I got this “either/or” from Thinklings. Since it’s the “literary edition,” I just had to play.

Hardback or Paperback Unless I have to pack it in my purse.
Highlight or Underline, But I never have a high lighter handy, so I usually just lose the quote.
Lewis or Tolkien That’s a really, really hard choice. Unfair.
E.B. White or A.A. Milne Pooh rocks.
T.S. Eliot or e.e. cummings Mostly because my friend Julia taught me to appreciate Eliot a long time ago.
Stephen King or Dean Koontz Neither.
Barnes & Noble or Borders No Borders nearby.
Waldenbooks or B. Dalton
Fantasy or Science Fiction
Horror or Suspense
Bookmark or Dogear
Large Print or Fine Print I’m getting old, but my $1.00 glasses from Dollar Tree are changing my life.
Hemingway or Faulkner
Fitzgerald or Steinbeck
Homer or Plato Give me the story every time.
Geoffrey Chaucer or Edmund Spenser
Pen or Pencil Or a very sharp pencil.
Looseleaf or Notepad
Alphabetize: By Author or By Title
Shelve: By Genre/Subject or All Books Together
Dustjacket: Leave it On or Take it Off
Novella or Epic
John Grisham or Scott Turrow
J.K. Rowling or Lemony Snicket Neither.
John Irving or John Updike Neither.
Salman Rushdie or Don Delillo Neither.
Fiction or Non-fiction
Historical Biography or Historical Romance
Reading Pace: A Few Pages per Sitting or Finish at Least a Chapter When they let me . . .
Short Story or Creative Non-fiction Essay
Blah Blah Blah or Yada Yada Yada I told you, I’m old.
“It was a dark and stormy night…” or “Once upon a time…”
Books: Buy or Borrow Until I can afford to buy.
Book Reviews or Word of Mouth

Does anyone else remember singing this song as a child? I think my mother taught it to me.

In the temple, in the temple,
Stood a happy boy one day,
And the doctors wondered greatly
At the words they heard Him say.

FLORA KIRKLAND, 1921
Howard E. Smith

This week we read the story of the young man Jesus talking with the elders and teachers in the Temple for several days while his parents searched for him. I should teach my children this song. I pray that we will all learn of Jesus in the temple on this Lord’s Day.

Interesting article in the Seattle Times about Christian-themed books, particularly fiction. Unfortunately, the author cites the Left Behind books as the primary examples.

Jennifer Nichols is a homeschool graduate, a Christian, and an archer. This quote is from her interview with a PBS reporter:

I want it to be like a worship to him. I give God my best, but if that doesn’t measure up to what other people are doing, I have offered my best. And that is all he wants.

It sounds to me as if she’s got it pretty well in perspective. Read more about Jennifer Nichols and her Olympic performance here, and here.
Jennifer Nichols only made it to the quarterfinals in individual competition at the Olympics, but I’m sure she and her parents and God are all pleased with her best. She still has the team competition on Friday. Oh, and for Dancer Daughter, J. N. is a dancer, too.
She says dancing is an outlet and has taken classes in ballet, modern, jazz, tap and Irish Step. She recently started teaching a “pre-dance” class to 4- to 6-year-olds at a dance studio in Cheyenne.

According to Scripture, a married woman’s focus and orientation is required to be towards her home. But while the Bible teaches that a woman’s priority is the home (Tit. 2:11), the Bible most emphatically does not teach that a woman’s place is limited to the home. Her place is in the home (1 Tim. 5:14), real estate (Prov. 31:16), agriculture (31:16), evangelism (Phil. 4:3), philanthropy (Prov. 31:20), logistical support for ministry (Rom. 16:1,6), explaining theology (Acts 18:26), and more. In all of this, the central responsibility is of course the home. This priority on the home is not threatened by geographical location; it is threatened only by sin and disobedience. ?Douglas Wilson in Credenda Agenda, Vol. 7, Issue 3 Feminist Traditionalism

I’m not doing too well at my dominion over the home, but it’s not because my mind and my abilities are not being challenged enough. I’m just not very good at the career in which God has placed me. Right now a simple 9 to 5 job sounds boring, but at least possible. No, really, I’ll keep doing my best to manage my home, and pray for grace and wisdom.

