Friends and followers

I don't have Followers on my blog. I have Faithful Friends. Occasionally one of these friends 'unfriends' me, and I fret a little, wondering what I've done wrong. Did I know you by name? Did we have a relationship, or did you lurk there, joining as silently as you left? Do I follow your blog? Should I unfriend you as well?

I wonder.

There is a lot of talk nowadays about the value of cyber-friendships, and yet that group of Faithful Friends knows much more about my day-to-day life than many of those whose telephone numbers are listed in my speed-dial.

Amongst my Facebook friends I have both real life and bloggy pals. My bloggy pals are much more likely to comment on my status updates than the real life ones. Why is this, I wonder? Is it because you are more intimately involved in my day-to-day life through the pages of my blog, or are you more computer literate?

I wonder.

Sometimes a bloggy friend with whom I have a daily relationship will announce suddenly that blogging is taking up too much of her time and that she's going to take a break. Mostly that break becomes permanent, and I mourn the loss of one who has become a close friend, even though we've never met. After all, I don't speak to any of my 'irl' friends on a daily basis, and yet everyone would understand if I were sad at the loss of one of those friendships.

Today Jemimah and I travel to Avalon Airport to collect the beautiful Ruby and her two young men. I am terribly excited. Ruby and I both homeschool and we both blog. We attend churches of (almost) the same denomination. But we share much more than that. We share a great love of family. We both have a dry wit and a love of words. We know secrets about each other.

Like most friends we have differences too. She is so wise and I wonder whether she finds me frivolous and shallow. I wonder how my non-Christmas observing friend will cope in our home of over-exuberant Christmas cheer. Will our friendship be strengthened or weakened by this time we spend together? Will our friendship change by transforming itself from a cyber-friendship to one enjoyed in real life?

I wonder.

To all of my Faithful Friends out there, thank you for that friendship. Thank you for pressing the 'follow' button. Thank you for praying that our home would be safe from yesterday's floods. It was. Thank you for caring that our cameras were stolen. Thank you for your kind words as we mourned my dear father's death. Thank you for missing me when we're away. Thank you for encouraging me to write. Thank you for supporting me on our homeschool journey. Thank you for your help. Thank you for caring.

You are certainly true friends to me. That I don't wonder about at all.

Flood progress report

Thought you might like to take a look at the water. Pretty impressive, isn't it?

I'm glad to say that so far there is no danger to homes, although my hubby has just had to cancel this afternoon's journey out of town because the road was closed.

Thanks for all of your prayers.

PS My phone takes a pretty decent pic, doesn't it?

Totally Awesome!

Would you look at that flexibility...wow!

If you have time to pray for us today we would appreciate it. You may recall the terrible floods that hit our small township back in September. Well, we are again under threat today. The river level is expected to peak sometime this afternoon, and while we are not expecting levels as high as last time, all the water catchments are full to overflowing already, and we are preparing for the significant possibility that we may be underwater again by tonight.

• Please pray that the river might be contained within its banks.
• Give thanks for the tireless work of the CFA and SES volunteers as they fill and distribute sand bags.
• Pray that people might be able to remain in their homes.
• Praise God that the although the rains and rivers are not under our control, they are still under His control.
• Pray that He might be glorified.

Sigh - what a weekend...what a year!

Christmas films and camera thieves

We're watching White Christmas, my beloved and I. It's nice. We're supposed to be out at a classy restauraunt for dinner, only when we went to leave the house a little while ago, all dressed up in our glad-rags and all, we discovered that the back window of our car had been smashed and thieves have stolen all of our camera equipment. All of it. Meh.

So now we're waiting for the windscreen repair men and watching a film.

Which makes me wonder - what are your favourite Christmas movies?

Do tell. It'll help occupy my mind a little.

Here's my list:

• White Christmas - 1954
• Miracle on 34th Street - 1947
• A Christmas Carol - 1984
• The Polar Express - 2004
• Frosty the Snowman - 1969
• The Little Reindeer - 2004
• Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus - 1974
• It's a Wonderful Life - 1946
• The Night Before Christmas - 1968

We collect timeless, traditional, holiday films and keep them in a special basket to watch each year. It is such a nice thing to do as a family.

Even if your car has been broken into.

On shortbread and lemon curd

Jemimah and I have been baking shortbread. Mmmmmmm crisp, buttery yumminess to get us in the Festive Mood. Of all the items that we bake for the Christmas season, this is probably my family's favourite.

We've eaten quite a lot already. Jemimah and I, of course, take our positions of Royal Cup-bearers very seriously. We must taste test each batch of dough before baking to check for possible tampering. Imagine our shame if something poisoned came from the kitchen of our peaceful home! I mean to say. We taste each batch twice. Just to be sure, of course. You must be sure. Testing the finished product is an essential part of the process as well. Obviously.

Daddy prefers his shortbread cooked. Strange man. He loves it dipped in honey or lemon curd straight from the jar. There have been a number of miserable comments about the lack of home-made lemon curd in the pantry over the last few days. Being a bad wife I did suggest that asking his mother-in-law might be a good idea, but with a gentle sigh he replied that he had done that three or four times already. So it looks like I'll be cooking up some next week doesn't it?

Bad wife.

If he would stop eating it by the spoonful straight from the fridge it would last longer. That's all I'll say on the subject.

Have you noticed that some people make their shortbread too thick? I like mine thin. And crunchy from the rice flour. I also like my petticoat tails to be small, but not as small as my Mum does. She cuts her saucer sized rounds into sixteenths. We settle for twelfths. Only we make some sixteenths too - just to cover our bases.

Do all the rest of you make shortbread for Christmas, or is it a follow on from my Scottish heritage? Mind you, my dear Dad always said that shortbread was only eaten at Hogmanay when he was a kid in Scotland. Anyhow, do you make it? Is it part of your tradition too? Do you like it? Thick or thin? Petticoat tails or fingers? Dunked?

