I have been off the board for years, but as my eldest is now a senior, I thought I'd peek back in. My daughter was also accepted to Hillsdale ED (her first choice). She got enough of a scholarship that we got her under her grandfather's limit of how much he will pay. After some back and forth between Hillsdale (it's 14 hours away) and John Brown in Arkansas, she has decided on Hillsdale. Congratulations to your son!

I won't continue using it. It hasn't been serviceable to me in the last few years. I went through my llooooong list of "saved for later" books in my Amazon cart, some of dh's go-to writers, and some recs from here to use up my handful of credits. As soon as everything comes through, I'll delete my profile.

Just settled the kids into bed and sat down with a glass of wine and decided to check in on you lovely ladies. I'm trying to keep up with the thread throughout the week, but I don't often find enough time to reply, so by the time I get a chance to type I've forgotten all the remarks I had wanted to make. I finished After the Quake by Murakami today. I think the stories got better as the book went on. I preferred the last one most of all because it was the first one in which I felt that Murakami gave something of himself away in the writing of it. I need to be able to connect with either the author or a character in a story to feel satisfied (?) in reading it. I could not connect with either in any of the other stories, but in "Honey Pie" there was a sense of an emotional connection to the author's life-yearnings via the main character. Overall, the book was fine. I don't know that I would pick up another Murakami, though. I picked up The Revisionists by Thomas Mullen at the library that was mentioned by Stacia. I think that will be the one I start tonight...that or Patriot Games. My daughter wants to participate and I've been forgetting to put her book list on here. I'll have to get it from her tomorrow, but I know this week she read the first Lord of the Rings (her first time!), The White Company by Arthur Conan Doyle, Homefront by Doris Gwaltney, and she is re-reading her favorite series by Wayne Thomas Batson...The Berinfell Prophecy trilogy, maybe? So far for me: 1. The Giver 2. The 39 Steps 3. Everywhere Present 4. The 9th Judgment 5. After the Quake - Murakami Currently reading: Ongoing: HotMW Thirty Steps to Heaven: The Ladder of Divine Ascent for all Walks of Life (leading an Orthodox College Group) The Gospel of John by Farley -and- Introducing the Orthodox Church (these two dd and I are reading together for school) The Living Page by Laurie Bestvater Starting soon: Patriot Games The Revisionists The Bat - Jo Nesbo The 10th Women's Murder Club book

I'd take you up on that offer in a second! ...But you would tell me the correct answer eventually, right?? Maybe after the first cuppa? :D

Hope everyone on the east coast is staying safe and warm. Here in the south central plains we're to have an unusual 75 degree day! Last week late I finally finished book 3--Everywhere Present: Christianity in a One-Story Universe by Stephen Freeman. I've read it slowly over the past few months, even though it was less only 100 pages. The concept of seeing the universe as Two-Stories, with heaven and God and angels "up there" is so pervasive in American religion and culture. This book made me rethink what Christians say we believe--God is with us here and now; there is One Church, not a Church of those already passed on and one of believers left here on Earth; and for those of the sacramental persuasion, God is present here in the Eucharist. A quick read, simple but not easy. For anyone who's interested, It's really a written form of Fr. Freeman's series of podcasts on Ancient Faith Radio: http://www.ancientfaith.com/podcasts/series/christianity_and_the_one_storey_universe I was late finishing up Everywhere Present, so I read James Patterson's next book in the Women's Murder Club series: The 9th Judgement. Somehow the quick, fluff reads always allow me to settle down and read some harder reads, where I found my mind wandering before. So, I'm a little over halfway through Murakami's After the Quake. I'm finding the stories well-written and hard to put down, but also a little like reading e.e. cummings poetry. You know they're trying to say SOMETHING, and you feel like you can almost touch what that something is, but it's just out of grasp. And I'm not really sure I'd like what that something was anyway...but I'm finding the cultural nuances in language and interactions between people interesting. I'm wondering if something is lost in translation, or if the Japanese culture and relationships are like that, or if it's by the design of the author--not the stories themselves but just the basic everyday interactions and conversations between characters. I'm also partway through the 2nd chapter of HOtMW, which I started on Audible, got completely lost in the second chapter with the unfamiliarity with Chinese names (I have to SEE it to remember and keep up), and have resorted to the hard copy so my visual mind can be at peace again. :P Read: 1. The Giver--Lois Lowry 2. The 39 Steps--John Buchan 3. Everywhere Present--Stephen Freeman 4. The 9th Judgement--James Patterson Currently Reading: After the Quake--Haruki Murakami History of the Medieval World The Brothers Karamazov Next up: The Bat--Jo Nesbo Jane Eyre not sure what Austen I'll reread...everytime I watch one of the movies, I decide that I want to reread that book. I've most recently watched (for the first time) the Emma series with Johnny Lee Miller, but I'm not sure that I want to reread Emma. An aside: Are we supposed to have read 4 by this past Sunday, or be reading our 4th this week? The perfectionist inside of me wants to know. ;)

