March Highlights // An Invitation!

Hello, Faithful Followers! It's time for me to catch you up on what's been going on in my March, why I've been so absent lately, and finally, an invitation to read a book together! Guess I'd better get started . . .

My family kicked off the month with a much-needed burn day to clear out all our fallen tree branches and pruning work. The day was a lot of fun and the whole family enjoyed our traditional relaxing into the night by the dying embers once all the work was done. I also enjoyed taking numerous pictures!

On the sixth of March, we packed up the car and went to church. Afterward, we drove to my grandparents' house and celebrated my grandma's birthday with them. Again, I took lots of pictures. :D From there, we traveled back to Shaver Lake for some more snow time. We took a downhill skiing lesson for the first time! At first, I was pretty apprehensive, but I soon found that I loved downhill skiing! (Even though I didn't get to try out the bigger slopes. :( ) However, the only two downsides to that day were that the whole family (mostly myself) had gotten NASTY sunburns. We had everyone calling us “racoon eyes.” *sigh. Anyways, the second downside that actually was a tad funny was that we thought we lost our cell phone, so my dad drove all the way back to the snow park, and after he got back . . . we found it. Lol. The next day we went cross-country skiing and then played in the snow with a few friends who had gone there at the same time as us. By the end of this trip, everyone was so sore and tired. On the day we drove home, it snowed as we were leaving. It was beautiful but I wasn't able to get any good pictures. :(

At the ski resort.

The following Friday my sister and I had to give presentations for our homeschool group. Mine was about the Captain Shackleton expedition that I wrote the journal entries about. I got nervous and didn't do too well so, I'll not elaborate on this night except by saying that I did have fun hanging out with the younger kids in our homeschool group. :)

The good thing about that Friday night, was that it marked the beginning of our Easter vacation! Yeah! We got a two-week break and much of it was spent cleaning our garage and classroom, painting the classroom, and building it into my Dad's future office. This summer, we plan on moving rooms around so that my sister and I finally get out own rooms!!! I can't wait! We did take a break from all the work for the Saturday before Easter (where we celebrated with dear friends), Easter Sunday, and my sister's birthday. Then, my grandma came to help us finish converting the classroom. So that is the reason for my recent absence from my blog. This project has taken all my energy!

You may be wondering if, with everything going on, I managed to read my ten books. The answer is yes, but barely. I literally had to read the last two books plus about a hundred pages between yesterday and today. But I made it! Every book was great and my total pages ended up as 2,047! Here is the complete list.

1. Silas Marner, George Eliot (202 pages)
2. Golden Filly: Go for the Glory, Lauraine Snelling (126 pages)
3. Golden Filly: Kentucky Dreamer, Lauraine Snelling (130 pages)
4. Golden Filly: Call for Courage, Lauraine Snelling (122 pages)
5. Dear Enemy, Jack Cavanaugh (288 pages)
6. The Kingdom Series: Kingdom's Dawn, Chuck Black (145 pages)
7. Blessed Child, Ted Dekker and Bill Bright (349 pages)
8. Left Behind: Desecration, Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins (405 pages)
9. The Kingdom Series: Kingdom's Hope, Chuck Black (138 pages)
10. Adventures of the Northwoods: The Hidden Message, Lois Walfrid Johnson (142 pages)

As I previously mentioned, I enjoyed reading all these books. Dear Enemy was very fun to read, but Blessed Child was amazing! I plan to read the sequel in April. Speaking of books I plan to read in April, I would like to read The Hobbit. I read it awhile back but don't remember much of it. This is where you come in! I not only want to read The Hobbit, but I want reading partners! Whether you have read it before, or never before, I would love to have you join me in reading it! My plan is to read five chapters a week. There are nineteen chapters, and we should be done reading it by the end of the month. Then, on May first, those of us with blogs can post our thoughts on the book and J. R. R. Tolkien! I would also love to chat about what we are reading with those of you who choose to participate. I have set up a blog for those of you who choose to participate. I hope that you can join me! Please send me an email and I will send you the link to the blog. If you get partway into the book and don't want to continue, or cannot, or can't do a blog post, that is totally okay! Don't worry about it! This is not meant to cause pressure.

So how did your March go? Have you enjoyed reading any of the books that I read this month? Will you be joining me in my goal to read The Hobbit? Have a wonderful April!