Wordless Wednesday - 1/5/11 - Nature Study

52 Books in 52 Weeks - Augustine Came to Kent

This is a book by Barbara Willard and is the first I've completed in 2011.  It really is a middle school level book that I am reading with my 15 year old son.  I got to read it first, now he's reading it.  I actually read the book about 8 years ago so this is a reread.  Perhaps it shouldn't count in my 52 Books list?  My son and I were plugging through St. Augustine of Hippo's Confessions and decided to go rather lighter when moving on to learning about St. Augustine of Canterbury.  The book is set in 597 A.D. when Augustine sailed to England to convert the Saxon pagans.

This is a very well written book of historical fiction.  Wolf is the son of Wolfstan, both are Angles from England who are captured and sold into slavery in Rome.  Pope Gregory is said to have been walking through the market place and had pity on these fair men from so far away.  Legend has it that when he asked who they were and was told they were Angles, he replied, "Angels not Angles."  He buys Wolfstan and Wolf and sets them free.  They convert to Christianity and Wolf and his father are reunited with his mother and sister.  They live happily in Rome.  However, Pope Gregory has charged Bishop Augustine to travel to England as a missionary of the Christian faith.  Wolfstan and Wolf get to go along.  The book relates the various difficulties that Wolf and the others encounter.  Upon finally landing at Kent, Wolf meets a young native girl there, Fritha.  A love develops between them.  The love story is understated and sweet.

I'm always a bit puzzled by the idea that Augustine gets credit for converting England.  The queen of England, married to King Ethelbert is a Christian already.  Christians had been living in England prior to the Roman retreat when all the soldiers had to return to Rome as it gradually fell to the 'Barbarians.'  I did a little research and apparently the Celtic Christian church was responsible for some of the conversions in North England but Augustine did his work in the south of England.

Willard is very good at creating a feeling of the time.  The book has suspenseful moments in it.  We see everything through Wolf's eyes, a devout boy but very human too.

I appreciated the illustrations in this book as well.

I give Augustine Came to Kent two thumbs up!

Three Kings Bread

Getting started on our bread.

On  Sunday Becky wanted to make Three Kings Bread.  She'd seen the recipe on a little clip of the PBS Kids show, Zoom.  Sunday was a pretty crazy day but we managed to fit baking the bread into it somehow.  It was supposed to be shaped like a crown with a hole in the middle, but as our bread rose, the hole closed up.  We are not the most experienced of bakers, alas!

Here's Becky grating some lemon peel.

This was the hardest part, as the bread was really sticky.  We had to add lots more flour than the recipe called for.

The bread's second rising.

Ta da!

What is this stuff?

I can not say that it was our most favorite bread ever!  People tended to scrape the icing off and just eat that!

Good Habits Challenge of the Week

This is something that we've been doing for about 4 weeks now, but it fits in well with the idea of New Year's Resolutions, I thought I'd post about it.

I was trying to find a way to dull the roar of the constant chaos around here WITHOUT nagging (which really only contributes, I find).  I had been cruising Charlotte Mason sites and blogs and started thinking more about intentionally trying to incorporate good habits into our lives.

For some reason I suddenly got inspired to approach things this way:

Every Sunday morning I post a new Good Habits Challenge of the Week.  I point it out to the kids.  I try to talk about it casually during the week (it's hanging right in our main living space the center of which is my desk!).  I openly try to work on my own habits in regards to the challenge.  I find things are improving noticeably!

At the bottom of each challenge it gets signed by either the Good Habits Fairy, the Christmas Elf or this week, Your Guardian Angels.  Becky really wants the Good Habits Fairy to come back for some reason.   Also at the bottom of the page, I stick a reminder about the past few weeks challenges just so we can reiterate that we are CONTINUING to work on those habits as well.

Read the Bible and Catechism in One Year

The Beautiful Bible my husband gave me several Christmases ago.

I'm a day late letting anyone who might read this post in on this particular Bible reading plan.  People on the unschooling Catholics list I'm on did this last year (I didn't).  Some are planning to do it this year, and some are planning to start all over again!

I hadn't planned to attempt it, but yesterday, on an impulse, I printed out the pdf.  The print was so tiny, I went over to my Bible stand to get the wonderful magnifying glass that is there.  Then I realized I'm all set up for this already!  I've got a Bible, a magnifying glass and a CCC all in one spot in my living room anyway!

The handy dandy magnifying glass that comes with the Bible stand  (another Christmas present a couple years later).

So I did the first reading and checked it off.  We'll see how things go!  I'm a great one for starting things and then drifting off. . . . . .

The Bible stand (ignore the clutter crammed into the corner!)

King William's College Quiz

Every new year, King William's College in the Isle of Man publishes its famous quiz.  If you are Anglophile and love arcana, this is the quiz for you!

I sometimes frequent the Republic of Pemberley website, and every year on their Ramble board the group works out the answers to these questions.   The questions are mind-bogglingly obscure to me so it is fun to see other folks work out the answers.  Slowly the obscurity fades and things start to make sense.  Sort of.  On some of the questions. I imagine in the age of Google this quiz is much easier for us non-King William's College students.

Anyway, check it out and see how smart you are!  Or, if you are like me, see how smart other people are!

