On My Way Home

Posted September 27th, 2007 by Jen in family life, the ranch
9 Comments »

I have three lovely pictures to share with you from my drive home yesterday. First, you’ll see the friendly deer I passed, with the amazing vistas in the background; next is an abandoned bridge stretching across the Crooked River (which the cows still use); and finally, the full moon rising over the hills in front of my house. (Here is a handy Night Sky Calendar from Space.com, if you’d like to know the moon phases.)

The Hunter

Posted September 23rd, 2007 by Jen in education, family life, the ranch
11 Comments »

My husband (“The Hunter”) just had his first archery kill yesterday. It was special for several reasons. First, he had taken our six year old daughter (“JJ”) with him that morning, since it was her turn. Second, they were hunting on our own property. Lastly, the whole thing turned into a family affair and a great educational experience for all.

I’ve mentioned our 20 acres in Central Oregon where we’re currently building a house. It’s not an enormous piece of land as far as hunting grounds go, but it’s situated in an ideal location for the sport. One end of the terrain drops down to a rimrock cliff which is the natural path of herds of deer and elk that run though here. The other end is bordered by a large canal which makes a nice watering hole, and the other sides of the property are bordered by large acreages. So it works.

The Hunter has been rifle-hunting for years – mostly for elk in Eastern Oregon. Last year, he switched to bow hunting and seems to enjoy the sporting challenge. Since we lived on our property last year at this time, in our travel trailer, we had opportunity to see all the wildlife up close. There was an enormous buck (“Chester”) that came by nearly everyday during the late summer, and The Hunter was out looking for him all during the hunting season, but with no luck.

The night before this hunt, The Hunter had taken our eight year old son (The Scientist) to the property to hunt, and with just two days left of the bow season, he was anxious. The Scientist has his own small bow, and just target shoots for fun – but you can imagine that he really feels like he’s hunting with Daddy. They were hoping that Chester would make an appearance. The hunters saw nothing that evening.

So, the following morning, JJ begged to go with The Hunter, as she had been in tears the day before at not having gone. But The Hunter just wants one child at a time at this point. I’m sure you can understand all the noise made by a six and eight year old poking each other. I was home with the other children and had really forgotten about the morning activity.

My phone rang, and there was a bad connection, but I did hear the word “spike.” Yes, The Hunter and his young huntress had accomplished the mission. Standing in our future master bath, they were getting ready to leave, when along came the buck. The Hunter waited patiently for the deer to change his head-on position, took the shot, and the well-placed arrow shot clean through the animal.

Here’s where it was really neat to have him hunting less than 10 minutes away. I was able to grab the neighbor to come and help, pack up some supplies and the other three kids (and Grandma), and head over. Now all my children are well educated in the gutting, hanging, and skinning of a deer. If we were lost in the wilderness, we’d all survive. :-)

Family Hunt: notice the various expressions…and the proud huntress posing next to her Daddy. The Scientist was so jealous, and on the way to the property, said, “I hope JJ didn’t help Daddy track the deer.” I said, “Honey, you will have your time.”

Gutting the deer: the kids and I learned what an awful, dreadful, and vile smell is created in this endeavor.

Hanging the deer: the old Juniper tree, rope and pole are skillfully used.

Skinning the deer: not for the faint of heart, but now we all know the ins and outs of this.

We all had a good chuckle as The Scientist put the front legs to good use. He strung them up and made some sort of deer puppet…he said he was making deer tracks. I love the creativity of this child.

The deer needs to hang for a few days, then The Hunter will take it to the butcher and we’ll have a freezer full of venison. Dinner last night? Backstrap, of course. According to The Hunter, tradition in the hunting camp calls for the backstrap to be cut off immediately and cooked for dinner, so this coincided well with the fact that the neighbor who helped him was having us over for a BBQ that night.

