Tales From The Bonny Blue House

I Love May

May is a wonderful month.  Spring has finally taken hold and the damp April wind leaves us for another year. May is Mary's month and I love our Blessed Mother and to have a whole month to celebrate her life and and remind me of her great love is just another great blessing of our Church.

May is also the month when I became a mother for the first time. My sweet baby boy arrived in May and this May he becomes a teenager.

When did that happen?

Sigh.  Too fast. It happened too fast.

So we have a birthday to celebrate. Now he is past wanting a mom planned party and has opted for a boys night out with his dad, his friends and their dads. About twenty men, all told attending a Ducks game. This has become a birthday tradition over the last two years for Ryan and his friends anticipate it all year. 

Tonight I rearranged ourbook display. 

Good bye April...

The botany study will continue but the books are now in Erin's backpack since we are studying outside so much.  I would like to point out the binder/scrapbook of the Holy Father's visit was completed by adding newspaper clippings, blog posts, and my letter from the archdiocese and my ticket.  It will be a wonderful keepsake.

Hello May!

We'll be studying Twelfth Night this spring since Ryan has a small part in our homeschool group production of this play. We will use our trusty Catholic Mosaic for a few of the books and others will just slide into circle time, story time and bed time.

I took down the April banner.

See ya!

I made a May banner.

It would have been more artistic to remove the push pins before taking the picture.

Reality blogging is what you get at the Bonny Blue House.

Tomorrow I plan to work out (5:00a.m. - eek), go to Mass (6:30 a.m. - double eek) Dave will come with us and then I want to spend some time planning out May.  Our school year officially ends in May (we begin in August) and I want to make sure we get to everything. I am also planning a HUGE Costco trip with BFITW so I need to be organized. So I cleaned off my desk.

That looks nice right?  Like Dawn I plan better when I am not distracted by a big mess visual clutter.

Then I pulled out a few things I will need to plan.

The green folder is filled with JPII resources. Then there is my ever present planner.  I filled in all of our activities, appointments and celebrations this month. Now I have to put in my school notes. My planner, being totally Catholic, is also a great resource for Saint days, prayer intentions of the Pope and other liturgical information. The purple bound book is A Year With God which is chock full of Marian activities and is a generally excellent book to have around. My clipboard has my housekeeping lists, shopping lists and the library newsletter. I will be putting a lot of the library activities in our calendar.  The blue folder is my May folder. I use Dawn's file folder method. She uses a crate but I have this amazing desk, built by my father-in-law God rest his soul, and I have ample drawer space. Lucky me.  My mother-in-law generously gave me the desk when she moved out of her home to be nearer her children. Actually I think the grandchildren were the bigger draw :).

Behind is a small pile of books I plan to use to add some interest to our month.  I will also look though the blogs, peruse some favorite magazines and check out some cookbooks to round out the month.  I have several more books to look through but they are by my bed to be flipped through tonight. Also missing is my laptop. That honking big PC is one used by the children.  We actually have two PC's for the kids. That way no one is ever tempted to touch my laptop ;). Ever.

So the next day or two will be given over to planning out Mary's month, working on an article, and coming to grips with having a teenager.

Have a blessed evening.

The Creative Family

It came yesterday and I dove right in.  I'm about halfway through right now and I'm loving it.

I'll let you know when I finish!

GK Chesterton

The talented and fabulous Nancy Brown has started a Yahoo Group to help us all get the works of the great G.K. Chesterton into our local libraries.

G.K.  Chesterton was, in my and many other opinions, the greatest writer of the twentieth century. He was certainly the most prolific.  From the American Chesterton Society website:

"He wrote a hundred books, contributions to 200 more, hundreds of poems, including the epic Ballad of the White Horse, five plays, five novels, and some two hundred short stories, including a popular series featuring the priest-detective, Father Brown. In spite of his literary accomplishments, he considered himself primarily a journalist. He wrote over 4000 newspaper essays, including 30 years worth of weekly columns for the Illustrated London News, and 13 years of weekly columns for the Daily News. He also edited his own newspaper, G.K.’s Weekly. (To put it into perspective, four thousand essays is the equivalent of writing an essay a day, every day, for 11 years. If you’re not impressed, try it some time."

