Soccer, Summer, Lego, Buffy

• I think that maybe it's finally going to be summer. It feels like today is finally warm enough with everyone healthy to consider it summer vacation.
• Have you tried Sobe Lifewater Pacific Coconut? I'm obsessed. Best drink on earth.
• There is a rumor that we are going to see Snow White and the Huntsman tonight. I don't want to jinx that tho.
• The Pirate is obsessed with Lego videos. It seems the most boring thing on earth to me, but there are people who build giant Lego kits and then make surprisingly long and detailed videos of said creations. The Pirate has started making his own videos and I'm putting them on YouTube for him. I can't bring myself to watch them, but maybe you'd enjoy it. (Also, please let me not be yelling in the background or anything awful.) (His are maybe even more boring than his inspiration.)
• In other internet news, Gayle Forman, author of If I Stay, wrote this terrific post about how Buffy saved her life, my friend Amy (not My Friend Amy) did a stitchbomb on a fence in San Francisco, how cool is this?, annnnnd, that's all the links I saved.

In Bookish News:

• 
  
  The Stand... Along starts today. You can still join!
• I read The First Husband: A Novel by Laura Dave for BlogHer Book Club, and really enjoyed it.
• I'm reading Key of Light by Nora Roberts. This is a reread for me, but I only vaguely remember it, so it feels new.

Wordless Wednesday, the Beach!

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Levees, we haz them.

Are you ready for this Pierre? Today is the big day, as of about two hours ago, water began flowing out of the dam at the higher 100,000 cfs. That will slowly increase over the next few days, leading the Missouri River to rise four feet by Tuesday.  The people in charge expect that the levees will hold, that all of the homes behind the levees will be ok.  Of course, there are homes outside of the levees that will not be ok, but I think the town did everything in it's power to help them too. (Wouldn't it make you cry to have your waterfront view replaced by that wall of dirt? Better than a wall of water, but still, so heartbreaking.)


The parks are almost all on the wrong side of the levees. See the island out there in the middle? There is a new swimming path on that island! (for the fish to use?)

The town of Pierre has come together in amazing ways. Everyone with hands has turned out to sandbag or to deliver food or to volunteer their truck or trailer to the cause.  People are offering their yards for tents and campers, are offering to keep your pets for you, to let you use their washing machine. Restaurants are donating food and selling food at cost to volunteers. Someone called Mike's store yesterday and bought $100 worth of gloves, and Knechts matched it. Everyone is in on it, young and old. I went sandbagging a few nights ago and worked alongside a couple carloads of high school students, a handful of 6 year olds, and a dozen National Guard soldiers, along with an assortment of folks of my generation and that of my parents.  Sandbagging continues around the clock. The businesses downtown all got together and built a berm all the way around the block   Just a quick look at this Facebook page that is helping coordinate efforts will show you how terrific everyone has been.

I am so proud to be from Pierre, SD. I may be new to town, but I am loving the way everyone pitched in.  Everyone we talk to from out of state talking about how amazing this town, Pierre and Ft Pierre, is. How they've never seen so much generosity and hard work. Today the water is coming.  My optimistic nature tells me that it's enough, that we've done enough and that the water will lap peacefully at the levees instead of the houses. Meanwhile, the people won't stop working. Bags are still being added. Berms are still growing. Downstream in Dakota Dunes people are still packing up and getting ready.

It promises to be a long summer of watching the water, of waiting to see it recede instead of rise.  Watching it instead of playing in it. Eventually though, the water will go down and life will return to normal. We'll all get used to living on the water again and we'll forget the threat it poses. I hope we don't forget the feeling of helping each other, of being there for the friend we don't know yet. I've said for months what a friendly town Pierre is, this experience just proves it.

(First two photos courtesy of SDPB, last two from this Facebook page)


I am an Amazon Associate. As such, any purchase you make at Amazon.com after following a link from this blog will earn me a (tiny) percentage back as income. Thanks. All content copyright Books. Lists. Life. at http://bookslistslife.blogspot.com. If you're reading this post anywhere other than there, you are reading stolen content.

Revising our plans for a flooded Pierre summer!

Like a lot of people here in Pierre, SD, the flood has changed a lot of our plans for the summer. I know this doesn't in any way compare to losing your home or your business, no need to point that out, but it does change what we had planned for our summer. This is our first summer in Pierre and we were full of plans for boating on Lake Oahe and fishing on the weekends. We were expecting picnics at the band shell and camping at Farm Island (pictured above). I had big plans for taking the boys to the park on the waterfront during the day and walking around La Framboise Island with the dog. All of those things are on hold, for at least two months. 

