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To This Great Stage of Fools: Born April 5th

Apr5

No race can prosper, till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem.” Booker Tallaferro Washington, b. 1856. And vice-versa.

Arthur Hailey, b.1920. I read Hotel long before I saw the movie, and I remember it being very entertaining. I don’t remember much about the movie.

Wednesdays are poetry days at The Immaculate Castle, and the family there recently found themselves memorizing Tennyson. Then, mom asked the question: What did Alfred Tennyson’s mother read to him as a child?

I wonder whether Shakespeare’s mother read to him?

The Reading Mother

I had a mother who read to me
Sagas of pirates who scoured the sea,
Cutlasses clenched in their yellow teeth,
“Blackbirds” stowed in the hold beneath.

I had a Mother who read me lays
Of ancient and gallant and golden days;
Stories of Marmion and Ivanhoe,
Which every boy has a right to know.

I had a Mother who read me tales
Of Gelert the hound of the hills of Wales,
True to his trust till his tragic death,
Faithfulness blent with his final breath.

I had a Mother who read me the things
That wholesome life to the boy heart brings —
Stories that stir with an upward touch,
Oh, that each mother of boys were such!

You may have tangible wealth untold;
Caskets of jewels and coffers of gold.
Richer than I you can never be —
I had a Mother who read to me. – Strickland Gillilan

What are you reading to the children in your life?

The Penderwicks by Jeanne Birdsall

Mar18

The urchins and I finished this read aloud book a few weeks ago, but I was waiting for one of them to write something about it. No luck. Then, I wrote a review, posted it, and my server went down and lost it. You’ll have to make do with my warmed-over observations.

First of all, Karate Kid, Brown Bear Daughter, and Betsy-Bee were enthralled with this story. Organizer Daughter (age 14) overheard us reading The Penderwicks, and she took it and read it to herself while we were doing other things. Every day I had to read at least two chapters because we all wanted to see what would happen to Penderwick sisters and their friend, Jeffrey. How would they get out of this scrape? And what would happen to Jeffrey? It was an excellent read aloud book.

The book did produce some “deja vu” moments. See if any of this description rings a bell. Four sisters live in a small cottage with one parent, next door to a grand mansion where a lonely boy, an only child, who loves to play the piano, lives and watches them from his upstairs window. The boy wants to become a musician, but his rich grandfather had other plans for the boy, and the boy is expected to follow his grandfather’s wishes. The four Penderwick girls become friends with the boy, Jeffrey, and the five of them have all sorts of adventures together. The eldest Penderwick sister, Rosalind, age 12, is just starting to become interested in boys. Another sister, Jane, age 10, is a writer and a daydreamer, and Skye, age 11, is a tomboy who says things without thinking first, sometimes getting the sisters into lots of trouble. Oh, and Batty, the youngest who is only four years old, is so shy that she hardly speaks to people outside the family.

Does any of this sound familiar? To any who are fans of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women, it certainly does. However, this story, while it obviously echoes that of the March sisters, doesn’t feel annoyingly derivative or copied. It was just fun picking out the echoes. There are certainly enough new elements here in terms of plot and characters to keep the reader turning the pages and reading to see what will happen next. Some of the more exciting events in the book include an encounter with a bull, a fire in the cottage kitchen, and a soccer practice gone mad that collides with a Very Important Garden Competition to produce havoc.

The Penderwicks will join some of my other favorite fictional families such as the Melendy family (The Saturdays and Four Story Mistake by Elizabeth Enright), the Fossil sisters (Ballet Shoes by Noel Streatfield), the Moffats by Eleanor Estes, the Austins (Madeleine L’Engle) and All-of-a-Kind Family by Sydney Taylor. And of, course, I can’t forget the March sisters. Four children seems to be the preferred number in most of these books, although three is OK and five is also acceptable. Often, the families have two girls and two boys or alternately all girls. Parents are available but not heard until needed. Most significantly, the children in all these families share an adventurous spirit and loving family relationships, making these books a joyous romp seen through the eyes of children who are a lot like my eight urchins. One of my urchins won’t read fantasy or historical fiction or science fiction or anything else except stories about “real life children who are like me.” The Penderwicks is a great sample of this kind of a book, and since it takes place during the summer holidays (subtitle: A Summer Tale of Four Sisters, Two Rabbits, and a Very Interesting Boy), it would be perfect to read or listen to in the car during summer vacation.

