18 in '18

I love reading. My attention span seems to be getting worse (screens? age? grey hair? teaching stuff all the time?), so it's been taking more effort to sit down and plug through. My goal for 2018 was to read more, and happy to report I read 18 books in 2018 (two 12+ hour airplane flights helped).

I promised myself I would write down every single book, even if it wasn't something I thought was worthy of being a bona fide "Reading List" book. This list doesn't count the four books I've partially read and are still sitting on the shelf begging me to finish... please finish. Goal for 2019 - 19 books!

1. Capital Gaines / Chip Gaines
2. To Light a Fire on the Earth / Robert Barron & John Allen
3. The Beet Queen / Louise Erdrich
4. The Benedict Option / Rod Dreher
5. Off Main Street: Essays / Michael Perry
6. Y is for Yesterday / Sue Grafton
7. The Jesus Cow / Michael Perry
8. One Thousand Gifts / Ann Voskamp
9. Montaigne in Barn Boots / Michael Perry
10. One Beautiful Dream / Jennifer Fulwiler
11. Ford County Stories / John Grisham
12. The Master Butcher’s Singing Club / Louise Erdrich
13. Mrs. Pollifax and the Golden Triangle / Dorothy Gilman
14. The Summer Before the War / Helen Simonson
15. The Spy Who Came In From the Cold / John LeCarre
16. A Simplified Life / Emily Ley
17. The Cardinal of the Kremlin / Tom Clancy
18. Wild Swans / Jung Chang
    
    
    
    
     

Hello 2018

2017 was an uninspired blogging year and 2018 promises to add to that! Nothing creative or inspired to say, but that's okay.

My brothers used to use a weird numbering system where all the numbers got added together. If one of them was turning 11, they would be 2, since 1+1 = 2, and so on. Zeroes of course didn't count, and any digits over 10 went back into the add. So, this year would be 2: 2+0+1+8=11=1+1=2. Here are the top 2 for January:

1) School and school are back in session. I'm teaching a brand new clinical on 2 new-to-me units in the brand new curriculum and sharing a clinical in the old (the same I've taught for 10 years, but I teach one day and someone else teaches the 2nd, each week - and it's DAY shift. This night/evening brain cannot grasp it!) and it's driving me crazy. Control freak + Type A + anxiety don't work together well with a minimally designed course taught by multiple people in all sorts of new locations. The clinicals are similar in some ways yet different enough I can't keep it all straight. Since this clinical includes acute care across the lifespan, this week I take my students to pediatrics and OB. Since I know absolutely nothing about these areas, I'm sure it will be a complete disaster. But, I'm OK with it.

The Boy and Baby Girl are doing well with school. He is doing a writing program/coop and we switched to Saxon Math from Right Start, and these two changes have made a world of difference. He's also becoming so much more self-directed, and although we work together on many things still, it's a huge relief to be able to get him going on a 30 minute project he can do himself, and have the time to get dinner in the crockpot before work and play a learning game with my girl. The Boy is at nose height on me and my little baby is recognizing most letters, shapes, colors. Tempus fugit, but it's all hen hao.

2) No New Year's Resolutions or SMART goals here. I'm so grateful to be feeling well enough to be doing the things I struggled to even somewhat accomplish last year - exercise, intentional nutrition, and sneaking in a few minutes of prayer time daily. Keeping up with these things is goal enough, plus trying to learn a little Chinese with my Hubby here and there (not doing so great with characters, but the pinyin is ok-ish). Guess if had to make some sort of a goal, I'm really hoping to spend more time in real pages and less on webpages. Although have never been big on social media or surfing, I'm increasingly dragged down by opinions, headlines, and just the generally overwhelming information flood. Santa brought some new reads (Michael Perry!), so at least some of this blog drought can be attributed to reading. I read quickly through "To Light a Fire on the Earth" by Bishop Barron and John Allen, and am struggling through "The Benedict Option" by Rod Dreher, and finished off "The Beet Queen" this week. Maybe on to something slightly lighter after this round.

Reading for Basketball

The Boy did the library's winter reading program over Christmas break and into this month.  Unlike the summer reading program, he was able to do quite a bit of reading on his own.  He read five easy readers to me the other day for school - he just needed to read one for the day, but he was so excited he didn't want to stop.  The incentive prize for completing the reading logs was a free ticket for him to an area college basketball game, with reduced price tickets for parents.  The game was today and it was a lot of fun - first college basketball game for him and for me.  Hubby was pretty familiar with the rules and team, his dad having ref'd a lot of games back when. 

