A Novel About Prayer (The Pray-ers review)

I like to read. I especially like to read Christian fiction. So when I found out about a new novel written by Mark S. Mirza and published by CTM Publishing Atlanta called The Pray-ers / Book 1 Troubles, I immediately went to the website to find out if it was something I wanted to read and review. After reading the synopsis and watching a YouTube video of the author talking about his book, I thought it looked like an interesting book and one that I would enjoy reading and reviewing.

Members of the Homeschool Review Crew had the choice between a paperback ($23.95) or an ePub download ($4.99). I prefer to read books on my Kindle (scandalous, no? I just prefer the lighter weight of the Kindle over a book), so I chose the ePub. I was so surprised when the email arrived and it was over 1100 pages! But as I started reading, it wasn’t such a big deal; the pages were only about a third the length of a normal ebook.

About Mark S. Mirza

As the leader of a men’s ministry in Atlanta, Mr. Mirza started Common Threads ministries to teach individuals to pray. He also coaches men in starting their own prayer groups. He wanted to write a novel to help people to pray because he preferred books and novels that taught him something in the process. Even with a lot of Christian novels, that doesn’t always happen, so he decided to write his own. Because his focus is prayer (even though it’s something he admits doesn’t come easily to him), his debut novel is the first in a series that teaches Christians to pray more effectively. “If I can teach prayer through the fun of a novel, then THAT’S what I want to do,” he says on his website.

About The Pray-ers / Book 1 Troubles

the-pray-ersTroubles tells the stories of three men living in three different eras: Epaphras (from the first century), Alexander Rich (a contemporary of Dwight Moody living in post-Civil War Georgia), and Dr. Dale (modern times). Each of these men faces adversity in their prayer life and find themselves having to rely heavily on the Lord to overcome these problems. There’s a fourth point of view explored in this novel, too: that of the demons who are causing all the problems for these upstanding men of God.

The book shifts around to the different times and places, and it does it well. One chapter might focus on Epaphras, and the next on Dr. Dale. Following that, we’ll follow Alexander Rich, and after that, the demons will make an appearance, plotting their attack on Dr. Dale. (The men from the previous eras are mostly there as examples of the demons’ past attacks.) All throughout the novel, in all the different eras, with all three different men, we see how the fight the adversity caused by the demons and how their prayer life is all the better for it.

My Thoughts

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A sample of the random font differences. This picture also shows how footnotes are used in the novel.

I liked this book just as much as I thought I would. When I first started reading, I was a little confused by a word: katepa. I tried using my Kindle dictionary to learn the definition, but it wasn’t there. As I kept reading, I realized that this wasn’t a normal word; it was the name of one of the demons. The lack of capitalization had confused me. Thinking about it, though, I think the author was doing a good thing in keeping demon names (including satan) in lowercase. Even though it takes some getting used to as you read, it’s important not to give those creatures the respect of a capital letter. It’s mentioned in the forward that the author chose to use lowercase letters for demon names on purpose, but with virtually no introduction, it was still tricky to realize that that’s what was happening the first time.

My other issue was with the ePub itself, and it’s possible that there was a glitch with my particular Kindle, but there were random letters, words, sometimes full lines that were in a completely mismatched font to the rest of the book.

That aside, I found this novel quite enjoyable to read (when I turned off my “copy editor’s brain,” that is – but I’m not going to go into that today). I really liked how there were footnotes to scripture references whenever Mr. Mirza wrote about a biblical concept, even if he wasn’t directly quoting the scripture. I think this book would make a really good Bible study basis for an adult or teen group. It is enjoyable to read, and the scripture references would make for a compelling unit.

If you enjoy reading Christian fiction and want to learn more about prayer while you read a novel, give The Prayers / Book 1 Troubles a chance. I don’t think you’ll regret it.

