Baby it's cold outside

Leaves gently floating to the ground, birds rapidly flying overhead, sweaters, pumpkins and apple cider. School buses, marching bands and football games. Ah, Autumn...

I miss summer already

My mourning period for the end of summer lasts about 8 months. My feet miss the grass, my skin misses the sun, my kid misses the pool, and I miss the camping (reading outdoors). 

Thankfully, I have found a hobby to ward off the post summer sadness. Scoping out all the great fall book releases! Yay! (C'mon, humor me. Keep reading)

I am really excited for 

 The third book in the Divergent Trilogy. If you are a fan of dystopian books (After the end of the world kind of stuff) you will love these books. The first two were staying-up-late, can't-put-them-down reads and I expect nothing less from the third. Release date: October 22nd

 I Am Malala sounds like an amazing story of a young girl from Pakistan who insisted on an education and was shot in the head for it. "Malala's miraculous recovery has taken her on an extraordinary journey from a remote valley in northern Pakistan to the halls of the United Nations in New York. At sixteen, she has become a global symbol of peaceful protest and the youngest nominee ever for the Nobel Peace Prize." Released on October 8th

 The long awaited 5th book of the much loved Game Of Thrones series! Yay! Release date: October 29th

 And finally, Some crazy chick that likes to make everything fro scratch shares her holiday recipes and tips. No, of course I'm not going to cook! My goodness! I am excited about this book because it will make a great Christmas present for the amazing from-scratch cooking people that I know. Release date: October 29th

Anything look especially good to you??

Don't Judge a Book by it's Cover... But Maybe Judge a Reader by Her Bookshelf?

I had a moment of shock earlier this year that all of you should know about.

I am a NOOK patron. NOOK is Barnes and Noble's e reader. Once you are NOOK friends with someone you can see all of the Barnes and Noble books that they own which are lend-able. This was good news for me at the time because I was saving up for a big trip. Saving up for a big trip means that I am struggling to adhere to a strict budget... adhering to a budget means using the library more then the bookstore.

Not that I don't LOVE the library... it's just that I really enjoy being able to walk up to one of my bookshelves and see a good book and remember what I loved about it and possibly reread it at any time. Other people borrow library books, which means they are not always there when I want them. Also, the library is not open 24 hours a day like my bookshelves are and Gwen would probably get pretty annoyed with me if I threw her in the car at 2 am because I couldn't sleep and I wanted to read that particular book that I borrowed from the library 8 months ago and was really awesome...

Anyway...

This past spring I was checking out what my friends with NOOKs had to offer and I was blown away. Now I realize that these were only the 'lend me' books (not all ebooks are able to be borrowed, which is stupid, but that is a soapbox you don't want to get me started on!) and people always keep all of their ebooks because they are a lot easier to store then actual books and why delete something you paid for? An ebook collector is not nearly as committed as a physical book collector. Take it from the chick that has 7 overflowing bookshelves AND books piled up all over the house. Still though, you really can tell a lot about a person by what they read and even more by what is physically on their bookshelves.

For example, two of my friends are closet romance readers. Who knew?!?! I have never heard them talk about them or seen them lend them out or buy them. I don't think they kept it from me, specifically, because they know how I feel about romance books. I try to keep my distaste for that entire section of the bookstore a secret (So shhhh!) because really, I read crappy science fiction/fantasy so who am I to judge.

Anyway...

I took a look around my books with new eyes and discovered a couple things about myself by my own bookshelves.

First: My joy in owning and lending out books actually exceeds my literary appetite. I own roughly 40 books that I haven't read yet. About 10 of them I never honestly plan on reading (free or 50 cent yard sale buys) and another 10 or 15 of them I will probably never get around to reading because they don't strike me as books I will love.

Second: My love of certain books exceeds my love of lending out books. I have a 'top shelf' of books. They are organized by author and series and double stacked so that only half of them are visible. Many of them have been read so many times that the covers have completely fallen off. I have never offered to lend these to anyone. Ever. I don't plan to either. They are mine. My only. My prreeeccciiousss.

Third: It's all about the escape (but I knew that already). Historical fiction, Science fiction, Fantasy, etc.. are my favorites. I want impossible or in the past. I get enough of reality when I am not reading.

