Sunday Readings for Advent II: Silver and gold

Dear friends, I am not writing you a new command but an old one, which you have had since the beginning. This old command is the message you have heard. Yet I am writing you a new command; its truth is seen in him and in you, because the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining.  (1 John 2:7-8 NIV)

On the radio yesterday we heard a commercial giving holiday decorating advice.

"Gold and silver this year--lots of gold and silver.  For me, the holidays are all about richness and luxury."

Does that make you want to laugh?  Or maybe cry?

We decided to laugh.  We could afford to.  We were sitting in Country Style, warming up after a cold few minutes of stuffing groceries, including a small turkey, into the trunk of the Civic.  We had also been to the thrift shop, where Mama Squirrel had picked out a couple of bags' worth of "gold and silver."  Actually, we felt pretty blessed, and not at all in need of rushing out to the Home Place to stock up on Holiday Bling.

Richness and luxury.  Silver and gold, as Yukon Cornelius said.  And what will next year's hot colours be?

Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father^[ is not in them. For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever. (1 John 2:15-17 NIV)

I'm thinking of the DHM's daughter, who hasn't left the hospital since her baby was born, two days before American Thanksgiving.  I'm thinking that silver, gold, orange or puce, the colour of the decorations is pretty low priority for her this year.

I'm thinking of another family, waiting to hear the final decision on a foster grandchild's permanent placement, and waiting to bring their own adopted child home.

Of someone at our church who just lost a parent.  Another family whose income has dried up. And of other friends who are facing illness with courage, changes with faith.

In the face of all this, how dare we trivialize "what it's all about?"  The "true light shining" is more beautiful than any bowlful of gold balls or any silver tree that we could put up.

As someone said in the comments to last week's Advent post, Advent is not a countdown; it's a preparation.  When you prepare to get married, you expect it to last at least longer than the wedding day (and I do not mean to be flippant about that--I know that lasting marriages do not always happen) . When we prepare our hearts to receive the gift of God's Son, we look forward to something that will last forever.

 As for you, see that what you have heard from the beginning remains in you. If it does, you also will remain in the Son and in the Father. And this is what he promised us—eternal life. (1 John 2:24-25 NIV)

Christmas cookies, not for Ralphie

In the movie A Christmas Story, Ralphie is disappointed when his secret message turns out to be "Drink your Ovaltine."

Last year when I was experimenting with this master dough (also mentioned here), I wanted to try the Malted Milk Buttons variation, but couldn't find any Ovaltine at our supermarket. So I put that idea aside; but when I saw jars of Ovaltine weeks later, I picked one up. It turns out that nobody here likes to drink it much, so we had more than the required two cups' worth left to make the Buttons this year. And they are very good.

As with the "Chocolate Shortbread" we invented last year, giving you the actual recipe is a little tricky, because you need exactly half of a Master Dough recipe which contains three egg yolks and so on. But I'll give you the idea and you can work it out from there...or you can buy Leslie Glover Pendleton's book...or you can find a copy of the December 15, 1998 Woman's Day Magazine.

Make a shortbread-type dough containing about 2 1/2 cups flour, 2/3 cup white sugar, a cup of butter, 1 or 2 egg yolks, 1/2 tsp. salt, and 1 tsp. vanilla. Mix in, probably with your hands, 2 cups Ovaltine-type powder and another 1/2 tsp. salt. You will also need at least 6 oz. of milk chocolate or semi-sweet chocolate--chips or squares, doesn't matter--for melting and dipping. We ended up using the whole 8-oz. box of semisweet chocolate, and had a few left over that did not get dipped. Squish all the Ovaltine powder (and the extra salt--not sure why that's needed, but I did put it in) into the mixed dough, and roll it into approximately 140 teaspoon-sized balls--no joke, these are quite small like Pfeffernusse. Bake on ungreased sheets for 10 to 12 minutes at 350 degrees, but watch them--you do not want the bottoms to burn. When they've cooled enough to handle, melt the chocolate and dip the tops of the cookies into it, forming a sort of kiss-type swirl if you're skillful enough, or just getting them chocolatey if you're not. Let them set--they probably won't get firm enough unless you put them in the fridge.

As I said, we're not Ovaltine drinkers--but the cookies seem to be addictive.

This post is linked from Four Moms Cookie Exchange at The Common Room.

Wednesday already? This and that, and dialing for dinner (not pizza)

The week has been busy...everybody's been making things, and Ponytails the Photographer is going to post some photos soon.

The crazy radio stations that play Christmas music too early (and the same songs over and over) are still good for something. Yesterday afternoon Mama Squirrel happened to turn THAT station on, and the nice announcer invited her to phone in and be caller number three...and tell him what comes after "Chestnuts roasting on an open fire." So Mama Squirrel obediently dialed the phone, said "Jack Frost nipping at your nose," and won dinner for two. How about that?

Mama Squirrel and Crayons are one chapter away from finishing Kidnapped. Crayons was not pleased to leave Alan knocking at David's uncle's door at the end of yesterday's reading, but that's what suspense is for. We are also almost finished the biography of Stevenson, and one unit from the end of Grade 3 Light Blue Math Mammoth. Mr. Fixit has ordered the download of Grade 4 so we should be ready to go with that soon.

And we are all putting in extra time on Latin. This is part of this week's lesson:

"Benedic, Domine, nos et haec tua dona, quae de tua largitate sumus sumpturi. Per Christum, Dominum nostrum. Amen."

Virtual saccharum if you know what that means.

School Plans for the first week of December

This is "Ornament Week" as well as the first week of Advent! We will be doing special crafts each afternoon this week (along with the Allspice study), as well as shifting into a couple of different books for December. We will also be leaving French aside until the New Year and doing only Latin this month (hoping to include one or two Latin carols).

Crayons:

Monday

Bible reading
Hero Tales
Life of Stevenson, 10 pages
Kidnapped, one chapter
Math
George Washington's World, about Catherine the Great

Tuesday

Bible reading
Bible Geography, 1 section
History, pages 102-104
Story Book of Science: "The Age of Trees"
Math
English work (sentence structure and punctuation)
Life of Stevenson, 8 pages
Kidnapped, one chapter

Wednesday

Bible reading
Hero Tales
Math
English
Finish Life of Stevenson
Finish Kidnapped

Thursday

Bible reading
Math
English
Bible Geography
History pages 109-112
A Christmas Carol, pages 1-10

Friday

Bible reading
Math English
Hero Tales
Story Book of Science: 1 chapter
A Christmas Carol--pages 11-20

Ponytails:

Monday

Bible reading
History--catch up
Math and Science, as assigned by Dad
Mr. Pipes, 5 pages
Write with the Best Vol. 2, continue lesson on notetaking/outlining

Tuesday

Bible reading
Math, science
Composition
Mere Christianity, pages 51-52
Story of the World Vol. 4, 1/2 chapter

Wednesday

Bible reading
Math, science
Composition
Mr. Pipes, 5 pages
Story of the World, 1/2 chapter
Watership Down, 1 chapter

Thursday

Bible reading
Math, science
Composition
Mere Christianity
World of Caesar Augustus, with Mom
Watership Down

Friday

Bible reading
Math, science
Composition
Mere Christianity
Story of the World, 1/2 chapter
Watership Down, 1 chapter

Group:

Monday

Latin lesson 4 day 1
Shakespeare: Continue Twelfth Night
It Couldn't Just Happen--about two pages
Composer study: Pelléas et Mélisande (Fauré)
Poems

Tuesday

Latin lesson 4 day 2
And The Word Came With Power, chapters 2 & 3 (skip chp 1 for later)
It Couldn't Just Happen--about two pages
Poems

Wednesday

Latin lesson 4 day 3
And The Word Came With Power, chp 4 & 5
Age of Fable, half of chapter 13

Thursday

Latin lesson 4 day 4
And The Word Came With Power, chp 6 & 7
It Couldn't Just Happen, about 2 pages

Friday

Latin lesson 4 day 5
And The Word Came With Power, chp 8 & 9
Age of Fable, finish chapter 13

“O Come O Come Emmanuel”: Advent I

I’m reading about one family’s nature-and-woods-and-symbols Advent ritual. The description is well written, the celebration is well intentioned, and the whole thing sounds much more organized than our usual Advent dining-table mess of crayons, song sheets and slightly aged artificial candle wreath. I have no quarrel with thoughtful parents who want to make their families’ holiday traditions meaningful and personalized.

