Get ready to get swept away into history! We have been listening to another new favorite St. Bartholomew's Eve from Heirloom Audio. We have been enjoying these fully dramatized audio adventures for the past several years, and were so excited for another!
This 2 CD set is over 2 hours of action packed adventure. Recommended for ages 6 and up, my entire family loves to listen. It is filled with some big name actors like -Brian Blessed, Elizabeth Counsell, David Shaw-Parker, Brian Deacon, Andy Harrison and Hugo Docking just to name a few. The music has been written by Emmy Award Winning Composer John Campbell.
Based on The Extraordinary Adventures of GA Henty, this story takes back to 1572 and a true historical event, the St Bartholomew's Eve massacre. My boys have been long-time GA Henty fans. His stories are full of edge-of-your-seat adventure, but also of noble characters and godly wisdom. I highly recommend introducing your family to his writing and these audios are the perfect way!
In the story we follow young Philip Fletcher, a young Englishman with French family ties, and his friends as they find themselves inside the religious war between Catholics and the French Hugenots (protestants). We are currently studying the reformation time period, and this story brings the struggles these Christians faced to life, and makes the time period unforgettable. I love this short video from Heirloom Audio about the power of stories...
The audio is full of sound effects, swords clashing, hand-cannons firing, and beautiful music. A Mighty Fortress is our God, a Martin Luther song, is unforgettably sung by our heroes in a dark hour. To be persecuted by other Christians simply for a difference in expression of worship to the same God, is a sobering history we share. My testers and I will never look at this historical time period the same.
The story is an intense one, so be sure your young children are ready to listen. This time period is violent, and the audio does a great job showing an accurate picture of the time. The story focuses around the question, Whom shall we obey? The King of France, or the King of Kings? I think it's so important our children know and understand our Christian history... if they don't, they will be destined to repeat it. This story gives them a clear charge to obey God, whatever the cost.
All through the stories, we hear our hero, Philip and his friends quoting scripture, and openly displaying their Christian values, even at great personal cost. I love how these stories demonstrate true heroic values like courage, friendship and devotion without being preachy. Our families need heroes to look up to, and their are few better that those GA Henty has given us and Heirloom Audio has brought to life for us.
We highly recommend them!! Be sure to check out our reviews other audios we have enjoyed:
These fully dramatized audios are part of a family favorite, the Brinkman Adventures. We enjoyed Season 4 last year, check out our review.Season 6: Underground Rising continues following the fictional missionary family - The Brinkmans around the globe as they encounter true-to-life adventures. My family loves to listen to these audios in our van together. This edition has about 2 hours of listening, which we received as a download. It's simple to copy it onto a cd to take it with you, or from your mobile device. Season 6 the recent addition in this series which has 60 episodes now! Each episode is around 20-30 minutes, short enough to enjoy in one trip.
55 - Dutch Underground Part 1
56 - Dutch Underground Part 2
57 - Twice Born Fly
58 - I Wonder Why
59 - Free Burma Rangers Part 1
60 - Free Burma Rangers Part 2
Most of my children want to be part of missions when they grow up. I really love getting to share a taste of what adventure their lives will be, and the Brinkman's give us a real, up-close view. Their goal is to "inspire, motivate, and facilitate the next generation of Christian world changers!"
The audio stories are very well done, with sound effects that make it come alive. In this season, history comes alive as we travel to the Dutch Underground during WW2 all the way to Burma to fright for freedom. Other episodes take us around the globe as we experience real-life stories of sharing the gospel.
My favorite episode was "I Wonder Why" - it follows a real life family that decides to move to India to become missionaries. Young Sam (Samanatha) is the main character as she adjusts to a difficult new life in a foreign country. I just connected with so many points in this story - I've had a miscarriage, I LOVE India - and in fact, I've been there twice, my son (who wants to be a missionary in India) is named Sam, I worked with Indian orphans(and know who naughty they can be), and I never ever get enough of hearing Indian accents. It was truly inspiring to see it through Sam's eyes as she learns compassion and love for the Indian orphans as she trusts God's plan.
One of the best parts of this series is found online, in the "Real Stories" section. You can read the true stories behind the audios. They have interviews, photographs, even recipes you can explore the reality behind the stories better. It is a wonderful way to expand the conversations with your family.
For a limited time - you can use a coupon code for 10% off of what you purchase from the Brinkman Adventures website. The coupon code to use at checkout is FALL10.The coupon is good from October 10th - the 31st.
