Homeschooling 
Economics for Everybody is a new video curriculum produced by Compass Classroom in conjunction with Ligonier Ministries. The materials are taught by Dr. R.C. Sproul, Jr., and presented in a fun and captivating way. Dr. Sproul is an engaging and knowledgeable instructor. He is particularly suited to teach this series given his teaching background and his knowledge base in the Bible, different worldviews, and economics. Why we like Compass Cinema Luke and I have had the opportunity to use a number of products put out by Compass Classroom and have come to expect high caliber products from this company. Compass Cinema ...Read More
Archives for 2012
Foods In Defense of Lard & How to Render it Yourself!
LARD! A word that strikes fear into the hearts of men. The fat you're supposed to avoid at all costs. Right? Not so fast on that one. I recently rendered my own lard and have even begun to use it in my cooking, and I'm loving it. Lard is a natural fat that has been used for many, many years—even before the "obesity epidemic." In fact, the "obesity epidemic" didn't begin until after we decided to add in franken-fats like Crisco and margarine. Unlike Crisco and margarine, lard is naturally hydrogenated and as such can be heated to very high temperatures without it turning to a trans-fat. It is also interesting to note ...Read More
When Good Cholesterol Does Bad Things
Alright, today's post about "good cholesterol" is going to be a deep one. I spent hours trying to distill this information down into easily understandable chunks, and I hope that I have succeeded, but you'll have to be the judge of that. If you have not already read my prior post on cholesterol, "What is Cholesterol and Where Does it Come From," I'd highly recommend going back to read that before trying to digest this post. This post will assume you understand what I said before. Cholesterol moves to where it needs to go in our body via blood, but as you'll remember, cholesterol is hydrophobic (it can’t dissolve in ...Read More
From First Date to Wedding
Read the first two parts of our journey: "How we met on eHarmony" and "From eHarmony to First Date" Luke: I was glad Trisha needed to use the restroom as soon as she got to Starbucks, because I needed to catch my breath right after seeing her. As I stood there listening to the sounds of coffee being poured into double-sleeved cups, I kept saying to myself, "You can do this, Luke. Yes, she's really cute, but you can go on a date and not make a complete fool of yourself." By the time she came out, I had psyched myself up enough to continue with the night. Trisha: Yikes! Who was this crazy driver. One of the first ...Read More
Teaching Writing: Structure & Style – Curriculum Review
Institute for Excellence in Writing (IEW) seems to be first and foremost a parent/teacher training tool. The core of the curriculum, Teaching Writing: Structure & Style will teach you as the parent to do exactly that. It will teach you how to gradually and systematically train your child to be a competent writer. IEW has a number of pieces of curriculum that can be used with students of many different ages. We decided to use the Student Writing Intensive A for our first year of IEW. SWI-A is a video curriculum with lectures featuring IEW'S founder, Andrew Pudewa. The curriculum includes easy to implement lesson ...Read More
Bible Memory for Children
As I discussed in a prior post, Bible memory is a very important part of our family devotions. It is a discipline we believe has a lasting impact even on our young children. It's a discipline we believe we will reap the benefits of for the rest of our lives. Here are my tips for Bible memory for children. We begin Bible memorization with our boys as soon as they are able to put sentences together. It seems like this was around 2 years old for both Bradley and Cameron. We begin working through full chapters or large portions of chapters with our children and shy away from individual verses (though there are ...Read More
Why we eat grass-fed beef (or, What’s wrong with meat from the grocery store?)
Several months ago we purchased a grass-fed and -finished cow. I made lots of calls trying to find the best deal on buying a cow, but buying a grass-fed and -finished cow costs substantially more than a grain-fed cow, no matter how you slice it (the pun is intentional). Despite the extra expense, I decided the health benefits were worth the cost. I'd rather reap the savings at the doctors office than in the grocery store. What's Wrong with Beef from the Grocery Store? The beef that you're purchasing from the grocery store (you know, the kind on the styrofoam plates with the plastic wrap on top, or in the plastic ...Read More
Xtramath: Simple, Effective, Free Math Drills (Review)
Xtramath.org is a supplement we used alongside Teaching Textbooks and Times Tales this year. I found it to be a simple and effective tool to use in drilling Bradley on his math facts. It's been so easy to implement into our day, I hope I never have to use math flash cards again! The student begins the program by taking a placement test so the computer knows which facts the student already knows and which ones need to be worked on. The program gradually adds new facts while periodically quizzing the child on old ones. Students work on one math operation at a time until mastery is achieved. Students must respond within ...Read More
