Feeling Creative

Just like any of the other books…Or is it?

Ta-da! It’s a Kindle. A library of thousands of books!

I made a book cover for my Kindle 2nd Generation. After watching a video to make a hollowed out book, I decided to instead just use the cover of the book. Of course, I made a few mistakes which are visible and obvious, and I may need to hot glue the side the Kindle sits in again. But overall, I am super happy

Oh, at first I dreaded cutting up the book; one reason I went with this option instead of hollowing it out. That would have destroyed the pages of the book; the reading portion would have been trash. This way, I can try my hand at making a cover for the pages I removed. If I should want to. Besides, this particular book is actually one that I have on the Kindle

Kindle Fire- What’cha Got?

Well, I’ve had hmmm, 11 days to get to know my Fire. So, what can it do? I won’t ask “what can’t it do?” because there’s plenty it cannot do. I’m a realist, sorry. It is not an iPad, people.

It works great for checking my email and checking on Facebook. It also works well when someone links to a website (in email or on FB) that I want to read.

Here are a few photos {I changed the screen to bright for better photos this time }:

 

  

First two are the screen when it is first turned on {the bottom ‘shelf’ are my Favorites- and you can see the stylus I purchased for my Fire}; next two are the upper part of the screen at the ‘home’ screen [indicators show ‘settings’ button, wifi connection and battery life] {it shows you how far you’ve advanced in each book at the top right corner of the book [percentage]}; last is my ‘carousel’ [what I have recently looked at or has been recently downloaded onto the Kindle].

The carousel can be cleared by placing your finger (or stylus) on the book or ‘item’ until a little box pops up with choices (sometimes you will be given other options)

Here is what it looks like when I am browsing online. Facebook, of course

The visibility/quality is good for reading online [but it is small print unless you double click to zoom or ‘pinch’ and stretch- check out the video below]. I can read it but sometimes I zoom in.

It works fine when I want to fill out a survey {I got 10% off from Old Navy} or to fill out a form online {required for the TOS Homeschool Crew often} . It works great to get things from Amazon (of course ). Here is a short and very quiet (purposely) video of me going online and browsing Kindle Free Books.

I have always had trouble selecting “Kindle” on Amazon.com- sometimes it takes me way too many tries. You’ll see me click on “Top 100 Free” more than once also... issues.

My Fire won’t read to me So sad… As much as I dislike the robotic voice on my 2nd Generation, I really liked the option at least. Perhaps I had gotten used to her {I prefer ‘her’ to ‘him’}. From what I understand one would need to purchase an mp3/audio in order to get it to read to you. In that case, I’m content reading on my own

It will download amazingly fast the apps I ‘purchase’ from the App Store at Amazon {I don’t pay for much}. The books available from Amazon are sent directly to my Kindle Fire {just like with my other Kindle}. Also with my Kindle Fire, I noticed I get Prime membership for a month. Nice! Saved me quite a bit on shipping already but not just that, Prime-members also get free video streaming {the selection is somewhat limited} for the length of the membership. Oh, and then there is that Prime-members-Kindle-Fire-owners-thing with the Lending Library… I haven’t checked that out yet.

For now that’s enough I will be doing more posts {hopefully} after I learn more about it. I really really am looking forward to when Fire owners can download directly from places such as Gutenberg and ManyBooks. That will be awesome.

*all links that go to Amazon.com are affiliate links

Kindle Fire- Obviously I’m Spoiled

You may have heard that I received a Kindle Fire as a gift from my most wonderful husband for our 15th anniversary. Even if you didn’t- you did now.

I’ve loved my 2nd Generation Kindle. I still love it. It is wonderful for carrying hundreds of books wherever I go. And I can read on it for hours without eye strain. (Check out my review of Yesterday’s Classics ebook collection- you can see other photos of my beloved Kindle ) Love, love, love it!

