World Communication Day & Promote Catholicism Day

Via Sarah R. via Lisa Hendey via I’m not sure who, but I finally got the memo.  How to join in the annual Catholic new media blog-love-a-thon:

This year, in keeping with the theme of Pope Benedict XVI’s message for World Communications Day 2012 — Silence and Word: Path of Evangelization — we’re asking you to do something different.

On Wednesday, May 23, we’re asking you to take a one-day break from posting on blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Google +, Pinterest, etc… and use that day to reflect on the Pope’s words about the role of silence in communication and evangelization.

Then, on Thursday, May 24, please share the fruit of that day of prayer and silence with everyone, by posting your answer to the question: “What in Catholic Media has had an impact on me during the past year?” Share it on the New Evangelizers website at: http://newevangelizers.com/forums/topic/catholic-media-promotion-day-2012/

Because I totally needed an excuse to:

a) not post anything

and

b) write about the Catholic Media.

You too, huh?

7 Quick Takes: Mother’s Day. Liquor Store Edition.

1.

In my family growing up we had a set of Mother’s Day rituals — taking Mom out to breakfast, going to the garden center to buy flowers to plant for her, sometimes even exchanging of gifts and cards.  When the Boy was born, I expected SuperHusband to just know what to do.  After all, my family’s traditions were hardly secret — you see that kind of stuff on TV.  I assumed everyone just knew.

Except that he didn’t.  Tears ensued.  Until I discovered one year that actually, there is a much, much better way:

2.

Making my own breakfast.  Why not have a day a year devoted to eating exactly what I want, prepared the way I like it, and you other people please just stay in bed and give the mother an hour of quiet to enjoy it?  It really is better.

3.

But I did tell the poor man what I wanted this year:  For him to please get repaired the watch he gave me a different year.  It needs a new battery and a new clasp, and yes I could take it to be repaired myself, but you know, he’s a mechanical engineer.  What a great way to show his love, driving to the store himself to oversee the repair of a tiny metal mechanical device?

Luckily there’s no deadline, except that I’d really love for it to be fixed by the end of August, when I go to the Catholic Blogger Foretaste of Heaven Conference.  Where our lovely 7-takes hostess will be speaking, no less.  I am wildly excited.

4.

Last year for Mother’s day, SuperHusband gave me a reprint of this book:

Which taught me how to make my own vinegar.  Seriously easy and you feel so crunchy-granola, and also it uses up wine ends.  And it is better than anything you can buy.

Small hitch: The cloth-covered Famous Grouse bottle serving as miniature vinegar barrel reminded the SuperHusband he wanted to resume homebrewing.  He’d been on a long toddler-rearing hiatus.  So he did.  Causing us to stop buying wine.  But I did the calculation, and it is cheaper to buy a bottle of Aldi wine and make vinegar out of it, than it is to buy Publix-brand red wine vinegar.  So that’s what I do.

5.

Speaking of famous grice: The SuperHusband was in the doghouse the other week, and to demonstrate the sincerity of his love, he came home with a bottle of Laphroaig for me.  Which was a tiny bit strange, because I had not been grousing about a lack of single-malt.  And the stuff is expensive.  But in a moment of virtually Therese-like holiness, I figured: Hey, this is good!  Might as well enjoy it!

He really does love me, you know.

6.

A prayer for Allie Hathaway is prayer for her mom, too.  You can’t go wrong.

7.

The American Frugal Housewife was not the first historic housekeeping title on my shelves.  The previous Christmas the SuperMother-In-Law, who knows me well, gave me this one:

Mrs. Beeton’s is much heftier than the Frugal Housewife, and addressed more towards homes with servants, and our servants are mostly the electric type anymore.  But I came across this eminently reassuring and useful* bit of advice about the rigors of breastfeeding and the avoidance of colic:

The nine or twelve months a woman usually suckles must be, to some extent, to most mothers, a period of privation and penance, and unless she is deaf to the cries of her baby, and insensible to its kicks and plunges, and will not see in such muscular evidences the griping pains that rack her child, she will avoid every article that can remotely affect the little being who draws its sustenance from her.  She will see that the babe is acutely affected by all that in any way influences her, and willingly curtail her own enjoyments, rather than see her infant rendered feverish, irritable, and uncomfortable.  As the best tonic, then, and the most efficacious indirect stimulant that a mother can take at such times, there is no potation equal to porter and stout, or what is better still, and equal part of porter and stout.

