Norse Mythology with a side of Falafel

I picked up a bunch of falafel filled sandwiches from our local pita place, so the kids could have a taste of Magnus Chase's favorite food.  You can check out this Good Eats chickpea episode if you aren't familiar with falafel.  We watched it while eating our pitas.  It's quite educational.

Rick Riordan's latest hero loves falafel.  My bunch...

 ...let's just say they're not all fans of Middle Eastern flavor (and don't even ask about the hat).  The book though, has been a pretty big hit with those of us, T (age 18) - avoiding his college textbooks, D (age 12), A (age14) and yours truly, who are reading it.  The children are all fans of the Percy Jackson series, but haven't cared much for Riordan's Egyptian sagas.  This book, set in the 9 worlds of Norse mythology, has recaptured their interest. 

In fact, they're enjoying the story enough, that I might have to re-read an old high school favorite of mine (just to make sure it isn't too colorful for their sensibilities - I was a lot more liberal in my youthful reading selections than they usually care to be).

If I remember right, pizza was the food of choice for Adam's Norse god encountering characters - pizza and something about clean, white, linen sheets.

We all like pizza (even my youngest), and clean sheets, and now have a new interest in Norse mythology.  Plus, the next book in Riordan's new series doesn't come out until October.  We're going to need something to read in the meantime.

Clean Teen Fiction - Guitar Notes by Mary Amato

I

I picked up a copy of Mary Amato's Guitar Notes for my guitar loving oldest daughter (age 15), after spotting the cover art at our local bookstore, and then seeing a commenter on Good Reads list the book as "Clean YA Fiction" - those can be hard to come by.

After losing his father to a brain aneurism, and his best friend to a move, Tripp retreats into his room with his guitar.  That is until increasing isolation, sinking grades, and a summer of not working on make-up math assignments leads his mother to take drastic action by taking away his guitar.

Lyla has also lost her mother, a professional cellist, who died in a plane crash when she was young.  Lyla took the fact that her mother's cello, flying on a separate flight, due to an overload of baggage, survived as a sign, and took up the cello, herself.  Now in high school, the talented and driven musician has reached the age of life changing auditions, looming music school enrollment, along with her equally driven best friend (a violinist), and all her dreams are coming true - except she's not sure they're really her dreams at all.

Tripp signs up, and is assigned odd days, in music practice room B.  One hour every other day, over the lunch hour, of escape and relief, with a borrowed guitar from the school's music closet.

Lyla is also assigned to practice room B, on even days.  Armed with a recording of cello music, so no-one will know she's not practicing for her upcoming rehearsal, audition, talent show - life...she eats lunch in peace, writes an acerbic note to Tripp (Mr. Odd) for leaving garbage on the music stand, and tries to convince herself she loves her life, and is not about to have a heart attack.

One note leads to another, then to text messages, cell phone calls, emails, a friendship, a musical collaboration, improving grades for Tripp, a shared website, a gig playing at a wedding - and a pack of lies to teachers, to friends, and to their parents, that threaten to undo every good thing their friendship has brought to both of them.

The Positives -

1. The book is clean - with no foul language to speak of, or sexual content.  
2. Interlaced with the story is a lot of real world advice on how to brainstorm an idea, write a song, and learn to play the guitar.
3. The author's website has a fantastic reading guide, teaching unit (including vocabulary, creative writing, music, art, and science tie-ins), karaoke versions of the songs from the book, as well as the guitar chords for musicians who want to play along - and more.
4. Edgar Allan Poe's The Tell-Tale Heart is mentioned often enough in the story to make it almost impossible for a teen reader not to take a look at the classic.

The Negatives -

1. The ending is predictable, and too neatly tied-up.
2. The secondary characters are one-dimensional, and underdeveloped.
3. The main characters lack any sort of moral compass.  They lie, steal, break rules, and dishonor their parents. Their intentions are not bad, but they are so self-focused, that they can justify just about any action in pursuit of their own happiness.  As such, they better their situation in life, without bettering their characters, or themselves.

Overall, I'd say it is a good book for junior high to early high school students, probably aimed more at girls than boys.  It's light reading, with a lot of potential for additional activities and discussion.

Macrame Owls and Canadian Set Fiction

For some odd reason, I can't quite explain, I decided it would be fun to make macrame owls, this weekend.  My original intent was to craft alone, but after finding a 2010 post from That Artist Woman detailing a 4th grade art extension project, to go along with Farley Mowats Owl's in the Family...

...I decided it would be fun to bring my younger four (ages 8-13) in on the project, as well.  The owl pattern That Artist Woman used with her class doesn't seem to be available online anymore.  But, our library did have a copy of Owls in the Family on the shelf, and the after a little trial and error, I settled on a simple, easy to follow pattern from Free-Macrame-Patterns.com for us to use with it.

We made our owls from yarn, because we have a pretty good selection of fall colored yarn on hand...

...and the children raided the button box, trying out different combinations of yarn, eye, and beak colors until they were happy.

Having a very limited knowledge of macrame, I needed a pattern that was simple.  Somehow, I managed to live the entire first half of my childhood through the 1970s, without ever tying a single macrame knot (or doing any of those nail and string pictures, either).  Fortunately for me, the pattern we found, only uses four different knots: a larks head knot, for fastening the yarn onto a stick, or necklace string...

...a series of square knots for forming the top of the head...

...double half hitches to outline the face, and form the wings, and a couple of standard overhand knots to attach the bottom stick (broken chopsticks, in our case).

