Friday Morning Book Post

Ahh, May. You've brought a lot of Spring snow. Tess built a snowman on Monday. Yup. In May. That's Colorado for you. She was in full snow gear building a snowman on Monday. Sam left for school wearing snow pants. By the end of the Spring Storm, we had nearly two feet of snow. I'm weary of snow, but I've learned something living here in Colorado. The seasons are always late to arrive. Spring is really Winter here. The only consolation of snow in May is the warmer weather makes it melt faster. Tess's snow man started melting yesterday. I guess I better go outside and collect our wooden carrot nose and hat.

We're full throttle right now headed straight for the last day of school finish line. Sam spent largely the first half of May in rehearsal for his theatrical debut in The Aristocats! Paul and I also spent a good chunk of our time helping out backstage and guess what? We both found that we really love getting involved with children's musical theater. I believe in theater. I believe theater offers all kinds of new brain skills while also building confidence. I almost wish I could get out there and perform too. After a full weekend of four performances of The Aristocats where Sam played both an alley cat and Private Vichy, the dog, he was exhausted.

Luke is heavily involved in digital audio production classes at school. He's just about to finish his freshman year and I can tell that he's passionate about film making. One of his collaborative film projects got nominated for an award this week. His film didn't win, but I think it was a big boost just to be nominated! He's learning to use all kinds of film-making technology and he will earn some college film school credits in high school as well.

So, life is full, busy, crazy, frustrating, and well, good, especially when I fill every tiny moment with books. A sentence here, a sentence there...

So, onto the books:

So, after I finished reading Flora and Ulysses: The Illuminated Adventures by Kate DiCamillo to Sam, we took a few days off for a read-aloud break. I mean, he was busy with theater anyway. Flora and Ulysses is the current Newberry Winner, but I was kind of disappointed. It's quirkiness feels forced. I usually love DiCamillo's novels, but this one was just okay. I think Sam felt the same way. Anyway, after scouring Luke's shelves, Sam really just wanted to read the next Harry Potter. (A friend of mine bought me a British edition with the above cover). I was kind of eager to re-read Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban too.

I was also pondering J K Rowling's revelation that she thought Harry and Hermione should have ended up together. I know this is old news already, but as I'm reading these books again, I just don't see what Rowling sees. I can't really get into Rowling's head to understand her reasoning, but I see Hermione and Harry as just too similar in personality making them kind of a bland match. I suppose there's some Myers-Briggs philosophy that could be applied here, but there's something so delightful and wonderful about Hermione and Ron being so different from each other. They make a vibrant couple. I'm glad that Rowling made the choice she did even if she isn't ultimately happy with it.

 As I read through Azkaban again, I'm going to especially focus and hone in on Hermione and Ron. I suppose the story could have worked either way, but I loved seeing Ron's emotional transformation especially in the final book. It may have taken him a long time to figure out how incredibly awesome Hermione is, but we all knew he'd get there. What do you think?

Ok, I read a lot of Jane Austen fan fiction. I can't help it. I like seeing her stories unfold in modern circumstances. Dear Mr. Knightley is a little different. It isn't a re-telling a of any of Austen's novels. It's more of an homage to Jane. This was a quick read, but after I was done, I was ready for another YA Austen-inspired novel. I'm on the look out now.

Maybe this? It's Persuasion, but you know, set in high school. I love it already. It's a Summer read for sure.

Okay, I don't know anything about this one. I just heard some initial buzz on The Books on the Nightstand podcast. Of course, I'm instantly curious. This might just shoot to the top of my reading list.

As for my other kids' reading: Luke is reading The Giver so that we can see the movie this Summer. I'm also reading a lot of Fancy Nancy to Tess. The twins are quickly growing out of our vast collection of board books. Liam really likes this terrible Strawberry Shortcake book that he chose at the library. I can't wait to return it.

I'm on Goodreads all the time. You can follow me there as I review every book I read.

Happy weekend!

Friday Morning Book Post

Book pressure. Do you have it?

