I just got this in my email today and HAD to share--I've already downloaded my copy. Thank you, TOS!

It's your FREE gift . . .

Get ready to . . .
Wrap your family in a ribbon of thankfulness and joy and
season your holiday with laughter, love, and togetherness.
Start planning now for a wondrous holiday season with . . .
 

The TOS 2009 Digital Holiday Supplement

WOW . . . a gorgeous Holiday/Christmas Digital Magazine filled with a fabulous lineup of planning, recipe, gift, and craft ideas you'll love. 

“This is TOS’s gift to the homeschooling community, and anyone is welcome to it. The 2009 Digital Holiday Supplement will fulfill your yearnings for fresh and original additions to your long-treasured, family customs, and maintain Christ’s honored position first, and foremost, in your celebrations.”

—Gena Suarez, publisher of The Old Schoolhouse^® Magazine

This week I began reading several different types of books--Christian living, children's fiction, and adult Christian fiction. In an evening I finished C. S. Lewis' last book of the Narnia series, [appropriately titled] The Last Battle .  I also began  D. Martin Lloyd-Jones' Spiritual Depression Its Causes and Cure. The title sounds dreadfully boring, but it's actually one of the best things I've picked up in a long time. Here's a challenging excerpt  from chapter three, "Men As Trees, Walking"  :

We are considering this subject not only because it is sad and tragic that any Christian should ever be miserable, but because of the whole state of the Church today. I have no hesitation in asserting again that one of the reasons why the Christian Church counts for so little in the modern world is that so many are in this condition. If all Christians simply began to function as the New Testament would have us to do, there would be no problem of evangelism...It is because we are failing as Christian people in our daily lives and deportment and witness that the Church counts for so little and that so few attracted to God through our Lord Jesus Christ. So for that most urgent reason alone it behoves us to deal with this question...

 

On a recent trip to the library I picked up some Christian fiction. The only current Christian fiction author I care for is Jan Karon. Another author came highly recommended and I sighed while pulling it off the shelf, hoping to be pleasantly surprised.  Let's just say that Christian Gothic/prairie/Amish/western/modern romances  and Christian serial killer series aren't  appealing to me. But I do like classics, some mysteries, and--of course--Hank the Cowdog books.   Our local library is small and has a limited space [about three small shelves] devoted to classics.

To change the subject slightly, our librarian commented that our local library would be moving into a part of the new public school about to built in the community. It will be a little strange taking my homeschooled kids to school just to go to the library, though  we certainly could use a bigger library facility.  Here's hoping there'll be more room for classics.

It's time to pass along  the products I liked on CBD's "Fab Friday" sale this week.   The first is something I'd like to get for hubby---shhh! Don't tell him!

Pastoral Ministry  Retail 24.99, SALE $8.99

KJV Compact Reference Bible with Magnetic Flap Closure Blue Bonded Leather  reg. $24.95, SALE $9.99

The Beloved Poetry of Helen Steiner Rice reg. $19.95, SALE $2.99

 Here are direct links to CBD's   Homeschool   and    Marriage, Parenting & Homelife sections. Enjoy!

It's time for my Fab Friday book sale from Christian Book Distributors!   Wow--these are some real deals! !  Elizabeth George's books are so well written and helpful when you are teaching daughters.   The Noah's Ark book is georgiously illustrated--just follow the link to view a sample. The Charles Stanley book looks really good, too. Enjoy!

Landmines in the Path of the Believer: Avoiding the Hidden Dangers By Charles F. Stanley

From CBD:

" Are you aware of the hidden dangers planted by Satan along your spiritual path? Helping you navigate the devil's minefield, Stanley shows how to identify, avoid, and defuse seven explosive booby traps that can derail your faith---pride, jealousy, insecurity, compromise, unforgiveness, sexual sin, and laziness. A must-have survival guide for your Christian journey! 256 pages, hardcover from Nelson."