But I’m wondering what, if anything, is wrong with the words I’m reading and the pictures I’m looking at.

I read “the Christ child.” That’s good.

I see pictures of Mary and Joseph. Also good.

So what’s wrong?

I think it over, and it occurs to me that though the Christ Child is named here, he seems still somewhat undefined. Or perhaps just part of the ensemble, rather than front and centre. The trees and the stars seem bigger here than He does.

And I’m thinking that if He is the “reason for the season,” the focal point, then our understanding of the reason must begin with something bigger than a little baby. Something ugly. Something messy. Something that doesn’t fit nicely into candlelight walks and rituals, into firelight and hot chocolate, into perfect Nativity scenes. Something not so easy to swaddle.

Something like sin.

Attempts to edge Christ out of Christmas may be as blatant as political groups banning Bibles; they may be as commercial as a ToyStory advent calendar; or they may be as subtle as an Advent ritual in which Christ becomes only one more thing to be symbolized along with rocks and plants. Or Christmas trees. Or even light and candles, if Christ is not behind and in and over them all. If His coming because of our darkness and sinfulness is minimized. Christ announced the beginning of His ministry by publicly reading a prophecy that said He had come to set prisoners free. Matthew 1:21 says “And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus: for he shall save his people from their sins.”

Do we need to emphasize this ugliness during Advent? Shouldn’t this be a happy time, an exciting time? It’s not Lent, after all. Christmas is coming. Jesus’ birthday is easy to talk about, sing about (see any toddler Sunday School curriculum for how sweet and simple it can be made). But the reason—that’s not so simple. Not so beautiful. It doesn’t fit so well into our ABCs of Advent.

What if it doesn’t fit, can’t fit, doesn’t need to fit? What if that is the point?

“It seems, then,” said Tirian,” that the stable seen from within and the stable seen from without are two different places.”

”Yes,” said the Lord Digory. “Its inside is bigger than its outside.”

“Yes,” said Queen Lucy. “In our world too, a stable once had something inside it that was bigger than our whole world.”—C.S. Lewis, The Last Battle

When we sing “O Come O Come Emmanuel” tonight, let’s emphasize the name Emmanuel, God With Us. We are singing to the Creator, the Saviour, the Lord. We are not singing to some vague spirit of love, snowfall, family, and Christmastime peace on earth. Because there is no such thing. People suffer at Christmas, sometimes die on Christmas. Wars are fought at Christmas. People are sick and lonely at Christmas. All kinds of evil is committed every single day in the world, Christmas or not. Even Longfellow admitted it:

And in despair I bowed my head:
“There is no peace on earth,” I said,
“For hate is strong and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.”

Don’t look so much to the creation…or to our creations…but the Creator. Pray for His spirit to come among us during Advent. Thank Him for His gift of the Son, for reconciliation, for restored relationship with Him. And for the work that was accomplished on the cross.

No ear may hear his coming; but in this world of sin,
Where meek souls will receive him still the dear Christ enters in.

Allspice ideas?

Over the past few weeks, we've been dipping into Marmee's Sugar'n'Spice unit studies. We've mostly used our own recipes that feature the "spice of the week": ginger tea when we read about ginger; cinnamon-sugar doughnut-muffins; clove-stuck oranges rolled in nutmeg and cinnamon (we are trying to dry these out in paper bags so they won't go mouldy); and this week, the Common Room's Nutmeg Muffins with fresh-grated nutmeg.

The fifth study in the series is sugar, and I'm thinking about saving that one for later in the year--maybe around Valentine's Day. But I would like to do one more actual spice now--probably allspice, since that's another one we usually have here. Most of our allspice recipes combine it with other spices, usually in baking (in pumpkin bread) or heated in cider, so I'm trying to find a way to use it this week that gives it more of a starring role. We're not likely to be making Jamaican chicken or chutney either...something simpler would be better.

These Whole Roasted Yams with Maple-Allspice Butter sound like they might work.

Any other favourite allspice ideas?

UPDATE: the comments about Swedish meatballs reminded me that I posted a recipe for Pork Meatballs (with allspice) here a few years ago. Thanks for the memory-jogger!

The Myrmidons: Written Narrations

Book used: The Age of Fable, by Thomas Bulfinch

Crayons (Grade 4) (uncorrected--Crayons' punctuation has improved greatly this fall!)

Once upon a time there was a king called Cephalus. He was right in the middle of a war. So he went to his friend Æacus. "Can I use some of your people" he asked. "Sure sure" said Æacus "as many as you want". "Thank you" said Cephalus. "But um I noticed that there isant any of your old people." "Ah yes" said Æacus "thats a long story."

Ponytails (Grade 8) (also uncorrected)

The Myrmidons

There was a war going on between Cephalus, the king of Athens and Minos, the king of Crete. Now, Cephalus was friends with the King of Ægina, Æacus. Cephalus went to Ægina to ask Æacus if he could borrow some soldiers. When he got to Ægina, he didn't see anyone he know.

"Where are all my friends?" he asked.

"I'll tell you the story," Æacus replied.

"The godess, Juno got very mad at us. Her husband, Jupiter's girlfriend's name was Ægina, like the city. She got very mad because it reminded her of her husband's other love. She sent a plague here.

"The plague wiped out all the men and women, but my son and I survived. Now I got mad, I had no people! I went to sleep under an oak tree infested with ants. I had a dream about the ants in the tree becoming men. Then I woke up.

"My dream had come true! The ants turned into men!" finished Æacus.

"Wow! That's amazing!" said Cephalus.

"Now, my friend, take as many men as you need! Good luck and good health!" exclaimed Æacus.

A never-ending stream of craft ideas

Anyone who thinks that nobody sews these days should check out Sew Mama Sew, as they continue a month-long series on gifts to make--and buy and print out--for people of all ages and interests.  Today's entry is Gifts for Scholars--book bags, wrist wrests, Kindle keepers, and more. (Their gift posts from past years are also on the website.) 

And crocheted dishcloths--knitted ones too--I thought were long gone, but with this era's eco-emphasis they're back, in every shape imaginable.  Here's a visual sampling of what's currently out there; I especially like the Scrubby Rows Dish Cloth at Little House in the Suburbs.

