Eat, Read, and Be Mommy

This is why I’m reviewing Best Friends for Never (Katie the Catsitter #2) at this moment, folks–because my twelve-year-old might die if she has to wait another hour for it. I gave her the first one for Christmas and at the time, the second book wasn’t out yet; once it came out and she FOUND out, however, she’s been–ahem!–a trifle eager to get her hands on it. Thankfully, I did manage to finish it before dinner, and so here we are! (I might have finished it earlier, except that I spent almost three hours painting doors and trim today and then had a shorter-than-usual wait at the elementary school because that same eager twelve-year-old missed the bus and had to be retrieved.)

Luckily, it was a fun read–every bit as fun as the first book, in fact. There’s a nice nod to feelings, a hero twist or two, and a lurking British baking show. What’s not to love? Friend problems proliferate for a bit, but resolution prevails; I’m guessing my eager twelve-year-old will love this one.

My children are the perfect age for Mother’s Day, folks. My littles came in around 7:30 to wish me happy mother’s day, and then my son asked me when I wanted breakfast in bed. I told him anytime would be fine, and so he left his 7-year-old sister behind with “The Kid Book of Awesome Jokes” (or something) as my “entertainment” while I waited. So she told me jokes–I eventually pulled her in to snuggle with me while she did it–until her 9-year-old brother brought me 1)watery hot chocolate, 2)a piece of wheat toast, very scantily spread with butter and jam, 3)a small bowl of spray whipped cream, with some caramel sauce on one side for hair and a smile made out of chocolate chips, and 4)a parfait of spray whipped cream and pieces of a chocolate covered wafer bar from Trader Joe’s, with a “prize” at the bottom.

The prize was a mallow-topped Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup.

It’s hard to say whether it was literally or figuratively sweeter, because while even I can’t easily handle that much sugar at breakfast-time, my son brought it for me with no help from older siblings, and that was fabulous. My oldest made me a personalized coloring page–something I told her I wanted when she made one for her youngest sister on her birthday–and my 12-year-old brought me a separate breakfast tray when she woke up. It did actually have three varieties of fruit–mandarin oranges, banana slices, and a small bowl of bottled peaches–but it also had alternating marshmallows and Wiley Wallaby’s red licorice.

Maybe I need to be more discreet about my sweet tooth.

Anyway. I saw my mother-in-law and talked to my own mother, and my husband got me a quirky sort of present that made me smile. I am blessed.

And in other news, I finished reading Megabat and the Not-Happy Birthday aloud to my 7-year-old last week, and it was a cute maybe-end to the series. (It was published recently enough that I’m not ruling out the possibility of more, you understand.) Some normal-but-difficult feelings arise and mistakes are made, but all is well that ends well! Fans of Megabat will definitely enjoy this one.

My 12-year-old, who still loves me reading aloud to her, is generally not excited by nonfiction. (To be fair, neither was I at her age.) This means that I don’t get to share my passion for history with her, and that’s okay; we share other things. She IS, however, an animal lover, and so we occasionally read a Sibert winner together (that would be the Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Award, which includes a yearly Medal winner as well as various Honor books, like the Newbery). We finished reading one of those tonight–another Sy Montgomery and Nic Bishop collaboration called The Quest for the Tree Kangaroo: An Expedition to the Cloud Forest of New Guinea–and I lost count of how many times I heard “Oh, they’re so CUTE!” as we read. I have to say, I enjoyed the last book we read by the two of them more than this one (something about kakapo parrots), but this one was still completely interesting (I apparently just prefer rescue expeditions to exploratory ones). The photos of the cloud forest were possibly as appealing to me as the photos of the tree kangaroos were to my girlie; I would LOVE to visit there. If you have an animal lover in your household, however, he or she is likely to love this one.

