Books Lists Life

Random Friday, hey!

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 20:20:00 +0000

It was a very trying week, so happy it's Friday.
I'm enjoying a quiet day with just the Bug and the Princess.
Speaking of the Princess. Guess who still doesn't sleep? She takes four solid naps a day, broken up by 4 hour stretches. Think about that. (Edited to add: Yes, we've tried _______. She takes two naps a day, then sleeps from about 9pm-midnight and then from about 3am-8am. Occasionally she'll skip that early evening nap, and sleep from about 11 to about 7am. She still wakes once in there to complain.)
I'm looking for some good FREE kid's apps for iPhone. Any suggestions?
Mike is off this weekend (WHAT??) and while we have some plans I'm really looking forward to it.

What I read this week:

Split by Swati Avasthi. Good grief I can't remember that name long enough to type it. Barely started, but nervous already because of the bookstore scene.
Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor. Enjoyed most of it, the world is terrific. Felt it bogged down in the last third.
Blue Like Jazz: Nonreligious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality by Donald Miller. Highly recommended by a good friend.

Okay For Now by Gary D. Schmidt

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 13:30:00 +0000

Doug Swieteck and his family have just moved to a stupid new town for his father's stupid new job. His new house is A Dump and his older brother is a wanna be thug. His mom is doing her best, but is no match for the force of his father, who drinks and keeps bad company. His oldest brother Lucas is serving his country in Vietnam. Doug is starting junior high in a new school where it is already assumed he will follow in his brother's footsteps. Even with all this stacked against him, Doug manages to find a Saturday job delivering groceries, makes friends with the grocer's daughter, and discovers a talent for drawing that allows him to see more than what is on the surface.

I picked up because it's on Janssen's list of best books in 2012. Chances are I'd have eventually gotten around to reading it anyway, as I read The Wednesday Wars a couple years ago and absolutely loved it. Okay for Now is a companion book, in that Doug is also in TWW, but it's not a sequel so you don't have to have read one to read the other. I read the first half of the book over a period of about two weeks and then on Saturday afternoon I sat down and read through to the end.

Schmidt has a very informal way of writing, the book is written in first person and Doug speaks directly to the reader throughout. Despite this, he also has a way of quietly layering details that make the book really terrific. For example, early in the book Doug discovers a book of John James Audobon's birds in his local library and begins to practice drawing them. Each chapter has a picture of one of the drawings and a bit about the composition of the picture (which forced me to flip back and forth to the picture as I was reading). Somehow these technical details about drawing don't feel forced as he's learning them, and even more impressively, don't feel forced as he is thinking about them later. For me, this is one of the best parts of the book, it's just so well crafted that you as you're reading you notice the terrific composition of the book, but you don't mind at all because it's so well done. (Another terrific example of this is Rachel's Holiday by Marian Keyes, if you're not so into YA literature.) There are other tiny details throughout that, when you notice them, are brilliantly done.

The book wraps up with a bit of a bow on an ongoing theme, but a bit of an open ending on the cute little romance. Somehow the one balanced out the other enough that I wasn't annoyed by either (and yes, this is vague, but I don't want to tell you anything else.) Like TWW, it takes place over an entire school year, and the pacing is nice and solid. At this point it's a foregone conclusion that I'll be picking up Schmidt's remaining book Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy .

Have you read this one? What did you think? Have you ever read a book that blew you away with techinique, while managing to not have it impact the story negatively? I hate it when an author tries too hard to do something cool, but this one hit exactly the write notes for me. (HAHA, I meant "right notes", of course, but I think I'll leave that.)

Library Loot and Reading Plan

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 13:30:00 +0000

I recently moved the furniture around in our living room so that I could make a little play area for the kids to use during the day. I thought it would make the toys in the living room look intentional, as opposed to messy (and it does!) but one of the by products of this was that I relocated the shelves where we keep our library books. Instead of being along the same wall as my "desk" (the spot at the table where I always sit, next to my sewing machine), they are now directly across the room from me, in my line of sight. Suddenly, I can't stop seeing all the books that I have checked out and need to read before I can't renew them any more. At my current rate of less than a book a week, there's no way I'll be able to read them all. In order to make it seem a bit more managable, I returned every book that wasn't on the shelf for a reason. That is, I returned all the impulse grabs. This leaves me with the following list, in no particular order, which is still completely impossible!

