Friday, August 1, 2008

Sara's Potty

Potty training is going really well at our house! We were having a bit of resistance for a little while, so I went and checked out a bunch of books at the library. I think just looking at the books and seeing that going in the potty was "normal" helped Jonah. He now tells us when he needs to go and we have had almost no accidents.

One of our favorite books that we got from the library was called Sara's Potty by Harriet Ziefert. This is a lift-the-flap book that I really liked because it is very light-hearted and funny. The book asks if various animals sit on the potty and the answer is always, "No!". Jonah loves it when I ask the questions ("Does a giraffe sit on the potty?") and he gets to answer, "No, No! That's silly."

Then the book asks if Sara uses the potty and the answer is "not yet, Sara still wears diapers". Then it shows Sara a little bigger using the potty and then washing her hands afterwards. I think this is a fun book for potty training. I also found out that there is a version for little boys that uses different animals called "Max's potty". I think either book would work fine because it doesn't show any anotomical parts anyway (at least not in this version! oh.. except a rear end). In the end it shows Sara proudly wearing underwear.

This is a really cute book, which I would recomment to anyone.

Third Angel

I just looked at my post list and thought... I didn't post on that yet?! Shows you how busy my summer has been lately.


This novel consists of three stories connected by the same characters and places over different periods of time, beginning with the most recent events and going backward. It is is about unrequited love and betrayal and how life and death can affect three people in very different ways.

Read on...

Thursday, July 31, 2008

Water for Elephants

I just finished reading "Water for Elephants" by Sara Gruen this week, and I absolutely loved this book.

The story is told in two time frames; from Jacob Jankowski as a twenty-three year old vet traveling with the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth, and as a ninety-three year old man with a still-sharp mine confined to a nursing home. The story moves seamlessly between the two time periods. At the beginning of the story we are told he is about to reveal a secret he has kept hidden for seventy years----and what a story it turns out to be!

In 1931, a tragic accident takes Jacob's parents and leaves him alone and destitute in the midst of the Great Depression. The circus is both his salvation and his personal nightmare as he ends up signing on to be the circus veterinarian.

The characters in this novel are described so vividly that you will remember them long after you finish the story: Marlena, the pink-sequined star of the equestrian act; her charming-yet-terrifying husband August, who suffers with bouts of paranoid schizophrenia; Walter, the dwarf whose mother sold him to the circus; and Camel, the chain-smoking member of the circus who first befriended Jacob. And then there is Rosie, the lemonaid-stealing elephant that Jacob (and the readers) come to love.

This book was an easy read and had a very interesting plot. I also learned so much about the train-circus era in U.S. history. I think there is something in the novel for just about everyone: it includes pieces of many genres including; adventure, mystery, fictional memoir, love story, and historical account.

This was a great read, and I highly recommend it.

Saturday, July 12, 2008

Fancy Nancy

Since I don't have any girls (and thus not many books on girlish topics), my sister (who has three daughters) recommended this book to me. It is called Fancy Nancy by Jane O'Connor.

Her daughters LOVE this book and after reading it I can see why. Nancy loves everything fancy; from pink boas to sparkling tiarras, from her frilly room to her lacy socks, and even high heels....but alas, her family is SO plain. They don't even ask for sprinkles on their ice cream! So Nancy invites them to lessons on how to be fancy. Her family willingly goes along with the lessons and then go out for a night on the town all dressed up.

They are all having a fabulous time when there is a food disaster (or so it seems to Nancy) that puts a damper on the evening. Nancy finds out that her family loves her even when they end up spattered with ice cream sundaes... and that there isn't a fancy way to say "I love you".

The illustrations by Robin Priess-Glasser are every bit as fancy as the story and are a wonderful addition to the book. This is a great book for the little drama queen in every little girl.

Friday, July 11, 2008

The Glass Castle

If you ever feel like you need some reassurances about the job you are doing as a parent, then this is the book for you. The Glass Castle: A Memoir by Jeannette Walls recounts her childhood experiences as she grows up with her eccentric parents. She and her siblings grow up basically in spite of their parents, because apparently their parents never did grow up. Her father, Rex is a brilliant nonconformist who cannot keep a job for very long and has "a little bit of a drinking situation," as her mother put it. Her mother, Rose Mary, is a self-absorbed artist who can't be bothered by everyday tasks... like cooking or cleaning the house.

Read on...

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Have you seen my potty?

I am contemplating when to begin the chore of potty-training my two-year old boy. I want the diaper-free stage to get here, I just don't want to go through all the work involved in getting to that point. Know what I mean?

So my sister suggested that I take a look at this book. It's called Have You Seen My Potty? by Mij Kelly and it is hilarious!

Read on...

Monday, July 7, 2008

Memory Keeper's Daughter

The opening scenes of this novel are very gripping. Dr. David Henry's wife, Norah, goes into labor during a paralyzing snowstorm in Lexington, Kentucky in 1964. Although Dr. Henry is an orthopedic surgeon, he is forced to deliver his child, aided only by a nurse.

Dr. Henry is overjoyed when he delivers a healthy son and also discovers that he is to be the father of twins. Everything changes with the birth of his second child, a daughter, who has Down's Syndrome. Dr. Henry makes and immediate and fateful decision. Believing that he will spare his wife pain, he tells Caroline to immediately take the child to an institution and never reveal what she has done. He tells Norah (who was heavily sedated during the labor) that their son Paul's fraternal twin died at birth.

He had wanted to spare her, to protect her from loss and pain; he had not understood that loss would follow her regardless, as persistent and life-shaping as a stream of water. Nor had he anticipated his own grief, woven with the dark threads of his past.
Norah mourns for her lost child. The loss of Pheobe in always present in her life. It "had left her feeling helpless, and she fought that helplessness by filling up her days." The secret David kept from Norah also affected their family. Norah wanted to have another baby after Paul, and I think that would have helped her with her loss. However, David doesn't want to risk having another child with Down Syndrome. Norah doesn't understand why he doesn't want another child, and so the wall between them grows.

Poor Paul is left to deal not only with his parents' icy relationship, but also with his own sadness at the loss of his sister. David realized by the end of the book that his lie harmed Paul as wel as Norah
...however hard he worked to make Paul's life smooth and easy, the fact remained that David had built that life on a lie. He had tried to protect his son from the things he himself had suffered as a child: poverty and worry and grief. Yet his very efforts had created losses David never anticipated. The lie had grown up between them like a rock, forcing them to grow oddly too, like trees twisting around a boulder.
This book ends happily, but it still made me sad. I could not understand how David could give up his daughter... and if he was going to give her up, why did he even tell his wife that she'd had twins? I actually don't understand how he could lie to her about something like that, and then never tell her.

Caroline had to work so hard to raise Phoebe and ensure that she could get an education and eventually a job. David and Norah would have had struggles raising Phoebe, but I tend to think that they would have grown closer together because of their adversities. It was sad to see their marriage slowly deteriorate, and to know that they were missing out on spending time with Phoebe and each other.

Read on...