So the guy had some game. The fact that he has been largely ignored by colleges, universities and libraries is not only a disgrace it's also very telling. See, Chesterton was unabashedly Catholic. He argued for Christianity (leading an atheist you may have heard of to become a Christian ~ C.S. Lewis), he argued for the poor, he argued for social justice, and anything else he regarded as important. To say he argued well is a vast understatement and the powers that be in our educational system in this country can't win against Chesterton. So they pretend he never existed.

That says a lot about the intellectual integrity in our higher learning institutions, doesn't it?

So Nancy Brown is trying to recitfy that and we should all help her. Here's how it works...

"As taxpayers, we are already invested in our local libraries. Why not have our library work for us by helping it make good purchases? Our local libraries want our input, but hardly anyone actually gets as far as making a book purchase suggestion. With GKChestertonLibraryConnection, it's easy.

I do all the work, and I am the only one who can post. I send out a book, DVD, audio work, novel, magazine, or non-fiction title about once a week, and the group members can suggest it if interested at their library. Most libraries need title, author, publisher, ISBN numbers, and they often purchase through amazon.com so the amazon page is also helpful. I gather all this information and send it out in one neat email." ~Nancy Brown

I know my library allows us to request things online. Since we are a pretty small operation here I would imagine many libraries offer the same service. We can promote a great writer, great intellect and great Catholic and never leave the house. 

I went to a fairly prominent Catholic University here in New York, I was an ENGLISH LIT MAJOR for pity's sake and no one ever mentioned the name G.K. Chesterton. I now shake my head in amazement at such a thing. I'll know better when helping my children choose a college.

If you want to know more about this extraordinary man start with the American Chesterton Society, there is a ton of great information written in a lively and engaging manner. There is also a book list for beginners which will give you a place to start.

After you check it out go to Nancy's new Yahoo Group and join up.

Have a blessed evening.

Mitten Strings for God Book Study

Mitten Strings for God is a lovely little book that Dawn recommended a few weeks ago. While I enjoyed it I did have a few minor issues.

That's why I am dying to participate in the MFG Book study to take place tomorrow (Friday, March 7th) at Dawn's blog in the com box. I will be interested to hear everyone's take on the book.

Will you be joining us?

Great Yarns for the Close Knit Family

ANOTHER GREAT BOOK!

I am so thrilled to be able to chime in and announce all of these great books written by friends. This one is really unique and one of the coolest ideas I've heard in a while.

  Great Yarns for the Close-Knit Family
by Mary Gildersleeve

FROM HILLSIDE:

this book features knitting projects that accompany great works of children's literature:

Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi

Canadian Summer by Hilda van Stockum

The Hobbit By J.R.R. Tolkein

Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder

Little House in the Highlands By Melissa Wiley

The Lost Island by Eilis Dillon

Mary Poppins by P.L. Travers

Mr. Popper's Penguins by Richard and Florence Atwater

Otto of the Silver Hand by Howard Pyle

Redwall by Brian Jacques

The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

The Wheel on the School by Meindert de Jong

While your family enjoys reading aloud these great "yarns" you and/or your children can be knitting the projects. All the projects are original designs by Mary, the knitting guru.

How cool is that?  You can knit a project related to the story.  It just sounds so cozy and lovely.  I have to try it.

The book is due out on March 12th. You can go to Hillside's site and pre-order so you can be sure to start knitting right away.  You could be reading to your children all summer and they can be knitting away on projects to give as Christmas gifts. Then you can tell me all about it so we can post it on O Night Divine!

Go check it out, you'll love it.

A New Book

I haven't been blogging much due to other writing commitments and just being busy.  However, this I could not let go by without mention.

My dear friend Alice has written a book and it will soon be published by Hillside Education.  This is such wonderful news on many levels.  The first is that Alice is brilliant. She is well written and well read so that I am sure the book will just be a pleasure to read. Secondly it is about a subject that concerns many but for which there is little concrete information available.  Here's the title...

Haystack Full of Needles,

A Catholic Home Educator's Guide to Socialization

and here's the blurb....

"Most of us at one time or another have had to wrestle with the issue of socialization, either in dealing with friends and family members who question our decision to home educate, or from our own hearts as we worry about our children's hopes for friendship. In this book Alice shows that "Socialization is not the weakness of home education—it is its strength and joy."

How cool is that?  Now I can have extra copies and just give one to everyone who says, " I don't think hoemschooling is such a great idea, I mean, what about socialization?"

Or maybe I'll just throw it at them.  No, it's too pretty. I'll be a lady.  Just like Alice.

January in the Learning Room

Anxious to get in and get started...