 I feel pressure all the time. I know it's entirely of my own doing, but nevertheless, I still feel it.
 I have books (700 page books!) to read for book club. Well, I don't have to. I want to, but I have other books that I have to read quickly because I can't renew them. I am now reading two books to Sam. His school has an all-school book club every year and this year, the selected book is The Incredible Journey. This is a book that I didn't read as a kid myself. I'm not even sure I've seen the movie. So far, I'm enjoying reading this book to Sam and we're still reading Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. I'm inundated with reading, but that's a good problem.

Right now, I'm reading Unveiling Grace by Lynn Wilder. Most people know that I'm fascinated with Mormonism. I'm fascinated by their strange doctrine and their secretive ceremonies that somehow are supposedly compatible with Christianity. I've read many memoirs about the FLDS, but this time I wanted to concentrate on the mainstream LDS Church.

This book is about how one family found their way out of Mormonism. Lynn and her husband entered the Mormon church in 1977 after missionaries knocked on their door. I didn't even know that those missionary boys could be successful with their door-to-door proselytizing. I guess the church wouldn't continue to do it, if it didn't work though. It's a works based religion that has just enough Jesus to sound Christian. After decades in the church, Lynn found enough cracks and fissures in her faith to lead her away from Joseph Smith and to a very different Jesus. The Jesus of the Bible.  It's truly fascinating, if a little overly detailed.

Luke is reading 1984 in his English class. I remember reading this my senior year in English. I bought this book in the Kindle edition for Luke. He's still adjusting to reading on a Kindle. Luke should like it. He's living in an age where almost all the YA fiction right now is dystopian.

As for Tess, she is really enjoying Don't Wake the Royal Baby. 
This is the cutest book. The new royal baby just can't sleep with all the noise in the palace. It's adorable. The queen even takes the royal baby on a plane ride and then parachutes out with the baby to get him to sleep. The illustrations are delightful and it's one of my little girl's current faves.

That's it on the book front this week.  See you next week with more book adventures.

Daddy and his little girl

Watching Fireworks on the 4th of July

My little girl just looks so grown up here.  

The Great Room Shuffle Debate

I've planned a super big, possibly overwhelming, and challenging summer undertaking despite my need for hiatus and renewal, but I think that this change might actually facilitate some good transitions for us all.

Here's the thing: I have 5 kids, 3 bedrooms (on 3 different floors) for said 5 kids, and out of those 5 only 1 girl!! I've been thinking that it's time for a room shuffle for a long time. When the twins first arrived, I knew that I would be losing my guest/sewing room. After the twins moved from their co-sleeper in my room to the guest room in the basement, I just let things be. They slept magnificently in their basement room until recently when they decided to climb out of their cribs. Despite frequent after-midnight trips to the basement bedroom (two flights of stairs), Paul and I continued to let things be. We didn't want to disrupt Luke and Sam and their shared bedroom right across the hall from us. They've shared a bedroom since we moved into this house in 2006 and I just didn't want to break that up until now.

After removing everything (and I mean everything) from the twins' basement room for safety, I realized that their room was going to waste. We recently removed the toddler beds because they kept taking the mattresses off and moving the bed frames around the room. Yup. They do things that my other kids would never dreamed of doing.

As Luke gets older, I decided it might be time for him to have his own room in the basement although my heart breaks a little about it since I think this will impact Sam deeply. I suggested to Paul that we move Luke to the basement, move the twins to Tess's room on the main floor, and move Tess upstairs into Luke's old spot. Tess would now become Sam's roommate. It's a massive change. (Didn't I say change was coming?) I'm still not satisfied with this plan either. Sam said he'd rather have the twins in his room than his sister. I kind of agree with this sentiment. (Currently, Sam and Luke have the biggest room.) It can easily fit 3 kids, but frankly, I don't trust the twins and their crazy whims. I can't remove everything from Sam's room to ensure their safety either. Honestly, I don't think that I will be able to make these changes and have them be optimal. I'm just trying to work with my parameters. I realized that Sam and the twins are the same age spread as Sam and Luke. Luke is five years older than Sam and there's been some growing pains among those two for some time now. I guess it'll never be perfect, but as I feel that change is in order, I'll proceed with the plan.

