Shiny!

Can't really explain why shiny is better than not shiny. Maybe its some latent thing, some treasurehunting instinct that hangs in there. All I can say is shiny is awesome. Shiny coins, glossy cars, slick glass. Something about just catches the eye and draws me in.

So, I had to know. How the heck do graphic designers create those gorgeous icons and badges you see all over the internet? I thought, man that's got to be hard. I mean those things are designed by professionals. I'll never be able to do that.

So, I Googled it. I found a website that had a list of tutorials on how to make everything shiny.
What was great was, the guy was using Macromedia Fireworks. This is the very software I use for the snobby reason that it was free to download.

Even if you don't use Fireworks, you can apply the same concepts to any graphic software you're comfortable with. Read to tutorials here.

Or you can just enjoy looking over my obsessive learning process.

The first one doesn't have any shiny in it. It's just the original concept before I discovered how exciting and easy shining it up could be.



The second one is my first pass at making shiny icons. The tutorial I read showed how to make round ones so I made round ones too.



This has reflections. I'm gettin' fancier.



This is the last one I made before I realized I was getting on my wife's nerves by begging her to look at what I made now. Very shiny.



So, that's pretty much how I spent my Sunday off. The wife said she liked the first one best (the one that's not shiny at all...I know, right?). Incidentally, this is my first attempt to post images from a Picasa account so if everything doesn't display correctly I apologize. I can only get better, right?

Displaced Dialogue

I'm experimenting with some new content ideas. This one is called 'Displaced Dialogue.' I will create a non-sequitur where I juxtapose a photo of someone famous or influential and a quote that is NOT from that person. If you're keeping score at home, 'juxtapose' is worth twenty-five points in Scrabble, but you have to get 'pose' on the board first because 'juxtapose' is more than seven letters.

Anyway, let's just dive in.

Neither of the Clintons said:

"What?"
"I just thought...you were a guy."
"Most guys do."





If you know who did say it, feel free to comment below. I'll share the answer in my next post.

Don't forget to check out the links for Anna. Just click on of the buttons at the top of the sidebar.

Anna and the King...

This is Anna Vaprova. Anna is about two and a half. She is bright, beautiful and full of the potential of life that is the gift of young children. Unfortunately, Anna has a monster after her. This monster is not hiding under her bed or in her closet. It is not banished by nightlights or sweet dreams. The monster is cancer.

Anna, who lives with her family in Russia, has a form of cancer. The doctors have treated her, but this monster is persistent and the doctors in Russia have reached the limits of their resources. Anna's next alternative is to travel out of the country to seek treatment elsewhere. This is very expensive and family and friends are doing everything possible to raise the funds. To read Anna's story and see what you can do to help, click the buttons above. Also, check out www.iam4everlearning.blogspot.com to read the guest post by Ola, Anna's aunt here in Illinois.

Please read and consider the life of Anna. I know the Cancer Monster eats up men, women and children every day. If there's anything we can do to keep one child out of it's jaws I want to try. And remember:

The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.
James 5:16

Time to think...

This is my first post in something like ten weeks. I've had a lot to think about and I tend to think in silence. At the end of December last year, I was introduced to a series of sermons by David Platt of Brook Hill Church. Mr. Platt is a young pastor of a large church in the are of Birmingham, Alabama. Beginning with his family, and taking the lesson out to his church and then the Christian population as a whole, Mr. Platt has asked people to do something radical. He wants us to read the gospel of Jesus and accept every word as true. I believe the Bible is the inspired word of God. I have tried to apply it to my life and live according to its principles. Yet, hearing the passionate words of this pastor convicted me of the truth that I have lived a me-centered Americanized brand of Christianity that minimizes certain teachings of Christ that would be uncomfortable to accept. I have gone back to the scriptures and re-read them for myself. What Mr. Platt is teaching is not a new interpretation or his own twist on the scripture. It is a call to take Jesus's words exactly as they are given and resist the temptation to make them say something they do not.

