Book Club

I love my book club! It is full of fun ladies who have great insight into life, read interesting books, and like to talk! Every meeting is great fun and even if I didn't like the book we read, I always walk away with more appreciation for the book. I try so hard to never miss a meeting. I have been fortunate enough to be in charge of the group for the past year and I will miss the group when I have to move.

Last week we chose our next 13 books. The evening was full of laughter and suggestions of new books to read.

Here are our choices (Thanks Sarah-I copied the list from your blog):

44 Scotland Street, Alexander McCall Smith
The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell
Dinner at Homesick Restaurant, Anne Tyler

The Woman in White, Wilkie Collins
Pope Joan, Donna W. Cross
Silas Marner, George Eliot
Enders Game, Orson Scott Card
The Scarlet Pimpernel, Baroness Emmuska Orczy
These is My Words, Nancy Turner

Water for Elephants, Sara Gruen
My Name is Asher Lev, Chaim Potok
The Goose Girl, Shannon Hale
A Thousand Splendid Suns, Khaled Hosseini

Here are the other suggestions that weren't lucky enough to be chosen:
Back When We Were Grownups, Anne Tyler
Wish You Well, David Baldacci
Color of Water, James McBride
The Hot Zone, Richard Preston
A Return to Modesty: Discovering the Lost Virtue, Wendy Shalit
The Last Mimzy, Henry Kuttner
Till We Have Faces, C.S. Lewis
Winter of our Discontent, John Steinbeck
The Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula Le Guin
The Dark is Rising, Susan Cooper
The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold
Into Thin Air, Jon Krakauer
The Plague, Albert Camus
Narrative of the Live of Frederick Douglass, Frederick Douglass
Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad
City of Joy, Dominique Lapierre
Everyday Sacred, Sue Bender
Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
Eleanor Roosevelt, Blanche Cook
Girl in Hyacinth Blue, Susan Vreeland
Darcy’s Story, Janet Ayler
Frankenstein, Mary Shelley
The Shop on Blossom Street, Debbie Macomber
A Train to Potevka, Mike Ramsdell
The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls
I Can’t Wait to get to Heaven, Fannie Flagg
The Good Good Pig, Sy Montgomery
Gifted Hands, Ben Carson
The Mitford Years, Jan Karon
Mao’s Last Dancer, Cunxin Li
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, Lisa See
Botany of Desire, Michael Pollan
Sarah’s Quilt, Nancy Turner
The Star Garden, Nancy Turner
The Family Tree, Sherri S. Tepper
Twilight, New Moon, and Eclipse, Stephenie Meyer
March, Geraldine Brooks
The Namesake, Jhumpa Lahiri
The Bean Trees, Barbara Kingsolver

Kindness Jar

The past few days at our house there has been too much arguing, teasing, crying and disobedience (from the kids). Brad and I were getting fed up with it. So we have decided to try a "Kindness Jar". When they are nice, kind, obedient, and all-around-good, we put a rock in jar. If they are mean, tease, or disobedient we take one out. When the jar is full we are going to go get ice cream (Emily LOVES ice cream). So far it has changed the atmosphere in the house for the better. We hope it continues!

Does anyone else have any good ideas to help stop the teasing, crying, and arguing?

Our Fall Colors Saturday Drive

I have always wanted to take a drive to the Mississippi River to view the Fall colors and see some sights. We decided that we would make that drive last weekend since Brad had the day off and we might not be able to do it later in the season. The day started out overcast but weather.com said there was only a 10% chance of rain until 3:00 pm then it would be a 30% chance. So we started out with hopes that the rain would hold off until the drive home but before we even left the city it started to RAIN!!! It was a full blown downpour. We carried on because we might not be able to do this again. Despite the rain it was a fun day.

Our first stop was at L.A.R.K Toys. This is a really fun toy store/museum. It has all kinds of old toys on display. I think that "antique" toys are so wonderful because they were all about using children's imaginations and there were no batteries!

