Instagram Friday

Happy Friday! I’ve found a new linky party I wanted to try, at Life Rearranged.  Every Friday, bloggers link up their weeks using Instagram.  You know how much I love my Instagram, so I thought this would be a fun one to try every now and then.  I really enjoyed looking at the other bloggers’ links, it’s very cool to see a smattering of life in around the country (world?) using this simple medium.

Here’s my July in Instagram:

Did you know you could buy 6 year old boys at Target?  We got one…cheap!

We’ve had lots of time in the pool this month, it’s been a hot one.

 

So hot we even tried to fry an egg on the driveway. 

After about 6 hours, the yolk was solid and covered in ants.  Yuck.  The temperature was in the hundreds several days in a row.  Here was the temperature at 8:30 p.m.

I am obsessed with skies on Instagram!  They look so much cooler than when I use my big girl camera.

The local corn stand finally opened.  We all love sweet corn, except Dave who just tolerates it for our sake.

Here’s where Dave and I went for our anniversary dinner. 

Last week we went to dinner with our cousins to our favorite Japanese restaurant.  One of the cousins hiding behind Maddie turns 14 next week and was probably so embarrassed by the other kids (I remember those days well).  We went during the heat spell, and the restaurant’s air conditioning was out.  We were hot, especially since the meal was cooked right in front of us, but the food and company was greatly enjoyed.  Many thanks to Grandma W. for treating all of us!

He’s going to kill me, but…

And finally, you can’t have July without sparklers!

Please head to Life Rearranged to check out some more Instagram pictures!

Summertime Haikus

The swing chains go slack

His toes scratch the blue heavens

Grandpas push the best!

 

Innocent lily

I get the feeling that you

Just gave me the finger.

 

Three perfect sweet smiles

But always two eyes are closed

No Christmas card here.

 

Oooh, kinda creeeeeepy

Or she’s swimming in Kool-Aid

Ew.  Kinda sticky.

 

The bumblebee’s cute!

Unless your camera pokes him.

Then he’s awful mean.

 

The warrior paint

Of a raspberry picker

Scares away the bees.

 

Dear corn on the cob,

I love love love love love you!

But not stuck ‘tween my teeth.

 

The sparkler glitters

Its dazzling, twinkly glow

Jack’s lost in deep thought.

 

I’d hate to think that

My precious girl (on the right)

Just left a huge toot.

Book Review Time

I’ve had so many of you express interest whenever I’ve done my sporadic book reviews, that I’ve decided to do a regular Book Review after every five books I read.  I’m afraid if I wait much longer than that, I’ll forget the details of each book (dude, don’t you dare call me old).  If you look over there on the right (and down a bit), you’ll see my “Good Reads” widget, which keeps track of the book I’m currently reading, and the last six books I’ve read.  You can click on any of the books if you want to read more about it too.  I’ve been trying to think of a good name for my reviews, something a bit catchier than “Book Review Time”.  Maybe Beth’s Book Mania! or Books That Don’t Suck and Some That Do!, or possibly Beth’s Amazing Super Fab Book Review for Dummies! (no offense).

I’ll go in order from oldest to newest:

Pictures of You by Caroline Leavitt-This novel was one for book club.  Two women, both running away from their lives, collide in a car crash.  One dies, the other gets involved with the family of the dead one.  And darnit, I don’t remember much more about it, except that I didn’t like it very much.  I remember thinking as I read it that the storyline had so many stereoptypes in it…stereotypical characters, plot events, etc.  It was such a neat premise, but it really disappointed me.

The Book of Tomorrow by Cecelia Ahern-  I really like Cecelia Ahern’s novels (she wrote P.S. I Love You which was made into the movie of the same name, though my favorite novel of hers is Rosie Dunne).  Ahern mostly writes “magical realism” novels…books with all of the characteristics of realistic fiction, but with a tiny bit of magic thrown in for fun.  In this case, the main character finds a diary that she realizes is written in her own handwriting, which reveals the details of her very own “tomorrow” to her.  Knowing her future tiny bits at a time, she has the choice of changing those events as they occur.  I really enjoyed this book, though it was probably my least favorite of Ahern’s so far.  Look up Cecelia Ahern in the library.  She’s a very fun author!

