I could have especially used #1. (Although the first recommended book didn’t help me at my age.)
8 Essential Skills They Didn’t Teach You In School
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2008/10/21/8-essential-skills-they-didn-t-teach-you-in-school.aspx
http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/517925
“The CRTC is reviewing its policy of allowing unregulated distribution of broadcast media content over the Internet and cellphones.”
“The federal regulator has taken a hands-off approach to newer types of media distribution, while continuing to regulate radio and television outlets.”
“However, the CRTC wants to re-examine its current policy, noting that Canadians are spending more time accessing high-quality content over the Internet and mobile devices.”
“The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission says interested parties may submit their comments by Dec. 5.”
Right now, if you want the truth about any issue, what are your options? In Canada, our only option is the internet. The US has the internet, talk radio, and sometimes FOX News. Look out though, because Obama said he would be doing better without FOX News.
“My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I also will reject you from being priest for Me; Because you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children.”
Hosea 4:6
“Only the educated are free.”
Epictetus
Christopher Paolini on tour
http://features.csmonitor.com/books/2008/09/24/christopher-paolini-on-tour/
“Paolini who was homeschooled by his mother, wrote ‘Eragon,’ the first book in the series when he was only 15. Today, he still lives and writes at his parents’ home in Montana and is intensely private about the details of his life although he has told interviewers that he loves to hike in the mountains, practice woodworking, and make the chain mail used in medieval armor out of interlocking metal rings.”
“The things he likes to do, he acknowledged to CNN in an interview, ‘are not the things everybody in this country is doing.’”“And yet that may well be the secret to his success. Paolini himself gives the credit to homeschooling. ‘A lot of kids get traumatized in school and get beat down for being different,’ Paolini says. ‘When I went out in public, I was not afraid. I was never afraid to pursue my interests because of what other people would think.’”
We went to see The Clone Wars last night. B9 has been playing Star Wars Lego all summer, so I knew he would love the movie. L3 was also right into it, and N14 didn’t mind it. The girls (C7 and I) didn’t expect to be impressed, but we had fun anyway.
What I liked best about the movie was the baby carrier/backpack in which they carried the Baby Huttlet (AKA Rotta or Stinky). They could have chosen any fancy wheeled method of carrying the baby, but they chose the most efficient, safest, and BEST way! Love the babywearing!!
We enjoyed watching the movie Nim’s Island last night.
http://www.nimsisland.com/
It was pretty good. It could be that I liked it because it was positive about homeschooling, but the kids enjoyed it, too. They are watching it again right now before we return it. I also loved how it encouraged reading and imagining for children.
“One day we found it… Our home… This is my island. Not a bad place to grow up, huh. See, I don’t have to go to school. I’m homeschooled. Or technically, I’m island-schooled…”
“Anything else I need to learn about the world, I just open one of the books my dad brought for me. With a little imagination, I can go anywhere.”
Aww…. Freedom.
The Dark Knight- Joker Interrogation Scene Spoof
(Hilarious - if you’ve seen the movie. Derek and I used these lines all weekend.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2yv8aT0UFc
Barack
(I think BO stinks, but this is pretty good editing.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65I0HNvTDH4
In addition to The Dark Knight, we have seen WALL-E and The X-FILES lately. I was disappointed with both of them.
WALL-E was visually dark and didn’t have much of a story. It made bashing fat people just as acceptable as it is to make jokes about John McCain’s age. I didn’t like the sign behind the president. The children didn’t care much about the movie either.
I had too high expectations for The X-FILES. It turned out to be a decent murder mystery, but where were the aliens? Where were the UFO’s? I wanted to believe. I loved seeing Mulder and Scully again, especially Scully who is aging like I am. She is two years older than me.
All I Want is You
If I was a flower growing wild and free
All I’d want is you to be my sweet honey bee.
And if I was a tree growing tall and greeen
All I’d want is you to shade me and be my leavesIf I was a flower growing wild and free
All I’d want is you to be my sweet honey bee.
And if I was a tree growing tall and greeen
All I’d want is you to shade me and be my leavesAll I want is you, will you be my bride
Take me by the hand and stand by my side
All I want is you, will you stay with me?
Hold me in your arms and sway me like the sea.If you were a river in the mountains tall,
The rumble of your water would be my call.
If you were the winter, I know I’d be the snow
Just as long as you were with me, when the cold winds blow.All I want is you, will you be my bride
Take me by the hand and stand by my side
All I want is you, will you stay with me?
Hold me in your arms and sway me like the sea.If you were a wink, I’d be a nod
If you were a seed, well I’d be a pod.
If you were the floor, I’d wanna be the rug
And if you were a kiss, I know I’d be a hugAll I want is you, will you be my bride
Take me by the hand and stand by my side
All I want is you, will you stay with me?
Hold me in your arms and sway me like the sea.If you were the wood, I’d be the fire.
If you were the love, I’d be the desire.
If you were a castle, I’d be your moat,
And if you were an ocean, I’d learn to float.All I want is you, will you be my bride
Take me by the hand and stand by my side
All I want is you, will you stay with me?
Hold me in your arms and sway me like the sea.
Derek and I, along with the boys, and Ruth and Jordan went to see The Dark Knight last evening. It was long and very loud, but not a bad superhero movie. One of the previews was for this movie, which had a familiar tune in the background. I haven’t thought of this song for ages.
