Our family, like many others, has explored various options to make money online.  Some have been more successful than others.  With such a wide range of opportunities available to make money, there are quite a few websites dedicated to helping people explore their options.  This website – Online Money – is one of them.  It seems to cover a fairly good range of popular options to get you started.

Some, we have been successful with, others not so much, and others – I haven’t even looked into.  I’ve always done some paid blogging, and I have some sponsors (this isn’t a lot of money at all, but every bit helps), some affiliate programs have paid us a bit, others haven’t paid us at all.  It definitely takes some experimentation to work things out.

Some moms I know online have done VERY well for themselves with SwagBucks, earning themselves Amazon.com gift cards and the like, but in all honesty, I just haven’t had the time to check it out for myself.  One of my good friends keeps trying to convince me to sign up, but I don’t like programs that seem to have a lot of ‘hassle factor’ built in.  The simpler the better for me!

How about you?  Do you have any online money making enterprises that have or have not been successful for you?

I have so been looking forward to reading The God Hater by Bill Meyers.  With an intriguing sci-fi premise (artificial intelligence, virtual communities, consciousness transfer) the story does require some suspense of disbelief, but is a fast-paced, engaging read that I’ll be keeping on my shelf.

Using a virtual society, Travis McKenzie, the brother of the reclusive and God-hating university professor Nicolas McKenzie, is attempting to build an accurate model of human life that can be used as a market research model.  Unfortunately his models keep self-destructing.  Each and every society based upon evolutionary, atheistic models fails utterly as a barbaric ‘survival of the fittest’ mentality eventually cases each community to self-destruct.

Travis eventually calls in his brother Nicolas for help.  The pair of them, along with Nicolas’ Christian colleague Annie, and her young son are swept into a web of danger that none of them have foreseen or could have imagined.

I blasted through this engaging read in only a day, and I love way Meyers has portrayed the logical results of atheism, and spiritual philosophies devoid of a holy creator.  The parallels that Meyers has drawn between this virtual world’s need for a moral law, and thenceforth, for salvation, and the world that we ourselves dwell in, are fascinating.  Even I wasn’t sure how things were going to turn out, and what connections Meyers would make – even though the book’s premise was made quite clear from its promotional copy.

There were a few minor loose ends and inconsistencies within the book itself, and, as I mentioned earlier, you’ll need to set yourself into suspended disbelief mode in order for some of the technology present to jive for you.  That being said, I still highly recommend The God Hater as a fascinating read – its both entertaining, and a thoughtful exploration of the viability of various philosophical stances.

Good stuff.

CLICK HERE TO BUY NOW AT CHRISTIANBOOK.COM OR AMAZON.COM!

I think I must have signed up to receive some free baby samples way back when my first-born was a baby.  For some reason I seem to perpetually be on the diaper coupon mailing list, the Disney club movie mailing list, and a few others I can think of.  Could this be because I signed up for some freebies along the way, and my mailing address is now being circulated, bought, and sold?

“Hey, guys, we’ve got a live one!”

True, I do perpetually have a baby in diapers around (well, I normally get a break of a few months after my youngest at the time is potty trained and before the next baby is born – we potty train a bit early here), but still – how do they know that?

Baby samples are no doubt some of the most popular kinds of samples out there, and also highly sought out by moms, but there are also many, many more types of free samples to be had.  Food – yummy pizzas, fondue, and more – for free…free chapstick….free face cream…free makeup samples.  If you want to try before you buy, it’s definitely worth hitting the freebie sites to see what you can find.

Over the past month or so God has really been illuminating and bringing home parts of a classical education that I never truly understood before.  We have always had some loosely classical aspirations, but the more I work with my oldest daughter, spend time chatting with other home educators online, and listening to teacher training (aka recorded presentations on my iPod), the more I’m really ‘getting’ the model a classical education is based upon.

AND…I really think it makes sense.  I really think it works.