If You Were Here by Jen Lancaster-I really really really wanted to like this book.  I absolutely love Jen Lancaster’s memoirs (Bitter is the New Black, Bright Lights, Big A**, Such a Pretty Fat) which made me laugh out loud when I read them, which was unfortunate at night, as my convulsing, silent giggles would invariably wake up Dave, who did not like Jen Lancaster at all as a result.)  If You Were Here was Lancaster’s first (and I hope last) attempt at writing fiction.  The writing was seriously lazy.  Her characters were undeveloped, plot points were undeveloped, there were a bunch of small sideplots that led nowhere and did nothing for keeping the plot moving, the climax of the novel seemed thrown together, like her editor said, “Hey, Jen, we need something exciting to happen instead of just ending the story.  Can you think of something quick before I hand this in to be published?” This book dragged on for me and I couldn’t wait for it to be all over so I could read something that didn’t put me to sleep every night. (Many thanks, however, to my friend Shelley for loaning me her copy.  And she didn’t like it much either.)

Room by Emma Donoghue-About Face!  Since I had been trudging my way through Jen Lancaster’s novel, I deserved a page turner! Besides staying up reading ‘til after midnight (this is a big deal for me, people) I also read it during a two hour ride up to Penn State, a little bit there while waiting around, and two hours back, finishing the book in about a 24 hour time period (Lancaster’s took me two weeks!)  The book tells the fictional story of 5 year old Jack who was born in the shed where his mother was held captive after her kidnapping at age 19 (think Jaycee Dugard), and who grew from baby to boy knowing only that room, his mother, and their captor. It sounds like a tough topic to read, but it really isn’t, as the story is told from Jack’s innocent point-of-view.  Trust me…your plants won’t get watered and your kids will go without lunch and your dinner will burn…because you won’t be able to put this one down!

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese-I absolutely loved this novel, but it is no easy beach read as it is set in Ethiopia in the sixties and seventies, involves a lot of medical terms, and is over 600 pages long.  The first 250 pages were very descriptive, the author giving us a lot of background information (250 pages of character descriptions, an incredibly long birth scene, and a very slow plot = Beth almost giving up) but I persevered, taking about two weeks to read those first 250 pages, because, though slow, the writing was beautiful, and I just love learning about history or geography in the guise of a novel.  Once I hit page 250, I couldn’t put that baby down, and I read the remaining 400 pages over the weekend.  A quick synopsis:  conjoined twins Marion and Shiva are abandoned at birth by the father, a doctor, and their mother, who dies during childbirth.  Two doctors at the hospital raise them during a time of Ethiopia’s struggles for liberation.  Author  Abraham Verghese is a doctor himself (and according to the cover, a professor at Stanford University).  Some of his medical descriptions get a bit too graphic (“it would be all too easy to nick the bowel and spill feces into the abdominal cavity.  He made a midline incision, then deepened it carefully, like a sapper defusing a bomb.  Just when panic was setting in because he was going nowhere, the glistening surface of the peritoneum—that delicate membrane that lined the abdominal cavity—came into view”---EEWWWW!)  However, Verghese also makes medicine beautiful, his use of language was eloquent and vivid, the characters so developed I felt I knew them each personally, almost felt that I was a neighbor of The Missing Hospital in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.  I learned a lot about Ethiopia and its history, geography and people, and was really so sorry when this novel came to an end.  I’m still thinking about it.  Please give it a try!

Happy Reading!

Jack’s Lucky Day

I shudder to think what could have happened to Jack if Katie had already owned that  Barbie car.

************************

In related Lucky Jack news…

Fortunately, Jack (finally) lost his tooth!

Unfortunately, he lost it at the bottom of the pool.

Fortunately, I wrote a note to the Tooth Fairy begging for understanding regarding the lack of any pearly whites under the pillow. The very cool Tooth Fairy still gave Jack a dollar since it was his first tooth and she understands that accidents happen. 

Fortunately, a few days later, the tooth showed up in (most unfortunately) a pile of yucky-gunky leaves, bugs, and muck after I vacuumed the pool.

Fortunately, Dave fished it out of the gunk for me.  Ew. 

After much deliberation, Jack decided to put the tooth under his pillow and take his chances that the Tooth Fairy had forgotten about the other dollar.

