I blogged here at HSB for about a year, but then due to technical issues and a desire to have a blog that was linked to my name  (I may use it for some business ideas I am thinking of) I started a blog up elsewhere. You can come visit me at Melissa's Idea Garden . I don't have the time to move my many posts from this blog to my new blog and there are a lot of great posts here. I still get comments and visitors to my HSB blog and I have a lot of HSB friends. So, I try to post here periodically.

Be sure to visit my new blog. I still share interesting animal, archaeology, and astronomy stories as well as posts about my family, homeschooling, and our travel adventures. I also share book reviews and movie reviews.

     IMPORTANT: Below is a review that I wrote regarding a book I recently read. This contest is taking place on my other blog, but if you want, you may also comment here and I will pool all of the comments together when I have my drawing on the 11th.  This is a wonderful book and would be a terrific edition to your living history book collection!  BTW, For some reason in a couple of spots, I can't get the font size to change. Don't ask me why. It is changed where I am typing it, but when I preview it, it isn't. Sorry, but I don't know what to do about it.

How does one define the word 'veteran'?

    Originally, the word veteran meant "a person of long experience" or skill. Derived from the Latin term veteranus. After the American Revolution the word veteran came to be associated specifically with former soldiers of old age who had fought for independence. As time went on, "veteran" was used to describe any former member of the armed forces or a person who had served in the military.

What is "Veteran's Day"?

     World War I, also known as the "Great War" was officially concluded on the 11th hour of the 11th Day of November, at 11 A.M. in 1918. On November 11th of the following year, President Woodrow Wilson declared that day as "Armistice Day" in honor of the peace. (The term armistice means "truce" or the end of wartime hostilities.) This day was marked with public celebrations and a two minute halt to business at 11 AM. In 1921, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier was dedicated in Arlington Cemetery with a ceremony on November 11th. After this dedication, Armistice Day was adopted in many states and at the federal level as a day to honor veterans. This was made official in 1938 when an act of Congress made Armistice Day a national holiday. 

     In 1954, President Dwight Eisenhower changed the name of Armistice Day to Veterans Day. For several years in the 1970s, Veterans Day was observed in October by many states but in 1978 it was returned to November 11th. Today, Veterans Day is still observed on November 11th as a national holiday to honor all veterans of the United States Armed Forces. (If November 11th falls on a weekend day, the holiday is observed the following Monday.) Throughout the nation, Americans participate in parades, ceremonies, and observances to pay their respects to our servicemen and women, both past and present.

     Through the years, we have come to think of Veteran's Day as a time to honor the men and women who have been involved in the Armed Forces (past and present). But if we think back on the original meaning of 'veteran', wouldn't it also be appropriate to honor people of long experience or skill? We often seem stuck in the present or with our eyes turned toward the future and we neglect the past. We discount the wisdom of those who have gone before us and paved the way for us. We forget to take time to simply reflect and we neglect to take the time to learn. And we all know that 'he is doesn't know history is doomed to repeat it.'

     So this Veteran's Day, I am not just going to remember and honor the brave men and women who have been part of the United States Armed Forces. Today, I am going to remember a woman who was born on November 11th, 1926 at approximately 11:00 pm, Anny Jeanne Neuman was born in Luxembourg. Anny was born 8 years after the war to end all wars had officially ended. The day she was born had been set aside to commemorate peace that the world hoped would last forever. For the first 13 years of her life, Anny grew up in a home where she was loved and nurtured by her hard working parents. She visited relatives in France. She was an inquisitve and happy child who was a light in her family's home. But before she reached her 14th birthday, she was fleeing for her life with her family from the invading German army.

     Anny and her family were not Jewish. They were Catholic. But in the initial invasion of Luxembourg, everyone was at risk of being shot on sight. They left behind virtually everything they owned to escape death in May of 1940. They entered France riding in the same type of cattle cars that would eventually be used to transport Jewish people and other 'enemies' of Germany to concentration camps. She had first had experience of what it was like to be in crammed in a train where there was standing room only for four days without food or water. When her family arrived in France, the French helped them as best as they were able, but they were under attack as well and supplies were scarce for everyone. They were given a place to live in while they were there. It was little more than a hovel, but they made the best of it.