Daughter of Smoke & Bone by Laini Taylor, half done with this one, as mentioned previously.
Agnes and the Hitman by Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer. For my personal reading challenge
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. Because everyone and their dog loved it and put it on their list.
Falling for Hamletby Michelle Ray. For the Janssen Reading Challenge. This one is ILL, I can't renew it. Need to brush up on my Hamlet first though.
Splitby Swati Avasthi. Also for the Janssen Reading Challenge. Also via ILL.
In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto by Michael Pollan. Again with the everyone and their dog, plus it seems like a good followup to The Kitchen Counter Cooking School.
This Is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper. Recommended by several blogs, and my good friend Shawna.
The Most Beautiful Walk in the World: A Pedestrian in Paris by John Baxter. Recommended by Amanda. Sadly this one will have to go back because I'm not going to get to it before it's due tomorrow, and no more renewals. I'll bring it home again one day.
Ten Things We Did (and Probably Shouldn't Have) by Sarah Mlynowski. I have no idea who recommended this one, but someone did!
A Profound Mind: Cultivating Wisdom in Everyday Life by the Dalai Lama. Ok, no one recommended this one, it was on the new release shelf. I remain fascinated by religion, khama, happiness, and the intersection of such. At 148 pages and two renewals remaining, I think I'll get to it.
Tolstoy and the Purple Chair: My Year of Magical Reading by Nina Sankovitch. This is another that made the rounds. I saw it in the Large Print section and snapped it up.
Shine by Lauren Myracle. Because unless you spent last fall under a rock, you heard about this one and the controversy.
Hold Me Closer, Necromancer by Lish McBride. Bookshelves of Doom gets the credit for it. ("Speaking of, the love story is adorable.")
The Bucolic Plague: How Two Manhattanites Became Gentlemen Farmers: An Unconventional Memoir (P.S.) by Josh Kilmer-Purcell. Ok, no rec for this either, I guess.
The Weird Sisters by Eleanor Brown. This one isn't a library book, it's my next book for the BlogHer Book Club. I was thrilled to get in on this one since I've heard so many great things.

And to round it all out, yesterday I got a call that I have two more books waiting at the library- Make the Bread, Buy the Butter: What You Should and Shouldn't Cook from Scratch -- Over 120 Recipes for the Best Homemade Foods and The Magic Room: A Story About the Love We Wish for Our Daughters (that second one is an ILL, so again, no renewing on it!)

If I'm realistic at all, I'll start with the ILLs, then the BlogHer book (due Feb 8, I think.) Where would you start?

(The top shelf of books are the ones on this list, the second shelf are all for Mike. The third shelf are kid's library books, and the bottom shelf are random books we own that needed a place to go when I was cleaning the living room. The canvas bag is full of library returns.)

Random Friday: So cold!

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 15:32:00 +0000

It was -11F windchill when I took the Pirate to school today. That's cold.
We have a million things to do today, errands and such. Not looking forward to it, but it's my only Bo Peep free weekday, so we will go.
The Bug is obsessed with playing games on my phone. I kinda hate it. I really want to find a used iPod touch for them.
Do you guys think a 7 year old girl would like a sock monkey for her birthday?
The Princess is demanding my attention, this is all you get today, have a great weekend!

What I Read This Week:

Whiskey Sour (Jack Daniels Mysteries) by J.A. Konrath for my personal challenge. I did not love it. It had it's funny moments, but I thought the writing insulted my intelligence a bit.
Okay for Now by Gary D. Schmidt, for the Janssen Reading Experience.
Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor. Still reading, still enjoying. I'm just not a book monogamist.

So I made the Princess a Pony, every girl needs one.

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 18:29:00 +0000

His name is Neil Patrick Hesh. (The Princess says "hesh" for horse.)

I made him using Simplicity 2921 and a piece of pink plaid suiting fabric I had in the stash.

I didn't have any fake fur, so I used a bit of fleece for the mane and tail. I think it gives him a bit of a punk/ mohawk flair.

The pattern went together really easily, do not be intimidated by step 8, if you are thinking of making it. The hardest part was cutting it out and making his hooves nice and round. I may have rushed that last bit, because I was so close to having an entire horse made. They suggest making it with fleece and I'm pretty happy that I didn't, because I think the curves would have been harder to follow. The suiting had a tiny bit of stretch that worked in my favor.

The Princess is a fan.

She'd prefer you not touch it, thanks.

(Does anyone need me to tell you who is standing to her right?)

Don't censor the internet.

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 22:30:00 +0000

PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.

Seriously, watch it, and then do something about it. I emailed my Representatives. You should too. If you don't know who yours are, click here and plug in your zipcode.

