Archive for July, 2010
July 11, 2010 @ 7:28 pm | Filed under:
Books For one week I am attempting to record everything each member of the family reads. Today is day six. Day one. Day two. Day three. Day four. Day five.
Jane:
—reread Hunger Games
—Mindblind (ARC)
–Asimov’s Foundation Trilogy (in progress)
Rose:
—Rakkety Tam
Beanie:
—Marlfox
me:
—Great Expectations (cont.)
—The Weed that Strings the Hangman’s Bag (cont.)
Scott:
—the REM bio (cont.)
—Ringworld (cont.)
Will add bedtime reading in the morning.
July 10, 2010 @ 5:57 pm | Filed under:
Books For one week I am attempting to record everything each member of the family reads. Today is day five. Day one. Day two. Day three. Day four.
Jane:
—The Naming
—The Riddle
—Bella at Midnight
—Things Not Seen
—Things Hoped For
—Things That Are, these last three by Andrew Clements
(Saturday is library day.)
—UPDATED ON SUNDAY: I hear she stayed up late last night finishing Mansfield Park. Yay!
Rose:
—Pearls of Lutra (cont.)
—The Birthday Ball by Lois Lowry (ARC; in progress)
Beanie:
—Mossflower (cont.)
—Beck Beyond the Sea (Disney fairies book)
—Lily in Full Bloom (Disney fairies)
me:
—A Long Walk to Water by Linda Sue Park (advance review copy)
—Great Expectations, first four chapters (long story) (ha, pun not intended)
read-aloud to Rilla & Wonderboy:
—Today I Will Fly (a Mo Willems Piggie & Elephant book)
—There Is a Bird on Your Head (ditto)**
—Mr. Putter and Tabby Paint the Porch
Scott:
—Reveal: The Story of REM (cont.)
—Ringworld (cont.)
Scott to Rilla at bedtime:
—The Salamander Room
I forgot to do arrivals and departures! Saturday is our big library day, so a lot of things went back. I forgot to pay attention to what, though. A bunch of Jane’s things—handful of Dorothy Sayers mysteries, plus I think I saw the four-book Softwire series by P. J. Haarsma, the Orbis books (Virus on Orbis 1, Betrayal on Orbis 2, etc; and I know there was a Caroline Cooney book in the pile too. Also the two Cory Doctorow YA novels I’d checked out—I’ve decided to read them as e-books instead.
As for arrivals, the library-goers brought home more than they took back. I saw two of Mary Pope Osborne’s series of tales based on The Odyssey (brilliant idea, I must say); So You Want to Be a Wizard by Diane Duane; all the books in Jane’s list above; three Disney fairies books; the first book of a YA series by Ted Dekker; and Scott checked out Ta-Nehisi Coates’s memoir, The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, a Son, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood.
**Adding a note about reading the two Mo Willems books with Rilla today, because I’ll want to remember this in years to come. We had enjoyed both of these books, Today I Will Fly and There’s a Bird on Your Head, dozens of times already, but several weeks ago. Yesterday we found Today I Will Fly and she “read” it to me—mostly from memory, but a fair amount of sight-word recognition happening. And that’s so exciting; I can see she’s on the brink of reading, just as it happened with Beanie & Bob Books before her, and Rose with My Father’s Dragon before that. Today, she “read” me There’s a Bird on Your Head. Then she picked up Today I Will Fly and read that one—except she used, deliberately, the words from There’s a Bird on Your Head, tweaking them slightly to make them loosely fit the Today I Will Fly pictures. It was kind of hilarious, and great fun to see her playing with form that way. Gosh, I love this stage.
OK, I can’t be bothered to do italics on all those titles. Sorry, Chicago Manual of Style.
July 10, 2010 @ 9:17 am | Filed under:
Books For one week I am attempting to record everything each member of the family reads. Today is day four. Day one. Day two. Day three.
Jane:
—Feed
—more Dorothy Sayers
—Mansfield Park (cont.)
Rose:
—The Long Patrol (cont.)
Beanie:
—Mossflower (cont.)
me:
—Um. Weird. I seem not to have read anything from a book on this day. Really? Can that be right? Read a fair amount online, but no fiction. Well, we had other things going on. Our kitchen Monarch emerged from its chrysalis. I got a haircut.
read aloud to littles:
—the Searching for Small chapter from House at Pooh Corner
(big kids couldn’t help listening)
—Today I Will Fly by Mo Willems (actually, delightfully, Rilla read most of this to me)
Scott:
—Feed (cont.)
