Give the Gift that Lasts All Year with OAC!

Grace-Filled Writer
OAC-Gift-That-Lasts-All-Year-Facebook-Cover 

What’s on your children’s Christmas wish list? As excited as they might be about that new toy, as every parent knows, the thrill of the gift will eventually wear off. Focus on the Family and Adventures in Odyssey have created the perfect gift for those who want to give their children or grandchildren a present that will provide year-round fun with eternal impact.

The Odyssey Adventure Club (OAC) offers families 24/7 access to 25 years’ worth of Adventures in Odyssey (AIO) episodes in a safe online environment where children can explore and learn. Christmas really is the perfect time to tap into your children’s imagination while infusing faith and fun into their day . . . and every day of the year.

To celebrate the holidays this year, the OAC is offering free content for everyone, including an Advent calendar, a broadcast download with tips to create a memorable Christmas, AIO cutouts and Christmas stocking stuffer cards. Membership to the OAC costs just $9.99 a month — or even less if parents make a six-month or one-year commitment. Enrollment provides more than enough content to keep kids engaged throughout the year:

  • Access to exclusive content and first looks at books and select Radio Theatre dramas.
  • On-the-go access to the OAC app for both iOS and Android users.
  • 24/7 streaming access to nearly 800 AIO episodes.
  • A new, members-only AIO episode every month.
  • A subscription to Adventures in Odyssey Clubhouse Magazine, and more.

In keeping with AIO’s rich heritage of teaching children about biblical principles — such as the importance of giving — a portion of each OAC membership benefits Focus on the Family partner organizations. Here are a couple of examples of what has been accomplished through Odyssey Adventure Club members:

The Odyssey Adventure Club wants to reach beyond fleeting entertainment this Christmas, partnering with parents in helping their kids grow deep in faith and find their place in God’s story.

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Speaking of the holidays, you can prepare for Christmas with Thriving Family‘s 2015 Advent Activity Calendar — Tales of Christmas Past: 25 Inspiring true stories of the season. Assemble a beautifully designed Advent poster to help your kids focus on Christ this Christmas. Then read Scripture passages and stories that relate to individual flaps on the poster. You can also create easy-to-fold booklets for each story. Get more information about this year’s free Advent calendar at ThrivingFamily.com/Advent, or sign up to download it.

To learn more about the Odyssey Adventure Club, visit www.oaclub.org, Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.

Whipsers in the Reading Room: A BookLook Blogger Review

Grace-Filled Writer
I have thoroughly enjoyed getting to know Shelley Gray as an author. She is not new to the Christian fiction scene, but she is new to me. I am not typically a mystery fan unless it involves a historical Christian novel. I was very excited to have the opportunity to read and review the entire Chicago World’s Fair Mystery series through BookLook Bloggers. 
 
This entire series has been engaging from start to finish. I have very little time to read for pleasure even though it is something I love to do, so when I do read I like quality stories that leave me feeling as if I know the characters personally. Overall this series has provided that satisfaction. 
This particular novel involves an unlikely pairing between a wealthy nare-do-well and a young woman who had fallen from society’s graces due to her father’s lack of provision after his death. Lydia is the female protagonist who appears rather naive despite her high intelligence. Her mother’s indifference to her in general and her own seclusion in the library where she works creates a hopelessly romantic personality that is equally separated from reality. Her station in society has spared her from some of the harshest realities of life, but through her own misguided curiosity she finds herself embroiled in a murder investigation as a potential suspect. 
The male protagonist, Sebastian, was not a very likeable character for me at the beginning, but he did grow on me as the story progressed.  His arrogant nature and demanding ways do not present him as a hero. However, his growing desire to become an honorable man does redeem him in the end. 
The fast pace nature of the story kept me on the edge of my seat, more so than the other novels in the series. While a sign of a good book is always wanting to read more, this was probably my least favorite for a few reasons. I do like a good redemption story, but in some ways that portion fell flat. The only reason Sebastian seems to want to change is because of Lydia and not a convincingly true change of heart. I also felt Lydia’s naivety made her less likable and her growth during the story felt less than sincere or realistic. 
The other area I felt was slightly lacking was spiritual growth of the characters. Now, I am not one who likes a preachy novel. Some very successful Christian authors sometimes fill their pages with full sermons and I have never been a fan of this. At the same time I like a story with true redemption reflective of a heart changed for Christ and this never entered the picture, which is why I think I did not feel the character’s changes were completely sincere. 
I would still recommend this novel and the entire series but I personally think the first two books are more enjoyable than the third. 
Disclaimer: I received Whispers in the Reading Room as part of the BookLook Bloggers review team. I was not required to write a positive review. I was not compensated in any other way.                                                                                             

Week in Review: October 26-30

Grace-Filled Writer
After being sick most of last week with a horrible upper respiratory thing going around I was so grateful to feel well this week. There is nothing like bad health to remind you to be grateful for the good health we often take for granted. Thankfully this just hit my husband and I. Our girls mostly missed it with only a few sniffles.
This week went really well for the most part except for a few moments of meltdowns with my youngest. She is in one of those phases right now that everything contrary to her immediate desires requires an overly dramatic response. I remember this being pretty common for this age. I also remember that this phase passes as they all do…thankfully! 
Grace – Kindergarten: Little Hearts for His Glory Unit 30