Picturing Pierre, South Dakota

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 19:45:00 +0000

One of the hardest parts of living in the middle of nowhere is trying to describe to your friends and family just how middle of nowhere it really is. Everyone thinks they know what a deserted back road is, but there's a good chance that your deserted highway and mine are nothing at all alike.

For example, look at this map of South Dakota. This shows the population of each county. (Sorry for the blurriness, if you click here you can see it larger and clearly.)

I live in Hughes County (the green one in the center), which is home to Pierre, the state capitol of South Dakota. (Pierre is pronouned like pier, by the way, not like a Frenchman .) The population of the entire county is under 25,000. The city of Pierre accounts for about 13,600 of those people. Those tan counties surrounding me have a total population of under 6,000. Per County. South Dakota ranks 45th for population density, with a vast majority of the population concentrated in the two cities, one on each end.

The population of the state of South Dakota is about 815,000. The population of the city of San Francisco, is about 808,000. This doesn't include the surrounding cities like Oakland, which brings the population to about 4.3 million. There are 12 other U.S. cities with a larger population that my entire state.

What is your state like? Your town? Have you ever experienced a true wide open space? When I first moved to South Dakota driving through in the middle of the night was overwhelming to me and I'd start crying for no reason. True story.

I have a series of posts in mind to introduce you to small town life in the middle of the prairie. There are some small businesses that cry out for introduction and I'd like to show you one of our favorite museums. There are a lot of things to love about living in a small place, as well as the negatives (the nearest Target is 2.5 hours away!), and I'm looking forward to sharing more about our life here.

Edited to add- I decided I wanted to link up to two other posts I've made about Pierre, to keep them all together. For my first post on the Pierre Library go here (I have plans to blog about the library again soon), and for my post on the flood last summer, use that link.

Susan Mallery's Fool's Gold series

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 14:00:00 +0000

Susan Mallery's Fool's Gold series of romance novels became a total guilty pleasure for me last fall. I picked the second on in the series (Almost Perfect ) up first, based on the review of another blogger and whipped right through it in one day, during the busiest time of the year, when I should have been doing other things (see, not guilty because it's a romance, guilty because I should have been doing other things!) I immediately fell for the town and the people. I felt like Mallery might be similar to Nora Roberts for me- strong relationships between the people, not just the main couple, strong family and friend bonds, and a solid sense of setting. I enjoyed the first three in the series quite a bit, reading them all in a similar all-at-once fashion.

Then the fifth one came (Only Yours ) and I was unimpressed. I felt like maybe Mallery was just phoning it in on this one, or maybe my love affair with them was over. Despite this I forged on to the last one (Only His ) and while it was better, it still wasn't as strong as the first three had been. I ultimately read book four last (via Kindle for iPhone, also from the library) and was least impressed with it. There was just too much stuff going on to make it feel like a successful romance, but too much romance to take it out of that category. I suspect that if I had read them in order, instead of in the order that the library supplied them to me, that I may have bailed at book four. I almost wish I'd just read the first three and stopped there, as they were by far the strongest of the bunch. I have one other quibble, if you're curious, that I'll discuss at the end of the post, as it is a spoiler for the series.

The series has an entire website devoted to it, as if it were a real town, complete with photos.
You can find Susan Mallery on Facebook, Twitter and Goodreads. The books have a solidness to them that a lot of romance novels don't and I"ll be picking up more of her work, in hopes that I find another family that draws me in like those first three did.

If you're interested in reading them, the proper order of the Fool's Gold series is as follows:
Chasing Perfect
Almost Perfect
Finding Perfect
Only Mine*
Only Yours*
Only His*

(*Does the title of these three remind anyone else of the Elizabeth Lowell series with the same names from the 90s? I loved those books. Please don't tell me if they are actually full of old school romance themes that would make them distasteful today.)

My other quibble- Without going back to check, the heroine in at least 4 of the novels ends up pregnant by the end of the book. If it had happened once or twice in the series I would not have noticed or cared. But this was just too much.

