books – Page 3 – Peaceful Reader

Moving forward to keep sane

Welcome to the new normal. Just about a month ago my Spring Break started with a small gathering of teachers at a local bar. We talked about our conferences, the virus, the book fair, what fun things we were going to do with our free time over Spring Break. One person said “maybe we’ll have a week or two off to keep the virus at bay.” I’d like to take that day back and appreciate that moment just a bit more. I would have hugged everyone at the table as we left that night because the fun things we had planned to do together over our break never materialized. We were asked as a state to not gather and then pretty quickly our restaurants, breweries, and bars closed except for take-out and while we were still “relaxing” we were all worried how far this would go.

That reality was announced yesterday when our governor closed schools for the remainder of the year. Tears, heartbreak, and anger are mixed with the mixed blessing of better safe than sick. I miss my students but I can be happy at home because I like my own time. I can fill it with all kinds of activity. I read, cook and bake, put together lessons for my students, relax with my two dogs, and I can watch the birds and other wild things in my backyard for a good long time. I know my daughter feels robbed though as this IS her senior year. I feel robbed of experiencing that with her. We had talked about prom dress shopping but hadn’t actually started, we have beautiful grad announcements on our table, we have hopes for a final dance recital to culminate her years of dance and a solo to perform one last time. I cried when our governor said the words yet we’ve moved on already. As May approaches we may fall back into grief and by that time we may be starting to get sick of each other.

As it is now we seem to be forging ahead. Being around my husband 27/7 is annoying somedays but we work it out. I love my own quiet time and he is extremely active. He worked long hours at the theatre, often late with rehearsals so I’ve always had lots of space. Lucky for me he is still going for long runs, spending time at the theatre- volunteering his time with the hope that theatre will begin again in June or July, and works outside when he can. He is filled with projects because he isn’t good at sitting still. I start my day with yoga most days and have done a lot of deep cleaning of my house, yet I have no problem stretching out in a chair reading for a few hours or watching Anne w/ and E with Groovy Girl. Eating a fair amount of dark chocolate also helps.

I’ve read 6 books in the time we’ve been sheltering at home. All of them good, some of them amazing reads. I’ve zoomed with students, teachers, and had a few happy hours/dinner hours with friends and family. I’ve watched quite a few shows and movies.

Books:

The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates: excellent look at The Underground Railroad. Coates has an amazing writer voice.
The Way the Crow Flies by Ann-Marie MacDonald: 800+ pages of excellent writing about a Canadian family living on an Army Base with many twists and turns.
Love Among the Ruins by Robert Clark: True love for two teenagers in 1968. William is afraid of the turns the world will take after Robert Kennedy is killed and the riots during the Democratic Convention in Chicago.
Goodnight, Beautiful by Dorothy Koomson: Story of Malvolio and Nova in London as they navigate friendship and love in the adult world.
Do Not Become Alarmed by Maile Meloy: Wow! I read this one in two days because I just had to know what happened to the children. My husband and daughter both read it before me so this morning we were able to talk about the characters and Meloy’s airtight writing.

I’m also reading Moving Target by Christina Diaz Gonzalez (great adventure in Rome) and Maximum Ride by James Patterson (group of unusual kids with out-of-this-world skills) to 4th and 6th grade students through videos posted to Google Classroom.

Streaming:

Little Fires Everywhere, Sex Education, Harlan Coban’s The Stranger, The Disappearance of Madeleine McCann, and recently discovered Kim’s Convenience. We also had a list of older movies we wanted Groovy Girl to see and we’ve made it through a few: Pretty Woman, Something about Mary, The Talented Mr. Ripley were all good to watch.

She particularly loved Pretty Woman and we were thrilled by Mr. Ripley. I’d avoided that movie years ago because I thought it was too creepy (as is The Stranger) and it was but it’s easier to take when we’re all there together which really sums up this pandemic. We have to be better together even though we are apart. I’m quite angry with Trump for not taking this serious right away because for me that’s what it means to be president; to see a little into the future and take steps to contain and control. He didn’t do that. I’m happy to have my family around me as we weather this crisis. I’ll miss being physically with my son’ for his 25th birthday, I missed my trip to Guatemala, and many other important moments and I’ll do all this to keep people safe. I’m not going to cry about my freedom or what should have been. I just need to keep moving us forward.

What are you doing to keep sane?

What a crazy summer!

photo: Scott Shepard

This feels like the middle of summer; it’s hot and the sweet corn is up and being sold on street corners all over the Cedar Valley. I’ve packed in a lot over the summer but I need a few more slow days reading in the hammock (when it’s not a 100 degrees out) and relaxing with friends. It’s been so busy writing hasn’t happened as much as I like; I dream up blog posts but they stay there in my mind.