For What It’s Worth
There’s something happening here
What it is ain’t exactly clear
There’s a man with a gun over there
Telling me I got to bewareI think it’s time we stop, children, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going downThere’s battle lines being drawn
Nobody’s right if everybody’s wrong
Young people speaking their minds,
Getting so much resistance from behindI think it’s time we stop, hey, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going downWhat a field-day for the heat
A thousand people in the street
Singing songs and carrying signs
Mostly say, “Hooray for our side!”It’s time we stop, hey, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going downParanoia strikes deep
Into your life, it will creep
It starts when you’re always afraid
You step out of line, the man come and take you awayWe better stop, hey, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going downStop, hey, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down
Stop, now, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down
Stop, children, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down
I think we are going to go pretty much media-free for the next couple of weeks. That means generally no TV, no movies, no internet, no Facebook, no computer, and no video games for the children and me. I am not going to be too crazy about this. For example, if we have kids over, and it seems appropriate to play the Wii, than so be it. I also want to go to the theatre to see The X-Files when it comes out. I think I will check my email only once every couple of days, but not visit blogs, etc. I may use the computer to prepare the homeschool schedules for the coming year.
Summer is going too quickly. In the future, I doubt my children will ever say to me that I should have let them play more video games and watch more TV.
See you in a couple weeks!
The following is from the end of the book, Prince Caspian, when Aslan (and Lucy and Susan) moved through the village. “At a well in a yard they met a man who was beating a boy. The stick burst into flower in the man’s hand. He tried to drop it, but it stuck to his hand. His arm became a branch, his body the trunk of a tree, his feet took root. The boy, who had been crying a moment before, burst out laughing and joined them.” (Prince Caspian, C.S. Lewis, p. 172)
This is what our counter looks like when we make popcorn.
We watched a movie together on Friday night.
We enjoyed watching the Prince Caspian movie last night in the back center seats. 
It was well done, perhaps with an even better plot than the book since quite a bit was added and changed. I was sorry we had just read the book though, because it made me disappointed when it wasn’t the same. I thought the actual Prince Caspian character was more negative than he seemed in the book, and I didn’t know he was Spanish.
Derek thought the first movie was better, but N14 and B9 enjoyed the second movie more. It was more violent than the first, and I probably wouldn’t have taken C6 if I had known. I helped her avoid looking at some of the worst scenes. She was bored with some parts, but did enjoy any scenes with Lucy, Aslan, Reepicheep, or the housecat.
The movie included most of my favorite parts of the book, with the exception of this quote, “Then after an awful pause, the deep voice said, ‘Susan.’ Susan made no answer but the others thought she was crying. ‘You have listened to fears, child,’ said Aslan. ‘Come, let me breathe on you. Forget them. Are you brave again?’”
It did include a variation of this part,
‘I’m sorry,’ said Lucy, who understood some of his moods. ‘I didn’t mean to start slanging the others. But it wasn’t my fault anyway, was it?’
The Lion looked straight into her eyes.
‘Oh, Aslan,’ said Lucy. ‘You don’t mean it was? How could I - I couldn’t have left the others and come up to you alone, how could I? Don’t look at me like that … oh well, I suppose I could. Yes, and it wouldn’t have been alone, I know, not if I was with you. But what would have been the good?’
Aslan said nothing.
‘You mean,’ said Lucy rather faintly, ‘that it would have turned out right - somehow? But how? Please, Aslan! Am I not to know?’
‘To know what would have happened child, said Aslan. ‘No. Nobody is ever told that.’
Here is another interesting quote from the book,
‘Wouldn’t it be dreadful if some day, in our own world, at home, men started going wild inside, like the animals here, and still looked like men, so that you’d never know which were which?’
It continues to surprise and confuse me that Christian church groups thoroughly embrace the Narnia movies, by taking their youth groups, etc., while at the same time, they label the Harry Potter movies as evil. I saw both good and bad “magic” in Prince Caspian. I can’t wait to stand in line at midnight for the next HP movie in November!
Take the ‘Narnia’ Personality Quiz
http://www.BeliefNet.com/section/quiz/index.asp?sectionID=&surveyID=454
82 ~ You are Peter, who became the High King of Narnia. You are a born leader who everyone naturally gravitates to for guidance and inspiration. You often feel the burden of responsibility, but you always do what’s right because you possess strong morals. Blessed with a golden heart, you always want to help others seek justice.
“That’s it. Meeting now. Everyone on the couch.”
Dave ~ Alvin and the Chipmunks movie
There were lots of giggles all around when we rented that movie last night.
We are quickly reading Prince Caspian again to be ready for the movie on May 16th.
B9, C6, and I enjoyed watching this movie for the first time last night. The book, Love Comes Softly, was part of a series I enjoyed as a teenager.
Do you remember watching Anne of Green Gables The Sequel, where Anne was reading to her class of girls, and they were all sitting there sobbing and then left the room crying?
I was reminded of that scene this morning in our homeschool when I read the last few chapters of Where the Red Fern Grows aloud to C6 and B9.
Looking at this book in relation to my “issues”, it mentioned a few instances of the boy being whipped or switched by his mother, although it obviously didn’t change his behaviour (which reminds me of the Israelites). These quotes stood out:
“I wasn’t scared of him [his father], for he never whipped me. He was always kind and gentle.”
“I could scold them [his dogs] a little, but I could no more have whipped one of them than I could have kissed a girl. After all, a boy just doesn’t whip his dogs.”
I also found the recurring themes of answered prayer and predestination to be interesting.