And with that, I bid you a Happy Mother’s Day.

*Do not use this advice. Or if you do and then need sue someone, sue Mrs. Beeton.  Her idea not mine.

3.5 Time Outs: The Plague-Ridden Lifestyle

Thanks once again to our host Larry D. at Acts of the Apostasy, who is nothing if not good for Death Star-themed humor.

TV is my friend.

1.

SuperHusband took the relatively healthy contingent to the family reunion [Bethune Homesteaders spared infection — castle residents went straight to our ancestral family’s farm, Curley family kept safe] and I stayed home with the weekend’s victims.  Got a lot of writing done, that’s nice.  But look, Barbecue!

2.

Having spent a weekend holed up in quarantine with an iPod, the Boy returned to the land of the living in order to show me this:

3.

And also this:

3.5

Not half a take, but themed on the halves: You’ll be pleased to know that while I learn slowly, I do eventually learn.  Monday I promised my would-be publisher I could have the manuscript on the new, expanded, book-length version of the catechist booklet done by  June 30th — and assured her that I what meant was “I plan to have it done by the 15th, so there’s two weeks of padding in there.”  Which I felt pretty good about saying, because I know I could get it done by the 1st.

See?  Take the estimated time to completion and double it — twice.  My operations management professor would be so proud.

Curiously, in checking those dates for the writing of this post, I accidentally set my computer’s clock ahead to June 29th.  Don’t worry, I put it back.

***

PS: Link day.  Help yourself if you are so inclined.  Though I can’t imagine there’s anything on the internet to top Barbecue-Zombie-Stormtrooper Day.  Post as many as you want, but only one per comment or the spam dragon will eat you up and I’ll never even know.

3.5 Time Outs: Plague Journal

Thanks once again to our host Larry D. at Acts of the Apostasy, who’s got a time machine of his own going on this week.

One day is like 30 years, 30 years is like one day.

1.

I finished reading Eric Sammons’ new book, and hey, it’s pretty good. A lot good, in fact, and a review is forthcoming.  But today let me caution you: There’s a humility component to this holiness business.

Exhibit A:

Why do my renewed efforts at holiness always coincide with the arrival of a nasty evil throat-lung-stomach virus in our home?  Doesn’t our Lord know I have important holiness work to do?

Exhibit B:

Why does a resolution to be more Therese-like and offer up little annoyances for some general heavenly purpose get transformed into:

1.  A multiplication of petty annoyances, and a sudden intolerance for them?

2. A friend suddenly coming down with a horrid affliction (probable bone cancer — femur — please pray for Mrs. P) for which to offer all these things?

3. Thus destroying any sense of virtue I might have otherwise relished, and instead leaving me with a crotchety personality and the knowledge of just how petty it is?

 

So don’t say I didn’t warn you.  Good book otherwise, though.  Great book.

 

2.

I’m going to Dallas!!!!!!!  Yes, all those exclamation points truly are needed.  Because look, it’s like a giant crack convention:

A.  The Catholic Writer’s Conference, which means meeting in person all the people I get to work with on the CWG blog, which really is that exciting because when you get to know these people . . . you want to get to know these people.

B. The Catholic Marketing Network Conference, which is code for “Catholic Bookstores”.  Enough said.

C. And then in case I just wanted to be near the superstars of Catholic internet, there’s the Catholic New Media Conference right there as well.

Quadruple bonus:  I double-checked the back cover of my copy of Happy Catholic, and sure enough, Julie Davis lives in Dallas.  It says so right there.  (I knew it was some place in Texas, but I can never keep Dallas and Houston straight, except to know that confusing the two means wow, a lot of driving time.)  So maybe, just maybe, I’ll get to live out my dream of one day buying the woman a cup of coffee.  Or something.

