Crimson Eve
2007-10-17 13:15:00
Last night Jesse and I took a big step toward buying our first home. We attended a class in Green Bay through NeighborWorks which teaches first time home buyers what to do to get pre-approved, how to clean up your credit, and most of all to find out if you are ready to buy a home. The class was a little intimidating: lots of information, a few horror stories, etc, but we're excited about the possibility maybe in the next six months to a year.I have a blackboard/corkboard in the kitchen where I post notes and invitations. On the blackboard, I put up a new piece of Scripture just about every week. I used to really push the kids to memorize them: every time they got one down, they got a candy bar. Now I post it and hope that they notice. The last few weeks I've been putting up powerful quotes that move me. This week's is: Is prayer your steering wheel or your spare tire? from Corrie ten Boom. What a beautiful reminder of where we need to keep God in our lives!Crimson
Eve by Brandilyn C
Mosaic
2007-10-15 14:29:00
I'm not a big TV watcher. I have certain shows I don't miss, and then otherwise I can do without it. Monday night is Heroes, Tuesday night is House, Wednesday night is Pushing Daisies. Sunday's, when we have time, is for family TV. I love that ABC has actually put on two hours of television that is safe for the entire family to watch together. Last night, Molly, Mia, and I curled up on the couch while Jesse was finishing up his finals for this round of class. After loud laughter followed by oooohs, I asked him if he knew what we were watching. Our reactions made it obvious: America's Funniest Home Videos. It's Mia's favorite TV show. It was a wonderful way to spend my Sunday evening. Us three girls watched AFV, then Mia was tucked into bed, and Molly and I watched (and teared up to) Extreme Home Makeover. There is so much on TV that I feel I have to shelter my children from; these shows are a nice change of pace.Amy Grant is Christian music's top-selling performer of all time, a
Read more: Mosaic
Knowing and Loving the Bible
2007-10-22 12:49:00
Saturday Molly had a competition in Tomahawk (over 120 miles away) for Forensics Drama. I am so proud of her; she won the female lead in the play, and has been spending ten hours+ a day at school between practices for that and Jazz Choir. She was supposed to be at the school at 6:45; the bus was leaving at 7am. I set the alarm for 5:30 giving her time for a shower. Instead I woke up to find her nearly shrieking in the doorway that it was 7:15! The drama instructor didn't answer his cellphone. Jesse threw on clothing in anticipation of driving most of the way if not all of the way to Tomahawk. While Molly was getting dressed, the phone rang: one of the other kids in the play was checking in. It turns out that they had to pass through Gillett to get to Tomahawk, and so Jesse and Molly met the bus at the gas station three miles away. Thank God! The team went on to advance to Sectionals and got high marks from the judges.I opened up a can of worms last week. I hate Barbie; I really do. Mo
Read more: Loving
Doesn't She Look Natural
2007-10-19 16:28:00
There is nothing like seeing your child in the hospital to remind you that God is large and in charge. Mia's been fighting a high fever and stomachache all week. On Wednesday, I called the clinic to get her for an appointment on Thursday, but nothing was available. So Jesse and I brought her in to the urgent care center in the Falls. At first the doctor didn't take us seriously, but after a blood test, she suddenly thought Mia had appendicitis and called in the surgeon. We barely had time to panic before the surgeon arrived and said that she needed a CAT scan first. But then there was a rollover on a nearby highway with five football players, so we had to sit and wait for two hours as they were a priority. It was a miserable night, and finally at eleven thirty, they decided to admit her for re-hydration and observation. Jesse and I took turns clinging to her and each other, but there was no time to break down, because for Mia we had to be strong. I spent much of the night praying. Mi
Read more: Natural
Authentic Parenting in a Postmodern Culture
2007-10-25 12:13:00
Bullies in schools has long been a topic that can get me riled, but today it put me over the top. A recent study by the University of Michigan points to lack of sleep as a possible cause of bullying. I think that is a just another excuse to avoid the real issue. When schools think about bullies and say that they have a zero tolerance policy toward bullying, they are ignoring the real problem. Yes, there are some kids in schools who are larger than their peers, come from broken homes, and have little parental influence who may be bullies. These are the sort that schools target. They put them in in-school suspension; they expel them and make them an example in order to make themselves feel good about dealing with bullies. But any unpopular kid in school can tell you that these are not the kids who make them lose sleep at night and fake stomachaches to avoid school. The real bullies are the popular kids. Teachers' kids, school board members' kids, prominent community members' kids, goo
Read more: Authentic
, Parenting
, Postmodern
Illuminated
2007-10-24 11:39:00
