The (Used to Be) Annual Crocus Post

For five years, from 2010-2014, I wrote a tiny crocus-sized poem every year when I first spotted crocuses. One of the surest signs that spring is starting to at least inch its way forward, I've always found those first crocuses a beautiful bit of brightness and hope.

When the sweet girl was little, she and I would take walks and be "spring detectives" on the lookout for all sorts of clues that spring was on its way. In our urban setting, we sometimes had to hunt pretty hard (like cracks in the sidewalks!) but we always knew that sometime in February, we could head over to a house not far from us and find a patch of crocuses in their side yard. It got to be a kind of game. I would count how many I could see, and that number would make its way into the poem.

I don't know I missed counting crocuses in 2015. Last year, in 2016, I can understand completely how I missed it -- I was in intensive chemo, sleeping nearly round the clock when I wasn't in pain or feeling sick, and not getting out for walks.

This year, still battling cancer in various and different ways, and still tired, I am thankfully walking better and have at least moments of better energy. And when we had that warm spell last week, I determined to get out for a walk on one of our rare sunny days. I wasn't even thinking about the crocuses, but I did ask my husband to drive us over to the seminary (closer to our old stomping grounds) so I could walk around the area I walked for twenty years. I mostly needed to see the trees that had become such good friends during all that time.

The sweet girl decided to come, so it turned into a family stroll (that's a nice way of describing my turtle pace these days) and we were heading down a certain sidewalk enjoying the beauty of the day when suddenly it hit me.

Late February. Warm. And we were only a block or so from the crocus house.

"Crocuses!" I called out, almost involuntarily.

"Yes!" My fourteen year old said excitedly. "We've got to!"

I love that kid. And her dad. So much.

So we crossed the street and headed for the crocus bed, which we could see even from a block away was just a riot of purple. There were tons and tons of crocuses in bloom -- a bit late to play spring detectives, but I didn't care that we were late to the party. This year I really, truly needed that riotous bunch of mostly purple (a few white) flowers, with their lovely yellow eyes looking as happy as little suns.

So much life! No way I could count them! So here's this year's little poetic offering.

So many crocuses, too many to count!
An awesome, amazing, abundant amount!
Thank you, dear God, for warm winter weather
and life that blooms bright in bounteous measure.

(EMP, 3-2-17)

If you want to see the other five crocus poems from earlier years, just click the "crocus" tag at the bottom of the post, and it will direct you to the older postings.

Blessings as the Lenten season gets underway! 

Llama, Llama Red Pajama: In Memory of Anna Dewdney

The literary world was saddened this month to lose author and illustrator Anna Dewdney. Our household was saddened too.

Dewdney was the beloved author and illustrator of the Llama, Llama books for preschoolers. We discovered the original book, Llama, Llama Red Pajama not long after it was first published in 2005. Our daughter was the perfect age for the book then, and our family read it over and over, delighting in both its pictures and its rhymes.

I love what Dewdney once said: “A good children’s book can be read by an adult to a child, and experienced genuinely by both… A good children’s book is like a performance. I don’t feel my world really exists until an adult has read it to a child.”

There is great joy, as a parent, in helping your child discover the power and beauty of a classic book that has been around for many years before they were born, but there is also joy in discovering a brand new classic-in-the-making right alongside your child. That’s always how it felt when I would bring out Llama, Llama.

In honor of Ms. Dewdney’s life and work, I thought I would pull my October 2006 review of Llama, Llama from my archives and re-post it here. It was fun to revisit the delight our family found in the book when our daughter, now a teenager, was just four years old. 

Below is the slightly touched up version of that ten year old review.

********

We love books that make us laugh! Ever since my now four year old daughter was an infant, we've enjoyed discovering books that make her smile, grin, or chortle. Those stories that inspire soft giggles? Even better.

But what's really fun is when we find a book that causes all those things and then some. Llama, Llama Red Pajama is just such a book. It doesn't just make her smile. It causes her to erupt in side-splitting shouts of laughter! And between the enjoyment we get from hearing our little girl laugh so hard, and the humor that ensues from repeated parental readings of tongue-twisty rhymes involving the phrase "Mama Llama," we laugh right along with her.

Be warned. Llama, Llama Red Pajama is a habit forming phrase. Once you've read this book -- and if you have a 2-6 year old in your house, you will likely be asked to read it at least a dozen more times -- you will find yourselves repeating this phrase, not only when you read together, but just at random and for fun.

That’s because the prhase is a fun rhyme in a book full of great rhymes accompanied by truly funny pictures. Llama, Llama Red Pajama is a young male llama who has trouble settling down to sleep at bedtime. Throughout most of the story, he's in bed cuddling his stuffed baby llama. He's wearing bright red pajamas, of course. Mama Llama in a blue dress, apron and pearls (looking for all the world like a llama version of Donna Reed) tucks him in, kisses him good-night, and heads downstairs to do the supper dishes.