After he emerged, we moved him to the backyard. Photo by Jane.
July 8, 2010 @ 8:08 pm | Filed under:
Books For one week I am attempting to record everything each member of the family reads. Today is day three. Day one. Day two.
Jane:
—Lord Peter by Dorothy Sayers
—Unexplained (cont.)
—Showcase Presents: Batman #4
—Mansfield Park (cont.)
—Percy Jackson: The Demigod Files
Rose:
—Salamandastron (apparently started last night; I missed it)
—The Long Patrol (in progress)
—Jennie’s Moonlight Adventure by Esther Averill
—The School for Cats, also by Averill
Beanie:
—Mossflower (cont.)
me:
—Finished Feed.
read to Rilla:
—If You Put Me in the Zoo. Seems to be this week’s favorite.
Scott to Rilla & older listen-and-laughers:
—Pish Posh Said Hieronymus Bosch (this time for real!)
Scott himself:
—Ringworld (cont.)
Arrivals:
—an REM biography for Scott
—the two Esther Averill cat books on Rose’s list above, a nice distraction from sore teeth on braces day
Another busy day: Rose got braces; I did the grocery shopping; we went to the Y. So not a lot of cuddle-and-read time. That’s summer.
July 7, 2010 @ 6:25 pm | Filed under:
Books For one week—starting, awkwardly, on a Tuesday—I am attempting to record everything each member of the family reads. Day one was yesterday.
Jane:
—Mansfield Park (cont.)
—Unexplained (cont.)
—Showcase Presents: Batman 3 & 4
Rose and Beanie:
—Fraggle Rock comics #2 & 3
Rose:
Pearls of Lutra (cont.)
Beanie:
—Mossflower (cont.)
—Rowan and the Ice Creepers
me:
—Feed (cont.)
—The Weed that Strings the Hangman’s Bag (cont.)
Scott to Rilla and older listeners-in:
—Pish Posh Said Hieronymus Bosch (whoops, strike that, she fell asleep too soon)
Arrivals:
—None! Practically a first!
Departures:
—Bears on Wheels went back to the library. Yup, I remembered.
Other book-related activities:
—Stopped into our local children’s bookstore to see if they were stocking the Betsy-Tacy reissues. The Emily of Deep Valley reissue with Mitali Perkins’s foreword, and the Carney/Winona reissue with my foreword, will be published in October. ALA Midwinter is being held right here in San Diego in January, and the Betsy-Tacy crowd is already gearing up for some Maud-themed fun. I wanted to make sure this little bookstore was up to speed on all things Betsy Ray. The manager had not heard about the reissues and was quite interested.
Miscellaneous notes:
—Busy morning out of the house; Jane had a friend over in the afternoon. I didn’t read anything at all to the little ones, a realization that, here at the tail end of the day, makes me wince a little.
This list doesn’t (yet) include bedtime reading. I’ll update it in the morning.
July 6, 2010 @ 7:14 pm | Filed under:
Books Just for fun, I thought I’d try to keep track of everything everybody in the house reads each day for one week. I’ll update today’s entry tomorrow morning after I find out who read what in bed tonight. I’ll also include notes on books that make their way into (or out of, on loan or otherwise) the house.
Jane:
—finished one Dorothy Sayers (The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club); started another (The Documents in the Case)
—Mansfield Park
—new issues of Muse and Calliope
—Unexplained: 347 Strange Sightings, Incredible Occurrences, and Puzzling Physical Phenomena (began)
Rose:
—High Rhulain
—(UPDATED next morning) Pearls of Lutra, at bedtime
Beanie:
—Mossflower
—Billy Batson and the Power of Shazam (comics trade paperback)
Read aloud to Beanie & Rose:
—chapter of String, Straightedge, & Shadow
Read aloud to Rilla & Wonderboy:
—Bears on Wheels
—Mama!
—Mr. Putter and Tabby Paint the Porch
Scott read aloud to all girls:
—I’m writing this before bedtime, but I’m assuming he’s going to read them a chapter of their current read-aloud, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. (Jane & Rose has read it already, numerous times. First time for Rose and Beanie. The older girls wouldn’t dream of missing another opportunity to hear Scott’s Dumbledore voice.)