Chain letters have evolved. The letters that used to come through the mail to your house threatening death and destruction if they weren't forwarded on have mutated into emails promising fulfilled wishes if forwarded and death and destruction if not reposted on MySpace. They have also evolved into snail mail trees. Several weeks ago, I received a letter from my Aunt Sandie. In it was an invitation to join a recipe tree. If I send the letter on to six more people and include Sandie's address, then send a recipe to the person who sent it to her (her mother), I should receive 36 recipes in the next couple of weeks. I thought it sounded like a cute idea, so I went through with it. No threats of death and destruction, just the possibility of great cookies and desserts. A week later, I got the same letter from Aunt Sue, who had received it from Sandie. I had to be a little more creative with my choices from recipients this time, because obviously as this was going through the Lockstein fam
When Your Teen is Struggling
2007-10-23 12:38:00
Time Magazine's cover article this week discusses birth order and how much it effects not only personality but IQ, schooling, and earning potential. This article is interesting and has lots of data to back it up, but there are so many families that it doesn't address, it makes the conclusions seem outdated. As an only child, I looked in vain to find detail about singletons, but they weren't mentioned even once. Where do we fit in? Isn't a good sized portion of the population being ignored by these statistics? According to the Hoover Digest, by 2000, women were having 1.8 children, which means that obviously there are a lot of us out there. I found an interesting article while looking up statistics for this entry on the University of Texas website refuting birth order theory with several quotes about how sad the fate of only children is. No social skills, narcissistic, useless in life, etc. Tell that to Alan Greenspan, Rudy Guiliani, and Franklin Roosevelt! Another demographic is co
The Art Thief
2007-10-30 14:06:00
This may sound a little crazy, but I am blessed in my divorce. Divorce is never a pretty thing, and when children are involved it only gets harder. This first couple of years were really hard. We have 50/50 custody. This month the kids are with him during the week and with me on the weekends. Next month (tomorrow) we will switch. During the summer, we each keep the kids for six weeks so we don't always have them during the same months year after year. Initially we argued over clothing not being returned, who paid for school lunches and activities, etc. In time, we grew up and got over it. Now that Doogie and Molly are 16 and 14, they bounce back and forth between our houses almost at their whim. Doogie always comes here on Wednesday nights to watch Heroes with us and goes to Doug's on Tuesdays to game. Molly stays every Sunday night, because she doesn't want to go to the gaming session. We almost always have one of them here (and I love it). And it works because we aren't arguing a
Read more: Thief
Hollywood Nobody
2007-10-29 13:38:00
I need to write about guilty pleasures today. This weekend I finally finished reading Stephen Ambrose's Undaunted Courage, a biography of Meriwether Lewis. I usually finish a book in a day or two, so the two weeks this one took made me need a change of pace. So the first book I dove into immediately after was Lisa Samson's new YA book Hollywood
Nobody
(see review below). Lisa's writing is like a good friend to me, and much of the book revolves around a young girl and her blog about Hollywood goings-on. Which brings me back to guilty pleasures. I love judge/court shows. I'm not sure what the appeal is, and just watching them makes me feel like my IQ is dropping points, but I can't quite stop myself. We don't have cable or Dish, so we're stuck with just the seven basic channels, but I can still watch these shows from 10 am every day until 5 pm. Not that I do, who has time for that much TV? But it's always good to know that no matter when I take a break during my day, there's alw
We Are On Our Own
2007-11-03 13:54:00
Doogie is spending the weekend at his dad's. Molly is cleaning her room (this is an all day process). Mia is hanging out with Mom and Jeff. Jesse is doing his homework. I am stuck in bed. At least I can get caught up on some reading. Because I'm not on any RA medications, the pain just doesn't let up. It used to be that I would have a flare-up that would go away after a few days giving some relief and the ability to function with some normality. Now there are no flares, just constant pain. I push on and do what I have to do until I collapse. Then I rest as long as I can before starting the cycle again. Sorry Dad, I haven't whined in a while. I can't quite help myself today. I would covet your prayers.We Are On Our Own by Miriam Katin is the story of a young Hungarian Jewish woman and her small daughter struggling to survive through the Holocaust. Esther Levy is during her best to raise Lisa (really author Katin) while her husband Karoly is off fighting the Nazis during WWII. But o
Surrender Bay
2007-11-02 19:15:00
Scenes from the life of the mother of a four-year-old.Yesterday morning, Mia was eating cereal in front of Good Morning America before school. Joan Lunden was going to interview Heather Mills about her meltdown the previous day on British television. They played a portion of Mills' emotional breakdown, to which Mia immediately said, "Oh, geez!" in disgust. After I picked Mia up from school, I ran up to Hickory Cemetery to take some pictures of tombstones. A very nice gentleman from California contacted me earlier this week about his father who was a neighbor of my grandfather when they were boys. I went up to take pictures of his great-grandparents' stones, as well as a bunch of my own. I had to explain to Mia where we were going which evolved into a long conversation about the difference between the soul and the body and what happens to us after we die. She is struggling with the concept of the separation, just as philosophers have for millenia. Sometimes I use the shower as a brief
