Eat, Read, and Be Mommy

Not to or from Idaho, mind you–we did that Thursday and Sunday. (We had a nice weekend with family, too–my brother took my kids with some of his and our oldest great niece to see “Wonka,” the kids found treasures at DI with Grandma–and when we got back, I helped finish up the PTA fundraiser. Hallelujah!) No, today I drove my son to a med check, home, to therapy, and then to school; in half an hour or so I get to take our poor sick bunny to the vet, with my coughing-and-therefore-not-at-school 3rd grader in tow. Thankfully, this week’s church activity for the youth was last night instead of tonight, so once we’re home from the vet and the rest of the kids are home from school, we’ll be HOME.

In the meantime, I finished a graphic novel today while my son was in therapy, and it should cheer the coughing queen up immeasurably if I review it and pass it on, so here goes! Britt checked The Do-Over out with her kiddos, and from her reaction to it I had no doubt my evens (children numbers 2 and 4, the graphic novel-obsessed ones) would enjoy it. I confess to starting it and then taking a long hiatus from it before picking it back up again, but from there I zipped through it pretty quickly, and it was fun. Not, you know, realistically fun–adults are going to have to suspend a whole lot of disbelief–but fun all the same, and with great messages about friends, family, and being yourself (whoever that may be). Mariana’s shyness makes for a storyline my kiddos should absolutely relate to, and the hair salon she opens with her new friends turns out some fantastic ‘dos. This is perfect for the shy, the recently-moved-and-trying-to-adjust, and the fashion-fond, so if your kiddo fits that description–or just loves graphic novels–don’t miss this one!

I’m conceding defeat, folks. It’s the second week of the PTA Fundraiser, I’m trying to cover as much money counting/collecting as I can while still ferrying children places, there’s a Relief Society dinner tomorrow night, and my son has a band concert on Wednesday. Despite the fact that I have at LEAST 3 books waiting to be reviewed, I’m going to take the rest of the week off. And given that Monday is the last day to turn money in?

Let’s just plan on reconvening Wednesday.

I should have blogged on Wednesday, yes. Shall I tell you about my Wednesday?

I was at the elementary school to collect money for the PTA fundraiser from 8:10-ish to 8:50-ish, after which I booked it home to exercise and get ready so I could be at the library to pick up holds right when it opens at 10. From there I went back to the elementary school to check out my daughter, then to the junior high to check out my son, then on to therapy. After dropping them both off at their respective schools afterwards I ran home to use the bathroom, grabbed lunch at Sonic, and then headed to Kearns High to donate blood (it was the most convenient blood drive I could find for this week). I did get to go home for an hour or so before leaving to pick up my elementary schooler, but I used some of that time to snag a bit of rest and more of it to consider laundry mountain. I had kids in and out for church things from 4:30 until after 9, and so in between my four loads of laundry I fed them, sent them off, welcomed them back, sent them off again–you get the idea. By the time I was truly done with the day, there was no coherence left in me.

(Honestly, I was gone a good bit yesterday as well, but almost three hours of that involved driving to Draper and having lunch with one of my best friends, so it was a better kind of busy.) Today, however–today is the day I get to attack a book review or three (depending on my level of coherence, you understand), go to Costco, and then drive kids around all afternoon. Good times, right?

So. I finished listening to Jamie Sumner’s One Kid’s Trash earlier this week…again. (Because the first time I listened to it I let too much time pass before managing a review.) My second girlie and I both enjoyed Roll With It and Time to Roll, and both my older girls and I read and thoroughly enjoyed Tune It Out; I wanted to love One Kid’s Trash as well, but I have to confess–on my second listen, I started to find Hugo a bit whiny. To be fair, however, I think it’s a much more gender-specific thing to be bullied for being small; I’m not saying girls don’t deal with short jokes and such, but I don’t think it’s quite the same. And Hugo does have a good bit to deal with–he’s had to move away from his friends and his dad’s lack of attention to home and family commitments is no small thing. While it’s not unusual for a kid to let newfound popularity go to his or her head, however, I’ve always found it to be a particularly annoying thing to read about, and Hugo’s rationalizing needed a more significant epiphany moment for me to consider him fully redeemed. (Of course, on the other hand, family relationships are in some ways more complicated than friendships.) Still, it’s a good story with likeable characters, and Hugo’s grand gesture is impressive; I know I’m letting myself be more irritated than the situation warrants. I’m thinking my second girlie will probably enjoy this one, and for any boy that’s been picked on or bullied, this could be a fantastic choice. (And Hugo’s epiphany over his crossword mistake is significant, thank goodness.)

As for me? I’m already looking forward to my next Jamie Sumner experience!