The Kindle Fire looks so small but it is heavier than my Kindle. Attempting to show the difference in screens (e-ink vs back-lit), I forgot that I set my Fire to the lowest brightness. I’m so used to the Kindle not being ‘bright’ {and not straining my eyes} that I didn’t take into account that it would affect my photos. The screen is brighter on the Fire and not as bright on the Kindle, as they look in the photos, if that makes any sense at all.

 

I also set the reading screen on sepia to lessen the strain on my eyes so it looks a little odd in the photos. After reading for awhile, I forget that the page isn’t white!

Yes, I am spoiled and will not complain again. The end.

I am still trying to figure it all out. It appears, at first that I cannot download books directly from websites such as Gutenberg and Manybooks (my two favorites) but still can download to my computer and then upload via USB cable. I did put all of the books from my Kindle onto my Fire but have encountered some hiccups. I am not sure if this is usual or operator error {gauging from the discussions on Amazon.com about the Fire, it’s not my doing…hope it is fixed soon…}. Some of the books say that they cannot be put/read on my Fire and need to be removed. I click remove and then it gives the option to download. Almost all of my books are ones that have been free so they download free- again- but I worry/wonder if sometime I will come across one that will try to charge me. I won’t be happy if that happens.

But until it does- I am happy with my Fire.

And I can get totally consumed by play Angry Birds. My kids want to play with my Fire (the games) but I haven’t let them yet… give me some more time to enjoy having only my fingerprint smudges on the screen (click on that photo and you’ll see the little prints I’ve left lol).

I’ve used my Kindle since having the Fire and try to use it as a touch screen! Haha!

I’m hoping to have a few posts on what nifty things to do with the Fire…but that’ll come after the new year.

AO/HEO Kindle Ready Books

Ambleside Online and House of Education Online…two of my favorite curriculums.

Kindle- my absolute favorite ereader.

Put them together and you get Extraordinarily Awesome I put together a site that has AO/HEO Kindle ready books. It is called NLHome’s Compiling Spot (simply because at first it was for my own use and I didn’t intend on sharing! haha).

When I started with AO Yrs 5 and 7 (Lite), I went about searching for the books as cheap as I could possibly find them –at used book stores, on Amazon, alibris, paperbackswap, used curriculum groups. I did find a lot of good deals and now I have quite a few bookshelves with a good many of the books (some of which I will not part with ). I read on the computer a lot but don’t particularly care for how it fatigues my eyes. I got to the point of printing out a lot of the books we would be using. That got costly real quick. Our printer is a good one but a little on the older side and the cartridges are some of the most expensive.

But when I got a Kindle for my birthday last year….oh! what a treat!

Talk about savings! I have over 700 books on it right now (uh, no, not all of those are for school!). A good number are for school, however. A good portion of them were free or very inexpensive. I originally went looking on Amazon for the books…but I think that people are catching on that they can make a few pennies by republishing public domain books which caused some free books to be much more than free! I started a website that I originally intended to have for just the free books that are recommended for AO/HEO. You can find a lot of them on Project Gutenberg or Manybooks.net (which is a subsidiary of PG) but there are a few other places as well. Google Books used to be a great resource for PDF files (I am finding it difficult to navigate through the site now).

I’m working on updating it (uh, really I am) but right now it is good up until Yr 9.

Kindle Collections Manager

Do you have a Kindle? Do you love your Kindle? Do you have a lot of books on your Kindle? Do you find it somewhat difficult to manage your books/collections? Well, then there is a possible solution: Give your Kindle to someone that does not get annoyed at anything -ever. Problem solved! 

Of course, just kidding. Buy that person their own Kindle! and then download the Kindle Collection Manager. It is in beta at the moment and is only for Windows but it makes it somewhat easier to manage your books/collections on Kindle. Here's how it works, somewhat ;)

You go to Kindle Collections Manager website and register. You will receive an email with the download link. From there you will download the zip file that has the installation software. You will have this application on your computer in whatever location you put it (mine automatically goes to Program Files).