School plans for the last week of November

Ponytails (Grade 8)

Monday:
Bible
Reading from Mere Christianity
Math & Science as assigned by Dad
Lesson on Outlining and Notetaking in Write with the Best Volume 2
Story of the World Volume 4, read with Mom today

Tuesday:
Bible
Reading from Mr. Pipes--written narration
Math & Science as assigned by Dad
Lesson on Outlining and Notetaking in Write with the Best Volume 2
Story of the World, read alone
Whatever Happened to Justice?, with Mom
Watership Down

Wednesday:
Bible
Mere Christianity
Math & Science as assigned by Dad
Lesson on Outlining and Notetaking in Write with the Best Volume 2
Story of the World
Extra French lesson with Mom

Thursday:
Bible
Mr. Pipes
Math & Science as assigned by Dad
Lesson on Outlining and Notetaking in Write with the Best Volume 2
Story of the World, half chapter
Canadian History, with Mom
Watership Down

Friday:
Bible
Mere Christianity
Math & Science as assigned by Dad
Lesson on Outlining and Notetaking in Write with the Best Volume 2
Augustus Caesar's World, with Mom
Story of the World, half chapter


Crayons (Grade 4)

Monday:
Bible reading
Hero Tales--Mary Slessor
English--work on sentence structure
Math drills
Math Mammoth--finish division chapter this week, keep working on multiplication
Life of Robert Louis Stevenson, ten pages
Work on history timeline scrapbook


Tuesday:
Bible reading
Bible Geography (review lesson)
Free Reading List
Math Mammoth
Science on a Shoestring

Wednesday:
Bible reading
Math drills
Math Mammoth
English work
Chapter from Kidnapped
History: George Washington's World--"The Seven Years' War Ends"

Thursday:
Bible reading
Hero Tales
Free Reading List
Math drills
Chapter from Kidnapped
Chapter from Story Book of Science--"The Old Pear Tree"

Friday:
Bible reading
Bible Geography--start a new lesson
English work
Math drill (short)
Math unit test
History, George Washington's World--"Goethe"


Group Work

Monday:
The Fearless Treasure--start "The Knight's House"
Latin--finish off lesson 3 this week (we are a bit behind)
It Couldn't Just Happen--pages 56 to 58
Picture Study--Jason and Medea, by Waterhouse
Poems

Tuesday:
Ourselves
French--start a new lesson this week (we are a bit ahead)
Shakespeare: Twelfth Night
Home Studies
Singing

Wednesday:
The Fearless Treasure--written narration
Latin
It Couldn't Just Happen, pages 58-60
Composer Study--songs by Faure
Poems

Thursday:
Ourselves
French
Age of Fable--Cadmus
Home Studies
Singing

Friday:
Age of Fable--The Myrmidons
It Couldn't Just Happen--finish the chapter
Latin
Jack and Jill--written narration (or do one from Age of Fable)

When homeschooling hits the real world

We have used Richard Maybury's "Uncle Eric" books as part of our homeschool curriculum--first with the Apprentice and now with Ponytails. We haven't read all of them, just the first few. Recently Mr. Fixit decided to read Whatever Happened to Penny Candy? and Whatever Happened to Justice?, and he was also impressed. In fact, he posted the Two Laws--do all you have agreed to do, and do not encroach on other people or their property--in his office (along with his Legalize Shemp and Danger Man posters). Nobody coming into the office recognized them--which is more ironic than it first sounds, considering the professional background of most of the people Mr. Fixit works with. This is not good.

(source)

But it does get better. Mr. Fixit went to see our Money Guy and they were discussing something about the economy, the idea of the government printing more money, and how that affects the kind of investments we should make. Mr. Fixit mentioned that he was familiar with that from Richard Maybury's books (homeschooling is good for parents too!), and the Money Guy said..."Oh yes! I read his Early Warning Report website all the time!"

The connections you think should be there--aren't.

And those that are there--will surprise you every time.

Composer Study for Wednesday

Gabriel Fauré's Pavane

What's for Dinner? (National Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day)

Seriously, it is. CakeWrecks even has a (mostly) family-friendly post to prove it.

I didn't know it was cleaning-the-fridge-day...had no idea there was such a thing...until Ponytails informed me of that fact while I was in the midst of arranging leftovers in a casserole dish. So I guess we were on target, if not with the cleaning, at least with the using up.

Tonight's menu was:

Pork-and-sausage casserole, made from leftover pork roast, two leftover sausages plus the brown rice they were cooked with, two or three chopped potatoes from with the pork roast, mushrooms, gravy plus a little milk, margarine, and paprika. Baked till the mushrooms were cooked through, but not long enough to dry out the rice.

Peas

Mini pita breads that the supermarket had for 99 cents a bag

Baked apples with a bit of apple butter, plus yogurt.

Transformations (craft and gift supplies)--now with photos!

It's fun picking up bits of fabric and other things at yard sales...but even cheap, if you don't use them, what good are they? (H.T. to Frugal Hacks for that link. The Deputy Headmistress posted something similar at FH this week too.)  I have a small stash of raw materials myself that I'm trying to use up before buying more.

It's the transformation of a "piece of something" into something much nicer...something you didn't have before, or something you can give to someone else...that makes gathering those pieces worthwhile.   It's the same philosophy as "a bag of raisins in the cupboard is only half as good as a batch of oatmeal-raisin cookies." It's the annual Treehouse Use It Up fever that usually lies dormant until about December 20th...kicking in a bit early this year.

(Ponytails was having fun with Picnik)

A piece of shiny striped fabric becomes a binder cover.

A bit of brown crochet cotton becomes a jar topper...or a coaster.

An old spool of white crochet cotton becomes a mat...in progress.

A piece of rummage-saled red velour fabric becomes...I'm not allowed to say yet.  Besides, I still have to go buy red thread to finish it properly.  There are some corners I'd prefer not to cut. Update: we went to the mill-ends store yesterday, so we're ready to roll on that.  I did end up buying some extra yarn there, mostly because I had no red yarn at all (must have Used It Up in some other making spree) and I have a crocheting project in mind that needs some.

[LATE ADDITION]  A thrift-shopped gingham bag with a ribbon drawstring (maybe for a wine bottle?) becomes a Crissy dress, with a bit of lace added to the top and bottom.

And a small pile of thrift shopped books may become...this year's Treehouse Advent Calendar. (Previous Advent Posts)  Stay tuned.

Photos:  Ponytails and Mama Squirrel

Wednesday School Plans

Crayons:

Bible reading--Hebrews 7
Hero Tales--reading about Menno Simons
English--some "messed up writing" to fix from Czechoslovak Fairy Tales
Math drills--times tables
Math Mammoth lesson--division with remainders
History:  work on timeline scrapbook
Poems
If we get time:  a science experiment showing the difference between safety matches and regular ones

Ponytails:

Reading from The Accidental Voyage (current Mr. Pipes book)
Poems
Reading from Bauer's Story of the World 4
Extra French lesson with Mom (most French is done with Crayons)
Grammar page
Math and science as assigned by Dad

Together:

Opening--hymn, folk song, reading from It Couldn't Just Happen about the age of the earth
Latin lesson:  copy the quote for the day "Alma mater" and look for derivatives from "mater"; review some of the roots we have already learned; practice counting to ten; review the genitive (possessive) case
Chapter 8 from Alcott's Jack and Jill, with written narration...this is the chapter where Merry redecorates her room and sets the curtains on fire
Composer study:  Fauré's Dolly Suite
Time for...making things...or maybe playing Zooloretto (Crayons' request)

What's for dinner? Slow cooker beef stew and Doughnut Muffins

I knew we would be going out sometime in the late afternoon, so stew in the slow cooker seemed like a good choice for tonight.

Beef Stew (from the Rival Crockpot booklet--I substituted water for the beef broth)
Reheated couscous or bread
Salad (lettuce and mushrooms)
Doughnut Muffins (recipe below), clementines and pears

Doughnut Muffins, from More Food That Really Schmecks by Edna Staebler

Ponytails and Crayons are on the second week of their Spice Studies; the spice-of-the-week is cinnamon.  I didn't want to make the cinnamon cookie recipe given in the lesson, but thought cinnamon toast might be a bit too basic; this was a good compromise.  These treats look like muffins but really do taste like Timbits.  Or like something grandma took out of the deep fryer.

