The best thing about non-fiction picture books is that they are fast and easy to read at night, when you don’t really want to start a new book. Heh. These were all nice enough non-fiction books but only one of them was one I’d buy or read again and again. I also have a wee fondness for another one…
All the Water in the World – nice enough, the illustrations were really the best, but there are a lot of better books about the water cycle.
Bring on the Birds – Hmph. It didn’t even include flamingos! The illustrations were nice and bright but it wasn’t even close to the best bird book for little kids.
Can We Save the Tiger? – This was interesting, but the italicized text about various extinct animals was a little hard to read – like the ink was disappearing along with the animals?
I Feel Better with a Frog in My Throat – This is the best of the bunch. Elly spotted it and whined because I hadn’t told her I had it. It was interesting and funny. I’d buy this one for a kid.
Planting the Wild Garden – I liked this one pretty well. Good way to talk to young kids about how seeds are carried – by people, wind, animals etc. But again, I think there are better books about this topic.
The Case of the Vanishing Golden Frogs – Here’s my sentimental favorite, having been to El Valle and to Chiriqui and seen a couple of golden frogs in the wild. It’s a horrible thing to think about them only surviving in captivity.
Thunder Birds: Nature’s Flying Predators — This is a nice book for kids who are really interested in birds. The pull outs were the best part.
Blood Red Road, post apocalyptic YA fiction – on audio. Fun stuff. Oddly enough, there’s a bit of a summer king storyline (one of the other Cybils books had a summer king storyline.) I enjoyed the book quite a bit, there were some great female characters but Saba made me nuts – I’m not sure she ever really learned anything, no matter how it ended or how there were points in the story when it looked like she was learning some important life lessons.
Looks like there is a book 2, we’ll have to listen to that to see what happens next. I hope Emmy grows up and kicks her sister’s butt.
Right before the #readathon, I picked up Granny D’s American Century because I was afraid I might not have enough books to read for the #readathon. (Haha, very funny, hahaha.) It’s a good book to read during election season – Granny D was an awesome woman and I’m feeling all inspired to vote tomorrow. The only problem with this book is that there were not nearly enough darn photos.
Once upon a time, you could write a post about almost anything and be fairly confident you weren’t going to be attacked, ridiculed, questioned, or called out as having completely missed the boat.
I’m not talking about the traditional hot button topics like abortion, circumcision, bottle feeding, religion, alternative sex topics, politics — those always have been hot button issues and probably always will be.
No, I’m talking about things like recipes and family stories and lists of favorite things. Those types of posts used to bring in discussion. People who could relate said so. People who had ideas to share did so. People who couldn’t relate or didn’t have anything to add, either stayed silent or left a comment indicating they’d read the piece but didn’t have a lot to add.
In today’s hyper-active internet, no topic is safe any more.
Post a recipe, someone’s going to have something negative to say about it.
Post a list of favorite things, someone’s going to call you out for missing something.
Misuse a comma and you’re fucked. An apostrophe out of place and you’re even more fucked.
The peoples, they are passionate. And I’m not just talking about other peoples. I find myself doing it, or close to doing it, a whole lot more often than ever before.
It’s so bloody easy to let our personal (or professional) passions get the better of us. It’s hard to read with a gentle eye. It’s hard to stop and look at the individual behind the post. Who is she? Where is she coming from? What led her to post this recipe, story, list, idea? If we stop to look and listen. Stop to think about the person behind the post, would we be less quick to react from a place of passion? Would that allow us to have more proactive and positive online interactions?
We’re not all professional writers, recipe developers, politicians, activists, etc. Most of us are just people who want to share ourselves with others. Our posts aren’t perfectly polished. Our ideas aren’t perfectly formed. Our experiences are colored by our environment. Our beliefs are informed by our histories. We’re also not that interesting in changing others at every drop of the hat, so there’s no reason to get your hackles up if someone posts something counter to your beliefs, opinions or experiences. And, we really do not want to be changed, improved or informed about all of our shortcomings (in your opinion) at every drop of the hat.
I need to remember to use my passion wisely and maybe not always take things quite so personally. How about you?
The girls have so many activities that it’s rare for us to be able to do anything that isn’t related to driving them around town or picking them up again so when we found ourselves with about eight free hours one Saturday morning, I knew we had to find something fun to do.
