Learn to love these people, THEN they will listen to you.

This is a lesson that Frank Laubach needed to learn when working among the Muslims.

Step by step Mr. Laubach, a congregational minister from Pennsylvania, learned to love the Muslim people.  Studying their Koran so he could find similarities between his faith and theirs.  Teaching them to know how to read, teaching one to teach another.   Fighting illiteracy in a battle against poverty and to help people learn about God in their own language.

in 1955 in founded Laubach Literacy.   Eventually this became ProLiteracy Worldwide.  He thought that literacy and world peace were linked, and travelled extensively talking about the needed for people to be literate, promoting peace through literacy.  

His conversations with God helped to formulate his approach to working among the Muslim people, gaining their trust and acceptance.   His literacy approach was very popular in the Philippines and from there spread through several countries.

He wrote many books and pamphlets.  One of his pamphlets encouraged people to spend one second of every minute focused on God, thereby encouraging people to always be in an attitude of prayer.  He wanted people to always be focused on God.  He detailed these in his Letters by a Modern Mystic.

"His work touched 103 countries, involved 313 languages, and taught 100 mission people to read. His fifty-six books promoted both literacy and the intense spirituality which marked his life. In 1984 a U.S. postage stamp in the Great Americans series was issued in his honor".

Sources:
Missionary Hero stories (book)
Wiki:
Boston University:  
Dallas Willard:

Be kind to Your little children, Lord.
Be a gentle teacher,
patient with our weakness and stupidity.
And give us the strength and discernment to do what You tell us,
and so grow in Your likeness.
May we all live in the peace that comes from You.

May we journey towards Your city,
sailing through the waters of sin untouched by the waves,
borne serenely along by the Holy Spirit.

Night and day may we give you praise and thanks,
because You have shown us that all things belong to You,
and all blessings are gifts from You.

To You,
the essence of wisdom,
the foundation of truth,
be glory for evermore.

(A prayer of Clement of Alexandria)

HT Challies

It's a sign that a boy is listening when he asks when reading a book of history, Mom.. was that the boy who disappeared when someone was caring for him?   Leading us to check the history and learning that it was a different boy, and having a boy reiterate how he is so glad he wasn't born royalty back in the day.   Royalty had to be watchful of so many different intrigues, and if anything unusual happened, they could lose their lives so quickly or spend their lives imprisoned.

Elizabeth's story really brought this home to my boy (and to me).

We lived her life for a couple of years.   Moving from house to house.  Seeing murder, almost smelling the stench of unwashed bodies and vomit in the corridors, feeling sorry for the servants who simply couldn't keep up.    Seeing the class divisions.   The fears and hopes and simple joys in the life of royalty.   So much danger.

But she lived.

She became a highly popular queen.  Called the virgin queen as she chose not to marry in a day when women were expected to keep their mouths shut and to marry well.

It was a neat story to read.

Do you know how much fun it can be playing games with your children?   During this review I, along with my son, our international student, various friends, AN Don the odd occasion, my husband... had a complete hoot playing two games: Tapple: Fast Word Fun for Everyone (a battery-operated game) and  Wonky: The Crazy Cubes Card Game given to us by USAopoly.   I have to tell you, it's a hoot! 

We had a whole lot of fun learning... letters!  (oooh.. exciting eh?  :) )   It is when you have a challenge.. can you find more first letters to words than your mom can?   Can you beat your mother? (not so easy)   Can you beat your dad?  (easy)   Can you beat your international "brother"?  (very easy)    My very competitive son enjoyed learning his letters and proving that he knew them through cooperative play as well as independent play.  

I have to admit, we played around with the rules for the game of Tapple quite a bit.  In fact, for the most part we totally ignored them as we made up our own variations of play.   This skill building is what brought this game to life for my son and I.  Can we form teams and think of words on one subject?   Can one 10 year old English speaker team up with one 17 year old Portuguese speaker and figure out more heroes then mom and dad can?   (in case you wondered.. YES they can!!!!)   Can a 10 year old think of more words on a given subject than his mom can?   Sometimes yes, sometimes.. lamentably.. no.  :)  

No spelling.
Just tapping letters and passing the wheel.
Some letters aren't included: q,u,v,x,y,or z.   This means you have just 20 letters of the alphabet to use without having to worry about the really hard to do letters.
Tapple stands for: Touch Activated Press & Play Letter Eliminator .   What it is in real life is fast word fun for everyone.

