in Chapter VII of her Philosophy of Education.

And two of us won free coffees when we "rolled up the rim to win" at Tim Horton's afterward. So all in all it was a worthwhile trip!

10 Books That Stuck, by Mama Squirrel

Jeanne is asking for the names of ten books that stuck with us in some way.  I don't have the pile of books to take a nice photo like she did, but here's a very incomplete list.

1. Winnie the Pooh
2. What is a Family?, by Edith Schaeffer
3.  Tears of Silence, by Jean Vanier
4.  The Pilgrim's Progress
5.  The Tightwad Gazette
6.  Who Do You Think You Are?, by Alice Munro (very Southern-Ontario-gothic)
7.  The Blue Castle, by L.M. Montgomery
8.  The Educated Imagination, by Northrop Frye
9.  101 Famous Poems
10.  The Heart Has Its Own Reasons
11.  Brave New World.  Had to be in there somewhere.
12.  Material World, by Peter Menzel.

Which leaves no room for Charlotte Mason, David Hicks,  Jean Little, Jan Karon, Elizabeth Enright, Sir Walter Scott, Don Aslett, Narnia, Shakespeare, Rumer Godden, Ray Bradbury, Dickens, Plutarch, or Mother Goose.  But you can't have everything.

Southey quote for the day: Daniel's Books

From The Doctor, &c., by Robert Southey

Happily for Daniel, he lived before the age of Magazines, Reviews, Cyclopedias, Elegant Extracts and Literary Newspapers, so that he gathered the fruit of knowledge for himself, instead of receiving it from the dirty fingers of a retail vender [sic]. His books were few in number, but they were all weighty either in matter or in size. They consisted of the Morte d'Arthur in the fine black-letter edition of Copeland ; Plutarch's Morals and Pliny's Natural History, two goodly folios, full as an egg of meat... Ripley Revived by Eirenaeus Philalethes, an Englishman styling himself 'Citizen of the World'... the Pilgrim's Progress; two volumes of Ozell's translation of Rabelais; Latimer's Sermons ; and the last volume of Foxe's Martyrs, which latter book had been brought him by his wife. The Pilgrim's Progress was a godmother's present to his son : the odd volumes of Rabelais he had picked up at Kendal, at a sale, in a lot with Ripley Revived and Plutarch's Morals:  the others he had inherited.

Daniel had looked into all these books, read most of them, and believed all that he read, except Rabelais, which he could not tell what to make of. He was not, however, one of those persons who complacently suppose every thing to be nonsense, which they do not perfectly comprehend, or flatter themselves that they do. His simple heart judged of books by what they ought to be, little knowing what they are....The Morte d' Arthur therefore he received for authentic history, just as he did the painful chronicle of honest John Stowe, and the Barnesian labours of Joshua the self-satisfied : there was nothing in it indeed which stirred his English blood like the battles of Cressy and Poictiers and Najara; yet on the whole he preferred it to Barnes's story, believed in Sir Tor, Sir Tristram, Sir Lancelot and Sir Lamorack as entirely as in Sir John Chandos, the Captal de Buche and the Black Prince, and liked them better. 

Good Friday: of grief, loss, and flattened faith

I recently read a Globe and Mail essay that left me both aching for one hurting soul...and wondering how Jesus would respond to his pain. 

Basically the author is saying that although he believed that his Christian faith was solid, he got the wind so knocked out of him by the senseless death of his mentor that, within another year or so, he had "stopped" being a Christian.

I don't know this person, so I can't guess how deep his faith went, or the amount of grief he had to deal with.

But if the same logic applied to all Christian believers, then there would have been no Christian believers.  Ever.  Because that's exactly what happened on Good Friday.

Of course the disciples had the Resurrection to boost them up, a few days later, just as we have the promise of eternal life.  But all the same, would they ever forget the grief, failure, abandonment, betrayal that that Friday meant?  Yes, they saw Jesus alive--but did that end all their questions about the God who allowed His Son to suffer? 