We studied about Abraham Lincoln, General Lee, and D. L. Moody this week. Grace loved the poem this week about these three men who lived during the same time period of the Civil War. This was especially meaningful because all of the students at our learning center had the opportunity to hear from a couple of Civil War reenactors the previous week. Grace is the little blond head with the pony tail! 
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She started reading about Buffalo Bill this week. All of my girls are excellent and eager readers, but of the three Grace is the most curious. She always wants to learn more and more and more…
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We struggled with handwriting this week. She no longer wants to practice and just rushes through her work. More than a few of our meltdowns occurred when I erased the ones she had not tried her best with and asked her to redo them. This did not please her at all, but by the end of the week she figured out this would keep happening and I noticed a marked improvement in her effort. 
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While I read history this week I gave Grace some different activities to do with her hands. She loved this and my goal is to help her grow in the area of finger manipulation activities.
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I love how she props her little foot up. Do you notice her sweater and bare feet? She takes after me in that way. Even though I’m quite cold natured I really don’t like wearing socks. I do once the cold weather hits, but all three of my girls prefer their bare feet like their mama! 
Beth – 3rd Grade: Preparing Hearts for His Glory Unit 6 (1st half)
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Beth continued studying about ancient Egypt this week. She loves the history projects. I really like that there is purpose in the art and creations she is making. Not only is she learning a variety of artistic mediums, but she is furthering her understanding of history. 
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In preparation for creating her Crook she researched using our Bible dictionary. This has been one of the best resources for us for both Preparing and Creation. If you are able to invest in a really good in depth Bible dictionary, do it!
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We use the Rod and Staff worksheets and tests. I really do like testing my girls and they are not stressed at all. It is a helpful gauge for both me and them to see what we need to make sure we review again. I use the worksheets at the end of a chapter as review. Both of the girls likes these and really prefer them to the regular book-work!
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My sweet Beth can be found in any number of areas when she reads! This week she was reading Sarah Plain and Tall. She wanted to know why it was titled this and I told her to read a bit and see what she found out. She came to me so excited when she figured out to whom the title referred! 
Rose – 5th Grade: Creation to Christ Unit 24
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Math is going very well and this week we moved into working with decimals. That little grin on her face has nothing to do with math and everything to do with my teasing her for looking so serious while she was working! 
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As I was trying to get over my cold completely I wasn’t able to read aloud quite as much today. Rose is such a good sport and happily read a lot of her geography on her own this week. I did read some with her, but she understood my need to read more to her youngest sister and helped me out a lot this way!
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We really struggled with spelling when we first started out with HOD. We ended up following both the HOD spelling recommendation and All About Spelling. I’m grateful to both methods and where spelling was once one of the longest parts of the day, we now move through it quite quickly. 
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It’s a bit hard to see as I was struggling to get the lighting adjusted correctly this week for my pictures! Rose is working on her notebooking pages for history, which she loves. I really like how timelines are presented in Heart of Dakota. She draws beautifully and the timeline entries are more meaningful to her because of this. 
How was your week? If you use Heart of Dakota curriculum please link-up your week in review below! 

52 Little Lessons From A Christmas Carol: A BookLook Blogger Review

Grace-Filled Writer
We all have things we love about Christmas and Charles Dickens gave us one more item to add to the list those many years ago. In many ways the culture of his day was much like our own even if apparel and technology have drastically changed. Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol intending to bring to light many of the social ills of the day such as over indulgence of the rich, ignorance of poverty, and poor education. His tale is timeless and as much as it is tradition, it is, I also see it as a learning opportunity.
I was excited to read Bob Welch’s analysis of the this tale of Christmas in 52 Little Lessons from A Christmas Carol. This is a new author for me and I always anticipate what will come when I read someone new. The layout of the book is simple. Each chapter has a very short quote along with an attribute to the character it refers to or who spoke it. Then proceeds several pages of discourse about the quote. 
Each quote is enhanced with literary analysis, historical significance, and Scriptural reference. The reader is led on a thought-provoking journey through these 52 quotes, often left to think of how this relates to our present day lives. 
I was a little disappointed that the quotes were so short. I prefer having the entire context. While I do have many copies of A Christmas Carol handy, I would have liked to have more context included in the quote. I believe the author presumes a familiarity with the story, whether by theater, a retelling, or the original text. If not, this book would feel a little empty. I have extensive experience with the novel as I have taught it repeatedly in my English classes for middle schoolers. I also have multiple versions on DVD and a few audio dramas. Still I felt there was a bit lacking as far as providing the text. 
I also think I would like to have the chapters separated into Staves just as the original novel is. While the quotes do go in order, having further clarification of the stave in which it occurs would have been nice. 
I did like this very much as it has given me more to think about for the next time I read the story.  