For me this has meant thinking about my life and my stuff differently. If I believe what the Bible says, then I have given my life to Jesus and that means it is his. Truly it was his before then, he having the claims of the maker upon the made thing. Either way, my  time, my strength, my devotion, my all BELONG to him. If I were to dedicate my every living moment to his service it would be nothing more than what he has a right to. Every penny I earn, every possession in my house MUST be available and not merely in a wishy-washy "willing to" kind of way. I need to put everything I have to work for Jesus to meet the demands he places on those who choose to follow him; love each other, help the poor, and preach the gospel.

It has taken me some time to weigh this out. I can't tell you for sure what all the implications will be, but I can say that since God has gifted me with a drive to write and I already have this blog established, I will be trying to use it for Him in someway. Bear with me and I hope we will all draw nearer to God.

Finally, I strongly urge everyone, believer or non-believer, to listen to and consider the words of David Platt. I'm not lifting up one particular man, but I think he has hit on a critical truth and the emotion he shares it with is very compelling. Please take the time hear his message. He has also written a book containing much of the same materials as his sermon series if you would prefer that format. I've included links below.


http://www.brookhills.org/media/series/radical/


Radical by David Platt available at Amazon.com

The End of the Story...

 I saw heaven standing open and there before me was a white horse, whose rider is called Faithful and True. With justice he judges and makes war. His eyes are like blazing fire, and on his head are many crowns. He has a name written on him that no one knows but he himself. He is dressed in a robe dipped in blood, and his name is the Word of God. The armies of heaven were following him, riding on white horses and dressed in fine linen, white and clean. Coming out of his mouth is a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations. "He will rule them with an iron scepter." He treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty. On his robe and on his thigh he has this name written: KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.         -- John the Apostle (seen in a vision on Patmos c.90 AD)

Christmas is at once a delightful holiday full of joy and good-spirit and a time of controversy when those boundaries we have put up between different peoples and cultures are strained and tested. It nags at me every year that there are issues in the celebrating of Christmas. Most of us who are Christian make a great effort to remember the "Reason for the Season".

In our time and place Christmas can be celebrated from start to finish with no real mention of Christ as all. Christmas trees, eggnog, presents, candy, movies, lights, on and on. None of it has to be about Christ if you don't  want it to be. That's weird.

Christmas was first celebrated on December 25th, 336 A.D. Before that, there was no set celebration of the Jesus's birth and there was still a lot of debate about what day he was born on. Virtually everyone agreed that December the 25th was not the day and so in what would prove to be a long Catholic tradition, the date was fixed firmly there. For the last one-thousand six-hundred and seventy-four years, Christians have been celebrating the birth story of Jesus on that day. Currently, there are 490,000 babies born every day. What made one birth worth all that debate?

Christmas is not about dates and times. It is not even about good will and extraordinary charity. It is one thing only. This feast day was created to remind Christians annually of the advent of their creator.

Once there was a man named Jesus. He was good. He taught many hard lessons. He claimed to be God. It was illegal to claim to be God where he lived. He was executed. He came back. He really was God and many people trusted him to save them from a dark and broken world. He is still saving us. If we are going to be become preoccupied with the image of a Jewish baby burbling in a feeding trough we have to bear another image in mind as well. The quote above is from the revelation that John received; that is The Revelation of Jesus Christ. In his visions he saw a man he recognized in a way he had never seen him. John had seen Jesus riding a donkey colt but never a white horse. He had seen him rebuke Peter from drawing a sword to defend him, now one was coming out of his mouth to execute judgement. He had seen Jesus stand silently while he was condemned and to do nothing while unclean hands nailed him to his deathly tree. Now he stood shining in glory with an army at his back and the blood of enemies under his feet.

The next time anyone sees Jesus on the earth, this is what we will see. The good shepherd of Galilee will return as the Commander of the Army of the LORD. Celebrate it. It is worth celebrating. Christ died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again. We are not abandoned to the dark and broken world we live in. Sin will not reign indefinitely and what has been stained and ruined will be restored. God promised to be with us. He is with us. That child, that precious and fragile infant who literally was 'born in a barn' will stand at the pinnacle of existence and it will be his rightful place. That's my God. That's who was born on whatever day in obscurity and what I will remember every December the 25th. I will remember the end of the story when I tell the beginning of it.

Time.

