Three Books

I've been bouncing around between the three of these. I like each of them so far.

A Charlotte Mason Companion: Personal Reflections on the Gentle Art of Learning
by Karen Andreola

This lady is a Charlotte Mason guru, and the book goes through many different aspects of CM home education and tells what she has studied from Ms. Mason's writings and ides on how to implement.

Strong-willed Child Or Dreamer?
by Ron Braund and Dana Spears

For those of us with strong willed, yet very sensitive children. This book discusses a cognitive style that is a blend of strong-willed and sensitive/emotional. It describes different aspects of this style, and has a "how to parent a dreamer" section as well. Interestingly, I have seen myself in many aspects of this book (and so has Scott). Claire and I both score very high on the "is your child a dreamer?" quiz. Perhaps Claire takes after me a little more than I thought...

CLEAN: The Revolutionary Program to Restore the Body's Natural Ability to Heal Itself
by Alajandro Junger

The "program" outlined in this book is a recommended annual cleanse where you consume very easy to digest/highly nutritious foods for three weeks, allowing your digestive system to rest from its usual labors and clear out toxic buildup from your body. The author is a cardiologist in NYC who has spent time practicing medicine in India as well, and takes a "whole body" approach to medicine, blending healing of Eastern and Western cultures. The first half of the book discusses clean living and the effects of toxic buildup. The later half of the book discusses the how-tos of the cleanse.

Let me know what you think if you decide to pick any of these up.

Snake oil? No but perhaps fish oil

A friend's mother (who is also a good friend) visiting from Canada was telling me the other day that she was just getting over the first virus she's had in three years. That's right folks, no flu, no common cold, no nothing. I asked her what her secret was and her answer was vitamin D. As we enter into a predicted worse-than-usual flu season this was welcome news indeed.

Over two years ago our pediatrician told me to give Eve a vitamin D supplement since I was exclusively breast feeding. Surprised and skeptical I asked him why that was necessary and he gave me two solid reasons:

1) we live above 42 degrees north latitude and everybody knows "it rains 9 months out of the year in Seattle"

2) our modern lives are spent indoors far more than our was bodies evolved to be

I might also add:

3) we organic do-everything-from-scratch girls don't get a lot of the fortified milks, cereals, flours, juice, etc.

I've been doing some additional research (this and this for example) on the benefits of vitamin D and I'm pretty convinced. In fact I'm going today to our local natural pharmacy to ask them more about it and get some snake/fish oil for all of us.

BTW, she said that she takes 3,000 IU per day.

(in most annoying Jimmy Stewart voice) Ha-ha-have some soup. It'll make ye' feel better.

We started the winter squash season with a sure fire winner: BUTTERNUT SQUASH AND CHEVRE SOUP

roast your squashes in the oven until soft (375 for an hour)
saute a lot of onions and/or leeks
put squash (no skin please), onions and as much chevre as you can afford into your food processor and blend away. Season with salt and fresh ground pepper to taste.

When you are ready to eat some (I always make large batches) put some into a sauce pan and add vegetable/chicken stock until you get the consistency you want. Taste again and add more salt or pepper if necessary.

If you want to get really fancy, you can fry some whole sage leaves and sprinkle them on top after dishing the soup into bowls.

Bonnet

Chrissie has been begging me to make her a bonnet ever since pioneer day. I found a pattern I like here. Chrissie picked everything out right down to the color of ribbon.
I plan on making her another bonnet (but omitting the brim) with a matching jacket as soon as I can. I found an adorable jacket pattern/idea here(the pattern is by simplicity). I love the idea this girl has of making a pocket on the lining with a matching notebook to slip inside. Chrissie is always carrying notebooks around and I think she would just love being able to keep it in her jacket.