Regularly, $19.99, on sale TODAY for $4.99

The Abbey Road Sessions/The Walk--CD and DVD By Steven Curtis Chapman

This is a cd and dvd set. Regularly $18.99

on sale for $1.99

The Elizabeth George Young Woman's Collection

This collection has three books in one. Her books sell for $7.99 each, but here's three for $6.99

Regularly $17.99, on sale for $6.99

KJV New Testament - Audio Bible on Cassette

Regularly $39.99, on sale $4.99

The Story of Noah and the Ark, According to the Book of Genesis the King James Bible By Gennady Spirin, illus.

Regularly $18.99, on sale $2.99

Thoughts & Reflections on Billy Graham's Life Principles

Retail: $14.99

Sale:  $ .99

This is a hardcover, 128 page book. What a deal!

Wycliffe Bible Dictionary By Charles F. Pfeiffer

From CBD:

"Comprehensive enough to satisfy the avid student, and inexpensive enough to meet the needs of the layperson! This Bible dictionary gives you extensive information on every proper name and place in Scripture, as well as doctrinal, historical, and theological topics. Includes articles by more than 200 leading evangelical scholars, photos, maps, charts, and more! 1871 pages, hardcover from Hendrickson."

Regularly $39.99, on sale for $14.99

The Senior: My Amazing Year As a 59-Year-Old College Football Linebacker By Mike Flynt with Don Yaeger / Thomas Nelson Chatting with former college buddies, Mike Flynt mentioned his regret about not completing his senior year with the football team. Could he tackle his dream again? Read how this 59-year-old grandfather returned to his alma mater and played linebacker! An inspiring story about possibilities and fulfilled dreams---great for baby boomers! Includes practical fitness tips. 224 pages, hardcover from Nelson.

Reg. 24. 99---sale $7.99

Trying to read the Bible through in a year is a real challenge for me. I tried but I'd just lose my place, or hit a rough patch and need to get down the commentary and the dictionary and about that time the baby cries becuase it's time for the kids to get up... Well, I finally got a little help in this area.

One of my husband's friends gave him a really nice gift. It was the Bible Explorer 4.0 cd. I have to confess, I use it as much as he does!  It has a customizable Bible plan calendar, several versions to choose from, and lots of study helps.  I set my Bible plan up in July, and I'm still on track. Not only that, but when we read a chapter in church or finish a chapter in homeschool, I go to the plan and check off what I've read.  It's also handy to look up things without  trotting off to the office to find the commentary, dictionary, atlas, what have you. It's all right there.  Yea--Mommy's got her study time back again!

I really love the classic Christian literature included, too, like Paradise Lost, Augustine's Confessions, E. M. Bounds entire set on prayer, and works by Alfred Edersheim.  I heard him mentioned by Diana Waring on her cds. There are lots of commentaries, devotional, and study helps,  too.  If you are a CBD member [5$], you can get this for $14.99. CBD listed the retail price at $99. Whoo-hoo!  I just love finding help like this!

Bible Explorer 4.0 Limited III on CD-ROM

I could go faster if I didn't always carry my heavy bookbag.  There's usually an assortment of theology, history, homeschooling, or cooking books/magazines in it. And I always carry paper and pencil in my bookbag.  I'm the kind of reader that has to respond to what I read, or jot down titles/authors references to remember later.  Today I had Robin Sampson's "What Every Child Should Know" and a printout of books from www.amblesideonline.org  .

I've just started Ravi Zacharias' Deliver Us From Evil. As usual, it's engrossing from the first page--and it needs rereading. I like a book that requires careful thought to process. While I usually am a fast reader,  Zacharias' books take me more time. His writing has sparked conversation in this house many times over the years, becuase my husband enjoys his works, too.

The kids have picked up this habit, too. My son started reading Pilgrim's Progress on his own this morning, and my oldest daughter read Elizabeth George's Proverbs 31 for Little Girls.  The baby is just chewing on books, but I see promise for her reading future ahead!