This is a card game meant for the whole family.  

How do you choose your topics?    Cards are provided with a variety of topics.  These cards are two-sided. the blue/white being easier topics, the red/yellow being harder topics.    For our use we generally used the blue/white cards.  If you don't like what the cards say... Make your own.  :)

Rules of the game are fairly simple.

• Use the yellow slide to put all the tabs in the up position.
• Pick a card.
• Each player has 10 seconds to name something in the category and to push down the tab and hit the red button in the middle of the ring.
• Rounds continue until players drop out due to not being able to name something.
• Play is quick.  
• Person who wins three rounds in all is the winner of that "set".

We modified the game for two reasons.
1. usually it's just the lad and I playing so adding challenges makes the game go faster.
2. modifying games is fun. 

The other game we received was called wonky.   Ever since we received it, I've repeatedly heard "Mom, can we play wonky?   Mom, can I bring Wonky along to the ______"?    My lad absolutely loves this game and it is fun to play, easy for all ages as long as they have a steady hand.  Recommendation is age 8+ but younger children can play as long as they have a steady hand. 

Do you see the smiling face on our international student?    He's a serious minded lad and doesn't smile easily.   Playing this game is generally a guarantee to get a grin.  :)   Such a pleasure to find an easy way to get a grin.  :)

So how do you play Wonky: the Crazy Cubes Card Game?

• Shake out your nine blocks.   Three different sizes, three different colours.
• Deal out your playing cards - seven each unless playing with a large crowd.
• NOTE: the blocks are wonky... not flat on all sides, have a bit of a curve to them.
• Use the cards to determine which card to play and how to possibly stymie your opponents (our student excelled at this stymieing)
• Play until all the cards in your hand are done - first one out wins (or by stacking all nine blocks to a count of three).
  
• Mind that a 10 year old doesn't find ways to exploit opportunities... ie wind blowing, tables shaking, hey look what's that, etc.??? as you place the blocks down.  :)

So my advise to you?   Plan a family game night (or two), grab up these two games and prepare to have some fun.   Visit USAopoly today.

In this family card game you will notice a deck of 54 cards.  The cards vary in their depictions.  They have turn around cards, pass cards, cards showing various blocks you can use, some of those cards also have additions of pick up one or reverse order which affect the next player in line.

This strategy helps players build skills as they play.   You could just see my son thinking his way through it.  How can he mess up the next player.  Could he set it up in such a way that the next player.. or two down the line will be forced into a "you'll make it fall" scenario.

Winning is accomplished by using all your cards in hand first OR stacking all nine blocks.   

It's a challenging game but one in which you will laugh a lot as you try setting up another to take a fall and then get caught in your trap due to skillfully played cards by your opponents.  Luck plays a role, but mostly skill and strategy.   Steady hands are  much THOUGH shaky hands gramma was able to play rounds with lad as well. :)

Product Details:
Received: Two Games  Wonky and Tapple
Prices: Each game is priced at $19.95
Vendor: USAopoly
Age Range: 8+
Players: For Wonky 2 or more, for Tapple 2-8 players

Check out what other crew members have to say.  GO HERE.  :)

Social Media:
Twitter https://twitter.com/USAopoly
Instagram https://instagram.com/usaopoly/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/usaopoly
Pinterest https://www.pinterest.com/usaopoly/

are so easily way laided.

It's been a tough past couple of weeks.   Suffering from a migraine makes it tough to think through what you want to do well.    Everything just is SO much work.   So our schooling has been slow and not as thorough as it should be.

Today I was feeling pretty chipper so thought AT LAST we can complete a full day.. but my best laid plans were put to rest when "Mom, why do you think my stomach is so sore?"

Sitting up hurt.
Laying down is BORING MOM!
So we made do.

We did some poetry cause poetry is EASY.  Then doing his Jump Math.

We did Veritas Press because it's just clicking buttons and listening and you don't have to sit still.

After this was completed my son moved around and did some critical thinking with some toothpicks.  The challenge was simple.... how many designs can you make with just TWO toothpicks.  Spread them out and let's see.    Are they different if you orient them in different direction?   Does it matter if the top toothpick is over or under?   Explain.   He made them, then checked the sheet.