How do you eat yours?

I ♥ we ♥ books

Image from we ♥ books
Australia is blessed with some pretty terrifically fantastical independent bookstores, but I defy even the best of these to come anywhere near the awesome Aussie online store, we ♥ books for their range of sublime children's picture books for Christmas.

Okay, lots of my signature superlatives there, but take a look at some of these titles:

• A Christmas Manger by H A Rey (of Curious George fame)
• A Visit to Santa Claus by Margaret Evans Price
• Christmas in a Noisy Village by Astrid Lindgren (of Pippi Longstocking fame)
• Little Tree by e.e. cummings
• The Christmas Rose by Sepp Bauer
• The Elves' First Christmas by Atsuko Morozumi
• The Little Drummer Boy by Ezra Jack Keats

Ever seen any of those in a real life store? In Australia?

I am in lust. I mean to say, Jeanne the Book Tragic has never even heard of many of these, and that is despite my hubby's firm belief that our Basket of Delights includes every kid's Christmas book known to mankind.

How can I can justify purchasing these? Any ideas?

Perhaps Santa is reading...

Don't forget to browse some of their other book categories when you visit. They're all equally excellent. Take a look at their blog as well. It's there in my sidebar.

I'm off to drool some more.

Christmas books for older kids

Thanks lovely ladies for all of your help yesterday. There are some fantastic suggestions.

Thanks, especially Erin for your links - and for your suggestion, Lisa, of the delicious looking Treasury. I've compiled a list of my favourites from the suggestions, and I thought that I would share it here for those of you who are interested in read-alouds for the 8-10 year old age group or so as I was.

Remember though, I've only read the ones in bold. The links are from to my mate Abe.

• A Box of Delights by John Masefield
• The Christmas Mystery by Jostein Gaarder
• The Thirteen Days of Christmas by Jenny Overton
• Christmas at Longtime by Hesba Brinsmead
• A Joey for Christmas by Margaret Paice
• The Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson
• The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus & A Kidnapped Santa Claus by L. Frank Baum
• The Mysterious Toyshop by Cyril W. Beaumont
• The Family Under the Bridge by Natalie Carlson
• The Light at Tern Rock by Julia Sauer
• Christmas Tapestry by Patricia Polacco
• The Birds' Christmas Carol by Kate Douglas Wiggin
• I saw Three Ships by Elizabeth Goudge
• The Nutcracker by E.T.A. Hoffman ill. by Paschkis (or Sendak.)
• The Story of Holly and Ivy by Rumer Godden
• Starlight in Tourrone by Suzanne Butler
• Miracle in the Wilderness: A Story for Christmas by Paul Gallico
• The Long Christmas: Stories and Carols for Christmas by Ruth Sawyer

So there you are. If none of these catch your fancy, be sure to check out some of the wonderful links in the comments here.

And thanks again.

Anybody else love Christmas read-alouds as much as me?

Christmas read-alouds

Hello.

I'm after your help. Yet again.

I'm searching for a Living book read-aloud for Jemimah. A chapter book for older kids, not a picture book. A Christmassy book of some type. Preferably available in Australia. The ones we've read already have been excellently great, but I'm struggling to find something of the same calibre for this year. Like Dickens A Christmas Carol, but not that because we have that on the AO5 Booklist and we're saving it for then.

If you have any ideas, please let me know. Thank you. I will be forever in your debt.

In exchange, I'm offering you our list of past reads. In case you're stumped as well.

• A Box of Delights by John Masefield
• The Christmas Mystery by Jostein Gaarder
• The Thirteen Days of Christmas by Jenny Overton
• Christmas at Longtime by Hesba Brinsmead
• A Joey for Christmas by Margaret Paice
• The Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson
• The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus & A Kidnapped Santa Claus by L. Frank Baum
• The Mysterious Toyshop by Cyril W. Beaumont

I have Natalie Carlson's The Family Under the Bridge, Julia Sauer's The Light at Tern Rock, Patricia Polacco's Christmas Tapestry, and The Birds' Christmas Carol by Kate Douglas Wiggin on my list - are any of these any good?

Any others, Girls?

Our Basket of Delights will be open this week!! I've posted it up on my sidebar already. Yippee!!!

Ho Ho Ho

Getting excited here. Can you tell?

The Passage of Time

Martin Luther and Philipp Melanchthon 1543 by Lukas Cranach the Elder Uffizi Gallery, Florence

Lately I've been thinking a lot about time. Not so much the passage of time and how old I'm feeling, nor why it is that the weeks leading up to Christmas get shorter each year (see how I whispered so as not to offend those of you who don't celebrate?), but the concept of time in the teaching of history.

It is clear that even very young children have some understanding of time. "Once upon a time" begin the fairy tales of our preschoolers, and the child understands that the story takes place in times long ago. "When grandpa was a boy" explains the war and the development of motor cars; and daddy's childhood covers the invention of space travel and computers.

But time is more than this. Time is a highly complex concept, and a clear understanding of the chronology of time is something that develops as the child grows and matures. Which has significant implications for the teaching of history to our young children. And that's what I've been thinking about.

One of the problems of homeschooling only one child is that I will always be a learner. A beginner. Never do I come into a new stage of development with the benefit of sibling experience. Which is why my experiences in the understanding of time will be, by necessity, based on the large sample size of precisely one: eight year old Jemimah.

Given that, let me try to explain where my daughter is at in her understanding of time:

Jemimah has begun assembling the building blocks of history. This year, during our study of the Reformation, she has learned how Michelangelo studied as a young boy with the sons of Lorenzo the Magnificent - Lorenzo de' Medici - and that one of his class mates was to go on to become Pope Leo X - the supreme head of the Roman Catholic Church. She can imagine his frustration when Leo cancelled the decoration of the facade of Florence's San Lorenzo Basilica and how he felt when Leo later commissioned him to work on his family funerary chapel in the same uncompleted building.

