A Life Better Than I Deserve

Nov. 23, 2009

Review: C. S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters

When I was seventeen years old and only a few short years after my spiritual conversion, I attempted to read C. S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters. I say attempted because I neither recall completing it nor did I feel I really comprehended it completely. I never did study it again until now. Yet as much as I looked forward to listening to this audio drama, I did not anticipate how brilliantly disturbing yet insightful this audio drama would be.  True to the spirit of the original letters penned by C. S. Lewis and published in book form in 1942 as The Screwtape Letters, this audio rendition not only captures Lewis' depiction of the demonic underworld but also sheds light on the nature of human temptation. Indeed, Lewis' underworld is a dark depiction of a totalitarian bureaucracy, with demons not only delighting to torment their human victims in order to escape punishment themselves but also out to manipulate and even torment their fellow-demons. By learning to recognize demonic temptations in our own lives, Christians can hope to better thwart these schemes. For Lewis' original intent was perhaps best expressed by his stepson, Doug Gresham: You see, to know what's contained here is to gain vital insights into how to fight those beings who would devour you even while they are embracing you in an imitation of love. Now you can laugh at them, and that really annoys them. This audio drama, due to some mature subject matter as well as the intense dramatic interpretation, is recommended for ages 12 and up, which is an appropriate guideline. My own 14 year old has become quite enamored with not only this audio drama, but has now almost completed reading Lewis' original The Screwtape Letters--inspired by listening to this audio drama. However, I have not been allowing my younger children to listen to the audio CDs nor view the bonus DVD with behind-the-scenes featurettes. The outstanding cast, including such actors as Geoffrey Palmer portraying C. S. Lewis and Andy Serkis (perhaps best known as Gollum in The Lord of the Rings ) portraying Screwtape, has entertained me while it has occasionally convicted me of my own susceptibility to temptation. If this review intrigues you, be sure to look at the official Screwtape audio drama website for more information about this audio drama and bonuses including a downloadable study guide, audio samples, ring tones, wallpaper and icons. This set includes 4 CDs of approximately 4 hours of material, plus a bonus DVD. I was provided a free review copy of this audio drama by Tyndale House. However, I was not compensated in any other manner, and opinions expressed represent my own honest opinion.

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Nov. 23, 2009

Review: We R Fun Life on the Farm board game

Recently our family received a fun, educational board game from We R Fun, Inc. My children are always up for a fun way to learn, so they were understandably excited when this multiple award-winning game arrived on our doorstep! As the granddaughter of a Wisconsin dairy farmer, I was glad for a way to teach my children something about their own family's heritage, since my children never had opportunity to meet their great grandfather. Although this game is designed for ages "8-108," we have found that if our 4 year old receives help from an older sibling or parent, even she can play along and have fun learning about life on a dairy farm! However, if your preschool or kindergarten aged child would be sad to see that one of their cows was struck by lightning or a passing automobile, you may choose to postpone playing until he or she is a little older. How do I play this game? Up to six players may play at a time. Basically, this game is played by everyone rolling the dice and proceeding around a roughly circular game board. As you move, you land on spaces which give instructions to draw a "Farm Income" or "Farm Expense"--or something else entirely. You pay money, earn money, buy or sell cattle, help a neighbor, take a shortcut, or perhaps even lose a cow to complete your turn. When you complete a circuit around the board, you get to collect "milk money"--your primary source of income! You will want to purchase cattle until you have 60 cows in order to win the game--but watch out! As your herd increases, so do your expenses! Certain cards will see you paying out more money than others, so choose wisely when and how many cattle to purchase! Our own children have been enjoying playing the short version of the game, which generally lasts around an hour, although it can easily last longer. In one game I kept acquiring money yet could never seem to land on a "cattle auction" space in order to purchase more cattle! When I finally did, I purchased over 20 at once and quickly moved from last place to winning the game! We have not attempted the longer version of this game yet, since the shorter version has worked fine for the amount of time we generally have to play games as well as my children's attention spans. Now, what do I like about this game? Sturdy manufacture--the game is fairly heavy-duty in its construction. With a little care, it should last through many playings. Easy to learn and understand how to play. Employs strategy (as in deciding how many cows to purchase) as well as chance (with the roll of the dice). Representative of the joys and challenges of life on a dairy farm. You may choose between a regular and a "short" version of the game. Fun!  The Life on the Farm game can be ordered directly from We R Fun's ordering page yet is also available at specialty retailers and Kmart.com. This board game, priced at $25--or the preschool version, available for only $25--would make a nice family Christmas present! This game was invented by Keith Gohl and Ev Johnson, a brother-sister team. Keith himself is a third generation midwest dairy farmer. You can find out more about the inventors of this unique game on the about the inventors page. This company also offers a farm theme-related math game titled "-13" and maintains a growing website. If you are looking for some fun, family-friendly farm jokes to share while playing this game, see these. To quote the We R Fun, Inc. website, we found this game to be "'udder'-ly unpredictable" and lots of fun for my children! I was provided a free copy of this We R Fun board game for review purposes. I did not receive any monetary compensation in exchange for providing my honest review, and the opinions expressed represent my own and my family's experiences with this product. To read more about this product and many more exciting homeschooling products, please visit the Homeschool Crew web page.