Much to The Hunter’s delight, I’m now convinced that hunting can be a family activity for us. He likes that the kids are learning not just the sport of hunting, but the entire process, from field to fridge. We know where our food comes from. :-)

You Might Want to Read

Posted September 19th, 2007 by Jen in carnivals, family life
4 Comments »

That time again to highlight some “Carnivals,” which are just collections of blog posts in particular categories of interest.

The Carnival of Homeschooling is hosted by About.Com:Homeschooling

The Christian Carnival is up over at The Minor Prophet

The Carnival of Family Life is currently hosted by Mother Approves

The Carnival of Principled Government is up at Principled Discovery

I will not actually be reading today. I need to teach all morning, then work with the dog trainer who’s coming out to my house, then head to my office and possibly train a new employee (just heard that I train her tomorrow, and only get things ready for her today), then come back home to do chores and prepare the kids for dinner and bed, then go to a wine club that I was just invited to (I’ll give you a nice report later). :-) Have a great Wednesday, and enjoy this beautiful view from my front porch:

In the Spirit of Rich Mullins

Posted September 18th, 2007 by Jen in music, religion
14 Comments »

September 19, 2007 marks the 10 year anniversary of the death of Rich Mullins. As you can see, the only other music review I’ve done is on Mullins, in my first month of blogging. You can read more about his life there, and how I first met his music.

People remember where they were during monumental events. Like when JFK or MLK were shot. I wasn’t born yet for those events, but I do remember exactly where I was when I heard Rich Mullins had died. He was already my favorite musician. I was standing in my classroom full of 3rd graders at Bailey Hill Elementary in Eugene, and my husband was just arriving to pick me up at the end of the day. These were the times of our tiny duplex and one car. It was a Monday, and the news had just come over the Christian radio that over the weekend, Rich Mullins was killed in an automobile accident.

He and I were both shaken and saddened. It was eerie to think that Rich had sung “When I leave I want to go out like Elijah.”

The Jordan is waiting for me to cross through
My heart is aging I can tell
So Lord, I’m begging
For one last favor from You
Here’s my heart take it where You will
………
But when I leave I want to go out like Elijah
With a whirlwind to fuel my chariot of fire
And when I look back on the stars
Well, It’ll be like a candlelight in Central Park
And it won’t break my heart to say goodbye

With this ten year anniversary upon us, it’s good to give honor and remembrance to a man I think of as a poet, a prophet, and a friend. When my husband hears a really great worship leader, he’ll say, “He has the spirit of Rich Mullins.” There have been very few he’s said that about, because it’s a rare quality. How to capture the essence of that spirit in words is difficult. It’s a humility-authenticity-passion-straight out of the heart of God kind of quality.

To carry on the “Spirit of Rich Mullins,” we can practice authentic worship and heart-felt serving. He was the kind of guy to stay up all night to talk to a friend in need. The kind of guy to not just talk about caring for the orphan and the widow, but actually doing it. The person who could easily have gathered worldly riches for himself but gave it all away. What an amazing example of Love.

Bonhoeffer and Gatto on Education

Posted September 15th, 2007 by Jen in education, germany
9 Comments »

For Kinderlehrer , a post for her International Freedom in Education Day.

Since I just spent a great deal of time reading about Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I’ll submit something interesting I came across in Eberhard Bethge’s Biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. From p. 17, where he briefly discusses the fact that Dietrich’s mother, Paula Bonhoeffer, homeschooled all eight children for their early schooling:

This home teaching, of course, implied some criticisms of traditional schooling. The Bonhoeffers did not want to hand their children over to others at an early, impressionable age. One of the family sayings was that Germans had their backs broken twice in the course of their lives: first at school, and then during military service.

Oh, did the Bonhoeffer family have it right, way back in the first decade of the 1900s! Does German schooling “break the back” of its children? Could this be a reason for the number of homeschooling families in Germany, despite the dire consequences? Yes, it’s illegal, since about 1938 (and do you know what was happening in 1938?), and you face jail, fines, and loss of custody of your children if you homeschool. Or you simply go into exile and are forced to flee the country.