Blessings,

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The Pray-ers / Book 1 Troubles
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Exposing Children to Fine Arts

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2016 has been a big year for our family, especially in the realm of “fine arts.” Will and I went to our first opera back in July. We had tickets to see The Italian Girl in Algiers on opening night, and we did the whole dressing up thing for our night out. A couple of days after we saw it, Will got an email that included information about the opera house’s free simulcast of the performance. It was coming right up (two days later), and we decided to take the boys to see it. The simulcast is a time when they close the street outside of the theater and turn it into a courtyard of sorts, with tables, chairs, and restaurant food available. Because we’d enjoyed Italian Girl so much, we really wanted our children to see it, too. Seahawk was excited about it; Munchkin not so much. (The other two were too young to really understand much. Since this experience, Small Fry has become much more into opera.)

In addition to opera, I’ll be taking my first ballet class later this month. I’m really excited about that, but it’s really a post for another day – namely, after I actually take the class. I bring it up only to confirm the notion of “2016 being a big year.”

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At the Italian Girl simulcast

Back to opera, though, as that’s the main point of today’s post. Some people might think it’s crazy to take children, especially young ones, to the opera – even if it’s not to a ticketed performance. But I think it’s important to expose children to these kinds of things, especially in a movie and TV centric world. It’s really important that they learn about “real” things, and seeing live performances is a great way to do that. I’m not saying that recorded options are bad, but stage performances is important, too. As our children grow, we want them to become well-rounded, cultured adults. Taking them to things like operas, plays, ballets, and museums is a great way to accomplish this.

And from my experience, even if your children are very young (when we went to the Italian Girl simulcast, Dragonfly was only 8 months old), don’t be afraid to take them – especially to a free event, especially if it’s outside. People think it’s really cool that you’ve brought children, and they don’t even mind a bit of baby noise (for the most part). If you’re still unsure, even at something like the simulcast that my family went to, look for other opportunities to expose your children to fine arts. For example, just yesterday, we had the privilege of seeing the upcoming Hansel and Gretel opera in its rehearsal stage. The costumes were crude, and there were a lot of starts and stops because it was a working rehearsal, but it was still pretty neat. We looked at the website when we left and learned that the “real” performance for that will be taking place next month (for free at the library a few towns over), so we’ll take the children to that. It will be really neat for them to see the difference between a rehearsal and the official opera.

And remember: if your children – even babies – are brought up in these kinds of environments, it will become normal to them as they age, and they’ll develop a deep appreciation for fine arts.

Blessings,

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Picture of the Week: Ten

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kimg0079Last week was one of birthdays in our family. On the same day, Munchkin turned 10 years old and Dragonfly turned 10 months old. I thought that was kind of neat 🙂 We had a dinner party for his grandparents over the weekend to celebrate. In early October, we’re planning to have a party for friends for both of the big boys’ birthdays (Seahawk’s is near the end of October, so early October is a nice in-between time).

Blessings,

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Getting Started with French (Review)

Bonjour! I think it’s important to teach children a foreign language, and in the past several years I’ve read conflicting reports about what the “most used” language in the world is. It seems to vary between English and French, depending on which report you read. (The most recent one I read said that French had overtaken English, but it’s been a few months so it might have changed back again.) Combine that with the fact that I learned French when I was in high school (forever ago!), and it was an easy choice to have my boys learn French as their foreign language.

In our pursuit of the “perfect” language curriculum, we’ve tried lots of different things. (Spoiler alert: there’s no such thing as the perfect option.) We typically use computer-based curricula for foreign language because, even though I know some French, I’m far from fluent – even pseudo-fluent enough to teach it effectively. When I learned that members of the Schoolhouse Review Crew were being offered the chance to try out Getting Started with French from Armfield Academic Press, I wanted to give it a chance.

Getting Started with French is a softcover book with 172 lessons and over 280 pages. The lessons are very short (usually just 1-2 pages, sometimes not even a full page), with each one introducing just a few vocabulary words or a single concept. Some of the lessons don’t even teach any new French, but instead a concept in English that you’ll need for upcoming lessons (what an article is – a, an, the – for example). A lot of the early lessons focus on French pronunciation, which is quite different from English. To help even further with this, the company’s website has a free set of mp3 recordings you can download to help you.

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An early lesson

As  you progress through the lessons, they get more complex (as should be expected). You learn the different ways to conjugate verbs and how to read and build sentences. Getting Started with French relies on a translation method, which can be “controversial” depending on who you ask (a lot of scholars say that immersion is the best technique for learning a new language). Once the new word or words are introduced and explained, there’s a list of French phrases (no more than what’s already been taught) and students are instructed to translate them into English. This can be done in writing or orally/mentally.