And it really shows me where I’ve been going wrong in my approach a few times.  As an adult, I love to dig in, make connections, and express what I’ve found and my budding opinions.  HOWEVER, my seven-year-old DOESN’T necessarily want to do that!  AND I shouldn’t make her!  This is where narration, copywork, and the re-telling skills come in instead.  I’m better served by helping my daughter work on building ‘pegs’, facts to hang future data on, than I am by trying to dig into dialectic level discussions with her.  That’s what -I- want to do, but not what’s necessarily in her best interests!

Having grammar level children is tricky for me, I want to hoist them on up to my level ASAP, but it’s not going to happen, and will just frustrate everyone!  We do enjoy talking and learning together (the biggest homeschooling perk for my oldest is that she gets to chat with me), but it will be a while yet before we have those earth-shaking, soul-gripping discussions together .

Being an eclectic classical educator means that I need to develop a range of age-appropriate teaching styles, and not just the ones that I find the most fun!  Patience, Jennifer, patience.

Yesterday I wrote a post about the two free e-books from the new All About Reading program.

Did you like what you saw? Our family really loves everything that Marie Rippel of All About Spelling produces, and this new reading program looks just as excellent!  Ooh, pretty!  I have to admit…I’m REALLY liking the puppet (maybe I’m strange!)

The All About Reading Level Pre 1 is now available for sale, and there is a free bonus offer of two audio CDs (worth $20) if you purchase either the basic or deluxe kit before March 7th!

You can CHECK IT ALL OUT HERE!

There are now samples lessons available to download online to get a better feel for the program. I’m in the process of dong that right now!

I am seriously considering it for our eager-to-read-write-and-do-school four-year-old, but it looks great for five and six year olds who aren’t yet reading as well!

Enjoy your time educating your children today!

I have some exciting news for you today! Our family has been using All About Spelling as our phonetically based, multi-sensory spelling curriculum, and I just learned that tomorrow the LONG-AWAITED reading portion of the program – All About Reading – will be released!

We’ve been waiting quite a while to see what will be included, because though our oldest is reading proficiently now, we still have (at least) three more children who will be learning to read after her.

All About Spelling’s, clear, scripted, phonetic instruction is simple to use, includes integral review and drill, and is pretty much open to go. I can’t wait to see what All About Reading has in store for us!

Would you like to take a peek along with us? All About Reading is making two of their pre-reading skills activities books available for free.

GRAB THEM HERE!

Here’s what they say:

“We’re going to be releasing the first level in our new All About Reading program tomorrow, Wednesday, March 2! Level Pre-1 teaches preschoolers and kindergarteners a very specific set of skills that we call the Big Five Skills. These five skills help young children understand the basics of language and how it works, preparing them to learn to read.

With All About Reading Level Pre-1, your child will play special games, enjoy little crafts, and engage in charming storytime activities–all the while absorbing these all-important Big Five Skills.

To celebrate, I’d like to give you two fun activity e-books that you can use with preschool and kindergarten children who are ready to start learning the Big Five Skills. Feel free to pass this information on to friends with young children. They will thank you!

Free E-Book #1: In the Kitchen with the Zigzag Zebra

The Zigzag Zebra is in the kitchen cooking up a storm, and your child can help! And while your child is helping Ziggy, he or she will be absorbing critical pre-reading skills. The activities in this e-book focus on rhyming, identifying the first sounds of a word, oral blending, and clapping syllables–all designed to reinforce phonological awareness.

Free E-Book #2: Safari Stories with the Zigzag Zebra

We’re on safari with the Zigzag Zebra, and your child can come along! The activities in this e-book focus on listening comprehension, which is a precursor to reading comprehension. You can foster listening comprehension by discussing stories and characters, expanding vocabulary, and exposing children to a wide variety of activities. Sequencing activities–such as those found in this activity book–are also great for improving comprehension.”

I can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings!

Don’t forget to pick up your free e-books here!

I look forward to digging in with our own pre-readers!

May God’s blessings shine upon you brightly today!