That's when the fun ensues. As any young child knows, sometimes when your Mama closes that door at night and disappears, you start to wonder. Where is she? Is she coming back? What's she doing without me? You start to get lonely. You start to see things in the dark. You start to wonder if you need to go to the bathroom or get a drink.

Lllama, Llama Red Pajama (one wonders if that's his full name on his birth certificate!) begins to wonder all those things. In rollicking rhyme, we learn:

Lllama llama
red pajama
feels alone
without his mama.

Baby llama wants a drink.
Mama's at the kitchen sink.

And later on:

Llama llama
red pajama
waiting waiting
for his mama.

Mama isn't
coming yet.
Baby llama
starts to fret.

The book wonderfully captures the night-time insecurities and impatience of a young child, but in such a fun way that it creatively defuses them. First time author-illustrator Anna Dewdney captures those childish feelings just perfectly, right down to the fact that "Llama, llama" keeps attributing his feelings and the subsequent behavior (hollering, wailing, pouting, even jumping on the bed!) to his stuffed toy llama, much as a child might say it was her doll who needed a drink of water or an extra kiss good-night.

I appreciate it that this is not a story about deep, dark night-time fears. Many picture books want to deal with fears about monsters under the bed or in the closet. Those might be helpful if you need to find ways to creatively discuss a specific fear, but if your child hasn't struggled with those, you certainly don't want to introduce the specific fearful thoughts into her mind! Instead, this book is more about general night-time anxieties that all children can relate to, as well as the need that all toddlers and preschoolers feel from time to time for just a little bit of extra attention.

I certainly don't want my daughter emulating Llama lama's worst behavior, but I appreciate how she relates to his feelings. And it's worth nothing that she hasn't copied his behavior, perhaps in part because of its over-the-top silliness, and also because now that she's a big four year old she can feel mildly superior and amused about such fussy tantrums! This book has helped her to realize she's growing up. Gently laughing over such kinds of behavior is a backhanded way of defusing the anxieties themselves. It's a creative way of saying "see? Llama llama didn't need to worry. His Mama was right there all the time, and she came as soon as she could...she was just on the phone for a while!" The great thing is, you don't have to say that, because the story says it for you:

Little llama,
don't you know?
Mama llama
loves you so?

Mama Llama's
always near,
even if she's
not right here.

As much as we love the rhymes, the illustrations are what really make this story. I'm delighted you can see the cover which shows the wide-eyed little llama in bed. Every expression on his face, as well as his Mama's, is delightful. In fact the pictures are so expressive that you'd probably get the story (and even laugh a lot!) without the text at all. Dewdney claims that all the facial expressions she draws in her books are inspired by her own. All I can say is, she must be one expressive lady!

My daughter's favorite spread is actually the only one without any text. Llama llama finally works himself up into a "tizzy" (as Mama later calls it) and wails so loudly that Mama hangs up the phone and goes rushing up the stairs. There's a wonderful sequence of four pictures across two pages where you see her running, her own furry face crinkled with maternal worry, until she bursts into his room. Only to realize, of course, that he's fine.

I love that spread too, but I'm especially partial to the illustration of Llama, llama with his quilt pulled up over his nose. All you can see are his two huge eyes, his little hooves, and his long, floppy ears!

I will warn you that this book is not the most "settling" of bedtime reads, since it inspires so much laughter. If your child needs help calming down before bedtime (and what child doesn't from time to time?) you may want to choose a quieter story to follow. But sometimes a book of this tone is just right – especially if you want to help your child expend a bit of energy right before bedtime.

Llama, Llama Red Pajama is handsomely designed in bright colors, especially red and blue. The colorful, expressive pictures and the short stanzas of silly rhyming text combine to make this book one of our family's very favorite funny reads! 


********



Review slightly revised and re-posted in loving memory of Anna Dewdney (December 25, 1965-September 3, 2016).

The Creativity Angel Come to Visit

I had to laugh when I walked into the living room this morning and discovered the creativity angel on the floor.

Twenty-eight years ago I spent a year in Connecticut, living with my older sister. We spent a lot of time reading, cooking, and creating together. One of her gifts to me that year a set of tiny "angel cards." Each card has a picture of a small angel on it, right next to a gift word. "Responsibility," "Surrender," "Love," "Creativity," etc.

I honestly am not sure where the whole set is anymore, but occasionally the angels turn up in unexpected places, as angels tend to do.

Today's angel was, I'm pretty sure, tucked inside a basket of photographs and cards that I keep on the white shelf between my dining room and living room. The basket overturned late last night when I was hunting for a hole punch so that Jedi Teen could finish up her Stars Wars Christmas ornaments (speaking of creativity). I scooped everything up willy-nilly and shoved it all back in the basket, too tired to organize it in any way. Apparently the creativity angel escaped my clean-up efforts. Seems fitting somehow!

And this morning, I think I finally finished this year's advent poem. 

May the creativity angel visit your house soon too.

The Middle Years

Lately I've been realizing that some of the challenges (joys, tensions, giggles) at our house consist in the fact that we're all in our "middle years."