…Meaning I stayed up later than I should have with my audiobook and a jigsaw puzzle. Stopping either one by itself can be hard enough, but the combination–well, I struggle.

On the other hand, that means you get a quick review, so I can return said audiobook before I head off to the library today (although I’ll have to get my car back from being serviced first). I started listening to The Marlow Murder Club when I was in need of something lighter but determined not to just re-listen to an old favorite; I’ve read and listened to parts of other books since starting it, but last night I got to that point in a mystery where you can’t really stop, and while I’m tired today, it’s still nice to have finished it.

I will say, I don’t read a ton of mysteries overall; I tend towards romance when I want something fluffy. I am a devout Agatha Christie fan, however, and so a sleuthing team made up of an older British woman, a vicar’s wife named Becks, and a down-to-earth empty-nester single mother appealed. (Okay, they’re all British women, but that sentence was giving me more trouble than last night’s bedtime could deal with.) Judith, Becks, and Suzie are an unlikely but likeable trio; while their camaraderie may be on the sudden side, they’re both engaging and entertaining together. Robert Thorogood’s red herrings are such that it took me longer to put my finger on the solution than it might have done, and the ending is satisfying (if a touch farcical). Marlow Murder Club isn’t perfect, I grant you, but it’s enjoyable enough that I didn’t really care. Give it a try if you’re interested!

I was really, really going to write a review today, folks, only I got caught up getting dinner in the crockpot, collecting library books that are due and not renewable tomorrow, and calling to make appointments, and then somehow it was time to eat lunch and pick my 14-year-old up for her 2:00 appointment. From there it’s been mostly go, go, go, and now I’m most definitely not mentally capable of much critical thought. Here, then, is a review of another color…

Parents of school-aged children out there–have you heard of the Graphic Library series? In some ways it’s a bit like the “Who Was ______?” series, only they’re graphic novels of between 25-35 pages long about all kinds of people from history. There are categories–inventors, courageous children, etc.–and today I read (in order to pass it along to my children) Elizebeth Friedman: Expert Codebreaker of World War II. I’ll admit that the art in the series isn’t always fantastic–and honestly, neither is the writing. Regardless, I keep checking them out and making my children read them after I do, because a)I love history, b)it’s important and I want to communicate that to my children, and c)requiring them to read graphic novels of 35 pages or fewer isn’t unreasonable. Every once in a while one of them balks a bit, but I remain hardhearted–and I love that my 9-year-old knows who Claudette Colvin is.

The one about Elizebeth Friedman, however–and yes, spell check’s hissy fit notwithstanding, that IS how you spell her first name–was more my style of art AND beyond fascinating. I had no idea how big of a role Friedman played in cracking codes in the US–for decades, no less! She SHOULD be a big deal in history books, but instead (shocker) an unscrupulous man took public credit for some of her more serious accomplishments, and it’s been relatively recently that she’s begun to receive the credit she deserves. Look her up if you want some interesting reading for the day!

I did not manage a review today.

I did manage to:

1. Get my nephew to the airport by 7:30-ish this morning
2. Get my oldest to the eye doctor by 8:15-ish this morning
3. Exercise
4. Get my youngest to therapy at 11 this morning
5. Eat lunch and read more than half of my Come Follow Me for the day
6. Get my 14YO to therapy at 2 this afternoon
7. Pick up library holds–and crickets for Palmer
8. Do the load of wash that I meant to do yesterday before the kitchen/dining area ate me
9. Exercise
10. Feed all the people that needed feeding
11. Listen to my conference talk, exercise, read to my youngest, put her to bed, and do the dishes
12. Make muffins for people to have for breakfast tomorrow
13. –oh, well, I’m not DONE…so I’m off now to finish Come Follow Me, shower, and (maybe, hopefully) get to bed slightly early. Goodnight all!

I was a good girl and showered early last night, which meant I had time to do something after my shower; I used that time to finish reading Nidhi Chanani’s Jukebox.

It was, as my 14-year-old says, pretty okay.

To be fair, it’s visually beautiful–the premise lends itself to some fantastic two-page spreads. And it isn’t that the plot isn’t interesting; the idea of going back in time through records played on a magic jukebox is a great one. It’s just that it’s a fast adventure tale, and so the details–the specifics, the ‘why exactly’s, the ‘what makes these people tick’s–are just kind of vague. The relationship between Naz and Shahi is definitely there but could have been fleshed out, and the major plot points mostly feel a bit abrupt (and slightly random) to me. I am, of course, decades older than the intended audience, but part of this is a writing issue; the book just wanted to be 50 or more pages longer and more detailed. (My favorite thing about it was googling the famous musicians as their albums came up and learning more about them.) As for my intended audience children? I’ll have to let you know what they think after they read it. (They may not actually care.)