If Paula Bonhoeffer were raising her family in Germany today, would she have landed in jail? Would Dietrich and his siblings have become wards of the state? Those sound like ridiculous questions; however, that is the reality of what is happening in Germany today.

John Taylor Gatto’s The Public School Nightmare: why fix a system designed to destroy individual thought is an excellent essay in which he describes the evolution of modern compulsory education.

The structure of American schooling, 20th century style, began in 1806 when Napoleon’s amateur soldiers beat the professional soldiers of Prussia at the battle of Jena. When your business is selling soldiers, losing a battle like that is serious. Almost immediately afterwards a German philosopher named Fichte delivered his famous “Address to the German Nation” which became one of the most influential documents in modern history. In effect he told the Prussian people that the party was over, that the nation would have to shape up through a new Utopian institution of forced schooling in which everyone would learn to take orders.

So the world got compulsion schooling at the end of a state bayonet for the first time in human history; modern forced schooling started in Prussia in 1819 with a clear vision of what centralized schools could deliver:

1. Obedient soldiers to the army;
2. Obedient workers to the mines;
3. Well subordinated civil servants to government;
4. Well subordinated clerks to industry
5. Citizens who thought alike about major issues.

Schools should create an artificial national consensus on matters that had been worked out in advance by leading German families and the head of institutions. Schools should create unity among all the German states, eventually unifying them into Greater Prussia.

Prussian industry boomed from the beginning. She was successful in warfare and her reputation in international affairs was very high. Twenty-six years after this form of schooling began, the King of Prussia was invited to North America to determine the boundary between the United States and Canada. Thirty-three years after that fateful invention of the central school institution, as the behest of Horace Mann and many other leading citizens, we borrowed the style of Prussian schooling as our own.

Gatto continues his essay with a very interesting remark from none other than Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

Erich Maria Ramarque, in his classic “All Quiet on the Western Front” tells us that the First World War was caused by the tricks of schoolmasters, and the famous Protestant theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer said that the Second World War was the inevitable product of good schooling.

It’s important to underline that Bonhoeffer meant that literally, not metaphorically — schooling after the Prussian fashion removes the ability of the mind to think for itself. It teaches people to wait for a teacher to tell them what to do and if what they have done is good or bad. Prussian teaching paralyses the moral will as well as the intellect. It’s true that sometimes well-schooled students sound smart, because they memorize many opinions of great thinkers, but they actually are badly damaged because their own ability to think is left rudimentary and undeveloped.

I’ll wrap up this post with a simple warning given by Gatto. My hope is that if people understand what sinister objectives lurk beneath compulsory schooling, they will stop being so willing to comply. German citizens need to rise up, en masse, and rebel against this kind of tyranny that leaves them no options, no power to choose.

It’s important to note that the underlying premise of Prussian schooling is that the government is the true parent of children–the State is sovereign over the family. At the most extreme pole of this notion is the idea that biological parents are really the enemies of their own children, not to be trusted.

International Freedom in Education Day

Posted September 14th, 2007 by Jen in education, germany
5 Comments »

Kinderlehrer over at Educating Germany is hosting the International Freedom in Education Day. If you have a post to add to her carnival, please head over there; she’ll be running this through tomorrow. If you would like to learn more about the education crisis in Germany, spend some time browsing her site. I’ve written several times, including here and here, about Germany’s mandatory school laws which leave homeschooling families living in fear, often being fined, jailed, or having their children taken away by the state – simply for refusing to send their kids to the public school, choosing instead to educate their own children.

I’ll have something by tomorrow to add to Kinderlehrer’s effort. She certainly needs our prayers as she works for reform.

There is also an incredible wealth of information on education/homeschooling in Germany at Dana’s site, just do a search on her site for Germany.

