LittleMissMatched

My daughter and I discovered this store while in Florida, and it gives you permission to wear different (but schematically similar) themed socks. I love it! I've always been a wild sock person. Great gift idea, too, for someone who likes bright colors.

Where Did I Leave My Mind?

Today was one of those power gotta get things done days, so I was running around a lot, and this morning I picked up a tall cup of java so that I'd stay awake for the power surge.

Then at some point, I guess while I was running around the house, I set the coffee down, and couldn't find it for hours and hours.

Embarrassed to admit defeat, I finally asked the kids to keep a lookout for an abandoned cup of coffee somewhere in the house. But still, no one found it.

Gaining in desperation, I went out to the truck--did I take it with me when I picked someone up? No. I checked the basement--I'd taken some things down there earlier. No. I checked the laundry room, even though laundry was NOT on my agenda today. No. Where could it be?

Completely fooled, now, I began seaching places I couldn't possibly have left coffee. Near a computer. On top of a filing cabinet. In the kid's bedrooms. In the linen closet. What? I said I didn't do laundry today, what's this coffee cup doing on the shelf with the washcloths?

They say somethings, like the Trinity, remain a mystery. This cup, too, is a mystery.

Plucking Up The Courage

Will Thanksgiving be the Norman Rockwell picture at your family home?

I know for some people, holidays can be difficult. Let's pray for those who have difficult family situations, tension between family members, and for whatever reason may not feel quite that joyful about this week's family event. May peace and joy surround us all as we give thanks for the gift of our own and our family's lives.

Grateful...

This Thanksgiving, I'm grateful for so many things. All of you who continue to read this. Life, love, children, fresh air, health, eyes to see, ears to hear, legs to walk, hands and fingers.

Waking up every day is a resurrection of sorts, and I'm grateful for each day I get, and each day I get a chance to love and live my best. Naturally, I mess up every day, too, but God keeps giving me new chances every day. He must like me. I sure love Him and am glad He chose me to live right here, and right now with you.

Parenting Teens

I've noticed that parenting teens takes a lot more parental communication, it seems to me, than at any other time in our children's raising so far. Have you had the same experience?

This just proves to me, once again, that having good communication skills as spouses is essential to raising our children. I don't think it can ever be over-emphasized how important communication skills are to marriage and family life.

Uncommon Sense #10

New Leaf Theater in Lincoln Park, IL puts on The Man Who Was Thursday by G.K. Chesterton and adapted by Bilal Dardai for a new audience. Tickets available until November 21, 2009.
I talk first with Jessica Hutchinson, the director of the play, and then with Deb Lillig, who attended the play to find out more about how this 100 year old play came to life.
Rochester, NY Re-awakening Wonder Conference CDs are available now here.
Chesterton and the Romance of Orthodoxy by William Oddie available here.

http://newleaftheatre.org/

Web sites:
http://chesterton.org
http://americanchestertonsociety.blogspot.com
http://www.twitter.com/amchestertonsoc
FaceBook Fan Page: The American Chesterton Society
http://music.mevio.com
(Pictures: Left is Deb, next to her is Jessica)

Disney's A Christmas Carol--a review

Saw the movie this afternoon. Friendly warning: don't take the kids. Those in front of us obviously were not enjoying themselves. The movie is dark and scary, with some rather frightening scenes.

The CG (computer graphics) are fantastic, and if you are into that, you will enjoy it. There are some amazing shots that could never be done with a "real life" movie camera. The 3D was great except that in our particular theater, the glasses were messed up and you had to wear them upside down to get the 3D effect!

While basically staying true to the Dickens story, there were a few alterations, and overall, as I mentioned, the scenes were dark, and with the 3D glasses on, seemed almost too dark.

My rating: kids 13 and up or you might have some nightmares afterwards. Seeing it earlier in the day might help if you are on the fence about someone seeing it.

Can I Do Latin Now?

There are two voices that could say this, "Can I do Latin now?"

One voice says it eagerly, and with high anticipation, wanting to get right to Latin and conquer the third declensions we're working on.