I did make a big batch of yogurt at the beginning of July. Delicious and creamy, mixed with fruit preserves and pumpkin butter it is the best start to my day. When I make it I don’t use the cream in the recipe-I just used good quality, local 1% milk. I recently found a easy (two ingredient) coconut yogurt recipe from Minimalist Baker that I want to try for my dairy-free Groovy Girl.

My husband and daughter have been very busy with our summer musical production of Beauty and the Beast. She’s had a great time as an ensemble character; she dances, she plays a wolf, Maria, the baker’s wife, and a townsperson. It has been quite a run, with sold out performances, and today the run is done so life might be a tiny bit quieter. (maybe)

I have made it to yoga more than a handful of times which was on my summer plan. I’ve recently read several articles talking about the importance of meditation on our brain. It’s a matter of settling our brain from 5-50 minutes; the more we let it rest, the better our mind functions. It makes sense of course just like sleep for our bodies. I’ve added that to my day even if it is just 5 minutes of quiet breathing in the car before I get out.

I’ve read quite a few great books already and I still have a full basket to go. Every summer I bring home a crate of books to read. Some are books that students loved and it’s my turn to try them and some are books I read to pre-choose the Iowa Children’s Choice Awards. I love doing this as I like to make sure there are a lot of well-rounded choices; books with diversity, books that take kids out of their small-town Iowa world, books that expand their minds, books that tell amazing stories. I’ve read a few that fit this description:

1. Amina’s Voice by Hena Khan – As a Pakistani-Muslim girl in American Amina struggles to mix her family’s culture while blending in at school. Luckily she does have one true friend in Soojin who seems more adept at understanding people. This is a rich story filled with family, food, and new beginnings but also devastating vandalism of her beloved mosque. One of my favorite quotes from the book is from her brother Mustafa – “It’s just so freaking unfair. What kind of person would want to destroy a place where people gather to pray and learn?” My thoughts exactly.

2. Bob by Wendy Mass – This story is a bit of magical realism more than fantasy to me. Livy and her mom come back to visit her grandmother in Australia 5 years after their last visit. When Livy explores her mother’s old room and the room she stayed in when she was little she finds a young greenish creature named Bob in her closet. Bob remembers everything from her last visit but Livy struggles with these same memories. She makes it her duty to figure out how to get Bob home (wherever that might be?) while her mother is off visiting old friends for a week. I had trouble getting into this story yet I liked the conclusion of Bob’s story.

3. Merci Suarez changes gears by Meg Medina – This excellent title won the Newberry medal this year! This story resonates with her family’s rich family culture as Merci navigates her private school surroundings as a scholarship culture. Eventually she learns that if she stays true to herself all will work out. Her grandfather plays a large role in her life and his world is changing as he ages and this affects the whole family as they learn to deal with his aging mind.

4. Amal Unbound by Aisha Saeed – Amal lives in Pakistan with her family and she loves going to school and being in her village. Her only dream is to become a teacher. One day she has a heated encounter with her village’s horrible landlord and her dreams are quickly disrupted as she learns what it means to have an enemy. I loved this story and learned a great deal about Pakistani culture. I hope she is working on a second book of Amal so we can see if she realizes her dreams.

5. Aru Shah and the end of time by Roshani Chokshi – I’m only about 5 chapters in but am in love with this fast-paced fantasy book about spunky Aru who has awakened a demon in her mom’s Indian museum. This is one from Rick Riordan’s new imprint and it is excellent.

I’ve also read Helen Hoang’s two books; perfect, quick summer reads and sexy-not for the prudish. These are modern day romance novels even though the covers do not feature bodice-ripping of any kind. I like the characters which feature people on the autism spectrum. I read this fantastic Washington Post article about Hoang and her desire to write romance novels. Very sweet, super sexy, and I will read every book she puts out…

How is your summer?

Happy July!

I’m not a fan of our flag yet I am a happy to have the right to voice my opinions about our country and it’s love of symbols. While I’m spouting off about unpopular concepts I am also not a fan of fireworks-especially the kind sold in every parking lot across America leading up to this holiday. They are loud and intrusive and dangerous.

I didn’t come here just to complain about holidays though; I thought I’d share some of my top books. Litsy, the book site I play with other than Goodreads, has a thing right now to post your top reads from January to June and these are mine. All excellent reads if you are in need of a new summer title.