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Nov. 22, 2009

Last Week's Activities in Photos

Okay, I said I would try to share these photos Friday, but my camera battery went dead right after my husband came home Friday and he took a short video of my two year old. So, we had to charge the battery up today. So, here are some photos today! Here is a recent woodworking project my son completed for scouts. He actually completed that one last weekend, but close enough! Doesn't my son look proud? That aloe vera plant on the back deck behind him came inside this week, as it has turned cold lately. And here are some of the Operation Christmas Child boxes my daughters packed this week. Below you can see one of my daughters wrapping shoeboxes. Here are the shoeboxes my children bought gifts for and packed for Operation Christmas Child. And here is nearly $1500 worth of Trail's End popcorn and trail mix, stacked in our living room ready to be checked off and tagged to be delivered! And below is what happens when you spend all week at church packing shoeboxes, you sort and deliver BSA Trail's End popcorn, and your husband goes out of town to a conference. Something has to give somewhere, and this week it was laundry getting folded and put away. We finally are caught up just in time to need to wash a few more loads!    So, there is our week in pictures! How was your week?

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Nov. 19, 2009

Chocolate, Popcorn, and Shoeboxes

Just in case anyone is wondering where I have been this week, I can sum it up in three words . . . Chocolate Our American Heritage Girls Troop turned in its chocolate fundraiser order Wednesday. We had a goal of 300 boxes. By the grace of God, we sold 303 boxes. What a relief! And, no, don't ask me to head up your next fundraiser! I do NOT like to pester people about these types of things! Trust me, ask someone else! Popcorn Wednesday night we picked up $1490 worth of popcorn tins and boxes, plus some bags of Trail Mix. I'm still signing neat little Christmas-themed gift labels thanking all my son's customers for being such faithful customers and supporters of scouting so that we can begin delivering those tomorrow! I had thought that maybe I should have come up with a photo of my son in his scout uniform this time to make small cards, but I just never had time to get fancy! Shoeboxes Operation Christmas Child time. Our older 4 children each packed shoeboxes this year, corresponding to their own ages and genders. Since our church is a local drop-off point and since my two older girls needed service hours for AHG, we have been spending much of the week up at church helping receive, gift wrap, and box up all those shoeboxes. I believe the official count this evening was 1,050 or close to that. We have genuinely had fun checking all those boxes for taped labels, rubber bands, wrapping them, etc.! Interesting informational tidbit: the shoeboxes from our church generally wind up going to India and Peru. Besides, it wound up working well with our schedule to head up after schoolwork in the afternoons anyway. Monday we had homeschool 4-H club at church, Tuesday we had Webelos den meeting at church, Wednesday we had Wednesday evening church plus popcorn pick-up, and today we had a piano lesson up at the church. I had planned to add some photos to this post, but I left the camera upstairs and I have been on my feet in an old pair of tennis shoes all week . . . so I'll try to add those photos tomorrow instead!

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Nov. 17, 2009

Review: Exploramania's Gymathtics!