Now I'm on the search for other things we can do in Pierre.  Harrison Park remains high and dry. We can play on the playground at the Pirate's school- and check out the playgrounds at the other schools. We can talk walks around Hilger's Gulch and skip rocks into the lake at the memorial by the Capitol building. We can still go to the library (if my children ever find their inside voices) and to Zestos.

My mother will be visiting for several weeks in June (can you believe she hasn't met the Princess yet? Sidenote: the Princess is 9 months old today!!). Mom is an elementary school teacher, so I'm planning to squeeze every creative idea out of her while she's here. Left to our own devices, my kids will be flying kites made of Wal-mart bags (hey, don't laugh too hard, they did it for over an hour!)

We'll make detective kits and look for mysteries and bug catching boxes. We have sidewalk chalk and bikes to (learn to) ride.  The boys excel at scavenger hunts and now that the Pirate can read it's even easier for me to make them lists.  The Pirate still finds educational things fun- learning to count money, and making up worksheets and tests for us to take.  I've promised to buy them a case of carbonated water and let them shake it up and spew it at each other once we have a hot day. Worst case I take them to the mall and plunk quarters into the "rides" that litter the place.

So there's still plenty to do here in Pierre. It's just not the same as we had planned. (And if you have any suggestions, I'm all ears!) I am optimistic that the Corp's plans will succeed and that by August we'll be out on the boat. That everyone's homes will be dried out and that Pierre will recover, with slightly different flood maps.



I am an Amazon Associate. As such, any purchase you make at Amazon.com after following a link from this blog will earn me a (tiny) percentage back as income. Thanks. All content copyright Books. Lists. Life. at http://bookslistslife.blogspot.com. If you're reading this post anywhere other than there, you are reading stolen content.

Planning my first summer vacation, from the mom side

As the title would suggest, this is my first summer vacation from the mom side of things. Yes, there have been other summers in my kid's lives, but I always worked and they were in year round daycare. This is the first time we've had a summer break to plan for and I know that if we don't have a routine in place that we will all be unhappy within a week or two.  We didn't ever have a routine when I was a kid, beyond "get up and go out on the boat." (Yes, nearly every day.) We talked a bit about it as a family and I've been fine tuning it in my head and now I'm going to turn it over to you for suggestions. Here's what I'm thinking so far, and please, help me out, this is my first time!

• From the time we get up until breakfast: free time for kids and mamas. This means I'll surf the internet mixed in with a little cleaning and my coffee, same as always. If it ever warms up I plan to sit on the porch for a lot of this, but it was 40F out there this morning, so not today!
• Breakfast. The Bug and I have had a fairly loose breakfast plan. I want to have a time where we all sit down and eat and talk about the day. I'd like to get them to "help" plan lunch and an activity for the day, including looking up the weather to see what activity is suitable.
• Mornings. The Princess takes a nice solid morning nap lately. The boys will need to play with each other, with minimal help from me during this nap. This is crucial, because it's the best time for me to get paying work done. I am hoping that with a few days practice and a definite activity in the afternoon that they will learn to cooperate.
• Lunch. As soon as little girl wakes up, we'll make lunch and get it eaten. I'm hoping to teach them to clean up they living areas while I make lunch, but we'll see how well that goes.
• Activity. Finally, the thing we picked out to do! Yay! I've been trying to think of all the parks and nature walks and other free things to do in town. Some of them will be things we stay home for (and suggestions are welcome!) but I think leaving the house once a day will be good for us. We do have one great park (and one crappy park) within walking distance.
• Late afternoon, free time. The Princess likes a short afternoon nap. I'd like to be home for that so that I can hopefully get a little more work in.   Boys can play or whatever they want. We'll have a snack.
• Dinner. And, more importantly, Daddy comes home! (I think this is the best part of the Bug's day.)

I'm not planning the part of the day after dinner, because it'll depend on  Mike, but I'm hoping we can go walk by the river or go fishing after dinner or other fun things. Also, Mike and I are both hoping to start jogging soon (Mike once he gets around to it, ahem, and me once I stop coughing), so that will happen in the wee hours of the morning.  He'll go, then I'll go while he showers and gets ready for work. More on this later.