3.

So here’s the thing: What’s the etiquette on bringing books to be signed at these events?  Because I don’t think I can carry that many books to Texas, and yet it would pain me, just pain me, to miss my chance to get some autographs.  I’m so conflicted.

3.5

Because I met the guy — that’s why.  Neat person.

***

PS: Link day.  Help yourself if you are so inclined.  Post as many as you want, but only one per comment or the spam dragon will eat you up and I’ll never even know.

PPS: Thus far I myself appear to be spared the evil thing — I thought I was coming down with it last night, but this morning I’m good.  So here’s your mission:  Imagine you’ve already finished praying for Mrs. P and your other serious concerns . . . Would you consider offering up a little prayer for our family, that my other dream of seeing the Bethune Catholic homestead is not thwarted by more plague later in the week?  I so want to go.  I pass the place every non-plague  year on the way to the family reunion, and I totally want to get a child to bake some brownies, and a different child to pack some airsoft guns, and stop in for an hour or two.  Goodness I might even mix up the brownies myself.

I was about to ask that we’d also be miraculously able to attend religious ed tonight (last night of the year), but #2 came staggering into the study with glazed eyes and feverish misery, so I don’t think the virtue of prudence will let us get away with that, even if there were miraculous recoveries in the next six hours.

 

7 Quick Takes: Paragraphs

All the paragraphs a person could need. Click to see.

If you clicked on this page from Jen F.’s blogfest because you saw the Kolbe Reviews picture, click here to see the whole series.  It was the most interesting picture I had, and plus I’m so excited about my new page where you can find them all in one place.

You regular readers who are completely, utterly sick of hearing about Kolbe by now, here are 7 Takes with never a mention of the K-word:

 

1.

When I got to page 24 of Holiness for Everyone, I e-mailed Eric Sammons.  “If this hasn’t gone to print yet . . . there’ s a typo.”  I figured he or some other person had already caught it, but if it were my book, I’d appreciate someone telling me, just to be sure.  What I saw was this:

1) A long quote, indented.

The author’s words, introducing next long, indented quote.

2) The second quote.

So that in-between prose shouldn’t be indented, since it isn’t part of the quotes.  Right?

Um, no.  But he very graciously answered me, “Oh yes, we had the same question, but OSV assures us it is correct.”  I did not hear a single snicker in that e-mail.  I feel sure the man’s been practicing his holiness.

And I replied, using my super-special idiot powers, “Okay.  That’s a really strange convention.”  Ha.  Those weird publishers.  What are they thinking??

But at 5 in the morning, I woke up to my crazy-busy brain back to work in crazy-busy mode,  and suddenly I knew the answer.   Everything made sense.  I was no longer mystified.

2.

Remember long, long ago, when you used the “Tab” key to start a new paragraph?  And then you didn’t have to put a blank line between every paragraph?

They were thinking that.

A world utterly, utterly removed from the reality of blogging software.  Never even occurred to me to check and confirm that I was reading a book with indented paragraphs.

3.

Consider that your little pre-review for today.  I hope it isn’t too much of a spoiler.

4.

I just looked real quick, and the first five books I pulled off my shelf all had them too.  Apparently it’s the big thing in Catholic Publishing.

Okay, so no it isn’t really a surprise, because at 5:05 I found myself marveling at the genius of it all. And longing, deeply longing, to know how much money they saved by not having to print all those blank lines.  What a way to save paper!

5.

Lately I’ve taken to spelling “paragraph” with only one p, and typing “gh” instead of “ph” at the end.  And then I have to fix it.  I do not like this new typo.  But I’m very grateful for the red squiggly line that catches it every time.

6.

I bet  Allie Hathaway knows how to spell “paragraph”. Thanks for praying for her today.

7.

That upstart Larry D. is picking a fight with Patheos again, and for my part I just don’t care, other than to wonder who are these people who don’t like Mark Shea* and what is wrong with them?

