Better late than never! My gratitude post for July is all about my brother, Scott and a trip he made to Kansas City in 2016. I still think about that 2016 visit all the time! The Richard Scarry sticker was something I found in an old Richard Scarry activity book during Scott's visit. Richard Scarry was a favorite author of ours when we were little.
Have I told you how much I love this kid? Here she is with Meachum, who is my friend, Hunter's newest family member.
As soon as I told Izzy the cicada was a friendly bug, she scooped it up and befriended it. She was just as overjoyed by this beautiful creature as I was and we danced around squealing as the cicada tiptoed up and down her arm. Well she danced and I hobbled, but this cicada received nothing but adoration and appreciation during its interruption from whatever official cicada business it was doing.
With all the hustle and bustle of coming home, stepping on a crack and breaking my back, cannonballing into summer reading at work, and Izzy's visit, I forgot to tell you about two recent publications.
My poem, "Roadkill" was published in Slippery Elm's 2019 issue. This is the first time one of my 'Rose and Ella' poems has been published and I am totally giddy about it. After my grandma passed away in 2015 I had nightmares for weeks and battled another short, but crippling bout of sleep paralysis, which I've had on and off since I was 16. After my grandma passed away I struggled to get back into life and I tried a handful of things to get my life going again. Nothing worked. I started writing all the nightmares down and reading them from different perspectives. I often tried giving the nightmares positive spins as a way to show my nightmares who was boss. This seemed to help and gradually the nightmares went away. I have a stack of poems from this dark period of my life that I've been slowly polishing. The first poem from my 'grandma' collection has been published, which is another important milestone for me. This poem, "Grief," along with two others, "Loose Park" and "Kaleidoscope," were published in Well Versed. I cannot find a page on their website where copies can be purchased so email me if you would like to purchase a copy. And don't worry, Dad, I've got copies for you ; ).
Last week a coworker, Octavia and I did a family storytime together and it was so much fun! We picked out a few favorite books, our favorite songs and fingerplays, and decided bubbles was a great way to go due to having a storytime in our large meeting room (sadly, we don't have 50 shaker eggs). We also did back-to-back storytimes so we could give everyone a chance to come. Our first storytime was almost full and our second storytime was full. Here's what happened: Storytime Rules (sneakily worded as "Welcome to Storytime")
Because this was a one-time special storytime I decided to try out my new list of helpful tips. I compiled and tweaked these tips throughout the spring and was planning on rolling them out in the fall. But I thought this summer storytime may be a good time to see how receptive the grown-ups were to the tips. Prior to this summer I haven't included anything about phones, and I've only had a few issues. However, in other storytimes in our system there have been issues, so I thought it would be wise to include phone rules in the hopes that I can nip it in the bud before it becomes an issue. It definitely wasn't an issue during last week's storytimes!
Here they are:
Please keep your phones tucked away.
Please don't take pictures or record videos (at the request of other parents who don't want pictures/videos of their kids on the internet).
Help your child with the actions and songs.
Lyrics for songs and fingerplays will be on the screen.
Repeat the songs and rhymes you like at home – repetition is key!
If your child needs a break, feel free to leave the room at any time.
A few words of wisdom from Love the Fur You're In read by Octavia
Hello Song (Octavia's hello song from the spring)
If You want to hear a Story
Tune: If You're Happy
and You Know it
if you want to hear a story
clap your hands
if you want to hear a story
clap your hands
if you want to hear a story
And you really want to show it
if you want to hear a story
clap your hands
Stomp
Shout hooray
Do all three
Quieting Down Fingerplay - Finger Fiddle (from my spring storytime)
This fingerplay is a magical amazing thing. The noise level plummeted in both storytimes while children and grown-ups took lion breaths and counted fingers. I was astounded it worked as well for these summer storytimes as it did for the spring, because we had twice as many kids.
Take a few deep breaths in
and roar like a lion when you breathe out
Press the fingertips of both hands together
in front of your chest
Tap your thumbs together five times
Pointer
Middle
Ring
Pinkie
Shake out your hands and wiggle your fingers
Book - I Want to Be in a Scary Story by Sean Taylor and Jean Jullien
This was SUCH A HIT. It's a great book for a two-person storytime. I was the voice of the narrator and Octavia was the voice of the purple monster. She did such a wonderful job with her inflections.