This is a half-size version of the recipe from Edna's book; it makes 18 small cakes.  If you want you can double it back again to make three dozen.

1 ¾ cups flour

½ tbsp. baking powder

½ tsp. salt

¼ tsp. nutmeg

¾ cup white sugar

1 egg

1/3 cup shortening, lard, or oil

¾ cup milk

1 tsp. vanilla extract

For rolling:

About 1/2 cup butter, melted

1 cup sugar mixed with 2 tsp. cinnamon (you will probably not need nearly this much sugar and cinnamon; we had some left over to save for other uses.  You can reduce the amount of sugar coating by sprinkling just a small amount at a time on the plate you use to roll them on.)

Combine dry ingredients.  (Don't omit the nutmeg; it really adds to the flavour.)  In another bowl beat the egg, oil or shortening, milk and vanilla.  Add to the dry ingredients and stir just enough to moisten.  Fill greased muffin tins 2/3 full (we used our smaller-size ones) and bake at 350° F for 15 to 20 minutes. (Don't use muffin papers.)  Tap the tins to dislodge the muffins.

Melt the butter and roll the hot muffins in it to coat them all over, then immediately roll them in cinnamon-sugar mixture.  (To make things more organized, have one person dip muffins into the butter with a slotted spoon, let any extra drain off, and then set them onto a plate sprinkled with some of the cinnamon-sugar.  Have another person roll them around and then put them on another clean plate.  Add more cinnamon-sugar if needed.) Eat them warm.

What's for dinner? Stuffed Peppers with chili sauce (or not)

Green peppers have been unexpectedly cheap at the supermarket lately.  Mama Squirrel bought five smallish ones on the weekend.  Tonight she cut them all in half, took out the seeds, and arranged them in a large glass baking pan.  She stuffed the halves with the following mixture:

Ground beef, somewhere between a pound and a pound and a half
1/2 cup frozen bread crumbs
1/4 cup milk
1 good squirt Worcestershire sauce
1/4 tsp. pepper
1 egg

There was a bit of mixture left, so Mama Squirrel added two custard cups to the pan and made two no-pepper servings along with the ten pepper halves.  (Like mini meatloaves.)

Then she took half a jar of chili sauce--about a cupful--and poured most of it into the bottom of the pan, trying to distribute it evenly.  She poured a bit of it over a few of the peppers, but not all of them, because not all of us like or can eat much chili sauce.

The pan, covered with foil, went into the oven for about an hour; the meat was done when Mama Squirrel checked, so she took them out and sprinkled some of them with Parmesan cheese.  We also had a butternut squash, cut up and baked in a covered casserole with a bit of water; and couscous (add boiling water and let it sit covered for ten minutes).

How homeschoolers do things: period.

I was pleased with Crayons' written narration of Dryope, but I did notice that her sentences and punctuation need some work.

Well, as Ruth Beechick said, find out what they don't know and teach that.

Today's English lesson:  three separate paragraphs copied from an online edition of The Secret Garden.  I copied each paragraph into a Word file twice, and then mucked up one copy of each, leaving out periods, erasing capitals and quotation marks.  I printed them out and gave them to Crayons for "editing."  After she had a go at the first one, we compared it with the original.  Oops--missed a few sentence breaks, but not too bad.  She did the same with the other two paragraphs.  I pointed out that there was one place where I might have broken a sentence in two but where the author kept it as one long sentence; that there's often room for individual choice.

I'm planning on having Crayons continue to work on this for awhile.  However, I did notice that a written narration she did later on showed much more attention to periods! (maybe too much, but we'll work on that)

JACK AND JILL, by Crayons
(from Jack and Jill, by Louisa May Alcott, chapter 7)

One day Jack and Jill were working in Jack's stamp book.  Then Frank came in.  "Jack when are you going to do your latin." he said.  "I dunno" Jack said.  Frank became angry he grabbed Jack's stamps.  "I'm not giving them back till you do your latin."  He said.  "ERRRRR" shouted Jack.

What's for supper? Butternut Fries

Did you ever notice how interchangeable sweet potatoes, pumpkin, and certain kinds of squash are?  You can use any of them for pies, muffins, soups...and now oven fries.  We've made sweet potato fries before, but had never tried squash fries.  But the farm stand, about to close for the season, had all their squash at two-for-one prices, so we picked up a couple of extra butternuts on the weekend.  And just before I was about to stick one of them in the oven this afternoon, I saw this recipe at Tea Time with Annie Kate (with a link to where she got the idea at Fresh Local and Best).

I used olive oil, and seasoned them with paprika and a very little salt.  They don't get too mushy as long as you keep the heat high enough.

So the dinner menu was:

Honey-Mustard Chicken (one of the easiest things I know how to do with chicken)
Butternut Squash Oven Fries
Peas

Apple Cake (made from this muffin recipe, without the raisins or the streusel topping)

Storebought cookies, or, what to do when the Good Cavekeeping Lady calls

It used to be that the Proverbs 31 Lady was held up as the near-impossible ideal for us:  wife, mother, transactor of business, clother of children, maker of bed coverings, laughing at the future.

These days she has a new rival for perfection.  I call her Aunt Alberta, and she makes old Prov.31 sound like a slob by comparison.  She doesn't bring her food from afar, because that's not politically correct; it has to come from within a hundred miles, and must not include bananas or anything that's not fairly traded.  The organic spinach and cauliflower she buys at the local farmstand cannot be eaten raw, because that's not nutritionally correct.  Everything in her fridge is in glass, not plastic, and she dumped her non-stick pots a long, long time ago.  When she talks about canned tomatoes, she means the organic ones that she put in jars herself.  She makes her own laundry soap as well as most of her other cleaners, and puts out only one tiny bag of garbage a week because she is recycling everything in sight (and is training her children to do the same).  All her children's art supplies are made by hand by Waldorf-friendly elves living deep in the forest. She knits her socks from recycled plastic bags (which she gets from the neighbours, because she carries only reusable bags herself), and she's replaced all her appliances with energy-saving models that run only at off-peak hours.  If she could do the same with her husband and children, she probably would.  Her favourite musical instrument is the djembe...she's building one herself in her spare time.  Out of sustainable materials.

There is no place in this woman's world for a 99-cent box of store-brand oatmeal cookies. 

Now, personally, I prefer a batch of homemade raisin bars, or if we're going a bit fancier, a pan of brownies sprinkled with chocolate chips.  I can get either of those in the oven pretty quickly if I have to.  Or maybe an on-sale bag of Peek Freans, even though I think the bags hold less than they used to.  Homemade is a good thing.

Nutrition is good too. 

So is recycling.

But all at once...it can be overwhelming.  Especially if you feel like something's going to get you if you don't get it together.

There are times when a small bowl of sliced apples, the season's first clementines and some store-bought oatmeal cookies, work fine as dessert.  There are nights when your husband comes home late from a work emergency, and you know you're going to be the one washing the dishes by hand later.  There are days when you're busy teaching French and Uncle Eric and division and not beating on each other, and you are lucky just to get a couple of loads into the washer, let alone make your own detergent and a scrubulous dessert and not mix them up.  (Yum, what's that foamy stuff in the oven?) 

There are seasons when you do some or all of those good things, or you start taking baby steps, or giant steps, into places you've never been before, because health or finances or allergies or consciousness or conscience dictates a change.