But what? With a puppy who doesn’t necessarily do well home alone for eight hours, our choices were limited. It was October and we didn’t have a pumpkin. And, we needed at least one pumpkin so I could try to make this melted crayon pumpkin project that someone saw on Pinterest and tried, which led TW to send it to me, which led to me wanting to try it.
A perfect storm of madness.
I searched high and low for a pumpkin patch or a farm that welcomed dogs. (Apparently most places like this don’t welcome dogs, in part because the dogs who live on those farms don’t like strange dogs visiting, which I can understand, really.) When I found one about a half hour away that welcomed dogs and had lots of other activities, including a corn maze with a theme of 100 years of Girl Scouting I knew this was the one.
It was fate and a perfect storm of madness.
We woke Elly up early and loaded her and the dog into the car. Elly forgot her iPhone which meant that every five minutes she asked “Are we there yet?” or made some comment about how far away pumpkin patches were.
We parked. We paid. We walked over to the little mini zoo and laughed while an alpaca stared down the puppy and the puppy cowered in fear.
We wandered into the corn maze where Elly decided the best course of action was to let the dog decide which way we’d go. It wasn’t long before I decided that was a stupid idea and headed off in a different direction, assuming Elly was right behind me. She, err, wasn’t. I shrugged and kept walking. Then I remembered she didn’t have her phone and we might never find her again. So I punched a couple of spots on my card and called TW to see if she had seen the kid. She had. But then I had to figure out how to get back to them. We (obviously) figured it out and decided we’d had enough corn maze. (A real shame since TW and Elly both love them so much.)
We were hungry so we headed to the refreshment stand — oops, it wasn’t open yet.
So we headed to the bathrooms. Those were open.
We wandered around a little and then headed back to the refreshment stand which was open — you could tell by the long damn line of people. I waited in line for TW’s donuts and coffee and Elly’s elephant ear. We got our food just in time for the pig races.
Skeeter loved those but the bees loved Elly and her elephant ear and that landed in the mud. Skeeter hated the zip line so TW decided not to ride that. Instead, she bounced on some big bounce thing (much to Elly’s horror) and she and Elly both climbed into some funky tubes and tried to take the dog with them. That was funny. Errr until it started rolling and they all three started flying all over the tube.
Elly climbed up on a John Deere (she looks like she was born to drive one, doesn’t she) and then we picked out some pumpkins and headed home where the real fun happened, though Elly and TW did kind of whine about not getting enough time in the corn maze.
We all stripped the paper off of a box of crayons and then I went in search of some glue. We didn’t have any hardcore glue so we tried… Elmer’s School Glue. Which didn’t work so well.
TW insisted we should just put the pumpkin into the oven and let the crayons melt that way. We tried it but the crayons were almost touching the top of the oven and I was afraid we were going to set them on fire — so we pulled it out and I grabbed the hot glue gun and re-glued everything while Elly took a quick shower (She was covered in mud!)
The hot glue gun did work better but good grief we made a mess and it took for-freaking-ever to get the crayons to melt at all, much less melt and drip down the side of the damn pumpkin.
In the end, Elly really liked the way they turned out and I thought they were pretty darn good — all things considered.
The key here is … have the right kind of glue and DO THIS OUTSIDE while wearing clothes that you don’t mind being covered in melted crayon. We’ve still got melted crayon on the wood floors in the kitchen and I’m not sure it all came out of Elly’s pajamas (which she put on over her clothes after her shower.)
The next time I think about doing some Pinterest project, someone should just say “melted crayon pumpkins” so I remember just how much trouble these things are. We will definitely go back to the pumpkin patch, Elly and TW love those corn mazes.
When we brought Skeeter home in August, TW read about 50 dog training books. And she surfed the web looking for dog training tips, techniques and videos. She has tried on all sorts of methods and I’m never sure whether she thinks The Dog Whisperer is an idiot or a God. Or whether she prefers some other dog training method over another. Skeeter is probably unsure, too. I don’t know, she seems to take it all in stride.