January craft materials

I still need to fill in the feast days in our calendar. Raggedy Ann is just hanging there lately.

File crate is filled up and ready.

The bulletin board is ready for Ordinary Time. I love how the banner I made turned out.

The January book display. The basket contains the Catholic Mosaic book titles as well as many winter and snow themed books. I'll be adding more after a trip to the library this weekend.

The book baskets. From left to right, poetry, trains (for Kevin, there is always a train basket), board books for the twins, early readers for Kelli and Erin, and a variety of picture books that I switch out every few days.

It's only the 9th and I am all ready for January :). 

Good night friends!

January Plans

Today I have time to think.  Not that there is nothing around here that needs doing, there is. I'm just choosing, for one day, to ignore it and have a quiet day thinking.

The kids are tired due to all the illness followed up by a lot of fun partying. They are content to quietly play with their new toys use their new art supplies, read their new books and watch their new movies.  I am content to let them do this.

I am looking toward January. Tomorrow will be devoted to cleaning up, planning for the New Year's Eve gathering we are hosting, and some lesson planning and quarterly report writing. Today I am noodling about January.  I like January. It's hunker down time.  The weather gets cold, there is the promise of snow and there are no big holidays or even birthdays to distract us. We can just focus on school work and our activities and catch up on the house stuff.

So I thought it would be helpful to make a list a la Dawn of things I would like to get to in January.  Kind of a wish list.  With two very active 17 month olds in the house how ever much gets done, gets done.

• Faith
  - We will join the Holy Father in his prayer intentions for the Church in Africa
  - It is the month of the Holy Name of Jesus so we will explore the names of Jesus
  - We will learn this hymn
  - Confirmation prep for Ryan. He gets measured for his robe this month and he needs to submit his stewardship time chart to the diocese.
  - Solemnity of Mary Mother of God (1/1)
  - Holy Name of Jesus (1/3)
  - Ephiphany of the Lord (1/6)
  - Baptism of the Lord (1/13)
  - Saint Agnes (1/21)
  - Saint Thomas Aquinas (1/28)
  - Saint John Bosco (1/31)
  - Continue with our Magnifikids study and activities
  
• Nature
  - Make some cool homemade bird feeders to supplement the ones we have
  - Try to take some pictures of the birds visiting.
  - Peruse the seed catalogs to get ready for spring. Our garden may have to be merely containers this year due to the construction.
  - Pray for a snowstorm so we can build a snowman - it's been a while.
  
• Food
  - Wassail for New Year's Day
  - Beef stew
  - Chicken and dumplings
  - Maple pancakes
  - Cocoa, lots of cocoa!
  - Shepherds pie
  - Molasses cookies
  - Apple pie (should be on every food list)
  - Chocolate cream pie (ditto)
  - Christ's diapers
  - Epiphany bread
  - Pork roast
  - Red wine
  - Popcorn
  
• Homekeeping
  - Begin to de-clutter in preparation of the construction.
  - Look into storage facilities
  - Put flannel sheets on all of the beds.
  - Buy new crib sheets
  - Take down all the curtains and wash and iron them :(
  - De-clutter the book shelves and school closet
  - Sew up the two dresses I have cut out for myself.
  - Sew up the t-shirts cut out for the girls
  - Sew up the tote bag project
  - Plan for Dave, Katie's and Kevin's birthdays in February
  
• Crafting
  - Make this cute craft for the Holy Name Feast
  - Beaded snow flakes
  - Mitten Bookmarks
  - Pipe Cleaner Penguins
  - Some kind of snowflake flower for St. Agnes' Day?
  - A lamb for St. Agnes' Day?
  - Teach Katie and Erin to knit.
  - Frames for saint pictures
  - Winter placemats
  - Make a few candles in preparation of Candlemas
  
• Special Events/Days
  - Homeschool Poetry Slam is in early February, the three big girls are memorizing poems to recite.
  - Twelfth Night - read the Lamb version.
  - A weekend trip later in the month. Perhaps Boston?
  - A trip to NYC to either The Met or the The Museum of Natural History which will necessitate watching the movie either right before or right after.
  - National Popcorn Day (1/19)
  - National Pie Day (1/23)
• Books
  - See my sidebar in the coming days for what will be in our winter book baskets! I just received my latest Amazon order of winter goodies :)

So that's all I can come up with at the moment.  I still have some tweaking to do and a lot more planning.  Now it's off to tackle some of those chores I was ignoring.