Jemimah knows that it is this Leo X that conferred on King Henry VII the title of Defender of the Faith as a reward for his issuing of a pamphlet against the German monk, Martin Luther. She can imagine Leo issuing a tirade of abuse over the Luther and the controversy over indulgences. She knows about John Tetzel's "Get out of Jail Free card". From Luther she leaps easily to the Nuremberg artist, Albrecht Dürer, and from there to Dürer's friendship with Lazarus Spengler, Secretary of the Nuremberg City Council and his role in the Reformation in that city. She knows that Spengler and Dürer's childhood friend, Willibald Pirckheimer, were accused as heretics in the papal bull that demanded Luther's recantation or excommunication. She knows that Dürer pleaded with Desiderius Erasmus to help his friends, and she can tell of his friendship with Philipp Melanchthon, Luther's close colleague and fellow Reformer. From there is the leap to Calvin, and through him to Farel, Viret and Bucer. She learns about the amazing Reformation of Geneva, and with it the terrible plague...and the list of names goes on...and on...and on.

It has been a terrific year of history in our peaceful home, this year of immersion in the exciting period of the Renaissance and Reformation. We have come to know the lives of Michelangelo, Luther, Dürer, Calvin, Knox and Mary Queen of Scots in intimate detail, and through them we have leaned about their world. We have learned about all these people in action together, and, much like characters in the same book, they are remembered together. Never until now, well into my middle age, did I know as much about this pivotal period of church history as my daughter knows and understands at the age of eight.

Will a child who learns history like this ever say, "History is dry and boring."? Can a child who has his imagination excited by fascinating characters, exciting battles, tragic illnesses, beautiful art, wonderful music and relevant geography fail not to be moved by a study of history?

Charlotte Mason thought not. I have spoken before of her feeling about the study of lives, not dates and events:

The fatal mistake is in the notion that he must learn 'outlines,' or a baby edition of the whole history of England, or of Rome, just as he must cover the geography of all the world. Let him, on the contrary, linger pleasantly over the history of a single man, a short period, until he thinks the thoughts of that man, is at home in the ways of that period. Though he is reading and thinking of the lifetime of a single man, he is really getting intimately acquainted with the history of a whole nation for a whole age. Let him spend a year of happy intimacy with Alfred, 'the truth-teller,' with the Conqueror, with Richard and Saladin, or with Henry V - Shakespeare's Henry V - and his victorious army. Let him know the great people and the common people, the ways of the court and of the crowd. Let him know what other nations were doing while we at home were doing thus and thus. If he come to think that the people of another age were truer, larger-hearted, simpler-minded than ourselves, that the people of some other land were, at one time, at any rate, better than we, why, so much the better for him.

Charlotte Mason, Home Education pp 279

Using this suggestion, I would consider our study of history this year to be entirely successful...so far as it has gone. But a study of the Reformation as a period of history cannot be made in isolation. Although we may date the Reformation from the nailing up of Luther's 95 Theses on the doors of the Castle Church doors in Wittenberg on October 31st 1517, it didn't just begin on that day. What of the day before, and of the one before that? What was happening before that one momentous event that lead to the Reformation? What of its chronology? What of its sequence?

And that's where we run into difficulty, because although Jemimah can tell you more than you probably ever wanted to know about the Reformation, she doesn't even know what century it happened in. After Jesus and before her Grandparents. That's where she'd place it. (In fact, that's where she did place it, because I just asked her!)

Jemimah is totally unable, at the age of eight, to arrange the dates and events of history in order. This is despite the fact that she has studied British History sequentially for the past three years. She is unable to understand the basic framework on which history hangs. And without this framework there is no cause and no consequence. There is no flow and no change. While she can tell you that the church of the early 1500s needed to change, she cannot tell you why.

I am not all that surprised that this is where we're at. Before I began my Ambleside Online education three years ago (as opposed to teaching my daughter), I was in the same boat as she is in now. I understood history from the 1700s onwards. Modern history, as it were. The Australian History I had studied at school. History since Captain Cook visited the east coast of Australia in 1770 was my history. Before this was just a blur. I knew many of the events prior to this time, of course, but they were not alive for me. I knew them as incidents, not as part of the passage of the history of mankind. As a Christian this has particular issues, because I also failed to be able to place the years of our Lord into the pages of history. To me, his life as history was little more than unrelated stories. Please don't conclude from this that my faith was questionable - or worse, that it still is - it is the history of his life that I was confused about - not the content of it.

When we started AO, the first thing I was excited about was developing a timeline. At the end of our first year I enthusiastically blogged about our experiences with what I erroniously called our Book of Centuries, but which was actually a cross-curricular timeline book. I explained that it was at this stage a parent-lead activity, and that the book would become Jemimah's in AO4. Which is next year.

I loved this activity. The chronology of history opened up before me. For the first time I began fitting together cause and consequence. I learned about change. I could see what events happened together and what things lead to others. It was fantastic.

So why is it that at the beginning of AO3 I made a conscious decision to discontinue our timeline book?

I'll tell you.

This year we have pasted nothing in our book because to Jemimah it made absolutely no sense. She failed to gain any order of history by using this book. It was a waste of time. My time.

Part of the problem was that we were using a book of pages, not a single page of paper. That's what Miss Mason suggested for the early years - one piece of paper. Why, oh why, don't I listen to this woman?

In order to give definiteness to what may soon become a pretty wide knowledge of history - mount a sheet of cartridge-paper and divide it into twenty columns, letting the first century of the Christian era come in the middle, and let each remaining column represent a century BC or AD, as the case may be. Then let the child himself write, or print, as he is able, the names of the people he comes upon in due order, in their proper century.

We need not trouble ourselves at present with more exact dates, but this simple table of the centuries will suggest a graphic panorama to the child's mind, and he will see events in their time-order.