     In September of 1940, Anny and her family were allowed to return home to Luxembourg under German rule. But it was not the Luxembourg they knew and loved. Fear marched the streets. Friends disappeared in the dark hours of the night. There were rules to be followed. Anny was told she could no longer associate with her best friend who was Jewish. Indoctrination took place in the school as the Germans tried in vain to turn the citizens of Luxembourg to their way of thinking Anny even had to go through a name change to make her name more pleasing to the German conquerors. Her father was forced to fly a German flag from his window, to ignore friends, and to follow the German rules. He did these things in order to protect his family and to ensure their survival. Anni (her new name) walked a careful line. She was deferential when she needed to be, but she also visited her Jewish friends in secret. She carried messages and packages for what one can only assume to be some type of underground network. She watched, she learned and during years of deprivation and loss, she never gave up. She never lost her sense of who she was or what was important.

     Eventually, the Americans came. And the hope that had kept the Neuman family alive (along with many others), was renewed. As the Germans were pushed back and countries regained their freedom, the Neumans rejoiced. Anni found love or maybe I should say love found her. Even though life was better now that the fear had been banished from the streets. It was still a struggle. Europe had been ravaged by war and it was going to take a long time for any sort of normalcy to return to this war stricken land. Food was still scarce as were jobs and all supplies.

       But Anni had dreams and the darkness of the occupation had not destroyed them, only reshaped them. And while she did not live happily ever after, she did way more than survive.

     I don't want to tell you the end of her story because that would be spoiling the book that I have to share with you. I do want to say that this book has taught me and touched me more than any book that I have read for a long time. While reading it, I felt much the way I did when I saw Schindler's List. I was reading about horrible things and because I was reading them through the eyes of Anni, I understood them way more than I ever have by reading history books in school. I saw this family triumph time and time again. I saw them not fall to bitterness as so many did. Instead they continued to struggle, to hope, and to dream. They helped one another and others as they could during some of the darkest days of our world's history.

     The book that I read was "The Meeting of Anni Adams: The Butterfly of Luxembourg". I won this book in September but was unable to read it until the last couple of week due to other commitments. Lonnie D. Story wrote the story of Anni Jeanne Neuman Adams. He wove in excerpts of history so we would know what was going on in the world beyond  Anni and her family.  This story will capture you and carry you along as you cry, fear, hope, and survive alongside the Neuman family. 

     We all go through periods of difficulties and how we get through them is a measure of our character and our outlook. Sometimes we feel like no one else has ever dealt with as much as we are. They wouldn't be able to survive! How can we be expected to be in a good humor with all that is going on. Let Anni and her family be your guide. Let their courage lift you up and let their survival give you hope. Read of their struggles, then compare them to your own. Share this book with your older children so they can get a good inside look at World War II. So much is glossed over and forgotten in today's history books. Don't let them forget. Let's prevent history from repeating itself.

     I wrote to Lonnie and told him how much I enjoyed the story and how I wanted to share it with others. I told him I planned to do a review of the book and that I wondered if he would be kind enough to bless one of my readers with a copy of The Meeting of Anni Adams The Butterfly of Luxembourg.

     He wrote back and said that in honor of Anni's upcoming 81st birthday, he would share not one, but five copies of this wonderful book with my readers. Each copy will be signed by Lonnie and Anni.  I am grateful. I am excited to be able to share this amazing story with you. And I look forward to hearing what you think of it when you are through.

     All you have to do is leave a comment below. I will close this contest at 11 pm on November 11th, 2007 in honor of Anni Jeanne Neuman Adams. Lonnie will be mailing the book directly to the winners. He said he can mail to U.S. addresses, France, Luxembourg and Belgium.

     UPDATE!!!!  Lonnie has emailed me Anni's email address. He said she loves to get email, so if you would like to send her birthday wishes, please feel free to contact her. Remember her birthday is November 11th.

Be sure to come and check out my main site for a bunch of neat opportunities to win in the month of October.