(Sometimes Dumbledore performs selections from The Cat in the Hat. I’m told this is the funniest. thing. ever.)
UPDATED WITH CORRECTION: I was wrong; last night turned out to be a late bedtime, so no Harry Potter. Scott read Put Me in the Zoo to Rilla (and the room at large).
Me:
—a wee little bit of Denby’s Great Books
—began Feed by M. T. Anderson
—various blogs
—UPDATED next morning: at bedtime, enjoyed another chapter of The Weed that Strings the Hangman’s Bag (Flavia de Luce sequel)
Scott:
—Ringworld by Larry Niven.
—plus of course he reads all day at work, including, on this day, an early volume of Sandman which he had to proof for the digital edition.
Arrivals:
—The Simpsons in the Classroom (review copy; looks like fun)
—The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks and two others we’d reserved at the library; titles escape me now.
—also from the library, a few beginning readers: the aforementioned Mr. Putter book; ¡Mama! (a Spanish picture book Wonderboy makes a beeline for every time we go); a Little Bear book I think we own, but he was keen to check it out, so why not.
Departures:
—a stack of beginning readers returned to the library, except the one (Bears on Wheels) which was actually due today and not renewable, dadgummit. If I remember to return it before noon tomorrow, there won’t be a fine.
Will I remember? Oh the suspense.
July 5, 2010 @ 9:10 am | Filed under:
Family Scott took the four girls to see fireworks last night, while I stayed home with my exhausted, early-to-bed boys. It was a peaceful evening for me, and a quick one. The girls tumbled in the door around ten, flushed, starry-eyed, thrilled. “Too wonderful to talk about,” Rose said, which may be a first for our family. Scott had found them a choice spot on a rise at the edge of a golf course, and they stretched out on their backs—no blanket, we don’t think that far ahead—looking at stars until the fireworks started. Scott says Rilla ran and ran and twirled in the dark, and it was magical. She fell asleep on the way home, and he carried her straight to bed. I’d dressed her in soft clothes just in case, so we wouldn’t have to wake her by switching to pajamas.
This morning she padded down the hall toward me, staring in sleepy confusion at her pink sweater and t-shirt.
“I didn’t go to bed?” she asked, or said—it was more a statement than a question, but clearly a statement of fact which she found puzzling.
I’m trying to imagine swimming up toward consciousness and finding myself in my bed, with my sisters still sleeping in theirs, and then noticing my daytime clothes and deciding that meant I hadn’t slept at all. Even when I explained, she was still skeptical.
Scooping a few things from Twitter and Facebook for our family archives…
Beanie misreads “tapioca” at the grocery store, cries out in horror: “TILAPIA PUDDING???”
Rose has announced her new favorite snack: vanilla yogurt with red pepper flakes. I feel faint.
Beanie on Roald Dahl: “In a way, he’s kind of mean. He wrote books that are TOO GOOD, so now that I’ve read them all, I’m sad.”
Bowie on iTunes; Scott giving dramatic recitation, from memory, of HAND, HAND, FINGERS, THUMB in Patrick Stewart voice. #morningatmyhouse
A #booksthatchangedmyworld I forgot: Best Christmas Pageant Ever. Mrs. B in 5th grade read it aloud, hooked me on readalouds. (& that book!)
Also, possibly my first encounter with ‘unlikely heroes.’ Those awful Herdmans surprised everyone.
The 9yo asks, “How DO you fall unconscious, anyway?”
Scott is singing “Macho Man” to the baby, who is dancing like the Caddyshack gopher. I’m supposed to tear myself away from that and work??
Really, Amazon? There can’t possibly be anything in my buying history that suggests I would appreciate an email about a sale on Baconnaise.
“What happened to Alf’s girlfriend on Lark Rise” has surpassed “toddler nose blowing” as a top search topic bringing people to my blog.
Remark #905709 I never anticipated needing to make: “Please don’t kick people in your fake sleep.”
How Beanie, my early bird, greeted me this morning: “Mom, I was thinking. If you were in a coma for a lot of years, when you woke up, wouldn’t you be a GIANT? Because you do most of your growing when you are sleeping.”
Rilla is worried. Her sisters told her they are biking to Egypt today. From San Diego.