The other voice says it in a way that means, "Let's hurry up and get this over with."

Some days it's one voice, some days, the other.

In either case *I* am learning Latin, and probably guilty of the sin of pride because I feel so lucky to finally be studying something I've never been able to study before.

Pater noster, qui es en caeli.

2001: a Blogging Odyssey

This marks my 2001th blog post. Wow! I didn't know I had it in me! Thanks for hanging around here with me.

Shakespeare Smakespeare

I never got any Shakespeare growing up. OK., well that I can remember, and I am starting to have senior (40-something) moments. Yes, my education was sadly neglected. I *did* hear the name and know *of* him, but not personally.

Trying to improve my own children's education, I've done some Shakespeare at home. In fact, my ninth grader and I just finished reading Romeo and Juliet ("Kids!") which was, sad to say, the first time I've ever read the whole thing in a form that wasn't a synopsis or movie or play.

So, we're moving on and starting Twelfth Night today, and I'm probably way more excited about it than my student, but that's OK. I think she may like a comedy better than the tragedy we just finished, at least, I'm hoping so.

I do like these Folger Editions, as they have the play on one side (right) and on the left, they define any words you might not know, which is really helpful to me.

More Geekness

I continue on my geek journey towards the perfect podcast. I actually think I have a better setup now. I've added two pieces of software to my repertoire, the main great thing is Sound Soap. Because I have this very noisy home phone line, my interviews have had this horrible buzz on them. Sound Soap greatly improves this. Sound Soap is a plug in that works with GarageBand.

Second, is a free app. called Levelator. This takes your file and levels the sounds automatically. This is great for the interview files, because often my voice is much louder than the interviewee. Levelator corrects it all before I import the file into GarageBand.

I also have the ungeekiest microphone set up possible. I've got a piece of foam (from my sewing kit) rubber-banded on top, and a nylon stocking stretched around an embroidery hoop (again, the sewing box came in handy) for a pop filter. They actually work really well.

Innocent Brown

All my life, I've been the naive person who doesn't know the current slang. Epic bad. My bad. Sweet. It rocks. Buff. Watching submarines race?

I used to feel bad when I was a kid, but then I usually found out I didn't want to know what the things meant. I didn't think it would happen to me when I was forty-something. But it did, just the other day, in front of my whole family.

So I must be the only one who never heard the term "watching submarines race" right? Then I looked it up (you couldn't do that when you were a kid, could you. We were stuck not ever knowing what "shiny loafers" or "that was the pumpkin's muffins!" were supposed to mean.) and discovered once again, I really didn't need to know that.

Well, just call me Innocent Brown.

The Penderwicks

We really enjoyed the first Penderwick story, and were recently visiting with book-loving friends who informed us that there was a second book now in the series, The Penderwicks on Gardam Street.

If you, too, haven't yet read this book, now is the perfect time to read it, as it takes place at this time of the year, culminating around Halloween. As we read it, we felt kindred spirits with the children, as they walked through the falling leaves, and felt the chill of October.

The story is inviting, interesting, and definitely great. I highly recommend it.

Series

I got an email from a random person because of my interest in children's literature asking if I'd heard of a book series that just didn't ring a bell. I tried to come up with something, but then wrote back saying my only idea, which was a movie I'd once seen.

The writer wrote back and had found the series, which sound great, and I've got to see if our library has it.

Paradigm Shifts

Isn't the pop use of the word paradigm sort of yesterday?

Yesterday I sat through a presentation on Confirmation and they made it seem like the words "paradigm shift" and "cutting edge" went together, and I just though, gee, that's so old.

Get this: We were told we were going to discuss the history of our understanding of Confirmation. I'm thinking, "gee, 2000 years's a lot to cover in 15 minutes, but ok, let's go" and then the "three phases" of understanding of Confirmation start were:

1. Christ to 1960
2. 1960 to 2008
3. Now (here's where the "cutting edge" part came in, and as a hint, the "now" was *not* going back to stage 1)

Interesting stuff, eh?