But you know what I do care about? It relates to Patheos because this happens to people when they move to Patheos, but Mark Shea and Elizabeth Scalia are both proof that reform is possible.  Now I can’t just e-mail every famous Catholic blogger to complain, because look I already have this reputation over the Indenting Fiasco, so I’m just going to say it here:

Fix your settings so your whole post gets sent to the feed reader.

Thank you Darwin, Bearing, Julie D., and every other sensible blogger whom I read faithfully, due in part to this one kind act.

Also:  Make that little “subscribe to comments” check box show up in the combox.

***

Thank you.  Have a great weekend.

*Mark Shea writes books with indented paragraphs.  Two P’s.

3.5 Time Outs: On Tour

Thanks once again to our host Larry D. at Acts of the Apostasy, who pulled the ol’ you-vacationed-where?? trick on me.  Works every time. I’m easy to surprise.

Click and be amazed.

1.

We unplugged for Triduum, and wow:  Peaceful.  But look, the power of scheduling made it look like I was on the internet: In Defense of Pretty Good Schools, at CatholicMom.com. Technically it’s a homeschooling column (because that’s how I tricked Lisa H. into letting me write for her — I said, “Gosh, do you need any homeschooling columnists?”), but actually it’s for everyone.

2.

Remember that whole girl problem I was having before?  That Christian LeBlanc answered so easily, like he always does? I stole his answer, of course.  He’ll probably cringe when he sees what I went and did with it.  My post on the word “Women” goes up at Sarah R.’s blog on Thursday morning.  She says she likes it.  But if you want something really smart, with Doctors of the Church and all that, you’d better just read Jeff Miller’s post about “Among”.  Or for a reflection about intimacy and Old English, you’d want Julie Davis on “Thou”.

But Sarah’s going to be nice to me at least until Friday, because her Catholic Family Fun book tour visits right here at this blog, when I’ll be reviewing her book in seven quick takes, for the other evil overlord who we won’t mention just now.  What you need to know today: It’s good enough I actually bought a copy with my own money to give as a gift to somebody.  Admittedly I buy a lot of books.  But when I acquire a second copy, that’s your hint.

3.

Look, more things for smart people:  Barbara Nicolosi let us post the transcript of her workshop on “Towards a Literature that is Catholic” at CWG.  I think maybe she doesn’t read the Hardy Boys much, because she says things like:

My theory is that the secular world is not anti-Catholic as much as it is anti-bad art.

Me, on the other hand, I’m all about bad art*.  Then again, I’m not real secular.

3.5

In more book tour excitement, this coming Monday I’m reviewing Karina Fabian’s Live and Let Fly, and let me tell you, it is absolutely . . .

 

***

Well, that’s all for today.  It’s Link Day once again, which is not an obligation, just an opportunity.  Because no one likes having their perfectly good link stuck in my inbox with a little star next to it, when it could be down in the combox for everyone to enjoy.  One link per comment so you don’t get accidentally caught in the spam dungeon, where even detective dragons dare not prowl.

And hey, Happy Easter!

*This is not a strictly factual statement.  I’m good with hokey genre fiction as long as the story is fun and entertaining, though I reserve the right to joke about it over a cup of coffee with the boy afterwards.  But even I have my limits.

Vocation and Holiness

This morning as I stumbled down the hall, coffee in hand, the fourth grader handed me A Bridge to Terabithia.  “Mom,” she warned me, “don’t let anybody read this for school.  It is terrible.  It has very foul language.”

“Oh?”  I had read it way back in elementary school, but hadn’t looked at it since.  I couldn’t really remember what was in the book.

“Yes.  They use the d-word.  And the parents say things like ‘crap’ and ‘crud’ and ‘you stupid’.  And that’s just in one chapter.”

Ah.  Duly warned.  I thanked her for the head’s up.

1.  Simcha Fisher writes:

We’re so used to seeing our own children, so used to the idea that they’re under our care, that we sometimes forget that the angels rejoice when a young person goes out into the world armed with truth and love, instead of going forth with their hearts cramped and crabbed by an acceptance of abortion.  This is where the battle is fought: in individual hearts.  Each abortion is a tragedy because it ends an individual life—but each heart that is taught how to love is a true and eternal victory.

