First Day of School 2012

All smiles before the day starts

And all smiles after the day ended too,

even for Miss. Clare

Back to School Pack

Clare's school supplies have a stowaway!

Clare would happily take Ree with her to school!

 

Here's my back to school pack.

Topped with a Bow!

If you're Gregory, what do you do to make your baby sister even cuter?

 

Put a bow on her head!

Mom, why do you even let him do these things to me?

I'm happily playing along, but one day I'll get Gregory back!

Purple doesn't even go with my little watermelon outfit.

Book #41 - State of Wonder

 



 

When reading the novels this year, I generally find my mind coming back to the question of "what is the author trying to do here?"  This isn't my natural disposition to reading, I would rather get immersed in a story.   Perhaps a good story isn't the main purpose of fiction, since many books have political points they want to make, or morals to share, but I far prefer the first.

 

State of Wonder by Ann Patchett is a very good story.  Marina, a doctor, works for a large pharmaceutical company.  Her co-worker, Anders, has been sent to the Amazon to follow up on the work of a team under the lead of Dr. Swenson.  The company receives a letter from Swenson, Anders has died.  Marina must now travel down there, find Dr. Swenson, and discover what is going on.

 

While it sounds like the latest work of Michael Crichton (author of Jurassic Park, Congo, etc) State of Wonder is an almost believable story.  The Amazon jungle is exotic enough without anything extra.   While there are political situations in the book, one doesn't feel like the author has an agenda, and can enjoy the story for what it is.  Some of the scenes bring one to a state of wonder as to what the world holds and the possibilities therein.

Meet N' Greet

The kids and I had an opportunity to meet their teachers and see their new school on Friday.  We picked up supplies, books, spirit shirts and miscellaneous goodies/papers.  The school even had a hot dog lunch so everyone could hang out longer.

Gregory was thrilled.  He ran around his class room filling out the worksheet his teacher gave him, saw his best friend, made new friends (they all compared how many teeth they had lost), and gobbled up hot dogs.

 

 Clare's refrain for the day and today so far has been. "I don't want to go to school!, Why do I have to go to school?"  She doesn't know anyone and had decided it is going to be awful.  She was very subdued meeting her teacher, and didn't see anyone else from her class.

When she saw the above picture, she thought it was horrible.  Here she is trying to put a brave face on it, but you can still see the stain in her eyes.

 

This morning I covered all of her workbooks with contact paper, labeled all of her school supplies and worked with her on multiplication tables.  It's going to be an adjustment, but I hope that after a few days she will have a great time.

Wordless Wednesday -One last video

Book #40 - Birds of Paradise

I'm not sure how my reading will keep up once school gets back into swing.  I keep hoping that I will focus more on housekeeping and having a life.  So I've been reading up a storm to be covered.

I found another book about a teenage girl, her family and Hurricane Katrina.  Other than that, Birds of Paradise by Diana Abu-Jaber is very different from Salvage the Bones (book #38).  Felice's family lives in Miami, are middle to upper class, and instead of being a tight family unit, she has run away.

The novel is written from the differing points of view of the main characters, Felice, her mother Avis, her father Brian, and her brother Stanley.  It is a story of isolation even in the family unit.  Each of the family members copes in their own way with Felice's departure.  I found the story plot given to the husband/father the most telling:

"A family like any happy family.  He wanted only to keep them whole and entire: to provide.  But perhaps that's where the problem was?  The drive to pour oneself out, into the providing?" (102)

He has given himself over to his job, to leaving the children with his wife, because that is what he believes good husbands and fathers do, they provide.  Later when he and a co-worker are talking about their struggles his co-worker says:

"I left.  To make her happy.  You see how that works?  You keep leaving, like you say, to keep them happy.  You go to work, you keep working, you run away until you're all the way gone.  Maybe even you shoot yourself.  And the whole time you keep thinking--Are they happy yet?" (312)

Each of the characters' plots are quite complex and a story unto themselves.