By the by, I’m well aware that this is rather a poorly written review; I’m just too tired to do better in the time I have as well as unwilling to put it off. My apologies! My oldest took her first AP test this past week, and after enjoying a church women’s conference this morning, I’ve been playing chore catch-up ever since. Here’s hoping for a slightly calmer week…

I normally don’t review books that I’ve skimmed before handing down to my children–reading first and handing a book down isn’t quite the same thing–but I have to give a shout-out to Lenore Look’s Alvin Ho series. If you have an elementary-aged boy, you know how hard it is to find good books that appeal to boys but DON’T depend on bathroom humor; Alvin Ho, however, is a perfect example of boys’ literature done right. First of all, he’s hilarious. Secondly, we see his siblings through his eyes (not to mention the rest of his family). And thirdly through whatever number-ly, he’s a NOT white kid growing up in an area that’s positively crawling with colonial history, and the juxtaposition is fabulous. (Plus he struggles with anxiety, and I LOVE the way Look deals with it.) My son and I are both completely bummed that we’ve run out of new Alvin Ho books, so if you have a boy in elementary school and you’re looking for a worthwhile book to put into his hands, look no further.

It’s been a while since I posted a recipe, although not for lack of trying new ones; last night, however, I tried two new syrup recipes to go with our French toast, and this Lemon Syrup recipe was amazing. (I didn’t try the pancakes, obviously. French toast was on the menu because we had bread to use.) I actually had some leftover heavy cream that hadn’t gone bad–a rarity–and since I don’t love the taste of lemon extract anyway, I just zested the lemon before I juiced it and added the zest in place of the extract. (My lemon gave me about 3 tablespoons of juice, so I topped off the last tablespoon with the bottled variety, and that worked just fine.) I did wish I’d used a bigger pan–the foaming was impressive–but oh, the lovely, creamy lemon taste! Easier to make than lemon curd, and if you were to serve up a small slice of vanilla cake topped with fresh raspberries, this syrup would make the whole thing completely amazing.

If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to daydream about that for awhile…

Today is my mother’s birthday, and since she and my dad are actually in town, I went with them and one of my mother’s sisters to Cafe Rio for lunch.

I’m still stuffed. On the other hand, since I wasn’t actually EATING dinner, I read three new library books to the kiddos!

Anyway. I finished reading Gillian Goerz’ Shirley & Jamila Save Their Summer yesterday–before my 12-year-old’s dance concert at the school, which she repeated tonight–and I quite enjoyed it. Shirley Bones is very much a 12-year-old, probably-on-the-spectrum Sherlock Holmes, but Jamila is a delightfully unexpected Watson who wants to spend her summer playing basketball. With some maneuvering (from more than one quarter), they find themselves summer partners of a sort; as the nature of their partnership starts to change, however, rough patches inevitably follow. How they (successfully) navigate those is a pleasure, because the more our kids can read about compromise and conflict resolution done well, the more hope they have of making it work in their own lives.

Not to mention the whole “it’s a fun graphic novel with an intriguing mystery and multi-faceted characters” thing. My 12-year-old is going to be pleased as punch to get this one!

Technically, I finished listening to The Cat I Never Named: A True Story of Love, War, and Survival in May of last year; I didn’t review it then, however, and so this month I listened to it again.

It blew me away the second time as well.

I’ve probably read more than my share of war memoirs, mostly because WWII fascinates me; Amra Sabic-El-Rayess’ memoir, however, was an entirely different experience for me, because she came to the United States the year I graduated from high school. Our high school experiences overlapped, yet I had no clue what kind of suffering was going on in her world, and it was my own fault. Sarajevo, after all, was in the news; this I know because I avidly followed the 1994 Olympics, where both Katarina Witt and Torvill and Dean skated their free programs as tributes to the city and the people that had hosted them ten years previously. At that point in my life, however, I had little to no interest in politics and little to no awareness of conflicts taking place so far away from my own life. (I was more aware of major happenings in the US–I remember the basic story behind Waco and David Kouresh in 1993, for example–but still.) While I was competing in band festivals and hearing Ace of Bass on the radio, Amra lived in daily fear of bombings. At an age where my test scores consumed my thoughts, she fought the weakness of malnutrition every time she walked to school. And as I completed high school and headed off to college on a full-tuition scholarship, so did she–but without the family, resources and ready support system that met me at BYU. Her courage astounds me.