Fourth: Stronger is better. My favorite characters that I like to revisit over and over in the pages of their books are strong. They make mistakes... a lot, but they are not indecisive sissies (speaking of indecisive sissy characters, those twilight books are collecting a lot of dust on their shelf. Hehehehe!). 

So I love to share the literary 'bug', but am possessive of my 'top shelf' and I am drawn to strong characters, but only when they are facing impossible settings and situations.

What can I learn about you by your bookshelf? More importantly, what can YOU learn about you from your bookshelf??

Disappointment

This is important.

Read it again.

It drives me absolutely nutty when a great book gets massacred in the theaters. I just want to yell at the screen: It was good the way it was!! If you didn't have any improvements you should have left it alone!! Of course, the first time I did that, mini-me was so worried that I would be arrested that I save it for the car ride home now. I have also had plenty of opportunities since then to show her that my kind of crazy is not against the law... just funny and occasionally embarrassing.

Movies that have been a horrible disappointment to me are:

• The Great Gatsby (2013)- I actually walked out in the middle of this in the theater, and my movie buddy was more then happy to leave too!
• Prince Caspian- *sigh* It was such an amazing book
• Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005)- One word- Creepy!
• The Cat In The Hat (2003)- Theodor Seuss Geisel would be sooooo unhappy. This was so upsetting, I couldn't even read the book for weeks afterward
• A Wrinkle In Time (2003)- I have tried to stay awake through this movie on three separate occasions and have failed horribly.
• The Golden Compass- My favorite parts of the book were slaughtered. It was sad.

Did I miss any?

Picky Eaters?? Get Creative!

For the past five years that I have been feeding the children I watch I have struggled to find a happy medium between what they will eat and what is healthiest for them. Here are some things I have learned:

1. Names have power. If I say Egg Salad Sandwich to a kid who thinks negatively of salad, he or she is not going to like it. They won't even give it a chance. If I say Smooshy Egg Sandwich to that same child, he or she will taste it with an open mind. A child may not like celery, but might eat 'ants on a log' (celery with peanut butter and raisins for the ants). It's all in the name.

2. Children want control. If I put a salad in front of a child for lunch and it had one thing in it that they don't know if they like (or definitely don't like) they may not eat any of it. If I put 10 diverse salad fixings out with serving spoons and an empty bowl in front of each child the bowls will empty faster then I can refill them and the kids will be full at the end of the meal. This also works for getting them to put veggies on 'Make Your Own Pizzas', eat veggie pita sandwiches, and devour fruits & granola toppings on their plain yogurt. There are so many things they have no control over in their lives, give them a little power and they will revel in it!

3. Appearance matters! Adults know that something may look gross but taste amazing. Children have not always had the experiences that make that believable yet. If at all possible, make it look good. I only buy whole wheat pancake and waffle mix and many of 'my kids' are used to the "regular stuff". Not a problem though. I make snake, sun and flower shapes out of the pancake batter and... drum roll please... my awesome Aunt Joy once gave us a Mickey Mouse waffle maker for Christmas. Problem solved. Supply them with plastic knives and Apple butter or strawberry jam and I can avoid syrup too (see the control factor above). 

4. The two bite rule (at least two bites of everything before they can have seconds of anything, but not mandatory, only if they want seconds) Combined with repetition- WORKS! The tricky part is outlasting them and not overdoing it. Make sure you don't serve that one food they don't like every day. Once or twice a week at the most if at all possible and pair it with food they LOVE so they will want seconds!

5. Shake things up. Kids like routine, but they also like craziness. Get a good book and find some good websites for food ideas. Turn them into kids that like to try new things and they will turn into open minded teens! My favorite book is Healthy Lunchboxes For Kids by Amanda Grant.

Some good websites are:

http://weelicious.com/

http://www.cookinglight.com/food/lunch-box-recipes-kids-00412000072333/

http://www.freshforkids.com.au/index.html

And of course Pinterest has an unlimited supply of great ideas!

Bring in new ideas, come up with crazy/fun names, give the kids control (either helping with the cooking or assembly or choices), make it look good, and let them try it & not like it as many times as they need to.

This is what I have found to work well. What tips/tricks/hints do you have??