My intention when I asked to review this book was to work through it with Will in the evenings after the boys went to bed; I thought it would give us something constructive to do at night rather than just watching TV. Unfortunately, he wasn’t keen on the translation method and opted not to work on it, so I did it myself. I was able to skip the first several lessons because of my history with the language. The book was a bit easy for me, even though I haven’t used my French language skills in so many years; I had a great teacher, and the things she taught me have really stuck with me.

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A later lesson

That said, I think this book would be a really good starting point for anyone who wants to learn French and is more comfortable having some English to rely on. Immersion might be the “best” technique, but it can definitely be frustrating at times. I personally don’t think there’s anything wrong with the translation method, especially for older students (it’s how I learned). I find that even in an immersion program, you find yourself trying to translate, so it’s okay to just embrace that and allow yourself to understand what you’re learning.

I would highly recommend this book for someone looking for a gentle introduction to French. The approach is slow and steady, but you really do learn a lot in just a few minutes (they recommend 30) a day. If you have a friend who’s willing to learn along with you, that’s even better because then you can practice with each other! Because this is such a slow build to the language, I think it would also be good for children who are beginning to learn English grammar, too. They can learn the concepts in English and then apply them in both English and French.

Overall, even this book wasn’t exactly what I was hoping for, I did get some good stuff out of it, and I will definitely employ some of the vocabulary and technique as my family continues to expand our knowledge of the French language. In fact, the more I think about how I used it myself, the more I think I missed an opportunity with the boys; by starting them at a later lesson (because they definitely don’t need the early stuff about how French pronunciation is different from English pronunciation), I think this would be an amazing supplement to their other curriculum, and one I’ll probably implement later this week.

And what if you don’t want to teach French in your homeschool? No problem! Armfield Academic Press also offers Getting Started with Latin and Getting Started with Spanish. They’re also developing Getting Started with Russian, which will be available soon (though I don’t know exactly how soon).

Blessings,

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Introducing Getting Started with French {Armfield Academic Press}
 

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Downloadable Worksheets with a Christian Flair (CHSH-Teach Review)

I’ve got a really great program to review today: the CHSH Download Club from CHSH-Teach.com. I’ve spent the past few weeks exploring the website in preparation of our school year, and I have to tell you: there’s a lot of really great stuff on this site! Covering all grades (K-12) and a huge variety of subjects, there’s sure to be something you want or need to incorporate into your homeschool here.

When you go to CHSH-Teach.com (short for Christian HomeSchool Hub), the first thing you’ll see is a “Today in History” calendar. These tidbits include all sorts of things from presidential assassinations to devastating hurricanes to William the Conqueror claiming the throne of England. Scroll down from here and you get to the real “meat” of the site: the Download Club, which features over 50,000 pages of educational material. Obviously I haven’t been able to sift through 50,000 pages, so I’m going to spend a short period today talking about the stuff we did (or plan to) use.

chsh-teach-french-flashcardsThe first thing I printed using my Download Club membership was some French language flash cards for my husband. He really wants to learn the language, but struggles to find time to devote to Rosetta Stone. These flash cards were just the thing to help him work through some vocabulary on his own terms, especially when he was away from home.

knittingUp next was something for Munchkin. Every so often, he expresses interest in learning yarn crafts from me, but apparently I’m not a very good teacher because he struggles to become proficient at them. On CHSH-Teach.com, I found a printout of basic knitting stitches. He knows how to cast on from my teaching, but actually knitting something has proved rather elusive for him. Now, he has a handy-dandy reference sheet to help him. Because he’s a good reader, sometimes things make more sense for him if he can look at a piece of paper and read instructions rather than watching and listening to me. He hasn’t put forth a huge effort in  a while, but I’m sure that when he’s ready to give it a real go, this document will really help him.

chsh-teach-biologyThe last thing I spent a good amount of time on was a science program for Seahawk. Included in the Download Club ($25 for one year or $99.99 for life) is a whole series of full textbooks. That’s right: complete texts! So I downloaded a 7th grade level biology course for him, and that’s going to cover his science this year. There’s a digital textbook and student book, so it really is a complete program. We haven’t actually started this one yet, but it’s on my agenda for later this week (and I have looked at it myself, so I’m not completely clueless regarding it). We’ll also use the spelling pages for Seahawk. These are separated by grade level, and there are 4-week units for each grade. Because this is a subject he struggles with, we’re going to start at a much lower level than he’s at age-wise to help him work through and hopefully become a better speller. Because he’ll utilize several grade levels, this will likely last him most of the school year.