Read more: Surrender
Hollywood Nobody by Lisa Samson Chapter 1
2007-11-01 12:50:00
Trick or treating wasn't quite up to my expectations last night, but it suited Mia just fine. Here's a pic when we got home, shortly before I collapsed.This week I joined a new blogging group called FIRST (Fiction In Rather Short Takes). Every 1st of the month, I'll be posting the first chapter of a book for your perusal. Hopefully it's enough to get you hooked! This month we're featuring Hollywood
Nobody
by Lisa Samson. If you scroll down the page a bit you'll find the review I wrote on this title last week. Check it out!Lisa Samson is one of my favorite authors. She's written several books including TigerLily, Club Sandwich, Women's Intuition, Straight Up, Songbird, and Quaker Summer. She's currently working on the release of Embrace Me. Hollywood Nobody: April 1 Happy April Fool’s Day! What better day to start a blog about Hollywood than today? Okay, I’ve been around film sets my whole life. Indie films, yeah, and that’s all I’m saying about it here for anonymit
Read more: Chapter
The Pale Blue Eye
2007-10-31 13:36:00
I love Halloween. I don't get into the dressing up myself, but I enjoy helping the kids pick out their costumes. I like listening to the goofy spooky music on the radio. Fall is my favorite season of the year; so full of color and smells. It's odd, even though everything is dying, this is the time of year I feel the most energy and life. There's nothing better than walking through crunchy leaves in the bright sunshine with a stiff breeze and the smell of rotting apples and smoke in the air. I dropped Mia off in her classroom this morning, and the excitement was electric. Twenty four-year olds in costume, it felt like being on the inside of a pinball machine. I like your costume. Do you want to try on my hat? I'm a ninja! I LOVE dressing up! I think every sentence was ended with an exclamation point. Mia is a bat princess this year. Molly dressed up as a witch for the school party, and Doogie was a cereal killer (mini-cereal boxes and plastic knives taped to his clothing) at a costu
Finding Father Christmas
2007-11-07 12:34:00
People are always offering me suggestions on how to deal with my rheumatoid arthritis, and for the most part I am very grateful. I've tried Noni juice, flax seed, giving up all dairy products and fried food, and none of it worked. Some of the ideas I get just don't seem workable, how do you incorporate ginger into your daily diet in a quantity to make a difference? On Sunday, I attended the fall memorial service that the hospital puts on for the families of all those who have passed away in the last six months there. I'm in charge of coordinating the program, so I needed to be there, regardless of the fact that I'd spent the entire weekend in bed. But the Lord blessed me with the service. Jesse and I haven't attended our church in several months because of different issues, so we haven't had the opportunity to connect with the new pastor. I've met her through work, and she's an extraordinarily nice woman. After the service, she mentioned that her son has RA and isn't on any me
Read more: Father
, Christmas
Boo Humbug
2007-11-13 13:29:00
As much as I love reviewing books, there's always a time when it's hard to do so. Sometimes I read a book I just don't like and didn't move me. Most of the time, I don't review them. It's also a dangerous path to walk as a reviewer who isn't paid and doesn't work for a publication. Especially, because I want to be published myself someday. A lot of book reviewers (at least online) are working on a book of their own. The book I've been working on for four years is Christian fiction. Christian fiction is a small community where you often encounter the same people again and again. The authors are absolutely fantastic when it comes to supporting their fans. So it's doubly hard to review a book I don't like: first, I don't want to upset someone I like as a person, and second, I don't want to shoot myself in the foot by making enemies in the very community I'm hoping to become a bigger part of. Ultimately, I think it's important to post the occasional review of a book I don't
Read more: Humbug
Home to Holly Springs
2007-11-12 12:43:00
Molly is obsessed with personality quizzes. When she's bored on a weekend, she'll take them by the dozens (if you are one of her friends on MySpace, you know this already). I know it's an age when you are trying to figure out exactly where you fit in. Last weekend, I made her take the Myers-Briggs personality test. I took it 18 years ago, and taking it again, I'm still an INFJ. Molly is an ESFP; Jesse's an ENFJ, and Doogie is an ESTP. It's a fun test to take if you never have seen it before. The questions seem simple, but the results are scary true. I've read articles debunking it, but I've never found anything else that so accurately nails my personality. An INFJ is a counselor archetype, political activists, people who see the hurt and pain in the world and want to do something to change it. Ghandi, Mother Theresa, and Martin Luther King Jr were INFJ's (according to some sites, because they didn't take the tests themselves, you'll find them listed under other types dependi
Read more: Holly
, Springs
Fellowship or Worship?