The sweet girl (aka Jedi Teen) is in the "middle years" between childhood and adulthood -- never an easy road to travel.

Her dad and I are in our middle years, period. Which turns out aren't the easiest road to travel either, bringing with them new aches and pains, different kinds of questions about our lives and what we've done/still want to do with them, and other issues we hadn't thought about very much before they got here, like the challenges of watching and accompanying our parents as they age.

Now don't get me wrong: both sets of middle years have their blessings and compensations. The sweet girl would likely tell you she enjoys newfound freedoms and enthusiasms, and in some ways, that's true for us in our middle years too.

But sometimes the different kinds of middle years collide head on, and then the fireworks can fly! Sometimes it makes me laugh.

I know that part of the challenge for me is that I am slow to keep up with changes of any sort these days, and my daughter is just full of them -- she is a walking, talking, laughing, long-legged dancing, eye-rolling, hollering, crying, giggling ball of change most days. This slow middle-years mama (who feels like it was just yesterday she was teaching this adolescent dynamo-who-is-taller-than-she-is how to tie her shoes) sometimes just stands there in awe while she watches that dynamo practice her slip jig for Irish dance class.

I suspect, though I don't know, that parents of more than one child get to ease into all this change a little more gradually. Because there is some space between children, they get to keep experiencing one stage of life with one child while another leaps ahead into the next. I've seen this with friends who have kids at multi-ages and stages, and sometimes I am a little wistful about it. Maybe I would deal better with the swift progressions of adolescence if I was still cutting crusts off sandwiches and reading Eric Carle to an up-and-coming sibling. But that's not our experience nor our particular blessing (though I am grateful I still get the chance to spend time and work with younger kids in other venues, even if not here at home).

Still, I think I need to remind myself from time to time to relax and laugh a little more about the middle years. These too shall pass. And probably far too swiftly.

Just as Geeky as my Grandmother

One of things I sometimes miss is being able to afford magazines. While I know there are many cool things that can be seen and read about online, I still love the feel and look of a magazine, especially one with good writing and gorgeous photographs.

When we recently got an offer to subscribe to Smithsonian magazine for less than a dollar an issue for a year, I confess I leaped at the chance. Our first issue came yesterday, and I gave myself some late Saturday evening/Sunday afternoon time to enjoy a few of the articles, including a great cover story about lions and a fascinating look at the current NASA mission due to fly-by Pluto next month.

It dawned on me somewhere along the way that I had a very clear picture in my mind of someone else devouring articles with a Smithsonian magazine in her hands: my grandmother, in the years she lived with us when I was growing up.

Apparently I am just as geeky as my grandmother. Which makes me absurdly happy.

Maybe We Should Call Him Rocky...

We were glad to get to the end (or what we thought was the end) of a long, tiring day yesterday. I was breathing a sigh when we’d finished up family prayer and nighttime reading. It was a little after 10, and the sweet girl was headed for bed. Her dad and I were headed for an episode of “Elementary” (we’re hooked) and then also to bed.

And then came the noises.

I didn’t hear them at first. It was my husband who came out of the kitchen with a puzzled look on his face. “I think there’s somebody in the attic,” he said.

You have to understand that we live in an apartment in a very old building. We’re housed over a warehouse which belongs to a local business (the owner of which also owns our building). The attic space above us is sometimes visited by workmen during the day, but there had never been anyone walking around up there at 10 at night.

“Are you sure?” I asked. And then I heard the sweet girl, from her room, shriek, “Mom? Dad? What was THAT?”

We hurried to her room. “What did it sound like?” we asked. She looked seriously alarmed. Thud, thud, THUD, she told us.

I was starting to wonder why everybody in the house was hearing noises but me when I heard something too. I went into the kitchen and looked up at the ceiling, where the sound seemed loudest. Creaking (was it footsteps? I couldn’t tell) and a kind of a bumping noise. And then some kind of scraping noise that sounded like metal. Like someone might be dismantling pipes. Or like Ron Weasley’s ghoul might’ve decided to move in.

We were all getting a little weirded out by then. I went next door to see if our neighbor was home and to see what she made of it, but she didn’t answer my knock. The sounds kept coming. I had misplaced our landlord’s home number, so went hunting through the book. We didn’t want to call the cops if there was something going on in the attic (“but what?” we kept asking ourselves) that he had authorized.

I found a number that looked like it might be right and tried it. It turned out to be my landlord’s somewhat elderly but very kind mother, who happened to be up watching t.v. (“Oh, I’m always up late!” she assured me cheerily, and then promised to call her sleeping son and wake him up and get him to call me pronto.) When the phone rang a couple of minutes later, I apologized for having him wakened, but then explained there were a lot of really strange noises in the attic. “I’m afraid there might be a person up there,” I said.

“Oh no, I don’t think so,” he assured me. “The trap must’ve sprung. I’m pretty sure it’s a raccoon in a cage.”

Um…what?