But there are also times to say enough...especially when it seems like the more we start to do, the more we could do.  Count up all the responsible, grown-up, frugal, intelligent things you have managed to do lately--in the home or outside of it.  You are probably doing more than all right. Don't look at the vast, empty prairie of what you do not feel able to take on.  Just look at where you are.  For some people the step of taking the cookies out of the box and arranging them on a plate with fruit is enough of a change for now.  For others, getting all the socks off the living room floor is good.  Some may have moved on to blue agave nectar, but others are still just getting out of the starting gate when it comes to alternative sweeteners.

As one person posted recently about homeschooling, when she says that they did such and such, you need to remember that you're listening to someone who's been at this for Seventeen Years, and you are not to knock yourself over the head because you don't get as much accomplished as she does.

So don't let Aunt Alberta do that to you either.  Just pass her a cookie and smile.

The Story of Dryope: written narration by Crayons

Book used:  The Age of Fable, by Thomas Bulfinch, chapter VIII.  Read out loud, written narration.  Spelling corrected at Crayons' request.

DRYOPE

Once upon a time there were two sisters Dryope and Iole.  Dryope had a husband Andraemon.  One day Dryope and Iole were out picking flowers and Dryope picked lotus and showed it to her baby.  With horror Iole saw where her sister had plucked the lotus was dripping blood all of a sudden Dryope's feet were rooted firmly to the spot she started growing branches the lotus had been no other than a nymph in disguise and now the gods were angry at her.  Andraemon ran out of the house.  Please take the baby and teach him to call me mother and then she fully became a tree the END.

Friday night rummage sale

 

This is a Friday night/Saturday morning event. If you go Friday, you get more choice but have to pay for everything individually; if you go Saturday, it's pay-by-the-bag. We decided to go tonight so that the Apprentice could come too (she works Saturdays).

This is what came home with me:

Yet another copy of The Owl Book of Winter Fun (we have two, but another is always welcome)
How the Irish Saved Civilization
The Omnivore's Dilemma, by Michael Pollan
Use the Good Dishes: Finding Joy in Everyday Life, by Dr. Elaine Dembe
Cassell's Compact English-Latin Latin-English Dictionary (1939 printing)
One big bag of heavy yarn
One big package of interfacing
One small bag of lace and trim
One piece of blue-striped fabric
One unopened package of "decorator burlap" in an interesting avocado-greenish colour (I'd guess it's been around for awhile)
Four red candles (Advent starts in another month)
And my favourite: a three-inch candle in a four-inch frosted jar, decorated with words like "Charity," "Love," "Hope," "Faith."

Total:  $8.00 Canadian.

Photos: Ponytails

What's for dinner?

Earl's Soup (Potage Paysanne)--lots of chopping but worth the effort...and probably the only time all year that I buy leeks

Frozen pizza in the toaster oven (could have been garlic breadsticks, or Peasant Bread, or rolls, or just toast, but we got the pizza on sale and it seemed like it would bulk up a meal of what is basically vegetable soup)

Banana-peach freeze (frozen bananas and a bit of peach jam run through the food processor, with plain yogurt added if needed to make it run better) (could have been fresh bananas, but we don't have any)

School plans on a blustery day

Since I have schoolwork written out by the month, whenever we get to the last week I have to be a bit creative trying to fit in things that slipped through the cracks.  So this week we're having a daily reading from It Couldn't Just Happen; a daily folk song (You-tube is helpful); and a bit of extra push to finish off math units and sections of the history books.  No special reason that we HAVE to do that--it just feels better when you start a new month fresh.

Crayons' schedule for today:

Singing and science reading with Ponytails

Having a look at a jar of beans we're sprouting (new science challenge)

Bible, spelling and math with me (we are still doing spelling every day; next month's language focus may be a bit different)

Finishing a chapter of Life of Robert Louis Stevenson

History reading from George Washington's World:  "A King but not a Ruler"

Stories from Bulfinch's Age of Fable:  "Dryope," "Venus and Adonis"

Latin lesson from Our Roman Roots

Poems by Charles G.D. Roberts:  "The Solitary Woodsman"

One game from Word Play Cafe

Homemaking/crafts time...if we get time, a drawing lesson with Ponytails

Books from the extra reading shelf

Ponytails' schedule for today:

Keeping up with chapters in Christian studies, history, science, math
Page of grammar
Group reading and singing times with Crayons
Latin with Crayons
Extra reading

Baking with "spaghetti-pumpkin"

Our Apprentice went to a youth group pumpkin event last weekend, and brought home a carved creation that, unfortunately, collapsed shortly thereafter due to structural difficulties.

She offered the bottom of it to me for cooking, and there was quite a bit of veggie still there so it did seem a shame to waste it. The pumpkin piece was about as big as our round pizza pan, so I put them both, with a bit of water, into the toaster oven (at 350 degrees).

When it came out and I was scooping the cooked squashy stuff into a bowl, I noticed that the texture was more like stringy spaghetti squash than either the smaller pie pumpkins or the canned pumpkin I've used before. I wasn't sure how that would work in the Pumpkin Loaf I planned to make with it. So when I baked the next day, I put all the wet ingredients (including the cooked pumpkin) into the food processor and blended them together before adding the dry ingredients. You could use a blender too.  (Obviously you could process or blend the pumpkin by itself, but I think dispersing it with the other wet ingredients gave the mixture a smoother texture.  If you prefer a few lumps, process for a shorter time.)

And the pumpkin loaf turned out fine--actually better than usual. I like the fresh taste of "real" pumpkin in baking.

Using the "kitchen slaves" to blend ingredients with a less-than-ideal texture may not be terribly original...but it worked for me.

So what are we supposed to do with our weekends now?

Grandpa Squirrel brought over some Toronto papers last weekend, including several auto sections he had saved up for Mr. Fixit. I don't usually read the car pages, but the front page of the September 16th Globe Drive section stood out: there was a hand holding a wrench, and the headline "The death of do-it-yourself auto repair."

It turned out to be a column by Peter Cheney, with the subtitle "The art of home auto repair has been shuffled to the scrap heap."

"Knowing how to fix a car used to mean something. In university, I studied the classics. My abiding memory was of Odysseus returning home to slay the suitors who had invaded his house. To me, overhauling an engine was a less dramatic version of the same process – I had driven out the forces of mechanical disorder.

"So how could I imagine that the golden age of the home mechanic was approaching its end?"

My own dad was never much of a do-it-yourselfer when it came to cars; he knew his limits and preferred to trust Ernie's garage on the corner. But my mom's brothers were die-hard wrench twisters from way back; I've heard the stories about how, lacking a hoist, they pulled up the front end of their jalopy using a rope and a nearby tree branch. And when I married Mr. Fixit, most of our cars (until emissions testing killed off the Caprices) were still the kind you had to tune up; the kind you COULD tune up. I got used to sitting in the front seat during brake jobs and pressing down on the pedal, while he crawled underneath or had his head under the hood. Vrm vrm...Again...Vrm vrm...Again...Vrm vrm...this usually went on for awhile.

"To [car designer Pete] Brock, a good machine is the elegant, real-world expression of an idea, not just something to be used and cast aside when it breaks. Machines are philosophies, expressed in metal."

And yet times change. Peter Cheney says that he used to be a professional mechanic but now rarely works on his own car himself. It's the same for Mr. Fixit, and that's only partly because of middling-aged back and knee problems. It's more just a matter of, as Cheney says, our newer cars now not "needing us" as much as they used to; and, in many instances, not being able to access the parts or supplies we used to get, or finding newer cars deliberately designed too complicated for home mechanics to deal with.

If cars aren't your thing (they're not mine really--I just pressed the pedal down when requested and appreciated Mr. Fixit's talents), consider this: that's only one example of the general death, or perhaps assassination, of self-sufficiency. At what point will there be nothing left at all that we can fix, clean up, make ourselves? Will we stop even comprehending Bible verses like "where moth and rust corrupt," because there we won't have anything that lasts long enough to get moth-eaten or rusty?