So at various points in this day I heard the baby referred to by his sisters as a minotaur and a ham. I suppose this is to be expected when his mother refers to him as her little side of beef.
Reeeaaaalllly wish I’d remembered the neighbors can hear outside my bedroom window before I started belting Don’t Cry Out Loud.
Today so far: a little Eliot, a little Plutarch, a little Skye Boat Song. Now watching Beanie fall into FARMER BOY for 1st time. #Ilovethis
Plutarch, by the way? Best kept secret when it comes to adventure tales. Those Romans, sheesh.
Beanie is astounded by FARMER BOY’s assertion that Almanzo & his siblings were not allowed to speak at meals. But she envies him his pie.
9yo: “Mom, I fear you have hooked me on Shakespeare. I keep thinking in quotations.”
Overheard: Rose, in a reproving tone: “Beanie, you’d CARE if you got your legs cut off.”
I could just stand here all day & transcribe. Beanie: “Beware, you creep-faced loon!” Rose:”You have to admire her creativity & desire to die.”
Listening to a Yale Open Course music class on the fugue. Fugue, from Latin fuga, flight: “One voice going ahead, leading ahead; another voice following it.” Yale’s Prof Wright is quite engaging.
Rilla: “When I grow up I want to be a goddess. Because I really want to know what clouds taste like.”
The 11yo just pitched me a six-book historical fiction series. I’m being roped in as research assistant.
A descent into madness and a brutal murder: that’s what I call an afternoon well spent. Love my kids’ Shakespeare Club.
Baby sits on kitchen floor chuckling, dripping water from a bottle onto his bare legs. Grins up at me all proud, like water’s his invention.
Scott has the day off; took big kids bowling. I’m playing dressup with Rilla but she had to pause for a pizza break. Signed, Mrs. Fancylady (mother of, apparently, a baby named Pickle Cheatman)
Rose is working on the last page of a Dover coloring book on dragons. It’s a “dragon questing license.” Wonderboy is driving her crazy by repeatedly grabbing her colored pencils. Laments Rose: “What I really need is a brother-maiming license.”
In the Awesome Baby Tricks department, he has learned to “hit the deck.” We are dying laughing.
Relieved to wake up and find that I did not, in fact, pay Clint Eastwood $1100 for a barrel of flour.
The 11yo says she is loving STARGIRL for its “imaginative, rich writing.” Future book blogger?
Children have constructed zipline for velcro-pawed toy monkey between closet and bunk bed.
The title of this conversation is “Not a Morning Person.” Me: “Good morning!” Rilla: “Mommy, I don’t like when people say that.”
July 1, 2010 @ 6:35 am | Filed under:
Books Continued to read, slowly, big chunks here and there, my two books on crows: Crow Planet and Caw of the Wild. In Caw, the author makes the acquaintance of her neighborhood crows (whom she comes to know by sight and personalities) by tossing peanuts onto her roof every day at the same time. This amused and delighted me, because the crows here fly passes over our yard every morning to see if I have chucked our bread crusts out the back door yet. I started clicking my tongue when I put out the crusts, and now if I walk out back in the morning and click, I’ll hear the sentry crow, perched in our neighbor’s tree with an eye on our yard, call a heads-up to his fellows. I get a little thrill of delight every time.
To Serve Them All My Days by R. F. Delderfield (a reread, only half finished at the end of June).
The Children’s Book by A.S. Byatt. I have not managed to be coherent about it yet.
Mindblind by Jennifer Roy. ARC sent by publisher. YA fiction about a boy with Asperger’s Syndrome. Mentioned here.
The Whisper of Glocken by Carol Kendall. Sequel to The Gammage Cup. From my notes: “Even better than Gammage, though The Firelings still holds the top spot in my heart. I want to write at more length about Kendall’s beguiling, quirky, suspenseful books, especially her fondness for bands of unlikely heroes whose faults turn out, Meg Murry-like, to be their strengths. For now I’ll just say that I highly recommend all three of these novels as family read-alouds or as satisfying read-alones for boys, girls, and fantasy-loving adults.”
A God Somewhere by John Arcudi, illustrated by Peter Snejbjerg (graphic novel).
Rivers in the Desert: William Mulholland and the Inventing of Los Angeles by Margaret Leslie Davis (parts).
Now it’s July. Three weeks to Comic-con. That’ll shape my reading choices this month.
