The princes and princesses have all of the Kingdom as their playground. One day they come upon a magnificent mud puddle. They play to their heart's delight and get wonderfully filthy dirty. But someone tells them they're in big trouble with the King! What will happen to the children with Plastic Crowns and Muddy Feet?

The purpose of this manual is to provide clear and helpful information for maintaining gravel roads. Very little technical help is available to small agencies that are responsible for managing these roads. Gravel road maintenance has traditionally been "more of an art than a science" and very few formal standards exist. This manual contains guidelines to help answer the questions that arise concerning gravel road maintenance such as: What is enough surface crown? What is too much? What causes corrugation? The information is as nontechnical as possible without sacrificing clear guidelines and instructions on how to do the job right.

New York Times Bestseller • Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize • An Oprah's Book Club Selection “Powerful . . . [Kingsolver] has with infinitely steady hands worked the prickly threads of religion, politics, race, sin and redemption into a thing of terrible beauty.” —Los Angeles Times Book Review The Poisonwood Bible, now celebrating its 25th anniversary, established Barbara Kingsolver as one of the most thoughtful and daring of modern writers. Taking its place alongside the classic works of postcolonial literature, it is a suspenseful epic of one family's tragic undoing and remarkable reconstruction over the course of three decades in Africa. The story is told by the wife and four daughters of Nathan Price, a fierce, evangelical Baptist who takes his family and mission to the Belgian Congo in 1959. They carry with them everything they believe they will need from home, but soon find that all of it—from garden seeds to Scripture—is calamitously transformed on African soil. The novel is set against one of the most dramatic political chronicles of the twentieth century: the Congo's fight for independence from Belgium, the murder of its first elected prime minister, the CIA coup to install his replacement, and the insidious progress of a world economic order that robs the fledgling African nation of its autonomy. Against this backdrop, Orleanna Price reconstructs the story of her evangelist husband's part in the Western assault on Africa, a tale indelibly darkened by her own losses and unanswerable questions about her own culpability. Also narrating the story, by turns, are her four daughters—the teenaged Rachel; adolescent twins Leah and Adah; and Ruth May, a prescient five-year-old. These sharply observant girls, who arrive in the Congo with racial preconceptions forged in 1950s Georgia, will be marked in surprisingly different ways by their father's intractable mission, and by Africa itself. Ultimately each must strike her own separate path to salvation. Their passionately intertwined stories become a compelling exploration of moral risk and personal responsibility.

At eighteen years old, a small-town southwest Michigan girl stepped foot onto Zambian soil and her life changed forever. As she looked into the eyes of an orphan for the very first time, she began to question why Jesus had brought her to encounter a need so pervasive. Why did Jesus open her eyes to a crisis so vast? What this young woman didnt understand then was the beauty that Jesus was also going to open her eyes to through the lives of so many hurting and broken children. After hearing the Lord speak clearly that He wanted her to move to Zambia, she courageously defied all that her family and friends hoped for her, and began her life in Zambia. All because of love for Jesus. Sophie Hartmans journey is one of finding hope in the midst of brokenness, beauty in the midst of confusion and pain, and Jesus in the eyes of Zambian orphans. Her journey of learning the honor of carrying the stories of so many hurting and broken children is truly inspiring, and the poise and depth of her maturity is remarkable. Crowns of Beauty is an incredible and beautiful story that draws readers into such an intimate place with Jesus where His heart to bring forth beauty from ashes is evident to all. No matter who you are, Sophies stories and heart will inspire you and leave you with faith to believe that Jesus loves to crown His children in beauty, including you.

Marysia Kawczak is growing up in the gray flatlands of Poland, where she feels she is predestined to become -- like her mother -- a house slave, "a 210-pound lump of fat with varicose veins." At the age of fifteen, Marysia moves with her parents to the nearest big city, where she meets two streetwise girls, Kasia and Eva, who -- each in her own way -- begin to teach Marysia the secrets of life. Marysia's drab outlook suddenly gains color as she discovers not only the ostensible ways of the world, but also the subtler experiences of love, sex, desire, passion, and -- finally, in the novel's breathtaking conclusion -- betrayal. Combining elements of straightforward contemporary fiction, the metaphysical, fairy tales, and the epic, richly layered styles of Dostoevsky, Flaubert, and Mann, and -- perhaps above all -- brilliantly capturing the affectless voice of a young girl, Tomek Tryzna has made an astonishing literary debut. This dazzling novel is sure to be widely discussed and lavishly praised.

Discusses the elements of a sign, and looks at pictograms, alphabets, calligraphy, monograms, text type, numerical signs, symbols, and trademarks.