My mom will be here for much of June and we have a little bit of traveling planned, so this routine will be flexible, but I really hope that if they know what to expect that our days will go better.


I am an Amazon Associate. As such, any purchase you make at Amazon.com after following a link from this blog will earn me a (tiny) percentage back as income. Thanks. All content copyright Books. Lists. Life. at http://bookslistslife.blogspot.com. If you're reading this post anywhere other than there, you are reading stolen content.

The Creative Family by Amanda Blake Soule AND a fairy house!

One of the things about working full time that I really regret is that I can't always do all the thoughtful, inspiring things that I always imagined I'd do as a parent. When you work a full time job there just isn't enough time to get it all in and while I'm willing to let some things go (just look at my house!) some things have to be done, like dinner and baths and the occasional laundry. Despite this lack of time, I love to read about how other mamas (and dads) find the time to do it.

I'm not sure how I first stumbled across Soulemama but I've been reading her for a few years now. I love to watch how she manages to find time to be the creative, nurturing mama that I'd like to be, only with four young children to my two. Her first book, The Creative Family: How to Encourage Imagination and Nurture Family Connections, came out a couple years ago but I only managed to get my hands on it this summer. The Creative Family is full of ways to encourage your children to be creative in various ways. There are quite a few simple projects to do with your child, most of which I've marked to do someday. There is an emphasis on being creative YOURSELF, without worrying about the quality of your work (WOW, that doesn't look much like an elephant!) but just letting go and having fun with it.

One of the projects in the book is to build a little fairy house using things you find in nature. This weekend we spent a lot of time in the backyard (I think we knew fall was coming, and it did!) and one of the things the Pirate and I did was to build one ourself. We started with a little area up next to the retaining wall. The pumpkin vine from the garden stretches along the wall and there is a small, softball sized pumpkin near the end. We thought that the fairy (Tinkerbell, which might take some of the magic away, but oh well!) would like to live near a pumpkin.

We gathered sticks to make a wall and a dandelion for her pillow. It's hard to see, but there is a little mossy bed up near the wall as well. We picked a few green tomatoes to add to the pantry, and some red chard for a roof.

Near the end of the project the Bug woke from his nap and joined us outside.

Neither parent claims responsibility for that shoe job.

Soulemama's next book, Handmade Home: Simple Ways to Repurpose Old Materials into New Family Treasures, is out now and if I had the spare $15 it would be the first thing I would buy. The Creative Family is very inspiring, it makes me want to go on walks and draw birds and pinecones with the boys. It's not too crunchy and it doesn't make you feel like you should be an artist, or that your kids should be an artist either. It simply encourages creativity and imagination.

Do you feel that you are a creative person? Do you encourage your kids to draw and paint? Do you buy quality supplies (as she suggests) or the cheap stuff in the $1 bin (like I am guilty of doing)? Do you look for the beauty of nature with your kids or do you tend to stay inside? What is your favorite creative activity with your own kids? (or, I guess, anyone else's kids!)

The Creative Family by Amanda Blake Soule
Trumpter Press

2008

224 pages

Lost my mojo and library piles.

Brilliant post title, huh?

I have lost my blogging mojo. I wrote out a really long post about our crazy weekend and when I went to proofread it I realized that it bored me. So I didn't post. (The short version: Mother's Day was great, the boys bought me a new pillow. The rest of the weekend: also great, but tiring.)

I did manage to do a little reading this weekend, and last night I finished up The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks, which was great right up until the last chapter. The last chapter took a turn towards making the book meaningful, which I didn't think it really needed. I'll try to post more of a review tomorrow.

I took a look at my library list to see what I needed to read next- it seemed like I have a lot of book out, many of which had short holds. As it turns out, the only two that couldn't be renewed were This Lullaby by Sarah Dessen and The Hunger Games by Susanne Collins. One of them will have to go back unread and I'll add my name back to the list. I brought The Hunger Games with me today, but I suspect that it is not the kind of book that I will read quickly (freezer book!) so perhaps it will go back.

I also have That Summer, The Truth About Forever, and Someone Like You by Sarah Dessen, Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson, Perfect You by Elizabeth Scott and Ten Cents a Dance by Christine Fletcher checked out from the library. It seems that YA fiction has taken over. Additionally, there are another 5 or 6 books that I own that I'm dying to read. It's summer and I want to be outside, sewing is comsuming my brain, and it's almost the finals of American Idol. When is someone gonna invent a time machine?

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