English lesson

Sparkle's English lesson today was about subject-verb disagreement. Her textbook says that when a subject and verb disagree, that breaks the sentence. Sparkle wondered why the textbook spent so much time on such a simple concept. We discussed it, and Sparkle came up with this simile:

Breaking a sentence is like breaking a porcelain dish by dropping it.

I love this analogy. Carrying a porcelain dish requires no more skill than carrying a plastic dish. However, dropping a porcelain dish has disastrous results, so we caution our children much more when they handle porcelain. Similarly, it doesn't take much skill in having subjects and verbs agree, yet the disaster to the sentence when they disagree is so great that the textbook spends extra pages on this subject.

North & South

My current obsession is Elizabeth Gaskell's "North & South". I haven't obsessed about a book this much since Suzanne Collins's "The Hunger Games" Trilogy.

Gaskell's book is much denser and slow moving than Collins's. It took me several days to finish the book, while I had swallowed Collins's books in a day each. To learn the story faster, I watched the BBC mini-series of "North & South" on Youtube. The mini-series has many changes (some significant, most minor) in order to tell the story in a visual format to a modern audience. However, the themes largely play out the same. I am satisfied.

I don't know anyone in real life with whom I can discuss these powerful stories. Most people of my acquaintance would be put off by the violence of THG and the treatment of religion and suicide in N&S. Wander is very patient listening to me prattle on about these books, but as he knows nothing of the books but what I tell him, it's very much me talking "at" him versus having an insightful conversation.

Just as the love story in THG is a delicious feast, so too is the love story in N&S. However to define either book only in terms of it's love story is to deny its full force. The themes, especially of rules vs. workers, leisure vs. activity, and now vs. future, replay through both stories, albeit with different results.

I am startled by how much the heroines (Margaret Hale and Katniss Everdeen) resemble each other. Both have mothers who came from a higher class of society. Both place their families above all else in their lives. Both live in the upper end of poverty. Both have little freedom to direct their own lives. Both have early "outs" in their stories where they could have chosen simpler, comfortable lives. Both are so full with dealing with their present lives that they are unaware and slightly confused by the passions they inspire in others. Both are bridges between the underclass and the overclass, and come to realize that neither group is perfect.

I admire these heroines and what they stand for. I don't want to be them. They endure far too much suffering. Yet, I do wish for their strength of character to do what is right despite confusing circumstances, to act with conviction, skill, and integrity.

What more could I ask for in a girly book?

p.s. How blessed I am to be able to toy with these lofty ideas in the safety and comfort.

It's COLD

The kids are running around outside. I managed to get them to wear leggings and closed-toe shoes. They also had gloves, which theye promptly put in their pockets. It's too cold for me to go out and scold them into wearing the gloves.

Here's the view from my kitchen window.

Nature Walk

Our weekly nature walks have been reduced to bi-weekly walks due to the new book club.

As usual, our walk started at the front pond.

After counting seven small fish, the girls turned their attention to the ants floating on the surface of the pond. The ants' wings were stick in the water and the poor insects' legs were wiggling like mad. Sparkle "rescued" one ant by scooping it out of the water. On the rocks, the girls watched smaller ants scurrying back and forth. On the ground, the girls found even more large ants with wings.


Lizards, in various sizes, are also in abundance, due to the warmer weather.


I've given up on hauling the large nature bag around, so the girls haven't been doing much drawing. Recently, I provided the girls with small notepads for them to carry in their purses. Sparkle pulled her notepad out to drawing the fish and the century plant.


Glitter hung out on the swing, the benches, and the "paths."

First Confession

Whenever we mentioned Sparkle's upcoming First Confession to her, she'd get this nervous look in her eye and she'd shrink about two inches. Discussing the matter didn't seem to help put her at her ease. So, I made sure that she knew her prayers, understood the concepts, read her the allegory of "The King of the Golden City" (which she *loved*), and left the rest to her teacher and the Almighty.

Then the *big day* came last Saturday. She wrung her hands and fumbled when practicing her prayers in the car. (Prayers that she has had down cold for months!) We exchanged extra big hugs as I dropped her off in her class.

The next time I saw her she was striding down the aisle of the church with her class, with a *huge* bounce in her step and a gigantic grin on her face. She was third in line for confession and seemed to take longer than the other kids before her. Then she quietly knelt in her pew and did her penance. Finally she joined us positively glowing with happiness.

Here's a picture I snapped just outside the church.


Then we went to celebrate with Marble Slab ice cream!