Yes, raising our children lovingly is commonplace, a duty, nothing new.  So what?  It’s still a big deal.  It’s still the way to save souls.  This is the great thing about being part of the Culture of Life:  everything counts.  You don’t have to save your receipts!  Your good works have been noted, and they will not go to waste.

2.  Bearing reminds me, I’m not the only mom who got paid to go to graduate school, in order to prepare for a rewarding career in the ultra-non-profit sector.  I don’t typically feel guilty about this.  Back when I was applying for fellowships, I assumed I’d ultimately end up in some kind of field that was a natural extension of my start in accounting — maybe moved out of staff and into operations, or teaching accounting 101 at the community college, or who knows what — who can really predict how a career will turn?  I also knew that I wanted to be a mom, and that I was intentionally picking a field that lent itself to momness.  Ditching it all in order to stay home and raise kids?  If only I could be so lucky.

At the fellowship interviews, I was asked, “What do you see yourself doing in five years?  Ten years?”

I answered honestly. “Solving problems.”

Which is what I do.

3.  This week at the Catholic Writers Guild blog I’ve been shuffling around the schedule to get all the mundane writer-talk posts pushed off until after Easter.  I didn’t want Holy Week to be chit-chat as usually.   But Sarah Reinhard’s post for today, even though it’s sort of a blogging post, it’s really a Holy Week post:  Remember Your Priorities.

–> Hey and real quick please pray for Sarah’s very urgent prayer request for a family member with a scary, likely life-threatening diagnosis on the way.  Thanks.

4.  You know what?  I just love this photo so much.  I was thrilled with Julie D. picked it out for her 1,000 Words post.  Because I just like to look at it.

5. Holiness versus Weirdness.  It’s a constant battle.  I spend a lot of time just trying to figure out how to live life.  I feel stupid about this, because, well, not knowing how to live your life has got to be one of the marks of stupidity, right?  But at the same time, I live in a culture that doesn’t know how to live life, so I remind myself it’s not exactly shocking that my adulthood be devoted to figuring out what I ought to be doing instead.

And I’m not alone.  Which makes reading Catholic Lifestyle Lit of a decade ago so amusing, because the holiness-fads of years gone by shout out like a pair of parachute pants.  Which is why my children in ten years will be laughing about this over Thanksgiving dinner:

When I wrote about fasting from artificial light in the Register a while back, I got a ton of interesting responses. One of my favorites was from a dad who told me about this family tradition that they’ve been doing for 30 years:

We turn off the light when we leave for Holy Thursday Mass and don’t turn them on again until we return from the Saturday Easter Vigil at around midnight on Saturday.

We got the idea when our parish turned off the lights and had us exit in silence on Holy Thursday. And we entered at the Easter Vigil in darkness which continued until the Gloria. And, of course, Good Friday services were held during the daytime so lighting was not a main focus. So we got the idea to practically “live” this period when Jesus the “light of the world” was taken away from us.

I think we might try this this year. Anyone else going to give it a shot?

My kids will the story of how I read this idea at some Catholic lady’s blog, and when I told Jon, not only did he like the idea, he proposed we just flip all the breakers in the house except the one for the kitchen.

So yeah.  Weird.  I know we are.  I know it kids.

6.  But listen, weird isn’t all bad.  My garden is awesome.  If by “awesome” we mean: I like it.  And I was sitting in it this spring, and realized that Margaret Realy’s book about Prayer Gardens had come true.  I read it, followed the instructions, and wow, it worked.  Highly recommended if you want a little quiet garden-y oasis, and need some ideas about how to make it work.

And with that I’ll cut out the rest of the chit-chat and go be all vocational.  Have a great week, and I’ll see you back here come Easter or so.

7 Quick Takes: Troublemakers

The Land of 700 Takes.

1.

It’s the end of the Catholic Writer’s Conference Online, and I had a reader here take me to task for not publicizing it enough.  (“Conference? What conference?”).  So I’m going to fix that.

2.

