Holidays 2009 slideshow

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Homeschool Adventures in Life Science

Today in science we learned about living things (other than plants) needing oxygen to live. We recreated Priestley's experiment with the candle in the jar. That was a big hit. Of course, Priestley went on to add a mouse to the jar and when the candle went out, the mouse died. Now, as much as I loathe mice, I wasn't about to duplicate this part of scientific history. We needed something a bit smaller. Enter Daddy Longlegs. (What can I say? He was handy and I could pick him up easily. Houseflies are much harder to catch.)

We put him in the jar, lit the candle, and screwed on the lid to let the laws of nature take their course. Problem is, once the candle went out he didn't die right away. He slowed way down but still tried valiantly to escape the glass. As his movements became slower and slower, Ben started to get agitated. He understood what was happening to the critter and didn't like it. (Quite frankly I didn't like it either, but I was willing to sacrifice an insect in the name of scientific knowledge.)

Finally, Ben couldn't take it anymore and asked me to please let the spider out of the jar. I did, and after a brief recovery period, I'm happy to say that Daddy Longlegs walked happily through the grass to safety. May he live a long, productive life.

Happy 70th Anniversary, Baker Book House!

http://www.mlive.com/business/west-michigan/index.ssf/2009/08/baker_book_house_opened_70_yea.html

After reading the article in the Sunday, August 2 edition of the GR Press, I spent some time reflecting on my relationship with Baker Book House over the years. I can’t remember a time before Baker, and I have to say that my life would not be the same without it. God has used this company, these people, to mold me into who I am today. Let me explain…

The bookstore on East Paris Ave. opened when I was just 6 years old. My family attended East Paris CRC, less than a mile south of the bookstore. When I turned 10 in June 1984, a pastor friend gave me a crisp ten-dollar bill as a gift. “One dollar for every year,” he said. I couldn’t wait to spend that money, so Mom took me to Baker. I bought an NIV award Bible for $5 and had my name engraved on it. I also bought a book by Patricia St. John titled The Tanglewoods Secret. I devoured the book, and the Lord used the story to convict me of my own sinfulness and need of a Savior. I began reading my Bible for myself, and on August 16, 1984, I asked Christ into my heart.

One of my best childhood memories is going to shop at Baker with my mom. She always thought it would be fun to work there, although she said she’d probably spend her entire paycheck on cards and books and music. Well, she was right on both accounts. I began working as a sales clerk at the store in May 1995, and it was a lot of fun. And I did spend a good portion of my weekly paycheck on books and music!

On my first day at the store, the manager took me around to meet my coworkers. She introduced me to a nice guy named Sean Nemecek. I remember thinking, “He’s kinda cute,” but one of the other clerks made sure I knew he was taken. So much for that. Still, Sean and I became good friends. We had many good conversations over theology while on break together. And we always had a lot of fun joking around with Lanny, Arlene, Jean, Karen, Pat, Greg, Bob, Nadine, Nancy, and Donna. Even after Sean became “available,” we continued to be “just friends.” That is, until I returned from a trip overseas in summer of 1996. We began dating that fall became engaged on February 14, 1997. Our first stop after he asked me to marry him? Baker, of course. We shared that special day with our friends, and we picked out our wedding invitations. We were married on July 25, 1997, with most of the bookstore staff in attendance.

Sean continued to work at the bookstore, but I began working in the editorial department at the publishing house in Ada. I was hired in as an assistant to then editorial directors Paul Engle (trade books) and Jim Weaver (academic books). Within just a few weeks I knew that I wanted to work in Christian publishing for the rest of my life. Within a year I became an assistant editor in the academic division. After the birth of our son in Benjamin on July 10, 2001 (yep, he shares a birthday with president Dwight Baker and theological great John Calvin), I became a stay-at-home mom. But I have continued to do freelance proofreading and editing almost exclusively for Baker.

One of our first trips “out” after Ben was born was to meet our friends at the bookstore. This photo shows Sean proudly posing with Ben in the theology section, right next to a copy of Calvin's Institutes.

So my life has been strangely, providentially entwined with this one company. I’m so thankful for Baker Book House and how God has used them to shape who I am as His child. Happy Anniversary, Baker Book House! May He bless you richly in years to come so that many more lives will be impacted for His kingdom.

"Essential" Reading

I’m often pleasantly surprised by what I find on the shelves at our little community library. Such was the case when I walked in last week. I was not intending to check out another book…if you could see the stacks of books all over my house waiting to be read, you’d understand why. But as a word-aholic, I can’t help looking over the newly arrived titles. Inevitably I find something that piques my interest.