If you enjoy history, here's a very satisfying series of books. Philip Schaff's 8 volume  History of the Christian Church   is detailed on the events, the people, and the ideas that shaped the church through the ages.

I'm reading Volume 4 now and it, along with Diana Waring's history cds for this time period [Middle Ages] has helped me a great deal in teaching my children. We're using Mystery of History 2, and these have helped help me, as a teacher, flesh out the time period.

 By the way, the Schaff series is marked down from nearly $300 at Christianbook to $59.99. 

History of the Christian Church, 8 Volumes By Philip Schaff

What in the World's Going on Here? Pt. 2 By Diana Waring

 One of the pleasures of winter is the joy of being warm and cozy, curled up with a cup of tea and a good book. I've just finished a delightful one---Elisabeth Elliot's Let Me Be A Woman.  Sigh--the trials of being a church librarian. There's just not enough time for all those delightful reads!

Here's a couple of lists of the books I've finished and the ones I'm working on. Not all the selections are for the church library [like the Shakespeare plays!]

Finished

• St. Matthew
• Let Me Be  A Woman, Elisabeth Elliot
• Money Matters, Dave Ramsey
• In the Fullnes of Time, Paul Maier
• What in the World's Going On Here?, David Jeremiah
• Recapture the Wonder, Ravi Zacharias [EXCELLENT book]
• Hamlet, Othello, and King Lear--Shakespeare
• The Case for Christmas, Lee Strobel
• The End of Reason: A Response to the New Atheism, Ravi Zacharias
• November/December issue of Victoria magazine

In Progress

• The Complete Works of Josephus
• Why the Nativity?, David Jeremiah
• With Christ In the School of Prayer, Brother Andrew

Feel free to share your reading list too! I'll be expanding this one as time permits.

Father Brown, from G.K. Chesterton's "The Oracle of the Dog" :

"...It's part of something I've noticed more and more in the modern world...  People readily swallow the untested claims of this, that, or the other.  It's drowning all your old rationalism and scepticism, it's coming in like a sea; and the name of it is superstition....

"It's the first effect of not believing in God that you lose your common sense and can't see things as they are. Anything that anybody talks about, and says there's a good deal in it, extends itself indefinitely like a vista in a nightmare. And a dog is an omen, and a cat is a mystery, and a pig is a mascot and beetle is a scarab, calling up all the menagerie of polytheism from Egypt and old India; Dog Anubis and great green-eyed Pasht and all the holy howling bulls of Bashan; reeling back to the bestial gods of the beginning, escaping into elephants and snakes and crocodiles; and all because you are frightened of four words:

'HE WAS MADE MAN.' "

Christian Book Distributors has a great deal going EVERY weekend called FAB FRIDAY sales.  Scroll down just a bit in my sidebar and enter "FAB FRIDAY" in my search box and you'll find some amazing deals each weekend.

This FAB FRIDAY specials include:

3:16 NEW TESTAMENT with essays by Max Lucado,  regular $9.99, FAB FRIDAY'd at $2.99

BRIGHT IDEAS FOR MOMS, Karol Ladd, regular $12.99, FAB FRIDAY'd at  $1.99

PLANET WORD NKJV STUDENT BIBLE, regular $21.99, FAB FRIDAY'd at $5.99

WOW!

Callapidder Days blog is hosting a FALL READING CHALLENGE--I blogged about it earlier. Here's What I hoped to read--

• Hinds' Feet on High Places
• Hope Again, Charels Swindoll
• Keeping Our Children's Hearts, Steven and Terri Maxwell
• The Enthusiastic Home Schooler, Mary Hood, Ph.D.
• Godliness is Great Gain
• Wisdom and the Millers, Mildred A. Martin
• Prayer 101, Warren Wiersbe
• The Great Divorce, C.S. Lewis
• A Family Guide to Biblical Holidays, Robin Sampson
• The Plug-In Drug, Marie Winn
• God's Secretaries: The Making of the KJV
• more Jan Karon Mitford series books

I've mangaed to read 1/3 of what i set as my goal. i've read more books--just not what's on my list. I'm reading Shonda Parker's Mommy Diagnostics  and Debi Pearl's Created to Be His Helpmeet and G. K. Chesterton's Father Brown mysteries [selected]. I had read the PLUG-IN DRUG before, but wanted to read it again. HOWEVER, due to more interesting stuff in my bookpile lack of time, I think I'll drop that from my Fall list.