If the same logic applied to me, my faith would probably either have been still-born...or killed off as well.  In some ways, it has died, more than once, through sin, stupidity, apathy, failure, disappointment, discouragement, betrayal.  (Sometimes other people's, sometimes mine.)  Every time we've had to make the decision to leave a church, some of my belief in God's people has been shaken.  I've seen Christians I trusted charged with criminal acts.  I've known others who should have been and weren't--which was worse.  I've seen Christian marriages, those that were an example to me, fall apart because of addictions; and ministries break apart over greed and power struggles.  I've often felt, like the author of the essay, that if we lose whatever or whoever most symbolizes Christ to us, then is there a point to continuing?

It seems that the body of Christ, once again, failed to see, to offer support and help where it was most needed...or maybe it was there, and this grieving Christian just didn't see it or couldn't receive it.  I don't know.  But even when the last friend has gone, the last mentor or reason to stay in the church has been taken--each Christian is still on his or her own journey.  Whether with welcome (or unwelcome) company, or alone for a stretch, the road is our own.  If that sounds like something from The Pilgrim's Progress, that's exactly what's on my mind, because that "Christian" had a mentor and best friend senselessly taken from him as well...and yet he continued on, I think, in part, to honour the memory of one he had loved.  And for a much greater reason: because it was his journey.

They therefore brought [Faithful] out to do with him according to their law; and first they scourged him, they they buffeted him, then they lanced his flesh with knives; after that, they stoned him with stones, then pricked him with their swords, and last of all, they burned him to ashes at the stake.  Thus came Faithful to his end.

Now, I saw that there stood behind the multitude a chariot and a couple of horses waiting for Faithful, who (so soon as his adversaries had dispatched him) was taken up into it, and straightway was carried up through the clouds with sound of trumpet the nearest way to the Celestial Gate.  But as for Christian, he had some respite, and was remanded back to prison; so he there remained for a space.  But He who overrules all things, having the power of their rage in His own hand, so wrought it about that Christian for that time escaped them, and went his way.  And as he went, he sang, saying:

"Well, Faithful, thou has faithfully professed
Unto thy Lord, with whom thou shalt be blest.
When faithless ones, with all their vain delights,
Are crying out under their hellish plights.
Sing, Faithful, sing, and let thy name survive;
For, though they killed thee, thou art yet alive."

Thinking about Lent

Lent starts next week--without nearly the fanfare of the beginning of Advent (unless you're in Mardi Gras territory). Maybe pancakes the night before, but other than that, most people won't notice.

I'll have to get our assortment of celebration books off the shelf again and see what we haven't done for awhile. Most years we go back and forth between old favourites like Before and After Easter and Celebrating the Christian Year. We have a felt banner (made when The Apprentice was small) that has symbols to add each week and then each day; but I don't like doing the exact same thing every year. Sometimes we've worked in themes like Pilgrim's Progress or Narnia, usually closer to Resurrection Sunday. It's definitely harder to find family-friendly devotional activities for this time of year.

I found this list of readings at Domestic-Church.com and thought it looked interesting. They suggest using the readings Jesse-tree fashion and posting them (or symbols of them?) in the shape of a cross. There are possibilities there...

Finishings

The last day of Treehouse classes (we still have exams next week). This week is full of finishings.

The Apprentice finished Fearfully and Wonderfully Made, Whatever Happened to Justice?, and part 2 of How to Read a Book (the part that was assigned for this year). We're still working on The Betrothed, but that's all right.

Ponytails finished Pilgrim's Progress Book II (I think she would have liked a Book III to go on to next year). We also finished the geography story about mountains we were reading. We are one chapter away from finishing the last Narnia book, but she won't let me read it to her because then we'd be done.

And I'm trying to finish typing the last Plutarch study for this year. Almost there...

And when exams are done, we will celebrate the year's achievements in school, the beans climbing up the wall, Crayons' graduation to a two-wheeler (with training wheels), our wedding anniversary, the pink roses blooming, Canada Day, and the arrival of Coffeemamma's family.

Four homeschool days with Ponytails

This is a four-day school week for us (we took Monday off), so these lessons cover what Ponytails did over the last two days and what's planned for the rest of the week. This week also marked the start of our spring term, although a lot of what she's doing is just continuing from the winter.

