What I read in March

"How to Behave So Your Children Will Too!" recommended to: Parents who are at their wits end and can't figure out what they are doing wrong, parents who want a refresher of methods they mostly already know.





"Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust" recommended to: Anyone who believes in God and anyone who is not offended by people who do, those who need or want to be reminded of what a marvelous thing forgiveness can be.





"A Girl Named Zippy" recommended to: Anyone who had a childhood prior to cell phones and the internet (or who had parents intelligent enough to let their kids have a childhood, see "Bringing Up Geeks" by Marybeth Hicks), people who enjoy a memoir and/or laughing out loud while reading, people looking for a fast, easy read.




"The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate" recommended to: Young Adults, Adults who are young at heart, anyone who has ever felt misunderstood by adults and found the one adult who "got" them which made everything okay (or wish they had).





"Cutting for Stone" recommended to: persons interested in the twin relationship, those who like an ending that ties everything up nicely, those who don't mind a smattering of language and a few awkward sexualish moments.

Month's End: My favorite Seuss

Dr. Seuss (Theodor Seuss Geisel) once said, "kids can see a moral coming a mile off" and therefore did not usually include a moral in his stories. The one thing he stuck to through out was his sense of fun. Kids love made up words, animals, etc. That's all I need is something to help my kids imaginations to grow! (and even though I said that with sarcasm due to the extra work imagination can cause a parent I really DO want their imaginations to grow!!!)

However, I'm a sucker for a moral. My favorites all seem to be the ones that did attempt to teach us something...

1. Perseverence: hard work pays off in the end.
2. Don't judge others, don't think that you are better or that you can buy your way into being better. We will all be happier for it.
3. Respect the earth and her creatures or it won't be a very nice place to live.
4. and finally life is a journey with lots of ups and downs. Don't get caught waiting for things to happen to you, go out and move mountains!

Of course, that's my quickly formulated generalized conclusion. PLEASE read these books and form your own opinion. They are all great!

Emerson - Mommy's Nose is Scary! (Original)

The amazing thing about this is how quickly this baby can go from seriously freaked out to laughing his head off. Love it!

Baby Food Binge

On Monday I went a little crazy making baby food. I wasn't able to finish freezing it all until yesterday. My baby will be happy to know that he has more of a variety to choose from now. I think bananas and rice cereal were getting a little old. Speaking of rice cereal... I found this really simple recipe on line. It's made with 1/4 C brown rice or 3 T millet and a cup of water. I have only tried it with rice. I bought a coffee grinder for around $12 to grind up the rice and a very large bag of rice is CHEAP so I was really glad to find an alternative to the boxed baby cereals.
I can't believe that I bought all of my baby food with the first two! #1 It is so expensive! We did have more money when my first two were babies but it's always a good time to save money. #2 It tastes so much better. I snuck tiny tastes of the girls baby food and it was gross, cereal too. With the homemade stuff I don't mind cleaning off their spoon. That's gotta be better for the baby too. Next step: finding some good recipes and combos once he's had a good sampling of plain fruits and veggies.

To be 10 again...

The three most memorable crushes I had on famous people as a child were:



#1 - Sean Astin. I still watch Goonies and think he is so cute, but when I do I'm ten years old at heart. Sadly, with time, his little snub nose and freckles did not retain their charm. I watched Lord of the Rings when I was still single and ... nothing.





#2 - Michael J. Fox. He was the epitome of cool to my little girl sensibilities. Every movement was poetry. Just watch him in the skateboarding scenes in "Back to the Future". Plus, he's just so darn charismatic. I watched a special on him a while back and was amazed by what he goes through with Parkinson's Disease. What a phenomenal person! He's still one of the coolest people around in my book (although my attraction to him has cooled over the years as well).



Finally #3 Davey Jones. I was completely duped by re-runs! I had no idea as a child that the Monkees were not a current band/TV stars. By the time I realized the truth I had surpassed Davey in height. (he once boasted that he is 5'3" with his boots on). I still have a fun time watching this video and I still enjoy listening to the Monkees now and again.

In retrospect

Almost everything I do/say is really embarrassing. Fortunately I don't realize it until days or sometimes years later. I am the Queen of dissecting every little thing I've done/said, but it often takes me a while before I have the time for such things anymore. When I analyze my actions immediately I get much less sleep than is desirable.

During my school years I had a teacher who had us read from various famous poems that he had compiled for that purpose. When my turn came up I was thrilled to see that I drew "Oh Captain, My Captain" a long time favorite (also I had been dreading being stuck with Chaucer, along with everyone else in the room. The evil instructor waited until the end of class to tell us he wouldn't make anyone read that excerpt, instead we would discuss it as a class). Anyway- I read my poem and the teacher made some little quip about the mood of the class being brought down or some such. I realize now that he was making fun of me for being overly dramatic. I can see me now doing my best Anne Shirley impression thinking I could bring the room to tears with my beautifully wretched recitation! Aaach, I want to run to a corner and hide. It's been years, I can safely say none of those people remember me nor do I precisely remember any of them. I think I would feel a little better about my behavior if this happened in elementary school or even junior high. Alas, it was a COLLEGE humanities course.