Have a blessed evening.

-

I'm in

Alice, Lissa and Meredith will all be doing St. Louis de Monfort's beautiful Consecration to Jesus through Mary beginning today and ending on December 8th the Feast of the Immaculate Conception.

I need this. To cast off the things of this world and better prepare for Advent.  Today, being my birthday, is a good day to start. A re-birth of my prayer life. 

Join us in prayer.

Have a blessed evening.

The Plan for Maine

The plans for our Maine state study have changed and evolved a few times.  I started out firmly convinced that a lapbook was the way to go.  I like lapbooks, they are portable, span a variety of age groups and are fairly easy to accomplish.  So we started reading and I began to re-think the lapbook idea. It occurred to me that I would like to make up notebooks for the children to use on our trip and to learn and record our journey. So I started with the Love2learn state by state booklist. This is an amazing resource put together by the homeschooling moms of the Love2learn.net website. I highly recommend checking it out.

I used the books over there in my sidebar and we have read and enjoyed them all except for Calico Bush which we haven't gotten around to yet. I will probably bring it and start it around the bonfire next to the lake in the evenings.  At least that's my idyllic view of what will happen. I'll probably end up in a mucky tide pool looking for crawfish in the evenings.

All of these books have started little rabbit trails that will eventually end up in that lapbook. I decided the lapbook would comprise our literary pursuits and the notebook our actual travels. This might be a bit ambitious but I"m giving it a whirl.

Next I plan to download Newberry: The Life and Times of a Maine Clam onto the iPod for the ride up there. It just looks like fun.

Now for the notebooks.

 

These are in reverse order since I am new to this Photobucket stuff. I downloaded the first page first, silly me. The first page in everyone's binders is a google map of our route, then a satellite picture of the place where we are staying. Next is directions. These are only in the big kids binders and I put them in in order to squash the "are we there yet?" monster. Then there is a timeline of Maine that I culled from a variety of resources. It is very broad and in fact, skips a whole 11,000 years at one point. That's ok because I'm sure nothing too important happened then. (:)). Then there is a Fact Tree and a bunch of cool coloring pages featuring the wildlife, flora and fauna particular to Maine. These I got from Maine's Secretary of State Kids Page. This website was an invaluable resource. It had so many fun facts, ideas, games and history. I wish every state was as accomodating to children with their online information. Not pictured in the binder yet but I will include are a bunch of pages from EdHelper. EdHelper has a fifty states unit and lots of games and puzzles for each state. You can make word searches, math questions, crossword puzzles and download reading comprehension stories. Next will be some stuff from:

State Flag
Map to be labled
Lobster Clams and Crab Book
Moose Info
Lighthouse Coloring Page

Now I am hoping to be able to get the binders all put together along with the accompanying goody bags and get it all up here for you all to see before we leave. Just in case I don't have time I wanted to leave you with the bulk of the project while I had time and then I will fill in all the fun stuff later.

I'll leave you all with a poem from Maine native Henry Wadsworth Longfellow that will be printed on pretty paper and kept in the binders. We will spend the rest of the summer memorizing it.

The Children's Hour

Between the dark and the daylight,
  When the night is beginning to lower,
Comes a pause in the day's occupations,
That is known as the Children's Hour.

I hear in the chamber above me
  The patter of little feet,
The sound of a door that is opened,
  And voices soft and sweet.

From my study I see in the lamplight,
  Descending the broad hall stair,
Grave Alice, and laughing Allegra,
  And Edith with golden hair.

A whisper, and then a silence:
  Yet I know by their merry eyes
They are plotting and planning together
  To take me by surprise.

A sudden rush from the stairway,
  A sudden raid from the hall!
By three doors left unguarded
  They enter my castle wall!

They climb up into my turret
  O'er the arms and back of my chair;
If I try to escape, they surround me;
  They seem to be everywhere.

They almost devour me with kisses,
  Their arms about me entwine,
Till I think of the Bishop of Bingen
  In his Mouse-Tower on the

Rhine

!

Do you think, O blue-eyed banditti,
  Because you have scaled the wall,
Such an old mustache as I am
  Is not a match for you all!

I have you fast in my fortress,
  And will not let you depart,
But put you down into the dungeon
  In the round-tower of my heart.

And there will I keep you forever,
  Yes, forever and a day,
Till the walls shall crumble to ruin,
  And moulder in dust away!

Have a blessed evening!