When you want to manage your books, plug in your Kindle to the computer and open the Kindle Collections Manager program. It will come up with a window like this (give or take a few books and most likely the collection titles will be somewhat different ) To get a better look at it, click on image (use back button to come back to this post)

When it comes up, it has every book on your computer that is compatible with Kindle (on the left) and it also shows all the books on your Kindle (on the right). It also shows duplicates –even when you don’t know you have any and even if you think that you don’t have any and it shouldn’t be showing that you do, such as the little snippet below. There are a lot of duplicates on my Kindle according to this.

You can rename your books, delete them (gasp!) and/or move them into collections or start new collections. When you download the software it comes with a “Brief instructions” notepad document. It’d be good to read that over before going to far but as far as I can see, this program is fairly easy to use

Well, another software/application to add to my growing number of technology gadgets

Ah, I love my Kindle & I like Google Books again

As if you've not heard enough about my Kindle and how much I love it.... I was looking at Google Books today and feeling so sad that they don't offer books for Kindle when I realized: I can use Calibre to convert the books to work with my Kindle! 

Yippie!

So I was looking at Living Books Curriculum today for Science book possibilities and came across The Story Book of Science by Jean Henri Fabre. We had started to read Life of the Spider by Fabre and thought it was interesting, we aren't fans of spiders (and there was an account we didn't like) so we stopped reading it. I had originally found Life of the Spider on Gutenberg.org and thought I would find Fabre's other book there as well but alas, no. It wasn't that big of a deal because there are many places to find books for free (especially ones printed before 1923).

That of course is what took me to Google Books and the dilemma that I could not download the book to my Kindle. Of course I do have the Nook, Sony Reader, Mobi Reader and Kindle for PC but I don't like to read on the computer unless I have to. 

In this case, I don't have to :)

And do you see the pretty skin I got for my Kindle? Yes, I'm a happy reader :)

Free eBooks and Other Freebies

A Thinking Love ebook from Simply Charlotte Mason

• Available from Simply Charlotte Mason this ebook is available in PDF, ePub and even Mobi (for Kindle!).  From the website: "It’s easy to give our children an indulgent love that caters to their every whim. Or a lazy love that follows the crowd and does what is easiest. But giving them a thinking love requires some effort."

NASA illustration

• How to Fly an Airplane (28 minutes!) & Rocketry Acceleration (mini lesson and videos- Slingshot Rocket) from Supercharged Science (Aurora Lipper). The lesson on flying an airplane is from a real flight instructor. The rocket lessons use simple materials that you probably have around the house. Short and fun :)

• That Printer of Udell's free PDF ebook. From Living Books Curriculum, this was a President's Day special, here is what Sheila Carroll says about this book in her email:

"That Printer of Udell's (an inspiring story)

Ronald Reagan's mother gave him this book to read at age 11. Reagan says that it inspired him to become an evangelical Christian and made a lasting impression on his life. After reading it, he felt convinced to become a Christian and was baptized in his mother's church. At age 66 Reagan said that the book "left an abiding belief in the triumph of good over evil."

That Printer of Udell's (1903) is a novel by Harold Bell Wright, who was a minister and later a writer. In his book he created a compelling story of Christian redemption that is still in print today.

The hero of the story, Dick Falkner, comes from a broken home. His father is alcoholic and as a result his mother is starving and ill. After both parents die, Dick goes to the Midwestern United States to take a job. A printer named George Udell hires Dick. Through a series of circumstances both of them decide to become Christians. Eventually Dick becomes a revered member of a Christian community due to his public speaking abilities and optimism. At the end of the book, Dick gets a political job in Washington, D.C."

• Free Resource of the Day (02/24/2011) from Learn Out Loud: The Future of Nuclear Energy by Andrew C. Kadak. (video) From the email sent by LOL: "Get ready for a great debate on the future of nuclear energy in America. Andrew Kadak is an MIT Professor of the Practice of Nuclear Engineering and he argues that in the face of global warming we need to face the "second inconvenient truth" that in order to deal with global warming all non-CO2 emitting energy sources must be used, including nuclear energy. Victor Reis was the Senior Advisor in the Office of the Secretary at the Department of Energy and he argues in favor of growing nuclear power with recycling in order to reduce nuclear waste."