I haven't posted anything in exactly two weeks, which you know of you keep up with that sort of thing. Two weeks around here is a long time. There has been a lot to do to get ready for Christmas and almost everyday has brought something more. I may yet regale you with some our our Yule-tide adventures, but for now, the post that follows will probably be the last until January.

Two classics come back...Part Two

The Return of the Kong

In 1981 Nintendo released an arcade game in America featuring an ill-tempered gorilla and a heroic laborer. (I found out that at this time in his life, Mario was a carpenter named Jumpman. I guess he picked up plumbing and dumped the pseudonym in '85). This gorilla was called Donkey Kong.

In the beginning we didn't know much about Donkey Kong. He was angry. He liked the princess. He hated that guy that jumped barrels to get at him.

Later, more of the story came out. In 1994 Donkey Kong Country hit the Super Nintendo and we could finally play Donkey Kong as the hero. With his side-kick Diddy Kong, Donkey battled through armies of mutant-gator thingies to recover his hoard of bananas. This game was tough. It was good-looking, challenging, and rewarded you for exploring. There were bonus rooms, interesting characters, variety of game play. It was great.

When the sequel came out the next year, it was great. Another sequel a year after that was great. It was a franchise that just kept getting better. The characters like Cranky and Funky Kong came to be old friends. When Donkey Kong came out for the Nintendo 64 it was with a full cast of new friends and old favorites. The same difficult but worthwhile challenges kept us coming back.

Donkey Kong has come back in a couple of solid games since then, including Jungle Beat, an innovative title that let you pound bongos to pound bad guys.

Last week Donkey Kong Country Returns came out for the Wii. Like Mario and Kirby, this title requires you to turn you Wii remote on its side and use the d-pad and two buttons to control the hero. Diddy returns as a side-kick and the hunt for bananas is on. It might be wiser for the Kongs to invest in a security system for the banana hoard but it would not be as much fun. Donkey and Diddy fight crazy tiki-controlled bad guys, ride mine carts, blast out of barrels and discover secret bonuses in a wild side-scrolling adventure. The graphics are beautiful. The gameplay is challenging. The classic DK-style is familiar and lovable. This game is tough, but for the preteen to adult set, it is a blast. And, as always, it's family friendly or I wouldn't be talking about it.

Two classics come back...Part One

I had the chance to play two of Nintendo's latest titles for the Wii. The Wii has proven to be the platform for family and casual gameplay. Before I had kids I played a lot of Playstation. The difference is I was playing games like Splinter Cell, Metal Gear Solid, Stars Wars Battlefronts and the like. They were games about war and espionage. Not family-friendly.

The Playstation is gone now. We have the Wii. I've already raved about New Super Mario Brothers for the Wii. As new games come out I get more excited about this game system. Nintendo has made playing video games not only family appropriate, but also family fun. Up to four players at a time means less arguing over taking turns. Childish themes with solid gameplay means even adult can have fun without going over the kids' heads.

Now Nintendo has brought back two classics. Kirby returns in Kirby's Epic Yarn. For those who don't remember this puffy, pink hero, Kirby came out for Gameboy and the NES in 1992. He could suck in enemies and copy their attacks.The game did well and a long series of sequels has come out for the various Nintendo platforms over the years.

Kirby returned this year. Unlike Super Mario Bros., which seemed to harvest the very best from Mario games and incorporate them into one title, Kirby Epic Yarn puts Kirby into a new world with new problems and new ways to solve them. In the fabric-and-thread universe of Epic Yarn, Kirby cannot suck enemies in, he has no 'in'. He and all his surroundings are cast in yarn. Instead he must shape shift or unravel his opponents as he may. Beads, buttons, and patches are the currency of the land and you'll have to collect them to move forward. The graphics are beautiful and the challenges are interesting. There's extras for those who love extras, but the main storyline is engaging (to a child) and will keep you moving. The game is not difficult; many enemies don't even hurt you, you just bounce off them. When Kirby falls in battle, you're carried back into action by a yarn-angel right where you left off, sans your collected beads. You turn the Wii remote side-ways (also like Mario) to play and only use two buttons and the directional pad to control Kirby. This is about as simple as it gets in video games. This is an excellent game for the ten and under set. My kids loved it.

