Puzzles

While Brian and the kids are downstairs working on a giant floor puzzle, I am upstairs working on a bit of a puzzle of my own. 

Here I am surrounded by some of the pieces.

I've got two marked up manuscripts.
I've got emails.
I've got binders.
I've got meeting notes.
I've got phone conversation notes.
I've got multiple documents with "thoughts for revision."
I've got hundreds of ideas swirling around in my head...
and I've got to put them all together.

Revision.

A bit of a puzzle? 

Yes, indeed. 

Too bad you can't see the girl behind the camera, pulling her hair out, trying to put it all together. 

Bright Young Things in a Dark Speakeasy

What could be more perfect than meeting in a modern day "speakeasy" (the front is a pie shop) to discuss The Great Gatsby?

Only going to said speakeasy dressed as bright young things and drinking pisco punch with a marvelous group of literary ladies.

Our book club really is the bee's knees.

                                                                         See! We really discussed the book too. 

And when the night came to an end, we left that place in style...

...each one of us a Zelda or a Daisy Buchanan until the stroke of midnight, when we returned to our homes and turned back into unassuming, bookish moms. 

Cheers, Darlings.

Kids' Reading Clubhouse--Ruby Lu

This month the Kids' Reading Clubhouse read Ruby Lu: Empress of Everything by Lenore Look.

It's a smart, fun, and well-written book for girls. In this story, there are lots of laughs, problems to solve, and new things to learn. (The author also has a series for boys that is all of the above, plus some.)

We talked about words like immigration on Friday, and discussed what it would be like if your cousin from another country came to live with you. We talked about what it would be like to be deaf and also how friends can solve some of their own problems by apologizing to each other.

Then we got busy with our activities of the day. Each girl got to try her hand at origami. We made Fortune Cookies.

Remember these?

Then we got some practice eating edamame and pot stickers (by far the most popular snack so far) with chop sticks. 

Finally, the girls got to memorize how to say something in sign language using a pictorial sign language chart and demonstrate it for the group. By the end, they all knew how to say "I love you" and "Thank you" in sign language. Always handy to know!

Dragons Love Tacos

This book found its way into our library bag a few weeks ago. 

I was skeptical. 

I sort of started to like it when I noticed all of the tacos on the endsheets. That's pretty funny. 

Then we read the first line:

"Hey kid, did you know that dragons love tacos?"

Then we learned that they love tacos and parties, but not spicy taco toppings. Definitely not spicy salsa. What they love most of all are taco parties, which are parties with lots of tacos. 

"Hey dragon, are you excited for the big taco party?"

By the end, we were in love and already flipping back to the beginning to read it again. Suddenly, the tacos on the endsheets were even funnier than they were the first time we noticed them.

After reading it 1,000 times, we couldn't even pull it out of the bag without cracking up. It's just funny. Deadpan funny. Majorly fun to read out loud. And so silly that you have to laugh every single time. It's one of those books that kids memorize after a few reads and then walk around the house reciting. 

I could never have guessed that this silly book would become one of our favorites. But it's true. We love Dragons Love Tacos. 

Kids' Reading Clubhouse--The Quilt Walk

This month, we read The Quilt Walk by Sandra Dallas.

Isn't this a gorgeous cover

It was a bit slower than the other books we've read--kind of like the long walk Emmy Blue and her family took from Illinois to Colorado. It wasn't magical like Pippi Longstocking or thrilling like The Spiderwick Chronicles. But still, it was good. We laughed a bit, gasped some, and we learned a lot.

When the girls and I met, we focused on the stories quilts tell.

Each girl made a log cabin quilt square.

And we put them all together to make a paper quilt. 

Then we looked at a quilt that a friend made for our family.

And each girl wrote about what she thought the bear was doing. We made up our own stories.

We ate dried apple pie for snack and named the two things (and only two) that we would bring along if we had to walk from Illinois to Colorado back in 1863. Tough choice. My favorite answer was from a little girl who said, "I'd bring my blanket and a huge stack of books." I told her she could only bring one book if she brought her blanket. "Well, hmm," she said. "That's impossible."

2013 Book Club Line-up

Yesterday was our book club's annual tea and planning meeting. This year we met at Oak and Berries Tea Room in The Denver Museum of Dolls and Miniatures, which was so quirky and non-hip, that it was pretty cool. It was actually really lovely, and I highly recommend it. Between tea and tiny sandwiches, we each offered our book suggestion for the year and nabbed a month to host.

Here's the line-up...


February
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

March
Left to Tell by Immaculée Ilibagiza

April
The Other Wes Moore by Wes Moore

May
Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simonson

June
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens

SKIPPING JULY--HAVE FUN WITH THE BEACH READS

August
End of Your Life Book Club by Will Schwalbe

September
The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

October
Little Princes by Conor Grennan

November
The Hummingbird's Daughter by Luis Alberto Urrea

December
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

Cheers!

Best Reads of 2012

Here are the top 5 books I read this year--the ones that I couldn't put down, couldn't stop thinking about, wanted to carry with me all the time, the ones I bought after having read them just so I can see them on my shelf and pull them out from time to time...the ones that changed my life for a brief and beautiful little bit.

Okay for Now by Gary D. Schmidt

This book is a triumph in character development, dialogue, and plot. It manages to be hilariously funny and bitterly sad all at the same time. There is one major flaw at the end...but I can overlook it only because the whole thing adds up to a wonderful read. Gary D. Schmidt is a master of his craft.

Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer



Everything is Illuminated tore me to shreds and put me back together again. The characters, especially Alex (!!) are fascinating and transformative.

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer



Now I am a huge Jonathan Safran Foer fan. This book is the best kind of sad because it's so well written and there are lots of hilarious parts too. Even when you're crying, you're laughing. I thought it was an excellent book. Excellent. The main character is incredible.

The Secret History by Donna Tartt



I got lost in this book. It's a reverse murder mystery. From page one you know who died and who did it, yet for over 500 pages, the author keeps you reading, rapt, as you slowly discover the how and the why and the aftermath.

Nicholas St. North and the Battle of the Nightmare King by William Joyce 



True adventure! Excellent storytelling! I read it to my daughter and she gives it 5 stars. She was gasping, hiding her head, laughing, and begging for more the whole time. The vocabulary is rich and beautiful as well.

Happy Reading in 2013!