It turned out, as I discovered, somewhat to my merriment (it’s amazing how relieved you can be to find out it’s only a raccoon, when you’ve been having visions of pipe- dismantling ghouls) that they had recently figured out that a raccoon was somehow getting into the building’s attic. A friend of our landlord’s, who is at trapper, figured this out from paw prints on a blanket they left up there. He also set a cage to catch the creature, complete with the enticement of red licorice. Apparently, the first time around, the raccoon managed to abscond with the licorice and not get caught. Not last night.

“It must’ve worked and the door closed on him. He’ll be OK until morning, and then my trapper friend will get him out and set him free.” (And presumably they will seal up whatever they can so no large wild animals can roam into the attic looking for the licorice bar.)

“All right,” I said, as there came a loud THWUMP from the ceiling, followed by a shake and a thud and a kind of rattle. “Just to let you know, he’s pretty loud up there. I don’t think he’s very happy.”

He did settle down eventually, our friend Rocky (we figured we may as well name him, since we were sharing a building with him for the night). We all had a good fit of giggles over the entire thing, not a bad thing following the stresses of the day. My landlord called back to check on us a few minutes later and to apologize again.

I hoped for Rocky’s sake that there was a bit of the licorice left so he could have a midnight snack. D. had to get up early for a breakfast meeting and heard him again. Apparently Rocky decided to get up with the sun. I’m pretty sure by now he’s out in the wild again, no doubt a bit grumpy about his night’s adventure. Perhaps he’ll post about it on his blog too.

Rudolph Revisited

Last night, we brought out one of our family favorites and watched Rudolph the Red- Nosed Reindeer during dinner. This Rankin and Bass claymation classic premiered on television 49 years ago (yes, folks, gear up – the 50^th anniversary of Rudolph draweth nigh) which means it’s been on the planet longer than I have. It still holds up as a delicious bunch of corny, sentimental fun, even when you’ve seen it over and over as every one of us (even our 11 year old) has.

I don’t know what was in our tacos, but all three of us were in a silly, snarky mood as we watched. The end result was that we found ourselves pondering some of these age-old questions. Here they are, in no particular order.

1)      How did they make Rudolph’s nose glow the way they did?

2)      What’s wrong with the doll on the Island of Misfit Toys?

3)      Does Rudolph actually know what a dentist is?

4)      Why does Hermy the elf have hair when all the rest of the boy elves don’t?

5)      Did they pattern the tall elf with glasses after Richard Deacon (on the Dick Van Dyke show)?

6)      How did Rudolph know Santa’s name before they’d been formally introduced? Is this an instinctual thing, something that flying reindeer are just born knowing?

7)      Does it occur to NO ONE that Rudolph’s nose might come in handy someday?

8)      When Santa says “too bad, he had a nice take-off too” – does he truly believe that a glowing nose will adversely affect Rudolph’s flying ability?

9)      Is there anyone who doesn’t laugh when Burl Ives quotes Donner as saying “No, this is man’s work!”?

10)  How did a poodle get the job of pulling Yukon Cornelius’ sleigh?

11)  Does Yukon really think he can taste silver and gold? Does he not worry that he will cut his tongue every time he licks his pick-ax?

12)  When Yukon and the Bumble go over the cliff, why can’t Rudolph and his friends see him when they look over? They act like they’ve completely disappeared. If the Bumble bounces, wouldn’t they hit and just bounce back up? (Unless it’s a really, really high drop.)

13)  What is IN the all-purple food that Mrs. Claus feeds Santa, enabling him to gain about a hundred pounds in just a few minutes?

14)  How does Rudolph suddenly learn how to magically control his nose (at the end, when he pulls Santa’s sleigh) when before it seemed to turn on and off without him being able to control it?

15)  Why does Rudolph leave the door open when he sneaks out of the house late at night to go off on his own? Wouldn’t Yukon and Hermy have frozen in that weather?

16)  If King Moonracer flies all over the place looking for toys to bring to his island, why can’t he just zoom over to Christmas Town and ask Santa to help them himself?

17)  Did they create Clarice’s tears out of glue?

18)  And last but not least, at the end when they throw the misfit toys out of Santa’s sleigh, how did the poor bird learn to fly? He was a misfit because he could only swim, not fly. But they don’t give him an umbrella, and one can only imagine the poor creature plummeting to his death.

Old Questions

While cleaning (or rather excavating) her room yesterday, the sweet girl came upon an old post-it note. About seven years old, I think, judging from what it had jotted on it...some questions she had asked me when she was about four or possibly five years old.

I had forgotten that I used to write her questions down. It's a great practice, and it was fun for both of us to see these, to remember a time when these were the burning questions on her mind, the things she was most curious about.

*Why do we eat with our mouths?

*Why is there no 13 o'clock? Why do we go round twice? (Meaning why does the clock go around twice in two segments of 12 hours each, rather than just counting up to 24...I remember when she asked that!)

*Why does the moon sometimes come up in the daytime?

That last one especially made her grin, since she's become something of a moon phase scholar in the past year.