This exercise DVD with a unique twist recently arrived in our mailbox. Can you guess what it is by the title? Yes, Mathletics is an exercise DVD which incorporates some math concepts into the stretches, movements and strengthening exercises. My first impression was that this was a really neat concept! However, my slightly critical side immediately wondered whether this approach would really work--combining learning math with an exercise routine. In case you are wondering, the covered math concepts target a 2nd through 5th grade level. These are the sections covered within approximately 30 minutes: shape stretches warm-up includes line, circle and polygon exercises counting calisthenics includes aerobic movements to work your heart as well as counting concepts pattern power includes growing and repeating pattern exercises combinations and is aerobic in nature (the youngest girl cast member is absent for this portion of the DVD) well-being wind down includes stretches, soft music, and some voice over of healthy lifestyle tips My 11 year old, 9 year old, 4 year old and 2 year old children were the test subjects for this "interactive math and exercise experience." I have viewed the video along with them, and I have also modeled some of the movements for my children in order to encourage their participation. Although this DVD is not exactly suited toward more adult tastes, my children have enjoyed not only watching it but also exercising to it. My 2nd grader and 4 year old seem to have enjoyed it the most. Yet the math material covered was for the age ranges of my 2nd through 5th graders. I am slightly surprised that my children have enjoyed it as much as they have, as I wondered whether it would prove too juvenile in appeal for my own 5th and 2nd graders. I actually think this DVD may be a good fit for my dyslexic 2nd grader, who seems to be a more kinesthetic learner and even for my 5th grade son who, being a boy, simply craves more physical activity during the day than my girls do. Overall, my 4 year old has been the one who has expressed the most interest in watching this DVD and doing the exercises. Yet I am also not seeing the math concepts this program purports to teach translating to their learning. My children simply are not pointing out parallel lines and repeating patterns in their everyday lives. My 4 year old has not begun picking up on the concepts, which are admittedly above her level. However, we have not been using this program long and perhaps some of these math concepts might start to become ingrained over time. My instinct is that the appeal level is a little lower than the concepts covered, so unless your child is younger yet needing more math stimulation, older in age yet more juvenile in what appeals to them, or you are desiring an exercise program for inclement weather days or some other special need, this DVD may not be your best option. Some of the strengths of this program are: the different aged children are friendly and appealing, with the children closest in age to my own children's ages being the most appealing the teacher is friendly and energetic the math concepts are correct a variety of exercises and activities are included preschool to early elementary appeal This DVD retails for $24.99 and this company is offering a free shipping and handling special. Other products offered by this company include an Exploracise floor mat and some very colorful soccer balls which have math concepts printed on them. A second level DVD is coming soon. Honestly, this is not something we normally would have sought out to purchase, especially at this price. Yet I can see times when we will pull this DVD out on a rainy day for some exercise with perhaps a little reinforcement of math concepts thrown in as a side bonus. I was provided a free copy of this DVD for review purposes. I did not receive any monetary compensation in exchange for providing my honest review, and the opinions expressed represent my own and my family's experiences with this product. To read more about this product and many more exciting homeschooling products, please visit the Homeschool Crew web page.

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Nov. 15, 2009

Review: Squeezing Good Out of Bad by James N. Watkins

Recently my own life has handed me a few "lemons," so when I had the opportunity to read James Watkins' study on dealing with how Christians should handle the problems (or "lemons") in one's life--a book which promised to be humorous, no less!--I decided to give it a read. What did I find? Well, whether his book refreshes or sours your own cup of tea may greatly depend on the flavor and quality of your tea. Now, while many of Watkins' humorous stories rang true for me, just a few hit a flat note. I couldn't help but appreciate the sweet humor of a man who wrote about the reasons why dark chocolate is good for you, yet some of the humor was simply not my cup of tea. Similarly, many of his spiritual insights were refreshing while just a few I had to beg to differ with. Actually, for the first half of his book (a book which, incidentally, has been written with chapters in descending rather than ascending order) I was thinking that I was reading more of a personal inspirational book rather than a Bible Study, although each chapter does include personal reflection questions. It was in the second half of the book that more in-depth discussions of Scripture are included, and it was after I finished the book that I located some study guide questions on the author's web site to correspond with each chapter. This makes this book much more useful as a Bible study. So, it is with mixed feelings that I discuss this semi-sweet Bible study. A few of Watkins' illustrations along with their spiritual lessons I will probably remember, but overall I will walk away with the citrus-sweet tang of refreshment in my nostrils while I leave the more sour undertones behind. Squeezing Good Out of Bad would probably prove most useful as a Bible study for those within a church family who are currently struggling--due to unemployment, family crisis, illness, or other difficulties. I can recommend this Bible Study with a few reservations, as I do feel there is still a good volume of healthy juice to be squeezed out of it. If this study is of interest to you, you may wish to read an excerpt from chapter 5 from the author's website. This 111 page Bible Study was an easy, often humorous read and is available for $12.95 in paperback, $4.95 as a download, and $3.96 as a Kindle download. I was provided a free review copy of this book from Kathy Carlton Willis.