Your opinions?

Sewing...it gets easier with time. Really.

My mom knew her way around a sewing machine very well. Me?--no.

You could attribute some of my sewing hangups to the typical middle-school home economics class, which, if I had paid any attention to the cooking units, would have finished me in the kitchen as well. Or just the fact that I hardly ever had to machine-sew anything, because my mom could do it better and faster, and liked to.

For some reason, it was not only the machine that stymied me for many years (yes, I do have ongoing battles with things that plug in), but the whole bewilderment of patterns. And fabric stores, which not only largely disappeared around here before I ever got the hang of them, but which are usually set up to be as confusing as possible.

My first breakthrough was a pair of maternity overalls that I finished about one week before The Apprentice was born. (Better almost late than never.)

My second was a purple jumper that I retooled for toddler Apprentice from a free pair of corduroy pants. It was, honestly, quite adorable and so was she.

My third was a set of stuffed Christmas elves that The Apprentice helped me make when she was three. (No, she didn't use the machine.) I sold most of them at a craft sale and bought myself a lovely angel which we still have. Which just goes to show that people buying Christmas crafts don't care what grade you got in home economics.

Since then I've become slightly less spatially challenged when it comes to figuring out patterns. (Fabric stores still give me a headache.) I am never going to be making wedding dresses, but at least I know how to get both pajama legs right side out now. The Squirrelings have all grown up quite chummy with our sewing machine. (Maybe because they didn't feel like I knew more than they did?) The one thing I've never done yet is put in a zipper...I don't think my machine even has a zipper foot. And through the magic of You-tube, I may even get past that one. I know Ponytails' ambition is to have a serger someday, and maybe she'll let me use it.

In the meantime, if you share some of my hesitations, or even if you don't, can I recommend my favourite sewing site? Sewing.about.com. Besides basic instructions and tips, there are tons of patterns (with lovely photos) and links to more. If you click on Free Patterns, you get a choice of Beginner, Intermediate, and Advanced, all sorted and ready to go. But there's another link in the sidebar that takes you to this page, and if you keep scrolling down the page, you'll find links to using Scraps of Fabric, Sewing Slippers, Projects to keep You and Your Home Warm, and more.

Got you interested yet?

If I can do it, anybody can.

How homeschoolers do things: a lesson on milliliters

The book: Math Mammoth's Light Blue Grade 3B, unit on measurement, lesson on "Milliliters and Liters."

The props: 250 ml measuring cup, 1 liter measuring cup, 1.2 ml measure (also known as a quarter teaspoon), several bottles and packages from the cupboard, several cups and mugs, water, towel.

Purpose of the lesson: to introduce the idea of volume, using the metric system. We have done linear measurement, first in imperial and then in metric units; we've weighed things, first in imperial and then in metric units; and now we're onto volume. I'm deliberately switching the order this time, since although we use lots of teaspoons and cups in cooking here (I cannot wrap my brain around cooking without my teaspoons and tablespoons), we don't hear as much about pints, quarts and gallons. So today's lesson focused on metric volume.

What we did: I put several bottles, jars and packages from the cupboard and fridge on the table, and asked Crayons to sort them into the ones that were marked g or kg (labelled by weight) and the ones that were marked ml or L (labelled by volume). The cereal and baking soda went to one side; the vanilla extract and juice went to the other. What was the difference? Crayons figured out quickly that the dry foods were mostly sold by weight, and the liquids were sold by volume. (Honey is an exception--I still don't know why it's sold by weight instead of volume.)

I showed Crayons how much a liter is (as big as our big measuring cup), and how much a milliliter is (about as small as the quarter-teaspoon measure which also shows 1.2 ml).

Then I had her do an activity from the worksheet: measuring the volume of cups, glasses, jars, or other small containers. We poured water into the cups and then poured it back into measuring containers. The Apprentice's giant tea cup holds 500 ml (2 cups for you Americans); an average coffee mug holds 300 ml; a small drinking glass holds 200 ml; and a tiny doll cup holds 5 ml. (We had to measure that one with a spoon.)

We skipped several of the calculating activities on the sheet--I'll probably have her go back over some of them tomorrow. Instead, we skipped to the end of the lesson, where there were three word problems. "One shampoo bottle contains 1 liter of shampoo. Another one contains 478 ml. How much more does the bigger one contain?" The other two problems were about drink bottles and juice in a pitcher.

And after all that we were very thirsty.

I told Crayons that if she wants a homework assignment, she should go ask The Apprentice if she can examine her stash of cosmetics, lotions, potions etc. and see which ones are packaged by weight and which are packaged by volume. I just thought of another fun homework assignment: figuring out how much toothpaste and shampoo you can fit in a zipper bag to get through airport security without going over the milliliter limit. See, grownups have to know about this stuff too.

What homeschoolers do with birdseed (besides feed it to the birds)

This is Crayons' current science project, from the "Changes" unit in Herb Strongin's book Science on a Shoestring.

Requirements: plastic shoebox, paper towels, masking tape or painter's tape, birdseed containing several different kinds of seeds, water, patience.

Method: Sort out the birdseed so that you have about ten seeds each of as many different kinds as you can find in the package. (We used sunflower seeds, milo, and millet, and added popcorn as a fourth type.) Line the plastic container with dampened paper towels, and divide it into sections with tape. Arrange the seeds in rows in each section. Put the lid on, dampening the paper towels again if and when needed. (According to the book, some mould is to be expected.)

And watch them grow, keeping notes on your observations. We started them on Tuesday and they were sprouting by Thursday; by the time we took these photos, the tallest sprouts were 10 cm (4 inches) tall. Since then they have grown even more, some of the sunflower shells have dropped off, and the popcorn sprouts have divided in two. We also noticed that the sunflower seeds went up with their sprouts, but the other seeds stayed on the paper towels closer to the roots.

I'm not sure how much longer we'll be able to keep the sprouts going; several of them are getting taller than the box, and there is some mould growth around the roots and around a few of the seeds that didn't sprout. But it has been very interesting.

Photos by Ponytails

Our apple butter (photo post)

The slow cooker full of apples was started at 8:30 in the morning (a slight change from the original plan) and it took until about 9:00 that night until it was thick enough...not quite as thick as some commercial apple butter, but still spreadable. We used 2 1/2 cups of sugar plus cinnamon, cloves, and salt as per the recipe.

We got 12 125 ml (half-cup) jars out of the 5 1/2 pounds of apples (19 apples, to be exact), plus a bowlful for the fridge. The bowlful is already gone--Mama Squirrel used it in a batch of muffins and in apple crisp (a cupful mixed with the chopped apples).

Jar labels and photographs: Ponytails.

Up in the Treehouse with Mama Squirrel

Listening to: Jazz.FM91, occasional radio chatterings from Mr. Fixit's workbench, and the rattle-clunk of Crayons building with Lego.

Coolest thing I saw tonight: the almost-full moon sailing between clouds...yeah, I know, it's the clouds that are moving, but who doesn't think the moon looks like it's moving?

Current addiction: logic puzzles (six birdwatchers wearing six different jackets went to six different parks etc.)--I am much better at those than I used to be.

Things I like in October: red maples, orange pumpkins, blue skies.

Things I could do without in October: the food-and-crafts emphasis on skeletons and other nasty stuff.

Best thing I found this week: a whole armful of books from the library discard shelf, for a total of $3.50. Highlights: a book of Joan Aiken stories, a nice edition of Pinocchio, a '70's book about gardening, another '70's book about bread baking. I'm also reading the book Brenda recommended, Food Security for the Faint of Heart.