The copper-colored spine is what first caught my eye. So shiny, I just had to pick it up. The title intrigued me: The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Bauermeister (Putnam, 2009). I read the author bio on the jacket flap. Hmm…a first novel. That knowledge always fills me with dubious curiosity. I had a project on my desk needing to be finished, and I really didn’t have time for a pleasure read. But I took a chance and checked it out.

I was not disappointed. The book is actually nine stories, intricately woven into one body. Reading them was like reconnecting with old friends. While Lillian -- master chef and teacher of “The School of Essential Ingredients” -- is the main character and her story ties all the personalities together, none of the other stories is either more or less important in the overall scheme. An older couple who have weathered the storms of life together for so many years, they can’t imagine being apart, even in the face of some hard realities. A young mother whose identity has become so tied to her children and husband that she doesn’t know who she is anymore. An elderly woman whose increasing dementia terrifies her. A lonely widower. A drop-dead gorgeous foreigner. A shy bachelor. A mixed-up teenager trying to get her life back on track.

While each character has his or her own reason for attending “The School of Essential Ingredients,” by the last page their nine separate lives have become inseparable. It’s a recipe for family. And even though it’s not a “Christian” novel, it is a beautiful picture of the way Christ wants his church to function. I’ve seen my own church family bond together through small groups (or cell groups or community groups, whatever you want to call them). Lillian’s “School of Essential Ingredients” is at its core a small group, and it is a beautiful thing. Whether or not you have a passion for fine food, I recommend feasting on this book. It’s about so much more than cooking. Bon appétit!

Caring About Fictional Characters

It’s Monday afternoon, and we just got home from running a bunch of errands. (Okay, so I wrote this a week ago...it is now the next Monday a.m. and I'm still in my p.j.'s.) I’m in my recliner sipping a latte and trying to clear my head of the constant stream of words that has emanated from Ben’s mouth since 8 a.m.

Since I have a few minutes to myself, I thought I’d write a little something for my blog. I haven’t written much of anything since the death of my father six months ago. But I have done a lot of reading. And I do mean a lot. And not all of it for money.

While browsing a Traverse City bookstore last month, I came across a table of staff recommendations. Two of the titles grabbed my attention, so I promptly logged on to MELCat and put through a request for them. When they arrived a starting bell went off in my head, and I couldn’t put either book down until I knew how they ended.

The first title is Those Who Save Us by Jenna Blum (Harcourt, 2004). The author worked for four years interviewing holocaust survivors with Steven Spielberg’s Shoah Foundation. This, her first novel, chronicles the lengths one woman goes to in order to protect her young daughter during the German occupation of Austria. Before I go on, however, I need to give a disclaimer: this book is sexually graphic. The protagonist, Anna, becomes the mistress of a high-ranking SS officer in charge of the Buchenwald concentration camp. Blum leaves little to the imagination with regard to the man’s animal lusts and abusive treatment.

The story really centers around Anna’s daughter, Trudy, a history professor specializing in German studies. As part of a research project, she interviews German civilians who had been citizens of the Third Reich. Since her own mother refuses to talk about the war years, Trudy attempts to uncover answers to her questions from those who, like her mother, were non-Jews living under Hitler’s regime. What she finds about her mother surprises her. And while the reader, who has been following Anna’s trail all along, knows how her story ends, I still couldn’t put the book down until I knew how Trudy is affected by that knowledge.

The second, and to me more powerful, of the two books is People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks (Viking, 2008). Several years ago Brooks won the Pulitzer Prize for March, her version of Little Women from the perspective of Captain March. People of the Book follows the journey of an ancient Jewish illuminated manuscript back through time. She chronicles how it was preserved through history as one person after another risked their life to protect the precious pages from extinction.

I don’t want to give much away as far as the plot. Much of it is based in actual events surrounding the discovery of the Sarajevo Haggadah. The character that ties everything together is a young woman named Hanna. She is an expert in preserving rare books. As Hanna prepares the haggadah for museum display, she uncovers the story of the manuscript. And she discovers her own story as an intersecting parallel. (I know…that phrase is an oxymoron. Just read it for yourself and you’ll see what I mean.)

If you know me at all, you know that I’m a sucker for stories of mother/daughter relationships. Both of these stories are driven by the bonds (or lack thereof) between mothers and daughters. Neither has a “happily ever after” conclusion. Neither is a “feel good” kind of read. The issues these authors deal with are weighty, and I guarantee you’ll think about them long after you’ve turned the final page. But the stories they share are worth reading, worth remembering, so that we never forget.