Abu-Jaber uses the hurricane to bring her family back together, in a healing, forgiving way.  I was pleased with this.  I really struggled with how unhappy everyone is at the beginning of the book in their separate lives.  And I felt like the title of the book is a metaphor for how precious and fragile people are, they are the birds of paradise living in Miami, placed there by life circumstances.

Super Easy Kid's Fondue

I really like fondue and have wanted to share it's fun with the kids.  However, I'm not sure they're quite ready yet to sit around a boiling pot sticking sharp sticks into meat or veggies to either dip or cook them.  And dessert fondue almost seems wasted on them.

This dessert fondue recipe is served cold and comes together in less than five minutes.  Perfect for us.

The kids loved stabbing and dipping the strawberries and bananas.  It tasted awesome with pretzels too.

Recipe: Monster in the Moat Fondue (source:  Little Monsters Cook Book)

1 cup whipping cream
1/4 cup nesquik (we used a pouch of carnation breakfast because I had it.)
1 tablespoon peanut butter

Put all ingredients in a bowl and whisk until completely mixed and cream begins to thicken.

My kids weren't that nutty about the peanut butter (not that it stopped them from eating the whole bowl).  Next time I might try it with nutella for an even more chocolately taste.

And I think I'll make my own nesquik using this recipe. 

Adventures in Movie Making

It's a cool and rainy day.  A perfect day for the kids to make little movies.

Here is the movie in all our realness.

There is also a shorter version

One week left until school starts.

Chess Master

She dominates the board!

Not much else going on here, just all the small business of getting ready to go back to school.

Book #39 - When the Killing's Done

Islands, boats, rats, snakes, pigs, sheep, ranchers, angry men, men who are jerks, and environmentalists, When the Killing's Done, by T.C. Boyle has them all.  Boyle's novel is the story of two opposed personalities - the animal rights activist and the national park service scientist, neither of whom is really the hero. 

The plot centers on the islands of the coast of California and their resident populations of animals.  The National Park Service is trying to protect the native species by eradicating the invasive ones, such as rats and pigs.  The animal rights activists want the lives of all of the animals protected because any killing is murder, even meat is murder.



Boyle is definitely not sympathetic to the activists, Dave Lajoy, the main guy is an angry jerk, who has a series of ideas that go awfully wrong.  However, the author doesn't really give the scientists that much credit either, the main gal, Alma, is whiny, often overwhelmed, and somewhat pathetic.  And her 'so good for the environment' boyfriend leaves her when he finds out she is pregnant.

I was somewhat surprised that almost all of the men in the book are jerks or cretins.  The author does a good job of creating family storylines for the women, generations of caring and strong mothers who do what is needed when the men around them die (usually because of their bad decisions) or leave.  Not a bad read though, and an interesting novel about environmentalism.

Note to self

I should not ever, ever let the children talk me into a puzzle at the thrift shop.

Or rather, I should make them stick with 100 or 200 piece puzzles.

Definitely not 1000+ pieces.

When they do convince me that we can do a large puzzle, I end up do it obsessively over several days.  They fade out after 10 pieces/minutes or so.

I don't seem to be able to sweep the undone pieces back into the box.

And my husband thinks I'm a nut.

9 Months!

It's that time again...pony time.  I'm another month older.

This whole gimmick is getting a little passe, don't you think?

I'd rather you take pictures of me with my toys,

playing with the air vents (see my skirt stick),

or even with a snot catcher!

If you want a shot with the pony, get Thomas to do it!

He's got a lovely smile.

Book #38 - Salvage the Bones

I think I've been in the land of non-fiction too long.  It was strange readjusting to a novel, especially one that I had a hard time relating to.  Jesmyn Ward, the author of Salvage the Bones, the winner of the 2011 National Book Award, is trying to give the poor rural southern black American a fictional voice (I read that somewhere, but can't find my source now). 

This is the story of a young black 15 year old girl and her brothers.  Their mother has died and they live with their unemployed, generally drunk father.  Esch has been sleeping with the boys because that is "the only thing that comes easy to her".  Skeetah, her brother, loves his pit bull above everything else.  Another brother plays basketball and is hoping for a college scholarship.  Their story takes place in the 12 days leading up to and including hurricane Katrina.  There are dog fights, boy fights, stealing, and other intense situations, especially during the storm.   Ward is a visceral writer and you can feel the heat, grit, blood, and sweat that abound in the book.