On top of the downloads I’ve used thus far, there are pages in a huge variety of subjects: Bible, Foreign Language, Arts and Crafts, Language Arts, Math, Science, Social Studies, Health (this is a subject I plan for us to use, but I haven’t explored it much yet), and Electives. You can browse the worksheets by subject or grade level. Having everything cross referenced that way is pretty helpful.

In addition to thousands of pages on the paid side of the subscription, there’s a free version to CHSH. The free version can be a great source of support for homeschooling families, even though it doesn’t include any of the downloads. There are forums, groups, chat rooms, and more, all of which would be a blessing to a homeschooling parent.

After using the website for several weeks now, I have just one complaint, and that is that it will sometimes require me to sign in twice to access certain materials. I always sign in first thing upon going to the site so that I can see the downloads I want, but there are times when I’ll click through to a certain document I want, and it will tell me that I have to be logged in to access that content. I wish it would remember from one click to the next that I am logged in, but it’s not something that’s a huge problem. It’s just an inconvenience.

Because there are so many different options in the CHSH Download Club, I’ve barely scratched the surface of available items. Make sure to visit other reviews through the Schoolhouse Review Crew blog to learn about some of the things that other families have used. That will give you some more insight into just how amazing this website is

Blessings,

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Astronomy with a Creation Mindset (Apologia Review)

If there’s one thing Apologia Educational Ministries is known for, it’s their science programs. I’ve always wanted to try one out, but it’s never quite fit in the budget, so when the opportunity to review Exploring Creation with Astronomy, 2nd Edition was offered, I eagerly requested it. For this review, we received all of the different pieces to work this curriculum: the hardcover Student Text ($39), the Notebooking Journal and Jr. Notebooking Journal ($27 each), and the audio CD ($29), which is an audio book version of the textbook. Because this science curriculum is listed as a K-6 grade range, Munchkin and I have been studying astronomy together.

Apologia strives to offer curriculum with a biblical worldview, even things that some scientists would tell you don’t have any place in science – like astronomy. It’s easy to find God’s hand in biology (there are certain creatures that simply couldn’t exist the way they do without having been created – evolution can’t account for everything that evolutionists try to make it fit), but astronomy is a whole other beast. Especially when you consider that there have been people from the beginning of time (well, nearly the beginning…) who worshiped the celestial beings. I love that Apologia has taken this topic and given right back to God.

It’s a fairly simple curriculum to work through, though to be honest we haven’t really been doing it “right,” since it’s been summer. We kept it fairly simple and did mostly just the reading and notebooking, and a few of the easier demonstrations. We didn’t do much with the “above and beyond” stuff, but since school is starting for real this week, we’ll be adding those in with more vigor from here on out.

The textbook has 14 chapters. The first one is a basic introduction to astronomy, and it covers things like the stars, gravity, a list of the planets, space navigation, and astronomers and astronauts. Chapters 2-12 cover the sun, planets in our solar system, Earth’s moon, and space rocks – each one gets its own chapter. There is a lot of great information about each planet, including how to find it in the sky (where applicable), the astronomer who named each planet, and features special to that particular planet. The book finishes up with a chapter on the Kuiper Belt and Dwarf Planets (hello, Pluto!), and the book closes out with a chapter on Stars, Galaxies, and Space Travel.

apologia-worksheet-pagesThe Notebooking Journal and Jr. Notebooking Journal are hefty books (much thicker than the text) that are spiral bound for easy opening. There’s a huge variety of activities for each chapter including (but not limited to) minibooks, copy work, room for children to take notes based on what they read (or listen to, if you use the audio book), word puzzles, blank pages for drawing, experiment/activity recording, scrapbooking, and quizzes/tests. By the end of the school year, you’re left with a wonderful record of everything your child learned.