If your looking for a new game this season to share with the family, give Kirby Epic Yarn a try.

Next post, Donkey Kong Country Returns.

Too disctracted to write...

There will be no new post today. I think my wife is coming down with something so she's staying in bed while I supervise the torture of the children this morning. Our sadistic regimen includes such horrors as requiring them to get dressed, hard labor in the form of a few household chores, brain-washing by school-work, you get the idea. It's cruel and unusual I know, by that's what you have to do to maintain order under a tyranny.

Thank who...

My wife and I put together an event for the homeschool group a couple of weeks ago. There was girly stuff for the girls and video games for the guys.

Afterward, while we were eating lunch, a young man approached our table. I had just met the boy and didn’t know him at all. He came as the guest of one of our regulars. His question was, “Who do I need to thank for today?” These words coming from the lips of a teenage boy stunned me. When I regained my senses, I accepted his gratitude for my part in the day’s activities.

He went his way and I went mine, but the shock of it clung to me after. The good manners he displayed were so far removed from the coarse behavior I expect from kids his age. I know how I was a teen, how my peers were. A fifteen-year-old going to the trouble to find out whom, specifically, to thank, has something of the feel a fairy tale come to life.

Thanksgiving is a national holiday established for the purpose of gratitude. I can’t convey how really great an idea this is. Thanksgiving begs two questions. What are we thankful for? Most people remember that. The other, though, is whom are we thankful to? This is what that young man surprised me with.

Tomorrow millions of Americans will sit down to a meal with family and friends and begin to express thanks. My family is Christian. Our thanks is directed toward God. We call this ‘counting our blessings’. What about those who do not share my beliefs? Isn’t there a logical gap there that needs filling?

The definitions I read for gratitude made it sound like an emotion, something you could feel without directing it to toward a person. The problem with that is, to be thankful, you must feel like something was done for you. I don’t thank a dog for good behavior and I don’t thank a car for good performance. I do thank my wife or the cashier at Wal-Mart or the traffic cop who writes a warning instead of a ticket. They have done something for me. It is personal. Thanks is personal.

Gratitude for things not done by a person must be directed some place else. A farmer, grateful for a good crop, must express that gratitude toward the one responsible. A mother, just missed by a reckless driver, must thank a providence she cannot see.

Providence’s proper title is God. Be grateful to God for those happy accidents. If not, know that gratitude is foolish since no person really helped you at all. That’s the logical conclusion of denying God’s hand.

What we all need to remember is what the young man at our homeschool group expressed. To whom do we owe our thanks? Consider the source of the good things in life. Whom do you need to thank?

An Unfortunate Impulse...

We were driving up the highway a few days ago when one of the kids asked about sarcasm. I can't remember how the conversation started. Who knows how these things start. The question was put to me. "Dad, what's sarcasm?"

At this point, a wiser man than I would see where this was headed and end things before they got out of hand. Me? I have this delusion that when a child asks a question it is because of a genuine deficiency of knowledge and it is my job to supply it. Oh yes, I think, I can answer that for you my son. Behold, I have the very nugget of understanding you've been seeking. Be comforted by the abundance of my accumulated factoids.
This impulse to awe the masses goes way back. I remember taking rides in the car as a child and trying to bait my sister into asking me questions so I could have the pleasure of answering her.

So, when one of the kids asks a question, there's this impulse that drives me to answer. It's like a force of nature, a pontification instinct. "Sarcasm," I said, "is when you say one thing, but mean another. You use it for emphasis."

Bear in mind, my children are all under ten. According to accepted psychological standards, they are incapable of anything but concrete thought:

"Cognitive development refers to the development of the ability to think and reason. Children (6 to 12 years old) develop the ability to think in concrete ways (concrete operations) such as how to combine (addition), separate (subtract or divide), order (alphabetize and sort), and transform (change things such as 5 pennies = 1 nickel) objects and actions. They are called concrete because they are performed in the presence of the objects and events being thought about."
-- From an article on the Lucile Packard Children's Hopital at Standford

In other words, children under twelve only understand things they can see, touch, hear, taste or feel. They are the ultimate existentialists. This is why they struggle to communicate emotions. They can only explain how being sad or angry makes their body feel. To say one thing and mean another is not difficult to understand, it's impossible.

