{In a Week}

A slightly chattier {In a Week} than usual here...

Despite baby having a cold (she's on the mend now!), we've had quite a lot going on.  We're still schooling through the end of this week, so in addition to our regular school work, we've been fitting in some Advent preparations.  And some Christmas crafting--but I'll have to wait to show that here until surprises have been revealed here at home. ;)

First, a breakfast tea for St. Lucy's day:

What's that you say?  The traditional treat for St. Lucy's feast is not Starbucks-style cranberry bliss bars?  Whoops!  Well, I kept seeing pictures online of the traditional feast day breads drizzled with frosting and sprinkled with dried cranberries...and I started to get a craving.  I have to say, they're much tastier than any St. Lucy's bread I've tried, and no one seemed to mind. ;)  The rest of the day included a backyard scavenger hunt for signs of winter and a trip around town to look at Christmas lights that evening, with hot cider in hand.  Maybe it's just me, but I love when special feast days fall on Fridays.  I feel so much more on my game for some reason when it's the end of the week.

On to the rest of the week:

solemn high mass for guadete sunday, at a new location for our TLM community -
they had a beautiful nativity set up in back

connect four - their st. nicholas gift :)

their growing cast of wizard of oz characters -
they're determined to make them all after listening to the audiobook last month

a certain preschooler here started reading this week!

the Golden Nights have begun!

Wishing you a blessed last week of Advent!

My "Mosts" for 2013

I always get in a bit of a reflective mood toward the end of the year, so I'm very happy to join in Sarah's link-up of "Mosts" today.

:: The post with the most clicks - Nature Study Notes :: Our Weekly Outing + Journaling Session

This is really thanks to Ambleside Online's facebook page--every time they share one of my posts, my little blog's traffic goes through the roof that day. ;)  I wrote this post to be an encouragement to other moms, and I hope that it was.

:: The post with the most comments - Young Students and the Fairyland in Geography

On this post I got several great tips on other CM-friendly geography resources to use with early elementary students, a couple of which we're using this term!  So I'm very thankful for my readers and their willingness to share.  (Or just to say hi!  That's always nice too. ;) )

:: The post with the best pictures - Nature Study at the Beach tied with Nature Study at the Beach :: A Fall Visit

I certainly don't consider myself a photographer--the photos here on the blog are almost always taken with my phone. :)  BUT it's hard to take a bad picture of vistas like these!

:: The post that was the hardest to write - My "Learning Languages the Charlotte Mason Way" series:

Volume 1 and Francois Gouin (Part 1)

Parents' Review, Programmes, and Miss Mason Herself (Part 2)

Designing a Course of Study (Part 3)

I'm cheating here and including this whole series because I had originally envisioned this topic as a single post, part of my blogging through Volume 1 of Home Education.  But I ended up breaking it up into three (LONG) parts because there was just so much to cover.  It took me a few weeks to read through the material and condense it into something (somewhat) understandable, but it was an educationally rewarding project for me.  Still, not the easiest set of posts to write!

:: The post that was my personal favorite - What I Love Most About a Charlotte Mason Education

I wrote this for the Charlotte Mason blog carnival's prompt, and it was really nice to get all the things I love about this learning lifestyle out there.  It is a joy to me and I'm so happy to be able to share that.

Check out Amongst Lovely Things for many more "mosts" of the year!

Picture Books We Love :: My Top Ten Christmas Books for Littles

I narrowed my list of favorite Christmas books down to just ten to share with you today.  

First, the disclaimers -- These are especially geared to the younger set, so I left out chapter books and longish books like The Story of Holly and Ivy.  I also didn't include Advent favorites (for example, St. Nicholas or Our Lady of Guadalupe selections) or Epiphany favorites (we have several books on the Three Kings that we all enjoy). I'll have to share those another time because there was NO WAY I could fit all of those into one Top Ten list--I mean, I do have my limits! ;)

So here they are, in no particular order.  Maybe you'll see some of your old favorites here--or find some new favorites?

Petershams' The Christ Child

First up: for a more traditional telling of the Nativity, I like to have a well-illustrated version of the Bible text itself.  In that category, we have three favorites: 

A Christmas Story by Jane Ray

The Christ Child by Maud and Miska Petersham

The First Christmas from The National Gallery, London

All three set beautiful illustrations to the King James translation of the biblical text.  They are quite different in style: Ray's has a decidedly Middle Eastern flair, The First Christmas uses works from the Italian Renaissance masters, and the Petershams' features their simple yet distinctive 1920s style.  I find all three to be suitably lovely companions to the holy words they illustrate.