Julia, I found some books on your list to add to my tbr list. Thanks! And how have I not heard of Schall? I'm going to pick up a book or two of his...I think my dh would really like his stuff as well. Went to Half Price Books yesterday when we ventured into the city for a gymnastics meet. Snagged a copy of St. Theophan the Recluse's "The Spiritual Life, and How To Be Attuned To It." It's one I've been wanting to get for a while, so I'm excited to have found it! I also found an old hardback of "My Darling Clementine: The Story of Lady Churchill" by Fishman, Dave Eggers' "Zeitoun," Stephen Lawhead's first book in the Song of Albion series (I had previously bought book 2 at my library book sale), and another gem, The Lord's Prayers by Elton Trueblood, plus some other miscellany. I received my moleskine planner and "Art Journal Freedom" in the mail, along with a few art supplies, and found "The Decorated Page" at HPB yesterday. I've taken Nan's advice and started Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain last week. Here's to tamping down perfectionism and jumping into art journaling with both feet. (Yikes!) Oh, and I'm oh-so-close to finishing "Everywhere Present" by Stephen Freeman.

Nan, I downloaded a free app called SimpleResize that did the trick for me.

Nan, Were you able to find it googling? This is the homepage of the blog. They're also on facebook. I also found a related group that seems to be working in conjunction with but separately from the DLP group, if anyone would be interested: Documented Faith. It's fascinating but I'm not even sure where to start. Small, I guess. :) Thanks for the book recommendations; I think I have all that you mentioned lying around here somewhere. I have delusions that if I only own the art books and the art supplies that someday I will become artistic. :lol: That's definitely going on my goals list--a little time drawing each day. Thanks for the encouragement. (I just had a thought that maybe this is all off topic...sorry everyone!!)

Thanks, Cleo! I'll look you all up over there. The Mary Rowlandson narrative was one of my favorites from my college lit days--I'd enjoy another read-through of it, for sure! I haven't read all the previous posts, so I may have missed someone mentioning this but has anyone taken part in The Documented Life Project over at Art to the 5th? I thought about incorporating quotes or my book for the week into a weekly journal like that...I'm a list kind-of person and not really artsy, although in my dreams I'd like to be. :D But I'm more in the vein of Austin Kleon's logbooks rather than The Documented Life Project, but maybe I can meld the two??? If anyone is journaling about the books you're reading, I would love to see/hear about how you are doing it if you'd like to share. :)

I picked up Murakami's "Hard-Boiled Wonderland" and "After the Quake" from the library out of curiosity. I read Chapter 1 of Wonderland, and I'm still undecided if I'm going to really going to tackle the Murakami challenge. "After the Quake" is much shorter and seems to be based more in reality since it is loosely about stories surrounding the 1995 earthquake. I may retreat to that one if Wonderland doesn't work out. I'm going to give it a good try, though. :) I'm trying to finish up "Everywhere Present: Christianity in a One-Storey Universe" by Stephen Freeman. Brilliant book, but I've been taking it in small chunks to be able to contemplate what I've read. I'm nearly done though, so I'm gonna go ahead and push through to finish it. Also grabbed the 1st Jack Ryan book and the next Patterson book in the Women's Murder Club series. :blush:

Totally understand about Goodreads discussion. I was thinking more for just finding others from here that I could friend but I'm not that familiar with how it works. Thanks for the Luke books. My daughter and I are going through The Gospel of Luke by Fr. Lawrence Farley this year, reading a section a day as our Bible study. I might pick another out as a go-along. I'm enjoying the cookbook discussion!

(Rosyl) Lyne, Your post in the first week's thread struck me--I like your categories. I attempted a French Revolution study last year but didn't get far. What books are on your list for that? Robin, I'm curious--what did you have in mind for your category, Study of St. Luke?

Hi all! I'm going to attempt to join in this year. I've randomly read BaW threads over the past few years but have made some goals this year and a BaW was one of them. And I'm going to go totally against my perfectionistic read-every-post-in-all-previous-threads-before-posting, which usually means that I never get around to actually posting. Therefore, here I am. :) I may join in on some of the monthly author challenges. I have probably 30 books, at least, that I've started and never finished so I'm hoping to use this challenge as a means to complete many of those. Right now, I'm just keeping a list on paper, but I also have a Goodreads account, which has been sorely neglected. Maybe I'll look into that. I envy those of you who are reading the classics and deep-thinking books. That is truly my desire, but my brain is too scattered currently to read anything that requires much concentration. :( So, I'll be mixing in some easy reads with some of the books I'm stuck in. I'm also going to go for the HotMW read-along. I have it already on Audible, but I'll have to buy the hard copy of the book to have any chance of success, I suspect. My 13yo will be joining me. She is a far more prolific reader than me, both in quantity and quality. She has read many, many classics that I haven't, even with my having been a Lit major. But, I've already been introduced to so many new authors through these forums over the years, so I look forward to spreading my wings a bit. Week 1 I read The Giver, which I had never read before. I was a bit disappointed in the length and lack of really delving into the issues she introduces, but I guess since it is a YA book, the treatment was appropriate. I guess it does say something well about the book that I wanted MORE of it, though. Last week I read John Buchan's The Thirty Nine Steps. It was okay. I think I would have enjoyed it more if I had more background knowledge about the history and current events of the time. But I do appreciate it for what it was at the time it was written. On my TBR shelf is Unbroken, Till We Have Faces, Kristen Lavrensdatter (sp?), Athanasius' On the Incarnation, Call the Midwife, To the Lighthouse, Daniel Deronda, East of Eden, and I am determined to finish The Brothers Karamazov!! Thanks for letting me tag along. Is there any way to create a group on Goodreads?