Isn't it funny how something so little can make me feel so insecure YEARS later! It's much easier than thinking about the thing I did last month which rivals those bad dreams that involve nakedness in public. Speaking of nakedness in public... I was conducting the music at church yesterday. That can be embarrassing enough on it's own but apparently the light pink shirt I was wearing under my navy spaghetti strapped dress didn't show up in the back of the room. I think I'm going to go console myself with some cookie dough.

Leo Sayer & the muppets - You make me feel like dancing

Okay, honestly this is a pretty silly song. Maybe that's why I liked the version with the muppets the best. The point is sometimes silliness is called for- especially since this song REALLY does make me feel like dancing. My girls and I dance around the kitchen like crazy fools when it comes on (Yes, it is on my ipod. My old roommates included it on a dance mix that we made courtesy the Charlies Angels soundtrack and it makes me so happy I just couldn't leave it out.)

To do additions

#58 Learn how to assemble/restore bicycles. I Love old bikes and this goal sounds easier than tackling a car engine. Besides, I don't think my husband has the patience to teach me.
#59 Plant a small wooden boat with flowers (geraniums and Indian peas as a nod to Robert McCloskey) in my yard. I'm thinking either I will wait to do this when I am an old lady and the neighbors will say, "that crazy old lady and her boat!", or I'll plant it in the backyard. This comes a long with a pledge that I will NEVER do the same thing with an old toilet or an old bathtub.

Still inching my way toward 100.

If I Ran the Zoo, etc.

This is a fun story about what would happen if young Gerald McGrew ran the zoo. Of course HE knows where to find the most interesting animals as opposed to the boring everyday animals you would find at most zoos (such as a lion!!!) We read this on our way to the Denver Zoo this morning. My kids were under no illusions. When asked if they thought they would see any of THOSE animals they both said no.
Although we did not see any of the Seuss variations we saw more animals than I have ever seen in one day. I am still proud of our humble Hogle Zoo but it didn't fare well in comparison. We spent 6 1/2 hours at the zoo. My feet are tired.


This is probably our most read of the Seuss books. I guess my kids love a good tongue-twister, or watching their mom attempting them. This book comes with a warning: as all of the best books should. Warning: expect lots of laughing, lots of absurdity (of course, it IS Dr. Seuss) and do some tongue exercises before attempting (possibly practice it in private first). I Love the rhythm mixed with the tongue twisting which inevitably happens in many of his books. This is my favorite line, "When beetles fight these battles in a bottle with their paddles and the bottle's on a poodle and the poodle's eating noodles. . . they call this a muddle puddle tweetle poodle beetle noodle bottle paddle battle." Sheer perfection.


This has never been one of my favorites. I'm not sure why. Possibly it's due to my aversion towards indoor messes? I LOVE outdoor messiness. I did see a plaque in a friends home recently which made me realize I need to relax a tidge. It went something like this, "Please excuse our mess, my kids are making memories".
Anyhow- this was one of my daughters favorites a few years back and I learned to really enjoy reading it out loud. Seuss almost always (including this book) uses anapestic tetrameter which is made up of four rhythmic units, or anapests, which contain two weak beats and then a strong beat with variations that omit the first weak beat or add a weak beat at the end. If that doesn't make sense what it really means is an awful lot of fun for someone to read out loud. I find myself getting carried away by the rhythm when I read Seuss to my kids to the point that I don't notice the words as words some of the time but as fun sounds that work well together.

Sam I am

The luck of the Irish was with me when I chose Dr. Seuss For the author of the month. It was super convenient to tie in a reading of "Green Eggs and Ham" with our breakfast this morning. We had the title breakfast along with green milk and green butter on toast.
I had one squeamish child (it's bound to happen with 7 around). The great thing about "Green Eggs and Ham" is that it convinced her to give the eggs a try... and then the milk. The toast was a no go. I had gotten a bit too much dye in the butter anyway. Those who ate it were much more green-tinged about the mouth than the ones who went with out.
Happy St. Patrick's Day Everyone!!!

Cleanliness/Godliness

Q: How do you go about cleaning a house after being sick for over a week?
A: One room at a time.
Yep, over the weekend I picked up here a little and there a little. By Tuesday I felt completely depressed. The house was still a wreck. A little less of a wreck, but so what? A wreck nonetheless. So I cleaned the kitchen. I mean DEEP cleaned the kitchen. It felt awesome!!! There was one clean room among the several not-so-tidy rooms. You might ask if it is still clean as of breakfast ending this morning... it is not. BUT it is significantly better than it was yesterday and I feel much better about not tackling the rest of the house 'til the weekend (or at least until the laundry is done).