Seeing these made me feel nostalgic, not just for the days of such innocent questions, but for the days when I felt at least semi-capable of answering what she asked.

The questions coming at us so quickly these days are more challenging. I know every season is good, every part of growing up a blessing -- so I don't really want to rewind or fast-forward (though fast-forward has felt like a temptation lately)! But every once in a while, it's definitely fun to revisit times gone by.

"Decorating Tips for Crazily Creative Familes..."

Another fun day in a highly creative household. My husband continues to build a dragon in our dining room (okay, he's actually only working on the tail section at home at this point).

Meanwhile....

One of the ways I bring in money as a writer is by ghost-writing web content for various clients through a freelance site. This means I write all sorts of odd and interesting little articles and blurbs (good thing I'm a research geek). They may be on all sorts of topics: travel, food, parenting, home repair, books (once in a while, if I'm lucky), etc.

Today I was working on an article about home decor. More specifically on tips for making a more peaceful environment in your home.

This just cracks me up. I'm sitting in my crowded little office corner behind my eighty-three year old couch that is positively begging for a slip cover I can't afford to give it. Yes, listening to Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier (I do get peaceful touches in where I can!) but my living space is basically a leaning tower of boxes, books, papers, and yes...dragon innards.

Wouldn't it be fun if someone wanted to pay me to write an article on "Decorating Tips for Crazily Creative Families"? File that under "writer dreams..."!

Homeschool Challenge #314

"Moooommm! I can't study while you're singing!"

(At least it's a happy challenge!)

Sunday Blessings

This morning I went back for healing prayer after communion. My ear has been feeling worse the past few days, and I’d had a particularly bad night with a lot of fluid build-up. All during morning worship and teaching Sunday School, I’d been feeling frustrated with how congested it was feeling, and how badly I was hearing.

Two lovely folks from our congregation prayed for me, one of whom happens to be a bishop. He anointed me and laid hands on my ear while he prayed. During the closing song at communion, I could feel my ear begin to pop (which it usually only does when I move my head way back into a certain position) and I could feel the fluid levels start to go down and the ear start to open up. After church, I mentioned to my husband and daughter that it was much better. The fluid is definitely still there, but I was amazed and blessed that the ear opened the way it did. And though I’m still struggling, it’s been better all afternoon that it has been for the past few days.

My daughter grinned at me and said “wow, prayer!” when I told her. Later this afternoon, she asked me how I was doing and I said the ear was still not as full of fluid as it had been. She asked, “Can I pray for you?” I told her of course, and she laid hands on my ear and asked God to help bring the fluid down.

Actually, she first said, “Please help bring Mommy’s ear down--” Then she giggled a little and said, “I mean the fluid, not her whole ear.” Because we are a silly family, after the Amen, my husband said something teasingly about how funny it would be if my ear started sliding down my neck. I laughed and said I was glad that God was wise and would know not to do that. Then the sweet girl, who has been studying ancient history all year, said, “Actually, that sounds like something the Greek gods would do – if they were real.” I agreed, and said something like, “That’s true, because they often were rather sly and not--” and into my slight pause, the sweet girl popped up with “godly.” We all agreed and had a good laugh again.

So much encouragement in just a few small encounters, conversations, prayers. The encouragement of being prayed for, and helped toward healing, by others in the body of Christ. The encouragement of seeing my daughter spontaneously copy the prayer practices modeled before her. The encouragement of realizing once again the joy of knowing the true and living God, who is never sly or manipulative, but holy and full of delight in doing good things for his children.

Spring Excavation…I Mean, Cleaning…Has Begun

Baby, it’s cold outside (well, chilly still) and my list of items misplaced in the built-up winter clutter of my home was getting longer and longer. Thus today I began to spring clean.

I’m  a few hours in, and thus far have found some interesting things as I dig deep into the mess to clean and organize. Here’s a list of a few things I’ve found so far (some useful, some fun, some that make me nostalgic…and none, alas, the library book I REALLY need to find…)

~My cutting board (don’t ask, but it’s been missing in action for a long time)

~Component parts to an ancient Roman city made from air dried clay

~One lone mitten my daughter wore when she was about three (she’ll be 11 this summer)

~A Bingo card for an episode of LOST, made a few years back by my friend Erin

~My blackline maps for world history, which we could have used in school last week

I’ll keep adding as the fun continues!

Imagine That! They're Asking You to Do Math!

Sometimes a conversation will occur during the course of a homeschool morning that just makes me laugh. If you could eavesdrop on some of the conversations at our house, I have a feeling you'd chuckle too, though some of these conversations are not the kind you'll find in magazine articles about the joy of teaching and learning.

Because let's face it -- real kids and real teachers sometimes get cranky. They get bored. They get frustrated. They miss the point. Real learning, and real teaching, is full of ups and downs and moments that look anything but graceful. And sometimes they're just downright funny.

Take today's math lesson. The sweet girl has been swimming in the land of fractions for a few weeks now. Although we've moved on to ratios, fractions still loom everywhere, and today the book had the audacity to present not one, not two, but three sections of dividing fractions.