Each of the knots are explained, and demonstrated in the instructions in a way simple enough for even my eight year old to follow, with the smallest amount of help.  We worked on our owls on top of cardboard box lids, attaching them to the cardboard with bread ties, and using small pieces of clear tape to hook the yarn to the back of the board, when it needed to be kept at a certain angle, or pulled tight.

I worked with the children one at a time, and one step at a time, throughout the weekend.  It is a small project, that could have been completed all at once, but we took our time, and really enjoyed the whole process.

Finally, taking one last bit of inspiration from That Artist Woman, we displayed our completed owls, hanging them with clear tape on either side of their top sticks...

...perched on the branches of our fall to-do tree.

While the younger children and I enjoy Farley Mowats tale of life, and wildlife in rural Saskatchewan, I've picked another owl themed, and Canadian set story to read together with my teens...

...which I haven't read since I was a teen (in Saskatchewan, strangely enough) myself.

A Skip Counting and Fancy Nancy Vocabulary Apple Harvest

I decided to slip in a couple of last apple themed lessons for my youngest, before turning the page on the calendar to pumpkins and the like.  It was super simple with the help of a "count by fives" apple printable from Doodle Bugs, which I cut out and paper clipped to our fall leaf list tree...

...for C to harvest and place out in order on the table, as she counted by 5s.

Then, I reset the tree for a Fancy Nancy vocabulary, pick and match-up, activity using an apple template from dltk-kids.com, modified in Paint to add the vocabulary words...

...and their definitions from...

...the back of Jane O'Connor's Fancy Nancy Apples Galore.

It's great to be a homeschooler.

Summer Fun Day 55 - Reading Props - Crowns and Swords

While we had the tent fort up, I decided it would be a good time to pull out a care package we received recently from the fabulous kiddos (and super sweet Mom) of The Fantastic Five blog...

...they treated us to a little taste of kingdom living with four packages of inflatable battle swords (two swords per package!) and cardboard crowns...

...ready to be decorated with stick on jewels.

They were a huge hit with all three of my youngest (ages 7-10)...

...even though D is not pictured above, he spent a good deal of time decorating a princely crown, as well.

In fact, all three were quite absorbed, and spent more time working out the designs and placing sticker "jewels" on their crowns than I would have imagined for such a simple, low set-up, no mess, kind of craft - wonderful!

I wanted to have Princess Märtha Louise of Norway's Why Kings and Queens Don't Wear Crowns to go with the crowns, but it was already checked out.

I did, however, find a very sweet picture book, encouraging noble behavior befitting the kingly headgear (for those of who are not actually kings or queens)...

...and a perfect cautionary tale...

...to accompany the swords.

Thanks Fantastic Five - you made our day!

Summer Fun Day 52 - Reading Props - Fake Mustaches

I'm up to my elbows in Vacation Bible School prep, this week.  So, instead of planning crafts, or activities for the younger children, I picked up some props to set out with themed selections of library books, throughout the week.

The idea being, that the props draw the children to the books, and the books, besides encouraging summer reading, spark ideas for creative play.

Yesterday, I set out a couple of picture books...

...a short chapter book...

...and a package of inexpensive, fake mustaches.

They were a huge hit with all the children, older and younger, except for my T (my almost 16 year old), who informed me he didn't need a fake mustache, because he is growing one of his own - you just can't see it yet.

It's great to be a homeschooler.

Summer Fun Day 25 - The First Jane Austen "Novel" Every Teen Girl Should Read

As your daughters reach the age of Austen, let me suggest before they join Jane, and Elizabeth, Emma, Elinor or even Fanny in seeing Darcys, Knightlys and Willoughbys behind every male smirk and smile, introduce them to Catherine Morland.

Let them laugh at her (and themselves) as they see just how silly seventeen can be.

"Perhaps after all it is possible to read too many novels."

It's great to be a homeschooler.

What My Child is Reading - Easter

I've already mentioned a number of Easter themed books, this week...



...and the crafts, or snacks we made to go along with them (just click the pictures to see our reviews, or craft instructions).



In addition to the stories above, we also enjoyed Liz Curtis Higgs' The Parable of the Lily again (we read it first a couple of years ago)...



...and C (age 5) lent me hand, literally, in making another bouquet of hand print Easter lilies to go along with the other items on table.


For the most part, we've been trying to stick with Easter stories, leading into the Easter season, that touch on the Biblical story, or at least, as in the case of the Little Critter book, involve church in some way.

But, we made an exception for Wende and Harry Devlin's Cranberry Easter. I've been a big fan of the Devlins since I was a child myself, and we are all very fond of their Cranberry holiday series of books.



We weren't disappointed by this story, either. A community egg hunt serves at the backdrop, with a bunny suited Mr. Wiskers presiding over the festivities, but the story is really about neighbors coming together like family, to care for each others needs. There are glimpses in the background of the illustrations, of a church, and very cross-like, ships' masts, that are pleasant, subtle, reminders of what is at the core of both the story, and Easter, alike.

Like all the books in the series, this one has a cranberry recipe at the back, this time for cranberry cobbler. The children and I were eager to give it a try, but it turns out there's not a cranberry - fresh, frozen, or canned, to be found in our town right now.

Instead, we made up a batch of Resurrection Rolls, to go along with a quick science lesson...


...and another story.


But, you'll have to come back for tomorrow's Science Sunday post to read more about that.

It's great to be a homeschooler.

Linked with What My Child is Reading at Mouse Grows, Mouse Learns.