We had great seats from which to watch the action - right in the middle, directly behind the scorekeeper.  I couldn't figure out, though, why they had a big printer and copier set up right behind the scorekeeper, and what exactly was on the print-outs they kept delivering to the coaches and various people along the sidelines.  Goes to show what I know about sports.

Busy-busy around here, so it was good to take a break for a couple hours.  Plenty of grading to keep up with, plus trying to keep a step ahead of The Boy's school stuff.  The season of taxes is in full swing for Hubby, but we're grateful as usual for the way God provides for our family, even if it does mean facilitating the payment of hard-earned cash to greedy Uncle Sam.  And it's been really, really cold. 

Some new favorite kids books:

-Detective LaRue and Pigsty by Mark Teague
-Playhouse by Robert Munsch (we love all Robert Munsch, but this is a newer one, and it's pretty good)
-The ToothGnasher Super Flash (can't remember the author - this one's a classic)
-Agent A to Agent Z by Andy Rash (he has this one memorized)
-More Lisa Wheeler - Dino Baseball, Dino Basketball, Dino Hockey - a bunch of books about carnivorous dinosaurs vs herbivorous dinosaurs, with a few good puns for measure

As You Wish...

Hello.  My name is Inigo Montoya.  You killed my father.  Prepare to die.

Mawwiage...  

To the pain.

 Sound familiar?

Hubby gave me a copy of William Goldman's abridged version of S. Morgenstern's The Princess Bride for Christmas.  I fully intended to gobble it down by myself in a day or two, but The Boy was intrigued by the cover and begged to hear the story.  So I read him the entire book (all 280 pages) in the past week or so.  He followed the story from start to finish and the look in his eyes throughout was golden.  When Westley dies, the look on his face was so sad.  "But there's more to the book," I said.  "I know," he proclaimed, with new light in his eyes; "Fezzik and Inigo find him and put the Machine back on and turn it back to a different setting and put all the life back into him, and then he goes to get the Princess."  Sharp kid.

I promised him we could watch the movie once we finished the book (just as much a promise for me, or maybe more for me, than for him), and can't wait.  Now the trick is to find the full Morgenstern (ILL, maybe?) and compare.  Goldman's version was a bit full of himself, although apparently Morgenstern wasn't going for the humility award, either.  The other high point of Christmas break reading was Helen Simonson's Major Pettigrew's Last Stand.  Finding half-decent modern fiction is like trying to find socks without holes in The Boy's drawer - this one was a good sock.  Ah, good books. 

Tired.

I am so tired.  

My cycles are much improved since starting on the PPVI treatment, but I still hit a point every cycle when every ounce of energy leaves my body immediately, not to return for a good week.  I so very much envy those lucky people who have so much vigor and drive (and real, live hormones).

We've been keeping a tight schedule since school started.  The Boy loves doing his lessons every day, and the funny thing has been that I am usually ready to be done for the day before he is.  He has bunches of questions about everything.  We took a nature walk for science last week and discovered different kinds of pine trees, seed pods, ant hills, a few kinds of bark, and clouds.  He borrowed a relative's copy of Prince Caspian, which we've been reading (along with plenty of "C is for Caspian" and "M is for Miraz" and "T is for Trumpkin"). 

Getting all the students rolling for their classes.  Clinical is going fairly well.  Now into my fifth year of clinical I'm finally getting tired of explaining how anemia is NOT the cause of low hemoglobin, but rather a synonym for it.  They'll get it.  And then we'll start over again next semester (smile).  It's fun teaching a new class and learning alongside a different class of students.  We're doing injections tomorrow - should be exciting.  I do find it frustrating that I'm receiving a 10% workload for lab (10% of a 40 hour workweek)- essentially I'm being paid for 4 hours a week, to teach a 3 hour lab, 45 minute course planning meeting (disorganized, of course), and that doesn't even take into account grading and prep work/lesson planning.  I shouldn't complain, but wouldn't it make sense to have a folder put together of weekly objectives and content which could be given to each instructor for a four-section lab which has been taught since eternity, instead of having new instructors invent their own lab?  But we're using our Outlook calendars, so we are efficient and using technology, yes.  Oh, academia. 

