One important benefit of fiction is that it teaches empathy. We can put ourselves for a while into someone else’s story, and view life from a different perspective. When I Go to Church, I Belong is one of those books that is excellent for building empathy, especially in kids who are able-bodied and neurotypical. This picture book from IVP Kids shows a medley of children with special needs being loved in very practical ways by their local church congregations. A variety of differences, and a variety of ways of meeting needs, are depicted, demystifying situations that might ..read more

I frequently hear people say that spanking “should be a last resort.”  I appreciate what they’re trying to do, in ensuring that spanking isn’t overused — as the single approach to everything, all the time.  However, this well-intended approach is likely to be more harmful than helpful. Last Resort – Last Nerve When a particular approach — in this case, spanking — is treated as a “last resort,” there’s a built-in quality of escalation.  That is, the behavior gets worse and worse and worse — and usually the parent gets more and more and more exasperated — until finally the s ..read more

My mom talks about Durenda Wilson fairly regularly (they know each other), but I haven’t read any of her (Durenda’s) books before. I’m sure they’re excellent; it’s just that what she’s written about prior to now — at least that I’m aware of — is low-key homeschooling, and homeschooling is an area where I already feel pretty comfortable. Since I have a TBR (to-be-read) list about a mile long already, they just haven’t been at the top of the priority list, if you know what I mean. Then I heard that this book was coming out: Raising Boys to Men: A Simple, Mercifully Short Book on Raisi ..read more

This book is delightful from the very first page: “Josey Johnson’s hair is a wonderful adventure — it’s different all the time!” What is Josey Johnson’s Hair and the Holy Spirit About? The story follows Josey as she goes, with her father, to get her hair braided and buy a new dress for Pentecost. Along the way, they have a conversation about how Josey feels different from many of her friends because their hair is straight. They talk about how God makes us all different because He’s a creative God. The book wraps up with a brief explanation of Pentecost as they attend their Pentecost church s ..read more

I have to confess that when I saw the Timeless Truths Bible it particularly caught my eye because of another Bible I’d recently seen, The Ancient-Modern Bible. That one is in my preferred NKJV, but it’s…weird. I bring it up here because having seen that one, when this one came through my email, I was especially interested — and because readers who have heard of both might be curious how they are and are not alike. What is the Timeless Truths Bible? The Timeless Truths Bible is a Bible, obviously, which brings in a number of elements from church history. The end resu ..read more

I’m short. At just 5’1″, I find that most adults are taller than I am, and many tower over me. In a game of co-ed volleyball, this is, shall we say, not an advantage. I also have relatively limited experience with volleyball, so I don’t place among the most-skilled players of all time. When you put all these things together with the competitiveness of teenage boys, pickup games of volleyball in my youth group were frustrating experiences for me, to say the least. Everyone Has a Position to Play See, on a volleyball court, each player has a position to play. Your little area of the court is yo ..read more

Sometimes truth is found in unexpected places. Michael and I recently watched Castle, and in one episode the police chief was celebrating his 30th wedding anniversary. Half-jokingly, they asked him what his secret is. He replied: “There is no secret. You just keep showing up.” This may be one of the best bits of marriage advice I’ve ever seen. Of course life is more nuanced than that. Someone may be tempted, for instance, to claim I’m saying that if your husband is beating you, just keep showing up for that everything will be peachy. Obviously that’s not true. Just keep showing up. Click To ..read more

I have to take a quick detour as I introduce today’s post. This is a guest post written by my oldest daughter, who got married over the summer. The most important thing is that she demonstrates a biblical wisdom here that brings great joy to her daddy and me. But for the sake of those who have been reading around here about unschooling, I’d like to point out that even before we officially began unschooling, I refrained from using formal writing instruction for her. (She loved writing stories, and I didn’t want to squash that by making “writing” something she viewed as a chore.) As you can see ..read more

Many thanks to Lifeway Christian Resources for providing a sample of the product for this review. Opinions are 100% my own and NOT influenced by monetary compensation. I have to confess I wasn’t sure what to expect when I heard about The Old Testament Handbook from Lifeway/Broadman & Holman. Lifeway is associated with the Southern Baptist Convention, and there’s been a bit of upheaval in the Convention the last few years, so I didn’t know where to expect this to land, theologically. So far, I have not been disappointed. A Beautiful Book First of all, this book is simply beautiful. T ..read more

A little background: I’m not an especially creative person, in the artsy sense. My creative talents fall almost entirely in the thinking-outside-the-box-for-problem-solving arena. I’m especially bad at creating pretty art from scratch, although I can do a little with arranging things that already exist into an aesthetically pleasing arrangement, like with photography or graphic design. But I’ve been making a concerted effort over the past handful of years to grow in this area of playing with art and creativity, and using prompts and challenges and other forms of external structure t ..read more