Now...the sweet girl is good at dividing fractions. She totally gets the concept, and she does them well. But frankly, she's bored. Now sometimes when a student is bored, it's OK to say "go ahead, skip that, and go on to something else." But she's been struggling a good bit lately with keeping a good attitude and persevering on things she doesn't really feel like doing, and today I decided to die on that hill. So I told her she needed to soldier through.

"But I know how to do these," she said (okay, whined might be more accurate). "They're easy and I know how to do them and I don't want to do..." she paused and counted..."26 dividing fraction problems."

"Well," I encouraged, "break them up. Do one section and then go on to something else. Then come back and do another section."

Often this works. She's found it a helpful strategy in the past, to break up doing several sections in a row of the same thing. Today she sighed. "But the only other section left is the one on equations," she said in a aggrieved voice. "You know I don't enjoy equations. Especially when I have to check them. Checking them is such a pain because if I don't know for sure that it's right, then I actually have to go back over and do the math to figure out if they're correct."

I was in the kitchen cutting up veggies for the crockpot when she said this, and for some reason, it totally tickled my funny bone. Although I try hard not to give into sarcasm very often (knowing how much it bothers my daughter) a snarky little elf seemed to be giggling right next to me. Without thinking I said, "Imagine that! Having to do math in a math lesson! What could they have been thinking?" As the snarky elf continued to giggle madly, I added, "I mean, you might think they could have come up with something a little more creative! They could have asked you to do science...or yoga...or cooking. But no, they asked you to do math!"

Lest you think the snark elf masquerading as mom went too far, I am pleased to report that I suddenly heard snickering from the dining room. Once the giggles subsided, she did the rest of the math with nary a complaint. OK, maybe one or two small ones.

Patchwork Post for the Second Day of Christmas

So it turns out that if you want your kitchen to smell good on the day after Christmas, when you're just having leftovers, the key is to make another batch of stuffing. Onions and melted butter seem to provide just the right aroma...

I was so pleased with the way Christmas dinner turned out yesterday. We were given a big turkey this year, one that weighed about thirteen pounds. We're not huge meat eaters and most recent years, when we've been home and cooking on the holidays at all, we've simply done a small turkey breast in the crockpot. So it had been a long (very long!) time since I'd cooked a bird this big, and I was worried that I'd goof it up.

I had visions in my head of a rather disastrous cooking experience we had just a few years into our marriage. We attempted a biggish turkey then too (how hard could it be? I thought with the confidence of youth) and apparently did not thaw it enough. We cooked it and cooked it and cooked it...and it just wouldn't finish. Parts of it stayed pretty cold and parts started to brown too much and and...well...it wasn't all that appetizing.

So this year, when I delivered a moist, juicy, perfectly cooked turkey to my husband for carving, I grinned at him and said "we've come a long way, baby." It really turned out to be quite easy. I confess I looked up some tips on the internet (something I couldn't do all those years ago) which provided a handy guide. I taught the sweet girl how to baste, and she enjoyed it so much we probably did it a little more than we needed to, which if anything made it even tastier. I kept things simple and just used butter and some freeze-dried poultry spices on the skin, and I added a couple of cups of our favorite veggie broth to the roasting pan. Yummy -- and lots of leftovers. I think I need to find some good turkey leftover recipes!

We had a lovely, quiet day. We're still not quite used to Christmas Day with just the three of us and no travel. I think it's hardest on D, who is used to seeing his family that day and to lots of hustle and bustle on Christmas in general. But the beginning of new traditions can also be enjoyable, and having a quiet day yesterday seemed to suit us all pretty well, especially at the end of a busy, tiring year.

We also seemed to strike a good balance with presents this year. The sweet girl got a few "oh, I really wanted this!" type of gifts, but also some sweet surprises, and D and I, though we don't get one another much, always do a good job of knowing something that will make the other's day.  The sweet girl also has some traditions of picking out some small things for us which are very cute because they don't vary much -- she loves to get us each a new mug, and often some candy, and she and her Daddy go together to pick out a small, inexpensive piece of department store jewelry for me (usually something from the 1928 collection, which I love).

D. did most of the wrapping this year, while I was doing other things, so one of the funniest moments came when the sweet girl opened a book I didn't know she was getting. I was confused because it was a book I'd picked up on clearance a couple of months ago and stashed away for family read-aloud. I hadn't intended to give it as a gift. I thought he must have picked up another copy as a gift for her. Later I mentioned that and he said, "um, no...you gave it to me with the other stuff to wrap." So it *was* the copy I bought, though how it got in with the Christmas presents, I have no idea! Oh well! One can never go wrong with a book as a gift!

Speaking of book gifts, the sweet girl was thrilled out of her socks to get her very own copies of her two favorite books this year -- the ones she has checked out over and over from the library, and read over and over -- The Penderwicks at Point Mouette by Jeanne Birdsall, and the graphic novel version of A Wrinkle in Time, adapted and illustrated by Hope Larson. She also got a new Calvin and Hobbes.