I’ve had some time to enjoy real summer days after my trip to Colorado and yesterday I spent a couple hours reading on our patio. I also was in my pajamas until about 1pm. It rocked. I even had a friend show up with lunch and a cold coffee brew and I stayed in my pajamas. It’s a joy to unwind and take a break. I am taking one class right now about gender and while it is a lot of work to type out the papers I am enjoying the readings that go with the class.

Take it easy today, remember what our country should stand for and that it has been GREAT for many, many years and spend time with family and friends. Be careful with your fireworks and be kind to the environment~it’s the only one we have.

Talents

This week at school we had two mornings filled with our talent show. It was amazing and as I watched I was overwhelmed by all the talent we have in our school. We had dancers, very funny comedy routines, dynamic singers, piano players, tiny musicians, and one young man who solved his Rubic’s Cube while jumping on a pogo stick.

As teachers we put together a synchronized routine following these two routines from YouTube. We did a good job of and had lots of teachers involved.

I started thinking about my own talents that I could share and came up with a very short list:

I am a very good reader

I can mix a great drink

I am an adequate cook

None of these are talent show worthy. Long ago I was in a small town beauty contest (not my idea) and had to come up with an act. I wrote an interesting parody about friendship and read it aloud; people laughed and I won third place. Not bad for a brunette. My talents will have to remain low-key.

I am ready for the year to end but it is always bittersweet; this group of 6th graders were in 2nd grade when I became the librarian at Hansen. There are more than a few of them that I will miss a great deal.

In other talented news I made this dish, Mediterranean Chickpea Salad, this morning for a picnic and it was delicious. I’m reading two books right now; The Inquisition by Taran Matharu (the 2nd in the series) and Eat to beat disease by William Li. Recently my husband and daughter watched his excellent TedTalk, Can we eat to starve cancer?, and I watched What the Health on Netflix one afternoon. I was pretty disgusted how major health organizations are sponsored by meat/diary/fast food companies. If you have a chance both of these videos are worth your time.

Happy June!

Snow Day

I finished reading both An American Marriage, a decidedly sad tale, and Less, an uplifting tale of love and highly recommend both books. I’m now reading Front Desk by Kelly Yang, which won the ALA Asian/Pacific Award this year.

These week I made Khichdi which a friend posted on IG referring to it as comfort food. Mashed potatoes with a slice of real butter melting on the top has been my comfort food for years. I can picture it in the large bowl my grandmother brought to the table for many family meals. I can smell it; the creamy yellow potatoes mixing with the soft butter on top. Comfort food means different smells and feelings to everyone and I thought this lentil dish was definitely worth trying. All the spices made my kitchen smell amazing, maybe the comfort starts in the making, as I took lots of deep healing breaths while chopping and stirring. When it was finished we soaked it up with toasted naan and cleaned our bowls. It was a perfect dish for a freezing evening.

Last Sunday I made a tomato soup recipe I’d ripped from a food magazine. It was a very easy recipe to put together and it was delicious. Tomato soup pairs perfectly with grilled cheese and I used white cheddar with some yummy sourdough to fry up in my cast iron skillet. They were a perfect gooey mess to dip into the creamy soup. Here is the recipe for yourself.

Creamy Red Pepper and Tomato Soup

4 red bell peppers, seeded and sliced

4 large tomatoes, seeded and quartered

1 T olive oil

1/2 tsp sea salt

1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper

1 cup onions, chopped

5 cloves of garlic, diced

1 can tomato paste

32 oz vegetable broth

1/2 cup loosely packed basil leaves, torn

Parmesan croutons *I didn’t make b/c no me gusta croutons

1/2 cup shaved Parmesan for topping

1. Add olive oil to large saucepan over medium heat. Add onions, garlic, chopped red peppers and tomatoes and sauté until tender.

Stir in tomato paste and then add vegetable broth.

Bring to a boil and then reduce heat .

2. Allow the soup to cool just a tad and then add in batches to a blender or use an immersion blender. Blend until smooth and creamy.

3. Ladle into bowls and add Parmesan shavings, fresh cut basil leaves, and freshly ground pepper to top.

The red peppers added an excellent flavor to the soup. Also I didn’t have 4 fresh tomatoes on hand but I did have a Mason jar of tomato sauce from this summer so I substituted that which worked fine. I even think you could substitute a good quality can of diced tomatoes for this. Fresh tomatoes in the winter are not as flavorful as the summer so it’s a fair switch.

Stay warm and drive slow. We are on our 8th snow day.

Just do it!