Charlotte Mason, Home Education p292

One sheet of paper. Names in order. No dates, just the right century. Pasting pictures of people into a book of pages failed to become a visual representation of time for Jemimah. So we stopped using it.

Which is why recently I've been thinking about the concept of time and the teaching of history. And this is what I've decided. Next year we will begin work on our Timeline book again. But in addition to this cross-curricular timeline we will creat a specific timeline for the period of history that we're studying. The book, for example would show merely Luther's nailing up of the 95 Theses. The specific timeline would show him at the Diet of Worms, influencing Dürer, disputing the Lord's Supper with Calvin, Zwingli and Rome and so on. One shows people; the other events, focussing on a specific time and with a specific bias - in this case its relevence to the Reformation.
I can see this approach being useful for our reading of George Washington's World. I envisage another for the discovery of Australia. Perhaps there will be some overlap - Captain Cook, for example. I hope so. Because I am hoping that in this way Jemimah's building block might get bigger and eventually merge into one chronological history block joining up with the wonderful Reformation block that we have created this year, the sixteenth century joining to the seventeenth and so on. That's what I hope.

I can't imagine that Jemimah will attach a particular year to the events we study any time soon. But to be honest, it doesn't really matter if she doesn't know the date if she knows what came before and what its consequences were, does it? History is just so much more than memorising dates, after all.

As the homeschooling mother of one child I may get it wrong again, but these are my plans for next year. We'll see how they go. For those of you with multiple children or of kids of older ages, what's your experience of teaching the chronology and sequencing of history? What did you do right? Where did you go wrong? Please tell - this mummy at least could use your experience. I'm just a learner after all. Always a learner.

Here is our lovely Record of Time. I still like it, but if I were buying a timeline today, I would seriously consider this one.

Read Laurie Bestvater's fascinating thoughts about Charlotte Mason's Book of Centuries here. Interesting stuff. What do you think? Personally I think this Book of Centuries works better than our timeline books. Personally. You?

PS Any of you interested in hearing more about our in depth Reformation study as part of AO3?

PPS I'm going for a swim now!

Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom. Psalm 90:12 NIV

One of these things

Can you tell me which thing is not like the others - before I finish my song:

• sunshine
• coffee
• deck-chair
• Kitaro
• Understanding time: chronology and sequencing
• Lindt chocolate

Have a nice weekend everyone.

Listening to:

South Korean Christian pianist, Yiruma.

Grannie crochet footstool

It is wonderful being on holidays. Already we've had time to visit the Strawberry Fair, go swimming, have friends to dinner, gather great bunches of spring roses, read lots of frivolous books, cook up a storm, and sleep.

I've also spent quite a bit of time chocheting. But not on Ripple. I've had to order more wool for her. I've been working on this:

It's a cover for a footstool.

Like?

I've had the stool forever. It is upholstered in a pretty needlepoint cover, but in orange which is bad, and the piping has frayed and it was time for an update. Only for as long as we've been in our peaceful home - coming up nine years now - I've had no idea what to recover it in.


Until Deb posted this.

It was a great project to work - only a weekend's worth of hooky, really. I used up scraps of Noro Silk Garden from Grannie and Ripple, crocheting two strands of yarn together on a 4.5mm hook, and formed the corners using Deb's directions by omitting the three extra triple crochets in the four corner spaces. (Three triple crochets and one single right round.) Deb also recommended omitting the singles in the last row to bring it in at the bottom edge. This forms a nice snug edge to keep the cover on the stool.

It was great fun to make. It grew incredibly quickly, and would make a fantastic handwork project for kids. As long as you have a spare footstool with a frayed cover hanging around somewhere like I did.

I like it.

Bullies and bullying

When I was in the Forth Form, a two new girls came to our Exclusive Private School. Both stood out as new because of one thing: their uniforms were too short. In our school, girls wore their dresses long. Below the knees long. High School kids wore minis, not College girls. Short dresses were for bogans. Short dresses showed a total lack of social class.

One of the new girls was gorgeous. Slim, blonde and tanned. A surfie chick. She actually looked sublime in her neatly altered mini-uniform. Not only was it short enough to show the length of her slim, tanned legs that went on forever, but it was expertly adjusted in the back so that it fitted her curves perfectly. She only wore it for a week. By the next Monday she had a new uniform. Still perfectly fitting, but long. Just like it should have been. This girl was clearly one of the beautiful people, and she quickly gained her rightful place as one of the 'in crowd'.

The other girl was...um...not gorgeous. She was fat. She had a funny name. She was not very bright. She had greasy hair and pimples. She was not good at games. She was poor. It was clearly obvious to me, even then, that her parents had moved her to our Exclusive Private School because she'd been bullied at her local High School. Plus, she wore her uniform too short.

Probably this girl's parents couldn't afford to buy brand new uniforms for their daughter a week after starting her at one of the 'best schools', but whatever the reason, she sported her above-the-knee dress right to the end of her Sixth Form year. And of course, she continued to be bullied. Worse than ever.

Wanda Petronski was bullied too, and it was easy to see why. She was poor. She had a funny name. She came to school with her shoes caked in mud. She had a shiny round forehead. She came from Boggins Heights. She wore the same faded blue dress every day. Wanda might have got away with it, if only she'd kept her mouth shut. If she'd stayed quiet, nobody would have noticed Wanda. But not only was Wanda poor; Wanda lied. Big, whopping, hilarious lies. About how many dresses she owned. As if. Would she really wear one faded dress every day if she had that huge wardrobe at home? Sure. What a story!

Wanda didn't have any friends, but lots of girls talked to her:

"Wanda," Peggy would say in a most courteous manner as though she were talking to miss Mason or to the principal perhaps. "Wanda," she'd say, giving one of her friends a nudge, "tell us. How many dresses did you say you had hanging up in your closet?"

"A hundred," said Wanda.

"A hundred!" exclaimed all the girls incredulously, and the little girls would stop playing hopscotch and listen.