Children tell lies, but they know they are lying and they mean to convey the exact information they give, even if it is untrue. My children couldn't grasp the idea that you might say a thing that is untrue and mean the thing that is.

So I began to explain. In my defense, my wife helped with this part.

"If I go to the refridgerator and bring mommy back a Diet Pepsi, and she says, 'Thanks, I love Diet Pepsi.' Does she really love Diet Pepsi?" (imagine me investing exaggerated contempt into the phrase)

The children, who know we prefer 'the red can' as they call Coke to all others, answer "No, she doesn't like Diet Pepsi."

"So, why did she say that?"

"Because she doesn't want to hurt your feelings."
"Because she might like it she's never tried it."
"Because it's what you got her and if she doesn't like it she can get her own."

Concrete answers. It never even occurs to them that mommy was insincere in her statement. Never. The rapid fire answers were all based on the firm conclusion that she said exactly what she meant to say.

Just as I'm about to launch into another example and attempt to explain this abstract concept, my wife looks at me. She's out. I can tell by the look in her eyes. She's not going any further with this. Why, I think? We can explain this. We're smart. We can break it down for them.

Then the epiphany strikes me as well.

I am teaching my children to be sarcastic. I have a five-second horror show in my head of the sharp-tongued teenagers these kids will grow up to be. They are quite articulate now. Another five or ten years and straight answers will be a thing of the past. WHAT AM I DOING?!?

"Dad...?" they ask. They are waiting for me to re-engage. I stifle the pontification response. I suppress the teaching reaction.

"Let's talk about something else." Mom quickly supplies a new topic and we're off again, swerving away from the verbal doom I had steered us toward. Maybe I've learned my lesson. Maybe. I'm morbidly curious what it will be like when they do grasp this unattractive concept. They could all become brilliant satirists. More likely they will simply lampoon my every attempt to teach them anything after the age of fourteen.

But hey, that's life for a parent, right?

My new favorite book...

     I was wrong. There. I said it. I thought that great English literature would be as difficult to read as other great works I have read. The Count of Monte Cristo was excellent but it was work to read. Well, it was French after all. Dante’s Inferno was hard to follow, well worth it, but I had to go slow and use a dictionary half the time.

     So when my wife recommended Charles Dickens I resisted for a while. Not that I didn’t want to have such an important English writer under my belt, but I was preparing myself mentally to slog through pages of difficult prose and literary imagery.

     I was wrong. I borrowed a copy of A Tale of Two Cities on CD from my sister and I’ve been listening to it the last week and a half. I love it. Let me be clear. This is one of the best books I have ever read. I don’t mean best in the English Major’s sense of the word. I mean it is actually enjoyable.

     From the first sentence, I was hooked. Dickens has it all. The language is beautiful and he wields it so effectively to create images and moods. His settings and characters are perfect. The story has a depth you can get into and swim around in. I’m almost finished with it and I’m already thinking about when I’ll read it again.

     My wife, as I’ve alluded to, has already read a couple of books by Dickens and she’s told me he’s good. I didn’t know. People say books are good all the time. I trust her judgment, but labeling a book a classic can be the death of that book for popular fiction readers. I have no doubt anyone willing to give it a shot will be delighted by what they find in this excellent book.

     Needless to say, I’ll be trying a few other Dickens books in the future. As antagonistic as I’ve been toward French writing, it feels good to be vindicated by one who is a master of my own language. I’m sure this won’t be the final word on this particular book, but for now, enjoy a little hero worship of Dickens and my ringing endorsement of A Tale of Two Cities.

Train in Morality

Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.

--Paul of Tarsus in a letter to the Christian Church at Ephesus

Sometimes as a father I feel the burden to prepare my kids for the ‘real world’. Usually this line of reasoning takes me into some moral gray zone where I start trying to justify lying or fighting or some other such thing. The truth is, God has given us righteousness as a breastplate and faith as shield to protect us from whatever may come at us in the ‘real world’.

If a child is trained from birth to know x, y, and z are wrong and that a, b, and c are right, he will remember these rules all his life. Even when he is of a rebellious age, it will be very clear what he is rebelling against and in what direction he must go to defy these rules.