I’m happy to share that I’ve made it to a yoga class the first Saturdays of January. State Street Yoga has a new teacher, Corinne, on Saturdays at 10:30, which is a very good time for me, because I can’t roll myself out of bed too early on a day off. Corinne is slightly unconventional, with a very soothing voice, good energy, and I’ve learned some new poses from her. New learning is always good. So I’m happy to have started again and found someone interesting in that process.

I’m reading several books right now, trying to read more than watch, which is a struggle especially because Groovy Girl introduced me to Grey’s Anatomy. I didn’t pay attention when the show aired originally but now I’m genuinely interested in the characters and what’s going on. It’s a bit like watching General Hospital while I was in college.

Books I’m reading:

The Library by Susan Orlean – so beautifully written, would not have thought I’d enjoy a nonfiction book about a library fire.

Endling by Katherine Applegate – I am just about 6 chapters in and curious about where the story is going. This morning I had the book in my arm at church and a precocious 10-year-old reader told me she thought the story was great. That recommendation alone should keep me going…

Code Girls: the untold story of the American women code breakers of WWII by Liza Mundy – This is for book club and I’ve cracked the cover twice and read a total of one page. I’m not encouraged to read this whole (572 pages) book. I’m a fiction girl at heart and struggle with titles like this. I’ll take a fiction book about this topic any day. If you loved this title, let me know…

My hands (and the house) smell all spicy from chopping onions, garlic, and ginger for a big batch of chicken korma. Friends are coming over for a beer tasting first and a bite to eat after. I’d already planned the korma dinner for family; I just had to double the batch. It smells delicious.

Namaste…

Are you ready?

There is magic in the air! Are you ready? I feel like I am in a good place with my lists and plans. I just need a little voodoo magic to get it to all come together. Everything seems to sparkle just a little bit more right now.

Today is my first official day of break and I started the day by sleeping in a little, which felt so lovely and going to have brunch with friends. While we were brunching we sampled the new Resilience beer coordinated for fire relief by the Sierra Nevada Brewery. It was pretty good for an IPA but more importantly an amazing effort to pull together to help others.

Last weekend we made it through the graduation~ it was amazing. Everything came together in a magical way like the universe was simpatico. We now are the proud parents of two college graduate adults, making their way out there in the world. One left and I’m in no rush for that to happen.

I have all my shopping done, my menu is planned but everything still needs to be prepared. If I waved a magic wand the food could all be thrown together at once but then I would miss the joy of tying on my apron, pouring a glass of wine, and mixing things myself. I hope the next few meals go together as smoothly as the graduation food did.

I just finished Eleanor Oliphant is completely fine by Gail Honeyman. I loved it and wanted Eleanor to find her way to happiness. I highly recommend this title and just ordered it today for a friend’s birthday. When I finished it I compiled a new stack of books from bookcases and piles about my house, trying to decide which one to read next.

Here are just a few of my choices:
Reconstructing Amelia by Kimberly McCreight
The Library Book by Susan Orlean
My absolute darling by Gabriel Tallent
inward by yung pueblo (this one is perfect to read to start/end the day)

and I also brought home an armful from school to read. Now I need to carve out some time to read in between cooking and family time.

Merry Christmas and happy holidays to all! Enjoy the magic.

Small thoughts

It’s cold and rainy here and I miss summer already. I am taking another class which I thought would be easy to fit in but there is more to it and the homework takes a lot of deep thinking. Just like my summer classes though it will push me to be a better teacher.

It is taking me forever to finish Stephen King’s 11/23/62 time-alternating look at Lee Harvey Oswald and the Kennedy assassination. I feel like I’ve been reading it for months now, really just August and September. Luckily I found a DVD at the public library of the series which helped me when it came time to discuss at book club but I was committed to still finishing the book. The series with James Franco was very good and I highly recommend it as I do the book-if you don’t want to read an 849-page book though feel free to check out the series. It does stream on Hulu as well.

I have a lot of elementary fiction I need to get back to though as my students are serious readers and are constantly recommending books to me. I have stacks of new books from Follett that I want to bring home and read so I need to finish and move on.

I’m in shock that tomorrow the calendar turns to October, that it is already cold here, and that I have a pumpkin decorating my table. My mindset is still back in the hot days of August. At least we have baseball for a few more weeks. And we have the Cubs!

I’ve watched bits and pieces of the Kavanaugh hearings and am disgusted that he is still very much considered to be a great candidate for our most important court of the land. What a joke. Although when we consider that Trump is not too far from Kavanaugh’s privileged and ridiculous behavior than it all makes some sort of reverse universe sense. If women have any pull in the universe this man will be done and we won’t hear any more from him. Watching the hearings should give us all pause in that we are being led by many old white men set in their chauvinistic ways. We need more women, more young people, more people of varying shades of color. Pasty old men need to go. Lindsey Graham and Chuck Grassley-be gone.
And what if in time we can time-travel back to change all of this ala Stephen King-what and how would we change it?