Just one of the guides available

• And last but not least, here are 15 MORE Free Guides That Really Teach You USEFUL Stuff brought to us by Kathy Schrock's Guide for Educators.  Facebook Privacy Guide, Automation Guide for MAC Users, A Dropbox Guide (which I've no real idea what is but sounds interesting- makes all your information/programs/files accessible to all your computers), Guide to USB Flashdrive, Windows 7 Ultimate Guide (I still have Vista...I'm resistant to change), Guide to Gmail, Wordpress and others.

Enjoy!

Borrowing/Lending eBooks for eReaders

Kindle Lending Club

I wrote a small post about this site/service for the Kindle a while back. I've been there, registered and requested a book. Yet to receive the book yet...but I'm not in that big of a hurry. I don't know yet which books that I have that are lendable in my Kindle library at the moment or I'd share too.

ebookfling

Today while talking with the ladies of the TOS Homeschool Crew, one of them suggested this site for borrowing/lending books for ereaders. I've not requested anything from this site but have signed up. It looks promising :) It's not been officially launched yet.

Kindle Lending Club

Well, it's amazing where the internet will take you! I'm doing my paper on what forces/experiences were the greatest that shaped the US Constitution and some how (okay I know how I got there!) I end up at Kindle Lending Club! It's still in the beta phase and I hope that it will soon allow for more than one lend/borrow but for right now I am so excited about this! 

You'd have to read all the FAQ's to get all the nitty gritty details (which I will do another time). But thought it was a great find :)

And in case you are interested in my bunny trail, here it is (all of which has nothing to do with the paper I am working on in the background lol):

searched: how to go plasticless

clicked: How to Reduce Plastic Usage- My Top 10. Ok, 15.

clicked: here (talking about produce bags in #4)

went back to search page and clicked: Martin Higgins (PlasticLess) on Twitter

clicked: KindleLending tweet (Will you purchase more than 40 books over the life of your Kindle? It may be the greenest option: http://t.co/gdkR4kH)

clicked: @KindleLending view full profile

followed KindleLending on twitter

clicked: http://www.KindleLendingClub.com

Free Ebooks from Kaplan

I would have bet you money that I had posted about this but I cannot find it anywhere! So, I take back the bet ;)

Here is a great opportunity!! Free books from Kaplan for your ereader. I've downloaded one or two already but at the time it wasn't available for the Kindle. Luckily for me I have Mobipocket Reader, Kindle, Nook, Calibre, and Sony Readers on my computer (you know, in case it doesn't work with one...). The offer from Kaplan is for Nook, Kindle, iPad, and Sony.

Until 1/17/11 you can download over 130 books from Kaplan for free. What a great opportunity!! Hurry though, this only lasts for a few more days.

Interested in what kinds of titles are being offered? Check out the listings page here. For Kindle, it comes directly from Amazon, which makes it slightly easier, in my opinion. For the Nook, it also comes directly from Barnes and Noble (the easier the better, right?). My apologies but I've no real idea about the iPad... For the Sony eReader, you have to find the books under Reference, in the Subjects section. Or if you are downloading to a PC version, you can click here. That also may download to your Sony- but since I don't have one, don't quote me on that!

I have downloaded three more since writing this post and I'm sure there are a lot more (hoping!) that I might like- with over 130 possible! Hope you find something that is useful to you as well.

E-reader Uncertain?

If you are tired of hearing about ereaders- and my awesome Kindle- you might want to stop reading now :)

Everyone knows I love my Kindle. I honestly can live without it but so glad I have it. Surprisingly, I've never written a post on why I like the Kindle so much...I might not ever write the post. Or maybe I will someday.