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Nov. 15, 2009

Review: Becoming More Than a Good Bible Study Girl

A few days ago I finished reading Becoming More Than a Good Bible Study Girl by Lysa TerKeurst, the President of Proverbs 31 Ministries. Initially I found myself drawn into this inspirational book by Lysa's humor. Lysa truly is a gifted storyteller. In an early chapter, "When I Feel I Don't Measure Up," her brownie bake sale had me not only laughing but reading the story aloud to my family to enjoy. From that chapter on, she had me hooked. Yet it is not simply Lysa's humor but also her transparency in sharing her own less than glorious moments from girlhood through womanhood which really brings her own spiritual journey to life for her readers. Sharing her sometimes painful life's struggles with such honesty in order to inspire younger women toward spiritual growth is what makes this a good book. If you find yourself struggling with your own walk with God--finding yourself simply going through the motions of church attendance, quiet times and prayer--consider allowing yourself to laugh along with Lysa and see whether her joy does not inspire and encourage you as well. Purchase this book from Zondervan here. This resource is also available as a Bible study set of DVD lessons with accompanying workbooks, as an ebook download, an audiobook download, or as an audio CD purchase. I was provided a free review copy of this book from Zondervan.

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Nov. 14, 2009

Review: AVKO

I was provided a free year's membership to AVKO for review purposes. I did not receive any monetary compensation in exchange for providing my honest review, and the opinions expressed represent my own and my family's experiences with this product. To read more about this product and many more exciting homeschooling products, please visit the Homeschool Crew web page. What is AVKO, exactly? Well, I had heard some good things about a spelling program called Sequential Spelling, and I discovered that this is the organization which produces that curriculum. Now, I have not used this particular spelling program, though it was in my top few options when I was researching a spelling change a few years ago--and I have talked to a few people who really love it. So I was interested in finding out more about this particular curriculum. So, what is AVKO all about? First, AVKO is an educational non-profit organization based on the following mission statement: AVKO is a non-profit, 501(C)3 membership organization that focuses on the development and production of materials and especially techniques to teach reading and spelling, handwriting (manuscript and cursive), and keyboarding.  AVKO is dedicated to the teaching everyone how to read and spell, regardless of their mild to moderate learning disabilities, dyslexia, poverty, or opportunity.  Its founder, Don McCabe, is himself a dyslexic and this program focuses on addressing the reading difficulties associated with learning disabilities--particularly dyslexia. Both Sequential Spelling as well as the AVKO membership option will probably prove most useful for families which have dyslexic children. I have skimmed a couple of the e-books which are available free to members and it is all very interesting, though I cannot say that I understand all the theory and method yet. However, in clicking on different pages of this website I further discovered that this method both holds some similarities with the Charlotte Mason method as well as some differences (which gave me some food for thought, since we incorporate some of Charlotte Mason's ideas into our homeschool). I also can tell you that this method seems to rely on using multisensory learning techniques as well as word families in teaching reading and spelling. As I have time in upcoming weeks and months, I hope to read up on this philosophy more and decide whether our family will be implementing portions of it in the future as well as discover how it is both alike and different from our current reading program, which is working for our dyslexic child. I can also tell you that if this approach is of interest to you, you may be able to save considerably (over $400!) by purchasing either a basic membership for $25.00 per year or a Deluxe Membership for $100.00 a year. If this might benefit your family, be sure to read the detailed benefits here on the Membership benefits page. AVKO also maintains an AVKO's Freebies page, which can be a great place to learn more about AVKO to see whether this program may be a good fit for your own family.

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