As I mentioned before, this was primarily used by Munchkin (5th grade) and me together during the summer. We’d read the text book together (we didn’t use the CD for two reasons: first, I don’t have a player for it; second, he’s a strong reader, so it wasn’t necessary) and then he’d do the pages in the Notebooking Journal that I assigned to him. He’s using the regular journal, not the junior one; I’m setting the junior aside to use with Small Fry when he’s in Kindergarten or 1st grade. It has the same kinds of activities as the regular journal, but it’s much simpler and therefore perfect for younger students. There are a couple of activities in each chapter that aren’t worksheet-related and therefore not in the Notebooking Journal – for instance, creating a model solar system with different sized balloons. We didn’t have balloons, but I still wanted Munchkin to understand the relative sizes of the planets to one another, so I had him draw circles using the sizes indicated. We didn’t have any paper big enough to draw a 300-inch circle (!), so we didn’t do the sun. I showed him my 60-inch tape measure and he calculated out how many of those it would take to make 300 inches and was duly impressed.

Our first experience with Apologia’s science has been a wonderful one. I wanted to review this program to decide whether I thought it would be a good idea for us to purchase these books for other science topics (they’ve been on my wish list for quite some time), and after seeing and using this one, the answer to that is a resounding YES! I’m definitely looking forward to using the different titles in this series in the future.

As always, I’m not the only one reviewing this program this week. Head over to the Schoolhouse Review Crew blog for more info.

Blessings,

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Back to Homeschool 2016

This year, I still have just the two older boys who are “officially” in school. Seahawk is beginning 7th grade, and Munchkin will be entering 5th. Small Fry, at 4 years old, will be working on expanding his listening skills and learning his letters and maybe the numbers, too. But mostly he’ll be learning the letters in preparation for learning to read. Because he’s still so young, there won’t be anything formal with him; we’ll do some worksheets and continue using Talking Shapes, but that’s it. He’s not required to start formal schooling until he’s 6 years old, so I’m okay letting him be a kid for another year or two.

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Even though we have no real reason to follow the public school schedule, we typically do – at least vaguely (meaning we start the day after Labor Day and end in mid-June with a real summer break). This year, we’re going to try something a little different as far as scheduling breaks all throughout the year, though, in the hopes of eliminating the burnout we all start to feel around mid-April. It’s called Sabbath Schooling, and the basic idea is “6 weeks on, 1 week off.” I think having such regularly scheduled breaks will be really beneficial to us. I’ve already sat down with the calendar and calculated out our breaks; in order to have them fall properly around things like Christmas and the summer break next June, we’ll have a couple of spots where we go 8 weeks instead of 6, but I think that will be okay.

Now, onto the most interesting parts of these kinds of posts: what will we be learning this year? It’s hard for me to choose things that we’ll use all year long, because as a curriculum reviewer, that’s just not the kind of school we have. But I do have some basic ideas of where we’ll start, at least, so I’ll talk about those for now. As things update and change, I can write new posts.

Everyone

Bible

I think we’re going to do a study of Biblical figures this year. We’ll read scripture sections featuring specific people and create notebooking pages for each one. In addition to that, we’ll try to read the New Testament all together and the kids will read their Bibles independently. They’re old enough now to develop Bible reading plans of their own.

Language Arts

Writing: Finishing their novels using Here to Help Learning
Spelling, Grammar, and Handwriting: We’re going to try something new this year and do copy work instead of a formal grammar program. I really do love Fix It! Grammar, though, so we’ll probably go back to that next year. In addition to these changes, we’re going to work through The Logic of English. I really hope this will help my kids to understand they “whys” of how things work in English.

Math

They’ll be finishing up their math textbooks from last year. When they’re nearly done, we’ll purchase the next ones from Amazon.

History

Lots of great options here! My current plan is to listen to the new Heirloom Audio Productions release, The Cat of Bubastes. This takes place in Ancient Egypt, so we’ll form a unit study around that using the study guide that comes with it, and supplement it with some NotebookingPages. When we’re done with this, I’ll find other history unit studies.