"Yeah, a hundred, all lined up," said Wanda. Then her thin lips drew together in silence.

"What are they like? All silk, I bet," said Peggy.

"Yeah, all silk, all colours."

"Velvet, too?"

"Yeah, velvet, too. A hundred dresses," repeated Wanda stolidly. "All lined up in my closet,"

Then they'd let her go. And then before she'd gone very far, they couldn't help bursting into shrieks and peals of laughter.

Peggy was the most popular girl in school. She was pretty. She had many pretty clothes. She had curly auburn hair. Maddie was her closest friend.

Maddie was bothered by the way Peggy teased Wanda Petronski. Sometimes she felt embarrassed and studied the marbles she held in her hand, saying nothing herself. She didn't exactly feel sorry for Wanda, but she did feel something. Maddie was poor too. Maddie usually wore hand-me-down clothes. Thank goodness she didn't live on Boggins Heights. Thank goodness Peggy was her friend. Peggy wasn't really cruel. She protected small children from bullies, and she cried for hours if she saw anyone mistreating an animal. Besides, it was Wanda's fault. She should have more sense than to make up such lies. A hundred dresses? As if.

Only, one day, the girls discover that Wanda has been telling the truth...

This week is Anti-bullying week in the UK, and the Newbery Honor book, The Hundred Dresses by Eleanor Estes is the ideal book to talk about bullying with your child. Told through the eyes not of the bullied child but of Maddie, one of the tormentors, The Hundred Dresses provides an entree into our own thoughts, attitudes and behaviours toward bullied children and of the bullies themselves. What is a bully? What makes a child a target for bullying? Was Wanda being bullied even before the story of the hundred dresses began to get out of hand? How would she have felt having no friends? Did being poor make her a target for the bullies, or was it something else, like her name, or where she lived? Was Maddie as bad as Peggy?

A bullied child will wear the scars of that experience all their lives. The impact on their emotional development and their self esteem cannot be measured, and yet the insecurity remains for ever. Believe me, I know.

Read my post on bullying and a review of The Book Chook's book, Monster Maddie about a little girl who becomes a bully here. Read the feathery one's post, Say NO to bullying here. And above all, speak to your kids. Read them a book. Ask them their experiences. And never, never assume that it won't happen to them. Or that they won't be a bully themselves. Pop over to The Book Chook's post for more ideas of how to introduce this important topic to your children.

Together we can all say NO to bullying.

20 Questions

From Meet Me At Mikes. Can you tell I'm on holiday? (Gleeful cackle)
Let me know if you join in, won't you? Pip would like to know too.

1. Sweet or Savoury?
2. Dresses or Jeans?
3. House or Apartment?
4. Shop Online or Offline?
5. DVDs or Downloads?
6. Cocktails or Juice?
7. Chocolate or Strawberry?
8. Laptop or PC?
9. Magazines or Newspapers?
10. Facebook or Twitter?
11. CDs or MP3s?
12. Kids or Pets?
13. Macaron or Cupcakes?
14. Walk or Run?
15. Breakfast in Bed or Breakfast Out?
16. Market or Supermarket?
17. Sourdough or Grainy?
18. Heels or Flats?
19. Late nights or Not?
20. Coffee or Tea?

1. Sweet or Savoury? Savory. Corn chips get me every time. It's the salt. On the other hand, Godiva chocolates take some beating.
2. Dresses or Jeans? Jeans. I do have legs though...mostly in summer.
3. House or Apartment? House. Not enough room for books in an apartment.
4. Shop Online or Offline? Both! Bookshops are good any way you shop.
5. DVDs or Downloads? DVDs. Mostly for Jemimah.
6. Cocktails or Juice? Cocktails. Of course. Juice is fattening :)
7. Chocolate or Strawberry? Chocolate. Every time.
8. Laptop or PC? PC. I use both though.
9. Magazines or Newspapers? Magazines. Definitely.
10. Facebook or Twitter? Facebook. Twitter is fun as well, but more of my friends use FB.
11. CDs or MP3s? MP3s. but I often buy CDs and upload them to iTunes.
12. Kids or Pets? Both. I can do with all the love I can get!
13. Macaron or Cupcakes? Cupcakes, although a macaron from Ladurée is divinely wonderful.
14. Walk or Run? Walk. Running is against my religion...
15. Breakfast in Bed or Breakfast Out? Out. In bed is nice too, though.
16. Market or Supermarket? Market but I don't get there often. Preston is my local in Melbourne.
17. Sourdough or Grainy? Potts Sourdough. Mostly I make my own white loaves now. Totally unhealthy, but extremely delicious, and it makes me feel like a good housewife.
18. Heels or Flats? Birkies don't come with heels...do they?
19. Late nights or Not? Late nights. I. Am. Not. A. Morning. Person.
20. Coffee or Tea? Both. Tea first thing in the morning and last thing at night. Coffee mostly in between.

The Really-Very-Good-Weekend

All weekends are good, don't you think? Some are really-very-good. This past weekend was a really-very-good-excellently-nice weekend. One of the bestest for a long time.

To begin with, it was long - one of those Thursday night to Monday affairs. That's an essential criterion in the very-good-weekend rankings for me. Secondly, it was in Geelong. With my mum. And my sister. If my brother had been there it would have been pretty near perfect. (My dad would have had to be there for a totally-perfect weekend. Dad and Audrey. But I digress.)

Anyhow, we had four whole days of really-very-good-excellently-nice fun. Mmmmmm.

We started out on Thursday night fraternising with the Beautiful People of Geelong. The Social Set, as it were. The 'In Crowd'. Now before you look at me with horror and delete me from your blogroll, I am not part of this group. At all. I am the hoi polloi. The many. The common folk. I do, however, gain a great deal of pleasure watching the privileged ones at play, and in seeing how 'the other half' spend their time.