The Animals' Christmas Carol by Helen Ward

This is one I don't see mentioned often, but the verses are clever and the illustrations are fantastic: detailed close-ups of animals, rich watercolors decorated with gold leaf.  I love books with this motif of the animals on Christmas night, of which there are many.  This one stands out for a couple reasons: first, because it never shows the Child Jesus--just His light emanating from off the page.  I rather like the mystery.  It also expands to include a wider range of animals, which adds something new.  And did I mention the illustrations? :)

The Friendly Beasts by Tomie de Paola

Like I said, I love this motif.  This is actually a double whammy for me because not only does it involve the animals of the nativity, but its text is made up of song lyrics--another genre of picture book that I find absolutely delightful, though hard to do well.  And this one is done well!  I am actually not an unabashed Tomie fan like so many others, but the lyrics to this song seem to fit his rustic style.  A chorus of singers (feels very Greek-drama) sets the stage (literally--it has the look of a play) and then takes us through the song as each animal joins the cast of characters. (And please do yourself a favor and listen to Harry Belafonte's "The Gifts They Gave" while you read!)

Helen Ward's The Animals' Christmas Carol

Good King Wenceslaus by Tim Ladwig

I'm including this one because it's my husband's first choice to read aloud to the children.  He is a Christmas-songs-turned-picture-books lover like I am, and this is his top pick.  Ladwig's illustrations are, as always, realistic while not going off the cliff of Kinkaid-like sentimentality.  And being Catholics, we just love the story of Saint Wenceslaus here!  We save this book for "the feast of Stephen," which is the day after Christmas, and my children are absolutely delighted when we pull it out.

What Can I Give Him by Debi Gliori

This book takes the first and last stanzas of Christina Rossetti's "In the bleak midwinter" and shows a young girl in two different times and places (as a servant at the stable in Bethlehem and as a modern-day girl with a beloved grandfather) asking the same question anyone would ask in the face of such sacrificial love: "What can I give him?"  We see that her answer in each case is quite similar.  The lesson is told primarily through the illustrations and might go over the heads of very littles, but even my preschooler loves this one.

Christmas in the Barn by Margaret Wise Brown and Barbara Cooney

Unfortunately, this version is out of print, because Cooney's charmingly simple illustrations so perfectly match this text.  We have the Diane Goode rendition, but in my opinion, it pales in comparison to the older illustrations, so I end up checking out Cooney's version every year from the library.  I went to place a hold on it last weekend and was saddened to see it no longer in the system--I'm guessing it was discarded? (Sob.)  So I'll now need to hunt down my own.  I actually love how the Nativity story has been placed by Cooney in what seems to be nineteenth-century American countryside. (I just love the "Star" and "Bright" yokes on the barn wall--Almanzo, anyone?)  It feels very quaint and--not to be overly-philosophical about a children's book!--places the Christmas story outside of time, as it truly is.  Fans of Brown's will notice the similarity between the verses in this book and Big Red Barn, which is another of hers that I enjoy reading aloud, so I don't mind that at all.  There is a soothing, lullaby-like quality to so much of her writing, and that's certainly present here.  Just a wonderful read-aloud to quietly ponder over with the little ones.

The Little Fir Tree by Margaret Wise Brown and Barbara Cooney

Another partnership by this wonderful duo, and another home-run in my book.  There is a version illustrated by Jim LaMarche that is more available (and a pleasing alternative), because I believe Cooney's is sadly out of print.  But hers is definitely worth seeking out anyway.  As for the story itself: I usually eschew sentimental tales, especially when they feel forced.  Is it just me, or is there not a million and one Christmas picture books that seem precisely aimed to make Mom tear up while reading?  ;)  This one is certainly moving, but in a more genuine way than so many of the others.  A wonderful story of miracles in everyday life and how Christmas somehow makes those miracles seem that much more miraculous.  Life-affirming and just plain sweet.

The First Christmas, from the National Gallery in London

The Twelve Days of Christmas by Vladimir Vagin

This is my personal favorite of the many, many Twelve Days of Christmas renditions we have read over the last few years.  (Lovers of carols-turned-picture-books, remember?)  Jan Brett's and Leigh Grant's are lovely as well--but Grant's has so many pagan references and Brett's is a bit busy for my little ones.  I have a soft spot for Vagin's fun, folksy twist on the illustrations.  I first encountered him in his Peter and the Wolf (which also happens to be my favorite illustrated version of Peter and the Wolf!), and I knew when I saw his name pop up as an illustrator of the Twelve Days of Christmas that it would be a pleasing match.  His illustrations are fun and whimsical yet not irreverent.