This plan involves a lot of painting,  packing, and moving furniture. It won't be easy, but it's time for some transition in this house. It just might be the thing to kick start some renewal for everyone in this house.

Suggestions and ideas are welcome.

Summer Knitting

I just wrote this long post on how I've taken a break from a lot of my hobbies this summer, but I haven't stopped knitting entirely. I knit this cute little summer tunic for Tess. I knit this in a slow leisurely manner and it still didn't take me very long. However, I hate how this turned out in Ty-Dy Cotton. I'm going to re-knit this in solid colors. I also need to take a better picture not using my phone.  The back of this tunic is adorable with crossing i-cord straps. I definitely need better pics here.

This is the picture of Phoebe's Sun Tunic from the book, Phoebe's Birthday. Doesn't it look so much better in solid contrasting colors?? I must re-knit this before Summer is over.

Knitting for little girls

I'm not going to lie. Knitting for little girls is so much fun and I especially like knitting for this little girl in particular. This was supposed to be the Sydney Lace Dress, but when I realized that I had almost ten inches left to knit in a 4 row repeat pattern, I decided to shorten it and make it tunic-length. She can wear this with skirts and jeans. I'm actually pleased with the way it turned out. I don't usually get lazy on a pattern, but the more I knit, the more I realized that I'd like this better shorter. I used Cascade Sunseeker yarn. This is a cotton/acrylic blend with subtle sparkles as well.

I haven't been knitting very much lately since I transferred a lot of my energy to finishing those quilts in my previous post. Honestly, I think I had gotten a little burned out on knitting. I know. That doesn't sound like me at all, but I realized it's time for some Summer knitting and I have a handful of things I want to knit for Tess for this Summer. She's looking pretty grown-up these days especially since I swept her long bangs to the side for these pictures. She's 4  1/2 now. She's growing too fast for me to put these cute little girls items off.

Anyway, this is the Sydney Lace Dress from the book Just Like Me Knits.  You can even knit this dress for a doll, but I don't knit for her dolls. At least, Tess has never asked me to knit for one of her dolls and I can admit that I'm relieved that she hasn't.

Birthday Girl

                            She's 4 today! My little pink-obsessed princess girl is wearing blue. 
                                                  Happy birthday to my darling little girl.

November Knitting

Amazingly, I've finished three knitting projects this week, but I didn't get a post ready in time for this week's Yarn Along. I'm finding less and less time to blog these days. Life is very full.

 I realized that I have at least three different knitting bags filled with various projects in various stages of near completion. I had at least two projects that had been hibernating since last year. I finally decided to get serious and finish Sammy's sweater and a Christmas stocking. Although I knit the body of the sweater longer anticipating that Sam would grow a lot and knowing that I'd probably take forever to knit the sleeves, (I don't like knitting sleeves) the sweater fits perfectly right now. I mean, this sounds all well and good, but it really means that I waited too long and he grew too much and he won't get to wear his sweater very long. Okay. Lesson learned. Kids keep growing. Don't let projects for your children hibernate so long!

I knit this little hat this week. This is the Pippa Toque and it's a free pattern on Ravelry. This was a fun and very quick knit. I surprised myself by knittting this hat in less than a week. I'm really enjoying color work right now and I have several Fair Isle hats on my favorites list on Ravelry right now. Color work is like painting with yarn.

Has all this knitting this week made the three knitting bags smaller? No There are still three knitting totes. I don't know how this possible. No matter how much I knit, the bags of yarn always seem remain full. I suppose this is a good problem to have.

The October that was

My little corner of cyberspace has been so neglected of late. Honestly, I just haven't felt like blogging recently. Since I returned from my trip to the UK and Iceland, we were without a computer. After the demise of our last laptop, we bought a new one only to have it quit on us after five days! We sent it back and for whatever reason, they could not send a replacement within a month. The shipment kept getting delayed and we decided to cancel the order. So, I started taking lots of pictures on Instagram and posting them to Facebook while we were without a computer. I have to admit that Instagram is just so easy and quick. I suppose that some of my enthusiasm for blogging has transferred over there. Anyhow, I'm back and I apologize if you've seen some of these pictures already either on Facebook or Instagram.