Trivia

This weekend, our art fair is in a town which also is celebrating the arts and it's town history all weekend.

Yesterday, I got on a trolley and took the historical narrated tour through the town, which was quite fun.

Here's a bit of trivia for you: you can find out which town I was in if you discover which town David Hasselhoff lived in when he graduated from high school. He is, apparently, one of their more famed residents.

A second clue would be the person who founded Whirlpool clothes washers grew up here.

What town was I in?

School, Life, Etc.

First, I want to thank Dr. Thursday for helping out here, and for starting on What's Wrong, which I anticipate to be a great discussion starter.

This is always a tough time of year: school starts, and I homeschool; the art fairs continue on till October (and even November this year) and I am the artist assistant and general all-around framer for a very busy artist, plus this year I'm learning podcasting from scratch (golly, there's a lot to it), trying to keep up on the home, van (130,000 miles and still going...erm, not-so-strong!), family events, etc.

On the school end, briefly, someone in the combox asked about Apologia Physical Science and so far we LOVE it. There are hands-on experiments at least twice a week, and nothing contrary to our faith, so far. We're on Unit Two. Latin. Ha! So much for me thinking that signing up for an on-line class would eliminate me. I am very much needed. Ask me anything about the First Declension. Then there's math, religion, American Government, Literature...oh! funny story.

We're reading Romeo and Juliet out loud, and we just finish the balcony scene where they've pledged their undying love for each other and the nurse calls for Juliet, so we stop reading. My daughter puts the book down and just says, "Kids!" A moment passes, and we both burst out laughing. It was just so spot on, good comedic timing, and an apt summary of what had just taken place. And she's 14 who made this assessment. When I was 14, all I could see was the romance.

So, the big news is, our first podcast is up on iTunes, thanks to YOU wonderful supporters here. Thank you so much. I have to say, I still have much to learn, but podcasting is really fun. I'm having a good time when my computer isn't crashing. To hear the first episode (only 8 1/2 minutes long) check it out here.

Have a wonderful weekend! (I'll be at an art fair.)

Day After Labor Day--Yikes!

Assuming you have either started school or are starting today, and because of the Feast Day, may I say:

Mary, we wish you Happy Birthday! Give us the wisdom and grace to teach our children well today. Give us patience and help us to lovingly guide our children as you did Your Son, Our Lord, Jesus Christ, Amen.

And for all who share this birthday with Mary--Happy Birthday to YOU, too!

I am such a geek

If you've been following me anywhere (ACS blog, Twitter, Facebook, etc) you know I am preparing now to make some podcasts for the American Chesterton Society. In spare moments when I am just standing in line, a passenger in a car, washing dishes, sorting laundry, etc., my mind is producing podcasts. I'm thinking of what witty things I'll say, the cool people I will interview, the stingers and jingles I'll use, the microphone I want to put on my Christmas wish list...gee, I am such a geek that I think about mixer boxes and pre-amplifiers and pop filters (I made my own out of foam--it works!). And then there is the software--I'm using GarageBand (3, can you believe it? They have 9 out already!) (OK, so I am a behind-the-times geek, right?!)but I just heard about Ubercaster, and it looks so cool! I barely know GarageBand and I already want to switch. Geeky!

Meanwhile, taxes must be done today (monthly sales tax for our business), and some child of mine demands school. Hmmm. What should I do first? Duh! School it is!

We Started!

I had planned to start September 1st. Labor day is late this year, and I didn't want to wait till then.

Last week, my child asked why we couldn't start school. She was hearing through the grapevine that kids around here were starting already, had started already, everyone, it seems, started school. That's how things are when you are 14. Everyone else is doing it.

But on this, I thought, why not? So we started. American Government (a coop class) started last week, so along with that we added math (Saxon Algebra), Literature (we're starting with Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet), and Religion (Didache first book, Introduction to Catholicism). The first two days went well.

Have you started homeschooling? Are you feeling good, off to a good start? Let me know.