That’s my rant for the weekend. Drink more tea, take care of yourself as the weather changes.

Highlights of summer

I finished all the assignments for one of my grad classes and am on the homestretch for the last class, Creative Schools. My major goal is to finish before my birthday which is just around the corner! I’ve done some deep learning and am excited to implement changes in my library this next year based on the two books I read.

(Source)

My stepsister, Robin, and her family came to town for a weekend. I made these delicious dairy-free rhubarb-pecan muffins for breakfast one morning. I liked that the recipe had orange juice and orange zest as ingredients and I substituted lemon zest because that’s what I had. They were really easy to pull together and came out nice and soft. Diana, my niece was my assistant baker and took care of all the mixing and measuring. I found lots of great rhubarb recipes and these muffins at Thyme and Love look really good to try too.

I’m on the last legs of a major summer cold, luckily it’s lasted just about a week. We’ve gone through a major amount of kleenex between G.G., husband and myself. Which by the way he finished RAGBRAI on Saturday in good spirits. I’m happy to drop him off for his start and I’m happy to pick him back up again, safe and sound. Ragbrai is his happy place.

Yesterday I hosted my 2nd annual Croquet & Cocktails game and it was perfect weather for it. We had snacks and margaritas and hit the balls around with heavy mallets in thick grass. It was a perfect summer break with teacher friends especially because that morning I’d finished the 3rd module of this last class. Today I started on module 4 and should be able to finish in the next few days. I’m school obsessed right now.

What have I been reading other than Creative Schools and Formative Five you ask? I finished Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon. Thanks to Verda and Sela for the push to read it. Now I have to find time with Groovy Girl to watch the movie. She was dubious about the story; she liked it, read it just a few days, but was like, that wouldn’t really happen. Maybe she is more of a nonfiction, biography reader? I loved the story and yes, it is somewhat unbelievable but that’s what fiction is!
If you haven’t read it please pick it up from your local library.

Quick review: Madeline is sick and she cannot handle outside germs so she has been inside her (fancy) house for years. One day a new family moves in next door and she meets a boy, Olly, through the window. Her house nurse, Carla, conspires with her so the two can meet inside her airtight, vacuum sealed house. Young love-it can’t be beat. What would you do for love and how do you protect those you love?

I’m now reading Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng. Until I finish the very last homework assignment I only have a few minutes to read at night. This one is very good though and I’ll read more by both Ng and Yoon.

What are you reading? What have you filled your summer up with so far?

Hello June

There are some people in our lovely little house making a movie, creating art. About 7 people and my husband, shooting, holding a boom mike, and going over lines. Groovy Girl and I have sequestered ourselves on the second floor, in our rooms, doing homework and reading. Not what I expected to do with my day, ALL day, but such is this life.

It is a fairly gorgeous day out and I did take the dog for a long walk. It seems like it would be a perfect hammock day but I cannot for the life of me find where I stashed them over winter. I always keep them in one particular place for safekeeping and they are not there. I think the husband must have taken them down and stored them and he needs to find them. We are missing precious hammock lazy moments.

So with lots of time on my hands, I finished Anne Tyler’s A spool of blue thread, a good solid story that tells the tale of the Whitshank family of Baltimore. It doesn’t have a major plot upheaval and yet generally that is how family stories often are in life. Just a straight line with many zigs and zags up and down. This was my first Anne Tyler and I would read another. With that one done I’ve started Tangerine; a novel by Christine Mangan plus reading more of Cleo Wade’s Heart Talk, a very inspirational book of wisdom.

I love it when a friend orders a book based on my recommendation. It happened this morning; I raved about a book, News of the world, to my friend Tim at our church picnic and sent him a photo of it when I returned home. He responded back a few minutes later with “Just ordered it from Amazon!”

We have just 2 1/2 days left of school! The year has flown by and in a few short days, it will truly be summer. Groovy Girl and I are taking to the road, headed to Denver, CO to stay with family for about a week. It’s been quite a few years since I’ve made this road trip myself and while G.G. will keep me awake, she isn’t able to drive just yet so it will be all me. Generally, my husband does most of the driving (while I read) but I used to make this trek at least once a year when I lived there before there was a husband so it’s a challenge for myself. Bring on the Red Vines and blue chips, the loud music and the laughs.