L.A.R.K. Toys also has a hand carved carousel. It is beautiful and, of course, the kids love to take a ride (well, me too-I couldn't resist).
Emily chose a deer, Sam chose a bear and I rode a flamingo.
Brad and Ben waited on the side and took pictures. Here is my cute boy. He is teething and drooling like crazy so he constantly wears a bib.Our next stop was Pepin, Wisconsin. This is where Laura Ingalls Wilder was born and the setting of Little House in the Big Woods. Emily has listened to this book many times and I wanted to take her there. They have a little museum and tourist info center. At the museum they have artifacts that were of the same time period as the Little House books. They also had pictures of Laura and her family (Laura didn't look anything like Melissa Gilbert!). Around the museum they had quotes from the book and an example of what it was referring to like the butter press Ma used and Pa's fiddle and many other things. One of my favorite examples was the tin cup, penny and candy stick Laura got for Christmas. We showed the kids and read the quote and talked about how happy they were to get those gifts for Christmas. Another Christmas she received red mittens and a doll (because she only had a corn cob doll). It showed an example of a corn cob doll and a rag doll. Emily thought that was really neat.

Here is Emily at the Tourist Info Center. There was a mini riverboat the kids could climb. A fun diversion after the drive in the car.
Sam was having a difficult time. He was tired and hungry and wanted a turn steering the boat. There always has to be some crying on a day trip.

We drove 7 miles from Pepin down a windy road to the location of Laura's family farm. The Laura Ingalls Wilder Historical Society built a replica of the log cabin she was born in on the original location. The log cabin used to be surrounded by woods but now it is surrounded by corn. The rain was pouring down (you can't tell from the picture but it was raining hard and very windy) but I had to get out and see inside the cabin. I couldn't pass up an opportunity to show the kids how people used to live and how lucky we are. Notice how my umbrella turned inside out because of the wind. After our visit to Laura country, we drove home down the Wisconsin side of the Mississippi River. After lunch at a local cafe, the rain stopped and we were able to see some beautiful trees in various shades of green, yellow, and red. It was really pretty. We stopped in Alma, WI at the Lock and Dam #4. We were lucky enough to watch a huge barge enter the lock. I was fascinated.
This barge was made up of 8 individual barges bound together and pushed down the river by a tugboat. Once it gets to St. Louis, it could join up with up to 40 other barges (since there are no other locks past St. Louis). I don't know why but this fascinated me. A railroad lines the Mississippi River and we saw 2 trains speed past. The engineer on one of them waved to us as it past by. Sam was enthralled-every boy's dream.

One of the barges was full of scrap metal. We told the kids it would probably be sent to a recycling center and Emily said she wished she could have it because, "I could make some really neat stuff with it."

It was a great day and nice to spend time together as a family. Ben is a great traveller and is easy to bring along (as long as he is fed, changed, and gets to see what is happening).

Apple Ridge Orchard

Who can resist a visit to an apple orchard when the leaves start turning colors and the days get cooler? Visions of apple pie and caramel apples are hard to resist so we spent a beautiful, cool, crisp evening at a local apple orchard last Saturday. We went with our great friends Julie, Sarah and Mason C*. The evening started with a wagon ride pulled by a tractor up a steep dirt road to the orchard. At the top of the hill, we entered a corn maze for kids. They had a great time running through the maze and figuring their way out. They would giggle when they made a wrong turn and Emily was so helpful keeping all the kids close by so we didn't lose anyone. When they were done, Emily wanted to do it again and she did it without making a wrong turn!

Next we picked APPLES! They had many varieties but we picked our favorites - Honeycrisp (Minnesota's official state fruit and great for eating) and Harrelsons (tart and great for pies!). The kids had a ball picking the apples. Here's Emily and Sam choosing only the best apples they could find.

The apples looked so great, Emily couldn't wait to sample them.

The apples were so delicious even Benny had to have a taste (well, not really but cute picture huh!).

Emily and Sam are very intent on eating those apples. Emily ate hers down to the seeds.

I couldn't resist posting this picture of Sam wandering through the orchard with a bag on his head. This is so Sammy!

After we picked our apples, we headed to the pumpkin patch. Emily chose a pumpkin for Brad to make a pumpkin pie (Emily and I do not like pumpkin pie but Brad and Sam do. I made pumpkin chocolate chip muffins though and they were DELICIOUS!!!!!). This pumpkin had so much flesh it was amazing. It was about 2 inches thick. Good thing we did not buy it for a jack o' lantern.
Before we got back on the wagon, we stopped to see the farm animals. Here is Emily trying to feed the llamas some grass.