I am rarely part of high society. Except once a year, on or around Remembrance Day on the 11th November when my beloved mother hosts her annual Hamlin Fistula Fund Fund Raising Dinner. That's where we were on Thursday night. Here. Eating the most sublime food. And hobnobbing with important folk.



Three years ago my mum and her friend Marie set out to raise $100,000.00 for this deserving charity. We thought they were mad. And they're proving us wrong. More than $7,000 was raised on Thursday night. That's enough for operations to cure another six girls, to allow them to live normal fulfilling lives. To have children. To return to their families with their heads held high. That's what my mum thinks is so worthwhile. So do I. It was a really-very-goodly-excellent night, and my sister and I were incredibly proud of our fabulous mother.

The rest of the weekend we recovered.

I huggled under a Grannie that belonged to my grandmother and read Alan Bennett's The Uncommon Reader.

This slender book will only take you an hour or two of your next really-very-good-weekend to read, and I thoroughly recommend that you do. It is a delightful little fairy tale of a story about what would happen if one day the Queen was lead by her obstreperous corgis into the mobile library van at Buckingham Palace. The Queen of course doesn't read, but once there she borrows a book because, well, one does need to be polite, doesn't one? One should at least feign an interest. As Queen one has a certain sense of duty, doesn't one?

The Queen doesn't think much of her choice - a novel by Ivy Compton-Burnett, but when she returns the book she is directed to The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford. She is hooked. One book leads to another, and with the aid of Norman, her gay amanuensis, (you'll need to read the book to discover why he is called that), she embarks on a quest to read her way through English literature. And French. And Russian. The Queen had become a Reader. With a capital R.

If you, too, are a Reader, you'll love this book. I did. Get it.

Just so you know, there is one instance of x-rated language. Totally unnecessary, but there. Beware.

My really-very-good-excellently-nice weekend also had plenty of time for hooking. The crafty type of course...

I spent several incredibly enjoyable hours sitting with my precious mother working on her gorgeous knitted blanket. While she mattress stitched blocks together I outlined them in rows of chocolaty brown triple crochet. And we talked and talked. It was nice. Very-goodly-excellently-preciously-nice.

Wonderful, isn't it? See how wabi sabi her colours are...

I did lots of other excellently-very-good-things too, but if I tell you in too much detail you'll still be reading next weekend, and that would not be goodly-nice of me at all.

I started rereading P G Wodehouse's Blandings Castle Saga. Told you earlier that I like seeing how the other half lives, didn't I, and Something Fresh is just perfect for that. Love P G Wodehouse. Do you? Thank You, Jeeves is my favourite.

We ate out at a restaurant on the Geelong waterfront. We went to church. We discovered a new-to-me second hand bookshop in Castlemaine and bought a whole bagful of delicious titles including the highly regarded The Man Who Loved Children by Christina Stead and Man-Shy by Frank Dalby Davison. You know how excited I get about new second-hand bookshops, don't you. We celebrated the very-goodly-deliciously-exciting discovery that my much loved nephew, Prince Oh, had finally learned to read. Hurrah!! We had coffee with Jeana and her delightful girls. We picnicked on sushi. We shopped for Christmas pressies. We slept.

It really was a really-very-goodly-nice weekend.

Just one other thing before I go - and I am going, I promise you that...

We're on holidays!!!!! Eight blissful weeks of summer. Mmmm. This helped make the weekend pretty nice as well.

Lest we forget

Remembrance Day

On your maypole green
see the winding morris men
Angry Alfie, Bill and Ken
waving hankies, sticks and boots
- all the earth and roots

Standing at the crease
the batsman takes a look around
The boys are fielding on home ground
The steeple sharp against the blue
- when I think of you

Sam and Andy, Jack and John
Charlie, Martin, Jamie, Ron
Harry, Stephen, Will and Don
Matthew, Michael - on and on

We will remember them
remember them, remember them
We will remember them
remember them, remember them

Time has slipped away
The summer sky to autumn yields
A haze of smoke across the fields
Let's up and fight another round
and walk the stubbled ground

When November brings
the poppies on Remembrance Day
when the vicar comes to say
'May God bless them, every one
Lest we forget our sons'

We will remember them
remember them, remember them
We will remember them
remember them, remember them

My wise little girl

When I'm a good mother, I'm good. Very good.

When I'm a bad mother, though, I'm horrid.

On Sunday night, I was totally horrid.

We were travelling home from a big family reunion in Melbourne. It had been a super delightful day, and it was late and we were all tired and grumpy. I was reading aloud as we travelled. As usual. Only for some perverse reason, explainable only perhaps by the fact that we had been drinking Chandon since noon, I wasn't reading one of the nice storybooks that we have on the go right now - not At the Back of the North Wind nor Spiderweb for Two nor The Jungle Book even. No, for some reason I was reading from Trial and Triumph. About Gustavus Adolphus and The Battle of Breitenfeld. Plus, I was expecting a narration. Of Jemimah's normal excellent standard and no lower. With all proper names.

Which, of course she failed to deliver.

And I was horrid.

Really horrid.

Really, totally horrid.

Eventually, after I'd been horrid for quite a while, my beloved, who had been sitting silent in the driver's seat suggested that perhaps I'd been horrid quite long enough and that really I was probably not achieving anything too positive, now, was I?

At which point I was horrid to him as well. At least I wasn't expecting him to narrate though.

Then I sulked petulantly. Uncharacteristic of me, sulking, but that's what I did. Sulked.

Eventually, finally, we arrived home. A quick dinner of something totally unacceptable, like baked beans, I think, and it was into bed for Miss Eight. It was about ten o'clock.

And this is when I finally did something good.

Despite the lateness of the hour I reached for her storybook, and we read a chapter. Then another. No narrations. Then we cuddled for a bit in the dark. Like usual. Like when I'm being good mother.