French

They’ll continue working through Rosetta Stone. They took too much time off this summer, unfortunately, so I’m going to have them each go back a few lessons.

Here’s what they boys will be studying independently from one another:

Small Fry, Preschool

As I mentioned before, he’ll be doing just the very basics. I plan to have him make a “Learning my Letters” notebook using pages from our NotebookingPages.com Lifetime Membership. He’ll also work on Talking Shapes some more – he loves that program!

Munchkin, 5th Grade

Science

We have two really great science programs for Munchkin (Science Shepherd and Apologia Astronomy). We’ll either do one and then the other when we’re done with it, or we’ll alternate back and forth between the two (M/W/F and T/Th). We’ll see which way works best. In addition to these, we’ll probably do the health class offered on CHSH-Teach.com.

Reading and Literature:

We still have two literature units from Memoria Press that he’ll work through (Heidi and Lassie Come Home). When he finishes those, I’ll find some new options; if there’s not a new review available, I know there are plenty of options online. For fun reading, he’s currently working his way through the complete Wizard of Oz; he’s on book 5 now. Finishing up the rest of those will take him a while, and when he’s done, we’ll find him a new series to read – likely Narnia since he’s read two of those already.

Seahawk, 7th Grade

Science

Seahawk will be studying biology this year using the textbook we were able to download from Christian Home School Hub. It comes with a teacher’s manual and a student book; beyond that, I’m not going to say too much because it’ll be in my review on Wednesday 😉

Reading and Literature

Seahawk is a much slower reader than his brother, so I’m not going to stack as many books on him at the beginning. He spent a lot of the summer working through The Hobbit (along with a Memoria Press study guide), but he’s far from finished on that, so that’s his main goal in the short term. Because he’s not much into reading for fun, I’m happy to combine his reading and literature into one.

Spelling

In addition to the stuff I mentioned in the “everyone” section, Seahawk will work on some spelling units from CHSH-Teach.

So there we are… The main eight subjects we’ll be tackling starting tomorrow.

What does your homeschool year look like? Let me know in the comment section below!

Blessings,

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Book Club: Julie and Julia

Book Club with Lori

For Book Club this month, Lori and I have been reading Julie and Julia: My Year of Cooking Dangerously. It tells the story of Julie Powell, a New York City blogger (back when blogging was a new thing in 2002) who decided that it would be a good idea to cook every single recipe in Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Oh, and she decided to cook them all (524 recipes) in the span of just one year. During the course of her one-year adventure, she becomes rather well-known for her Project, getting stories in major newspapers and magazines as well as TV spots.

Before I dive into the questions, I want to take a moment to talk about my thoughts on the book itself. First, I wish there was less commentary added to make it “book like.” I would have found it much more interesting if they’d literally just published her blog entries. Because she went back and edited the blog entries to make a more “streamlined” book project rather than a series of short and sweet entries, it kind of dragged a bit. Second, Julie Powell is not a very nice person. She curses, she’s mean to those around her, and she’s so politically one-sided that her book is a nightmare to read, especially as someone with conservative-to-moderate political leanings. And finally, I cannot imagine undertaking the task she put upon herself. I’ve made a few recipes from the cookbook in question, and they’re complicated. Not difficult, but involved. Most of them take several hours to make, and a fair portion of that time is hands-on. So despite the fact that I don’t think I’d like Julie Powell as a person, I still respect her for having cooked all of the recipes in Mastering the Art of French Cooking.

Here are the questions (from LitLovers):

1. Julie has such a remarkable relationship with Julia Child, despite never having met her. What did you think of the relationship that Julie built in her mind? And why does it not matter, in some sense, when Julie finds out that Julia wasn’t an admirer of hers or the Project?

I think it’s weird when people say they “have a relationship” with someone they’ve never communicated with. (I think it’s completely feasible to have relationships with those you’ve never met, especially in the internet age, but to think you have a relationship with someone you’ve never even emailed is absurd.) In that sense, I think this question is silly. When you continue reading it, though, you get to the part about “the relationship that Julie built in her mind.” That’s a whole different thing, and something that I think can definitely be very real. The relationship Julie created in her mind is one of reverence to the great “JC,” and that’s an okay thing, I think. It didn’t matter when Julie found out that Julia wasn’t a fan of the Project because she’d decided that the “made up” relationship she’d created was better that the real person she was wanting to know. And by that time, I think Julie cared more about the task she’d set out for herself (cooking all of the recipes) than she did the person who wrote those recipes.

