No School Today? A Review

 

AS IN HOMESPUN


I have been meaning to review Christina Ramos-Payne's fine collection of homeschool comic strips for some time now. I have been a big fan of Cristina's blog Home Spun Juggling for some time now. This book, a collection of her early strips is fantastic.

I love comic strips and have most of my life. The Home Spun strips remind me in some ways of the excellent comic strip, For Better or For Worse. But Home Spun is definitely it's own animal.. Cristina really gets to the heart of homeschooling. I relate very easily to her work because my children are much like hers.   But even in the areas I can't can't empathize with she does a masterful job crafting her narrative so that the humor is obvious to all.
 
I guess the best way to review this book is to share some of the strips from the book ad tell you what I think of them. 
 
 
This is a great strip in so many ways. The thing I like most about it is the sentiment.  The Mom is glad that her daughter showed such kindness to her little brother.  At the same time she is bemused that her daughter will not be able to shine as the star of the show.  But you can tell by the wistful glance in the last panel that her daughter’s decision does make her the star of the show. 


I had my daughter write a short review of this  book for her blog.  This is the strip she liked most.  This strip rocks, because proficiency can never replace passion. 



I don’t know the technical terms related to comic strip writing.  So I just make up my own terms.  Each comic strip usually has one main punch line that the strip builds up to.  Sometimes there’s a joke at the end wholly unrelated to the continuity.  I would probably call it the non sequitir if there wasn’t already a strip with that name.  So I’ll call it the late hit.
The strips that I think do the late hit the best are Calvin And Hobbes and Fox Trot.  The above strip is of that caliber.  I also can relate quite well to it as Bunny has finished many a book just checked out from the library before we ever left the building.


I guess I don’t have to say why I like this strip. 

I would strongly recommend this book for both homeschoolers and comic strip aficionados and folks like me who are both.  No School Today can be purchased at Amazon,  Barnes And Noble and Create Space

Keith Rhymes with Grief.

 IS FOR GRIEF

Wait one minute, you might be thinking.  In yesterday's post you basically promised that G would be for Give-A-Way.  You indicated that you would be giving away some state quarters. 

That's true, I really did.  Then I realized that today (April 7th) is the 3 year anniversary of my brother Keith's death.  I just didn't feel like putting my Crazy Uncle Dave hat on over my mourning brother one.  So, the quarter give-a-way will be soon.  You won't have to wait all the way to Q, I promise.

I have spent better than an hour rehashing Keith stories here and then deleting them.  I do that because this post is not really about remembering Keith.  I do that often.  This post is not really about his life. This post is about the grief I feel from his death.

I thought that it might be good to give a working definition of grief.  Since I decided to check in at Show My Face for Six Word Saturday. Here are my 6 words:

Grief - Deep stress caused by bereavement*.

*Bereavement is generally associated  with the loss of a loved one by death.

Pushing 50 as I am, I am not a total stranger to death.  Most of that death has come as a result of old age.  My grandparents all died between the ages of 79 and 97.  Keith was 7 months from 39 when he passed away.  Sometimes, even now, I can't wrap my head around him being gone. 

I do still have deep stress about his passing.  This stress is not daily, nor weekly, or even monthly.  It will sometimes hit me at random times but generally hits at 3 times during the year: On or near his birthday, the anniversary of his death, and Christmastime.  Teaching school, blogging or just about anything becomes difficult to focus on and I become quite a bit more irritable. 

A few months after Keith died I won a book from the Library Thing Early Reviewers Program about bereavement.  I still haven't read it fully or reviewed it.  I guess it's hard for me to imagine reviewing a book for early reviewers 3 years after it came out.  The book's title "In the Grip of Bereavement"  accurately describes my episodes of grief.  I really do feel like grief has a hold on me during these times.

Keith has now been dead longer than he was sick.  Our sister who is 3.5 years his junior is now the same age he was when he died. Life has gone on without him.  His children were 8 and 5 when he died that means they are 11 and 8 now.  In just 2 years his daughter will have lived longer without a father than with one. 

My faith in God has been a great sustainer over the past 3 years.  Even so,  sometimes the grief is so strong it is all I seem to be able to feel.  Sometimes I am even frightened that someday I may not grieve at all.  These thoughts and feelings are not the entirety of who I am.  but like today's post, which is neither well crafted nor polished, they are incredibly real. 

For more 6 word Saturday Click Here.

To see other G posts in Blogging A to Z click here.

 

Alphabetical Fragments (and a Puppyism)

 AS IN FRIDAY

Last week,I announced I would probably not be  participating in the next few editions of Friday Fragments at Half Past Kissing Time.  My reasoning was that with 26 posts to write in 30 days time, I would probably not want to waste any of my ideas by consolidating them into fragment form. 

So, why am I here?  Well,quite simply, it is because  Friday and Fragments both begin with today's letter (which by the way is F).  I could not resist.  So, I decided to share with the Friday Fragments community some fragments regarding blogging A to Z.