Next morning I felt pretty horrid. Only this time I wasn't feeling horrid toward my daughter. This time I was feeling horrid about myself.

I went and apologised. I even asked her to forgive me.

And this is what my wise little girl said:

- You know how you're not supposed to let the sun go down on your anger, Mummy?
- Yes... (guiltily, and knowing that the admonition was deserved and that that was exactly what I'd done)
- Well, I don't think that that is true when you read stories at night.
-Huh?
- Well, when you read together at bedtime and then huggle and cuggle together, then you just know you're loved and that you're forgiven. You don't need to apologise anymore. It's all okay.

And then I felt about two inches tall. I didn't feel like a very good mother at all. And I still felt horrid.

But I felt incredibly proud of my wise little girl.

Homeschool Blog Awards

A Peaceful Day has been nominated in the Best Homeschool Methods as well as the Best Variety Blog categories of the 2010 Homeschool Blog Awards. I'm pretty chuffed about that, let me tell you. Thank you so much.

If you read my blog, you might consider voting for me. I would appreciate that very, very muchly indeed. My goodness me!!

Click here to cast your vote. It's easy!

Am I a prude?

I started my Christmas shopping on the weekend.

I tell you this not to show how impressively and obsessively-compulsively organised I am, but to explain why it was that I found myself in highly desirable home textiles store, Third Drawer Down , early on Saturday afternoon.

I was buying stocking fillers, and my purchases were predominantly for children - a make-your-own monster kit, some crayons shaped like brightly coloured pebbles, and some animal hands temporary tattoos were among my choices. Jemimah and her Daddy were around the corner shopping for - well, lets say I hope that they were shopping for - a certain somebody who, at that very moment, just happened to be in Third Drawer Down. Anyhow, were were to meet to continue our shopping imminently.

After making my selection I queued at the desk to pay. I was behind a couple who were also shopping for children - in her case, a baby's grow-suit and bib set. The cashier neatly wrapped the parcel in attractive paper, and then after finalising payment, she slipped the package into a brown paper carry bag for the couple to carry away.

Only then she did something that absolutely floored me: On the side of the plain brown bag she affixed a large white sticker emblazoned with none other than the 'F word' in great big letters.

On the side of a baby gift.

A grow-suit, for goodness sake.

Well, I'm sure my mouth dropped open almost to the ground. I may have even begun hyperventilating, I was so astounded. I was, well, I was gob-smacked, to be honest. I was also frantically trying to decide how I would handle it when the attendant came to attach a similar sticker to the side of my bag.

Then I began to wonder - am I alone in my dislike for obscenities in print? Was I wrong to worry what people would think of me walking along Gertrude Street with a bag saying...er...that? Am I prudish to be concerned what my eight-year-old would say as she read it? Was I being irrational and too OTT for words? Was I?

Are the mug, pennant and badge described on Third Drawer Down's website unacceptable?

Should the controversial trademark British clothing company, French Connection, choose for their stores upset me?

"Your lordship may find it offensive. I might find it offensive. But young people who buy clothes do not find it offensive, they find it amusing."

(Am I the only one who is saddened when I read that lawyer's comment?)

Am I really in a minority when I get concerned if books actually marketed for children contain foul language?

I do not use expletives. When I drop a heavy weight on my toe, I say 'Ouch'. It might be accompanied by a whole heap of over-dramatic hopping around the room, but that's what I say. It just comes out, really. I don't find a need to include any of the currently common obscenities in my every day speech, not even the relatively mild ones.

Personally, I even find it offensive when another word is substituted for the actual profanity. The characters saying "What the cuss?" in Fantastic Mr Fox, for example. Sorry, people, this does not automatically render the film 'clean' for a young audience. Far from it - to me it suggests that insertion of curses into speech is acceptable and normal.

Are these words disgusting, or are they common and harmless? That's the question. Certainly the line between amusing and offensive is arbitrary. People will always find new words to offend with and to be offended by. There is a word that I use that was used by mother before me, which upsets my husband. I try not to use it now... at least, not around my beloved, despite the fact that to me it is cute and certainly not rude. No, I won't tell you what it is. Not in polite company. If you know me in real life you probably know the word to which I refer anyhow.

Given that words of the type I refer to are offensive to at least some people, I find it perversely illogical that a store would deliberately choose to employ them as part of their store's identity. Do they use them to upset customers? Does it concern them if they do?

And maybe that's where I'm deluding myself. Maybe it is me that is wrong to care in the first place.

Maybe there's nothing wrong with the F word anyhow.

What do you think?

Decisions, decisions

Argh! I need your help, girlies:

iPad, Kindle, both or neither?

(Why would be good too...)

Yay, Jemimah!

I suppose we really ought to include deportment and lady-like posture as classes for next year, shouldn't we? At least we're working on flexibility though...and lolly eating... and getting our daily dose of Vitamin D. All while doing maths. Multitaskers extraordinaire, we are.

This is Jemimah completing her final lesson of MEP Book 4a. It was last week actually, but I forgot to show you, and she had asked me ever so nicely if I would tell you that she was up to her new book that I really had to rectify that omission as soon as I realised it.

We're working on fractions and decimals at the minute. They're a nice break from written calculations of numbers up to 10 000, which it seemed like we'd been doing forever. A few weeks of geometry were a pleasant reprieve as well.

We're still loving MEP. That doesn't mean that every day is fun and easy. A lot of the time maths is the subject that Jemimah chooses last - so that when it's done school's over for the day - but the spiral form of the programme means that no topic is around for long. "If you don't like what we're doing then just wait for next Monday" is our philosophy, and mostly it works.

Amongst my likes are MEP's emphasis on mental maths, and its use of precise and correct mathematical terminology. I love the variety of exercises. A lesson might include setting up a shop to practice using money; measuring weights and capacity; or using manipulatives like Cuisinaire rods or number cards. We might have a mental drill type exercise practicing multiplication facts, followed by a couple of practical applied maths problems and a puzzle. All this keeps boredom to a minimum - in our peaceful home, anyhow.