Planning and Inspiring

Jan31

Charles Dickens has a birthday this month (February 7th), and some of us are already reading A Tale of Two Cities for the British Literature class I’m teaching at co-op. I would like for the family to read Nicholas Nickleby aloud together in the evenings, but the teenage urchins aren’t being too cooperative about working some read aloud family time into their busy schedules. Any suggestions?

Oh, by the way, I want us to read Nicholas Nickleby because two of the aforementioned teenagers are performing in a play based on that book in May. It promises to be a long, complicated and enjoyable drama, but I thought it would be helpful if some of us knew the basic story before we saw the play. Does anyone else have what they think are wonderful educational ideas in which no one else in the family wants to participate? Do you compel participation? Do you give up? I told someone the other day that I don’t think I know how to be an inspirational teacher. I have lots of what I think are good ideas, but I’m not too good at getting everyone else “on board” so to speak.

Jewel by Bret Lott

Jan11

Wow! I just found another author/book to add to my list of Semicolon’s 100 Best Fiction Authors Ever (a list which only had 68 authors on it, now 69). I read A Song I Knew By Heart by Bret Lott a little over a year ago, and I thought it was OK. I read it because I had heard that Lott wrote Christian-influenced fiction and because the book was based on the book of Ruth from the Bible. I thought that sounded interesting, and it was.

When I wrote about A Song I Knew By Heart I said that “the plot wasn’t much.” Well, Jewel isn’t about plot either. A Mississippi woman named Jewel grows up poor, marries, has five children, the last of whom is a girl with Down’s Syndrome. The family lives in Mississippi, moves to California, moves back to Mississippi and then back to LA. No thriller here. However, it doesn’t matter how much or how little happens externally in the book; the action is inside the characters. The reader gets to see inside a marriage– that of Jewel and her husband Leston. At the same time we get to see the unfolding relationship of a mother to her children, especially that of a mother and her child with special needs, Brenda Kay. The doctors call Brenda Kay a Mongolian Idiot when she is born; those same doctors tell Jewel to put her daughter away in an institution and forget about her. The attitude of unthinking cruelty and dismissal that most of society has toward Brenda Kay, toward all mentally handicapped individuals in the 1940’s is mirrored in the unthinking and racist attitude that Jewel herself has toward the black people that live all around her. She freely uses the n-word to refer to black people and expects them to wait on her, to defer to her because she is white. Jewel knows that she and her family are nothing but crackers, poor white trash. She calls them that herself. The attitude is captured so well. In Mississippi in the 1940’s black people are servants and children with Down’s Syndrome are freaks. In California, Jewel’s “promised land”, these attitudes begin to break down and change.

In fact, that contrast between California and Mississippi is the only thing in the book that I would argue about with the author. In Jewel Mississippi is a backwoods place; nothing ever changes there. No one has any idea of justice for black people nor of education for the mentally handicapped. And by 1962, nothing has changed for the better. California, on the other hand, is a paradise of racial harmony and opportunity for the mentally handicapped. It’s a story, so I guess the author can make the places the way he wants. But I don’t believe that one place was all good and the other completely dark and full of ignorance.

The language and the images in this book are beautiful. The details of a mother’s thoughts and feelings, of what it’s like to live in poverty, of what it’s like to care for a mentally handicapped child, of what it means to balance the needs of one family member against those of another–all these descriptions and more are drawn artfully and engagingly. The characters in the novel remind me of people I know. Leston is a little like my daddy. Jewel reminds me of my great-grandmother and of my grandmother. I’ve known her sons, Wilmer and Burton, poor, working class and moving up.

In this interview, Bret Lott says that what he writes about is family:

I don�t know what else to write about, that�s the bottom line. I don�t know what else there is to write about. I�m not saying that to be glib or a quick answer. Family, that�s basically everybody�s story. Whether you are writing away from the family or trying to extract from the family or trying to get hold of the family, or the family�s dying or being born, or are you meeting your soul mate or your lover or whatever; it�s all about the family. So, when I�m writing, I�m not thinking about trying to say something so much as to write clearly and in love�what I love and what I hold dear. I know that�s kind of a vague answer, but I don�t want you to think I�m trying to instruct or preach or anything.