Life Well Lived: Fashion Resolutions

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 15:00:00 +0000

One of the things I constantly struggle with is my image as a Stay At Home Mom. I've blogged about it before, but I'm (apparently) obsessed with the idea that I might present myself as a sloppy stereotype. You'd think this means that I judge other moms, and I don't. (I DO, however, judge anyone over the age of 5 who is in any public area that is not an emergency room wearing printed fleece pajama pants. It's not playfully cute.) My point is that I don't want other people to think I'm a slob. I don't want to be a slob.
Near the end of last year I found myself getting a bit lazy. Since I don't have to take the Pirate to school in the mornings I'd find myself still in my pajamas at pickup time. Now, I'm not so far gone that I left the house wearing them, but I will admit to wearing my slippers a time or two to go get him. I may have also forgone proper foundation garments. I am, frankly, horrified at myself. I don't expect a lot from myself, I don't think I'll ever be a cute mom wearing heels and makeup every day, but I thought maybe it was time to put set some rules. I mean resolutions. I posted the beginning of my list over at the discussion on BlogHer, but I thought I'd refine it more here on my blog. Be sure to go check that post for other great ideas and add your own resolutions.

I will not wear slippers past my own mailbox. (Who are we kidding, I WILL wear slippers to the mailbox!)
I will always wear proper foundation garments if I plan to exit my vehicle or talk to a person who is not in my immediate family. (Or, well, Bo Peep. She does get here at 7:30 in the morning.) (Or I guess her parents, cause she can't drive yet.)
At least once a week I will fix my hair in a style that does not require a rubber band. On a day that I am NOT going to work.
More skirts. (I wore skirts for almost three months straight last summer, then one day put on a pair of jeans and haven't worn one since.)
Continue to look for interesting basics at the thrift store. I've found some really great unworn shoes (Borns, Danskos, cowboy boots!) in the last few weeks, and I'd love to find a few more shirts. In fact, I'd like to make a list of missing things so I know specifically what to look for. I already keep a similar list of craft type things to look for.

PS. While you're over there at BlogHer, you might enter their giveaway for a Kindle Fire.

Random Friday: Read to me mama!

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 15:53:00 +0000

I made this Pineapple Upside Down Cake over the weekend. It was terrific. I never thought I liked it before, but I've been proven wrong.
Do you guys remember a couple years ago when I was blogging over at So, What's for Lunch Today? No? Well I started back at it. And I convinced a few new people to join in. Feel free to stop by.
Last week I forgot to link you to our completed reading lists for 2011. You can find my list here, and Mike's list here. For those keeping score at home- he beat me by 7 books. The game is ON for 2012.
The sound of people eating cereal makes me insane. I want to rip their spoons out of their hands and make them go hungry. I don't, but I really want to.
I've started a new method of making coffee. I picked up a Melitta Ready Set Joe Single Cup Coffee Brewer and have been making it one cup at a time for a week now. I like everything about it, except that it doesn't stay hot as long. I think this is fixable, if I were to get a kettle to heat water. I'm using a Hot Shot now, and I think it just doesn't get as hot as a kettle might. I really missed the ease of my Keurig , but at $1.98 (After our handy Ace Hardware employee discount, but still super cheap even if you don't work for a hardware store) this is a much more reasonably priced option.
If you were interested in a Baby's First Christmas Ornament (seen here and here), they will be going in the shop later this weekend.

What I Read This Week:

Why Women Need Fat: How "Healthy" Food Makes Us Gain Excess Weight and the Surprising Solution to Losing It Forever You can read my initial thoughts here.
A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness. Whoa. Yeah, I cried, like everyone else. But then after it was over I thought, well, I don't know exactly, but I can't quite figure out the point of it. I'm going to blog about it next week, if you've read it please stop by and chat, ok?
Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor. I'm not done with this one, but I am really enjoying it (also like everyone else. Am I a follower this week or what?) Karou is terrific, and I love that it's setting us up to root for the "bad guys."

Why Women Need Fat

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 13:30:00 +0000

At the end of last year I read a really great book called The Kitchen Counter Cooking School, by Kathleen Flinn. While the entire book was excellent, there was one chapter about eating out of the box, about how mixes have taken over for cooking, even though they don't really save that much time. Food out of a box is full of ingredients and preservatives that we wouldn't be eating if we just made those items from scratch. I had just finished that book and was pondering making a lifestyle/eating change when the BlogHer Book Club offered me the chance to read Why Women Need Fat: How "Healthy" Food Makes Us Gain Excess Weight and the Surprising Solution to Losing It Forever. Since I was already in the mood to read more about food, I accepted the title. It arrived during the craziness of Christmas so I didn't start reading until after the new year.