Book - Book O' Masks by Donald Lemke and Bob Lentz
It's one of those books that you hold up to your face as you read it. It would be tough for one person to read unless they memorized the text. So Octavia wore the book and I read it, and holy moly the kids went bonkers. Each page is a different mask with a rhyme to go with it and something the person wearing the mask would say. For example, for the pilot mask, the person wearing the mask shouts "enemy on the right." Octavia and I came up with the idea to shout the line and then ask everyone to count to three and then say it all together. The whole setup went so well. Everyone was engaged - shouting out their guesses and then counting with me.
Song + Bubbles - Tiny Tim (a song I do in lots of storytimes due to its popularity)
While we sang this song and the next one, Octavia walked through the crowd with a bubble machine.
I have a little turtle.
His name is Tiny Tim.
I put him in the bathtub
to see if he could swim.
He drank up all the water.
He ate up all the soap.
And now he's sick in bed with bubbles in his throat!
Bubble bubble bubble
Bubble bubble pop!
Bubble bubble bubble
Bubble bubble pop!
Song + Bubbles - Ten Little Bubbles sung by Sara Hickman (another enormously popular song from my spring and fall storytimes)
One little, two little, three little bubbles.
Four little, five little, six little bubbles.
Seven little, eight little, nine little bubbles.
Ten little bubbles go pop pop pop.
Quieting Down Fingerplay chosen by Octavia
Jump like a frog, stretch like a cat
Hop like bunny, flap like a bat
wiggle like a worm,
slither like a snake
Be a wet dog
and shake shake shake
Turn around and take a seat
Book - from 1 to 10 by Mies Van Hout
I read the book and Octavia did the motions of the animals and helped the kids guess the animals. The first storytime was too excited after bubbles to get into this fun counting book, but the second storytime enjoyed it.
Song - The Itsy Bitsy Spider sung by Laurie Berkner (this is always a hit at my storytimes)
The Bunny Hokey Pokey chosen by Octavia
I tried to participate in this but I felt more like a robot bunny that was low on batteries. Everyone enjoyed being bunnies though and had no problem leaving me behind when it came time to turn ourselves around and it took me thirty seconds to slowly rotate without falling over. When it came time to put our tails in I very creakily teetered for a moment and decided that I must be a bunny without a tail.
Goodbye Rhyme
Octavia did this super fun rhyme for her storytimes last year and it was a hit this summer, just like it always is. It looks something like this, and the kids had a great time guessing the animals.
Less than two months to go until fall storytimes begin!
I haven't been blogging much because I've been spending all my free moments with my niece, Izzy. As crazy as it sounds, I haven't been able to spend much time with her these past sixteen years. I can count the number of times I've seen her on one hand so I'm super thrilled we're finally getting to hang out. We are two peas in a pod. I have more in common with her than anyone else I've known. We both love olives and dark chocolate, bananas in our cereal, and are diehard sushi fans. We are both perfectly content to sit down with our art projects and happily work on them together. Izzy likes to color, paint, draw, and make jewelry. She has this pack of 200 gel pens that she worships, which is eerily similar to how I feel about my paper collection. We started an official Izzy journal and it's been so much fun to work on it together - I ask the questions and she draws the answers. It's been a fun way to get to know her better. We both love silly, happy movies, but especially Disney movies, and unlike everyone I know (excluding my brother, Jason), she not only doesn't mind that I talk the whole way through movies, she talks the whole way through movies too. She also has a tendency to get incredibly loud, especially when she gets excited, which has startled me a couple times. I kind of knew that I can get loud too, but once, during a movie, I squealed and it scared the crap out of Izzy. It was definitely a good teaching moment for me. It hasn't been the visit I was hoping for due to my back problem. Though I've had my first shot, and I'm throwing back anti-inflammatories and muscle relaxers, and icing my back nonstop, I'm still struggling. My discs are still pinching my poor sciatica nerve (those asshole discs). My left leg simultaneously feels hot, heavy, numb, and weak with occasional pains shooting from hip to calf. It's definitely getting better though. I can successfully walk and stand for longer periods. I've been back to work full-time with few problems. I have this fancy ice machine that looks like a cooler with wheels and a handle to pull it. It connects to this pad called a bladder that I wrap around my back. The cooler is filled with ice and water that it pumps through the bladder (such a lovely name). I had a similar one for the knee surgery I had a few years ago, but it wasn't a portable cooler. Sadly, I cannot go for walks or hikes or take Izzy on the many grand adventures I planned. I cannot even go upstairs to my office, where I had hoped we would make all kinds of crazy things with glue and paint and papers. It's been a brutal lesson in patience. Over the weekend Robert purchased a plug outlet thing for the car so I can take my ice machine and go places again. We went out to breakfast and walked half the mall, which was fun. The next day Rachel, Izzy, and I got our nails done. It was my first pedicure and nowhere near as terrifying as I thought it would be. Because I cannot bend over, my poor toes looked so awful I knew I had to do something. I think it helped that my left foot is mostly numb. Afterwards, we went swimming. Well, Robert and Izzy went swimming, Rachel stayed home to work on homework, and I managed to walk in the pool for about fifteen minutes (sans ice machine). It was exhausting but rewarding. I got out of the pool and felt like I weighed as much as a small car. I'm hopeful we can do something exciting this next weekend. I'm thinking about a ceramic cafe where we can all paint together. But I have a special summer storytime tomorrow that I must survive first. Don't get me wrong, it's going to be great. Plus I'm doing the storytime with a coworker who's excited and more than willing to do all the crazy stuff like the hokey pokey. But I'm still nervous about it, and any kind of anxiety, even the positive kind, is exhausting. But the great thing about Izzy is that she will get just as excited about journaling and coloring the day away as she will about going on a grand adventure. So this weekend will be fun no matter what.