52 Books in 52 Weeks

In the name of self-education I'm participating in the 52 Books in 52 Weeks challenge againin 2011.  Here are all the books I read in 2010 in the order by which I remember them!
(F = fiction, NF= nonfiction, RA= read aloud)

1. King Solomon's Mines by M. Rider Haggard (F)
2. Simplicity Parenting by Kim John (NF)
3. The Virginian by Owen Wister (F)
4. Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie (F)
5, Ruth by Elizabeth Gaskell (F)
6. Charlotte Bronte by Rebecca Fraser (NF)
7. The Life of Charlotte Bronte by Elizabeth Gaskell (NF)
8. Villette by Charlotte Bronte (F)
9. Small is Still Beautiful by Joseph Pearce (NF)
10. Signs of Life; 40 Catholic Customs and their Biblical Roots by Scott Hahn (NF)
11. The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo (RA)
12. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (F)
13. Movie Shoes by Noel Streatfeild (RA)
14. Theater Shoes by Noel Streatfeild (RA)
15. Ballet Shoes by Noel Streatfeild (RA)
16. The Quest for Shakespeare by Joseph Pearce (NF)
17. The Marriage Bureau for Rich People by (F)
18. The Lost City of Z by David Grann (NF)
19. King of The Golden City (RA)
20. Catholic Converts; British and American Intellectuals Turn to Rome by Patrick Allitt (NF)
21. The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis (F)
22. The Autobiography of St. Therese (NF, audio)
23. The Story of the Other Wise Man (RA)
24. Archimedes and the Door to Science by Jeanne Bendick (RA)
25. The House that Cleans Itself by Mindy Starns Clark (NF)
26. Beyond the Heather Hills by Melissa Wiley (RA)
27. Hold Onto Your Kids By Gordon Neufeld (NF)
28. Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi (RA)
29. Gone Away Lake (F, audio)
30. Left to Tell; Discovering God Amidst the Rawandan Holocaust by Immaculee Ilibagiza (NF)
31. Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond (NF)
32. My Life with the Saints by James Martin, S.J. (NF)
33. The Cure of Ars; The Priest Who Outtalked the Devil by Milton Lomask (RA)
34. Five Little Peppers and How They Grew by Margaret Sidney (RA)
35. Herodotus and the Road to History by Jeanne Bendick (RA)
36. The Odyssey by Homer (F)
37. Homeschooling our Children, Unschooling Ourselves by Alison McKee (NF)
38. Old Town in the Green Groves by Cynthia Rylant (RA)
39. Watership Down by Richard Adams (F)
40. Big Red by Jim Kjelgaard (F - this was a trip down memory lane!)

41. The Real James Herriot; A Memoir of my Father by Jim Wight (NF)

42. Roots of the Faith; From the Church Fathers to You by Mike Aquilina (NF)

43. The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett (F)

44. Son of Hamas by Mosab Hassan Yousef (NF)

45. Riders of the Purple Sage by Zane Grey (F)

46. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (RA)

47. Little Men by Louisa May Alcott (RA)

48. Jo's Boys by Louisa May Alcott (RA)

49. Rachel's Contrition by Michelle Buckman (F)

50. The Jesuit's Guide to (Almost) Everything by James Martin S.J.(NF)

51.  Carry On, Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse(F)

52.  The Wolves of Willoughby Chase by Jane Aiken(F)

53.  The Apostle on Crutches by Henriette Delamare (RA)

I might have missed a book or two because I only kept track in the beginning of the year and toward the end. I did however occasionally mention a book I'd been reading on my blog so I used that as a resource and for several months I was good at logging in my books at goodreads but I fell away from that for some reason part way through the year

Here are questions Robin at Read 52 in 52 posed about last year's challenge:

Did you reach the goal of 52 books?: Yes, I did, with one to spare!

What was the last book you read?:  The last book I officially finished was a couple days ago, The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything by James Martin, S.J.

Did you read from a list and fly by the seat of your pants choosing a different book each week?:  Strictly by the seat of my pants.

Did you learn something new about yourself, an author, an topic?:  Yes, I deepened my love-hate relationship with Charlotte Bronte, I learned I still like Western novels and I read my first Agatha Christie!

How many classics did you read?:  I think a lot of the books I read could be considered classics but classic is a subjective term.  I read Homer Odyssey but I also read The Maltese Falcon, both are 'classics.'

Did you discover a new author or genre?  Did you love them or hate them?  I discovered Mike Aquilina.  I am looking forward to reading more books by him.

Name your top ten favorite reads:  I'm not going to bother to do this question.   I'm too sleepy.

Name your bottom ten least favorite reads:  Still too sleepy, however, I will say that I enjoyed all 53 books.

Name a book you simply could not finish:  There were five of these.  

1)  I read about 2/3's of A Connecticut in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain but it dragged toward the end and I hit a wall and couldn't finish.  

2) I also read a lot of The Idea of the University by John Henry Newman but didn't finish it.  I just kept picking it up reading twenty pages at a pop and then putting it down; picking it up days later to read a different random twenty pages.  I want to go back and read the whole thing properly. 

3) I read most of St. Augustine's Confessions but I didn't finish past much of Chapter 10, so I didn't include it in my list.  

4)  I also started The Life of Johnson by Boswell, but this was right before Thanksgiving and Advent and life got too hectic.  I simply couldn't concentrate on it enough to appreciate it.   

5)  I also started a dreadful book called The Given Day by somebody but it was so violent and crass that it literally made me feel ill, so I stopped reading it!

Name a book you expected to like but didn't:  Riders of the Purple Sage was well written but I did not like all the prejudice against the Mormons.  That made me uncomfortable through much of the book.

Name a book you expected to not like but did:  I thought Rachel's Contrition would be 'Good Housekeeping' level writing (as my mother used to say) but it was pretty good!  

Right now I'm in the middle of 5 books.  I'm reading The Birds' Christmas Carol by Kate Douglas Wiggin to my 9 yo, David Copperfield by Dickens to the whole family, Augustine Came to Kent by Barbara Willard for our church history studies and Brahms; His Life and Works by ????  some German name.

Happy New Year!