Have you ever seen an image of the Waltons gathered around their radio, together, at the end of a busy day? I’ve always loved that scene in my head. If our own living room can be such a picture of coziness and warmth, it would make my heart happy.
It’s nap time. And tea time. And right now, there are four giddy girls outside skating on the world’s longest “puddle-rink” that happened to freeze in a valley-area of our yard. They are delighted. [I had dreamy plans of making them a proper rink but that was pushed to the back seat by …. well, having a baby last month …]
But right before the girls laced up their skates, this was the scene in the living room…
… sitting around our radio, listening to the most fabulous audio stories…. I knew I just had to share these audio stories with you. If you homeschool, if you don’t, if you have children or if you do not, these historical audio stories are wonderful and engaging.
You see, when I was young, my parents ditched the t.v. and opened up a world of no-screens for their family. It did wonders, in my opinion. We read more. We sat on the living room carpet and listened to audio stories. We skipped most of the garbage that was on the t.v. and only watched (parental approved) movies. [Thank you, mom & dad!]
We also lived a slower paced life, compared to other families. We went to church on Sunday and Wednesday nights and piano on Mondays. In the summer, we all joined a baseball team. Perhaps life became busier as we grew older, but from what I recall, our life was not overly-rushed.
Well, we live a lot like that now in this home, as well. We go to church on Sundays, but not Wednesdays. We have piano once a week and fiddle lessons when their teacher is not touring. We don’t rush about too much. We don’t have a t.v. in the living room (it is stored in a closet until it is movie night).
However, the difference is there are more screens to avoid in this day and age. More to distract a young family. Ipods. Laptops. Ipads. Screens are a very big annoyance to me. And more often than not, such devices can discourage social time together. While we do not have a t.v. set out, I don’t want my children to spend their childhood with most of it in front of most screens. And even though it’s fantastic that you can save all your music collection to one device, you must have access to that device – and well, we have one very old ipod and one ancient ipad (given to us from family members). They do not hold very much music, they are usually not charged (an easy fix but still …) and I personally don’t like the girls to be carrying about an electronic device all day.
[This is just my opinion and what does or does not work in our home – I know that in many homes, ipods and such work great for gathering a family together to listen to music, etc.]
So, we do it old-school. We use … gasp … cd players! And time-tested CDs. No access to the internet. No cords or charging needed. Just a plain cd player. Recently, the cd player in the kitchen died and we had saved up for a replacement. Today was the day we first used our new radio in the living room.
The girls were delighted {and so was momma!} … We could finally listen to all our cds again!
Again, my parents gave these CDs to our family a few years ago as Christmas present. They are, however, the same ones that I listened to growing up. One set is the Bible completely dramatized {wonderful!}. And the second set gathers together fabulous historical stories and varied character-building tales. Both are so valuable! In fact, most of the history and facts that I remember from my school years involve these stories that I listened to in the living room of our home as a little girl.
Stories like Alexander Graham Bell and the “dead man’s ear” … Clara Barton … George Mueller … Christopher Columbus … Joan of Arc … the Wright Brothers … so many wonderful stories from the past!
And this reminded me that I truly needed to share with you these gems of audio learning that will truly benefit your own home.
It really does not matter if you listen from your ipod or cd player – these are wonderful stories that should be in every home’s collection.
There is something so pleasant to listen to audio tales … especially when the stories are gently teaching …
Here is another collection that we adore in this house: Your Story Hour.
Again, you will find these collections peppered with fantastic historical tales of great men and women … Louise May Alcott, George Washington, Sojourner Truth, Henry Ford, Sacagawea, and LOADS more.
They are fantastic CDs to listen to while folding laundry, preparing dinner, driving in the car, weeding the garden {pop in your car and open the trunk for outdoor stereo!}, down time in the evening … or quiet winter afternoons together in the living room …
For information to purchase the Dramatized Bible and Character Building Series, you must use the old fashioned phone. 🙂 No website, no email … just a phone number and here it is: 813-986-3464. I just called them this morning to replace some scratched CDs and they are still shipping out CDs, so don’t miss out.
For the Story House cds, they are available at ChristianBook.com – you can view them here.
Do let me know if you use audio stories in your home. I hope to share a few more audio gems in the future.
{:linked up with Strangers & Pilgrims}
by Gigi
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