Around the 15th of October, I will be posting a review about Amy Grant's book, Mosaic and I have three copies to give away!

Linky Contest (this lasts until October 15th)

4-H Community Project for Soldiers in Iraq/Sticky Note #3 (this lasts until October 25th).

It's a Contest! It's a Product Promotion! Help Katrina Survivors! Have fun! Sticky Post #1 (this lasts the whole month of October.)

And from my friend's blog....she is actually giving away my products so it is another chance to win. These contests end October 5th.

Three Educational Ebooks - Bison, Ruby-Throated Hummingbird, and Komodo Dragon

A Recipe CD (over 460 recipes)

Wow! Wasn't Tiany's Open House wonderful! I got to visit so many awesome blogs! And I got to learn so much about how others go on their homeschooling adventure.

We have been having a great summer and started back to school on the 13th. With almost two weeks under our belts, we are doing great!  I had hoped to be further along with my CSS knowledge and getting a business up and running, but there is always just so much to do...

Hope everyone is well and has a great year. Don't forget to come visit me at my new blog where I post pretty regularly.

www.melissaomarkham.com

I have so much invested in this blog that periodically I want to check in just to keep the site up and running. There is so much interesting animal news and there are so many great photos that I hate to let it go! 

If you would like to come check out my new blog home, visit me at www.melissaomarkham.com.

Do you like reading and learning? Do you not have enough time in your day to sit down with a book, but you have some time while you are exercising, doing chores, driving to town when you wish you had something good to listen to? Audiobooks are very expensive when you buy them on cassette or CD, but have you thought about investing in an MP3 player or IPOD? My husband has an IPOD, and he loves it. He listens to college courses while he exercises. It helps get him through the exercise time and he learns at the same time!

At any rate, we have found a great site to download audiobooks from at a fraction of the cost that you would pay to buy the same books on 'hardcopy.' And just think, no shipping fees and no waiting for the book to arrive, you can get it right now!

This month they are offering 15% off if you subscribe to their newsletter. Obviously, there is not a lot of time left in the month, so be sure to hop on the offer NOW:)  The subscription to the newsletter has  added lasting benefits:

1. You get 15% off all the audiobooks you buy this month.
2. You will know the specials to be offered the following fortnight before they are displayed on the website.
3. Every month you will receive an opportunity to save even more on those specials and on our full audiobook catalogue.

They even have a free book you can listen to when you go visit the site!  And there are over hundreds of titles to choose from in every genre! You can even listen to a bit of the book before you buy! There are no monthly fees, no membership. Just great audiobooks for you to choose from! The AudioBookPlace is definitely a place to go visit! 

What a bizarre looking creature! This is a Goblin Shark and is considered to be a living fossil due to its resemblance of prehistoric sharks. It was captured last month when it became tangled in fishing nets. It had wandered into a bay. Usually Goblin Sharks live in the deep ocean and occasionally dead ones wash up on shore.  Unfortunately this one died in a few days.  A few days prior to its capture, a live Frilled Shark was also captured in Japan, only to die within days.  The Frilled Shark is also a rare sight because it spends most of its time in waters thousands of feet deep. They believe it may have been found because it was weakened or ill. It died within a few hours after being captured.

They are soooo cute! They are unnamed currently, but children are putting in suggestions and three winners will be chosen later this month. The winners will become the godparent of their cub. Photos from the Discovery Channel

More than 60,000 shortnose sturgeon now swim in the Hudson River. These numbers could mean that it will be the first fish to be removed from the U. S. Endangered Species List. Biologists say this shows that recovery can take place anywhere, not just in special reserves. 

I originally posted my thoughts below on the 4th.  Unbeknownst to me, my husband was putting together a really interesting article on Global Warming on his blog where he discusses the need to look more at the science and to stay away from the political discussions of Global Warming. It is worth your time to give it a read!

I honestly don't know the answer to the above question. I know that global warming is a hot topic these days (sorry for the pun), but the skeptic in me wonders if it is like when they told us 30 years ago to not eat so many eggs...now they are saying eggs are good to eat. And other similar 'scares and misinformation.' However as a person who loves animals, I do know that polar bears are in danger from melting ice and that isn't just made up information (or misinterpreted information). 