DIY Display Project from EEME: Review

Grace-Filled Writer

Time for another review of the EEME monthly projects! These are becoming quite popular in our home, especially with Beth who is my little mathematician. 
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This project uses the base project from the first month of lessons and all the extra pieces needed to complete this. Beth was excited that this would display numbers. I have to say all the wires feel intimidating to me at first, but my girls don’t feel that way at all and I’m glad for that. The video step-by-step instructions are very easy to follow. 

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Beth prefers using the the iPad for the instructional videos over the computer. I agree that the touch screen makes it more user friendly for my kids to run the videos on their own without having to navigate the mouse. This means when she needs to pause the video or back it up a little she can do so much more quickly. 
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Beth’s favorite way to to put these projects together is to watch the video all the way through, then go back and watch it again as she puts it together. While she doesn’t always do this, she is a whole-picture kind of kid and this way seems to go more smoothly for her. In contrast, her older sister, Rose, likes to do a single part at a time and work through the video by pausing a lot. It’s interesting to see how each of the girls attacks problem solving differently. 
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My wireless keyboard comes in handy for answering the questions which pop up after the sections. I love this part of the project because it helps the kids process what they are doing and help see how they are not just building, but also understanding. 
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These lessons are an incredible addition to our homeschool. This is an interactive experience like no other which I don’t think would be available to my kids in a typical traditional school. If you have a child who loves to take things apart and put them together, this would make a wonderful gift for them!

Week in Review: October 12-16

Grace-Filled Writer

The beginning of this week was a little harder than usual. My husband was away at his annual District Conference for all the pastors in our district of the Christian and Missionary Alliance. We did just fine on our own (It was only one night after all!) but my husband is a very hands on dad, so even just a night away left my girls missing him a lot!

We kept our routine as usual for the most part. Daddy did come home with a cold that is now making its round among the rest of us. Thankfully it doesn’t seem all that serious so we’re hoping to bounce back soon.

Here is a peek at what school looked like this week…

Rose – 5th Grade: Creation to Christ Unit 22
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Rose has really enjoyed the notebooking pages in Creation to Christ. We really like the erasable gel pens from Frixion and there are often coupons for these in the Sunday paper. For coloring pictures and the timeline portion we use sharpie markers. We have worked towards neater handwriting without lines as well as proof reading. One of the best ways we work on that is for me to read her work out loud phonetically. This helps her hear both her grammar and spelling mistakes…and sometimes it gives us quite a giggle! This is also a little secret way I’m helping my perfectionist daughter treat her mistakes a little lighter. When we can laugh about it together she doesn’t take it so seriously. 
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We started reading about Cleopatra this week. Rose reads her story time assignments to herself. Running three guides and a part-time business from my home teaching piano every afternoon means we have made a few changes to how the Heart of Dakota guides are done. I don’t mind because we still discuss the reading selections. I like how much my girls are learning independently. 
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Here are my girls working on their weekly history projects. They were so sweet chatting away as they worked. Rose kept telling Beth how much fun her project was going to be. My girls get really excited about seeing one another do things. I used to wonder what it would be like when the were all doing projects and if they would wish they were doing each other’s. I certainly would understand that, but they seem to just take it as a matter of “this is how we do things around here”. They also are really great about complimenting each other’s efforts which is sweet to observe. 
Beth – 3rd Grade: Preparing Hearts for His Glory Unit 5 (1st half)

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Beth never really seemed interested in art until this year. She was not at all excited when we first began Draw and Write Through History, but now she really seems to like it. She takes more time with her drawings and I even catch her drawing the same thing later on just for fun sometimes. 
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Cursive is getting much, much easier. It’s just a matter of time. Her letters still seem a bit awkward, but I know it will come. Her printing seemed to improve overnight this summer and we will keep plugging away at cursive!
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Here she is working hard at her Egyptian hieroglyphics project. She was frustrated at first because it wasn’t turning out like she expected. So I helped her see how best to etch in the hieroglyphics, she smoothed out my work and did her own pretty quickly. And yes, her body position is just about as awkward as it appears in this picture! The way my kids contort themselves while they study amazes me, but I’m glad we have the freedom for this. Beth is typically the one wanting to work on the floor. Rose likes to sit at a table Grace would rather dance her way through her work!
Grace – Kindergarten: Little Hearts for His Glory Unit 28
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I love this picture! While Grace and I were working on Spelling Beth couldn’t help but listen in. She was supposed to be doing her copywork I think, but I didn’t really mind. Every time Grace spelled something correctly she would say, “That was good!”
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I have a favorite handwriting program (Fundanoodle!) but, when you are gifted a handwriting series for free, you say, “Great!” and fly with it! My girls have honestly all used something different and they’ve all done fine. Grace is now in the second handwriting book for Handwriting Without Tears. I was having her do 1 page a day, but she has been asking to do more, so I think I may plan more for this coming week. 
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Grace is so excited about her history now and sometimes enjoys reading it on her own. I have a feeling watching her big sisters do this is part of the reason, but I’m grateful she finds so much joy out of learning on her own. We actually call her our little dictionary because she loves to define words and if she doesn’t know what something means she’s quick to ask. She is always thinking and driven by curiosity. Her eagerness to know more is contagious!
Did you have a good week on your own journey through Heart of Dakota? We’d love to hear about it! Don’t forget to link-up below!