Sam liked the bunnies and chickens.I love this picture of all four kids watching the llamas and sheep.


Ben was such a good baby. He just loves to be part of the action and do what everyone else is doing. Brad was my hero and he carried Ben in the Baby Bjorn but near the end of the fun Brad's back was killing him (Ben is about 19 pounds and quite a heavy load).
As the sun was sinking, it got quite chilly so we loaded back onto the wagon to pay for the apples and pumpkin and get a treat. Our tickets to the orchard included a caramel apple for each of the kids and they were delicious!!!!!
Emily had a hard time sharing her apple with Mom and Dad because she liked it so much (but so did we and we were too cheap to buy one for ourselves for $3).
It was a lovely evening. The kids had fun. We spent time with great friends and made fun memories. Here are a few random pictures (as if I didn't already post enough :-).
I love this sweet baby!
Sammy had a great time - don't let the grouchy face fool ya!

Sam's First Day of Preschool

Sam went to his first day of preschool on Tuesday. He has been looking forward to it for awhile. We are a part of a preschool co-op where each Mom takes a turn teaching. He was so excited; he just ran up to the door and bounced right in and wanted to get started. The first teacher is one of our best friends and Sam is very comfortable at their house. I think that was really good for him. Sam and Mason were both really excited but the other students were more apprehensive. Here is a picture of his class (left to right) Mason, Sam, Blake, and Alyssa (Greta wouldn't pose). Isn't this just the classic picture of 3 year old preschool.On the way home, he told me all about the fun he had. He said they learned the letter A but as he told me, "I already knew that." I'm so glad he had a great time. This is his first real experience doing something without Emily. He's such a big boy now!

Creative Minds

My kids LOVE to do art-draw, color, paint, create, cut, glue, staple, whatever. Lately, my living room has been covered in paper, markers, paper, glue sticks, paper, scissors, and more paper. The other day I had to demand that they play outside with their neighborhood friends (it was a beautiful day-they will have all of the long, freezing cold Minnesota winter to play inside). Today Sam and Emily were making paper clothes. Emily would decorate a piece of paper in suns, stars, flowers, rainbows, and other girly designs and then staple or tape the paper around her. It took her many experiments to figure out if staples or tape worked best. At one point, I left the room and came back to find her in just her underpants wearing a paper skirt and paper shirt. Sam, of course, had to join in on the paper apparel fun and he designed paper shoes. Tape and green construction paper were the medium. He had formed the paper into shoes but they would not stay on so he taped them to his feet (at least he didn't try to staple them on!). I should have taken a picture, but by the time I thought about it their paper clothing and shoes had torn apart (paper clothes just don't last!).


The other day Brad came home to a disastrous living room and said something to the effect that they are lucky I tolerate such messes. Yes, it is totally annoying that a huge mess is made and I am concerned that someone will drop by and see my living room in such a state, but I tolerate it for a good reason. I believe that creative play is good for a child's brain. As they engage in their creative undertakings their brains are problem-solving and figuring out what to do next. They are imagining and having fun. I think that is really important so I tolerate the mess while they have their fun, but they do have to clean it up before they go to bed!


Sam noticed me posting a picture of Emily's awhile back and he wanted me to scan this picture. It is a balloon. He did it all by himself. He was very proud of it and wanted me to scan it into the computer so we "can keep it forever"!
Here's Emily's latest picture. The dress is colored with glittery pen. You can't see the shine on the scanned picture.

Heart Smiles

Emily and Sam got home from school today at about the same time (it was Sam's 1st Day of Preschool - more on that in another blog). They were both so excited to see each other. They gave each other a hug and asked, "How was your day?" Emily then had Sam show her all that he did in preschool. The theme at preschool today was Friendship and the craft was a pink and blue die cut of a person that Sam colored. He showed Emily the craft and said, "The pink friend is you and the blue friend is me." They told each other what they did and were just full of smiles and polite, interested questions and comments about each others. It was so sweet it just made my heart smile to see them so kind and loving to each other.