【推荐1】Christmas was near a season that we took seriously in our house. But a week or so before the 25th， my father would give each of his children ＄20. This was the 1970s， and ＄20 was quite a bit of money.

But I saw it___. My father trusted me to have the___to spend money wisely. Even better， he gave me the means to get it. On a very basic level， my father was giving me a shopping spree（狂欢） every year. But he was also giving me___over my own fun， trusting my ability to___money and making me feel like a（n）___. He didn't buy me Sherlock Holmes， but he gave me the means to walk into the bookstore and___it for myself， so it felt like a gift from him.

My mother had （a）n___for giving me what I needed， usually___at the moment I needed it most. This was when I was 25， I___at being an adult on my very first try. I had quitted my___job but had no new one. But when my mother paid me a visit， I___a good show， telling her I had started my own company.

My mother knew that I was trying hard and failing at that time. It wasn't until she___that I noticed at the foot of my bed an envelope thick with___. She knew how___I needed it. She knew that had she just shown up with groceries， or___to pay my rent， she would have made me feel much___. The cold， hard cash meant she was helping me. And， funnily enough， the___with which she gave the gift felt like she was giving me space to___my life and preserve my dignity （尊严）. My mother and father both did the same thing. One was giving me the means to make my own___，and the other was giving me a second___when those decisions had cost me dearly.

【推荐2】My two adult sons still live with me. Both of them have Autism(自闭症)and other mental disabilities. My oldest boy works at a local sheltered workshop while his younger brother suffers a(n) ________ disorder in the brain and stays home with me full time.

The other day I was walking into a restaurant ________ his finger when I noticed a teenage girl staring at my youngest son. She quickly ________ perhaps because she didn’t want to ________ us. I wasn’t mad at her. Many people have done the same thing over the years. I only wished that they could see what I see when I look at my sons and ________ that they could see behind the ________ . I have been ________ to be able to care for them, to love them, and to ________ from them all these years. I am sure that both of them come to this world to help teach us all how to love more deeply and ________ .

I have been my sons’ ________ as well as teacher in this life. As their father, I did my best to teach them how to do things with their ________ intellectual abilities. And they successfully ________ how to laugh more freely, love more openly, and have joy more easily.

When you see the mentally ________ in this world, then don’t just look with your eyes. Look with your heart. See ________ their disguise to their soul. Let the light inside them ________ your own light as well. Let the love they share help you to share your own love too. They truly are God’s angels in disguise.

【推荐3】For the past ten years, my dad and I have attended the same school—he as an administrator and I as a student. Our relationship, in and out of school, has been totally unpredictable.

When I was younger, all that my dad said was doctrine(信条) and anything he did I,_________, followed. We played games together, and stayed up late reading bedtime stories. I could_________my dad taking me to school, meeting him_________during the day and riding home with him every afternoon.

As I grow older, we were not as_________as we used to be. He wasn’t cool any more. He wore his socks too high, listened to_________country music and laughed too loudly in front of my friends. He became a total embarrassment.

However, the_________that occurred in school were even worse. The worst one happened in seventh grade. My dad came to our New Year party,_________as Donald Duck, guitar in hand, singing silly songs. Just kill me! I wanted to run away.

This_________continued into high school, but we somehow began to find a balance. Things started to_________around the time of my 10th-grade physics project. The__________was to build a wood bridge with the best strength-to-weight ratio (比率). All the students and physics teachers__________.So did my dad, the only administrator! Embarrassed, as usual, I__________the scene.__________, later when I learned from my friends that my dad__________all competitors and won everyone’s admiration, I found that mixed in with my__________was a touch of pride.

I had needed someone else to show me what I__________in my dad. It wasn’t the fact that he’d won; it was more than that. I began to__________that we have many of the same values and sometimes the same opinions. No matter how much I had tried to__________him, he still influenced me.

I feel__________to have such an unusual father. The__________I have developed with my dad over the years has enabled me to look back and see how I’ve grown.