I read a lot of books in June. I finally bought a Kindle for traveling so I don't have to use my ipad for reading on trips. I switched to reading ebooks while traveling about a year ago, and it's really helped make room in my luggage for books I find during my travels. Unfortunately ipads are expensive and I use mine for writing so I was always a little stressed about reading on it too. I have a keyboard attachment as well, which made it heavy and awkward for reading. I bought the Kindle to try out on the Europe trip and loved it. Every time we had decent wifi I would download more ebooks from the library, and I always had something to read. The best part about it is that I can read it in the dark, which is great when there isn't a lamp in the hotel and I'm the only one not trying to sleep. Since I've been home I've read a handful of books but find myself checking to see if there's an ebook version first. I've spent the last two weeks mostly in bed due to a herniated disc in my back. Robert made a library run for me at one point, but I was running out of books at an alarming rate. It was nice to check out a book without leaving the house. I am on the mend and even went back to work yesterday. One of my nieces is visiting this month, and I'm looking forward to spending lots of time with her. She's a reader too and also into artsy fartsy stuff. I think we're going to spend a lot of time talking, coloring, and watching movies so reading will take a backseat in July. Here are two amazing books I read in June: The Lost Vintage by Ann Mah (Adult Fiction)
I read this while I was vacationing in Paris so my love for this novel may be slightly influenced by that factor. Though I'm not a fan of wine or soft cheese, I really enjoyed the descriptions of wines and cheeses. Each time a cheese oozed, which I lost count of after awhile, or a wine was described, it made me giddy with happiness (and possibly hungry, but not for wine and cheese). Even though this is a predictable read, I enjoyed the story, which zig-zagged around the truth and alternated between the present character, Kate, who finds a hidden room in her cousin's cellar, and Helen, who lived during WWII and helped her father hide all the precious wine in the room. There are smaller stories - will Kate reunite with her first love? Will she pass the Master of Wine exam? But I was most intrigued by Helen's story. Was she a Nazi collaborator? Did she join the resistance and survive the war? I would recommend this to anyone who likes historical fiction, particularly WWII historical fiction. I also have to imagine anyone who appreciates wine, France, and/or vineyards will enjoy this read. Granted by John David Anderson (Juvenile Fiction) Oh this book! I love the cover so much I made it my lock screen picture on my phone for a few days in the hopes someone would ask me about it. In the process of doing this I noticed Ophelia's broken wing, and because of that I couldn't put the book down. I finished it in two sittings, which is not something I do very often. The world of fairies is beautifully constructed and a little reminiscent of Harry Potter's world. I found myself wondering what kind of fairy I would most like to be - granter, baker, scavenger, mender, whisperer, alchemist? Ophelia is a granter, which is the type of fairy that grants wishes. Because less people believe in magic, it is tough to get assigned a wish to grant. Ophelia has spent a lot of time training, and is finally given her first assignment only to learn how difficult it is to grant a wish. She faces many obstacles, including tearing her wing and losing her ability to fly. Because of this she needs to rely on a dog, Sam, to help her track down the nickel that carries the wish she needs to grant. Sam converses with Ophelia in the same way I imagine my dogs converse with me. I laughed at all of their delightful conversations. For example, at one point, Ophelia tries to lose Sam. "'What are you doing?' she growled. Sam wagged his tail emphatically. 'I am following you,' he said. 'It is like chase, but less fun because you are not going very fast at all.'" As I was reading this, I kept thinking about what a good movie it would be, and now I'm hoping that someone out there is dreaming up the most splendid Pixar movie based on Sam and Ophelia's adventures.