2007-11-11 15:06:00
Jesse and I went back to our old church today for the Thanksgiving service and meal. It's been over six months since we've been there. We attended a few other churches this summer in trying to find a new church home, and while we found one we love, it doesn't seem like the completely right fit. I grew up in this church, as did my mother and her mother. Jesse came to faith there, all three kids were baptized there, and the older two were confirmed there. It has a lot of history and memories for us; unfortunately not all are good, and that's why we left. Four years ago, we threw ourselves head first into the church and the youth group. We were part of nearly every commitee, Jesse was the lay leader. I was the confirmation teacher/youth group leader. And we loved what we did. We made plans to go places, have retreats, do mission work, all sorts of things to deepen the kids' faith and spread the Gospel. But we ran into church politics and got our feelings hurt. Eventually we got burne
Read more: Fellowship
The Devil's Gentleman
2007-11-10 14:41:00
I love my life. I went out to the mailbox today and found three books in it to review. I'm not sure how I got into this position, but somehow I get to do my favorite thing in the whole world, and while I'm not paid for it, I do get supplied for free. I've been struggling with RA for over three years now. In March of 2006, I decided to do something constructive with all of the reading I was doing since I couldn't do much of anything else. Through one bit of luck after another, I have relationships with a few publishers, publicity houses, and blog groups so I get to read a LOT of books. I get to look forward to getting the mail every day, because I never know what might be in it. Some weeks there are no books, but other weeks bring up to nine! It's amazing; I feel so blessed. And I get to share my blessings with others. I pass most of the books on to my library, and occasionally friends and family who I think might enjoy them. I also get to talk about my passion and share it with ot
Read more: Devil
, Gentleman
If Democrats Had Brains, They'd Be Republicans
2007-11-09 14:23:00
Last week I talked about Mia's silliness. Today I'm bragging up my oldest daughter, Molly. She is fourteen years old and miles ahead of me in sophistication. Almost every day I have to ask myself where she came from, because the skills that she shows with ease most certainly did not come from me (or her father)! Molly's pulling off straight A's in school, tonight she's the female lead in the play One and All at the school, and on Thursday, she made the junior varsity cheerleading squad. There are days when she's at school 10-1/2 hours between practice for jazz choir and cheerleading, but she's managing it with ease. She just blows me away. But the thing that makes her shine the brightest in my eyes is how our relationship has grown in the last couple of years. Molly was prickly as a child. She didn't like to be hugged or cuddled, and she had the nickname Katie Ka-Boom for a reason. Middle school mellowed her, and high school seems to be refining her even further. Now I get regu
Read more: Democrats
, Brains
, Republicans
One Drop
2007-11-16 16:05:00
I wish that I had Mia's faith. Earlier this week while we were cuddling and watching TV, she told me that she needed to pray. Here's her prayer. God, thank you for this earth we live on. Thank you for the sun that shines and the moon at night so we can see. Thank you for the stars that shine at night so I don't have to be afraid. Thank you for our noses so we can breathe and our lips so we can talk. Thank you for my Pokemon and Pikachu. Amen. Every now and then she would lean in to me and ask what else she should say, but I didn't want to put words in her mouth, so this prayer was whole-heartedly hers. Telling Jesse about it that night brought tears to my eyes. This morning after I picked her up from school she asked me if we would have any snow this weekend. I said no; the newcasts had big graphics reading "No Snow for Hunting!" so I felt pretty safe in my assertion. She wanted how we could make it snow, so offhandedly, I told her to pray. She immediately closed her eyes, clasped
Is That All He Thinks About?
