I’m glad to see you here, Carissa! I don’t remember if we crossed paths in FOCUS or not (I was on staff 2013-2018) but your name looks familiar and I was happy to stumble upon this post. Congratulations on the birth of Veronica! I had my first four months ago and just returned to writing weekly (so far) after several years away. I’m glad you’re enjoying homeschooling and beekeeping—sounds lovely!
Hey! It's totally possible we met during your time on staff--We were at the University of Alabama Birmingham from 2016-2020 and always at Ave for training. Now we are at a parish in the Diocese of Philadelphia. It's always fun to cross paths with other FOCUS people online.
Congratulations on the birth of your little one! I just followed you and looking forward to reading more from you :)
Hello Carissa, so fun to read your updates! Congratulations on welcoming Veronica!
I just bought Charlotte Mason's A Philosophy of Education, but I have yet to start it and I know very little going in. I'm not homeschooling, we love our private Catholic classical school, but I know that while I went to Catholic school, I personally learned a love of learning at home from my mom.
My Catechesis of the Good Shepherd formations introduced me to Maria Montessori, and one thing I've learned is to always go to the source. Dr. Montessori's books give you a much clearer picture of her thought than blogs and Instagram accounts that call themselves Montessori. I've heard the name Charlotte Mason so often along homeschoolers, I thought I'd look up her books and get one and start it, rather than sifting through podcasts and websites.
Heading off to do bedtime, we're reading Two Towers right now. :)
I've just begun working my way through Mason's volumes! I was a little intimidated given how much she wrote on Education but now I'm ready to really dig into it. I agree going to the source is best but I've found a lot of practical help and wisdom to get me started particularly through Autumn Kern's youtube/podcast and her online "community."
Are you reading Two Towers with your kids? Ben and I are both re-reading/listening to Fellowship but we've only read the Hobbit + Leaf by Niggle with the kids. I've been on the fence if our oldest is ready for it yet lol
We were really impacted by the thoughts of our friends, who were super libertarian Catholic converts and just super disciplined and intentional and wild people (like did CrossFit at home and built a CrossFit-esque kid gym in their garage for their kids). We were really surprised that they had watched Fellowship with their four year old, and they said they felt strongly about introducing good stories with clear good and evil when their children were young, so they'd much rather watch Fellowship with their son than Frozen. (And their kids weren't super sensitive/easily scared, just by personality.)
Miguel and I talked about it and agreed with that logic for our kids. C has seen the extended edition movie of Fellowship with me many times, it's our go to sick day movie (on a laptop or phone, since we don't have a tv). So after we read her the Hobbit on a loop for years, we started reading Fellowship at bedtime when she was 5/6 years old (and it took months and months of bedtimes to finish, but it's so great!) We started reading Two Towers to her last year, but we'll wait on the movie for a while because it's too sad/scary/depressing, and I think reading Sam and Frodo's hard journey is less intense for a kid than watching it.
We read Harry Potter 1-3 together and now listen to the audiobooks of those and she's seen the first three movies (she's 7 now). I stopped before 4 with her, because that one is pretty heavy, with realistic death and grief vs fantasy peril.
I’m glad to see you here, Carissa! I don’t remember if we crossed paths in FOCUS or not (I was on staff 2013-2018) but your name looks familiar and I was happy to stumble upon this post. Congratulations on the birth of Veronica! I had my first four months ago and just returned to writing weekly (so far) after several years away. I’m glad you’re enjoying homeschooling and beekeeping—sounds lovely!
Hey! It's totally possible we met during your time on staff--We were at the University of Alabama Birmingham from 2016-2020 and always at Ave for training. Now we are at a parish in the Diocese of Philadelphia. It's always fun to cross paths with other FOCUS people online.
Congratulations on the birth of your little one! I just followed you and looking forward to reading more from you :)
Wow!!! Congratulations, Carissa!! So many beautiful things happening!!!
Thank you so much! It's been a very joyful spring :)
Hello Carissa, so fun to read your updates! Congratulations on welcoming Veronica!
I just bought Charlotte Mason's A Philosophy of Education, but I have yet to start it and I know very little going in. I'm not homeschooling, we love our private Catholic classical school, but I know that while I went to Catholic school, I personally learned a love of learning at home from my mom.
My Catechesis of the Good Shepherd formations introduced me to Maria Montessori, and one thing I've learned is to always go to the source. Dr. Montessori's books give you a much clearer picture of her thought than blogs and Instagram accounts that call themselves Montessori. I've heard the name Charlotte Mason so often along homeschoolers, I thought I'd look up her books and get one and start it, rather than sifting through podcasts and websites.
Heading off to do bedtime, we're reading Two Towers right now. :)
I've just begun working my way through Mason's volumes! I was a little intimidated given how much she wrote on Education but now I'm ready to really dig into it. I agree going to the source is best but I've found a lot of practical help and wisdom to get me started particularly through Autumn Kern's youtube/podcast and her online "community."
Are you reading Two Towers with your kids? Ben and I are both re-reading/listening to Fellowship but we've only read the Hobbit + Leaf by Niggle with the kids. I've been on the fence if our oldest is ready for it yet lol
We were really impacted by the thoughts of our friends, who were super libertarian Catholic converts and just super disciplined and intentional and wild people (like did CrossFit at home and built a CrossFit-esque kid gym in their garage for their kids). We were really surprised that they had watched Fellowship with their four year old, and they said they felt strongly about introducing good stories with clear good and evil when their children were young, so they'd much rather watch Fellowship with their son than Frozen. (And their kids weren't super sensitive/easily scared, just by personality.)
Miguel and I talked about it and agreed with that logic for our kids. C has seen the extended edition movie of Fellowship with me many times, it's our go to sick day movie (on a laptop or phone, since we don't have a tv). So after we read her the Hobbit on a loop for years, we started reading Fellowship at bedtime when she was 5/6 years old (and it took months and months of bedtimes to finish, but it's so great!) We started reading Two Towers to her last year, but we'll wait on the movie for a while because it's too sad/scary/depressing, and I think reading Sam and Frodo's hard journey is less intense for a kid than watching it.
We read Harry Potter 1-3 together and now listen to the audiobooks of those and she's seen the first three movies (she's 7 now). I stopped before 4 with her, because that one is pretty heavy, with realistic death and grief vs fantasy peril.