D. gave me a copy of P.D. James' Talking About Detective Fiction, another cute thing because he had no idea that I'd read it already, but assumed I would love it. I did love it, back when I read it, and am very happy to own a copy. Book-wise, I gave D. a copy of Patrick O'Brian's Master and Commander. We've seen the movie but neither of us has read the book. He's been so into sailing ships, pirates, and all things related to the high seas of late that it seemed like a good pick.

While cooking most of yesterday afternoon, I listened to Emmy Lou Harris' Christmas album and got in some good reading time...nearly finished the new Leonard Marcus biography of Madeleine L'Engle (not a Christmas present, just picked up from the library hold shelf). I am finding this an intriguing read and will likely blog more about it soon.

I missed my family, as always, but had a wonderful talk with my parents by phone. They were sharing their 60th Christmas together! My family is celebrating so much this year...the birth of three new babies in the next generation (I have two new great nieces and another great nephew this year), a marriage (which also includes a new stepchild for that niece), and the news of two more babies on the way in 2013. My parents can hardly believe they now have fourteen great-grandchildren with two more on the way.

So many blessings to count this Christmas, and the biggest blessing of all is the precious gift of Jesus. So thankful for the celebration of his birth, and so thankful for his continued presence in our lives each and every day.

3 Children and It

No, the title of my post is not a typo. I know the name of E. Nesbit's classic book is 5 Children and It. It's my favorite Nesbit, and one we read as a family about a year ago.

We've been revisiting Nesbit recently with a family read-aloud of The Treasure Seekers. We finished it last night. This was our introduction to the Bastables (I've been wanting to meet them for quite some time, especially since I realized they merit a brief mention from C.S. Lewis at the start of The Magician's Nephew) and we definitely enjoyed the introduction.

At the end of the book, there was a brief bit about the author, and I shared some of it with the sweet girl and her daddy -- how Edith Nesbit was born in 1858, how she wrote for a number of years before she discovered her great talent for writing for children (when she was about forty), the numbers of books she wrote after that, how it amused her when people assumed she was a man, etc. The synopsis mentioned 5 Children and It, which caused us to remember the story fondly.

Then the sweet girl said: "Ha! That's what Madeleine L'Engle could have called A Wrinkle in Time! 3 Children and IT!" and I just about died laughing.

Today's treat on the library hold shelf -- the new graphic novel version of Wrinkle. I was excited to pick it up, but S. has absconded with it already (she read the first chapter in the library). "When I'm done with it, I'll pass it on," she promised generously. She's been raiding my sock drawer recently for socks, so why am I surprised we're now vying for books on the hold shelf?

Life marches on!

On the Way to Ten

We had an exhausting but wonderful weekend. The sweet girl is swiftly approaching the epic double-digit birthday, and we had her party yesterday, a few days early. We were blessed by a visit from my next-oldest sister and her two youngest girls (now 9 and 15) so it was a wonderful day filled with aunt and cousin love as well as regular birthday festivities. They even got to worship with us in church and meet some of our church family. It doesn't get much better than that!

My sister's visit was almost "coincidental" (if I believed in such a thing). They were traveling back from vacation time spent in Virginia and Maryland. It just happened that they could be in our neck of the woods in time for the tenth birthday party. How good of God to bless us in just that way! We have been famished for family. Hugging my sister yesterday was literally good for my soul...and so was laughing with her. I really cut loose and laugh with my siblings in a way I do with hardly anyone else. They are kindred spirits.

The whole weekend was filled with festivities. One of the sweet girl's very best friends, who happens to be exactly one week older than she is, had his birthday celebration on Friday evening. They always share in each other's celebrations in one way or another, and that's become a definite mark of another year passing. Then another friend (this one an adult friend) had a 40th birthday celebration on Saturday. I missed that one, home baking and cleaning for Sunday, but the sweet girl and her dad were there most of the afternoon. So they had three parties in three days!

Given the breathless, tiring pace of the rest of our summer, having a couple of days just to unwind and celebrate with friends and family felt very good -- and far more "summery" than anything else this season has held so far.

Although we've already had the party, I'm still trying to wrap my mind around the fact that S is turning 10. Perhaps it will hit me full-force on Wednesday. Should be a regular day of camp and busy-ness, but we've saved out a couple of presents, and we plan to go out to dinner. Chipotle. Her choice.

I wonder if the next ten years will go by as quickly as these ten have...

"I'm a Doctor, Not a..."

It's been Trek time at our house lately, and it's been so much fun. I've been a Star Trek fan for as long as I can remember, but this is the first time we've ever shown episodes to the sweet girl. We're starting with the original series for her -- geeky purists that we are -- and she's fallen in love with them all, especially Mr. Spock.