It will come as no surprise to you to learn that TW signed us up for a beginning dog training class. It also won’t surprise you to hear that I have made fun of her for this, whined about it, been snarky and sarcastic about it and came close to not going to the first class — which was last night.
Dog training class. Not. My. Idea. Of. Fun. (Even if I hadn’t had a long day, if it didn’t require us to leave during rush hour, and if TW wasn’t on Prednisone.)
First Day of School
We were supposed to arrive “early” for class, which didn’t happen because see above traffic issue. When we arrived, there were already a whole lot of dogs in the waiting area with a whole lot more people. There was one dog who barked constantly (this comes up again later) and a bunch of puppies who were very busy sniffing each other and a lot of people who were very busy trying to keep their dogs from sniffing each other. And it was mayhem and I was not having fun.
Skeeter, on the other hand, was very happy. Dogs to sniff. People to sniff. A man with treats and he didn’t even make her sit for them. Dogs to sniff some more which caused pretty much every dog there to growl at her because Skeeter does not understand the doggy cues that should tell her that other dogs are done with the sniffing. (We have a kid who had trouble learning this, too. Hopefully it won’t take Skeeter quite so long to learn these cues as it took that child.)
When we finally were led back to the training room, I thought things were going to be fine. We sat down on the wall, away from other dogs and people and then the room began to fill up and dogs began to snip at each other and there was much panting and the barking dog from the lobby just kept on barking.
Waiting for teacher
The trainer came in. He stood in the center of the room. He talked. He introduced a couple of his people. He talked some more. He asked everyone to introduce themselves and their dogs. One person managed the intro before he took control of the barking dog, who still barked but barked less often because he was getting walked, tugs on the leash, and attention from the trainer. So it did get a little quieter, which was nice.
By the time about half of the folks had introduced themselves/their dogs, he was pretty done with that and stopped asking owner’s names and just asked about dogs. I didn’t blame him, really. Everyone was restless and we all had name tags on (unless our dogs had eaten them off, ahem.)
A little boy was there by himself, with a young golden retriever mix and the puppy was annoying the other two dogs around him so they got moved to a corner by the door. Which didn’t help much so they got moved out of the room with another trainer. While we all had to sit there listening to the guy talk about training methods. And we all had to try and keep our very antsy dogs still, which was not fun. For any of us, really.
About a half hour into this, a gorilla came in with a bunch of balloons (not kidding) which was confusing and distracting and would have been a lot more interesting than listening to the trainer. Unfortunately, the gorilla gram wasn’t for us and we had to keep sitting there with an antsy dog listening to the trainer.
At some point, the golden retriever was returned to the room and another trainer took over keeping him busy. With treats. Skeeter did not think this was fair at all. She was forced to sit still, she was yelled at for jumping on the little old man sitting next to me, she was not getting treats. She wasn’t even getting walked and corrected like that dumb barking dog.
No fun. No fun at all.
So she chewed through her leash. Not kidding about this either.
What did we learn at the first class? We learned to say “Yes”. As in to wander around the damn house saying “Yes” to the dog and handing her treats. (You can see a good video explaining this technique here: The Power of Yes (sorry I can’t embed, WebMD is stupid, even if they do have good dog videos.)
The dog lays down on her bed. We say “Yes” and hand her a treat. She follows us into the kitchen, we say “Yes” and hand her a treat. I’m peeing and TW is in the bedroom and I hear muffled talking and say “What did you say, I’m sorry I couldn’t hear you.” and TW says, “I was just saying “Yes” to the dog.” I’m on a conference call and in the background, I hear TW luring the dog away from the prairie dog cage and then hear her say “Yes” as the treats go all over the floor (that’s a lot of yes… and err it might have been me who spilled the treats, whatever. I’m trying to paint a picture here.)
“Yes.” “Yes.” “Yes.”
Elly thinks this is stupid. Why should we give the dog treats and say “Yes.” when all the dog is doing is sitting on the seat in the car. What the hell else is she going to do — roll down the window and jump out? (Elly may or may not have said “hell”… I’ll leave it to you to decide.)