Why do I care? I live in the United States and have the freedom to homeschool my kids if I want. Well, I could talk about the fact that there is indeed a trickle-down effect in the international community, I could talk about the U.N. trying to apply international law to the United States, I could talk about many legal or political issues. However, the reason I truly care is not even definable. It’s something about being human and loving and caring for other people, no matter where in the world they live. It’s about brothers and sisters in the Lord who are being persecuted for their faith. It’s about freedom.

Harvest/Halloween Giveaway for Cheerleader or Football Costumes!

Posted September 13th, 2007 by Jen in product review, the office
2 Comments »

Tomorrow is the start of another Diary of 1 giveaway, in partnership with my online business, TeamMASCOT.com. I’m very excited and so thankful to Shannon at Rocks in My Dryer who is hosting this bloggy giveaway for me! Tell your friends and run on over there tomorrow, the contest runs from Sept. 14-18.

I told Shannon I wanted to give away two youth College Cheerleader Uniforms, since Halloween is coming up. Then several days later I said to her, wait, I forgot about the little boys! So, I added the youth Football and Helmet uniform sets, which we carry in both College and NFL teams. Shannon and I ended up deciding to choose FOUR WINNERS, and they can choose from either the cheerleader or football costumes. These always sell out, so I chose the earliest blog giveaway date that Shannon offered…good luck to you all!

We don’t actually celebrate Halloween at my house, but we do go to a church Harvest Party, so our kids still get to dress up and have a ton of fun. I tell you, the one time I took my kids trick-or-treating in the neighborhood, the people who opened their doors to give out candy were often scarier than the children dressed up like a bleeding brain.

My kiddos will all be decked out in these fun uniforms this year. My 6 year old girl wants to be an Oregon Ducks cheerleader, since we live in Oregon, and my husband and I both went to the University of Oregon. My 4 year old girl wants to be a Michigan Wolverines cheerleader, since I’m from Michigan and nearly my entire family still lives there, including my awesome cousin who’s right in Ann Arbor, the heart of Wolverine country! My 8 year old and 3 year old boys want to be Dallas Cowboys football players because that’s Daddy’s team! I promise I will post pictures of them all dressed up!

Okay, folks, have fun playing over at the Rocks in My Dryer Bloggy Giveaway! I’ll be in touch with the winners to make shipping arrangements.

Christian Carnival 189: Dietrich Bonhoeffer Edition

Posted September 12th, 2007 by Jen in carnivals, religion
20 Comments »

I am so pleased to present the 189th Christian Carnival, which I have labeled The Dietrich Bonhoeffer Edition. I wrote about Bonhoeffer back in April, on the anniversary of his death. I couldn’t resist returning to this compelling character, most well known for his martyrdom at the hands of Hitler. When I ran into a Christian friend of mine at the library about six months ago, lamenting to her that our little library had no Bonhoeffer books, and she replied, “who is Bonhoeffer?” – well, I would like to introduce you to him, if you also have not been acquainted with this German pastor, theologian, Christan, and man for his times.

The posts for this Christian Carnival will be organized around various Dietrich Bonhoeffer quotes and other passages from the book that sits in my lap as I type, the 1000+ page biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer by Eberhard Bethge. This is a monumental book, and should be in every Christian’s library. No, I don’t agree with every bit of theology that Bonhoeffer espoused, but do not miss this complex and fascinating man.

The misunderstood relationship between Law and Gospel, that is, a forgiveness of sin that does not affect the earthly, civil life of people. People are still told they are sinners, but are not called out from their sinful structures. How are we, who go on sinning in the expectation of grace, to go on taking seriously the forgiveness of sins and prayer to God? We make grace cheap and with the justification of the sinner through the cross, forget the cry of the Lord that never justifies sin. p.209, Bonhoeffer speech to Berlin Christian Student Movement

Michael presents Resisting Temptation posted at Chasing the Wind. Temptation comes from outside; sin comes from within. How do we deal with temptation? Did Jesus give us an example? A study of Matthew 4.