Tuesday:
Bible: listen to part of Proverbs 1. Start keeping a new illustrated copybook for Proverbs (one verse and one drawing for each chapter).
Copywork: one verse from Proverbs, see above.
Grammar and spelling: Ruth Beechick-style exercises based on The Enchanted Forest (a fairytale in chapters that Ponytails is reading to herself)--looking for synonyms, spelling patterns, word meanings, etc.
Miquon Math: Division concepts.
French: short lesson about "Je sens avec le nez."
Canadian History: Canada's Story, chapter 7, about Champlain and Captain Kirke (really).

Wednesday:
Pilgrim's Progress, Book II--about four pages (part of this section)
Copywork/handwriting: worked on capital G in cursive.
Miquon Math: Reviewed division lesson; did five adding/subtracting word problems.
Shakespeare (with Mom and The Apprentice): read two scenes from Two Gentlemen of Verona.
British History: An Island Story chapter 84: King Monmouth. Marked her timeline.
Minn of the Mississippi, chapter 14 (and an online jigsaw puzzle about the Mississippi)

Thursday:
Bible: Proverbs 2.
Copywork: verse from Proverbs.
Read poems with Mom.
Language work: same. Read some of The Enchanted Forest alone.
French: short lesson.
Natural History: Secrets of the Woods--finish the Tookhees chapter.
Canadian History: Canada's Story, chapter 8 (the death of Champlain). Timeline.
Read Children of the New Forest with Mom and The Apprentice.

Friday:
Bible: Proverbs 3.
Copywork: verse from Proverbs.
Language work: dictation from The Enchanted Forest.
Miquon Math.
The Heroes, by Charles Kingsley: Theseus, part 1.
Science: The Story of Inventions, pages 271-280, about Alexander Graham Bell. Do some experiments with sound.

Other things Ponytails is doing:
Reading The Magician's Nephew with Mom
Listening to Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang read on CD
Making clothes for a felt doll
Playing outside
Eating Easter candy
Loving her "pet bird" that drinks water
Watching everybody's beans sprout (a science experiment)

The Seven Things Game

The Common Room's Deputy Headmistress tagged me to list seven things I can't do, seven movies, seven things I say too much and so on. I have been having trouble with this! Some things that should go on the lists are too personal to post on a blog, but leaving them off completely is awkward too.

So here are my lists, incomplete but the best I can do.

Things to do before I die

1. Find a way of remembering the difference between further and farther.

2. Visit all those galleries in Europe.

3. Read all the books for every single year of Ambleside Online.

Things I cannot do

1. Drive

2. Work a yo-yo

3. Wear pointy-toed high heels

Things that attract me to my husband

1. He doesn't watch sports on TV

2. He's a very decisive shopper (he's even good at picking kids' shoes)

3. He still has hair

4. He has chips-and-pop-and-card parties with the kids when I go to meetings

5. He can install just about anything

6. He insists on comparing us to almost every couple we watch on TV or in a movie (my favourite is when he said the two of us were very much like Herman and Lily Munster)

Seven Things I Say Most Often

I had no idea what to put for this so I very gingerly asked two of the Squirrelings to write down what they thought (under threat of coal in their stockings if they wrote anything really embarrassing). Here's The Apprentice's List:

1. "Television is not a right, it is a privilege and it can be taken away." (My note: did I ever really say that??)

2. "Look what the DHM put on her blog!"

3. "Let's sing ANOTHER Advent song."

4. "Those Bratz dolls are hideous."

5. "That was NOT a good prayer." (My explanation: I am not attempting to criticize anyone else's theology, but I do say it if someone rattles off grace a little too fast.)

6. "Apprentice, get off of your tush and do some work."

7. "When I was a kid, there were quality toys in the stores." (I'm not sure about the truth of that one...toys of the seventies were only slightly less junky than the ones sold now. We had our share of things that took ten batteries or broke after two days.)

Here's Ponytails' list, written all by herself with The Apprentice as spellchecker.

1. "I love you, Ponytails. Kiss, hug."

2. "I like you, Ponytails."

3. "Let's eat."

4. "New stuff in the shops are junk."

5. "Charlotte Mason is great."

6. "Do some school work, Apprentice."

7. "I love you, Apprentice. Kiss, hug."

Seven books (or series) I love

I'm still working on this one. Somewhere on the list would be Great Expectations, Pilgrim's Progress, Mrs. Tittlemouse, Saint Maybe, Hercule Poirot mysteries, and What is a Family?. But there are a lot of others that I could put in just as easily.