If the only thing I know about is family, then what I�m trying to say is that family is all that matters; but that comes out of the fact that that�s all I know what to write about, for better or worse again.

If you like Southern fiction or novels about the inner workings of families, not “dysfunctional” families, just ordinary hard-working folks who are trying to make things work the best they can, Jewel is a masterpiece. I’m definitely going to read some more books by Bret Lott.

Seven Sevens

Nov29

Catez at AllThings2All tagged me to participate in this Seven Sevens meme. I like lists, and I like Catez, so here goes.

1. Seven things to do before I die

a. Go to Europe, particularly England. I’ve been an Anglophile ever since I read all those kidlit books and murder mysteries set in England: C.S. Lewis, R.L. Stevenson, E. Nesbit, Lewis Carroll, Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers.
b. See all my children to adulthood. My mother-in-law prayed that she would live to see her youngest grown, and she lived for five years after I married her youngest child, Engineer Husband. My youngest is four, so I have a ways to go,
c. Write a book. I know, I know. Just start writing, discipline, etc. However, blogging is about all I can handle at this season in my life.
d. Read all the books on my List–which keeps growing. Therefore, I’ll never finish it, but I’ll always be working on it. Until I die.
e. Live near my parents so that my children can enjoy their grandparents and vice-versa. But they won’t move, and I can’t so . . . .
f. Memorize at least one book of the Bible. I need to start working on that one.
g. Plant and grow a really good and fruitful garden. I’ve planted really bad gardens and really weedy gardens. The perfect garden eludes me.

2. Seven things I cannot do.
a. Draw. Dancer Daughter draws beautifully. Some of my other children show artistic talent. I do a great stick figure.
b. Dance. Again Dancer Daughter and some of the other urchins are elegant dancers. I don’t where they inherited the ability, but it wasn’t from me.
c. Play the piano. I have such talented children.
d. Make crafts. I don’t have the patience or the ability to sew, crochet, knit, stamp, embroider, or do any of the dozens of other crafty things that other women do. And whenever I’ve tried I get pity and offers to fix whatever I’ve produced. 🙁
e. Harmonize. I have an alto voice, but whenever I sing in a group I can’t really do anything but the melody–sometimes an octave lower with the men.
f. Play sports. At least one of my children did inherit my nonathletic abilities.
g. Read music. I know which note is an ‘A” and which is a “G”, but I can’t figure how people know which tone to sing in response to that note on the page.

3. Seven things that attract me to Engineer Husband:
a. His looks. He’s a very handsome and distinguished looking guy.
b. His intelligence. I like intelligent people.
c. His seriousness. I know you’re supposed to say “sense of humor,” and I enjoy silliness and laughter as much as the next person, but a steady diet of frivolity and froth would make me crazy. I’m glad Engineer Husband can laugh with me, but I’m even happier that he can think with me.
d. His faithfulness. He’s faithful to the Lord, to me, and to our family. What more could I ask?
e. His courtesy. He’s the most considerate person I’ve ever met.
f. His passion. He’s passionate about science, math, the Bible, apologetics, and me.
g. His service. He spends his days, and sometimes nights, serving me, serving our family, serving the Lord, finding ways to serve more. He’s amazing.

4. Seven things I say most often
a. I do not understand.
b. If you had the sense God gave a cabbage. . .
c. Lord help me . . .
d. OK, settle down.
e. Rub my shoulders.
f. I’m tired.
g. Let’s go.

5. Seven books (or series) I love (easy question)
a. The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis
b. The Lord of the RIngs by JRR Tolkien
c. Lord Peter Wimsey books by Dorothy Sayers
d. All the books by Charles Dickens
e. Homecoming by Cynthia Voigt and its sequels
f. All the Bertie and Jeeves books by P.G. Wodehouse
g. Jan Karon’s Mitford books
Go here for about 60 more favorites. Who in the world could limit herself to only seven?

