by Leslie Sholly | Apr 22, 2010 | Politics
It’s still Education Week, but I’m taking a short detour to ask what you think about discussing controversial topics with your friends on Facebook. Specifically, since it’s a social site, is Facebook kind of like a virtual living room, where...
by Leslie Sholly | Apr 22, 2010 | Uncategorized
I see I have an enormous uptick in visitors today thanks to the mention by my friend Katie Allison Granju in her awesome blog. So let’s introduce ourselves in the comments below–I’ll start! Let me know who you are, how you got here, what you look...
by Leslie Sholly | Apr 21, 2010 | Education, Parenting
Kindergarten. Think about the word: a garden of children. It evokes an image of children placed in an environment that allows them to bloom. But is that what it is like these days? Chances are the kindergarten you remember bears little resemblance to the one kids...
by Leslie Sholly | Apr 20, 2010 | Education, Parenting
The accepted wisdom these days seems to be that our kids need more math in order to be “competitive.” The requirements at my teenagers’ school just changed from three years of math to four–regardless of what level a student has reached upon...
by Leslie Sholly | Apr 19, 2010 | Education, Parenting
Since this is the week that public school students are taking the TCAPs, I’ve decided to make it Education Week on my blog. I have enough opinions on this subject for an Education Month, but we’ll just have to see how it goes. I’ve got a busy day...
by Leslie Sholly | Apr 18, 2010 | Parenting
It’s late, and I haven’t had time to post anything today, so I thought I’d share something I wrote a long–VERY LONG–time ago (about 15 years ago). [edit: this happened in 1993] The incident I recount below touched me so much at the time...
by Leslie Sholly | Apr 17, 2010 | Abortion, Contraception, Deep Thoughts, Life Issues, pregnancy, Reprints
The following is a reprint of a column that appeared in The East Tennessee Catholic in 2002. When I was pregnant with my third child, friends, family, and strangers in the mall all seemed desperate to know: “Was it planned?” At first I answered,...
by Leslie Sholly | Apr 16, 2010 | Catholicism
When I was a little girl, I received The Song of Bernadette as a Christmas gift. The story of Bernadette and the apparitions at Lourdes captivated me, and I immediately decided that Bernadette would be my Confirmation saint years down the road. I recently re-read...
by Leslie Sholly | Apr 15, 2010 | Catholicism, Genealogy, Graveyards
Well, maybe he’s not. Actually, I don’t believe it at all, because I’m Catholic and our tradition denies that Jesus had any siblings. This is some of the suspicious information you run into doing internet-based genealogy. I was investigating my...
by Leslie Sholly | Apr 14, 2010 | Parenting, shopping
It really is true that you can find almost anything on ebay. I know that many people shop for clothes there, and even big ticket items like cars, but I like to shop for treasures from the past, childhood toys, the kinds of things you think you will NEVER be able to...