It's been a year since I upgraded to a smartphone. While it's been much easier to take pictures of my offspring that with our actual camera, I otherwise have some regrets because having the internet at my fingertips steals much more of my time that I thought I'd allow. I'm making a conscious effort to leave it out of reach in another room, and have rediscovered what occupied most of my time in the days of dial-up...reading. So books are most of my quick takes today.
1. I was stuck in a reading rut because I started wading through Tolkien's The Silmarillion before Lady Infant was born. It's been hard for me to dedicate the necessary brain cells to keeping track of the characters and stories in this book, and I finally gave myself leave to put it down for a while. Another blogger mentioned this book and I had put it on my Amazon wish list months ago. Last week, I checked to see if our library system had it, and, bingo! Although I think that the four temperaments are psuedoscience, it was an interesting read and it helped me think about how to examine, understand, and handle my kids' burgeoning personalities, as well as my own (I am a classic melancholic, it seems).
2. Not a book, but did you know that there was a symphony inspired by the four temperaments?
I played it with my orchestra a few years ago. It's a fun one to play, at least from a first violin perspective.
3. I've been a slacker about meal planning for the whole week lately (and about linking up with Simcha!) but I've been revisiting this cookbook, particularly "The Sunday Cook" chapter.
I bought a 10-lb pork shoulder on sale at Market Basket and roasted it, made both of the leftover recipes (one of them twice) and then we had more leftovers with barbecue sauce over rice. It was the week of pork. Then "oven stuffer" chickens were on sale at Shaws for $0.88/lb so I roasted a whole chicken, made broth from the carcass, and then we had chicken soup and enchiladas from the leftovers, as well as feeding the baby shredded chicken for lunch a few times.
Don't make the mistake of thinking that this has made me into a meal planner extraordinaire. What's for dinner tonight? I don't know; I forgot to pick up a key ingredient for my original plan and Mr. Husband has the car today. And I already used my "nachos for dinner" card last night.
4. Speaking of Market Basket.
5. One of the reasons I've been reading more is because I've been trying to make weekly trips to the library. I really have no excuse not to go; we're walking distance, there's a great storytime program two days a week, the junior library has a very enticing train table, and it's a nice library in general. I'd given up bringing Sir Toddler to storytime a few months ago because he didn't want to leave the aforementioned train table, but it recently occurred to me that I could bribe him by checking out picture books about trucks after storytime. So now he goes to storytime, where he is very slowly learning to be part of a group of kids and listen to other adults. Meanwhile, I'm learning enough about different types of trucks that I can actually start to identify them by type instead of by color.
This book was a huge hit; Sir Toddler read it every day and still talks about it. We might have to invest in a copy when Lady Infant moves past the "eat and dismember every book I get my hands on" stage.
6. I haven't read this book yet, but it seems like just about every blogger I follow has. I'm apparently lucky customer #861 on the queue at the library, but I have grand plans to borrow it from a friend/family member (familend? framily member?). Why haven't I bought it, you ask? Well, it seems like sort of a zen riddle to buy a book about getting rid of stuff.
In the meantime, Mr. Husband and I are on a decluttering and organizing kick inspired by the mere idea of this book, so I suppose that's something.
7. Not a book. Not anything interesting at all. Upon the recommendation of my fellow friends-who-live-closer-to-the-ground, I bought jeans at American Eagle! They were on sale and they fit off the rack! I had to swallow my pride and search for 2S among kids that could be my students, and it was still more than I've spent on a pair of jeans in a long time, but it certainly beats wearing ill-fitting khakis every few days because my only pair of jeans without holes in it are in the washing machine. I've only been looking to remedy that situation since February.
Unrelated photo of Sir Toddler feeding his sister Cheerios in the Shaws parking lot.
More and better quick takes here. Have a killer weekend.
1. I was stuck in a reading rut because I started wading through Tolkien's The Silmarillion before Lady Infant was born. It's been hard for me to dedicate the necessary brain cells to keeping track of the characters and stories in this book, and I finally gave myself leave to put it down for a while. Another blogger mentioned this book and I had put it on my Amazon wish list months ago. Last week, I checked to see if our library system had it, and, bingo! Although I think that the four temperaments are psuedoscience, it was an interesting read and it helped me think about how to examine, understand, and handle my kids' burgeoning personalities, as well as my own (I am a classic melancholic, it seems).
2. Not a book, but did you know that there was a symphony inspired by the four temperaments?
I played it with my orchestra a few years ago. It's a fun one to play, at least from a first violin perspective.
3. I've been a slacker about meal planning for the whole week lately (and about linking up with Simcha!) but I've been revisiting this cookbook, particularly "The Sunday Cook" chapter.
I bought a 10-lb pork shoulder on sale at Market Basket and roasted it, made both of the leftover recipes (one of them twice) and then we had more leftovers with barbecue sauce over rice. It was the week of pork. Then "oven stuffer" chickens were on sale at Shaws for $0.88/lb so I roasted a whole chicken, made broth from the carcass, and then we had chicken soup and enchiladas from the leftovers, as well as feeding the baby shredded chicken for lunch a few times.
Don't make the mistake of thinking that this has made me into a meal planner extraordinaire. What's for dinner tonight? I don't know; I forgot to pick up a key ingredient for my original plan and Mr. Husband has the car today. And I already used my "nachos for dinner" card last night.
4. Speaking of Market Basket.
This came into the library today and I'm totally geeking out.
5. One of the reasons I've been reading more is because I've been trying to make weekly trips to the library. I really have no excuse not to go; we're walking distance, there's a great storytime program two days a week, the junior library has a very enticing train table, and it's a nice library in general. I'd given up bringing Sir Toddler to storytime a few months ago because he didn't want to leave the aforementioned train table, but it recently occurred to me that I could bribe him by checking out picture books about trucks after storytime. So now he goes to storytime, where he is very slowly learning to be part of a group of kids and listen to other adults. Meanwhile, I'm learning enough about different types of trucks that I can actually start to identify them by type instead of by color.
This book was a huge hit; Sir Toddler read it every day and still talks about it. We might have to invest in a copy when Lady Infant moves past the "eat and dismember every book I get my hands on" stage.
6. I haven't read this book yet, but it seems like just about every blogger I follow has. I'm apparently lucky customer #861 on the queue at the library, but I have grand plans to borrow it from a friend/family member (familend? framily member?). Why haven't I bought it, you ask? Well, it seems like sort of a zen riddle to buy a book about getting rid of stuff.
In the meantime, Mr. Husband and I are on a decluttering and organizing kick inspired by the mere idea of this book, so I suppose that's something.
7. Not a book. Not anything interesting at all. Upon the recommendation of my fellow friends-who-live-closer-to-the-ground, I bought jeans at American Eagle! They were on sale and they fit off the rack! I had to swallow my pride and search for 2S among kids that could be my students, and it was still more than I've spent on a pair of jeans in a long time, but it certainly beats wearing ill-fitting khakis every few days because my only pair of jeans without holes in it are in the washing machine. I've only been looking to remedy that situation since February.
Unrelated photo of Sir Toddler feeding his sister Cheerios in the Shaws parking lot.
More and better quick takes here. Have a killer weekend.
I am in the midst of the Market Basket book now. It's very interesting.
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