6. Seven movies I watch over and over again (or would watch over and over if I had the time)
a. White Christmas. We just watched it tonight. We watch it every Christmas.
b. The Princess Bride.
c. Lord of the Rings. All three of them, extended editions, on or around Tolkien’s birthday, January 3rd.
d. Henry V.
e. It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. The best comedy ever made.
f. The Sound of Music
g. The Importance of Being Earnest
Go here for Semicolon’s 105 Best Movies Ever

7. Seven people I want to join in, too
a. Eldest Daughter
b. Dancer Daughter
c. Organizer Daughter
d. Sister at Seize the Book
e. Donna at Quiet Life
And is it true that Real Guys don’t do memes?
f. David Wayne at Jollyblogger
g. Ariel at Bittersweet Life

I can think of a few other guys (whose names I will not mention or link) who could afford to spend a little more time on memes and a lot less time sniping at each other. If any of you want to participate and change both subject and tone of the blog conversation, feel free.
And here are the seven sevens you’re supposed to list:
1. Seven things to do before I die
2. Seven things I cannot do
3. Seven things that attract me to [my spouse or significant other or best friend]
4. Seven things I say most often
5. Seven books (or series) I love
6. Seven movies I watch over and over again (or would watch over and over if I had the time)
7. Seven people I want to join in, too

Out of the Mouths of Babes

Oct9

Z-baby: Daddy, you need to be more constricable.

Engineer Dad: What’s that?

Z-baby: Constricable means kinda like an artist.

Engineer Dad: So I’m somewhat artistic already, but I need to be more.

Z-Baby: Yes, more constricable.

Several hours later:
Z-baby: God can make the world out of nothing so he’s an artist.

Me: So does that mean God is constricable?

Z-baby: Yes, ’cause He’s an artist.

You heard it here first, guys. One of God’s attributes is that He’s constricable.

In the Beginning There Were No Diapers by Tim Bete

Oct4

Well, it’s not the fault of the author, but nevertheless this book was quite offensive–to my children. Karate Kid said, “OOOH! That’s disgusting!” Brown Bear Daughter asked, “Why do they have that picture on the front?” And several of the others just turned up their noses and sniffed loudly. You see my children believe they were born with diapers, or else born potty trained. When I try to tell them otherwise, they give me that incredulous look that says, “Mommy’s lost it again!”

Because of the very offensive cover art, I read Tim Bete’s opus on parenthood by myself. No one else in the family even wanted to touch it. Therefore, I got to laugh at all the stories Bete tells that parallel my own family and my own kids without offending the kids by telling them I was laughing at them. I, too, have children who were somewhat resistant to potty training (all eight of them), children who wouldn’t eat a vegetable if they were starving, and children who teach me lessons every day. I enjoyed the book because Bete’s hobbies–pushing his luck, skating on thin ice, and fishing his kids’ toys out of the toilet–sound a lot like my pastimes. As they say in the vernacular, I could identify.

The paperback book consists of nineteen chapters, each of which reads like a short course in parenting by Erma Bombeck. This humorous style is appropriate since author Tim Bete is director of the Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop at the University of Dayton. The book would be good for recreational reading, a great gift for a new father (or an old one), and perfect for any parent in need of a dose of laughter. Sometimes I just need to lighten up and realize that if my children turn out to be couch potatoes or experts in sarcasm, they at least had a good role model–me.

I got my copy of this book from Mind and Media for the purposes of review. You can purchase yours from Amazon by clicking on the graphic above, or from the publisher here. Either way you’re in for a treat.

Author Tim Bete’s website

A Typical Day in Our Homeschool, Part 4

Aug18

Read Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.

Everyone else is percolating right along, but it’s lunchtime, and the two middlers, Brown Bear Daughter (10) and Karate Kid (8), have only finished their Saxon math lesson and listened to me read the Bible aloud. We eat lunch, courtesy of Organizer Daughter, and then I herd the two slowpokes back to the table to do handwriting, easy grammar and dailygrams, copywork, multiplication practice worksheet, and a history workbook called Story of the USA.. A lot of our lesson plans come straight out of the Fourth Grade Sonlight curriculum, but I modify and cut and move stuff around as I feel necessary.