One characteristic of Bonhoeffer’s concept of religion expressed in the letters from prison, namely, that religion is passing away, has already been mentioned. It should be considered once more, although Bonhoeffer never clarified the relation of Barth’s systematic concept of religion to this historical one. Can faith ever escape becoming a religion, whether western, eastern, or African? But precisely in order to make faith possible, Bonhoeffer explains “religion” in its “Western form” as something we can do without and as a relic of past ages. His judgment here is so certain because he regards the age of Jesus as something different from the age of religion. p. 877, Eberhard Bethge

Dana presents Religion vs. Spirituality posted at Principled Discovery. Dana reflects on the meaning of religion as “go through again, read again.”

One can’t preach the Gospel tangibly enough. A truly evangelical sermon must be like offering a child a fine red apple or offering a thirsty man a cool glass of water and then saying: Do you want it? p. 234, Bonhoeffer preaching in Berlin

Richard H. Anderson presents I will gather the lame, the outcasts and the afflicted posted at dokeo kago grapho soi kratistos Theophilos.

Steve Bishop at an accidental blog looks at a Christian view of work (despite not having Labor day in the UK!)

Let us learn to do what is just without words for a while….He who knows himself close to death is decisive, but he is also silent. Without words, yes, not understood and alone if need be, but he does what is necessary and just, he makes his sacrifice… p. 830, Bonhoeffer from his jail cell in Tegel

Luke Houghton presents Does it pay to do the right thing? posted at Luke Houghton. Luke says, “I am a Christian and I do what’s right all the time… does it help? NO. So what can I do about it? Read on to learn more.”

Jan presents Serving Leaders posted at The View From Her. Are the leaders serving, or are we serving the leaders?

Paula [Dietrich Bonhoeffer's mother] gave the children their first schooling. In her youth, with a spirit of independence that was shocking at the time, she had fought for and obtained permission to take the qualifying examination for women teachers. She gave lessons at home to the older and younger children together, along with the children of some of her husband’s professor friends, and at the year’s end she was always able to register her pupils successfully for the state examination, where they did very well. Thanks to the excellent start she gave them, they were able to skip entire grades and eventually take the school graduation examinations at a remarkable early age, as Dietrich did. p. 17, notes by Bethge on Childhood and Youth

Renae presents Fulfilling the Purpose of Education, Reason 4 of Why I Home School posted at Life Nurturing Education. Renae is certainly in good company with Paula Bonhoeffer!

This is the end – for me the beginning of life.” p. 927, Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s last recorded words

Chris Brooks presents Homeward Bound: 5 questions to help your devotions posted at Homeward Bound. Questions to help you get to the juicy goodness when your devotions take you to more difficult passages.

It is not difficult at present to talk of freedom, and to do so in such a way that a German’s passions are roused and so completely agitated that he forgets everything else. In present-day Germany there may be many like the ancient Israelites in captivity who, deeply absorbed in themselves, were able to dream of nothing but liberty, and saw great visions of it and grasped for it, until they awakened and the vision faded….p. 237, Bonhoeffer sermon in July 1932, one week before 38 percent of the German electorate voted for Hitler’s party.

Ian Spencer presents Dispensationalism and the Interpretation of Scripture Part 3: Modern Israel and Biblical Prophecy posted at Philosophical Orthodoxy. Does Modern Israel fulfill Biblical prophecy?

Bruce Alderman presents why i will not be raptured, part ii posted at it seems to me….

And there is a word that among Protestants has the sound of something infinitely commonplace, more or less indifferent and superfluous, that does not make their hearts beat faster; which they associate with a sense of boredom, or, at any rate, which does not lend wings to our religious feelings – and yet our fate is sealed if we cannot acquire a new or perhaps a very old meaning for it. Woe to us if that word does not soon become important to us again, if it does not become a matter of concern in our lives. Yes, “church” is the word whose sense we have forgotten, and whose glory and greatness we want to examine somewhat today. pp. 63-64, Bonhoeffer sermon in Barcelona

Diane R presents My Church Visiting Odyssey posted at Crossroads: Where Faith and Inquiry Meet. “I visited four churches this summer, mostly alone. What transpired wasn’t the greatest.”