2007-11-15 13:05:00
I get a lot of boxes from UPS, especially now that I'm Christmas shopping, but today's delivery surprised me. It was marked overnight, perishable. I couldn't think what I may have ordered like that. Opening it relieved my curiosity, but raised my anxiety. It was my first shipment of Enbrel. As soon as I can get in the doctor's office for instructions, I start giving myself shots once a week to deal with my RA. The whole thing feels a little surreal. I have syringes in my fridge and a sharps container in my bathroom. That's not something I ever thought would be a part of my life, and I haven't completely adapted to the idea yet. The no beef diet isn't working quite so well anymore. Or maybe I'm just pushing myself too hard. I've been acting like normal the past couple of weeks: keeping the housework done, doing laundry, cooking meals, running errands, all the normal Mom stuff. Today I'm completely wiped out and fighting the pain. All I want to do is curl up in bed and read a g
Try Dying
2007-11-14 12:44:00
I love thrift stores. We do live on a tight budget, so part of it is necessary, but I also love the thrill of the hunt. I sent Mia to school today in head-to-toe thrift or clearance items, and she looked so cute, I had to share. I paid 10 cents for the shoes at a thrift store in Gillett. I got the tights there for 29 cents, and the skirt for $1.99. The shirt was $3.50 at Wal-Mart. But the jacket was my find of the season. I paid 99 cents for it at Goodwill. It was priced at $9.99 on a gray tag, but each week they have a special on color tags. I watched it for a few weeks and waited for gray tags to go on sale. During the week they are half off, but on Saturday, everything that color is 99 cents. After I brought the jacket home, I discovered that the original store tags were still on it with the price: $59.99! It was brand new. There's nothing like a good deal!Try Dying
by James Scott Bell is the first book in the Ty Buchanan series. Ty has everything going for him: well-paying job as
Mindless Eating
2007-11-23 17:06:00
Molly and I braved the crowds this morning and went to Wal-Mart at 4:30 am. Wal-Mart really has this down to a science. They allowed the crowds to come in and wait in the warm store, but customers weren't allowed to put anything in their carts until 5 am. Jesse's Christmas present to me was a Sony Cyber Shot camera, 7.2 mp, which is a huge improvement over my 2 mp Kodak that's five years old. We zipped through the store and were back in the van by 5:30. We drove up the road to KMart, which didn't open until 6. They didn't open the doors until 6, leaving us all in the 7 degree temperatures. When the door did finally open, people were racing down the aisles. We got one of the last three DVD players, and they were almost completely out of the cheap DVDs. We were home again by 7 am, and I made cinnamon rolls to wake up the guys. Mia was, of course, already awake. Doogie & Jesse spent the day cleaning out the basement so that the computer can be kept down there. Our little bedroom
The Yada Yada Prayer Group Gets Decked Out
2007-11-21 11:36:00
Two days on Enbrel, and I'm not seeing any immediate results yet, except for the need to remain close to a bathroom. I'm a long way from giving up hope, and if an upset stomach is the cost for being pain-free, I'll take it!Mia is enjoying her day off of school. She's dressed in one of her princess dresses, including crown and wand. All of the pillows have been stripped from every bed in the house for her fort in the living room, and she hasn't stopped talking since she woke up.Molly and I are gearing up for Black Friday. I've already scoped out the ads, and I think we'll only be hitting Wal-Mart. I cashed in the change I had been saving all year, my PTO at work, and my eBay money so I have plenty in the bank. Now we just have to fight off the hordes of other women with the same intention of getting it all done with great deals in just a few pre-dawn hours on Friday.The Yada Yada Prayer
Group
Gets Decked Out by Neta Jackson is sadly the last entry in this long-running, fantastic
Golden Legacy
2007-11-20 12:39:00
First off, the winner of last week's Try Dying book Contest was Holly Johnson. Congrats to Holly! I'll be holding another contest next week for two copies of For Parents Only, a Christian guide to parenting teens.Yesterday, I went to the doctor's office to learn how to give myself my first shot of Enbrel. I hate needles; I can't even watch when they take my blood. So I spent the weekend in a state of low-grade panic. I couldn't even begin to imagine putting a needle into my own body. Monday as my fear started to ratchet up to hysteria, I put it in the Lord's hands, and he reminded me that fear is not from Him. It was ok to be nervous, but the amount of fear I had was unnecessary. I had to wait a bit at the doctor's office, but I'm so glad that I went and didn't try to do it myself at home. A nurse, Mary, took me into a small room and took me through the whole procedure step by step. She even had a fake thigh to try it out on. It looks like a fetal heart monitor, but you strap
Read more: Golden
, Legacy
The Pirate's Daughter
2007-11-29 12:22:00