Blogging A to Z, simply put is a blogging challenge.  You choose 26 words, one from each letter of the alphabet.  The fun started this Sunday and excluding the remaining Sundays of the month of April the alphabetical posts will continue until Z on April 30th. 

1,852 blogs signed up to participate at the A to Z Home Page. Many participants, like myself, are just making random posts using a different letter each time.  However, many blogs are centering their entries on a theme.

For my fragments this week, I have chosen 5 participating blogs that are sporting a theme and will provide a link to one of the entries they have already contributed.

ALPHA FRAGMENT A:

The first blog is right before mine in the list of participants.  Kimberly of Meetings with my Muse has an alliteration theme.  Each day she shares an alliterative sentence or two featuring  the letter of the day, and then opens up her comments for submissions.  At the end of the month she will be giving some amazon gift cards to some of the best submissions.  Here is her A post.

ALPHA FRAGMENT B

The next blog, is the Star Trek Science Blog. I believe it is the only blog on my blogroll that is participating in the challenge. It is also, I believe, how I found out about Blogging A to Z.  Oddly enough, they have a Star Trek them for their submissions.  I really enjoyed B is for Boothby, I hope you do as well.

ALPHA FRAGMENT C

One of my mini goals for this month is to visit 740 of the participating blogs.  This is because I am the 371st blog on the list.  So by looking at all 370 ahead of me and the first 370 after me I would get to 740.  I found Words and Pictures  while working my way back from 741.   The pictures, for this month anyway, are moving ones.  Yes, each day she posts about a movie.  This Tuesday, she wrote about Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

ALPHA FRAGMENT D

The next blog is one of the first 5 blogs listed at the main page.  Stephen Tremp of Breakthrough is basing all his posts on what is called the Goldilocks Zone.  I think this refers to the parts of this vast universe that will sustain human life.  I have found his articles very enlightening and encouraging.  I present D is for Distance. 

ALPHA FRAGMENT E

I actually found this next blog through the previous blog.  Stephen, perhaps in his role, as a co host of Blogging A to Z, gave a shout out to the Blog Gospel Driven Disciples.  I checked it out and Greg is blogging about the people, places and words of the Bible.  On Thursday he wrote E is for Eve.

AND A PUPPYISM

I usually can't get through a Friday Fragment session without a puppyism.  This is because Puppy can't usually go a day without a shareable nugget.  This morning I handed her math book and told her to go into her work department and I'd be right there to help her with it.  She looked at the assignment and started panicking.  "Subtraction!"  I can't do subtraction."  I told her to bring the book to the work department and I'd help her when I got there.  After I got Spider Droid started with his math I walked over to Puppy and saw that she had already started.  I asked her if she needed help with her subtraction and she said "no, this is just minusing."

That's all the fragments I have for today.  For more Friday Fragments click here.  For more  blogging A to Z click here.  Thanks for stopping by and make sure you come back here  tomorrow.  I don't want to give away anything.  I just want to state that I will be putting in my 25 cents worth.  In the radio biz, that's what we call a tease. 

Encouragment

 AS IN ENCOURAGEMENT

The past few days have been a whirlwind of activity and emotions for me.  Tuesday morning I woke up at 3:45 a.m. drove to Michigan and picked up my friends the Lebedevs  (Vladimir and Tonya) who I worked with in Russia almost 20 years ago. 

It was a wonderful trip culminated by taking them to Chicago and going to the top of the John Hancock Building.  It was also a stressful trip.  The kids were well behaved much of the time, but the long trip and the early hours did seem to be getting to everyone.  After a fantastic dinner at the Cheesecake Factory, on the first floor of the Hancock Complex, I drove the Lebedev's to where they would be staying for the night and Amy (who had met us at Hancock) drove the girls home.  Since the family they were staying  with lived in the polar opposite suburbs than us, I did not get home until 12:30 a.m. 

After such a long day on Tuesday, I was wiped out physically and emotionally on Wednesday.  Wednesday night I was supposed to again travel about 50 miles to see Vladimir speak.  This would be their last night of their trip and my last opportunity to see my dear friends for some time.  Yet, I was still very weary and not looking forward to the meeting as much as I had one day earlier.  Still I went and am very glad I did.

Vladimir shared about his work in Russia as a church leader and Bible College teacher and gave an excellent talk on Colossians.  It was so encouraging.  It was especially amazing that he gave this talk in English which is his 2nd language. 

While I was there, I saw Dwayne King who was a missionary in Khabarovsk, Russia at the same time I was.  Dwayne is a missionary pilot from Alaska and a book was written about his life recently.  Dwayne gave me a copy of his book, which had this inscription:

"David, I have great memories of working with you in Khabarovsk.  They remember you and still appreciate your ministry."

That inscription, Vladimir's message and time spent with all 3 of my fellow co-workers meant an awful lot to me.  Words (written or spoken) and acts of encouragement are so vital and important in thriving in this life time. 

In future posts I hope to share more about my visit with the Lebedev's and also to review Dwayne's book

Come back tomorrow for some fragments about my first week of Blogging from A to Z.