Seven movies I watch over and over again (or would watch over and over if I had the time)

Again this is really hard, because Mr. Fixit and I watch a lot of movies on T.V. Mr. Fixit will tape something in the middle of the night and then we'll watch part of it late in the evening (sometimes it takes us several nights to get through one movie). Some of them are great, some are okay, some are such stinkers that we quit watching after a few minutes.

I would vote for anything with Alec Guinness (like The Lavender Hill Mob or Our Man in Havana), any good police or courtroom movie (I liked A Few Good Men and My Cousin Vinny, except for the language), anything I've seen so far with Emma Thompson in it (with a nod there to the DHM), and Veggie Tales' Jonah. And most of the mushy Christmas movies that Mr. Fixit WON'T watch with me. And most of the mushy musicals, ditto.

Seven people I want to join in, too

First, The Apprentice, because I know she really wants to play! After that, it's a free-for-all. If you want to put your brain on the rack writing one of these, you're welcome to play.

The week with Ponytails

For anyone out there who wonders what our third-grader's homeschool really looks like (well, as we plan it anyway), here's what's coming up in the next week for Ponytails. (Her general outline is here.)

We also have a couple of extra things we're working on: writing birthday thank-you notes, and getting ready for next Saturday's Explorer Night. (More on that later.)

Monday:

Bible reading: second story about Gideon, draw in the booklet she's making about the 12 judges of Israel; practice memory verses

Music appreciation: listen to some Beethoven music during lunch

History: keep reading about Magellan from Roger Duvoisin's book They Put Out to Sea

Literature: start reading On the Banks of Plum Creek with Mom

Math: work on parts of Miquon Math pages J 24 and J 25 with Mom (partly about fractions, partly about division)

Poems: read from Myra Cohn Livingston's Circle of Seasons

Spelling: look for words in Livingston's verses about fall that have "atch" in them

Singing: start a new folksong, probably Nonesuch (words here, music here (scroll down to Nonesuch). We'll also try picking out the tune on our Music Maker harp (something we've had since the Apprentice was Crayons' age).

French: work on the "Good Morning" page in our picture dictionary

Copywork: start copying one of the verses from A Circle of Seasons

Picture study: look at one of Raphael's paintings and describe it (later in the day, with her sisters)


Tuesday:

Bible reading: John 4 (the woman at the well); practice memory verses

Geography: finish the Rivers unit from Play Story Geography

Literature: read more of "Pericles" from Lamb's Tales from Shakespeare; read chapter 4 of The Wilds of Whip-poor-will Farm by Janet Foster

Poems: read from Myra Cohn Livingston's Circle of Seasons

Spelling: practice "atch" words

Singing: work on a new hymn, probably The Love of God

French: work on the "Good Morning" page

Copywork: work on the verses from A Circle of Seasons

Art/crafts: drawing lesson


Wednesday:

Bible reading: third story about Gideon, draw in the booklet; memory verses

Music appreciation: listen to some Beethoven music during lunch or teatime

History: keep reading about Magellan

Literature: "Johnny Appleseed" (from the book Yankee Doodle's Cousins by Anne Malcolmson); start a new story from The Jungle Book

Math: work on pages J 24 and J 25 again (and maybe some of 26)

Poems: read from Circle of Seasons

Dictionary: look up new words from the poems (in our children's dictionary), and write them in her "personal dictionary"

Singing: favourite folk songs

Copywork: copying verses from A Circle of Seasons

Crafts: pick one of the birthday-present craft kits (she got a couple of different things to make from friends) to start working on


Thursday and Friday are pretty much the same; we're also going to start Holling C. Holling's book Minn of the Mississippi at the end of the week if we have time and as we finish some other things. On Friday we'll do a couple of pages from Pilgrim's Progress. Math on Friday will be Ponytails' favourite Pizza Parlor game (see the post below).


Next Saturday night is a windup night for the study of explorers we've been doing--it's not a group thing, just a Treehouse event. Ponytails and the Apprentice are going to report on explorers they've learned about, and we're gong to have some kind of appropriate food--probably ending with a bowl of oranges to ward off scurvy. More on that as we decide!

And the answers are...