I have to be honest. I'm trying to read Hinds' Feet in High Places but I'm just not getting into it. I just want to tell Much Afraid "GET OVER IT AND GO ON , WILL YA'  ???????"

Cranky while reading a Christian classic, much beloved by people everywhere? Oh well, I'll just blame that on the sinus medicine, too.

Mommy Diagnostics by Shonda Parker is a book I wish I'd had when my children were infants! I'm only 3/4 of the way through it, but have dog-eared, underlined, and hi-lited so much already!

I've gingerly investigated healthy living for a while. I say "gingerly", because  it concerns me that there may be a lot of false information floating around out there. Also, I don't want to be one of those folks who are "made merchandise of". [2 Peter 2:3]. I'm more than a bit skeptical of the televangelists hawking supplements and Bible diets to cure sickness, fatness, halitosis, and romance problems.  I don't like someone trying to shame me into a sense of "unspiritualness" to get me to buy their products. On matters of health, give me proof and research, not just someone trying to build a semi-religious following.

Mrs. Parker backs up with research and experience the benefits of natural medicine, and does not denounce traditional practictioners or those who use a blended approach to wellness.   I've often shied away from natural medicine for being too "eastern" , or those who claim that you aren't Godly enough if you don't do everything that this book that Preacher Thus-and-So has endorsed.   The Christian viewpoint of the author isn't inferred, it's explicit. That's very much appreciated, but so is her committment to help readers make informed  individual choices.

I'm looking forward to reading the rest of it!  If you have healthly living tips, links, or other information, please leave a comment!

As part of my selections for the FALL READING CHALLENGE, I  finished Prayer 101 by Warren Wiersbe this morning.   The chapters are short and to the point, perfect for a group study, personal study, and reading aloud. 

The first sections starts out with helping us to sort out real prayer from empty religious statements,  "church-speak" that has become cliche.  Dr. Wiersbe teaches about eliminating useless, vain repetitious or unthinking speech, and then prods us to consider our attitudes about prayer. Are we praying in a manner that recognizes God as our loving Father? Do we understand that our prayer should be in accordance with His will?   In the last section the author urges us to consider how we approach the throne of grace and how often we approach it.

My favorite quote is this:

"The Father always gives His best to those who leave the choice with Him." 

Amen!

I'm a little late to jump in, but I will anyway.  What a pleasurable challenge! Since childhood, I and  books have been very dear friends.  I have alot of books to review for the church library, too. Here's a partial list of what I have to read. Here's hoping I can get quite a few of these read:

• Hinds' Feet on High Places
• Hope Again, Charels Swindoll
• Keeping Our Children's Hearts, Steven and Terri Maxwell
• The Enthusiastic Home Schooler, Mary Hood, Ph.D.
• Godliness is Great Gain
• Wisdom and the Millers, Mildred A. Martin
• Prayer 101, Warren Wiersbe
• The Great Divorce, C.S. Lewis
• A Family Guide to Biblical Holidays, Robin Sampson
• The Plug-In Drug, Marie Winn
• God's Secretaries: The Making of the KJV
• more Jan Karon Mitford series books

Here's some I'm putting on my library "to read" list:

• Of Plymouth Plantations, William Bradford
• Children of the storm, natasha Vins
• Postmodern Times, Gene Edward Veith
• Captured by Grace, David Jeremiah
• Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
• King Lear, Shakespeare
• Sense and Sensibility, Jane Austen
• All the Hank the Cowdog books!! 

