"Out of curiosity... do you buy most of the books your family reads for the school year? You must have lots of books. :)"
Yes, we buy most of the books our family reads for the school year. That said, nearly all of the books we buy we purchase at Goodwill (for 79¢/book) or at garage sales (even cheaper!), at library book sales or used book stores. It is very rare that we will buy a book for full price. (Our total budget for homeschooling is $20/month, so.. yeah- we don't buy much at full price.) Searching for cheap, *good* books has become one of our hobbies. And we find them, all the time.
We frequent our local Goodwill about twice a month, and our family is usually scattered throughout the book section- the girls are in the cart, reading books; the older three kids are on the floor, reading books, and Mark and I are perusing the shelves for good books to add to our collection.
When Mark and I went away for our anniversary, we stopped at a handful of Goodwill stores along the way. This is what we came home with:
As for how many books we have, here's a picture of some of our books:
A few years ago we purchased five tall black bookshelves (cheap: we got each one for maybe $19 at Big Lots) for our basement and we have one other bookshelf down there. Those are our books, and it is from the books on those shelves that we study history and choose many of our read-alouds. We know ahead of time what period of history we're studying so we keep an eye out for certain books within that time period.
Every thing else we check out at the library.
With five kids and our decision to homeschool them, and our appreciation for good (living) books, we figure it's a good investment to build somewhat of a library for our family.
Hope that helps!
If anyone else has any questions, I'd be happy to answer them!
What a beautiful book collection! I've gotten rid of so many books in an effort to pare down, and it's actually kind of nice. For me, that is. :>
ReplyDeleteYes. Even we pare down our bookshelves from time to time. But I'd rather pare down almost everything else in my house FIRST! ;)
DeleteI am SO inspired!!! I can't believe you find all that at Goodwill! We have a lot of books also. I'm not a big collector of stuff... we have a small home and I don't like keeping things around that aren't useful to us. HOWEVER, books are my one exception. :) I especially like that your kids have their own shelf of books they get to read over the year. That just makes me feel happy. :)
ReplyDeleteThank you for answering my question, friend! And yes, blog down temporarily. Thanks for the sad face. :) Happy reading! I already have my book list planned for next year too. :)
Happy to inspire. :) Yeah, we've found some treasures at Goodwill. Great, old, wonderfully-rich history and literature books for CHEAP.
DeleteOur home is small, too- around 1500 square feet- but we make room for books!
My kids LOVE having their assigned reading shelves! (I just started that last year and it's really fun for them. It's nearly full now and they're itching to get to it. :))
My parents made our family library a top priority while I was growing up, despite a very small house and an even smaller budget. I'm so glad they did! Because of the care they put into our access to good books, we read incessantly. So many of my perspectives on life I can trace back to those rainy days where I was curled up on the sofa reading. I have started to travel this summer, and have felt like I had already visited the places I am discovering, simply because I read about the places and people as a child. The only way I can remember history is through story, and only a few days ago I was able to chat with someone about George Washington Carver from what I remembered of stories I had read of him maybe ten years ago. Of the four girls in my house all of us are readers, and two of us write as a hobby. I believe this has a lot to do with the conscious effort my parents made to give us good books. Giving your kids a love of books is such a wonderful way to educate! Please know that it will be worth every cent! :)
ReplyDeleteThank you, Hannah! I'm headed over to your blog to leave you a comment there.
DeleteWe have book cases all over the house (10 to be exact). I am with you, I pare down pretty much everything but my books...that's different:)I don't like clutter.
ReplyDeleteAnd I loved Ella's book list. We have read so many of the same books. I recently just bought Little Britches to read to the kids this year. So excited to get started. We are reading The Hobbit right now.
Do you find it hard to find books that interest all ages? I know with my guys the gap between my two big kids can be wide in interest level and then again between the two younger (5 years). So Eli listens to the hobbit and plays and the big kids are eating it up. It is my first time through this book myself. It is so well written!
Eli shrieks through the house...."Hobbit Time" when the time comes for reaD aloud. So adorable!
Love ya and have missed ya
Good to hear from you, Sandi!
DeleteUgh- I don't like clutter either, but I have it (and create it)- a lot of it. I'm finding that summer is a good time to get rid of it. (All of a sudden I have extra time!)
The Hobbit. I've never read it, so when we read it it will be a first for me, too! (Unless we find it somewhere and I tackle it first.) I look forward to it. I'm happy to hear your kids are loving it so!
As for the different ages of kids and interest level, we just tend to aim for the older kids and the little ones play quietly. I don't think they're picking up much of Mark's current read-aloud (Robin Hood), but they sure perk up when he bursts into song and I'll bet Adelia (4) would be able to list most of the characters.
Love to you! Hope you have a great day!
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ReplyDeletewe look at books as an investment too. we have quite the collection as well, but our homeschool budget is waaay below what other families spend.
ReplyDeletecorrect me if i'm wrong, but you use AO, right? brian and i have pretty much decided on it for next year (Year 7 for the girls, Year 2 for the boys) ... so, i'm curious ... do you actually hunt for the books on their lists?
I was happy to stop by (Elise mentioned your popsicles:) and see you were posting again!
Love,
kathi
Kathi~
DeleteJust answered your question on your blog!
i love the idea of having assigned reading shelves- i hate getting to the end of the school year and having a handful of books they never got to. i'm so doing this!
ReplyDelete(and can i just say, i really think you and Mark and Kev and i are kindreds? i mean, we've been married almost the exact same amount of years, we're the same age, you and i (well, i don't know about Mark but Kev is forty), and we just got away for our anniversary and came home with two bags full of books for our kids!!! kindreds! maybe someday we'll meet, we of the tall, full bookshelves and beautiful children and kindred hearts. love you.)
xo
e
AND WE PLAY DOMINION! (At least now we do, thanks to your mention of it on your blog once. I thought then: I've never even HEARD of that game! We *love* games. I promptly bought it for the next round of gift-giving (Valentines Day? Birthday? I can't remember.) And we like it. A lot. (As in, we play nearly once a week.) :)
Delete~smile~ Love you, too. And I've been sure we were kindreds all along. :)
ps: Mark is 42.
I'm curious about your $20/month school budget. Is that for everything? We have a super small budget, too, but we also have to pay our umbrella school fees ($70/year for the family) and I'm pretty sure I end up averaging more than $20/month in the end.
ReplyDeleteYes. That's what we budget. Once a year (after we get our tax refund), we gift money whatever accounts are low, so usually we put $100 or more into those accounts, including homeschooling.
DeleteWhoops. Just edited, and it should read: "we gift money *into* whatever accounts are low..."
Delete