1. They waved their handkerchiefs until they turned the corner from New Dollar Street into Elm Street. Now they could no longer see the yellow house. Good-by, yellow house! Good-by!

The Moffats, by Eleanor Estes

2. That room was full to the brim of something beautiful, and Betsy knew what it was. Its name was Happiness.

Understood Betsy, by Dorothy Canfield Fisher

3. The other [thing] is that back in our own world everyone soon started saying how Eustace had improved, and how “You’d never know him for the same boy”: everyone except Aunt Alberta, who said he had become very commonplace and tiresome and it must have been the influence of those Pevensie children.

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, by C.S. Lewis

4. None throws away the apple for the core.
But if thou shalt cast all away as vain,
I know not but ‘twill make me dream again.

Pilgrim's Progress, by John Bunyan (the poem that ends Book I)

5. The mouse hurried to his safe home.
He lit the fire,
he ate his supper,
and he finished reading his book.

Mouse Soup, by Arnold Lobel

6. And Montmorency, standing on his hind legs, before the window, peering out into the night, gave a short bark of decided concurrence with the toast.

Three Men in a Boat (not to mention the dog), by Jerome K. Jerome

7. To begin perfect happiness at the respective ages of twenty-six and eighteen, is to do pretty well; and professing myself moreover convinced, that the General’s unjust interference, so far from being really injurious to their felicity, was perhaps rather conducive to it, by improving their knowledge of each other, and adding strength to their attachment, I leave it to be settled by whomsoever it may concern, whether the tendency of this work be altogether to recommend parental tyranny,, or reward filial disobedience.

Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen

8. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.

The Gospel of John

9. I took her hand in mine, and we went out of the ruined place; and as the morning mists had risen long ago when I first left the forge, so the evening mists were rising now, and in all the broad expanse of tranquil light they showed to me, I saw no shadow of another parting from her. ALTERNATE ENDING I was very glad afterwards to have had the interview, for in her face and in her voice, and in her touch, she gave me the assurance that suffering had been stronger than XXX's teaching, and had given her a heart to understand what my heart used to be.

Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens (he couldn't decide on an ending)

10. And Rose drew him in, and set him in his chair, and put little Elanor upon his lap.
He drew a deep breath. 'Well, I'm back,' he said.

The Return of the King, by J.R.R. Tolkien

500 Copies of Pilgrim's Progress

My kids were teasing me yesterday after we came home from a book sale with yet another copy of Pilgrim's Progress. I think that makes about 5 different editions we have now, including my favourite with Edward Ardizzone illustrations. The one I found yesterday was published by Sears, probably in the 1920s, and is in amazingly solid condition except for a little chipping at the bottom of the spine.

But the kids have nothing to complain about; here's an essay by somebody who has 500 copies, or did nine years ago anyway. [Updated link]

We also found four volumes of Charlotte Mason (we dug around to see if the other two were in a box but didn't see them); Hawthorne's Twice-Told Tales; a book of James Whitcomb Riley's poems (Ponytails wanted that one); a James Herriot picture book; Claire Turlay Newberry's book Smudge; and a nicely-abridged copy of Don Quixote for the Apprentice's school next year. All in all it was a successful trip.

Books That Get Used

One of the Beehive5 clan asked what we thought the three best books in the English language are. I like her choices, but just to be different I'll vote for Pilgrim's Progress, Mrs. Tittlemouse, and I can't decide on a third.

But it did make me think about a similar question. What books get cracked open the most in your house, over and over, whether you homesquirrel or not? Yesterday I was working on some Plutarch homework (an ongoing Mamasquirrel project) and as I grabbed my big hardcover dictionary for about the 20th time, I mentally thanked my own mama and dad squirrel who bought it for me during squirrely-versity days many years ago. For some people maybe a dictionary just sits on the shelf, but mine gets used a lot.

I also wouldn't want to do without our Philips World History Encyclopedia (saves a lot of Internet search time!) and our collection of yard-sale atlases...and an all-in-one-volume of Shakespeare (we never have to worry about which play is coming up next term at Ambleside)...and a hymn book. And, mamasquirrel is a little embarrassed to admit it, but one of those movie/video guides that tells you whether what's on tonight is a winner or a turkey.

They may not be the best-written books in English, but they do get used.