We highly recommend these inspiring stories! Find Brinkman Adventures on Social Media:
CashCrunch Careers from CashCrunch Games "What should I do with the rest of my life?" This is a common question around here lately, with 2 graduates, one Senior and another high schooler, not to mention myself... CashCrunch Careers from CashCrunch Games is a wonderful resource to help you answer that question!
Four of us, including myself, have had the opportunity to explore future job options with a simple survey called CashCrunch Careers from CashCrunch Games.
The 75 question, online survey only takes 10-15 minutes to complete. The questions are simple, you select a choice that fits you best from pairs of words for each question. Once you finish, you will get a detailed picture of what careers may suit you best.
Take a quick peek at this video:
Let me show you a snapshot of my report. Each individual taking the survey will need their own login, and will get access to their individualized report - and additional resources online.
The report highlights 5 sections:
Career Work Style - Knowing what you can do, what you would like to do and how you are able to do it.
Motivators and De-Motivators - Something the provides a reason or stimulates to do or don't do something.
Career Attributes - The qualities or features regarded as a characteristic or inherent part of you.
Career Match - Jobs that are most suitable for your career.
Matching Jobs - a list of possible careers/jobs ranked in suitability based upon your test results
The first section is Career Work Styles - a basic summary of your personal style and approach to work and career. I felt it was a very accurate description of me - "you excel at imposing order upon chaos" - exactly!! My 2 college age sons, and my high school daughter's styles were also very accurate.
The next section was the Motivators & De-motivators. Very interesting to see how a simple survey can produce such detailed, and in our case, accurate descriptions. This has been very useful for my students taking this survey as a way for them to begin to identify what works best for them.
The final sections are where it gets really helpful for anyone contemplating how to translate all of this information into a practical application for a future career. The Career Attributes section will identify how your key strengths that can become assets in certain jobs. This information has come from years of research by the US Dept. of Labor.
Finally, the report offers a list of potential careers that best match your personal strengths. Since we do spend a large percentage of our lives working, it's key to find a good match! Once you have this list - you can access videos and college links in the program to get more information about careers that suit you from the online account.
We found it very interesting to compare between us! My oldest son is currently double majoring in Accounting and International Business. His matching jobs included many managerial jobs, but not accounting specifically. However, his strengths of detailed, written, communications and analytical thinking confirm this is a good match.
My next oldest is a Freshman in college and agreed that his report truly showed his strong points of analytical thinking, and attention to detail. His job list did not contain his future hope to become a lawyer, but once again, it did highlight important strengths he has to get to his goal.
My daughter is in 10th grade - so taking this survey early is going to be a huge bonus for her planning through high school. I am impressed by how accurately this survey has been with the motivators and de-motivators (I guess it's the psychology major in me!). She wants to be a nurse, which was one of the jobs on her list.
Many of the jobs listed were the same on all 4 of our lists, even though we are very different from one another. Being able to explore each career further is a valuable tool. Cash Crunch games also offers fun ways to learn about money. You will want to check them out.
I highly recommend this resource for high school, college and even beyond! We have enjoyed learning more about each career option, and making plans for our futures!
This excellent tool is a 74 page PDF that you can download and print. It has a single page summary for each book of the Bible.
The handy one page reference is full of information to help you understand teach book of the Bible better. Each page shows the author and date that it was written, as well as the time period it occurred in in a glance.
I love the the highlighted sections of "Claims to Fame", "Famous Stories" and "Most Famous Verses". These detail the unique and important details found in that particular book of the Bible.
Important points in each book are summarized by bullet points. This is a helpful reminder of what is most valuable to remember.
This is such a versatile, and valuable Bible study aid! There are so many ways to use it. We spent the summer studying the book of Ruth in-depth, and like to use the Books of the Bible summaries each time we study a Bible chapter together.
My testers are using them for their individual Bible study too. You can choose to print them, or use them from your device. We find that adding them to our e-reader makes a handy reference at our finger tips.
We are also enjoying using the books to quiz each other. It's easy to take any section and turn it into challenge questions ... i.e. What book of the Bible has Paul's conversion? Who was the great-grandmother of King David? Where do you find the death of Moses?
This is a must have resource for your small group or Sunday school as well. We love discovering the fun facts and details and using it to build our Bible knowledge!