You hear of mums changing maths curricula nearly as often as they change their clothes. Personally I see little value. For me a maths curriculum is merely a tool that reassures me that I've not left too many gaps. It is not necessary to follow it slavishly, and, in fact, it seems foolish to even attempt to do so. As homeschoolers, we are in the enviable position of being able to tailor the education process to fit our children's unique learning requirements. It would be crazy to not take advantage of this. To me this is not a matter of changing the curriculum, but rather tweaking the one you already have to ensure that it fits your child's needs. MEP's presentation makes this easy.

Unless you insist on sitting like this while you're doing it, that is...

Well done, Jemimah.

Daylesford's delights

You probably heard my whoop of delight from there, did you, at about midday on Saturday? We were on a short break in Daylesford, as you may be aware, and as you didn't know, but would, no doubt, be unsurprised to learn, I was in a bookstore. A second-hand bookstore. Not a surprise at all, is it? You can see me there in the piccy above, see.

My kind of store, the Bookbarn@Daylesford - books and coffee. Perfect, really.

Well, actually, it was more than perfect, because I am now the deliciously delighted owner of Doris Chadwick's John of the Sirius. Yep - moi. For $5.00 as well - much better than the significantly overinflated $125.00 asking price on Abe.

So do you get the idea that I'm excited about this? Because I am. I actually did yell, but only quietly so that my hubby and daughter looked to see what was going on, but nobody else looked concerned that I had suffered some serious medical event. I would have been a bit embarrased then, so I'm glad that I was a little restrained. It was sort of loud though. For me.

I've been looking for John ever since I started haunting bookshops. The first in a trilogy, John of the Sirius tells the story of the First Fleet through the eyes of young John, a fictitious lad who always happens to be in just the right place when anything historically important happens. Of course, this is my first look at the book, and it looks good, although a little forced and jolly - life is always happy for John and his family, even in a penal colony.

Still, it looks excellent for use in next year's AO4 Australian History. Which is now only a few weeks away. That's what I wanted it for, and why I was so excited. Woo Hoo!!

We were in Daylesford to celebrate a dear friend's 50th birthday, a protracted affair over the entire four days of the Melbourne Cup long weekend. In between eating, which we did an awful lot of, and drinking champagne which we equally did a little too much of, we explored this pretty town situated west of Melbourne in Victoria's Spa region. This is the place to indulge in Rolfing, the Alexander technique, esoteric astrology, Tarot reading, spiritual healing reiki, shiatsu, ear candling, bipolar therapy, chakra realignment, traditional Chinese therapies or acupuncture, if you're that way inclined. Which we're not, for obvious reasons. We do lurve a massage though, and the Daylesford region boasts the largest number of natural mineral water springs in Australia and a huge number of spas and places for a seriously good massage. An hour and a half spent with the massage therapists at Salus Spa was another of the highlights of our delightful break.

The rambling maze that is Paradise Books was obviously high on our weekend agenda, and proved to be hiding a copy of AO4 free read Lassie Come Home by Eric Knight in its eight rooms of laden shelves. Lassie's now mine as well. Hee Hee.

Daylesford is also the real life home of online store, Lark, a very dangerous thing indeed. I left there with copies of Pip Lincolne's new book, Sew La Tea Do as well as Cath Kidson's Stitch! (I can justify those as Jemimah's Handwork projects, can't I?)

You can also spend a great deal of money in David Bromley's A Day on Earth. (Make sure you stay in the Childhood areas of his website - he also paints nudes...) Alas, the budget does not extend to a delightful picture book style portrait of Jemimah, but we did purchase some of his sublime pottery bowls...

Finally we visited Purl's Palace, home of all things covetable to purchase more yarn for Ripple. She's half-way done now, and I was running out of colours.

So that's about it. Old friends, food, champagne, massage, bookstores, long rambly walks and a stay at Lake House and Alla Wolf-Tasker's sublime culinary creations. Isn't that about the perfect long weekend getaway?

Well, when you find John of the Sirius it is anyhow.

Here are some pics.

When the sun went down

Without doubt she was the worst of the seven, probably because she was the cleverest. Her brilliant inventive powers plunged them all into ceaseless scrapes, and though she often bore the brunt of the blame with equanimity, they used to turn round, not infrequently, and upbraid her for suggesting the mischief. She had been christened "Helen," which in no way account's for "Judy," but then nicknames are rather unaccountable things sometimes, are they not? Bunty said it was because she was always popping and jerking herself about like the celebrated wife of Punch, and there really is something in that. Her other name, "Fizz," is easier to understand; Pip used to say he never yet had seen the ginger ale that effervesced and bubbled and made the noise that Judy did.

Spare a thought for me today as I attempt to struggle my way through Chapter 21 of Seven Little Australians. Yes, that chapter - the one where imaginative, enthusiastic, rebellious, lively, daring, delightful Judy dies.

The death of Mr Percival in Storm Boy earlier in the year was hard enough to read aloud without blubbering, let me tell you, but I've been dreading this scene all year. How am I going to read this?

Which has me thinking about sad bits in children's literature. Which, do you think are the saddest scenes? Which parts have you reaching for the tissues? The Little Match Girl springs to mind, of course, as does Anne Frank's The Diary of a Young Girl. The scene where Captain Crewe dies in A Little Princess is pretty heart rending as well.

I am sure there are more.

What are the saddest scenes in your opinion? What books have you found hardest to read aloud? Do tell.

While you're at it, do you reckon sad bits in children's stories are appropriate? At what age? What about current children's books?

I'd love to know your thoughts on this one.

PS If you decide to torture yourself by reading Seven Little Australians to your family, do keep a look out for the deliciously gorgeous version illustrated by John Lennox. It's out of print, but well worth searching out for the sublime illustrations. That's his picture above.