2. Throughout the book, various people become involved with the Project: Julie’s husband, her friends, and several of her family members. Discuss the different roles each played in the Project. Which people were most helpful and supportive? Who was occasionally obstructionist?

This is an easy one. Her husband was the most helpful and supportive (and Julie rarely gave him proper credit for that). He ate the food she cooked (even those that sounded gross, such as aspic, which in case you don’t know is meat-flavored Jell-O with stuff, usually bits of meat, floating in it), he helped her with things she couldn’t muster up the courage to do (specifically, cooking live lobsters), and at one point he even cooked two of the recipes for her when he knew she’d be working late. Eric was a saint to Julie.

The main obstructionist was definitely Julie’s mom. She was constantly berating her for the Project, and when Julie and Eric went to visit her, she flat-out refused to let Julie cook anything on that trip.

Others that were fairly indifferent to the whole process were Julie’s friends Sally and Gwen and her brother, Heathcliff.

3. Did you find Julie to be a likeable character? Did you relate to her insecurities, anxieties, and initial discontent? Why do you think it is that she was able to finish the Project despite various setbacks?

In case you couldn’t tell by my opening paragraph, I definitely did not find Julie to be likeable. At all. She had a bad attitude about life, and she seemed like the kind of person who is never really happy with whatever’s going on, no matter how good it might look to someone looking in. She’s very discontent.

She was able to finish the Project because it was important to her. Whenever we decide that something is important to us (even if it rates a zero on the importance scale to anyone else), we are willing to do almost anything in our power to make it happen. My not liking Julie doesn’t change the fact that she was a very determined person, and finishing the Project was something she felt she had to do, so she did it.

4. If someone were to ask you about this book, how would you describe it? Is it a memoir of reinvention? An homage to Julia Child? A rags-to-riches story? A reflection on cooking and the centrality of food in our lives? Or is it all (or none) of these?

If I had to describe this book, it would be none of the things the question suggests. I would describe it as a “gimmick.” She wasn’t trying to make her life better; she was just trying to do something difficult for a small period of time. She didn’t do anything life changing; she just cooked some recipes she never thought she would. I think it’s almost an insult to Julia Child to suggest that this book in any way is an homage to her; Julie Powell is definitely no Julia Child, and it’s sad to think that anyone might compare the two in a serious context.

5. Did Julie’s exploits in her tiny kitchen make you want to cook? Or did they make you thankful that you don’t have to debone a duck or sauté a liver? Even if your tastes may not coincide with Julia Child’s recipes, did the book give you a greater appreciation of food and cooking?

Some of the moments in the book made me want to cook, yes. A lot of them made me glad that I didn’t have to cook the things she was cooking. I don’t think I’d have the heart to slice a live lobster in half. Blech! Reading this book, I know that I will never cook all of the recipes in MtAoFC. Too many of them are either too complicated, too expensive, or too “gross” for me. That said, yes, I think I do have a better appreciation for cooking now. It makes me want to go through my own copy of MtAoFC and try some of the things talked about in the book.

6. When Julie began the Project, she knew little to nothing about blogging. What do you think blogging about her experiences offered her? Does writing about events in your life help you understand and appreciate them more? Do you think the project would have gone differently if the blog hadn’t gained so much attention? Who was the blog mainly for, Julie or her readers?

This is an interesting question, especially since I’m participating in a virtual book club on my blog. I think blogging offered Julie a place to air her frustrations over the recipes when she felt like she couldn’t really complain anywhere else. I don’t use my blog for that kind of thing; I write about our lives mostly to have a chronicle of the things my family has accomplished. I like giving my own take on things sometimes, but I don’t think that “writing about events in my life helps me appreciate them more.”