The thing is this:  A year ago, Mike Hays and I were making trouble at Sarah Reinhard’s otherwise very civilized blogging workshop.  We were saying things like, “And the CWG ought to have a blog!  And Mike will pray once a week! And Jen is willing to help! Because she always volunteers for things, even though she has no time, but this time she really thinks she should!”

3.

And someone took us up on it.  Ann Lewis presented me with a newborn blog, and said, “Here you go, find writers.”   Mike’s led prayers over at CWG every week since.  He rocks.

4.

So anyway, what you need to know is that if you’re a Catholic writer, you really ought to check out the Catholic Writers Guild.  And if you’re a Christian writer of any flavor, join us all through April for 30K for Christ.  There’s a 30K for Christ forum for CWG members, and non-members are encouraged to check-in at the blog with progress reports, or join in via Twitter following top-secret instructions Sarah Reinhard’s going to decode and make public by Sunday.

Meanwhile, you should steal this stylish 30K Logo so that everyone knows you aren’t just writing stuff, you’re on a mission:

5.

Allie Hathaway’s a Catholic writer.  Pray for her.  Thanks.

6.

Of the 7,000 cool things I learned at the online conference, my favorite is this:

Sr. Marie Paul Curley is Jim Curley’s sister.  That’s why she looks so happy in her profile pics on her blog.  If you weren’t already reading her blog, now’s the time to start.

And in news culled from that blog: Act One is accepting applications for the coming year?  Yes? Still open?  I don’t see a deadline.

But I do see this: A casting call for ex-Christians, disaffected Christians, and people who just don’t do organized religion:

SUBMISSION DEADLINE IS APRIL 4, 2012. Project is unpaid, but participants will receive copy, credit, and reimbursement for production-related costs.

ABOUT YOU LOST ME

With You Lost Me, Barna Group researcher David Kinnaman shows why younger Christians are leaving the church and rethinking their faith. Through research and statistics, Kinnaman shows how pastors, church leaders and parents have failed to equip young people and how this has serious consequences. Those disconnected from the church are not statistics, says Kinnaman — they are people with real stories. You Lost Me, in part, is a challenge to the church to slow down and listen to those who consider themselves outsiders.

FYI for those who rightly worry about these things, Act One has made it’s mark as an outspoken criticism of the sugary 3rd-rate rah-rah-rah team brand of inane Christian programming.  So this looks promising.

7.

And now I’m going to Aldi. Wait!  No I’m not! The kids made a list . . . and we all forgot! The truck’s in the shop!  Ack.  Leaky hose.  It’ll be home soon I hope.  Good thing our idea of “out of groceries” involves still owning large amounts of food.

And tomorrow: Taxes.  I’d better get a head start since I’ll have to do grocery run tomorrow. Do you know what my #1 writing rule is?  If you can’t write as clearly as the IRS, you should be fired.

7.5

Whoa!  What’s with the website redesign at IRS??? Ack.  It’s colorful. Bright.  Cheesy photos of satisfied customers.  NOOOOOO!  I want my boring soothing, orderly accountant-blue back.  Nooooooo!

 

Have a great weekend.

Kolbe Reviews: Voyages in English (Grammar)

Voyages in English is a vintage Catholic-school grammar book series. My mother-in-law used it growing up, and I love this because whenever my kids complain it’s so hard, Grandma is there to remind them she did just fine with it.  And went on to have a story published in Redbook Magazine, no less.

Originally published in the late ’50’s and early ’60’s, it is available as a reprint from Lepanto Press.  There is an modern version of Voyages in English still being published by Loyola Press, and I am told that Lepanto’s vintage reprint will soon be re-named Lepanto English to avoid confusion.

What I love about the old Voyages:

• I like using vintage and historic textbooks, because they double as primary sources for history.
• The grammar is rigorous.  Studied well, students will learn to write clearly and edit effectively.

What other people hate about the old Voyages:

• It’s so old-fashioned.
• Not everybody wants to grow up to be an editor.

Realistically, some of the material in the sixth grade book was new to me, and is understandably overwhelming to parents who aren’t word-geeks. (Fourth grade is no problem.)  The teacher’s manual has explanations and answers, but could make your eyes swim if you don’t already know roughly what the book is talking about.  Also, I giggle every time I see the word “copulative”.

