Childcraft Series Overview

In my childhood home, we had a room called “The Library”. It was a beautiful room with dark wood built-in book cases and glass doors. It was always my favorite room in the house. My dad had a deep and lovely leather chair which was perfect for getting lost inside of a good book. My…

The Children of Noisy Village

Oh. Oh. Oh. This review breaks my heart, and it is wrong. 3 Stars – “The content is too old for kids in 2016. Too old school story.” (An Amazon Reviewer) Confession: I am not a big fan of Pippi Longstocking, also by Astrid Lindgren. I love the charm of Lindgren’s writing but Pippi’s unconventional…

The Hedge School

In 17th century Britain, the Protestant English settlers of Ireland had failed to assimilate the native Irish Catholics, and there was serious political and religious tension on the island. In 1641, native Irish landowners staged a rebellion against the English settlers and failed. A bloody, complicated, and chaotic series of events unfolded causing political, economic,…

Twenty One Balloons

“We are slaves of our own piggishness, we have locked ourselves in a diamond prison. On the other hand, we are very happy here; and I suppose the fascination of knowing that we are each one of us richer than the combined Midases, Nabobs, and Croesi of history enters too into the Krakatoan spell which…

Nurse Matilda

Nurse Matilda by Christianna Brand is one of those books that the child in any of us would enjoy. When I consider recommending it, however, I realize that I have to wear two different hats. Wearing the hat of my inner child, I adore the book. It is delightful. It is moral. It is creative. It…

The Woman Who Was Chesterton

Who is not aware of the giant that was G.K. Chesterton? Even if we post-moderns haven’t read much or any of his brilliant writings, knowledge of the “Apostle of Common Sense” (a term used by Dale Ahlquist in a definitive Chesterton biography by that name) is inescapable. Chesterton was a lion for truth, and his…

Brain Games

A year or so ago, my family discovered the National Geographic Channel show Brain Games. It isn’t perfectly family friendly, but there is much about it to love. We are a puzzle family and love Mad Libs, brain games, Ravensburger puzzles, etc. We love to exercise our mental muscles. Several years ago we removed most…

Freckles Book Club

“Freckles never tired of studying the devotion of a fox mother to her babies. To him, whose early life had been so embittered by continual proof of neglect and cruelty in human parents toward their children, the love of these furred and feathered folk of the Limberlost was even more of a miracle than to…

Frindle

“If you asked the kids and the teachers at Lincoln Elementary School to make three lists – all the really bad kids, all the really smart kids, and all the really good kids – Nick Allen would not be on any of them. Nick deserved a list all his own, and everyone knew it.” Frindle…