Doug presents Has Sin changed Humans Biologically? posted at Bounded Irrationality. Doug considers if sin has changed our bodies and our genes over the generations since the Fall.

Do not try to make the Bible relevant. Its relevance is axiomatic….Do not defend God’s Word, but testify to it….Trust to the Word. It is a ship loaded to the very limits of its capacity! p. 442, Bonhoeffer sermon at Finkenwalde

Annette presents Head coverings, our position in the body posted at Fish and Cans. A three part pondering on 1 Corinthians 11 and what that might mean in the church today.

One should not spend a longer time in Africa without preparation, the shock is too great and increases from day to day, so that one is glad to return to Europe. p. 59, Bonhoeffer’s diary recounting a trip to Africa

Nick Cross presents Crossinator: Money Won’t Solve Africa’s Problem posted at Crossinator. Comments on a recent article about development aid from the West.

Wanda Grindstaff presents Prosperity and Abundance is Your Birthright posted at Creating Abundant Lifestyles.

Rodney Olsen presents Show me the money posted at The Journey. Does God want you to be rich? Is the kind of prosperity that Jesus promises in the Bible all about financial wealth?

FMF presents God’s Blessing on 90 Percent of Your Income is Better than 100 Percent without the Blessing posted at Free Money Finance.

It is impossible to become a new person as a solitary individual….The new person is not the individual believer who has been justified and sanctified, but the church, the Body of Christ, Christ himself. p. 455, Bonhoeffer from The Cost of Discipleship

Brent Turner presents Value of Christian Camping posted at Everyday Liturgy.

Tupelo Kenyon presents Goal Setting or Let Go and Let God posted at Tupelo Kenyon.

He did a great deal to keep some of the weaker brethren from depression and anxiety. He spent a good deal of time with Wasily Wasiliew Kokorin, Molotov’s nephew, who was a delightful young man although an atheist. I think your brother divided his time with him between instilling the foundations of Christianity and learning Russian. p. 924, letter from fellow prisoner at Flossenberg, 1945

Jeremy Pierce presents Dawkins and Atheistic Overconfidence posted at Parableman. A response of sorts to Richard Dawkins’ review of Christopher Hitchens’ new book defending atheism.

Tom Gilson presents Evolution is Easy: It Just Takes An Infinite Number of You posted at Thinking Christian. There’s an easy solution to the improbabilities of evolution, some say–just have enough worlds and it’s bound to happen. Here’s a response to one such theory.

The church must be able to say the Word of God, the word of authority, here and now, in the most concrete way possible, from knowledge of the situation, or it will say something else, something different and human, the word of impotence. Thus the church must announce no eternally valid principles, but only commandments that are true today. For what is “always” true is not true “today.” To us God is “always” God “today.” p. 255, Bonhoeffer speech at Ciernohorske Kupele

Henry Neufeld presents Learning a Little Greek posted at Participatory Bible Study Blog. On the dangers of interlinears and other learning crutches.

Michael McGinnis presents The Greeting Card Theory of Biblical Authorship posted at Tantalizing if True. The Bible as Hallmark would have written it, and as many Americans read it.

I shall soon be handing in my postdoctoral thesis…and soon I shall be going to Barcelona for a fortnight’s visit to my congregation, of which I am very fond, and I feel in general that academic work will not hold me for long. On the other hand, I think it very important to have as thorough an academic grounding as possible. p. 128, Bonhoeffer comments on his purpose in life

Steve Krager presents How to thrive at a Christian college posted at faithdoubt. Eight practical tips to help you thrive in college.

SWBTS Bloggers presents The OT, Christ and Textual Hermeneutics posted at Straight out of the SWBTS Blogosphere.