Head on over to Callapidder Days to join the fun.

Home haircuts bring to mind one of my favorite quotes from the Andy Griffith Show [gee I've been referencing that show a lot lately]:

"Sherriff, you may have a city haircut, but your heart was shaped in a bowl,"---Brisco Darling

My husband's family tells horror stories of their Dad cutting their hair at home. First, my father-in-law would sit them on a stool in the living room, tie a towel around their neck and say, "Well son, how do you want it cut?"  The oldest son--getting to go first--would always give specific instructions about how he wanted his hair parted, how long it needed to be,  and "leave a little here, Dad."

Then Dear Father-in-Law would begin and suddenly--accidently on purpose--the clippers would be set  to the wrong length and whole strip of hair was pratically shaved from their poor little heads. "Oops, I guess it will have to be a burr this time, son."

But not so with this e-book that I know you'll enjoy. No bowl haircuts or buzz cuts here!

Nancy Baetz over at Homeschooling Is Life has done homeschooling Moms on a budget a huge favor by writing this book.  Haricuts for Little Men gives you easy step by step directions for cutting car, including how to LAYER with great photos to show us how.  Demonstrating by cutting her own son's hair, Nancy takes the mystery and fear out of cutting hair at home. 

I'll be using it when our little Earnest T. Bass needs another haircut. THANKS Nancy!

When the whole crew has laryngitis, the best part of homeschooling can't happen--read alouds! Here's some neat sites I found to put reading back into our quiet [except for coughs and sneezes] day.

http://wiredforbooks.org/kids.htm   Read alouds of Beatrix Potter tales, Just So stories by Rudyard kipling, and interview with Mr. Rogers, Grimm's fairy tales, and others

http://www.kennedy-center.org/multimedia/storytimeonline/alexander.html  online version of Alexander and the terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

http://www.storylineonline.net  Members of the Screen Actors Guild read children's books [including The Polar Express]

 http://librivox.org   Lots of FREE classic audio books I found Anne of Green Gables, The Railway Children, and lots of great poems Not all of these are children's selections, some may need screening, but most seem to be great, especially for classical homeschoolers

Years ago I read his book, Illiberal Education.  I just read from Albert Mohler's blog that he has a new one out called What's So Great About Christianity.  I can't wait to read this! Dr. Mohler's  blog has commentary and excerpts--very good reading!

It's a practical and hilarious book about creative good stewardship. Living Well on One Income In a Two-Income World by Cynthia Yates was chock-full of tips for organizing, using up, substituting, and finding great deals.  Time management,  money management, resource management--all in one book. This one is a keeper!

And it's at  LIBRARY AND EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES for $6.48!  What a bargain!

Well, I'd like to review it, but I haven't read it yet. I have loaned it out to two other homeschool moms who are struggling with the same issues. That in itself is telling, don't you think? So many of us are needing to hear from one who has "been there, done that" when it comes to taming the selfish fire-tempered hag through the power of Jesus.

The book, by Terri Maxwell, was one I found at a homeschool resource fair. After I showed it to my dear hubby, he said, " I really think you ought to get that. "

I didn't get mad, but he was was half-joking. It was the other half that caught my attention--because it was true.

I've been jarred lately realizing that my good intentions aren't enough to cover the flaws in my spiritual make-up. My oft-repeated joke that I spend my days mumbling furiously, "Meek and gentle, meek and gentle" aren't that far from the truth.

I'm not allowing the Holy Ghost to  bear His fruit in my life. I more often exhibit a crabby, preachy, unloving, rigid, irritable spirit than a meek and quiet one. It's a big smear on my self-attached label of "Biblical-Titus-2-keeper-at-home-submissive [doggone it]-homeschooling-mama"

So far, my friends have enjoyed it. Thank you, Mrs. Maxwell, for writing something that so many of us need. And thank God that he keeps sending these true Titus 2 women mentors into my life.

