Archive for the ‘Books’ Category
Daddies are for Catching Fireflies
March 14th, 2006
Daddies play an important role in their children’s lives and this sweet book shows daddies doing things with their children: everything from teaching them how to swim to getting them ready for bed and reading a story. Daddy even falls asleep at the end, just as your child will with wonderful thoughts of daddy as they drift off to sleep.
This is one of our daughter’s favorite books. Her dad is very involved in her life and they love doing things together so it’s only natural.
View book details at Amazon.com: Daddies Are for Catching Fireflies
Posted in Tell Me Something Happy Before I Go to Sleep
March 7th, 2006
What this story is about
What a supportive and loving brother Willa has. She can’t sleep because she’s afraid she’ll have a bad dream. Her brother tells Willa lots of happy things to think about so she’ll have nice dreams. With happy thoughts in her head she drifts off to asleep. It’s a loving thing to do for any child. Drifting off to sleep with lovely thoughts in their heads helps them have nice dreams and makes them feel loved.
Conclusions
This simple story is loving and everyone is nice to everyone else. The pictures are lovely, too. You’ll like reading this one to your child. It is a medium length story book.
View book details at Amazon.com: Tell Me Something Happy Before I Go to Sleep
The ABC Herbal
March 6th, 2006
My father sent me this book when my first daughter was about 3. I’m so pleased to see it’s still in print. Over the years it’s eliminated a lot of worry for me and discomfort for my children. It has stood the test of time.
Summary
The ABC Herbal: A Simplified Guide to Natural Health Care for Children contains herbal remedies and common sense advise to help children, and adults, overcome illnesses faster by giving the body what it needs to heal. Generally, symptoms of illness are really signs that the body is healing itself.
How I use it
When my children are sick I look for natural ways of helping them heal. I use the following elements: energy healing (Reiki), herbs, homeopathy, positive affirmations, preventive measures, food (either giving helpful ones or cutting out conflicting ones), rest and lots of love.
Caution
As always use your own judgment and intuition. "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure," someone once said.
View book details at Amazon.com: The ABC Herbal
Conversations with God
March 4th, 2006
How the conversation started
There is a self-healing technique that has been used quite successfully for many years. I’m not sure how it got started or what it’s called but it involves writing a letter to anyone and everyone that you have a problem with or feel has wronged you in any way. These letters aren’t usually sent and sometimes they are even burned (in a safe way) to transmute the negative energy. Well, Neale Donald Walsch had been doing this for a while and he had run out of people to write letters to. His life still wasn’t where he wanted it to be so one day he sat down and wrote the ultimate letter: to God. He was mad and wrote down everything he was feeling and included a lot of questions. From page one he writes, "To my surprise, as I scribbled out the last of my bitter, unanswerable questions and prepared to toss my pen aside, my hand remained poised over the paper, as if held there by some invisible force. Abruptly, the pen began moving on its own. I had no idea what I was about to write, but an idea seemed to be coming, so I decided to flow with it. Out came… Do you really want answers to these questions or are you just venting?" And so started Neale Donald Walsch’s ongoing conversation with God making him a messenger for all humanity.
The Series
He has written several books since then but the three books named Conversations with God (CwG) Book 1, 2, and 3 are included in the one book called: The Complete Conversations with God. Book 1 deals with issues of a personal nature, book 2 with global issues and book 3, universal issues.
My thoughts before I read this book
I got this book through a spiritual book club years before I ever read it. Something drew me to order it. I didn’t read it because I thought it was about religion. My background drew me toward spirituality and away from religion so I wasn’t into reading anything religious at all.
I finally read it
Martin picked up book 1 and read it first. He said it was along the lines of what we both believed so I joined him in reading it. I just love when we read things together; it sparks great conversations between us. It wound up really altering the way we see the world.
Main things I got from it
I really understood that right and wrong don’t actually exist, and when people hurt themselves or each other they have just forgotten who they are. Seeing everyone, and myself, as part of God helps to remind me, and consequently them, of who they are. Neale wrote a children’s book about this very process in The Little Soul and the Sun. I also got a huge reminder that everything we do is done by choice. It may seem at times we have no choice but we always have a choice. Deciding not to decide is a choice. It’s been a while since I read the books, and I’ve read most of his other books as well so some of the themes of each cross over from one book to the next.
Life altering
I must say if I hadn’t read these books I wouldn’t have stayed in my marriage. It hit home with me that I can choose to stay in the relationship or leave. After careful discussions and pondering we both decided to stay. Before reading the Conversations with God books our relationship was on the rocks. Once we realized we weren’t trapped, that we were actually choosing to stay, things started getting better. We celebrate our 10th anniversary this year and things are the best they’ve ever been.
Saving the planet
As I’ve said before the earth will go on. The only question is whether the humans will go on with her so the phrase "Saving the planet" isn’t really accurate. If I wrote it the way I wanted to "Saving our own a _ _ _ s" Google wouldn’t like it. How about "Saving our own tails"? For this example I’ll stick with "Saving the planet" because that’s how most people think of it. Anyway, if we change the way we think about God, as suggested in these books, we have a chance of the best days of humankind being ahead of us instead of behind us.
Audio books
These are done very well. The voice of God alternates between a man and a woman so we don’t get fixated on the thought that God is either a man or a woman.
Supporting websites
Neale Donald Walsch has taken his role as messenger very seriously. He has created several programs and websites supporting and teaching the principles he received in Conversations with God.
Humanity’s Team Neale Donald Walsch‘s inspiration for humans to join together and make a difference in our future
Humanity’s Team World Wide Connecting like-minded people to make a change in the world. You can volunteer to help make the change happen in the world.
Neale Donald Walsch’s personal site that "Can Lead You Deeper Into The Holy Experience" including a free ebook, Retreats, Neale’s Schedule, Wisdom Center, Action Team, Newsletters, Soulebrate eCards, online programs, CwG Foundation, Endorsements, the Messenger’s Circle and Neale’s Blog
New Spirituality Network Teaching the New Spirituality (this network is just getting started)
Part of the Change Bracelets and Booklets so we can announce ourselves to each other and wear something that represents our new beliefs about ourselves and about Life
Spiritual Cinema Circle The world’s first transformational DVD-of-the-month club
The Group of 1000 People from all over the world working toward the common goal of changing the world in 10 to 15 years
View book details at Amazon.com: Conversations with God Book 1
View book details at Amazon.com: Conversations With God Book 2
View book details at Amazon.com: Conversations With God Book 3
View book details at Amazon.com: The Complete Conversations with God
The Raw Gourmet
March 1st, 2006
Favorite
This is my absolute favorite raw recipe book so far. The index is clear and comprehensive, the pictures are vibrant and beautiful, the recipes are easy to understand and the food comes out great!
My experience
Every time I make a raw gourmet dish out of this book people love it, even if they don’t usually eat raw foods. Most people can’t even tell it’s raw, they just know it tastes better than what they’re used to. The recipes are easy to understand and everything comes out great the first time!
Special equipment
You will need some special equipment to make certain recipes but most can be made with just a food-processor and some good knives. I found the Champion Juicer especially helpful to make some of the more complex recipes including the raw "ice cream".
View book details at Amazon.com: The Raw Gourmet