The one thing I really liked about the book was the love between the siblings, and how they took care of each other and their father.   Otherwise I was somewhat repulsed and saddened.

St. Clare's Feast

Happy Feast Day Clare!

It was fun celebrating at Fuddruckers with you.

Did you know that if you give Clare a hot dog and a chocolate malt, she will get a serious case of the giggles?

Geodes

I don't think a girl can have more fun with a hammer then when she is breaking open rocks to find geodes.

Clare got this kit for Christmas and we wanted to do it before the end of summer.

Most of the geodes we placed in a sock and whacked away with the hammer.  I think we got some nice pieces of quartz.

Book #37 - Caravaggio: A Life Sacred and Profane

In college I loved my catechetics courses, and especially the parts that focused on religious art.  In that vein, I thoroughly enjoyed Caravaggio: A Life Sacred and Profane, by Andrew Graham-Dixon.

This biography of Caravaggio is well-researched, pulling in sources from the 16th and 17th centuries, as well as newly discovered information from the 21st.  In my opinion, He goes beyond what the layperson is looking for here.

While I devoured the long first section on St. Charles (Carlo) Borromeo, I'm not sure what others would think.  Borromeo was the cardinal of Milan, where Caravaggio lived as a child.  The cardinal's catechetical methods were discussed and Dixon stresses that they helped shape the artist's style.  "It would always be [Caravaggio's] practice as a religious painter to rethink sacred story as living drama" (140.)

source: wikipedia

Dixon breaks down each of Caravaggio's paintings, pointing out style, symbolism, and the people behind the scenes and painted in each one.  I love the details, and how richly symbolic everything is.

For one small example, I found quite a bit to digest in this quote on St Francis of Assisi in Ecstasy: "The Lord makes it known to Francis that he will be transformed into the 'likeness of Chris crucified' not by the mortification of  his flesh but by the inner burning of love in his heart" (145).

I felt bogged down in some of the historical parts of the book.  Caravaggio was not a person of high morals, and tended to be in trouble with the law.  I found some of the proceedings tedious.  But I can now more fully enjoy most of Caravaggio's works.  Here is what comes up on Google Images for Art of Caravaggio if you would like a glimpse.

Also, if I start hanging more of his art up around my house, you'll know why.

Sisters

Sporty

Future women's basketball star - Maria

(oh and there are no pictures of the kids wearing their edible medals...the medals were eaten.)

Gold Medals & Cameras

I've been having blog and camera issues.

First, I reached the maximum size of my blog.  With a little poking around, I upgraded to google+ and that was taken care of.

This week my camera stopped working.  After fretting over buying a new one, I realized that it was my memory card, and not the camera thankfully. (Although the camera's turn is coming too, it's basically held together by duct tape.)

It looks like these have all been taken care of at the moment, so hopefully the blog with continue without interruptions, and only a slight loss of pictures until my new memory card gets here.

In the spirit of the Olympics, we made some gold medal cookies.

(this picture was taken with John's phone.)

The idea is to string a ribbon through the cookies to wear them like medals

(the below pictures were taken with the internal memory of the camera with a smaller size, so I could get a few)

My three favorite medal winners.

If my camera decides to cooperate, you may even get a picure of the medal wearers later.

Playground Antics

Earlier this week we took a meal to a friend of mine who is a new mom.

All four of my children invaded her pristine home.  They touched things, asked for food and drinks, and complained.  It wasn't exactly relaxing for anyone.

While Kelly and I wanted to visit, her baby was hungry.  The kids and I went out to the community playground for a while.

Now the children were back in their element.

Swings

Slides and monkey bars

And bouncy ride-ons.

Eventually Kelly came out and we chatted a little more, while my children complained about how they had become bored.

I guess Kelly and I will have to find another time to visit, children free.

I'll happily leave sure miss them for a little while one day.

Wordless Wednesday