This memoir is a testament to the ugliness of hatred and what it can lead to; it is also a testament to the power of love and how it protects us. It is an eminently worthwhile read–a powerful read–an IMPORTANT read. It is also a poignant, beautiful, and a compelling one.

Don’t miss it.

Last night I finished reading All Four Stars aloud to my 12-year-old, folks, and I have to say, Gladys Gatsby is living the dream. What kid wouldn’t want a secret job as a food critic for the New York–ahem!–Standard, if the first assignment was for an up-and-coming dessert place? (Although I admit, I wasn’t nearly as adventurous with food in 6th grade as I am now.) Unfortunately, after a regrettable creme brulee/blowtorch incident, her parents have forbidden her to cook, and Gladys is going to need her cooking skills in order to get into the city to complete her assignment…

My daughter and I laughed out loud while reading together last night; All Four Stars is intentionally hyperbolic (I was annoyed at her food-impaired parents before figuring that out) and it works for the plot, given that the premise is a stretch. Gladys’ passion for food is contagious, and I empathized with her, but her parents’ punishment forces her into making connections outside of her kitchen, which the parent in me recognizes as a positive thing. Food lovers, aspiring writers, and quirky readers of all ages should love this one!

I want you to imagine the most amazing stuffed peppers you can–fresh, perfectly ripe peppers, stuffed with cheesy, savory goodness, baked to perfection and served on lovely dishes in good company.

I loathe stuffed peppers. When I was a kid, I would save the filling for last–I enjoyed the filling–and grimly eat my way through pieces of the outside pepper first, hating every bite. (Sometimes I took a nibble of the filling in the middle of eating the pepper, just to fortify myself and remind me of the light at the end of the tunnel.) As an adult, I can intellectually understand the appeal of a perfectly crunchy, slightly sweet raw red bell pepper, and I periodically cut them up for some of my kids, but whichever taste bud makes bell peppers appealing rather than appalling did not make it into my mouth.

The Last Cuentista is a darn near perfect stuffed pepper. The writing is lovely, the suspense grows and has you on the edge of your seat by the end, and what could be better than a book that emphasizes the importance of story? The filling, in short, is fabulous. My problem is that I still don’t like bell peppers–or, in this case, dystopian sci-fi. I don’t just not prefer it in comparison to other sorts of fiction; I actively dislike dystopian anything, and I can only handle sci-fi if the emphasis is on the characters and the story rather than the sci-fi-ness of the setting. (I did, for example, enjoy Ender’s Game and Speaker for the Dead.) I love Petra–I admire her bravery and I felt the pain of her loss–and her story is a great one; I’m also thrilled that The Last Cuentista won the Newbery Medal, because its genre is definitely underrepresented in the Newbery canon. It just took me, personally, half the book before I was engaged enough for it not to feel like pulling teeth to read. The fact that I more or less enjoyed the second half is an incredible testament to Donna Barba Higuera and her storytelling; if you even occasionally like dystopian fiction and/or sci-fi, you should absolutely read this book. As for me, well–it impressed and moved me, but still.

Stuffed peppers.

I honestly didn’t realize that I haven’t posted in 8 days, but I’m somehow not surprised. On Monday my oldest had the orthodontist, on Tuesday I had the temple, on Wednesday we had my girls’ dance dress rehearsal, and last night was the recital…and then vomit. I did finally finish listening to the audiobook that was due in a day or two, but after being up in the night, my writing brain isn’t up to the review at the moment. Let’s hope for a better night’s sleep tonight!