Books I've Read Recently

Not in any particular order, and I'll likely mention if I really didn't like it. If you're looking for great books to read, here are my most recent selections.

Percy Jackson and the Olympians, juvenile series.

Three Cups of Tea, non-fiction. There's a sequel I haven't yet read called Stones into Schools. Very powerful non-fiction.

The Actor and the Housewife, fiction.

The Color of Water, non-fiction.

The Blind Side, non-fiction. The first 2 chapters are straight football, and I almost didn't make it through, but it was an amazing book. We just saw the movie last night, and it was also very good--and followed the book pretty precisely. It was fun to see what was straight from the book, and what was changed and embellished in the film.

Evermore, juvenile series.

The Guinea Pig Diaries, non-fiction. Not appropriate for a Relief Society book group, but hilarious. And highly recommended, with a grain of salt. :)

Parenting with Love and Logic, non-fiction. (It's a parenting book.)

And a couple books I have on hold at our library and am anticipating picking up are The Happiness Project, non-fiction, and The Help, fiction.

Happy reading!

I always accept suggestions.

Princess Danielle

Danielle opened 3 chests of princess dress-ups for Christmas. She is a very very happy princess these days.

Christmas 2009

The most Christmas-y of pictures of 2009. :)

Danielle's 3rd Birthday!

Happy Birthday, Danielle! Three things I love about Danielle:

1. She's girly. I absolutely love that she wants her hair up, me to paint her toenails, and that we pick out "make-up" together.

2. She gives amazing 3-year-old hugs.

3. She's silly! This girl makes me crack up every day. She's hilarious. And delightful.

Jeremiah's Photo Shoot

While we were in Florida, Jeremiah, my camera, and I went on a walk/photo-shoot. And, after manipulating some of the cutest pictures on my computer and some learning curve involvement, here's what we (Jeremiah, my camera, my computer, and I) came up with.

tidbits

The boys had their Kindergarten Holiday Concert this afternoon. SO CUTE!!! Very enjoyable. I teared up: Isaac surprised us by singing a solo!

Today was a beautiful day for biking.

Danielle is all-the-way potty-trained. Except she can't turn the light on by herself. I'll take it!

Jeremiah can mostly sound out words. He was watching a word-less video John found him (on YouTube) and at the end of it, he said in his sweet little voice, "Clash of Fates." Yes, that is a little too random to be environmental print.

Isaac's imagination continues to amaze me. He loves lincoln logs. He builds the typical log houses of various sizes and shapes, as well as fences and catapults and cannons. Sometimes the lincoln logs become standing soldiers defending Danielle's princess castle. He barricaded the castle door closed with tall lincoln logs and told Jeremiah it was time to knock it down...which Jeremiah proceeded to do quite happily.

Jeremiah continues to destruct while the other children construct, in general.

Isaac's being assessed for a gifted program at school, and has individual reading time with the reading specialist rather than typical kindergarten s-a-t.

My children are very much not interested in the tasty, pretty scotcharoo wreath which my visiting teachee gave me this morning, and I'm happily consuming it.

Zero Christmas presents under the tree have been opened.

We have been doing our Christmas book tradition. Each night, one child chooses a book to unwrap from under our tree, and we read a Christmas related picture book together. We all love it. I love that John comes to see the pictures. :)

The kindergarten teacher sent home "copies" of letters the boys wrote yesterday to Santa, in case the parents wanted to know what their kids wrote and what Santa might be leaving when he visits Christmas Eve. I'll just say that they have both been looking forward to these presents for a long time (for a child). Now to find out what Danielle wants...

I'm certain there's more, but that's a little taste of what we have going on around here.

Oh yes! That!

John accepted a job at Viterbo, in La Crosse, Wisconsin! After one more hot summer, we're looking forward to a very long and cold winter!

Where the Wild Things Are

The night Jeremiah wore his wolf suit, he found a blue river in the bathroom and laid it out on the floor in the living room. He dragged out a blue boat from his room, made himself a flag, and climbed in, ready to adventure down the river and to the island...where the wild things are! His brother and sister came along, in separate boats, of course, with flags of their own designs. They all sailed through the evening and into bedtime, before they fell over and ran into their beds, where they found bedtime stories and pumpkin cookies waiting for them...and they were still warm.

Since kids don't like hot food. Sorry Maurice, but it's true. They like to taste their food. Not have it burn their mouths.