Family Reading #8

 

Picture Book Highlights

Since we got our shipment about a month ago, we’ve been enjoying many of our very own books that have been packed away for far too long, such as Mike Mulligan and More (a treasury by Virginia Lee Burton), The Grouchy Ladybug, and Katie Meets the Impressionists (the very book that got Michelle so excited about the paintings we saw in the Musée d’Orsay in Paris last year.)  Also notable was our new “Easter” book – The Prince’s Poison Cup – an allegory of what Christ has done for us by RC Sproul.

 

Michelle’s Reading (Age 7-1/2)

Michelle has been enjoyed reading some of the Thornton Burgess stories on her own. Currently she is reading the first Boxcar children book AGAIN.  (She's read some of the others, but always cycles back to this first one.  She likes it when they are living in the boxcar.)   She also likes to read things that are far too easy for her…  I’m  working on finding a good balance between challenging her and reading the more “fluffy” stuff for relaxation.   (Any and all ideas are welcome!!)

 

Featured School Book

We are love, love, loving AO Year 1.   We are off homeschooling for the next couple of weeks while Michelle participates in the special co-op program for homeschoolers that our mission offers, and I am finding that I really miss the intellectual stimulation that reading and discussing our AO books provides.  So much so that we are having a ‘snack and story time’ in the afternoon and just reading one thing off of the AO list together – just so we don’t have to go a month without our AO books.  =)  She is enjoying it as much as I am.  One highlight lately has been Dangerous Journey, an abridged, illustrated version of Pilgrim’s Progress.  This isn’t actually on the AO Year 1 list, but I added it in as a replacement for Aesop’s Fables (which we read last year) and in preparation for Years 2 and 3 which have the original version of Pilgrim’s Progress scheduled.   She always wants me to read more of this one….

 

Bedtime Reading

We are reading Pollyanna, which we are enjoying…but I wouldn’t say is our favorite bedtime read-aloud ever.  Although...it is growing on us.

 

On Mama’s Nightstand

Too much, as usual. ;-) In the fiction department, I am reading North and South in English and Les Miserables (abridged) in French.  Hoping to finish both by the end of the month so I can participate in the book discussion of The Scarlet Pimpernel that’s going to start over on the AO Forum.  (ETA – I finished North and South last night.  Second time I’ve read it.  Am I the only one who feels really sad when you finish a book – even a good book with a good ending – just because it’s done?  I felt that way at the end of North and South.  Even for take two.)  In the non-fiction department I am trying to follow along with the discussion (also on the AO Forum) of CM’s Volume 5 Formation of Character and slowly wading through Poetic Knowledge.  Brandy over at Afterthoughts has a really good series of posts on this book of you are curious what it’s all about.  She is smarter than I am and can explain it to you better. =)

 

This is the famous floor-to-ceiling bookcase I was telling you about. Makes me happy to look at it...