Saturday, March 27, 2010

She Always Keeps Me Guessing...

Emily always seems to keep me guessing, often doing exactly the opposite of what I expect.  Today I was sipping a cup of coffee, and she really wanted to try a sip.  She asked me repeatedly, in a super nice voice, and even remembered to say "pleeeeease".  So I relented, fully expecting her to spit it out, or tell me it was yucky.  Instead, she asked for more, and then more, and then proudly walked around saying "I yike coffee".  Oops, I guess that one backfired on me!  At this rate, she'll be addicted to coffee before she hits kindergarten!

Friday, March 19, 2010

Friday Five

Tonight, in the middle of an unusually warm spring week, I bring you the top five reasons why it's harder to push Emily in the jogging stroller this year than it was last year:

5.  She is so much more aware of her surroundings.  If we get within a 1/2 mile radius of a park, or a field, or anything else that looks interesting, she'll start in on me: 'Out, Emily get out.  Swings!  Emily swing!  Walk!  Emily walk!"  And so on it will go until we are well past the area.  She may or may not also start whining when her pleas of excitement are ignored.

4.  She asks me to sing.  I only have so much lung capacity, and I'm usually using almost all of it already.

3.  She likes to take control of our running routes, and will start pointing in directions I was not planning to go, insisting "this way, mommy!".  If I listened to her, we may be running for a long, LONG time.

2.  She's no lightweight.  She's packed on quite a few pounds since last fall it seems, and you definitely notice the extra weight on the hills.

1.  There are dogs everywhere.  And birds.  And cars.  And anytime Emily sees something she likes, she'll point it out, or ask about it, and she keeps repeating herself like a broken record until you acknowledge that she has spoken or responded to her questions.  This leads to a considerable amount of huffing and puffing by the end of an average four mile run.  It feels more like fourteen.

Still, having the freedom to go out for a run again almost anytime I want has been wonderful.  The fresh air and the sunshine has been good for the soul this week, and we've enjoyed every minute of it!  Come on spring!

Saturday, March 6, 2010

The Saturday Six?

I missed the Friday Five yesterday.  I knew it would happen sooner or later, but I was hoping for later.  Oh well.  As a way to make up for it, I've decided to embark on the Saturday Six instead.  One of the things that kept me busy yesterday was the monthly meeting of our book club.  This book club has been together since November of 2007, and the same 10 or so ladies have met once each month to discuss our current selection.  We even have a name, the Read Wine book club!  I don't remember who came up with it (it wasn't me, so I can't take the credit) but I love the time we spend together.  Eric likes to tease me that we don't talk about the book very much, but we really do.  I mean, we're *usually* engaged in book related talk a solid 40 to 50% of the time we spend together!  Anyway, out of all the books we've read, here are my top six.  And this time they are in order, with number one being my all-time favorite.

6.  Belong to Me (Marisa De los Santos).  This was a fiction novel that was actually a sequel to a previous work, though it was easy enough to read this as a stand alone effort.  The characters were engaging, and witty, the story lines moved along nicely, and it was a pretty easy read.  I really enjoyed it!

5.  Loving Frank (Nancy Horan).  This was a piece of historical fiction that I really enjoyed.  The characters were complex, if their choices were sometimes frustrating, and it was fun to follow this partly imagined, partly true complex love story unfold.  Quite the ending too!

4.  A Homemade Life (Molly Wizenberg).  This was a super fun read because it incorporated short stories from throughout the author's life with recipes she associates with that time.  We all brought our favorite recipe to our meeting that month.  Yummy!

3.  The Namesake (Jhumpa Lahiri).  A coming of age story about an Indian American boy growing up in the NE United States.  The writing is phenomenal, and utterly believable.  The characters are very endearing.

2.  Same Kind of Different As Me (Ron Hall, Deborah Moore, and Lynn Vincent). A story so incredible no novelist would dare dream it.  I'm stealing a tag line from Amazon here, because it fits so well.  This is a very powerful, compelling, inspiring story about faith and the power we all hold to change one another's lives.

1.  American Wife (Curtis Sittenfeld).  This was another historical fiction piece, loosely based on the life or Laura Bush, and it was utterly captivating to me.  I love this genre, and I couldn't put this book down.  It seemed so plausible, the characters were flawed but totally redeemable, and I loved every minute of reading it.  I also quickly read the other two books this author had written, but found this one was easily the best.

You should check out these books if you're looking for a good read!