At the end of this the lad needed a break so went and laid down for a spell, I then joined him on the bed and we learned about Anselm and King Henry using this book: Monks and Mystics.   This is Volume 2 of the Chronicles of the Medieval Church.

We read some more in the book, Poking Holes in the Darkness by Jaki Parlier.    Another couple of days and we'll be done this book.   It's been an interesting read watching this missionary couple go about their work, complete with struggles.

We concluded our day with our world of the day (Absorb) and reading lesson two is Machines and Motion from the God's Design Curriculum.  He wasn't up to doing the experiment.   My son is enjoying this science material.  :)

Anyways, there was a day in the life for us.

We followed it up at night as the lad started to feel better with a meal from Iceland!   To go with our drawing around Europe study that we are doing.  :)  Yes, a recipe post is coming as is a review. :)   Just so you know.. the food was GOOD.  :)

Part of the Crew Round up of Feb 18, 2016.   See more here.

I am a firm believer that poetry is best learned by simply reading it and taking time with it.   Why does an author use certain words?   How does it make you feel?   How it is set up?   So I like to read poetry with my lad. :)  Here's a sample of one we did today.

Wanted--A Witch's Cat
by Shelagh McGee
taken from Childcraft: The How and Why Library, Volume 3-Stories and Poems page 245

Wanted--a witch's cat.
Must have vigor and spite,
Be expert at hissing,
And good in a fight,
And have balance and poise
On a broomstick at night.

Wanted--a witch's cat.
Must have hypnotic eyes
To tantalize victims
And mesmerize spies,
And be an adept
At scanning the skies.

Wanted--a witch's cat,
With a sly, cunning smile,
A knowledge of spells
And a good deal of guile,
With a fairly hot temper
And plenty of bile.

Wanted--a witch's cat,
Who's not afraid to fly,
For a cat with strong nerves
The salary's high
Wanted--a witch's cat;
Only the best need apply.

Discussion:
What did you think of this poem?   I liked it!
What do you think about the cat wanted?
"I wouldn't want that cat.   I want a cat that would be nice and kind with me, like Milo, but I would also want a cat that would attack people who wanted to hurt you.   Milo doesn't do that mom".

Observation:
When you look at the poem, what do you see?
It's broken into sections.
Each section has six lines.   "MOM?   Do you think she did that on purpose"?
It doesn't rhyme.

Can you find words you don't know?

• tantalize: torment or tease (someone) with the sight or promise of something that is unobtainable.
• mesmerize: hold the attention of (someone) to the exclusion of all else or so as to transfix them.

• guile: Sly or cunning intelligence
  
• hypnotic: of producing or relating to hypnosis
  
• poise: graceful and elegant bearing in a person.
• adept:very skilled or proficient at something.
• bile: anger, irritability

What kind of words were they?
They described the cat.
Which means they are what?   Adjectives.

How did the poem make you feel?
This type of question is always hard for my boy.
He said "the poem made me feel interested sort of".  :)

WOW.
Even through a massive headache... I enjoyed reading this book.  :)

Plots and intrigue, twists and turns, evilness and goodness.

This book has a bit of everything carefully woven together.

Unexpected revelations.

It starts with a dead general.
Then the general's wife.
Then a delta force guy.
and the deaths keep mounting.

Would Jack Reacher be able to sort out all the pieces?

In the midst of the tangle is the struggles with birth family.
Incompetent leadership... or carefully placed leadership?
A massive movement of men for what purpose?

The case will change everything for Reacher.    It's interesting going along for the ride.  It's the first Jack Reacher book I have read and now I want to go out and read more of them.   Isn't that what a decent book should lead you to do?   Read more?  :)

As a Pastor's wife, when I saw this book I thought, oh...that sounds like an interesting read.  I wonder what it will have to say to me. 

Since I blog, you get the benefit of my learning as well.  Fun eh?  :)

This first chapter was about setting priorities.

Priorities: putting first things first

I loved this quote: "The wife of a pastor is the most privileged life you could ever desire.    It may not always seem that way,  but God cocooned you in a place where you will constantly be exposed to his word.    This is a manifestation of his love toward you in Christ. "

I know that God has changed my life so much my having me marry my hubby.   Not only because I needed to understand his grace more, but I also needed to understand the depth of his love for me.  He shows this to me all the time through my hubby.