And no Top Ten list would be complete without mentioning my all-time favorite Christmas picture books (scroll down to the end).  Sorry to tempt you, as they're not yet available for purchase. ;)

If you have shared your own list of family favorites, please do leave a link in the comments!

Nature Study Outing :: On St. Nicholas Day

Happy Feast of St. Nicholas!  We have had such a lovely day here.  Like so many Catholic families, our morning started with treats in honor of today's saint, patron of children, filling the little ones' "stockings."  (The truth is we used to use stockings...but I've fallen a wee bit behind and my youngest three don't even have stockings yet.  <blush>  I  have grand plans to make a matching set for all the children, so I'll be starting from scratch one of these days...In the meantime, I'm just glad chocolate just tastes as good coming from a paper bag!)

After breakfast, we left for our weekly nature study outing, today to a trail we visited on a native plant walk in late summer.  That day, the path was covered with poison oak and it was in the high 90s by the time we left.  This time, it was literally freezing: I think it was in the low 30s when we got there.  Very unusual weather for our area.  As you can see, we were all dressed accordingly!

mommy with baby #6 on back and baby #7 on front :)

The sunlight filtering through the trees was just lovely.

sycamores, bay laurels, and oaks

The kids had a great time climbing the huge laurel tree along our route...

...and we all had fun looking at the mosses and lichen and watching the creek flow by.

When we got home, we had a sweet teatime with our St. Nicholas treats and hot cocoa for all but baby.

Our afternoon was spent working on nature journals, listening to our music selection for this week (Mozart's "Clarinet Quintet") and a chapter from our current audiobook (Nesbit's Five Children and It), and reading some of our favorite St. Nicholas picture books with the littles: The Baker's Dozen, Demi's The Legend of St. Nicholas, and The Miracle of St. Nicholas.  A happy feast indeed!

Wishing you a cozy Friday too.

{In a Week}

Gianna's watercolor placecards for the Thanksgiving table at Grandma's

...and Christmas cards by the kids - drawn, printed, and ready to be stuffed and mailed

as close to a "winter wonderland" as we ever get here! :)

so excited to finally get to the geometry section of this level - she has been waiting for months

Little Drummer Boy, a family favorite

italian games - practicing i colori and gli animali

Wednesdays with Words :: Esolen on Nature Study

Taking a break from the holiday posting to share some really lovely words on nature study from Anthony Esolen's Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child.  This book has been on my bedside table for six months, and I dip into it section by section between other readings--not because it can't sustain my attention, but because it's rich and funny and just the kind of book I like to savor rather than devour.  I was struck again recently by his thoughts on time outdoors, so I flipped back to them again last night and want to quote a longish bit here.  (And look, a double-whammy: Hopkins and Esolen in one!)

But it is not only the floods, and earthquakes, and electric storms that make natures strange to us.  It is all wondrous and strange.  When Elijah sought the Lord, he was not in the tempest, nor the earthquake, nor the fire, but in 'a still, small voice,' that made the prophet hide his eyes in reverence.  The poet Hopkins saw it his special calling to see what he called the 'inscape' in things, what makes them particularly what they are.  We might think an ordinary flower just that; but to the mind made attentive to the works of nature, the most ordinary things are steeped in their own peculiar ways of being, and are mysterious.  Here we find Hopkins describing bluebells:

'The bluebells in your hand baffle you with their inscape, made to every sense: if you draw your fingers through them, they are lodged and struggle with a shock of wet heads; the long stalks rub and click and flatten to a fan on one another like your fingers themselves would when you passed the palms hard across one another, making a brittle rub and jostle like the noise of a hurdle strained by  leaning against; then there is the faint honey small and in the mouth the sweet gum when you bite them.  But this is easy, it is the eye they baffle.'

Not everyone is a poet, yet children come uneasily near to it in their natural fascination with anything at all.  A child might take a stick to poke around a large mound of red ants, thousands and thousands of them, scurrying about their formicative business, without benefit of schooling, crawling up your shoes and socks if you step too near, to nip your ankles.
...