Alrighty, I’m off to the next thing. Happy Tuesday!

I suppose, for a lover of historical fiction, I’m on the picky side–not only do I generally avoid the American Civil War like the plague, I lose some interest with each receding century. I was, therefore, less than enthusiastic to see a book with a Silk Road setting on this year’s list of Newbery Honor books–and an outrageously long-titled book to boot. From the very first line of Daniel Nayeri’s The Many Assassinations of Samir, the Seller of Dreams, however, I was pretty much hooked. (Seriously–how can you not want to read a book that begins with “The first time I was stoned to death by an angry mob, I was not even a criminal”?)

I read somewhere that Samir is a buddy comedy, and when I finished it, I realized that it’s true–when I try to compare it to a movie, classics like “The Sting,” “Lethal Weapon,” and “Undercover Blues” come to mind. (That last is a husband/wife team, but still.) Having been saved by the aforementioned angry mob by a portly merchant with a penchant for tales–especially tall ones–Monkey is disturbed by his new master’s casual relationship with the truth and yet somehow drawn into his schemes. When Monkey, Samir, and the rest of their caravan realize that multiple killers have been hired to exact someone‘s revenge upon the Seller of Dreams, however, the novel takes on an “Indiana Jones” sort of quality–with a sprinkling of “Charade” thrown in. What results is a humorous action/adventure tale with an astonishing amount of heart (both emotional and philosophical), and I’m still inwardly grinning over how much more I enjoyed it than I thought I would. Don’t miss this one!

I was really going to review another book today, but it’s clearly far too late for me to do justice to a book I absolutely loved. On the other hand, I was legitimately doing other things earlier–to whit:

1)I made my hubby sandwiches for lunch. 2)I got dressed and ready before I had to take my 3rd grader to school. 3)I took the third grader to school. 4)I stayed and wrote a couple of PTA checks with the president and our book fair person. 5)I went straight from the school to the eye doctor, where 6)I got my pupils dilated, which affected my activities for the next several hours. 7)I stopped at Reams. 8)I got home, exercised, and made quesadillas. I did not write a book review, because I wasn’t at all sure that my eyes would be usable for the task. 9)I fetched my 3rd grader–and ended up napping on the couch for a bit afterwards. 10)I spent the rest of the day doing mom things–including three loads of laundry and schlepping my son to piano and back–and one of my kiddos got sick. I did spend time relaxing after all the kids were in bed, because who doesn’t?

I suppose I’ll keep my fingers crossed for Monday…

It was clearly more than just a week, folks. We actually spent Friday the 9th in Logan, the 10 was my youngest girlie’s 9th birthday, and then the next week saw me making dinner for neighbors two days in a row, juggling more kid appointments, and gratefully accepting wheat from neighbors who were getting rid of it. (Which involved schlepping not-light boxes up and down stairs. I also went to the temple, which was very nice.) My son’s basketball season ended with his last game on the 17th, my two older girls went to a surprise birthday party for one of their favorite cousins, which involved spending the night in Clearfield, and–you get the idea. Monday, of course, was a holiday with all the kiddos home, so there was shopping and the day got away from me (not to mention the distractions). Last night my hubby and I got to go to a BYU basketball game in Provo, thanks to tickets from his brother, and since BYU pulled off a home court victory over Baylor, who was ranked 11th to our 25th, it was quite a fun night. And that brings us up to date!

In the meantime, I don’t have to fix dinner tonight, since it’s Zupas night for the elementary school, and so I can actually review one of the books waiting for me to deal with. On Saturday night, while my blessed hubby drove to Clearfield and back to retrieve our teenagers (the younger of which didn’t want to take the train home), I finished Andrea Beatriz Arango’s Something Like Home. It was more quietly poignant than Arango’s Newbery-winning debut, Iveliz Explains It All, and there were fewer random Spanish phrases (most of which I could more easily translate). Honestly? If you take Jamie Sumner’s Tune It Out, mix it with Joan Bauer’s Raising Lumie, and throw in a dash of Cynthia Voigt’s Homecoming, you get a pretty good approximation of the plot of Something Like Home. (Maybe also a dash of Dusti Bowling’s Across the Desert?) Laura’s parents have been sent to rehab, she’s living with an aunt she’s never met, and the reality of a temporary–or not so temporary?–living arrangement/existence is complicated. Who (and what) helps, how Laura comes to terms with the upheaval she’s experienced, and what life is going to look like going forward is the crux of this verse novel, and a solid verse novel it is. I ended up feeling like Laura’s mental transition happened a bit abruptly, that there was less of a gradual transition than I might have expected, but I did read it over an extended period of time, so that may have been on me. In the meantime, this is a book for those whose families aren’t typical but are still families, and goodness knows we need those in our world. Give it a shot!