If, instead, a child is given no guidance, if he is told not to talk about certain things like sin and morality because he may offend some people (usually those people who practice sin and prefer immorality for some reason), if he is taught that a thing is sometimes wrong and sometimes right, he will be lost. He will have no touchstone by which to test his choices.

Such a child is not beyond hope by any means. Every man is born with a conscience. But it is harder to find studs in a wall with a stud finder than it is to mark them while the sheetrock is off and they are plain to see.

What happens when you bring the stud finder to a wall so difficult to penetrate that it becomes unreliable? How then do you choose where to drive the nail? Eventually, things descend into a guessing game where nail after nail is driven until finally something solid is struck. This exercise leaves the laborer exhausted and the wall devastated. How much more do we see exhaustion and devastation as the results of thrashing around in moral ambiguity, trying every likely possibility and retrying when those fail.

Contrast that with the man who knows where to find the studs under the plaster. He knows because the one who built the house has shown him exactly where each one is. Such a man will not, if he is wise, waste energy where there is nothing solid to strike. Again, so it is in life. Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain.

We do our children no good service when we fail to mark the boundaries between good and evil. This is the purpose of morality. It is not only to please God, which it does, but to shelter us from the storms of this fallen world. It is to keep us safe, whole and in our right mind until our savior can rescue us.

Father’s do not forget to pass on these lessons along with all the other gifts you give. Do not fail to preserve your own integrity. Keep it. Protect it. It is a sacred trust intended for generations yet unseen. May it pass through our hands unharmed.

By the way, the idea for today's post came from a post by wife. To preserve her ideas my my sticky fingers, she has started her own blog. 4 Ever Learning. Check it out when you get a chance.

An Overlooked Genre

I love books. I love long books and short books, I love scary books and sweet books, I love fiction books and fact books, I love funny books and action books and thoughtful books. This  has been true as long as I've been able to read. As a kid I could wear out a Dr. Seuss book in no time.

For a while, as I grew up, I forgot about children's books. I went on a sci-fi fling followed by a fantasy binge. I took a short break to get married and have kids and now I'm back to heavy reading. But with the advent of children has come a resurgence in my love for childish books.

I don't think I ever stopped liking them, I just stopped reading them. According to a recent article by the New York Times, this is exactly what is happening to kids across the country now. As parents feel the pressure to prepare their kids for rigorous school standards (see that pesky institutional school ruining another good thing?) they are pushing their early elementary kids out of picture books and into chapter books. Never mind that the text is equivalent or below the picture book's level. It doesn't have pictures so it must be bigger. Right?

Wrong. C.S. Lewis said, "A children's story that can only be enjoyed by children is not a good children's story in the slightest." In other words, any book that a child is expected to enjoy should be enjoyable for an adult. I have found this to be true. For one example, I have already shared Axe Cop, the webcomic written by a six-year-old. This work comes directly from a child's mind, yet it is captivating readers of all ages. Also, in my own case, I have found that I pick out the books I like, when I go to the library. The kids have their favorites, but some how one or two of my own favorites end up in the stack.

Or they used to. When I read the article I was cut to the heart because even I have begun to follow this pattern. My oldest is only nine. My youngest is four and it would be perfectly ok for her to be read picture books daily. Yet, as I've gotten more preoccupied with doing a good job homeschooling, I've pushed higher-level books on the kids. Some of it is an impatience to share what I love, but some of it is the stereotype that books with pictures are for babies.

The truth is there are many books released in over sized format with lush illustrations that contain fifth-grade level text or higher. They discuss themes, explain concepts and inform worldviews that adults are still learning about.

But even with all that aside, children's picture books are fun. They are witty and delightful and I have never failed to laugh at a well made one. My favorites include the Pigeon books by Mo Willems, just about anything by Jon Scieszka, and David Shannon. I still enjoy the 'classics' by Dr. Seuss and Shel Silverstein.

The idea that children's books are beneath anyone is ridiculous. We would be wise to stop trying to outgrow childhood, but rather carry what is good about it with us to keep us joyful and humble. One final quote from C.S. Lewis and I let it go.

