When I arrived in the church basement, there were a couple of elderly church ladies sitting there all alone, and I discovered many boxes of beautiful vintage children’s books…most still in Dewey Decimal order, as they had just been pulled off the shelves of a library. Little did I know, but the church was attached to a school that had just closed its doors, and I was looking at the entire contents of the school library!

I make my home in Clarence Valley, NSW, Australia with my husband, ten children, aged thirty to ten, and two daughters-in-law, though only five of our children now live at home. We live on a rural property with cattle and chickens, with the children driving 4WD’s and dune buggies and swimming in the dam. Our children have always been home educated, and we have graduated six thus far. 

“Cooperates quite well, but all books have to be hers.” Written by my mother when I was just one year old, this statement lines up perfectly with the memories in my head, that as far back as I can remember, I have always loved books. 

Over the years, we learned to visit the used book booths when at homeschool conferences and to stop in libraries when traveling to see if they had a book sale section or room. It seemed we could always find some treasure for each member of the family. Once, a friend and I got a call that a local school was throwing their entire library collection into their school dumpster. What do you think we did?? Minivans here we come!

We’re open when we’re home. Very few people use it, as I said, so it’s no problem. I mail books to people who request them, after they pay for the postage. Eventually, if the books haven’t come back, I ask for them back. I do not charge fees, other than the postage fee.

A few years ago, probably in self-defense, my husband installed a 12 ’x 26’ building next to our house, finished the walls, and provided electricity for the lending library. Life intervened with some unforeseen events, and I’m still setting up the library with a goal of it being officially open to memberships in 2024. 

Even before I was introduced to Charlotte Mason’s philosophy, I knew the greater value of narration versus multiple choice. During the summer months, I turned my children loose to browse the shelves of our public library for summer reading, to find whatever interested them versus what they were “told” to read because they could be quizzed on it. To this day, I still believe the most successful reading program is both reading to your child from conception and finding books that they are interested in reading.

My goal is to be a complete alternative to the public library by offering a variety of Christian creation based resources including books, audiobooks, dvd, cd, games, and homeschool curriculum. In the future I’d like to add homeschool resources such as a laminator, comb binder, and science equipment like telescopes and microscopes. Starting soon I’d also like to add programs such as story times, summer reading programs, and book clubs. I want to have all of the resources that my family used at the public library. I feel that God has called me to run this library and that this is my mission field.

With no grandchildren at the time, I just couldn’t see the books sitting on shelves or in boxes with no one to read them and love them… As the children moved out, the books moved in.

If you had known mom, you would know she would be mortified by us putting her name on this project, and we did refrain from calling it Little Lisa’s Library or something cute like that. But, sorry mom, we are doing all this because of you.