But I can tell you right now it's going to be the "quiet" part that I will struggle with the most. HELP LORD!!!

If you read some of the previous posts/comments, you may have noticed that I made a shocking confession.

I have, not counting music cassettes, cds, or movies [VHS or DVD], or magazines [three small baskets], or disposable books like coloring books, workbooks, etc.,  907 books in my home.

[NOT A TYPO----907 BOOKS]

Fortunately, we have a home with high ceilings and lots of shelves. Had I merely guessed, I would have put the number around 500. Just to satisfy my curiosity, I thought I'd count them today. To have nearly twice that much is just shocking to me.

Before you envision us stumbling over books, or boxes of books stacked in an unused room being slowly eaten by rats, bugs, dust and age, let me say that they are on shelves, loosely organized, and not in the floor or propping doors open or masquerading as other pieces of furniture. My house is rather neat to have toys, clothes, papers, and 907 books. That's why it didn't take long to count them--they are put neatly away. They just need to be inventoried.

Yes, it is surprisingly neat around here. Unless you look at the three boxes of books for the church library. That would put the number of books in my home to just over one thousand. 1,000!  Shocking.

It's no wonder my eyesight is shot.  This is the scary part--I'M THE AMELDA MARCOSE OF BOOKDOM!!!!!!!

Not the money kind, but the kind most of us homeschoolers really enjoy. I wouldn't be surprised someday for some kind of survey to be taken among homeschoolers to see if one reason they taught their children was "It's a good excuse to buy more books."

I was recently given some materials that were supposed to help me as I work with creating our church library. The quality of the materials is no doubt good, but the price is exhorbitant. Software alone was nearly $800. That's more than I've got to spend at church or at home.

So, my hobby of perusing homeschool catalogs has paid off. At Books on the Path you can buy a home library organizing package that is just gorgeous and does the job very nicely for $39. It's based on the New Public Library and called, simply, Home Library System. A very informative book, software, and a green cloth-bound binder with "Ex Libris" on the front in gold letters with beautiful cream paper is included.

The book is very informative with lots of websites and references to retailers that are off the beaten path of Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and the like. Free resources are covered as well as the proper care of books. First editions, organizing your books, Dewey decimal system,  creating indexes and subject headings ["access points"] are all covered in this slim paperback.

Load the software and then sigh at how beautiful it is. Well, if you love books like I do, you'll sigh.

The Microsoft Works package has a form included that will help keep a book inventory. A basic Excel document works nicely, but it isn't very attractive. This system is attractive and easy to use. You may have to be patient when ordering, mine was backordered. It took over a month to get it, but it was worth it.

Happy Reading!

I'm working through several books right now, two for the church library. I'm still reading through the book of Luke [more on that in another post], Beautiful in God's Eyes by Elizabeth George [love it], and Created to Be His HelpMeet by Debbi Pearl [thanks Kasey for loaning it to me].

I'm also reading What the Bible Says About Child Training by Richard Fugate and Seven Men Who Rule the World From the Grave by Dave Breese for our church library. So far, I like them both. Bear in mind, I'm not done yet.

You can definitely tell a man wrote Child Training.  Most of the parental help books that I've read b;y women are very, um, huggy, shall we say. And that isn't to fault either one, it's just a comment on the different approaches.  Its greatest strength is its Scriptural base and no nonsense-style. I think Dads would get a lot from this book [this Mom sure is!] While I may not do every little thing recommended in here, there is a great deal of help to be found. This book may foster a paradigm shift on the part of the reader who is convicted to train children Biblically.

And by the way, we were already parenting "by the Book" so to speak. I think the greatest challenge has been not in how dh and I raise our children--but in my personal walk with Christ. Kasey recently blogged about "school gaps, mommy gaps" and the latter describes me personally.

In  Seven Men Who Rule the World From the Grave,  Dave Breese introduces the reader to men whose ideas and actions have had effects on culture and thought to this day. Included are Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Julius Wellhousen, John Dewey, and others. The book is very readable and very Scriptural. I'm nearly done with it and will likely order a copy  for our church shelves.