What we've been watching on TV: Wonder Woman Season Two.

Tonight's dinner: sausage and sauerkraut in the Crockpot, sweet potatoes, baked beans (canned ones), apple crisp made with apples and apple butter. (Yes, the apple butter worked! Ponytails is going to upload some photos soon.)

Local news to think about: municipal elections next week. OK, not earth-shaking, but voting's still important.

It's pumpkin time too (Pumpkin Bars)

Needing to keep this weekend's grocery list on the light side, I nevertheless wrote down "can of pumpkin," because I wanted to try a new recipe for pumpkin bars.

Then I realized we had a pie pumpkin from Monday's Thanksgiving dinner. I bought it to cook in the first place, but it got lost in the pumpkin-and-maple-leaf scenery.

So I baked Mr. Pumpkin during school today, pureed it with an immersion blender, and ended up with two cups of cooked pumpkin--exactly what was needed to make the pumpkin bars. And now we have pumpkin bars on the counter, and some in the freezer (the recipe makes a big panful).

The author suggests an orange-cream cheese frosting, but that's fancier than we wanted. I just sprinkled the batter with a bit of extra cinnamon sugar before baking. Or you can leave it plain.

Peter's Pumpkin Bars, from The Perfect Basket by Diane Phillips

4 large eggs
1 2/3 cups sugar (I cut it back a bit)
1 cup oil
2 cups cooked pumpkin
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp. baking powder
2 tsp. pumpkin pie spice mix (homemade version is given in the book; I used 1 tsp. cinnamon, 1/2 tsp. ginger, 1/4 tsp. nutmeg, 1/4 tsp. cloves)
1 tsp. baking soda

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F and grease a 15 x 10-inch jelly-roll pan. In the large bowl of an electric mixer (or just a regular large bowl), beat together eggs, sugar, and oil. Gradually add the pumpkin, beating until smooth. Add the flour, baking powder, spices, and baking soda, and stir until the mixture is smooth. Pour the batter into the prepared pan, and bake for 25 to 30 minutes. Cut in squares. (Sprinkle before baking as described above, or cool and frost.)

In apple butter time

See our apple butter photos here.

The HeadGirl at The Common Room posted a link to a Crockpot apple butter recipe (plus a nice photo of her peeled apples waiting to get cut up). (Here's the recipe she used.) Cents to Get Debt Free posted a recipe for it last year too.

I mentioned that the HG might like the Apple Butter Pie we've posted about here.

And then I noticed that there's an Apple Butter Cake Roll linked at the Penny Pinching Party.

It's definitely that time of year.

What's for supper? Thanksgiving Leftovers

Terrific Turkey Tetrazzini
with last night's salad, a couple of sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce

Pumpkin pie, apples, almonds

Schoolwork, the day after Thanksgiving

Holidays are wonderful but they do mess up your school week as well as your mental clock.

So today isn't a very heavy day.

Crayons:

Bible
Hero Tales, read about David Livingstone
Math Mammoth Light Blue Grade 3B, two pages--learning about meters and kilometers
Spelling work
Canadian Children's Treasury--start reading a story about the Arctic by James Houston
Science--start a sprouting-birdseed experiment

Ponytails:

Bible
Mere Christianity
Math and science assignments
Einstein biography
Composition assignments
Page from Easy Grammar Plus
Watership Down
Augustus Caesar's World:  Mark Antony

Group things:

Hidden Art of Homemaking--read about music (put off from last week)
Latin lesson
Singing
Sewing
Teatime, using a recipe for Cranberry Apple Tea (if I can get the Squirrelings to try it)...we might combine that with the Homemaking reading

What's for dinner?

Slow-cooker beef goulash
Mashed potatoes (instant)
Baked sweet and sour cabbage (chopped cabbage with a bit of brown sugar and vinegar, baked in a casserole)
Peasant Bread

Apple slices baked in apple juice
Voortman's Ginger Kids

How homeschoolers do things: a drawing lesson

We are using Bruce McIntyre's Drawing Textbook this year, picked up in a free box at a homeschool meeting--today was our first lesson.

What we needed: paper (we used some pink paper just for a change from white), drawing pencils, the textbook, and a few props (a pumpkin, a bagel, and a coffee mug).

What we did: Read through McIntyre's "The Seven Laws of Perspective" at the beginning of the book, and looked at how his drawing of a doughnut illustrates all seven of those laws (overlapping, shading, density, foreshortening etc.). We didn't have any doughnuts to show how a round doughnut becomes a flattened-circle shape in a drawing, so we made do with a bagel.

Then we skipped over to exercises 1, 2 and 3 from the main part of the book: drawing a birthday cake, a television set, and a "simple candle." These involve foreshortened circles and squares. Everybody had a few tries at trying to get all the lines to go in the right direction, and nobody got too frustrated. The girls also got amusement out of showing me how younger kids would draw a birthday cake or a candle, without the understanding of perspective that they have.

Both girls have done drawing classes with groups, and they've heard lots about shading, but sometimes you just have to go back to how you make round things look round without drawing them round. This is good stuff especially for Crayons to learn along with the geometry and measurement she's doing in math.

Art lessons don't have to be expensive or fancy. Sometimes you learn more from a simple idea and a bagel.

How homeschoolers do things: spelling cards

Last month Crayons worked at penmanship. During October her language focus has switched to spelling. What I am using, because it's handy, is Alpha to Omega: The A-Z of Teaching Reading, Writing and Spelling, by Bevé Hornsby and Frula Shear, which came from a thrift shop a month ago. I like two things about it: the gradual building up of skills, and the wealth of dictation sentences (except for the ones about getting drunk at the pub). There are also some interesting activities. But having homeschooled for so long, you do start to have your own ways of doing things, and there are always ways to improve on "just a book." Especially if you have students who like doing almost anything better than holding a pencil.

Today's activity was called "word sums." It was a list of some compound words and words built out of common parts of words. Like putting building blocks together. I think you were supposed to have the student either read the list or spell the words. This is what I did with them: I cut a small stack of index cards in half and wrote the words across the halves: mar/ket, gar/den, part/ly, sharp/er and so on. Then, since I had so much space left, I turned each piece halfway round and wrote more half-words (and a few repeats) going in the other direction. So I had half-words going north-south and some going east-west.

I gave the stack of mini-cards to Crayons and asked her to make as many (real) words as she could from the pieces, and write them on a piece of paper. Like doing jigsaw puzzles.

That was the whole language lesson today, aside from an Alpha-Better drill. Cheap, simple, and hands-on--and it worked for us.

What is Mama Squirrel reading?

(besides school books)

Come Walk with Me: A Woman's Personal Guide to Knowing God and Mentoring Others, by Carole Mayhall--I bought this from a Choice Books rack in a store at the airport. It covers a lot of good basics on the Christian life--things you thought you did know but maybe needed spelled out--or pounded in a bit harder. This is something that I thought might work for our adult Sunday School class, especially if we decide to do a separate women's study for awhile, especially because we have women of very different ages in the class--some mentors, some mentees, and some in the middle.

At Home in Mitford (re-read)

The Great Code: The Bible and Literature, by Northrop Frye. (partly re-read--I know I never quite finished this one before, so I'm starting it again)

What's for dinner?

Ten Napkins Sticky Chicken, with fresh parsley
Baked pepper squash (acorn squash)
Spaghetti Squares (cooked spaghetti mixed with eggs and a bit of sour cream and pepper, baked until set)
Reheated potatoes for people who don't like too many eggs
Applesauce

Peach Crisp
Grapes

Don't talk over the music

During a recent conversation about Charlotte Mason and education, someone described a class they had seen where classical music was played, but where the teacher continued to talk, describe, and generally interrupt so that nobody could hear or pay attention to the music.

