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Showing posts from August, 2012

Crew Review: Game: Notable Novelists

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We are a game loving family.  We are also a book loving family so I jumped at the opportunity to express extremely high interest in reviewing the game, Notable Novelists of the 20th Century: a Card Game for Book Lovers . Some Tidbits: For Ages 12 & Up For 2 or more players 54 Cards (18 sets of 3 cards each) 18 Authors $10.95   This game arrived when my parents-in-law were here for a visit.  My father-in-law is a retired school librarian.  In other words, he’s book nut, just like his son and grandchildren.  I handed him the cards.  He looked through them and then my daughter looked through them and then my husband looked through them.  They began to talk about 20th century authors.  We hadn’t even played the game yet and already really cool discussions about books and authors were happening at my house.  This was exactly what I wanted to happen. At first my 13 year old and 15 year old were not too sure about this game.  “Mom, it looks like Go Fish.” “Mom, it look

Crew Review: Costumes with Character

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My family loves history. The girls often dig through old clothes (and some not so old) to find “costumes” for playing.  Tailorbear is especially fond of creating “hoop skirts” by layering bath robes and fleece throws.  It never occurred to me that we could make a   hoop skirt for her. It also never occurred to me that we could make other period piece historical costumes. Apparently my daughters are not the only ones who like to dress up in historical costumes.  Amy Puetz, herself a homeschool graduate and lover of history, has written a book, Costumes with Character .  At Amy’s website, Golden Prairie Press , you can read a bit more about Amy or check out some of the other books she has written such as: Ten Girls from History and Uncover Exciting History. This 72 page full color book covers 11 time periods in American History.  Using a “simple dress” you sew collars, bonnets, and other accessories to complete each period history costume.  In addition to sewing instructions, the b

Think Back Thursday: Rocks!

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It’s been several weeks (months??!!) since I’ve participated in Debbie’s Think Back Thursday Meme.  I really enjoy the the Think Back “meme” because it’s fun to hunt for pictures to fit the theme! I know today isn’t Thursday but thankfully, Debbie’s Digest keeps the link open for the whole week so I can post when I want. This week’s theme is “rocks.” I rarely (pretty close to NEVER) post pictures of myself on my blog.  I just hate looking at pictures of myself but while searching for pictures of my girls on a particular trip where we climbed on rocks, I found this one: We were on vacation in Kentucky visiting my Grandmother. On this particular day we’d left the girls with family while cousin Clint took us for drive to the State Overlook.  Grandma lived in Kentucky but if you climbed to the top of her mountain you could look into VA.  I don’t remember if we were in VA looking at KY or in KY looking at VA but at one point Clint, who reminds me so much of my dad, pointed and said “that

Crew Review: Mr. Pipes and the British Hymn Makers

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Music or rather hymns are an important part of Christian tradition. They are rich and full of theology and praise for God.  The hymns may be different in different Christian traditions but the idea of teaching theology and worshiping God through music during the service is the same. Recently my family had the opportunity to read an e-book (PDF)version of Mr. Pipes and the British Hymn Makers from Christian Liberty Press .  This book is the first book in the series.  In this book, the author, Douglas Bond, focuses on British Hymn writers such as Isaac Watts, Charles Wesley, and John Newton as well as others including Scottish hymn writers and women hymn writers. ABOUT THE BOOK: Two teenagers, Annie and her brother Drew, are spending the summer in a small English Village.  They meet Mr. Pipes who plays the organ for the local Anglican church.  He tells stories about different British hymn writers and shares a hymn or two from each composer. He also teaches them about “the value of

Crew Review: I Don’t Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist

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One of my favorite publishing companies, Apologia , has produced a new worldview curriculum .  This workbook style program is based on the book I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist (IDHEF) by Norman L. Geisler and Frank Turek.   Mr. Turek, coauthored, along with the late Chuck Winter, this high school level program.   The curriculum bears the same name: I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist. I said “based on” but really this workbook is a companion to the IDHEF book.  You will need the book in order to complete the assignments in the workbook.  Each lesson begins with a section called “Before Starting This Chapter” which tells the student exactly what pages/chapters to read from the IDHEF book. Other sections include: HOOK ~ reminds student what the textbook chapter said and may include a few questions to “warm up your brain.” BOOK ~ “The section takes you deeper into the specific issues covered in each chapter.”  This section also contains knowledge and comprehe

No Homeschool Budget? God Provides!

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Marcy, one of the Review Crew Leaders, hosts the Schoolhouse Review Crew Blog Cruise each week.  This week she reminded us that the topic is “Budget Friendly Homeschooling.”  I didn’t think this was a topic that applied to me.  For many many years I had a very LARGE amount of money allocated to spend on home education.  I didn’t really ever worry or think about how to cut corners or make “budget friendly” purchases. But in the last few years, I’ve not had that luxury. With my husband taking a significant pay cut a few years ago, the economy going south and some financial mistakes we’ve made, well, there just isn’t any money for home education. Seriously, my home school “budget” for the 2012-2013 school year is “whatever God provides.”  Yes, I have a $0 budget. But lest you, dear reader, think this is a whiny post about not having all the money I want to buy all the curriculum and supplies that I want, let me share with you some of the amazing ways God has been providing for our home

Crew Review: Vocab Videos

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  If you are like me, you might have children preparing to take the SAT or the PSAT.  Vocabulary is worth up to 150 points on the SAT test.  Helping my daughters do the best that they can on these tests is a high priority for me so I jumped at the chance to try this online vocabulary program called Vocab Videos. From the website: “The Vocab Videos program is based on watching humorous, memorable videos to teach vocabulary in a contextual format. Using both auditory and visual cues, each video includes a real-world representation of the meaning of a word in a way that you can easily relate to and understand.” Vocab Videos is a series of “Episodes” with each episode focusing on  20 vocabulary words.  Each word is presented in a short video clip and the whole episode is about 10 minutes in length. You can read more about their videos here. Vocab Videos has subscription plans for individual student subscriptions as well as subscription plans for educators .   Student plans start at $2