I started posting book reviews on Amazon before I even started my blog. I had picked up a book at a Christian music event, and the writer encouraged me to post a review there if I liked it. I hadn't really thought about it before, but I loved the book and wanted to help the writer promote it, so I posted it. After I posted that first review, I was listed as reviewer #50,467 (or something like that). I started looking at other reviewer's numbers, comparing them, of course, to mine. I started posting reviews pretty regularly, and even more so after I started up my blog in March of 2006. My goal has been to become a Top 1000 reviewer. When you reach that level, you get that neat little graphic under your name labeling you as such. In February of this year, I broke the 2000 mark. I'm currently at 1594. The number is made from some odd and nearly incoherent data: how many votes your reviews get matters far more than the amount of reviews that you do. So someone with 100 reviews and 5000
Read more: Pirate
, Daughter
Diamonds in the Shadow
2007-11-28 12:22:00
I'm having a hard time getting into the Christmas spirit this year. Yes, I know it's only Nov. 28th, but for most of the world the race is on. I've been Christmas shopping since early October, so I'm almost done, just need to finish up Doogie, Mia, and Jesse. I've been checking out lots of Christmas CDs from the library, but only Jesse, Molly, and Doogie listen to them. I know I need to get started on my Christmas cards, especially because I plan to stamp them this year, but I can't seem to get a fire lit under my bum to get me going. The decorations for the house have been sitting in the living room since Saturday, and by now the boxes are starting to become clutter collectors. Maybe Molly's Christmas concert will jump start me. Advent begins on Sunday in the church season, and I am in deep need of the King to come.Diamonds
in the Shadow
by Caroline B. Cooney is the story of the African refugee Amabo family and their hosts the Finch family. The Finch family agrees to take on th
A Shadow of Treason
2007-11-27 12:45:00
I'm still not noticing any effects of the Enbrel, other than the upset stomach the day of the shot. I'm not anywhere close to giving up on it, but it's a bit discouraging. I've heard from other users who said that it would change my life. The only thing it's changed so far is my need to be near a bathroom. I gave myself the shot alone yesterday. It burned a bit more than last week, but I'm so proud of myself for doing it.Mia has already jumped back on her Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer bandwagon this year. Last Christmas season, she had several deer toys, all of which were dubbed Rudolph (as was she), and we watched the movies ad nauseum. Yesterday she started talking about him again, so today I picked up the movies from the library. She's eating tomato soup (her favorite) for lunch and calling it reindeer food.A Shadow
of Treason by Tricia Goyer is the second book in the Chronicles of the Spanish Civil War. Painted Sophie Grace is back as is her love Phillip, and all the othe
For Parents Only
2007-11-26 13:22:00
First of all, watch this video. It tells the story of Patrick Henry Hughes, a young man who was born without eyes and crippled. But he didn't let his disabilities get him down. He has accomplished more than many people twice his age, and his attitude on life is terrific. He and his father are two of my new heroes. After watching this, you'll see that all the reasons we give for not succeeding in life are just excuses, and poor ones at that.This weekend Jesse and Doogie turned our basement into a rec room. They moved the computer down there and set it up well. It's become the new living room with two TVs, one for television, the other for videos and games, two game systems, computer, keyboard, plush rocker, etc, etc. Doogie keeps trying to chase us all out so he can claim it as his own. It's really given us a lot more room in our little house. Jesse needed a place where he could work on his homework uninterrupted (impossibly upstairs), and he's made quite a bit of progress this wee
Read more: Parents
Ursula, Under
2007-11-24 19:44:00
I don't usually get the opportunity to blog on the weekend, but we're home and resting after supper at my dad & stepmom's. I decided to do something a little different with my weekend posts, so here goes.I read hundreds of books a year. Ten in the last week. Sometimes I can't remember much if anything about a plot a few months after reading it, because I've read so many new ones, and often one story bleeds into another. Occasionally I encounter a book that is so powerful that I still remember it well years after reading it. These are the books that when asked I list as my favorites. Usually there was a central idea that made me think in a new way. Whenever anyone asks me to recommend a book, it's this kind that I give them. I am fascinated by books, and stories like these are the reason why. First on the list, but not necessarily my favorite book is:Ursula, Under by Ingrid Hill is the story of 2-1/2 year old Ursula Wong who while visiting the Upper Peninsula with her parents
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