Fortunately, the Tooth Fairy left him a nice note telling him she was glad that he found his tooth and then she gave him another dollar!

Unfortunately, as a result, Jack may or may not have gotten a little lesson in “working the system”.

Niagara Falls or Bust

In my last post you heard all about the dark side of our family trip to Niagara Falls and Toronto, and there were some dark moments, in fact, I don’t think you can spell family vacations without the words “snot cam” or “oily cat” or “it’s a fail” which I realize doesn’t make much sense, but I’m just coming off of 5 days cooped up with my nearest and dearest and I’m feeling a little bit lightheaded.

We did have a good time.  An amazing time.  We stayed on both the American side and the Canadian side.  The American side was a bit run-down, very few restaurants, and very little entertainment, but…it is the side with most of the falls which means lots of walks and hiking, and getting right up close to the falls, which was breathtaking!

The red decks and walkways are Cave of the Winds…remember that for later.

If you go to Canada, you must ride the Maid of the Mist, if only for the fashionable, neon poncho you get to keep!

(The bridge behind the kids is the Rainbow Bridge, which connects the US to Canada... later we walked across it and straddled the line between the two countries, which was pretty cool.)

The Maid of the Mist will take you right to the base of the Horseshoe Falls.  You will get wet.  It was fabulous!

Our other favorite on the American side was the Cave of the Winds.  It was no cave…apparently the cave collapsed many years ago.  Instead it was a series of walkways and decks that took you right next to the base of the falls.  We got another souvenir poncho and these awesome souvenir sandals for this one!

Then we headed off on our walk next to the falls.  I got a few pictures of about a million gazillion seagull nests and then had to put my camera away. It was thousands of time wetter than Maid of the Mist.  One of the decks was called Hurricane Deck and I really did fear that the falling, splashing, spraying water would push the kids off that deck.  Jack held my hand and left that one crying, he was scared too.  We had to scream to be heard and the spray and wind from the falls lashed at us violently.  We did the Cave of the Winds walk twice, and even with the poncho, we were all totally soaked through.  But it was incredible!

Then we headed to the Canadian side, which offered some amazing views of the falls, because you were across the river from the falls.

The view from the top of the Skylon Tower.

You can see the walkways and decks of the Cave of the Winds in the center-right of the photo above.

We also went on the Journey Behind the Falls tour on the Canadian side.  We took an elevator down through the earth and came out next to the Horseshoe Falls.  We could also walk through a tunnel and look out from behind the falls.  Compared to Cave of the Winds, though, it was a bit boring.

And yes, you do get wet.  And you get ANOTHER poncho.

The Canadian side had all the fun stuff.  We ate at a Rainforest Café and played mini-golf and walked around the Clifton Hill area which was very much like the boardwalk at the beach:  wax museums, t-shirt shops, haunted house rides, restaurants, and ice cream stands!  Bring your wallet, people.

Next we headed to Toronto.  We wanted to visit their zoo, and we were greeted at the front gate by this guy:

He was a very mean swan who watched all the people go by and would snap at you if you came too close, as Jack quickly found out.  I won’t show you many more zoo pictures, because you saw several already in my last post.  We had a great day there though. 

We also spent one morning on Lake Ontario.  The sunshine was warm (which was nice after Niagara Falls’ chilly weather), the kids played in the pebbles and looked for sea glass and skipped stones, and it was calm and relaxing.

Do you see Toronto behind the kids?

I’m so glad we did it.  I’m also so glad we’re back home again. 

P.S.-Someone asked me if the kids needed passports.  They did not.  Children under age 16 may use birth certificates instead.  Dave and I both needed passports.  We had two interesting encounters in the Border Control station (or whatever it’s called).  On our way into Canada, Jack was feeling grumpy and closed his window on the border control guy who wanted to match each child with their birth certificate.  Duuuude.  You don’t tick off the border control guy (who luckily realized Jack was being a stinker, but still insisted on the window going down again).    The other fun moment was after our trek across the Rainbow Bridge, heading back into Canada (again).  Maddie asked the Border Control guy if he could throw a wrapper away for her.  He glared at her, and said, “I don’t think so.”  DUDE!  Don’t tick off the border control guy!!!!  Sheesh.