"Those of us who are blamed when old for reading childish books were blamed when children for reading books too old for us. No reader worth his salt trots along in obedience to a time-table."

A Purple Apology

The weblog has grown stagnant of late. The author apologizes for his neglect. He is a man of good intentions and poor attendance. However, it is his latest good intention to return to the thrice-weekly schedule he has previously maintained. This wielder of words with bring back the power of his prose to stir vivacity back into the idle blog and make it Vivid once again.

What I Love About Homeschooling: The School of Life

You’re walking through the Wal-Mart when it happens. You turn down an aisle and you see kids hanging off a cart. They’re not preschoolers, the oldest could be ten or eleven. It’s not the weekend. Maybe a holiday? But, your own kids or grandkids are in school right now. No holiday or teachers’ in-service.

So what are these kids doing in the middle of the store in the middle of the day in the middle of the week? They homeschool.

Homeschoolers get out. One of the myths about homeschooling is that kids are stuck at home learning in a vacuum where nobody will interact with them. Do some people do this? Yes. Do most people do this? No. Most homeschool families have an itinerant schedule that turns a minivan into a NASCAR contender.

One of the things I love about homeschooling is the places we go. We’ve been schooling for about three years now. In that time we’ve been to:

• the St. Louis Science Center
• the St. Louis Zoo (many times)
• the Cincinnati Museum Center (includes the Natural History, History and Childrens’ Museum)
• the Mt. Vernon Register printing press
• the butterfly round-up at Crab Orchard
• the encampment at Fort Massac
• The Magic House (St. Louis)
• Cahokia Mounds
• Do I need to keep going?
• a pizza parlor
• a dairy farm
• Jefferson County Historical Village
• Franklin County Historical Jail Museum
• Illinois State Police barracks

I’m going to stop. The point is the words ‘field trip’ have lost all meaning. This is just a part of school for us. We don’t just talk about things and look at the pictures. If there’s a place they can go to look and touch, we’ll be scheduling a visit. The local Homeschool Group has been a big help in this. Most places are glad to invite children in and teach them about what they do. A larger group, with parents along to supervise, can make that possible.

The thing is, a lot of these places I had never been to. These kids are going places at six or seven that I’m just now seeing at twenty-eight. You can talk about the world all you want, but there’s no substitute for going out into it.

Our kids often tag along for trips to the grocery store, the hardware store, the bank, and more. A couple of days ago, my youngest son and daughter helped me pick out underwear for their mother on a quick shopping trip. It was only slightly awkward. (look dad this kind says ‘smooth’ and it looks smooth. Yes son those are nice.) This is real life for us, it can be for them too.

Do we do the table work, the worksheets and writing practice? Yes. We are, as a rule, very busy. From the time we get up in the morning to the time we go to bed at night, we are doing something. This is what I love about homeschooling. It is so much more than school at home. It is the school of Life.

Using the Princesses.

A little girl is cute. She looks like a living doll romping around in skirts and ponytails. One moment she is mimicking the tenderness of a mother with a baby doll in her arms. The next minute, she is upbraiding the dog for its considerable sins.

My own daughter is all too aware of the power of her cuteness. She has always been able to land herself in the lap or on the hip of a teacher. For a child of one or two years, this isn’t that big of a deal. She passed the four year mark many months ago and she still has the knack of insinuating herself into places no four-year-old should be able to go. This is partly because she is quite petite for her age, but it has more to do with the fact that she sees herself as irresistible. After all, who wouldn’t want to hold her and give her everything she asks for?

From the beginning, we have tried to keep our daughter from seeing herself as only a pretty thing. We have constantly found ways to compliment her that are not based on her appearance, but on her character. Yet, she still cannot pass a mirror without being captivated and if you don’t notice what she is wearing today she will surely bring to your attention.

Like many girls in this modern age of marketing, my daughter is obsessed with the Disney Princesses. She sleeps beneath them at night. She wears their clothes. She listens to their music. She begs to watch their movies. She wants to be like them. In her four-year-old heart, she is one of them. These are her heroes.

