Stuff We Like :: 1.4.18
How to be a learning model in your homeschool, easing back into homeschooling after a long break, the joys of Scholastic book fairs, ants on medical leave, the rise of small bookstores, glitter, and more.
Happy New Year! I love a break, but I also love that I have a life I enjoy coming back to after a break. (I will admit: I’m not loving the idea of going back to real pants after weeks of pajamas… but other than that!)
WHAT’S HAPPENING AT HOME/SCHOOL/LIFE
We’ve been revising our most-read posts of 2018 on Facebook these past couple of weeks, but in case you are interested in the full list, here’s what you guys read in 2018:
How I Use My Bullet Journal for Our Homeschool’s As-We-Go Schedule
Curriculum Review: Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons
A Fun Living Math Curriculum for Elementary to Middle School: Your Business Math
How We Created Our Homeschool's Studio Ghibli Literature Class (Without a Curriculum)
(Not all of these were published in 2018, but they were the most-read posts for last year.)
on the blog: Start your week off with our Monday meditations and how to model critical reading for your kids by thinking out loud to yourself (finally! talking to yourself counts as a legit educational strategy)
on Patreon: How I use commonplace books to chronicle our annual homeschool and create a family holiday tradition that we’ve come to love
from the archives: How to figure out what’s next for YOU when homeschooling is over and transitioning back to homeschooling after a long break
LINKS I LIKED
Apparently I am not the only person whose kids sometimes fail to appreciate my culinary creative because they want their favorite foods again and again. (I will happily make macaroni and cheese, which is my mom’s recipe for macaroni and cheese, just with more cheese, with them every other month for the rest of their lives just because we all know the recipe so well that we end up having the best conversations while we make it. But I am also excited to make coconut milk-braised chicken legs.)
Scholastic book fairs were the highlights of my childhood, and the one I went to as an adult was just as magical.
Something to celebrate: Small bookstores are thriving again. (I have such fond memories of the little bookstore in our small town that opened up when I was in middle school and was willing to order me all the weird books I wanted that the library didn’t keep on their shelves.)
If you, too, loved Firefly, I bet you will love this as much as I do.
THINGS I DIDN’T KNOW BUT NOW I DO
Mark Twain was so famous, his editor tried to get President Roosevelt to move Thanksgiving to accommodate Twain’s birthday.
The world of glitter is incredibly complicated. (And who is this top secret glitter consumer that no one knows is actually using glitter? It’s all VERY MYSTERIOUS.)
If I move, it probably should be to this town that has more books than people.
This is so cool: Scientists were able to recreate this pre-Incan temple using 3-D printed models.
Ants take sick days, too!
BOOKS ADDED TO MY TBR LIST THIS WEEK
Bellweather Rhapsody (Alex award winners are almost always hits with me!)
Crazy Salad (I’m trying to read more essays in general, and Nora Ephron feels like a good place to start)
Shiverton Hall (How did I miss this when it came out?)
Born to Be Posthumous (Who can resist an Edward Gorey biography? NOT ME.)
WHAT’S MAKING ME HAPPY
Watching School of Rock for movie night. (We couldn’t stop laughing. It was one of those right-movie-at-the-right-time moments. And we had the best tacos.)
My new $8 leopard print wool coat. (Thank you, thrift store.)
The first Agatha Raisin book — totally fluffy silliness, sometimes that’s just what you need
This gorgeous citrusy bubble bath that I would never buy for myself but was totally delighted to get as a gift
(We’re Amazon affiliates, so if you purchase something through an Amazon link, we may receive a small percentage of the sale. Obviously this doesn’t influence what we recommend, and we link to places other than Amazon.)
AMY SHARONY is the founder and editor-in-chief of home | school | life magazine. She's a pretty nice person until someone starts pluralizing things with apostrophes, but then all bets are off.