Goal: Come Sunday morning a sparkling house! (Sparkling may be asking a bit much but you get the idea). I'm planning to start painting Monday and I can't begin that kind of project without a clean house. I'll definitely post some before and afters.

KEANE- Somewhere Only We Know (LIVE)

So, I've been really sick this week. While my house has been a disaster and the kids have been roaming free of parental supervision I HAVE felt well enough to use YouTube. This has allowed me to renew my crush on the band "Keane". Sorry, I don't have much parenting/homemaking advice to impart. It would feel pretty hypocritical at this point.
I LOVE this song. I love all things British, really. Literature, music, comedy, architecture, history, accents, fashion (what can I say? I'm a sucker for a pea coat and scarf, now if I can just lose a little weight and get back into my old clothes and have a style again).

Keane - Hamburg Song (Live)

Okay, I love all of their songs. This one is particularly lovely. It was written by Tim Rice-Oxley (the piano player) for the lead singer Tom Chaplin. They have been friends their whole lives. Isn't it sweet? Enjoy. (Lookout, this really is a parade of Keane. I was serious when I said I've been sick all week. Plus I love so many of their songs you are lucky I narrowed it down to four.)

Keane - Everybody's Changing LIVE! DVD

Would this be a good place to talk about what a sucker I am for musicians?!?! Luckily I am now happily married. Once upon a time I was a bit of a groupie and watching these live shows takes me back a bit. Of course it was never at such a large venue, just local bands, but still...

Keane - We Might As Well Be Strangers LIVE! DVD

... and really I'm posting these for myself. This way I can come here and watch my favorite vids instead of looking through the plethora available on YouTube. I love the live versions, they can really pack the emotional punch. These last two are on a DVD they put out from this concert. Thinking I may need to invest in a copy. But when will I watch the whole thing? Good thing Brian is also a fan.

Classical Gas - Michael Lucarelli

This song makes me think of my dad. I stumbled across this artist and it was a happy find!
Also, at the end of the video it mentions that it was filmed by David Perry. He is the older brother of one of my good friends from High School! What a small world! It was filmed at La Caille, a very up-scale restaurant from my old neighborhood. Nope, I've never eaten there but I enjoyed driving past it's beautiful grounds almost daily.

My lifeline

When the deep waters of dieting (I hate that term) are dragging me down the one thing that saves me is keeping an account of what I eat. I am not a fan of counting calories or becoming obsessed with every little thing that enters my mouth. I spent too many years listening to this or that roommate list everything they ate that day, Ugh!

However, I HAVE found that when I am righting down everything I consume I am more particular about what I eat. I can't sneak. My food diary is sitting there saying, "You eat this or drink that and it will be forever recorded... indelible." On the other hand if I put good things in my body, "Hooray, I get to record the healthy foods I ate and that I drank a gallon of water today!" It's wonderful. Not to mention if something is wrong with me I can take my journal to my Dr. and he can have an extra hint into what's going on with my body. It's like keeping a mileage log for my body.

You can also discover things about your body that you didn't know. My husband did this when he lost 100 lbs. and he found out that bananas are a trigger food for him. When he eats bananas he doesn't lose weight. Who knew?

Why can't Mormons send flowers?

A classic from bean town (I know it wasn't really filmed there, calm down)

March Author of the Month: Dr. Seuss

This month we are going to focus on the beloved Dr. Seuss for our reading enjoyment. My decision was influenced by the fact that yesterday was his Birthday. Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss!!!
Theodor Seuss Geisel was born on March 2, 1904 and died on September 24, 1991 of throat cancer. His birthday has been adopted as the National Read Across America Day. Geisel graduated from Dartmouth and attended Lincoln College, Oxford where he met his wife, Helen.
His early career included drawing/advertising for such companies as Standard Oil, NBC and General Electric, among others and he became a political cartoonist during WWII. After the war he wrote several childrens books. Due to a report published in Life magazine about illiteracy in school children Seuss was challenged to write "a book children can't put down" - William Ellsworth Spaulding.
Spaulding came up with a list of 348 words that first graders should be familiar with and asked Seuss to include as close to 250 of them as he could into a book for children. Seuss came back with "The Cat in the Hat". Other books whose purpose was to foster the reading of these words include "Green Eggs and Ham" and "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish".
Geisel is known for his inventive characters, drawings and verbiage. He is a joy for parents and children to read. The popularity of his books remains today and he continues to outsell the majority of newly published children's books.
Stay tuned for our fun with Dr. Seuss this month!