Victorian author Charlotte Yonge was born on this date in 1823 (d. 1901). She was extremely prolific, author of over 120 books in addition to children’s stories, Sunday School materials, and other writings. She taught Sunday School for over seventy years to children of the village where she lived out her life. Her books are, I gather from my reading, too Victorian and Christian and didactic to be very popular nowadays, but they were enormously popular in Victorian England. She loved history and wrote many volumes of history, especially history stories for young children. I read a bit of one of her books online at Project Gutenberg, a book called Young Folks’ History of England. I thought it was delightful–even though I couldn’t agree with her characterizations of all the kings she writes about. Here’s an excerpt to give you a sample:

About Henry V The young King Henry was full of high, good thoughts. He was devout in going to church, tried to make good Bishops, gave freely to the
poor, and was so kindly, and hearty, and merry in all his words and ways, that everyone loved him. Still, he thought it was his duty to go and make war in France. He had been taught to believe the kingdom belonged to him, and it was in so wretched a state that he thought he could do it good. The poor king, Charles VI., was mad, and had a wicked wife besides; and his sons, and uncles, and cousins were always fighting, till the streets of Paris were often red with blood, and the whole country was miserable. Henry hoped to set all in order for them, and gathering an army together, crossed to Normandy.

Here are some titles of books by Yonge; I truly enjoyed reading just the titles, so evocative of a bygone era.

Aunt Charlotte’s Stories of English History for the Little Ones
Aunt Charlotte’s Stories of German History for the Little Ones
(and Greek and French and Roman, etc.)
Burnt Out: A Story for Mother’s Meetings
Aunt Charlotte’s Evenings at Home with the Poets
How to Teach the New Testament
Stray Pearls
Given to Hospitality
Spring Buds: Counsels for the Young
The Penniless Princesses
The Crossroads, or a Choice in Life
The Patriots of Palestine, a Story of the Maccabees
Reasons Why I am a Catholic and not a Roman Catholic
Willie’s Trouble and How He Came Out of It

Don’t those titles take you back in time? The books themselves may be pure drivel, but I plan to add Yonge’s most famous novel, The Heir of Redclyffe to my legendary and growing Reading List. She may simply be too pious, in the best sense of the word, for our modern and post-modern sensibilities.

And now for something completely different . . . I finished reading this Wodehouse comedy. Here are some quotes to cheer you up, if you need cheering.
I have always found that in moments of heart-bowed-downness there is nothing that calms the bruised spirit like a good go at the soap and water. I don’t say I actually sang in the tub, but there were times when it was a mere spin of the coin whether I would do so or not.

It was the old, old story, I supposed. A man’s brain whizzes along for years exceeding the speed limit, and then something suddenly goes wrong with the steering-gear and it skids and comes a smeller in the ditch.

I was trying to think who you reminded me of. Somebody who went about strewing ruin and desolation and breaking up homes which, until he came along, had been happy and peaceful. Attila is the man. It’s amazing. . . . To look at you one would think you were just an ordinary sort of amiable idiot–certifiable, perhaps, but quite harmless. Yet, in reality, you are a worse scourge than the Black Death. I tell you, Bertie, when I contemplate you I seem to come up against all the underlying sorrow and horror of life with such a thud that I feel as if I had walked into a lamp post.

And since I can’t leave you there, in the company of death and gloom and Attila the Hun, here’s one more:
To say that Bertram was now definitely nonplussed would be but to state the simple truth. I could make nothing of this. I had left Brinkley Court a stricken home, with hearts bleeding wherever you looked, and I had returned to find it a sort of earthly paradise. It baffled me.

And there you are, nonplussed and baffled.

This book can be borrowed by member families from Meriadoc Homeschool Library.