The same thing happened with us. Last year, my dd11 (at the time) were happily going along in DM7. I loved it; she liked it well enough. Curious as to how she was retaining things, I had her take the Saxon placement test as well as another placement test (Horizons, maybe?) in the spring. She barely tested into 7/6. And she clearly did not remember how to do the math, although I think part of it was also the hormone brain that I've seen many moms attest to on these boards. I put her into Saxon 7/6 at the beginning of the summer, and she loves it, mostly I think because she feels more confident because of the continuous review and incremental nature of the teaching. She will often come to me with light bulb moments in both math and Latin (in which I switched her over to Henle for similar reasons): "I get it now, mom!" :hurray: I should have learned my lesson in 4th grade when I put her in CLE for a time to get her math facts down and she thrived (after using Singapore). :glare:

Thanks for both your responses! I'm still thinking on it, but it sounds like at the least the workbook is worth it...

My second time through it didn't seem like it took as long, if that's any consolation! :) I just haven't found anything better than Rightstart B for that age! Although, IMO, you could skip A and do Miquon or something else less teacher intensive until they're ready for B. I'm not a huge fan of A.

I wondered if I might be able to pull the topics she was missing from MM, which I already own, to do first and then go straight into Horizons 3. My only concern with that is she will only be a second grader, turning 8 in November. She's bright, and has never had any problems with math (she's halfway through MM 2B), but I also don't want to frustrate her. I've read on here from some moms that they felt Horizons moved quickly. Of course, I guess I could just have her finish out MM 2B, which would probably cover some of what she missed. Duh, right? ;) I'm just not super familiar with Horizons, the scope and sequence or the pace, so thank you for replying! It gives me something to think about.

My dd almost placed into 3rd grade math (she missed one more than she could on the placement test). Of course, the items she missed were grouped into a couple of sections that she hasn't learned yet. I'm wondering if those sections are all in Workbook 2 of 2nd grade and I could just start her there instead of starting at the beginning of Grade 2, which looks like a lot of review from the samples. I have looked everywhere I know to look for Table of Contents of the 2nd workbook, and I can't find it! Even CBD's "Table of Contents" link is not the table of contents. SSSOOOOOO, I'm wondering if anyone who owns the TM or the second workbook can tell me if these things are covered in book 1 or 2: ratio, addition and subtraction of thousands, roman numerals (not so worried about this as I can teach her this myself), and problems having to do with the "shaded fractional part of the whole," which *I* couldn't even figure out what they were asking on the placement test. Also, is there anything else I need to know about starting in the middle of the year? Is it doable? I'm still not sure if I'm going to switch her over, just thinking about it...Thanks for any help/advice you can give!

Bumping to see if anyone else has experience with any specific instructors? I'm thinking about outsourcing Latin this year.

Well, I myself own Omnibus III, and am thinking about adding a few things in to the Lit of TOG too... :leaving: So, I do understand what a hard decision it is! Have you thought about maybe doing an Eastern year in the vein of Sonlight 5? Guesthollow also has wonderful American history resources...all free! You could pick and choose from her two American History years to get more of the slant that you're wanting. Just brainstorming over here... :)

My dc read them during our family reading time in the evenings, when we all take turns reading something.

We're going to be doing TOG Y2U3-Y3U2, which is basically Colonial up to 1850. I think it would make a good framework for you and give you lots of neat things to study about before going to DC! But do you know what you'll be studying the year after--you mentioned Year 3 WTM, which is usually 1600-1850, so you'd basically be studying the same thing two years in a row. You could do TOG Yr 4, which is the 20th century, but that wouldn't give you a whole lot to coincide with your DC trip.

I always correct if they're reading aloud to me. I want my dc to know there's a time (during free reading) that they can read quickly and there's a time (during their read-aloud-to-me time) that they need to read carefully and for detail. Reading for detail becomes more important the older they get when it is necessary to read for information, and it is not natural to all kiddos. I feel like that's one mistake we made with our older who is dyslexic. We didn't correct every time, and she still struggles with the second type of reading--reading for information and detail. Not that it would have cured all ills, but I'm sure it would have helped.

Okay, so I'm usually the naysayer when it comes to organized, boxed curricula for littles, as in, I tried MFW K about 7 years ago, and that lasted for all of about 5 weeks. Yet, here I am looking at Horizons for Threes for my 3.5yo. Maybe it's just me doing some wishful thinking that it would be nice to have a few minutes to work all at the table together so I don't have to wonder if he's sticking his finger into a plug or standing on top of the countertops... :D But anyway...anyone have any thoughts on this program? :001_smile:

The Big Wave - Pearl S. Buck (Beautiful but short (64 pgs))