The Kolbe Course Plans

The course plans assign the exercises, and every now and again tell you to diagram some sentences, or write a letter, or something like that.  There are quarterly exams and answer keys in the course plans.  If you aren’t enrolled with Kolbe I’d skip the plans and just type up your own list of dates and assignment numbers at the beginning of the school year.

I would encourage you, if you do follow the Kolbe plans, to blackline assignments that cover topics your child has clearly mastered, and generally avoid anything that smacks of busy work.  The plans, like the text, cover every possible grammar need, allowing you to be the Benevolent Dictator, mercifully skipping over long exercises training students out of bad habits they had no idea existed until seeing them in the book.

What if you can’t stand VOE?

You’re not alone.  A popular alternative used by Kolbe and Mother of Divine Grace families is Easy Grammar.

I picked up an older edition at a used book sale, and I like having it on hand as a resource for extra practice pages.  The edition I have (1994) has reproducible worksheets and then the filled-in worksheet on the facing page.  It seems to cover all the topics normal people cover in English grammar.

Another option that comes highly recommended  is the free online K.I.S.S. Grammar Books by Dr. Ed Vavra.  Worth a look.

Do you even need a formal grammar program?

Sooner or later, sure.  But if standard English is the language spoken in your home, I’m not persuaded students need to do a rigorous study of grammar every single year.   And note that if you are studying a foreign language of any kind, then the kids are getting quite a lot of grammar education that way.

Having largely unschooled grammar until 4th grade, I had no difficulty transitioning both kids to Voyages this year.  I looked through the Kolbe Placement Exams early last summer, and used a selection of worksheets from the Super Teacher Worksheets to give the kids an introduction to the concepts they’d be seeing in the fall.

So although I happen to like the Kolbe selection on this one, and I find that using it this year was well-timed for us, I wouldn’t make your child’s love of Voyages in English the make-or-break on your choice of programs.  I would be very comfortable with giving any student a year off of hardcore grammar study here or there, if that seemed like a better way to manage time and energy and avoid frustration.

3.5 Time Outs: Try Not to Think About It

Thanks once again to our host Larry D. at Acts of the Apostasy, who lives with a teenage driver.

Click for the whole story.

1.

When my big kids were little, they played Mass in the bathroom. The necessary accessories were:

• Holy Water
• Bible
• Crackers for Communion

They said the Lord’s Prayer, and read from the Bible, and it was all very heartwarming.

Now my current 5-year-old has taken to setting up a church for the hippos and bunnies.  The required items are:

• Drum Set
• Offering Envelopes
• Collection Basket
• Bulletins

She makes sure there’s a nursery in her pillow-fort church building.

2.

She also likes to play pirates.  I tried to serve her hardtack and sauerkraut for lunch today, but she wasn’t convinced it was real pirate food.  She voted for fish sticks.

3.

A friend is keeping the kids for us this weekend so we can get away for a couple vacation together.  We priced hotels in one town (expensive, yikes), looked at the time required to go down to our favorite patron’s free beach house (too long a drive), decided camping was too much bother to count as R&R,  and now are trying to decide . . . which room of the house?  We keep telling the kids we’re gonna sleep in their bunkbeds while they’re gone.  They think we are joking.

3.5

 . . . James Herriot.  Seriously.  Me.  I’d never guessed.

***

It’s Link Day.  Guys you  get your man card punched double if you leave boy links on a girl blog.  Surely you aren’t going to be out-linked by a girl, are you?  One link per comment so you don’t get accidentally stuck in the automated spam dungeon.  Jane-Austen themes purely optional.

Oh and look, I have a link.  I stuck up a post at Amazing Catechists yesterday, on how to teach about the sacrament of marriage when your students’ families are not 100% on board.  I meant to wait a bit before posting it, but then I needed to send it to somebody, so I went ahead and put it up.  One thing that might surprise you — this is a topic where the United State Catholic Catechism for Adults really comes into its own.  It’s as if the bishops have some practice with these situations.