I think Julie would have finished her Project even if her blog had never been read by anyone but her own friends and family. She seems like a very determined person, and I think completing the Project was something that was of vital importance to her, so she would have made it happen regardless of the popularity of the blog. Whether the blog was mainly for herself or her readers, well, I think it morphed over time. It definitely started as something for herself (as all blogs do – there’s not a startup blog in the world that comes with ready-made readers), but the more readers she gained, the more she made it about them. That’s not to say that it ceased being about her at all – it didn’t. I’m specifically thinking about the time she was cooking all the aspics. The blog readers begged her not to do the rest of them because they were gross, but she persevered and made them all anyway. That phase was about her. A lot of it seemed like it was about the readers, though. She even mentions several times (mostly in conversations with her mother) that she “has to post, otherwise her ‘bleaders’ will be disappointed.” (Bleaders, btw, is her smush word for blog readers.)

~*~*~

There’s one more thing I want to touch on before I leave Julie and Julia behind. I found it so interesting when she wrote about one particular recipe, Gâteau de Crêpes à la Florentine. This part was so interesting to me because that is one of the three recipes I’ve cooked from MtAoFC. And my experience with it was pretty much exactly the same as what Julie described in her book: time consuming to make, weird looking as a whole, but absolutely gorgeous when you cut it open and so delicious.

Lori and I are taking October off from Book Club so we can get back into the swing of things with our kids starting up homeschool again. I’ll have a book review for a Christian novel for you guys later this month, though, and we’ll have a brand new Book Club post in November! In the meantime, make sure to click over to Lori’s post and read her thoughts on Julie and Julia.

Blessings,

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52 Lists: Quirky Things About Me

I missed last week’s list, so I’ll include that first… It was “Favorite restaurants.”

  • The Old Spaghetti Factory
  • Olive Garden
  • Vineyard Grill (this is a local place that serves delicious Korean food and awesome burgers and fries)
  • Storr’s (another local place where we go for biscuits and gravy in the mornings sometimes)
  • Burgerville (a regional chain with amazing halibut fish and chips)

And now onto this week’s list: Quirky things about me.

quirky things list

  • I’m barely 5 feet tall. As in, if I’m not wearing shoes, that number might be a bit too generous.
  • I don’t wear pants, only skirts and dresses.
  • I used to drink a lot of iced tea, but last summer (I think… may have been the summer before) I switched to water. Now plain old water (I don’t even like adding things like lemon or cucumber) is my beverage of choice 99% of the time. I do buy distilled, though, because the tap water in our town is pretty gross.
  • I am not an animal person. I grew up in a house full of pets, but as an adult I prefer an animal-less home. Especially dogs. I really, really hate dogs.
  • I’ve had four surgeries in my life: one to get my wisdom teeth out when I was 21 and three c-sections.
  • On the subject of those c-sections…: I’ve had one vaginal birth and three c-sections. I wanted a vbac for my most recent baby, but it just didn’t work out with the hospital and insurance. Luck would have it that my water broke the day my surgery was scheduled and I started contracting right away. The pain of that was so intense (and I was only in labor for two hours) that I think I’ll take my chances with additional c-sections if we have more children. (My recovery was really easy this time around; I never even took anything stronger than 800mg Ibuprofen for the pain.)
  • My vaginal birth was with Seahawk, my oldest. I was in labor with him for 33 hours.
  • I’ve never tried smoking. I don’t understand the draw, so I never will try it.
  • I’ve never really drunk alcohol, either. We bought a bottle of wine once, “just to see,” and it was so foul that we’ll never do that again! I use cooking wine (from the vinegar aisle in the store) instead of regular wine for cooking, even.
  • I was a JV cheerleader in 10th grade.
  • I haven’t been on an airplane since 1997. Not because I don’t like to fly, because it just hasn’t worked out.

For more random things about me, check out this post from 2013 and this one from 2014. Some of the things on those lists are repeated here, but many aren’t.

Blessings,

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52 lists with Chasing Slow

Video of the Week: Peek a Boo!

A video posted by Wendy (@ladybugdaydreams) on

This video was taken when Dragonfly was exactly 9 months old (last Saturday), so it can double as his 9-month photograph 🙂 An extra tidbit: Sunday marked the “anniversary” of him being as old as his gestational age at birth – 39 weeks, 2 days.

Have a great weekend!

Blessings,

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