The content of the book was really fascinating, and (as the writers would hope) I thought their argument had merit. Their science made a lot of sense, and I'm more than willing to try their suggestions. I did find the writing a bit circular and at times a tad (ok, very) dry and hard to focus on, but I found that if I skimmed those bits and came back they would make more sense. Their basic premise is that the addition of so many processed oils, replacing more natural animal fats, have lowered beneficial Omega-3s and raised the more harmful, more fat inspiring, Omega-6s. They'd have you drop processed food and oils. This jibes well with my thinking from the other food reading I've been doing, so I was willing to go along for their ride.

If you want to join the discussion and learn more about how you can add fat and lose weight, you can click through to the BlogHer Book Club page here. The first topic of discussion is "This means I get to use real butter, right?" I mean, how can you not follow through on that?

This is a paid review for BlogHer Book Club but the opinions expressed are my own.

The Books Lists Life Personal Reading Challege

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 16:30:00 +0000

I don't usually do very well at reading challenges. I'm not sure I've actually ever completed one successfully. I get a little jealous of all the fun lists everyone else is making, but I'm realistic and I know I won't complete a challenge anyway. Despite this, I decided that I wanted to do a little personal challenge with a couple of friends. I thought that maybe I would slowly work my way through my reading friends, and maybe stir up a little conversation with them.

The idea is that we'd each make a list of 5 or 6 books and then the other person would read 4 or 5 of them. We are allowed an out, in case the other person picked something horrible, like poetry or a play. There is no time limit on the challenge and no pressure.

The first person I asked my my good friend Shawna. Shawna lives in Rapid City so we don't see each other often, and we don't read all the same books, but we both share a love of books and libraries (like many of you.) Shawna's favorite books are ones that make you cry. They rip your heart out and stomp on them, and make you ache for the characters. She likes serious books and women's fiction, with a big dose of non-fiction and memoirs to round it out. The more drama the better. We both read and loved The Time Traveler's Wife, Me & Emma, and A Thousand Splendid Suns.

For Shawna, I chose:

Heartbreak Hotel by Anne Rivers Siddons. This one is set in a fictional Auburn during integration. I've read it at least 6 times and love it.
Divergent by Veronica Roth. I loved this one last year and want to make everyone else read it.
The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery. It's possible I don't love it as much as I once did, but it made a big impact on me in college, so here it is.
Girl Meets God: On the Path to a Spiritual Life by Lauren Winner. For an unreligious person (I prefer to think of myself as spiritual. Hork.), I seem to read a lot of religious memoirs.
Moon Called (Mercy Thompson) by Patricia Briggs. This is the first book in what is, hands down, my favorite series.

I did NOT give her any traditional romances. I was tempted, but I did not.

For me, Shawna picked:

A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of "A Course in Miracles" by Marianne Williamson.
Ishmael: An Adventure of the Mind and Spirit by Daniel Quinn.
Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult
The Wizard of Oz (Puffin Classics) by L Frank Baum
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood (I've actually read this, but it was in high school and I don't remember much of it at all.)

The second person I asked was another Lisa, who (used to, ahem) blog at Git Down Kitty. Lisa is a quilt and craft blogger, not a books blogger, but as we've chatted extensively online it's come to light that we both do a good bit of reading. She reads more in the chick lit and mystery genres, with the occasional young adult thrown in for good measure. She's one of the many people encouraging me to read Outlander .

For Lisa, I chose:

Heartbreak Hotel by Anne Rivers Siddons.
Divergent by Veronica Roth.
Moon Called by Patricia Briggs.
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
Me & Emma by Elizabeth Flock. If you haven't read this, please do, so I can ask you a Question!

For me, Lisa chose:

The Prince of Tides: A Novel by Pat Conroy (unrelated note, my ex-sister-in-law's two cats were Conroy and Austen.)
Confessions of a Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella
Agnes and the Hitman by Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer
Theodore Boone: Kid Lawyer by John Grisham
Whiskey Sour (Jack Daniels Mysteries) by J. A. Konrath

My original list for Lisa was much longer, but I managed to narrow it down. For now.

If you were to pick a list of books for another blogger, would it be the same list for everyone, or would you prefer to match it to the other blogger? I had a hard time with this decision, I think my ultimate list would have ended up differently if I wasn't able to swap up a couple books. I wanted to formalize this as a challenge for myself, because someone when people say "Oh you HAVE to read this!" I don't ever DO it. This is a way to push myself to read books that other people truly loved.

How about you? Do you tend to push those recommendations to the side? Do you read them immediately? Especially for books that aren't new releases? Would you do a challenge of this type with a friend?