Either way, if you are tempted by either the Kindle or the Nook (in Color or the original), I'm sure you've researched the differences. I actually, for the first time, was able to see and hold a Nook over Christmas break. I still like my Kindle better. The Nook is heavier but otherwise about the same as my Kindle. It does have the touchscreen at the bottom but I wasn't fond of it. The backing of the Nook is a nice non-slip material, whereas my Kindle is brushed metal (can get cold and it can slip if you don't have a hold of it well). And that is about all I could tell was different. The salesperson definitely didn't have anything to say that would make me think the Nook was superior to the Kindle. He actually mentioned that "there are about 4 things Kindle does better and about 4 things the Nook does better" but gave no specifics.

I like Barnes and Noble but really with such ease and selection at Amazon, the specific vendor wasn't a deciding factor. Interestingly, I also saw for the first time a Sony and Aluratek e-reader in 'person'... still love my Kindle!

Here is a great post by Trisha at A Multitude of Mercies that shows why she chose the Kindle over the NookColor. She lists some things that I actually had not thought of (such as the genre of books offered for the e-reader) in her comparison. I really like her post that she links to about why not to get an e-reader as well ;)

Here are a couple other blogs that can be of help on why to get a Kindle :) Freely Educate (Lori) and A Peaceful Day (Jeanne) (look at the comments on this one). 


OH! And one more thing- if you use Ambleside Online curriculum I've compiled books for Kindle up to year 9 (I'm still working on the remaining years) on my weebly website. There are great books for free as well as purchase.

To Read ...Or Not to Read...that REALLY is the question!

I've been trying to get ready for our Christmas vacation and have been putting books onto my Kindle for reading on the drive and at times when I just can't take all the 'socializing' while at family's (lol yea, I'm an introvert by nature!). So I went to the Magic Catalog of Project Gutenberg E-books in search of free books to occupy my time.

Has anyone else seen this catalog?!? It is packed with every book that Gutenberg has archived into an e-book. I think it is absolutely fantastic! Some of the books I've downloaded from there are:

Anne of.. Books

A Life of Gen. Robert E Lee

Grass of Parnassus

The Lost World

The Book of the Cat

The Girl Aviators' Sky Cruise

The Battle of the Books and other Short Pieces

The Light Princess

The Land That Time Forgot

The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson

The Swiss Family Robinson

A Study in Scarlet

The Count of Monte Cristo

And that is just some of them. On my Kindle I have well over 150 books...and that doesn't count the ones in archive. I also have the complete works of Charlotte Mason (the six volume set). Of course books can be found for free from Amazon as well. Those are delivered wirelessly to my Kindle- no hassles :) 

Recently from Amazon I downloaded:

CK-12 Chemistry

The Game

In the Reign of Terror

Sidelights on Relativity

The Power of Movement in Plants

The Future of Astronomy

History of Astronomy

Personal Memoirs of Gen. Grant- Vol. 1

CK-12 Geometry

Sorry that I did not include links to each of these books that I've posted (that would take a bit more of my time than I have at the moment!) but it is easy to search either Gutenberg or Amazon, or both for these titles.

Oh! And for those times when I just can't read another word- in a book that is- I also have the games Every Word, Shuffled Row, and recently Black Jack *I deleted this one- I'm not into the gambling bit*. All were free. I love free :)

Alright! Now I know the answer is definitely TO READ! :) I hope that all have a great Christmas with family (however large or small) and remember what Christmas is truly about- Jesus Christ.  I will be 'gone' mostly for the next two weeks but may pop in occasionally, as I have reviews due.

Found another free ebook site!! Yippie!

I found this at Maple Hill Academy. She has a lot of other great resources and information on her blog.

Anyway, the ereader site is Mobipocket free books.

Just a note: You don't have to have a Kindle to download these books!! You can have another type of ereader (such as Sony or others that accept mobi format- such as the Kindle for PC). However, this site only has mobi format books.

I am on the lookout for more sites that have free books :) Whatever format! Know of any?