Today I read an article about how warmed temperatures are affecting hibernation cycles for animals, and no one is completely sure of what the long term affects of that will be. But there are animals starving because they are waking up too early and there isn't any food to be had. 

Some say it will take centuries for the full affect of global warming to be felt, others seem to feel, we could feel it in the next decade. Corals are dying due to warmer ocean temperatures and there are those that believe that a vast majority of corals will be gone by 2030. 

Personally, I wish for two things. One I wish I could trust the media. I can watch two different news channels, watch information about the exact same news story, but have it be told two totally different ways. Why can't people put their political agendas and fear mongering agendas aside and just give us the truth? The second thing I wish for is more knowledge about what we as private citizens can do to help with global warming. I know a lot needs to come from manufacturers, but I also know that if all the people on the planet make efforts to change our emissions, it can help too.

One thing we are doing is switching to fluorescent bulbs. As our light bulbs burn out, we are replacing them with fluorescent bulbs. I was hestant as I was afraid they wouldn't provide as much light, but we have 60 watt bulbs that only require 13 watts of electricity. they are just as bright and they are cute with their curly appearance.  According  to the box of bulbs I purchased, it says I will save 38.00 per bulb in energy over the life of the bulb. The bulbs are supposed to last up to five years.  and it also says on the box:

Did you know if every household used one six pack of GE Energy Smart CFL's, over the bulb's lifetime they would prevent the emissions equal to six million cars being on the road. GE Energy Smart bulbs save money and resources compared to incandescent bulbs.

So think about it! You can save money and the environment at the same time!  If you haven't switched fo Fluroscent bulbs, what are you waiting for? They are a little more expensive on the front end, but the savings on the back end more than covers their cost!!!!! 

If you have other ways you have heard of about how to make a difference in global warming, why don't you share them here? There is a lot of information out there and it is hard to sift through it all by yourself, but if we all chip in together, perhaps we can create one place with snippets that we have all picked up!

Millions of years ago, the planet was warmer than it is now. There weren't polar ice caps and North America was a tropical forest. But after several hundred thousand years of global cooling, the climate in North America changed and reptiles and amphibians underwent changes (in most cases becoming smaller) or they perished.   Mammals were relatively unchanged because of a mammal's ability to regulate its own body temperature.  This is an interesting article and points out that we don't know what the correct temperature for our planet is, so how can we know that the warming trend now is bad?

There is a link in this article to facts about global warming.  The debate rages on. And I will continue to follow it with interest and concern and in the meantime try to do my part to be more planet friendly.

WOW! Thousands of new species...I love stories like that. I wish they had more photos!

Thanks to extensive efforts on behalf of conservations, volunteers and the government of Tibet, these antelope, which were widely poached in the 1980s and 1990s for their fur, are making a terrific comeback!

Conflicts between poachers and local Tibetan volunteers who risk their lives to protect the chiru inspired the film Mountain Patrol, which opened last spring.

Who knew that vultures could be cute!  This slender-billed vulture certainly is. Researchers recently found the only known colony of this vulture in Southeast Asia while on expedition into Cambodia. There are several other rare species that have been discovered there as well. It is wonderful that there are pockets of life untouched by man around the world. 

Wolves have made an astounding comeback in the last decade. From 66 wolves reintroduced, there are now over 1200 wolves running through the Rockies.  There are more than 4000 living in the Great Lakes region. Wolves are smart and when given the opportunity to survive, they thrive. However, people living in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming aren't thrilled with this comeback and are already presenting plans on hunting and controlling the wolf population once they are removed from the endangered species list.   

I find this whole situation very interesting. Wolves were almost driven to extinction along with the American Bison at the turn of the century.  Now we have brought them back from the brink, just as we brought back the Bison. Bison has become a favored meat. Wolves...there are still a lot of high emotions about the existence of wolves. Farmers don't like them because they claim they kill their cows. Hunters don't like them because they claim they kill off the elk.  While wolves are hunters, they don't kill everything they see. They lose out when they hunt more often than they are successful.  They help cull out the old, the sick and the weak. This is the way nature was designed.