No more rants.  No more complaining.

Had our second home study meeting today and are about 90% done with our profile book (photos and explanations of who we are - shared with birth parents who are considering making an adoption plan).  Sounds like the home study will be finalized somewhere around the end of next month, and then we start waiting from there.  Feelings mixed - combination of hopeful, fearful, all that good stuff.

Garden is doing well - the peas and beans had a second round after we had some rain last month.  The tomatoes are lovely (and the slugs love them).  So far I've frozen 7 quarts and canned 7 quarts, but we're just getting started.  And we've had beautiful eggplant - yum!  We've been giving away cucumbers to everyone we know.  The Boy loves cucumbers and he prohibited me from thinning out the several plants which sprouted this spring, so we've been picking 10-20 at a time.  Nice to have some to share, and we haven't grown tired of them yet. 

And we started dismantling the bathroom (goodbye wallpaper, goodbye yucky grout, goodbye peel-and-stick tile) per hubby's request.  Think I figured out why I'm tired.

Book Sale

One of the area Catholic grade schools, which recently combined with another grade school, was selling its library this week.  The Boy and I made a quick trip and acquired 49 lovely additions to our own Catholic school library.  At a quarter apiece, we made out pretty well.

Here's a smattering of what we got:

-4 "Boxcar Children" books (some of my favorites when I was little)
-A state history and geography book.  It has, among other things, some amazing pictures of settlers holding the bear skins they got in northern parts of the state.  I'm excited about this book because I would like to learn a bit more about my own state, and it looks really thorough.  We also have to teach state history and geography as a required elementary subject, so this will be helpful.
-"Fire Cat" - a short children's book we have borrowed from the library several times.  Hubby read it when he was a little boy.
-Several biographies of saints, including Clare of Assisi, Peter Damian, Helen, Charles Borromeo, JPII, Miguel Pro, Bernard of Clairveaux, Father Marquette, etc.
-"Childhood of Famous Americans" biographies - again, childhood favorites for both hubby and me.  Babe Ruth, Carl Ben Eielson, Elias Howe, James Fenimore Cooper, Davy Crockett, Aleck Bell, etc.
-"Know Your Presidents and Their Wives" (according the cover, updated with newly elected John F. Kennedy!) - OK, so it's a little dated, but do George Washington and John Adams really change at this point?  And as far as I can tell, BO hasn't gotten his paws on this one to write himself into the stories.
-"The Monitor and the Merrimac and Other Naval Battles" - pure boy book.
-"Working with Magnets" - cool!
-"Men of Science and Invention" - again, a little dated (ends with some beginning computer equipment in the 1960s), but has some impressive discussions on inventions that changed our world.
-A bunch of wonderful children's fiction including "Little Eddie", "The Five Little Peppers", "Emil and the Detectives".

To all my homeschooling-to-be friends and cousins, my shelves are open for lending!

Easter Feasting

He is risen as He said, Alleluia, Alleluia!

What a joy that Easter is here. As Father said in his Easter homily, Easter is a beautiful demonstration that all Jesus' promises are true; He has done as He said, and He will do for us as He has promised. What hope, what peace. The Triduum is truly the most blessed part of the year, and I do look forward to it every year. We made it to Holy Thursday Mass, and after the Eucharist we had a Eucharistic procession with Jesus to the "garden". The church basement had been transformed into a garden with plants and flowers and the church was open until midnight for prayer, to spend time with Jesus. The Boy didn't last too long in the garden, so we went home and put him to bed, and I went back for a little while after he was asleep. It was good.

The Boy and I made it to Good Friday services and he was really naughty. He was flirting the entire time with a cute college student sitting behind us. What is it about little boys that they like pretty high school and college girls so much? In spite of his crush, some things did make an impact on him. We removed our shoes for the Veneration of the Cross. Later this week when we were coloring a picture of Moses and the burning bush, Michael connected Moses removing his sandals with our removing our shoes, and why.

We helped decorate the sanctuary and basement on Holy Saturday while my musician-husband practiced for Easter Vigil music and liturgy. We also dyed Easter eggs together on Holy Saturday afternoon - the Boy did really well this year. He was able to slow down a little and concentrate on making each egg different and decorated how he liked it. I continued to be out-done by the artists in my family. I mis-quoted poetry in crooked letters on eggs while they made landscapes, mountains, people in action, and intricate designs on their eggs.