Project 366 with Instagram and LetsLassotheMoon

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 15:00:00 +0000

At the very end of December I was browsing Pinterest when I saw the following pin:

Source: letslassothemoon.com via Lisa on Pinterest

Well I can do that- I always have my phone with me! I take a million pictures with it. I'm the world's biggest fan of taking a picture and texting it to someone for an opinion, or to show off my kids, or to share a giggle. A picture a day of my life? Easy peasy mac n cheesy!

(Unexpected boot storage)

If you want to follow along, you can find me on Instagram as lharsma, or you can see them on Flickr as part of this set.

(Unexpected Scissors Usage)
I'm hoping that at the end of the year I can find a way to export my 366 pictures to Shutterfly or Walgreens or some other nifty site and have them printed into a little book.

A picture a day, what a great record that will be.

Random Friday: Hello 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 16:21:00 +0000

2012 already! Time flies!
I've been making more ornaments. I know, Christmas is over. It's just more fun now that there's not deadline. These two are for my BFF, but there's more where these came from, if anyone needs their own. (And if you don't need your Baby's First Christmas ornament in Auburn Tiger blue and orange, I'd be happy to make it in some other colors.)
I managed to finish all of the lingering 2011 posts except one book review. I'd like to talk about Susan Mallery's Fool's Gold series.
I am still thinking about my New Year's Resolutions, but will post about that as well. Soon. Did you post resolutions? Goal?
If you're curious, you can see all the books Mike read in 2011 here, and my list here.

What I Read This Week: Nothing.

I made a castle out of a card table.

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 16:21:00 +0000

And apparently I'm never going to take better pictures, so you get these.

A month or two before Christmas I saw this play castle on Etsy. The kids are (were) forever asking me to make a tent out of ours by throwing a blanket over it, so I just knew they would love it. I had SO much fun making this. It really started an addiction to making things with felt.

I started with the door side, since it seems obvious that they will need a door.

The purple bit to the left is a little mailbox, complete with a flap so you can actually put mail in it. I didn't know who would be King or Queen at any given time, so it has a crown on it for identification. The door has velcro to hold it closed. And the porch light, of course.

This side is the castle proper. I left the canvas behind the felt window to give it a bit of body. It's very sturdy, but the canvas is unraveling a bit. Might do that differently were I to make another.
The orange things inside are from the Nerf guns. The castle makes a good target.

This side has a tower (obv) that makes me think of Repunzel. The flowers and leaves are only stitched on through the middles, so the petals are 3D.

The last side was really challenging for me. The inspiration castle had a dragon and a knight on it, but I knew I wasn't up to making a dragon and since I wanted the girls to enjoy it as well I didn't want to do a knight. I ended up with this Sword in the Stone, and the knight's abandoned helm. You can actually see through the helm (please ignore the fact that you'd have to lie on the floor to do so) and I sewed a little pocket in front of the felt sword so that they could slide a toy sword inside and pull it out trimuphantly.

I had a few issues with it fitting properly, that would have been easily corrected if I'd been able to set it up during the making process. While I was able to make all four panels right in front of my kids ("Mom, why are you making so many flowers?"), I didn't want to set the entire shebang up while they were watching. And since I worked every single night until midnight, I wasn't about to do it at 1 am! So there are a few baggy spots. I was unable to take it in more without getting into the designs.

Do they love it? Sadly, no. They barely even noticed it. Regardless, it was a lot of fun to make and I think once the Princess is better at interactive play it might get more use.

Handmade Felt Christmas Ornaments

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 15:39:00 +0000

One of the things I made for Christmas was a collection of felt ornaments for my sister-in-law. After making the castle* and the kitchen I found myself loving making things of felt, and ornaments were the natural progression. I ended up giving her 7 ornaments, as shown, except the lights were "strung" on floral wire.

The nativity scene and the lights are both from free ornament tutorials at Wild Olive, which I highly recommend for this sort of thing. She did an entire month of ornaments, I wish I'd done them all.

Another ornament I found (just after Christmas, of course) was this adorable baby's first Christmas one. So I made one for a friend, who had her first baby just a week before Christmas. It's hard to tell, but it's about 4.5" tall from the top of the hanger to the bottom.

I see many of these in my future. I'm also trying to think of some variations on it so I don't feel quite so much like a copycat.

Then last night I found this one, and know someone who really needs one.

Source: spabettie.com via Lisa on Pinterest

(note, I didn't make this one. yet.)