Ann Voskamp has often talked about silences, listening. Most of us now do not come from a culture of nurturing silence or of careful, deliberate listening. Silence is not natural or comfortable for most of us, any more than total darkness is natural or comfortable for those of us who live in cities and always, even in the middle of the night, have some light around us somewhere.

But that doesn't mean silence is bad; we just have to work harder at listening. And at letting others learn to listen. And look, too.

Do our lives and our children's lives include enough of these? Looking at pictures, without interruption. Listening to music. Listening to beautiful words, without too much explanation. Looking at and listening to large and small things outdoors, without chatter about other concerns. Looking at darkness (and at whatever stars appear while we look). Listening to others' prayers.

Listening to silence.

What's for supper? (for those who feel like eating)

Breaded chicken wings (from a frozen package)
Baked butternut squash (sliced thin and baked in a casserole)
A bit of leftover Beany's Beans
Gayle's Peasant Bread

Peaches
Last night's cookies

Books and writing, around the blogworld

Lizzie weighs in on a literature-based education at A Dusty Frame.

If you haven't already heard, Melissa has an exciting announcement about the foreward she was asked to write for a new edition of Carney’s House Party/Winona’s Pony Cart .

And if you haven't also heard, Ann Voskamp's book One Thousand Gifts will be available soon.

Katie posts about Liberty and Constraint in Writing.

The Deputy Headmistress writes about How Reading Alters Your Mind.

And she should know.

Favourite Fall Supper

Sausage Pasta
Baked Sweet Potatoes
Carrot sticks, crackers

Snickerdoodle Blondies
Pears

Yes, I'm here...and some CM thoughts

We have simply been busy with the daily round at the Treehouse, besides taking care of a couple of Squirrels who haven't been feeling well this week. Mama Squirrel's online time has also been taken up with working through last week's emails and working on some curriculum-related stuff. So the blog has been a bit quiet.

Our fall homeschool is starting to work itself out into the things that fit well, the things we're still figuring out, and the one or two things that obviously weren't going to fit in once we got going on our days. Over the past month or so, Mama Squirrel has had her mind back on Charlotte Mason's books and some of her "big ideas," because even when you think you have things the way they should be, there's always room to rearrange, shift focus, use things differently. For CM homeschoolers, the rut we often get into--even after only a few weeks of school--is turning everything into a book lesson. The challenge is to keep the big wonderful world close at hand, and to get out into it whenever possible, especially these days when the sun is still beautiful in the afternoons. And to remember that there are doll clothes to be made, games to be played, music to be listened to, nature walks to take, and that even subjects like French and history can benefit by an occasional change of scenery.

Especially when you're tired from a morning of teaching (she says to herself), it's easy to figure that you're done for the day, and it is true that (in CM terms) children should have enough freedom to amuse themselves for periods of time without the parents directing their play or hobbies...but a bit of extra effort to fill in the spaces around the books seems to set the whole thing into a more beautiful frame. Schedule in the hands-on, ears-on, feet-on, tasting-on if you have to, but make it happen. Use what's around you, go outside, do whatever you can to make learning real...then, strangely enough, the book lessons seem to come more alive as well.

What are the Squirrels up to?

Enjoying the blue skies of mid-September, and the green beans, and the end of the tomatoes (I think).

Getting into Latin, and French, and decimals, and drawing parallel lines, and Benjamin Franklin, and Kidnapped, and Watership Down, and Kon Tiki, and Fauré, and Amy Grant's You-tube videos from the '80's.

Looking forward to drama classes and voice lessons that start up this week. (Ponytails' side note: her class is an improv troupe. "I'm starting Tuesday, and the lady who helped us sign up says that we have to work on working well in a group together first, and then we're going to perform in places like nursing homes and stuff like that if we get to be a strong enough group. (fingers crossed)") And hanging out with Coffeemamma at the library while the offspring do their thing. (Coffeemamma, don't tell Schmoo yet that Crayons has signed up for the same class--she wants to surprise her.)

Ponytails: "My Birthday is coming up this week! Guess how old I am. This is soooooo hard. Hint: it's old enough to not have to order off the kid's menu. Heh, heh."

The flickers reappear

Have you ever seen a Northern Flicker?

They have been visiting our backyard in large groups over the past couple of afternoons, mostly when the sun's out, and have been feasting on something in the grass (probably the ants which seem to be out in full force as well). From our above-ground basement window, we have a perfect view of anything that flies, creeps or hops along the grass, including amazing close-ups of parent and baby flickers.

The last (and only other) time I mentioned flickers on the blog, it was also the middle of September--so I'm wondering if this is one of those annual events that Charlotte Mason said we should note down and look forward to each year. I don't remember seeing them last year, but maybe we just weren't looking for them.

Wheat-free banana bread/muffins (thanks DHM)

The Deputy Headmistress posted this recipe yesterday for wheat-free banana bread that uses oat flour (what you get when you run rolled oats through the blender or food processor). I tried it out this morning with a couple of changes: I used half a cup of brown sugar, oil instead of margarine, beaten egg whites instead of whole eggs (only because I had them in the fridge), and baked it in mini-muffin pans instead of having to bake one big loaf for an hour. You could bake regular-sized muffins too. I got about 20 half-sized ones out of that amount of batter, so you would probably get ten good-sized regular ones, or twelve if you're careful.

They rose very well and have a nice nutmeggy flavour. Thank you DHM!

A lot for a little (thrifted curriculum and some yarn)

Our homeschool budget this year is very small. Not that we don't already have materials to use, but I haven't bought a lot new, and there isn't much room for extras.

But God often does a better job of stretching a little money than I can. If he could do it with a bit of bread for thousands...still I'm often surprised at the things that come up.

Mr. Fixit took today off, and our rainy "vacation day" included stops at a couple of thrift stores, one for-profit (you have to watch their prices) and one charitable (more reasonable). This is what came home for $11.25:

Ginnie and the Cooking Contest (not pictured, Crayons is reading it), $1 at the for-profit store. (We have two other Ginnie books that she liked.)

NIV Adventure Bible, $1--perfect for Crayons' Bible reading

Gabriel Fauré Requiem cassette, 25 cents --our term's composer

Write Away, a younger version (aimed at second graders) of Writers Inc., a book we use in middle school (we have two thrifted copies of that one). Write Away is a bit on the young side for Crayons' English, but for $2 it was worth bringing home.

Alpha to Omega: The A-Z of Teaching Reading, Writing and Spelling, by Bevé Hornsby and Frula Shear, Fourth Edition. First published 1974, this revision 1993. A British book aimed at students with dyslexia and older learners with reading difficulties; but I just liked it for its short lessons in phonics and its British-flavoured dictation sentences (some of which are not kid-friendly--be warned). "Lay the table for tea." "I cannot do my Maths tables." "Mind that the candle does not set fire to your nightdress." "We live in the lodge at the park gates of the mansion." "It was a harmless frolic, but he shouldn't have done it in public." "A cynic is a person who knows the price of everything but the value of nothing." $2 from the for-profit store.

Milliken's Sumer and Babylonia, a book of coloured transparencies, by Kent L. Forrest, copyright 1969, $1 at the for-profit store. This will be great for Crayons' Bible Archaeology and Geography study.

Two new balls of Patons Canadiana yarn, $2 each, enough to make a pair of slippers and maybe some hair scrunchies.

And the sun came out after lunch.

Thank you, Ponytails, for the photo.