Here I am on the first of November lamenting the end of my favorite month of the year. I love October as it's truly the best time of the year for me. The oranges, browns, yellows, greens, and earthy hues fill my senses and make me long for warm hand knit items and pumpkin spice lattes. It's cozy and well, it's over for this year. The trees are now looking almost barren, but there are some that still have leaves, but they are past their prime. It doesn't matter. I still love that deep complex brownish-orange. I soak up all of Autumn until that last leaf drops.

Here's what made our October. Our little twins, Liam and James turned 2. I actually cannot believe that they are 2 already. Our little chunky monkeys are 2! I'm so happy that they decided to be born in my favorite month. October got even better with their arrival. This year, I wanted to celebrate in a low-key fashion and head out to one of our favorite pumpkin patches in Boulder, but it was a very rainy day. We went to the pumpkin patch anyway and only Sammy and I got out of the car. We raced in and bought three pumpkin pie pumpkins for the twins and Tesss and then, since we trekked all the way to Boulder, I dragged everyone to a yarn shop. Liam ended up getting sick in the car and well, it wasn't the birthday I had envisioned for the twins. I baked them a little pumpkin bundt. There's a picture in my collection of October photos above. I think it goes without saying that I love Autumn baking (all those spices!) as well.

I did my fair share of knitting too. I started a sweater for myself! It's miles of stockinette and I've already started to doubt that this sweater will look like anything other than a hand knit sweatshirt. There's a reason I don't knit for myself. There's a picture of the sweater in the photos above as well. It's the red, pink, and black-striped yarn. What was I thinking with horizontal stripes? Of course, I've set it aside for other projects like a blue dress I'm knitting for a certain little girl I know (not Tess).

Luke and I are tackling a lot of school work  right now. He's doing a fair share of his work independently these days, but I still ask him to cook with me or write with me. We're planning to read Winter World: The Ingenuity of Animal Survival together for some science reading beginning tomorrow. It's not the kind of book that I would normally read aloud. We're each going to read a chapter every couple of days and then discuss it. He's plenty busy reading, making stop-motion films with his Legos, taking care of his five chickens, learning high school Latin, writing a novel, and finishing up Algebra I. He would have been done with Algebra in early summer, but that's when we started to have some computer issues and the computer lost all of his work. I made him do it all over again, but Algebra has become something that he loves. He keeps a nature journal. He grumbles about French, but I'll get him back on track there. We're diagramming sentences and we talk the importance of good grammar every day. As the weather has become more chilly and the twins are napping, we watch The Story of Us and talk about the history of the United States. I love the home educating life and I'm passionate about lifelong learning. It's the biggest lesson that I try to instill in my children. I want them to want to learn all the time. I want them to be curious. I got off on a home educating tangent, but all these things are/were part of our October learning. For some reason, I'm always more optimistic and idealistic about our learning plans in October. Right now, as I blog, Luke is in the room with me. He's working on his novel. I'm sure it will be in the science fiction/fantasy genre. It's quiet right now and we have this time together. I'm cherishing this moment. Right now.

As I move into November and the Advent Season, I hope for more moments to cherish.

The Twirly Skirt

I didn't make this skirt. My friend Elizabeth did. She made these fun quilt-like skirts for her girls and I asked if she could make one for Little T and somewhere in her busy life, she found the time to sew up this darling skirt. I love
how this skirt captures patchwork quilting so well.

It's difficult to get Tess to sit still for photos. I really wanted to showcase the fabric.
This is Cape Ann by Moda and it's made using charms. You can find the pattern for this
skirt in Stitch by Stitch.

Thank You Elizabeth for sewing such a beautiful skirt. It's going to be the outfit of the summer!


Doesn't she look less like a toddler and more like a young girl here? My only girl
looks so grown up!