We have resisted this as much as we can. My wife wasn’t that kind of girl when she was little. It is hard for us to understand. Yet our own girl is exactly the kind. She loves pink and wants to be pretty all day long. How do you fight something that is so ingrained? She wants to be a princess. Of course she’s obsessed with clothes and expects to be waited on hand and foot. All she needs is a ball gown and a prince and she’ll be set for life. But, is it possible there are other lessons to be gleaned from these iconic Disney debutants?

My wife thought of it. Enlist the princesses. Recruit them to our cause. In one of those teachable moments we read about in books, she began to discuss some of the things she had noticed about the princesses with our daughter. Cinderella was kind to others and a very hard worker (that front hall blings in every scene). Belle is a big reader who makes good use of the library. Snow White was fair and took care of others. Pocahontas respected nature. Ariel saved a drowning man. Mulan was brave. (Yes, I know Mulan is not a princess, but she is female lead in a Disney animated film, therefore she qualifies in my daughter’s eyes.)

The more we talked about it the more we could draw out the virtues we wanted to teach from these heavily marketed hussies. I don’t think there is much we can do to keep my daughter from being vain. Even now, if you ask her about her modesty, she will go through her pockets, look behind her and then throw up her hands and say she hasn’t got any. She doesn’t even know the meaning of the word. Time will heal this, thought, and there really isn’t anything wrong with being pretty, which she is. But, maybe we can teach her to be a whole lot more. After all, she’s not afraid to climb a tree or brawl like an animal with her brothers. I think in her heart she’s really a warrior princess.

Well, I failed to keep my Tu Th Sat schedule last week. My wife says the Tuesday post was good enough to carry me, and it did get a few extra hits, but I'll try to get back on schedule. In the mean time, if you don't see a new post when you expect one, imagine me lecturing a child or whizzing down a hillside on a homemade go-kart. That's probably what I'm doing instead of writing. Thanks for paying attention to me anyway.

Homeschool and the Education Cop

We got an e-mail a couple of weeks ago about truancy officers turning up at the homes of local homeschool families. In the state of Illinois, homeschools are essentially private schools. They have the all the same rights and privileges of any other educational institution. A truancy officer inquiring of a homeschool family is akin to a highway patrolman pulling over motorists for no real reason.

So, with this in mind I decided to compile a short list of suggestions in case the “education cop” comes knocking on your door.

1. Fight fire with fire.
   

   Truancy officers are primarily a product and functionary of bureaucracy. Take the officer’s name, title, agency, contact information, shoe size, favorite color, and American Idol pick. Promise to pass this information to the superintendent just as soon as he gets back and tell the officer to expect a call in two to five business days.

2. Use a prearranged signal to tip the children off.
   

   Approximately forty-five seconds after answering the door, a child should shriek like a burning cat. Apologize and explain you’ve been studying the Spanish Inquisition and you really need to go take care of that. (Don’t forget to lock the door. This sends the correct message that you don’t need any help.)

3. Dig a Burmese tiger pit. Don’t forget to warn the mailman.
   
4. Try to convert them.
   

   It is very difficult to talk about why the kids aren’t enrolled in school when someone is adamantly wielding the Sword of the Spirit to the edification of your everlasting soul. Use this to your advantage. If you are not Christian, that’s okay, borrow a bible from a Christian friend or order one from Amazon.

5. Grill the officer on state and capital names, the American presidents, English grammar, spelling, multiplication tables, etc. For greatest effect keep score and give prizes to the child (or officer) who wins.
   
6. Tell them you are in the middle of a class, but your office hours are from four to five, Monday through Friday.
   
7. Duct tape the officer to the wall while the kids explain the Law of Gravity and other applicable principles.
   
8. Cast the officer as Polonius in the HS Group production of Hamlet.
   
9. Ask if the kids may interview them for a report on Government in Action (subtitled Freedom: What makes America great.
   
10.  Don’t worry about it because you weren’t home when the officer came by. You were at the lumber yard buying project supplies,
    at the newspaper office, dairy farm, history museum, wildlife refuge center, or police station on a field trip,
    at music lessons, soccer practice, book club, co-op classes, 4-H, or just taking a nice walk in the park because you only need one-hundred eighty days of school a year and you schooled through the summer so you could enjoy  a really beautiful day when one came along.

Please add your suggestion to the list.