Bonhoeffer was all humility and sweetness; he always seemed to diffuse an atmosphere of happiness, of joy in every smallest event in life, and of deep gratitude for the mere fact that he was alive. There was something dog-like in the look of fidelity in his eyes and his gladness if you showed that you liked him. He was one of the very few men I have ever met to whom his God was real and ever close to him….In fact my feeling was far stronger than these words imply. He was, without exception, the finest and most lovable man I have ever met. p. 920, Writings of fellow prisoner in Buchenwald, Payne Best

My Editor’s Pick is from Mrs. Darling, with Friendship, posted at Dishpan Dribble. Enjoy some practical tips on cultivating friendships.

I hear you know that we have suffered greatly and lost two sons and two sons-in-law through the Gestapo. As you can imagine, this has taken its toll on us old folk. For years, we endured the tension, the anxiety about those arrested and those who were not yet arrested but in danger. But since we all agreed about the necessity of action, and my sons were also fully aware of what they could expect if the plot miscarried, and had resolved if necessary to lay down their lives, we are sad, but also proud of ther straight and narrow attitude. We have fine memories of both sons from prison…that move both of us and their friends greatly. p. 933, Letter of Dietrich’s father, Karl Bonhoeffer

Jody Neufeld presents Frozen in Time posted at Jody Along the Path. There is a healthy way to deal with grief.

William Meisheid presents Do This in Remembrance of Me posted at Beyond The Rim…. A few thoughts on remembrance as it applies to Eucharist and our 9-11 memorials.

My Christian Carnival is Coming

Posted September 7th, 2007 by Jen in carnivals, education, family life, religion
3 Comments »

Hey, I get to host the Christian Carnival next week, and I really want a post from you! Do you have something to say from a Christian perspective? The current carnival is being hosted at Bounded Irrationality, so check it out if you’re wondering what kinds of posts might be appropriate for this carnival.

Submission deadline for this Christian Carnival is: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 23:59, and will be up RIGHT HERE on September 12! Use the handy Carnival Submission Form to get your post in right away! If you have any trouble with that submission form, go ahead and email me your post: blessedinthewest at yahoo dot com. Share your best post from the previous week, and as the carnival description states, your topic does not necessarily have to be about Christianity, but the writer must be Christian to qualify, and whatever your subject matter, the post must reflect your Christian worldview. Please get those posts rolling in, I’m very excited to see what you all have to say!

I will just mention that I’ve been both reading and participating in the Christian Carnival for several months, and have absolutely loved getting to know some of the regular contributors through their writings and I guarantee you will be blessed by something you come across there. And you will be a blessing to another, I’m sure. Do share.

Elsewhere in Carnival land, check out the Carnival of Homeschooling, the Carnival of Education, and the Carnival of Family Life.

How’s your end of summer/fall routine? We just completed Week 2 of our homeschooling year, and pretty much stayed on track. And what a refreshing thing to get back in a routine after the helter-skelter summer we had! We all thrive on order in some form, so blessings to you as you make good plans (and stick to them) for the coming months!

Puzzling Comment

Posted September 4th, 2007 by Jen in education
9 Comments »

I get a lot of peculiar homeschooling comments thrown my way, but this one was just downright tommyrot, eyewash, hooey. Those are just really fun words for nonsense.

Person Pretending To Ask Polite Question But Really Being Rude:

So, you’re homeschooling the kids?

Me: Yes.

PPTAPQBRBR: But you have a teaching degree.

Me: Exactly.

PPTAPQBRBR: But that’s what I mean, you have a degree so why don’t you go teach other people’s kids in public school?

Me: You’re kidding? The point is, I do have a teaching degree, and I love teaching my kids, so why would I want to teach in a public school?

END OF CONVERSATION.

I’m really not making this up. That’s about verbatim what this person said to me. I’m still shaking my head. Would these people please just come right out and say they think I’m a nut for homeschooling? That’s much preferable to codswallop.