I found myself starting an entire board on Pinterest, just for felt. Once I'm done with ornaments, I'm thinking I'll make some play food. And I'm sure someone else will show up before I'm done with that.

*Pictures soon, I swear.

Best Reading for 2011 Survey

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 15:00:00 +0000

All the cool kids did this last week, but better late than never, right? I'm copying off Trish (because really, she has the best posts) and only answering the reading questions from this year end survey. I was originally hesitant to do it at all, since I didn't love a slew of books last year, but sometimes you can't help yourself.

1. Best Book You Read in 2011?
Divergent by Veronica Roth

2. Most Disappointing Book/Book You Wish You Loved More Than You Did?
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (Movie Tie-In): A Novel by Jonathan Safran Foer

3. Most surprising (in a good way!) book of 2011?
Boy Meets Boy by David Levithan. I was incredibly annoyed by it when I started it, but I find myself thinking about it often.

4. Book you recommended to people most in 2011?
Divergent by Veronica Roth

5. Best series you discovered in 2011?
The only series I discovered in 2001 was Susan Mallery's Fools Gold series. I loved the first three. I found it awfully repetitive by the end, but if I hadn't read them back to back it may have helped.

6. Favorite new authors you discovered in 2011?
Kathleen Flinn, Karen Marie Moning, Veronica Roth, Susan Mallery

7. Best book that was out of your comfort zone or was a new genre for you?I stuck very close to home this year, but Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close was the biggest leap I took.

8. Most thrilling, unputdownable book in 2011?
Divergent, again.

9. Book you most anticipated in 2011?
River Marked (Mercy Thompson, Book 6) by Patricia Briggs

10. Favorite cover of a book you read in 2011?

11. Most memorable character in 2011?
Lola from Lola and the Boy Next Door . Or Four from Divergent.

12. Most beautifully written book read in 2011?
I don't think any of them were particularly beautifully written. They were badly written either, just not lyrical or anything.

13. Book that had the greatest impact on you in 2011?
It was the last one I read, but The Kitchen Counter Cooking School: How a Few Simple Lessons Transformed Nine Culinary Novices into Fearless Home Cooks by Kathleen Flinn really changed the way I thought about a lot of things, especially the chapter on cooking out of the box.

14. Book you can't believe you waited UNTIL 2011 to finally read? The oldest one I read was only published in 2003, so nothing really. No classic at all this year.

15. Favorite Passage/Quote From A Book You Read In 2011? I don't ever mark passages, but if I had it would have been from The Kitchen Counter Cooking School. There were a lot of good ideas in that one.

2011 Reading Goals and 2010 Reading Stats

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 20:25:00 +0000

Last year I only set two reading goals for myself.

- Read 52 books.
- Reduce the TBR.

I failed the first one, topping out the year at 37 books. I did remarkably well on the second though as I gave away a ton of books.

Here's how they broke down:

-7 Non-fiction
-11 Young Adult Titles
-5 Paranormal adult fiction
-3 Fiction
-11 Romance novels

-4 by men
-31 by women
-2 by multiple authors

-31 from the library
-4 that I owned
-2 from the publisher

-15 published in 2011
-11 published in 2010
-3 in 2009
-3 in 2008
-2 in 2007
-2 in 2006
-1 in 2003

15 new-to-me authors.
-Clinton Kelly
-Jenny Han
-Elizabeth Scott
-Kathleen Flinn
-Laurie David
-Dani Shapiro
-Karen Marie Moning
-Kristan Higgins
-Lisa Quinn
-Lenore Skenazy
-Tana French
-Karleen Bliss
-Veronica Roth
-Susan Mallery
-Jonathan Safran Foer

I didn't read any books that were flat out awful. I have some I didn't finish, but none that I just hated. This is probably because I tend to stop reading early when they don't grab me. I also didn't have many stand out terrific books. It was a long year and I read a lot of books that were easy and pleasant and that I knew I'd like, even if I didn't love them. Topping the list were Divergent by Veronica Roth and The Kitchen Counter Cooking School: How a Few Simple Lessons Transformed Nine Culinary Novices into Fearless Home Cooks by Kathleen Flinn. I did enjoy both of those tremendously, and had a hard time not talking about them to anyone who would listen. Patricia Briggs's latest (River Marked (Mercy Thompson, Book 6) ) was also good, as was Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins. I picked up a Susan Mallery Fool's Gold romance on a whim, and found myself whipping right through 5 of 6 of them (and then waiting forever for the one I hadn't read.) They started out strong, but by the end they felt very repetitive. I also read and enjoyed Nora Robert's latest (The Next Always: Book One of the Inn BoonsBoro Trilogy ) and was predictably charmed. I wish the entire series was already out.