【推荐2】Eclipse, an adorable dog in Seattle, leaves her house every day by herself to catch a bus to a downtown dog park, where she stays for a couple of hours to exercise and make friends. When she's done,she___ to the bus stop to catch a ride back to her home using the ticket she has been __ to her collar. It's____that the independent woman doesn't need human ____

It all___ when Eclipse's owner Jeff was taking her to the park one day and he was taking too long to finish his cigarette when the bus arrived. Unwilling to delay the __ any longer,Eclipse left him behind, hopping on the bus and waiting a few ___before thanking the driver and___ off at the park. Ever since then, ___ being led by its owner, Eclipse has travelled to and from the local dog park alone.

In a___ on Face book, which has racked up(累积)more than 290,000 shares, Robbie Lauren said that the dog's owner _____realized that Eclipse knew the _52___ like the back of her paw. Soon he____her enough to go on her own, knowing she would always return a couple of hours later, "All of the bus drivers know her and she makes them______"he wrote, “ and many of the ____ passengers enjoy seeing her every day and will often sit down next to her. Even the police have given their __ as long as the bus drivers are okay with the arrangement.”All of the drivers on the route will __ Eclipse if they see her waiting for a lift, before ensuring the bus pulls over at the park if she forgets to press the stop___. Eclipse has even got her own Face book page, with___ 50.000 fans sharing their photos and experiences of the ___dog.

【推荐3】A stolen baby goat was returned home to its community garden in Baltimore late Tuesday night.

Ed was reported _______ from the Filbert Street Garden on Monday night. His caretakers _______ in a Facebook post that two teenagers tore through a fence, _______ a lock and got into a barn (谷仓) to steal the animal. The animal _______ just 20 pounds (9 kilograms) and depends on its mother’s _______ to survive.

“We’re not _______ whether they are going to sell him or just kill him,” the Filbert Street Garden post said. “The community begs whoever did this to please just _______ return Ed. He is not _______ enough to live away from his mother yet and could die.”

The garden has since _______ a large number of photos of Ed. Many people ________ attention to it and hoped that it would be back ________ and sound. Security video obtained by the police ________ to show someone walking down the street with the goat in a suitcase as the animal ________.

To everyone’s surprise, the poor little ________ was returned by someone unknown before 10 pm on Tuesday. What’s more, it was really unharmed. In an update Tuesday, the garden ________ Ed’s safe return and ________ police for their help. The people who are knowing the little goat are happy with its ________ and safety. One man in the community said, “It is so ________ to see the little goat together with its mom. Actually, it’s a(n) ________ scene to return it to its dear ________ and let it live in this new world with us.”

【推荐3】I can still remember the afternoon when we climbed the mountain as if it were yesterday. It was a sunny day. _________ to spend some time outdoors, I went up the mountain with Uncle Jimmy. The mountain was not easy to climb and had tough rocks and streams on it. In the end, _________ and hot, I couldn’t go any further. Consequently, we went back down the mountain in the end. On the way back down, Uncle Jimmy asked me a question, which _________ me speechless for a second: “What’s your dream, young lady?” “I have no idea,” I answered after thinking for a while. Then he smiled and told me about his story. He didn’t _________ well at school when he was a student. Although _________ thought he could succeed, he knew clearly what his dream was — to be a _________. “I knew I wasn’t _________ when it came to studying, so I tried to buy snacks from a nearby market and sell them after class,” he told me. After he left school, he started selling different items to _________ which one was most attractive to customers. Of course, he often had no money in his pocket, but however difficult life was, he never gave up.

“There is no doubt that a person who puts in a great deal of _________ to reach his or her goal will have good luck at some point. The meaning of life is to chase your dream,” he said gently.

That night I could not fall asleep. With my eyes wide open, I lay in bed tossing and turning, asking myself, “What’s my motivation?” I wanted to be a top student, but the hard work __________ meant putting everything into following my __________. If I find myself __________ willpower, what should I do? Leaving home early the next morning, I climbed the mountain again all by myself. It made me think: If we don’t __________ the climb, how can we get to enjoy the scenery on the top of the mountain? At last, I reached the top and was __________ by the warm breeze and sunshine. Nothing could be more __________ than that.