She's also cracking up over some of the corny lines. They're there in spades, spouted by many of the characters, but I'd almost forgotten just how wonderfully funny DeForest Kelly is as Dr. McCoy. His crusty, curmudgeonly personality is set off brilliantly in the trio of Kirk/Spock/McCoy. I also love the way the writers gave him standard lines. Is there an episode where he doesn't announce: "he's dead..." in dramatic tones? And then, of course, the iconic, "I'm a doctor, not a..." lines, which always make the sweet girl giggle madly. Our favorite so far came in the second season episode "Friday's Child," when McCoy is trying to pull a struggling pregnant woman up a hill (they're being chased by baddies, of course). Spock tries to help and the woman resists, only wanting the doctor's help, whereupon McCoy snaps: "I'm a doctor, not an escalator!"

Which begs the question, what will escalators be like in the 23rd century anyway?

Raising a Reader

“She is too fond of books, and it has turned her brain.” That quote from Louisa May Alcott has always made me chuckle. The wonderful thing about books, of course, is that they do literally “turn our brains” – in new directions.

In addition to all the books I want to read, or in some cases feel I need to read, my ever growing TBR pile is expanding in a new way. The sweet girl (fast heading for her tenth birthday) has begun to recommend books to me.

It happened just the other day, and not for the first time. She and her dad were out of town last week for her step-grandad’s funeral. She took along her big pink backpack filled with books and art supplies for the car. On Sunday, unpacking the bag, she kept bringing out books and telling me what she’d read while they were gone. One of them was a book called Funny Frank by the delightful Dick King-Smith. I had pointed her in the direction of the King-Smith shelf at the library (we do love his books) but this isn’t one I’ve read before. “It’s hilarious,” she told me. “You need to read it.”

Yes, I have a new recommending reading friend – my daughter. I find this both delicious and a little strange. How did this happen so fast? Wasn’t she just chewing on her copy of The Very Hungry Caterpillar last week?

Yes, we’ve raised a reader – in both conscious and unconscious ways.  We’ve read books to this child from day one – okay, actually from well before day one, if you count all the reading aloud we did when she was in utero.

There have been so many good reading memories since. I recall D. reading to her from the book of Genesis when she was about a week old. I remember the beauty of watching her lie on her little gymani playmat, when she was perhaps four or five months old, and seeing her eyes trail over to the tiny little “Baby Einstein” board books she loved so much her first year – their chunky square size a perfect fit for her hands, their cardboard so good to chew, and all those great photographs to stare at! Then there were the accompanying sound effects stage…oh, how we all loved Moo, Baa, La La La.  

I remember countless repeated readings of beloved bedtime stories (Everywhere Babies, Goodnight Me, Goodnight You, Guess How Much I Love You) and later on, reading myself hoarse on repeat requests of longer favorites – Flopsy Bunnies, Make Way for Ducklings, The Seven Silly Eaters, the chapter in Winnie the Pooh where Piglet gets a bath. (Oh, and anything by Jane Hissey. The above picture, taken almost five years ago, was a path the sweet girl made in our kitchen...a path of Jane Hissey books. I called it the Jane Hissey path to success!) And poetry, poetry, poetry. Later on came read-aloud upon read-aloud of longer books…snuggled on the couch or on the bed, shoulder to shoulder on park benches in town, read by flashlight on the car on long trips as we wended our way through Heidi, A Little Princess, the Ramona and Henry books, the Narnia books, the Hobbit, and so many other wonderful books. (We still do this and always will…we were a read-aloud family before we became parents! Check my sidebar for our family’s current read-aloud books.)

In recent years, since the sweet girl became an independent reader, there has also been the joy of seeing her curled up with a good book. From the first halting attempts to get through Hop on Pop to seeing her sprawled on the bed or curled up in a windowsill reading Sarah Plain and Tall or Jenny and the Cat Club or Betsy, Tacy and Tib, I have loved every second of watching my girl become a reader.

But it still throws me when she reads something that I haven’t. I know the novelty of this will soon pass – as she grows and reads even on her own, it will happen more often. I will not always be the navigator and trail-guide, though I will hold onto that role for as long as I possibly can, and then trust to the fact that she has been so steeped in good, rich literature her whole life that she will make good choices about what to read (and be able to discern why she doesn’t like something as well as why she does).

Mostly when she shares a book, it’s because she loves it – and that’s a great joy to me, that she is learning by osmosis that good stories are gifts. Only once so far has she asked me to read a book because she wasn’t entirely sure how much she liked it – and she wanted my opinion. I read it and had a mixed opinion too. I saw places in the story that I wasn’t sure she’d been ready for, that I figured went over her head or simply didn’t “register.” And that’s okay. That will happen sometimes too. Once again, I have to trust that what she’s learned through reading and listening to the good, deep, rich stories will hold her firmly in place as she encounters new reading territory.

But for now, I think I’ve got to make a new and special place in my reading stack for the books she recommends. I may not always feel like I have time to add one more thing to that stack, but I treasure that she wants to gift me with the stories she’s enjoying, and I treasure even more that she still wants us to share that reading experience so we can talk  about it. So onto the reading stack goes Funny Frank this week. Thank you, sweet reader girl, for taking the time to recommend another book to your reader mom.