For 2012 I'd like to add a couple goals back into the list. I hope to:
-read 52 books (hope springs eternal)
-read at least one really great book that hits my mental Best Of Forever list.
-participate in one very personal reading swap with a couple friends (I'll post about it, it's just not open to the general blogging public.)
-read all of the books on Janssen's best of 2001 list. Though Room scares me to death. I might give myself an out on that one.
-read at least one book from several on-going series (JD Robb's In Death series, Jim Butcher's Harry Dresden, Rachel Caine's Weather Wardens, and Kim Harrison's witch series.)
-get back to reviewing what I read

What about you? What are your goals for 2012? Were you happy with what you read in 2011?

I have a couple more retrospective posts for 2011 that I'd like to get done in the next week or so- some more sewing, some more reading stuff, a handful of reviews. I'm pretty excited by a fresh new year and can't wait to get going on it.

1999 was a good year, apparently.

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 15:04:00 +0000

Things are finally slowing down a little here in the Books. Lists. Life. house. We have one more holiday weekend this weekend and then things are back to normal. I have some projects to show you and a couple bookish posts (best books, final tally, that sort of thing) that I want to post next week. I also have a handful of reviews I'd like to get posted, if even briefly. In the meantime, the lovely TRISH made me this beautiful bar chart and I thought I'd go ahead and share it.

Some interesting things to note:
-I graduated from high school in June 1993.
-I graduated from college in 1998. I was a history major, so it was very reading intensive, but generally giant, dry books.
-I worked at Books-A-Million from 1996-1998.
- in late September 1999 I started playing EverQuest, the online game in which I met Mike. I did not read a single book after early October of that year.
-in 2002 I moved to South Dakota.
-in 2004 Mike and I were married and the Pirate was born in 2005.
-the Bug was born in 2008.
-the Princess was born in 2010.

(There, that post oughta help any stalkers find me.)

Post holiday crafting: play kitchens

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 18:23:00 +0000

One of the things the Princess got for Christmas was a little set of wooden pans from Melissa & Doug. It came with a little cardboard stove, but I knew I could do better. The kids have this little table that was the perfect size, so I made a kitchen. I used felt to make a fitted table cloth and fashioned a sink at one end and a stove at the other. It still needs a few details added with a paint pen, but the kids already love it.

This has led to an idea percolating in my head about play kitchens for tiny spaces, once I finish up a bit of fun sewing I'll be showing you a brand new shop item!

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Snowmen for school

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 17:43:00 +0000

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Christmas owl

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 14:35:00 +0000

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Happy Valentines Day

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 13:21:00 +0000

Wait, I thought it was Christmas this week? (picture taken last night at work. )

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A Holiday break from words

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 20:50:00 +0000

(An in progress shot of one of the gifts I'm making for my own kids.)

For the next week or so I'm taking a little break from writing blog posts. I'm hoping to post little pictures of our holiday preparation as I take them. I hope you all have a great week and a happy holiday.

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Virtual Advent Day 14: Not So Wordless Wednesday

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa) — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 18:27:00 +0000

It's that time of year again, the time of parties, trees, lights, cookies and fudge. It's also the time of year where we frantically scrounge through our pictures looking for a good one for the Christmas card. We put the kids in their best clothes and convince them all to smile at the camera (hell, to LOOK at the camera!) all at the same time. Adding a third child to the occasion didn't make it any easier.

This year we decided to take my brother-in-law and his fancy camera to the Pierre Capitol Building for a little photoshoot. In December, the Capitol is always decorated with dozens of trees and lights, and is open to the public to view. In the evenings there is live music, the library sets up an area and reads stories, and there is a little station to decorate an ornament and hang it on a nearby tree.

In the end, we bribed the boys with Happy Meals and we still didn't end up with a smiling happy family picture. We did end up with the picture shown above, which certainly has it own charms. Now I'm impatiently waiting for the cards to show up in the mail so I can start the process of picking out my favorite 50 friends and family. (I kid!) (Kinda!)

Please be sure to visit the other bloggers on today's tour, and stop by the main page of the Virtual Advent Tour as well.

Rob Crompton @ Tales From the Snig's Foot

Nicole @ Linus's Blanket

Sheree @ The Eclectic Reader
L.R. Knost @ Little Hearts/Gentle Parenting Resources