Husband went to Easter Vigil services while I "tried" to watch the Vigil on EWTN's internet live stream. "Tried" because someone else (who was tired of church) wanted to play Tank Commander. I think Jesus understands. When Husband came home late at night we cracked open the jelly beans and sat up and talked for awhile - that's feasting, to me!

Easter was beautiful! It was cooler than earlier in the week, and windy, but very sunny. And it would have been beautiful no matter the weather. It's so easy to get bogged down in daily life, but Easter Sunday pulls me back to being part of something so much bigger than the day-to-day concerns. There's something HUGE just behind the curtain, and on Easter Sunday we pull it aside to revel in it, hope in it...

My family joined us for Easter dinner. Ham, au gratin potatoes, green beans, deviled eggs, fresh veggies, and Died and Went to Heaven dessert were on the menu. Yummmm! We had an Easter egg hunt in the backyard (found all but one - and I found that one while Round-upping grass for my garden spot yesterday - mmm, Round-up n' chocolate) for the smaller ones and then walked to the park to fly Dad's big kite. The wind was so strong it snapped one of the side-pieces almost right away. So we resorted to a long game of Tag. We spent Easter evening with my Mother-in-Law and ate some more! It was such a relaxing day being all together.

My blessings - reading the "Forts and Castles" book from the library. We both remember reading this book for unit studies in school way back when... The Boy loves this book so much we've been reading it about three times each a day.

HAPPY EASTER!

Renew with Neuhaus

I've never been good about completing a Lenten reading list, but with our new Adoration hour, I've been finding a little more uninterrupted time to sit down with a book or two. We picked up "Death on a Friday Afternoon" at a used book store when we traded in some of our old books after our move. Was actually a little reluctant to start reading it because it looked, well, thick - not so much inches-wise, but there were a lot of big words ("theodicy"). When I was in high school, the bigger the words, the better. My brain has shrunk since then (or maybe my hubris - no, that is alive and well), so lately the simpler the better. But I did finally pick it up and start reading it this week. And, oh my, is it wonderful. It's good how the Lord knows what we need to learn and when we need to learn it. Make no mistake - not all of it is going in nice and easily, but my ideas about Holy Week are stretching and growing little by little.

One gem from "Death on a Friday Afternoon":

The second day is the Friday we so oddly call "good". And the third day, the great Vigil of Resurrection conquest. Do not rush to the conquest. Stay a while with this day. Let your heart be broken by the unspeakably bad of this Friday we call good... Stay a while in the eclipse of the light, stay a while with the conquered One. There is time enough for Easter. By these three days all the world is called to attention. Everything that is and ever was and ever will be, the macro and the micro, the galaxies beyond number and the microbes beyond notice - everything is mysteriously entangled with what happened, with what happens, in these days. This is the axis mundi, the center upon which the cosmos turns. In the derelict who cries from the cross is, or so Christians say, the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. The life of all on this day died. Stay a while with that dying.

Also highly recommend "As I Lay Dying", Fr. Neuhaus' reflection on what death means following his own serious health problems and near brush with death. I took my own perspective as a nurse to the book and it enriched and expanded what I thought I already knew.

Richard John Neuhaus was a fierce, well-spoken champion of Christians' place in the public square. Although he just recently passed away, I think of him often and even ask him to pray for all of us especially given the current threats to religious freedom and public involvement.

Hug a Librarian

I complain too much about grad school - so here is something I am immensely grateful for:

Librarians! Especially medical reference librarians who take time for lowly grad students trying to plow through reference databases. There's a special place in Heaven for librarians. And interlibrary loan. Need a book that sits on a shelf in Florida? We'll get it for you! Need an article published in 1980something in an obscure European journal? No problem - it is on its way! Our amazingly helpful wonderful medical reference librarian also introduced me to SCOPUS. Oh SCOPUS, my life was so empty without you. Now I have six brand new articles sitting on my table ready to be incorporated into my manuscript. (The manuscript that was essentially ready to go - that is, until I found more information.)

OK, I'm a little silly - but truly, thank God for books and journals and knowledge at our fingertips to explore His big, wide world - and thank you, God, for librarians, who help us search.