Oh, it’s also important to say “Yes.” before you present the treat. Not after. Not while. BEFORE. So we’ve explained this to everyone in the house and we’ve asked each other if we are saying it “BEFORE” and OMG how many times can two women say “YES.” in one 24 hour period? I’m already going a little nuts and wondering why we didn’t decide to say “Si.” instead. TW wonders why we didn’t decide that our “Yes.” word would be something more fun like, I dunno what would be more fun when you have to say it 500 times a day, every day, for the rest of our lives. Or what seems like it might be the rest of our lives.
I did kind of break the rules and watch another video that talks about the closed hand training so we’re kind of doing that along with the “Yes” training. Don’t tell the trainer guy. He probably won’t like it but at least it’s a little more interesting than just wandering around the house saying “Yes. Yes. Yes.” all the damn time while sprinkling a trail of kibble behind us.
I sure hope she catches onto this “Yes.” thing in a week, like the training people say she should. Right now, she’s all for it — until something more interesting or troubling catches her attention. Then she’s all fuck the treats, I’ll have those later, lemme freak out because you’re going to leave me in the car for three minutes while you get your coffee. Or who needs a handful of kibble when we’re about to go into the damn PetSmart and I can shoplift some treats.
I’m screwed, aren’t I?
I’m going to have to walk around with a pocketful of treats and greasy hands saying “YES.” for the rest of my life, aren’t I?
Dragon Castle was a wee bit like Tuesdays at the Castle – just a wee bit. What was different was that Rashko’s parents are dumb, and his brother’s not so smart, either. At least that’s what Rashko thinks. What was also different was that the author seemed to be having a whole lot of fun. That’s really what made this book good – the reader never loses the fun.
How long has it been since I blogged here. I mean really blogged here. For awhile I could say that it was no big deal, I was still blogging on BlogHer but I can’t even say that any more, not really. The extreme coupon series was nice but it was written for a BlogHer-type audience, specifically. The Johnny Mac Pippin series was fabulous, and much closer to me really blogging but still, not completely “me”.
Is there a “me” as blogger anymore? It’s time to find out whether I have something to say or whether I’m just going to be the kind of blogger that I’ve been.
But first, I had to have a new blog template. I have needed one for a good two years, probably longer. I’m pretty sure folks had decided I was never going to get my act together and hire a designer and make it happen. I’m pretty sure BlogHer community member, Laine, had just about given up on me ever reaching out to her to make my blog pretty again. But I did it! And better yet, Laine did it. Laine made my blog pretty again and she made it so darn easy.
She wanted to know what I wanted and I didn’t know. I couldn’t even tell her what colors I wanted or what fonts I wanted, and lord knows fonts are important. What’s awesome is that not only did Laine give me a blog I love, she didn’t curse me for being so unhelpful about the design (even in the face of #Sandy barreling toward her!) That’s the kind of blog designer I need — someone who gives me a great blog and doesn’t get completely exasperated with me for not knowing what I want ’til I see it. That’s probably the kind of blog designer you want, too, so go visit Elaine Griffin Designs. She’s awesome and I will never be able to thank her enough.
What’s even more awesome than a new blog design, built by a BlogHer member, is a new header created by a BlogHer member using another BlogHer member’s gorgeous flamingo photos! Yep, my blog was built by BlogHer(s) — or to be more specific, by BlogHer Chatterers.
Those flamingo photos up there — not stock images. They were shot by Karen L. Sandoval who is one hell of a photographer and one hell of a woman, too. Karen graciously allowed me to BUY them from her (she wanted to just let me use them for free but I’m a big fan of paying women for their work so I twisted her arm. They’re worth paying for and she’s worth paying. Darn it.)
So here we are — new blog, another NaBloPomo — anything might happen.
What the hell. I’m gonna give NaBloPoMo a try again this year. I came close last year but didn’t quite manage it. This is going to be my year. I swear it. Maybe.
I’m turning over a new blogging leaf, starting now. As I recently told my friend Lori — I’m not sure I’ve got anything left to say, but it’s time to find out.
TW said An Uncommon Education was good, so I read it. And it was. I particularly liked the role Rose Kennedy played in the story – and I ended up liking the Shakespeare Society more than I thought I was going to. The middle of the book, that first year of Wellesley, it was a little slow. Thankfully it picked up nicely after the fall in the lake and besides the fact that I saw the end coming a mile away (the end for pretty much all of the characters), I liked the book overall.