Here in Virginia, we killed off the predators and we have to hunt now to keep the deer population in check or else they come into the town areas looking for food and destroy gardens, landscaping efforts and increase the number of car accidents.  But how do you keep a balance? Wyoming, Idaho, and Montana all have plans to try to do this. I wish them much success. We have changed the natural balance of our world simply by our presence. It is an honorable thing to want to try to restore it. For more information, here is the link to the rest of the article.

If you are reading a historical fiction book about the feelings regarding wolves and how they have been hunted, I recommend The Loop by Nicholas Evans. I am about 1/4 of the way into it and it makes for fascinating reading.

Something is killing the honeybees and has been for years. I was surprised to read this article which made it seem like it was a relatively new crisis. When I was a child, honeybees were everywhere.  I can count on one hand how many honeybees I have seen in the last 10 years, maybe even longer. Honeybees are vital pollinators and a vital part of our food chain.  Big companies are throwing research dollars at this problem and we can only hope it is not too little, too late.  For the complete artilce, click, here.

This link will take you to tons of animal photos on MSNBC. Plan to have some time available...there are 17 or 18 pictures to a show and then the ominous words...more animals which lead to more photos! I sat through three before I had to stop 

Well, after a month of Jodi trying to help me access my blog control panel, we finally met with success last week. Apparently some HSB changes made it so several bloggers were unable to access their accounts! Thanks to to Jamincea who helped me get my SOS to Jodi in the first place!

I hope everyone had a great Christmas and New Year. We have been very blessed in recent months. We are finally getting a well after 5 years of dealing with our well running dry, We are also getting a deck built onto our home. Since our home is on the small side, the extra space is much anticipated. We eventually hope to close in half of the deck and use it for another room. Homeschooling and co-op both continue to go well.  The last week of January we went on a five day trip to West Virginia and stayed at a Country Roads Cabin in Hico. We didn't see as much snow as we would have liked, but we saw way more snow than we have seen here in Virginia. It was quiet and peaceful. We got lots of reading done, played games, were blessed with two snowfalls, enjoyed the hot tub on the deck, the fireplace, and just being together.

Our sad news of the last couple of months was our loss of our recently acquired pet Maggie. She jumped out of our car on a trip to town and didn't return when called.  She got hit by a car. We miss her very much even though we had her for such a short time. My son, who got a digital camera for his 10th birthday had used it to take lots of videos and photos of Maggie. We are very happy to have those.

This giant squid was caught near Japan using a smaller squid as a lure. The 20-plus-foot female is one of the first giant squid ever seen alive. It died during capture, but gives researchers a chance to get a rare, close-up look at the elusive creature. What a sight to behold!  For more pictures, and the rest of the story, you can visit the Discovery Channel website.

I have a partiular fondness for the Komodo Dragon. In fact I have an Ebook I have written that has been read and reviewed by several mothers here at HSB and by some established authors around the world.  This book provides you with detailed information about these fascinating reptiles and lots of safe and interesting internet links. If you are interested in purchasing a copy of my book, simply visit my Ebay store.

Last April a Komodo Dragon hatched from a fertile egg that was laid by a female who had not mated. Now seven more eggs are due to hatch sometime around Christmas to another unmated female Komodo Dragon, this time in London. Only 0.1 percent of vertebrates can reproduce by parthenogenesis.  This assists in the survival of these amazing creatures. If a female is washed to another island, she can start a Komodo Colony there by reproducing through parthenogenesis.  Only males are born in this type of reproduction, then the mother can mate with her offspring when they are old enough and a new colony begins. Isn't God amazing?

This is one bizarre looking critter!  And look at him blowing bubbles! From National Geographic:

"The mole has now displayed equal prowess as a lightning-fast underwater sniffer, blowing and inhaling air bubbles at a rate of five to ten times a second.

The bubbles make contact with a target, such as morsel of earthworm or fish, and apparently pick up the target's scent before being sucked back up the nose. "

God's amazing ability to create so many different forms of life never cease to amaze me!