We’re reading two books aloud right now: Diary of an Early American Boy by Eric Sloane and Imprisoned in the Golden City by Dave and Neta Jackson. After we finish reading, Brown Bear Daughter and Karate Kid do a lesson in Cost Benefit, Jr. by Stephanie Herman, an economics curriculum I received as a gift for review purposes and liked so much that we’re using it in school this year. They still have to take turns reading their reader, a biography of Thomas Jefferson, and then we’re done–just in time for Karate Kid to get ready for karate, or Kuk Sool Won as it’s called at the place where he takes lessons. (It’s a Korean thing.) Karate Kid is a brown belt, and he says he’ll be a black belt before he’s twelve. Betsy Bee, Z-baby, and Brown Bear Daughter watch Cyberchase, a math show on PBS while I take Karate Kid to his lesson.

Dancer Daughter and Brown Bear Daughter both have dance tonight, and I still have to put supper (stew) on to cook sometime in between playing taxi. I sometimes think we’re way too busy, but if you have eight children and each one of them does only one outside activity, you still have a lot of taxi service to do. Dancer Daughter (almost 16) and Computer Guru Son (almost 18) are both taking driver’s ed from their dad in the evenings and on Saturdays and whenever they can work it in. That’s one class I gladly leave to Engineer Husband. He also tutors kids (his own) in math as needed, and he teaches science to Brown Bear Daughter and to Karate Kid in the evenings. They’re finishing up the Apologia Botany book right now, and my house is full of “plant experiments” that I must be careful not to disturb.

Our evening is a whirlwind of supper, dance, science, baths, and trying to go to bed at a decent hour. We don’t make it—again, but as Scarlett once said, “I’ll think about that tomorrow. Tomorrow is another day.”

A Typical Day in our Homeschool, Part 3

Aug17

Having disposed of the older set, figuratively speaking, in Part 2, we return to the younger four: Brown Bear Daughter (10), Karate Kid (8), Betsy Bee (6), and Z-Baby (almost 4). In our last installment, I sent Brown Bear Daughter and Karate Kid to the table to do their math lesson. They didn’t actually start because they were discussing how to build a space ship out of furniture and blankets–or some such project–so I had to not-so-gently remind that it was math time not space ship time. I’m working on the gentleness, which is a certified Fruit of the Spirit, but usually I find that a firm tone of voice, slightly louder than usual, gets more results.

I sit down with Betsy Bee to read her reader, Part 2 of Jake and Mike Take a Bike Hike. Those who have been through this set of readers six times already, as have I, will recognize this story immediately as part of that sparkling series of books associated with the curriculum Sing, Spell, Read, and Write. I do not fall asleep while Bethy Bee is sounding out words such as b-i-k-e and c-a-k-e and r-a-k-e. We are, as you can guess, studying the “silent e,” and all kidding aside, I find that teaching a child to read, seeing the words on the page come alive, is one of the most rewarding parts of homeschooling for me–if I can just stay awake long enough to see it happen.

Bethy Bee and I continue with school by doing her Miquon math, her Sing, Spell, Read and Write workbook, and her Explode the Code workbook. She likes workbooks. Then, she asks for a break. She’s actually about finished for the day, but she doesn’t know it since she hasn’t learned to distinguish schoolwork from other work or from play. We’re also reading Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder, mostly for Betsy Bee in the evenings, although the other “youngers” listen, too. Some coloring, lots of play, and her classes at co-op on Friday mornings and that’s about the extent of Besty Bee’s schooling at this stage.

Brown Bear Daughter and Karate Kid are still working on their math lesson. Z-Baby wants to do school; she also wants to watch television. I resist the TV idea and sit down to work on her alphabet book with her. We’re working on the letter “B” this week. We draw or paste a big B in the middle of of page 2 of a spiral notebook, and then one of us draws or glues pictures of things that start with “B” on the page. No, I don’t have a genius; she doesn’t really know what starts with “B”. I just tell her. We read a Picture Book Preschool book, and she loses interest in school and goes to play/make a mess with Betsy Bee. Something with water and Barbies.

Brown Bear Daughter and Karate Kid are still working on their math lesson. To speed them up, I threaten no afternon activities unless they finish all their school work for the day. Brown Bear Daughter gets serious about the math lesson, and Karate Kid follows her lead. Hooray! we’re done with Saxon math. We celebrate with a short break. I check my email and make a phone call. The math finishers start some project that they won’t want to put down in order to finish up the rest of their school work.

To be continued.