So... With that confidence of his never-failing goodness toward you.... Learn to put first things first.  It's important to do this you know?    If you don't  you'll be driven hither and yon and beaten down by the expectations of other people.  But the more you understand and are secure in his love for you, the more you can do what you need to do and be okay with it.

To do that you need to look at your life and see where your current priorities lie. " The habitual bent of our souls reveals where we look for satisfaction,  security,  and significance.    Do we look to God for these things,  or do we scatter our hopes elsewhere?"   Just what is it that I focus on?   What is that you are currently focusing on?    Does anything need to change in all that?

Search your heart.   What do you want out of life?     What are the things you feel you need?    What makes you despair and panic?

Prioritize your life before you organize it.

Things to help mold your thinking

1. Christ... The ultimate example

• A life of prayer - Christ prayed all the time
  
• Obedience to the father - even when he wanted to be released from his duty, he still did as the Lord God asked.
  
• Relationships with others - he spent time with people around him, he built himself a community
  

2. Women of the word

• Women to follow ie Hannah a woman of prayer,  also Proverbs 31 woman
• Women to avoid  ie Miriam seeking preeminence for herself Numbers 12:2.   She forgot her position was to serve so instead she sought preeminence.
  

3. Women of piety throughout history

• Mary Love.. Wife to Christopher Love   1639-1651.   Wrote a lovely letter to her hubby on the night he was due to be executed.   You can read that letter here.   Consider this section in Italics that follows, single minded goal of seeing the future for that it holds for us and how nothing else compares.:

• I dare not speak to thee, nor have a thought within my own heart of my own unspeakable loss, but wholly keep my eye fixed upon thy inexpressible and inconceivable gain. Thou leavest but a sinful, mortal wife to be everlastingly married to the Lord of glory. Thou leavest but children, brothers, and sisters to go to the Lord Jesus, thy eldest Brother. Thou leavest friends on earth to go to the enjoyment of saints and angels, and the spirits of just men made perfect in glory. Thou dost but leave earth for heaven and changest a prison for a palace. And if natural affections should begin to arise, I hope that the spirit of grace that is within thee will quell them, knowing that all things here below are but dung and dross in comparison of those things that are above. I know thou keepest thine eye fixed on the hope of glory, which makes thy feet trample on the loss of earth.
• Margaret Baxter... Fellow helper to her pastor hubby.... She learned to be content wherever she was.

Isaiah 26:3-4
You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you,  because he trusts in you. Trust in the Lord forever,  for the LORD  is an everlasting rock.

It's no secret.  We like to fish.  We mostly do catch and release cause the fun is in the catching more than in the eating...

Add this to mix a boy who is staying with us until mid-January and who has never fished and you get a great deal of skepticism until.....

He replicated this catch a few days later and my son had the fun to letting it go.

Now when we ask one Brazillian student if he wants to go fishing, we get an eager YES I come too?   :)    It's been a delight introducing him to this favourite hobby of ours... now to convince him to go out in a boat and fish....  :)

I have loved the writing of Mercedes Lackey ever since I was a young adult and discovered her writings.  I will not say that I loved EVERY book she has written but I've read most of her stuff, starting with the Darkover series (great books, though one of them haunts me to this day and I WILL NOT reread it). 

The book Fortune's Fool is a light, easy read.  
Fortune's fool (seventh son) is Sasha.  An easy-going fellow with a keen sense of duty and a delight in doing pranks.
Katya is the seventh daughter of the Sea King with a keen ability to spy out and resolve issues on the behalf of her father.

They are happy with their lives.   Though occasionally feeling somewhat dissatisfied, thinking there must be something more.
And then paths cross.  Delight in each occurs.  Evil threatens.
Help is needed and comes from unexpected quarters.

They stay true to who they are and evil is beaten.

(can't give too many details or one ruins the story!)

IF you like fantasy.
If you like light-hearted, easy reading books.
Then this book will suit you well I think.  

So go ahead, grab a copy and lose yourself to the world of the Sea King and Led Belarus.  You'll be glad you did.  :)