The Simple Woman's Daybook

For December 30, 2008

Outside My Window
It is 40 degrees and dark. The snow is gone, thank goodness.

I am thankful for
The fact that I have a few more days off with the Shrimp and my husband.

From the kitchen
Nothing tonight, but tomorrow we're having company, so I plan to peruse my new Barefoot Contessa tonight and make a menu.

I am wearing
The usual khaki pants, a white tank top, light blue cardigan, and blue clogs. Note short pants, still pretending that it's warm outside.

I am creating
The red sweater. Still. Also, I'm putting the Shrimp's sports pictures in identical frames from Ikea, and plan to line them up above his windows.

I am going
Nowhere. Hee hee hee.

I am reading
The Girl With No Shadow, and (telling myself I'm previewing it for the kid) The King In The Window. It's great.

Around the House
Thinking about organizing projects for the rest of the year. Started on the school project drawer, and still have hopes for my closet.

One of my favorite things
Being home after a week of travel and family gatherings.

From the Learning Room
The Shrimp and I made an agreement about the rest of his Christmas break homework today: he completes it without argument, and I buy some stuffed Dialga from the Pokemon collection.

He has to do five analogies a day for the next five days, read the rest of Gooseberry Park and write his synthesis, do his school math homework, do one new lesson of MathWhizz and test each day, do three drawings (today's is going to be a thank-you card we can photocopy for Christmas gifts), and do three geography lessons. He's less than thrilled, but . . . oh well . . .

A Few Plans For The Rest Of The Week
Company tomorrow night, homework as above, closet as above, read.

The Simple Woman's Daybook
From Cabo San Lucas

For December 18, 2008

Outside My Window
It is cloudy and 80 degrees, but will brighten up later.

I am thinking
About Gift From the Sea, in which she talks about how, when on vacation, it takes several days for her mind to come out of lock-down and start to toss up ideas, thoughts, observations, etc, about her life. I am just getting to that stage (day 5)

I am thankful for
The fact that the weather appears to be clearing in Portland, so we'll be able to get home tomorrow night.

From the learning rooms
I haven't been reading to the shrimp, except for a few pages at night before bed. During the break I plan to start doing that again, at least 20-30 minutes a day.

From the kitchen
Nothing except sandwiches and McVities. We're going to Damiana tonight in San Jose.

I am wearing
Shorts and a t-shirt

I am creating
The red sweater. This is the first time I've used a real pattern, and stitch markers. I'm learning lots.

I am going
To the pool, pretty soon.

I am reading
The Girl With No Shadow, by Joanne Harris. It's great.

I am hoping
That when I get home I can

1. clean my closet,
2. lose 10 pounds,
3. start working out five days a week,
4. start getting up earlier,
5. begin taking my child to church and teaching him about God,
6. help him make more friends,
7. teach him higher math,
8. take him to the theatre more often,
9. get him piano and swimming lessons started,
10. get him to eat more foods.
11. I am also hoping that the babysitter is still agreeable to helping out during the Session,
12. that I can start cooking 5 perfect dinners per week which we eat sitting around a table while conversing politely, and
13. that I can keep my car clean.

This list looks faintly ridiculous (as in, more than is realistic) when I line everything out in my head. Maybe I don't have as much to feel guilty about as I thought.

I am hearing
The waves and the sound of little kids around the pool.

Around the house
Dunno.

One of my favorite things
Having my family all together.

A Few Plans For The Rest Of The Week
Finish Christmas shopping, wrap the gifts, invite for New Year's eve, work out, clean my closet as above, etc. Not much.

The Simple Woman's Daybook--December 4, 2008

Outside My Window
It is sunny, and 40 degrees. Too late in the year for running around without stockings--I freeze every time I do it. Like today.

I am thinking about
The Christmas holiday--where we will go, who we will stay with, and if I am ever going to pull it together and decorate.

I am thankful for
My family, my job, my warm house, the fact that I re-joined my running club and started working out with them on Saturday mornings again.

From the learning room
We are going to work on drawing today, and coloring in the picture after it is done. We are also working on analogies, spelling words, and the multiplication tables--the threes!

From the kitchen
We are having split pea soup out of the crock-pot for dinner. I loooove coming home from work and having the house smell like someone's been in there cooking all day.

I am wearing
No nylons, as mentioned above, full skirt, flats, self tanner. I'm cold. Must figure something out. Boss informs me that we DO have a dress code around here, to which I said "oh, let me run right out and change . . ." He laughs, fortunately.

I am creating
Still, the grey sweater.

I am going
Nowhere. Yippee!

I am reading
Finishing up the Boleyn Inheritance--trash, but fun.

Around the house
Must. Decorate. Today.

A Few Plans For The Rest Of The Week
I am running. Today and Saturday.

The Simple Woman's Daybook

The 1% Challenge

I just joined the 1% Well Read Challenge, which will be a little more than the usual challenge, since I only have until the end of February to read the books. I'm looking forward to it, though.

Southern Reading Challenge Completed

I finished Mudbound last week. It was a great book, but I think I need to read it again. I get the sense that there is much more to the story than meets the eye on a first reading. I finished the book while we were in Sunriver, where there is a fabulous bookstore. Thus, I went from Mudbound to The Mysterious Benedict Society. That ended up being too much of a culture shock, as the Benedict Society is not exactly packed with things to think about. I think I'll wait awhile and read it to the Shrimp.

Southern Reading Challenge #2

I just finished Garden Spells (#2 on my list), and I really enjoyed it. It is a light, sweet book, and perfect for summer. It was also a good break between Giant and the one I'm reading now (and loving, by the way), Mudbound.

I get the impression that EVERYONE is loving Mudbound, based on the fact that our library has five copies of it, and there are at least 10 holds on each copy. Not that I wouldn't have bought the book for myself anyway--who am I kidding here--but that gave me a good excuse to go out and buy the book. In hardback, no less. When was the last time THAT happened?

Come to think of it, it was my mother that bought this one. But I would've, if she hadn't.

Southern Reading Challenge--One Down

I finished Giant (Edna Ferber) last night, and loved it. It is so hard to stop living with a book and move on to new characters, new style of writing, etc. Still, I think I can manage :-). I've now started Garden Spells, which seems much lighter. It's almost Alice Hoffman-ish, in that it focuses on women with mystical (or at least somewhat out-of-the ordinary) talents. Lighter, but still good.

Reading With The Shrimp

The Shrimp and I have had our struggles with his reading out loud--"I'm having fun right now. I don't want to" . . . "NO!" . . . "Let's do it after dinner" etc . . .. Sometimes I think the book I've picked out is too hard, sometimes it seems too boring, sometimes he just doesn't want to do it. Late last week, I decided to take a page out of his teacher's book (no pun intended), and just go with Horrible Harry.

During the school year, he read HH Goes to the Moon, HH and the Green Slime, HH and the Purple People, and HH at Halloween. In a quick review of Amazon, it would appear that there are enough HH books left to get us through the entire summer. So, on Saturday, we started HH Moves Up To Third Grade. The Shrimp reads a page, I read a page. We did chapter two tonight, and it works great. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that he stays interested--it sure is hard to find things that are interesting AND at the right reading level.

Southern Reading Challenge

My preliminary list for the 2008 Southern Reading Challenge is:

• Giant, by Edna Ferber
• Garden Spells, by Sarah Addison Allen
• In The Land Of Dreamy Dreams, by Ellen Gilchrist

Since I'm already halfway through Giant, I might add a few more titles before the end of summer.