Also, I've just ordered some cd albums for the church library--after having enjoyed the ones we bought for ourselves. Adrian Rogers had a preaching series called Critical Issues of Our Times. Evolution, animal rights, abortion, gambling, life issues--it's all on here in one of the strongest series of messages I've ever heard. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. All FBC readers--it will be on the shelves this week, next at the latest.

Oh, there are so many.  I hope my eyes hold out. My wishlist is always full to overflowing at Christian Book Distributors.

Finished Recently:

In the Presence of My Enemies, Gracia Burnham

The Long War Against God, Henry Morris

A Christian Manifesto, Francis Schaeffer

The Bait of Satan, John Bevere [I read this at the request of a friend. While interesting, it teaches against eternal security of the believer. Which I believe.]

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets JK Rowlings  I didn't want to bash it unless I'd read it. I expected much more witchcraft and gore fro mthe way some folks had put it down. It really wasn't that good in my opinon. Nothing near Narnia or The Shire. It certainly wasn't quality children's literature. Imaginative, yes, Quality, no. For a child really wanting a book about fantasy, those are the ones I'd go for because the magic and magicians and fantastic things are always symbols. The works of Tolkien and Lewis wouldn't stimulate a dangerous desire towards occultism, rather they point to Christ in some subtle and overt ways. Harry Potter, while not seeming to be terribly offensive considering the glut of really trashy books available for children, is still dabbling in things clearly prohibited in Deuteronomy 18. There is a dividing line between good magick and black magick, so perhaps there's a lesson there, but the line is too often blurred. I wouldn't recommend these books to anyone.

Jesus Among Other Gods, Ravi Zacharias

What Happens When Women Pray, Evelyn Christenson

My husband recommends Empowered By Praise by Michael Yussef.

Home Comforts: The Art and Science of Homemaking Cheryl ? [oops, forgot her last name]

Glorious Appearing, Lahaye and Jenkins  Okay, I'm a pre-trib rapture believer. I read the books. But this one was a disappointment. HOnestly, no one can capture what Christ's Glorious Appearing will be like. It's beyond comprehension, I believe. These are fluff fiction. I know they have a message, I appreciate how so many people have been moved by them. But I wouldn't read this series again for love nor money. If I crave some eschatological preaching, I'll just tune in to David Jeremiah and the late Adrian Rogers.

In progress:

LUKE--KJV

Mere Christianity, CS Lewis

Seasons of A Mother's Heart, Sally Clarkson

The Organized Homeschooler, Vicki Caruana

Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoevsky  This one is so heavy that I just can't zip through it like I do other stuff. It is emotionally draining to read this book.

Josephus: the Complete Works, Flavius Josephus  I keep getting sidetracked form this one because of homeschooling and reviewing materials for the church library. [sigh]

Planning to Read:

The Excellent Wife, Martha Peace

Life Management for Busy Women, Elizabeth George

1776, David McCullough

Home By Choice,Brenda hunter, Ph. D.

Let Us Highly Resolve, David and Shirley Quine

Closing of the American Mind, Allan Bloom

The Imitation of Christ, Thomas aKempis

Toxic Relief, Dan Colbert--at the request of a friend.

The Feminist Mistake, Mary Kaissan

Total Truth, Nancy Pearcy [ I learned so much from the book she co-authored with Charles Colson, How Shall We Now Live?]

I'd like to read another Mitford Book by Jan Karon.Her books are so easy to love. I'm thinking of reading some other Christian fiction writers. Obviously by the above lists, that's not usual fare for me. I'm open to suggestions here. Janette Oke and ted Dekker have been recommended to me. I have read some Frank Peretti books, too.

Hank the Cowdog books---how can you resist a character that is described as a cross between John Wayne and Maxwell Smart?

And maybe, just maybe, I'll work in time to read The Taming of the Shrew. I hope so.