One way to neutralize this fascination with the natural world is to cordon it off in parks and zoos, and then to act as if only the parks and zoos were worth seeing.  Persuade a child that a giraffe he sees once every couple of years is really impressive, but the wren on the fence post is only a drab little bird--though he warbles out a love song in the morning, cocking his stubby tail, and is in general one of the bravest and most cheerful of birds.  Persuade the child that the Grand Canyon is worth seeing, or Yellowstone Park, or Mount Rushmore, or the breakers of the ocean on the Florida coast.  But ignore the variations of hill and valley, river and pond, bare rock and rich bottom soil, in your own neighborhood.  Children should be encouraged to think they have 'done' rivers, or bird sanctuaries, or botanical gardens, in the way that weary tourists are proud to have done Belgium. (37-8)

(In case you're not familiar with this book, that's a bit of sarcasm shining through there at the end.)  

If those words doesn't make you bound and determined to include at least a weekly trek through the outdoors with your littles, then I'm afraid nothing else will.  Spread a feast of even the "ordinary," and over time, that natural fascination will work its magic.

A Time to Prepare

We don't take off school for Advent here--this year, we'll be schooling pretty much as usual from the Monday after Thanksgiving through the week before Christmas.  

This is partly because we like to hold off on the celebrating of Christmas until the Christmas season actually arrives.  In our home, we celebrate Christmas with feasting and fun from Christmas Day until Epiphany, and then continuing on in a more casual way until the Octave Day of Epiphany the week after, when the traditional liturgical calendar switches formally from "Christmas" to "the Weeks after Epiphany."  Our nativity displays stay out even longer, until Candlemas on February 2nd.  As you might imagine, if we started celebrating Thanksgiving weekend, we would be ready to pack everything up and get back to our normal routine by the time New Year's rolled around, if not earlier!  This way, celebrating is still fresh during those holy days.

The other reason is because of the nature of Advent itself: it is a preparatory season, a penitential season.  We try to sanctify it by adding in special devotions, books, songs, prayers, penances, and traditions, and there are feasts within Advent that we do celebrate (St. Nicholas Day, St. Lucy's Day, Our Lady of Guadalupe's feast day, Gaudete Sunday).  But the general mood of Advent is one of waiting and preparing, not of celebration.  So we hold off on our holiday as much as we can until the holy-day comes.

That said, even though we're not on "Christmas break," our days do look a bit different during those three school weeks of Advent.  We continue with our Year 2 readings as usual, but we also add in a few Advent activities:

:: Morning Basket.  Our Morning Basket plans during Advent include reading a section of Inos Biffi's Way to Bethlehem and praying the St. Andrew novena together, my favorite novena of the year.  (There is a lovely color printable you can download here, or you can download the black-and-white printable we use.)

:: Advent wreath.  We light this nightly during our family rosary while praying the Collect and antiphon for the week.  On Sundays, we include the Epistle as well. 

:: Evening devotions.  Every night before bedtime since my oldest two were toddlers, we have spent a few minutes at the little altar table outside their bedroom door, doing prayers or activities related to the traditional devotion for the month (January is the month of the Child Jesus, March is the month of St. Joseph, etc.).  During Advent, we pull a paper from our countdown paper chain.  Each paper has a "good deed" written on it, usually a prayer for someone.  We do that prayer together, and then the children add a piece of hay to the little manger we're preparing for Baby Jesus.  (It's a symbol of how the good deeds we perform prepare our hearts to receive Him as well.)  We add a piece to our felt nativity upstairs and then say an Advent-specific prayer in addition to our usual nightly litany.

:: Picture books.  We read one Christmas book each day as we count down toward Christmas.  During the formal Christmas season, the books all go onto our bookshelf and the kids have free reign over them. :)  But for Advent, we limit ourselves to just one per day.  I'll share some of my very favorites soon.

:: Memory work.  We substitute our usual memory work (poem, hymn, folk song, Bible) with Christmas-related selections.  These then become the children's Christmas program, which they perform for our extended family.  Here are our choices for this year:

Sara Teasdale's "Christmas Carol"

Philip Brooks' "Christmas Everywhere"

"What Child Is This"

"Joy to the World"

"It Came Upon a Midnight Clear"

Luke 2:1-20 (or as much as we get through--we'll pick up the rest next year)

:: Art and handcrafts.  We also change out our weekly art project, drawing lesson, and handcraft for holiday making-and-baking.  This year, we'll be doing handmade Christmas cards together (an annual tradition) and cooking up lots of goodies.   And my kids have lots of independent crafting planned for gifts for one another and for others.  More on that later too. ;)

Do you adjust your school plans to accommodate Advent activities?  I'd love to hear how it looks in your home!