Month: July 2012

Evie’s Chapter Book List

/ Shane / 6 Comments

Speaking of reading, we do go through a decent amount of chapter books with Evie. Although Evie had the patience to sit through a multi-chapter non-picture book before age 2, Oliver really doesn’t. So we mostly only get a chance to read these at relaxing time. In between, though, she gets plenty of shorter books and picture books, with Oliver (although I have been sneaking in longer and longer books at bedtime to sort of ramp up Oliver’s tolerance). We often have two or even three books going concurrently, because usually Sara has one that she reads when she’s taking Evie to relaxing time, and I have one that I read when I’m taking her. Having more than one going doesn’t seem to bother Evie, in fact, the only thing that bothers Evie is when you close the book. She would prefer to listen to you read forever and ever and ever.

Anyway, here is the list of chapter books we have read to Evie as far as I can remember:

  • Alice in Wonderland
  • Through the Looking Glass
  • Winnie-the-Pooh (x infinity)
  • The House at Pooh Corner
  • Little House in the Big Woods (x2)
  • Little House on the Prairie
  • On the Banks of Plum Creek
  • By the Shores of Silver Lake
  • Farmer Boy
  • The Indian in the Cupboard
  • The Enormous Egg
  • The Tale of Desperaux
  • The Door in the Wall <– Not very good
  • Charlotte’s Web
  • Stuart Little
  • The Incredible Journey
  • Where the Mountain Meets the Moon (x2)
  • Comet in Moominland
  • Finn Family Moomintroll
  • Moominsummer Madness
  • Black Beauty
  • Pollyanna
  • A Light in the Attic
  • Where the Sidewalk Ends
  • The Complete Grimm’s Fairy Tales (Pantheon Edition – we’re talking 864 pages here)
  • My Father’s Dragon (Currently Reading for the second time)
  • The Long Winter (Currently Reading)
  • Caddie Woodlawn (Currently Reading)

In addition to the above, we tried Heidi, but Evie never really got into it, so we quit. We’re waiting on the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe books until she’s a little older. (Also, as Sara pointed out, we want her to discover at least some of the classics and read them on her own)

Some other suggestions we’ve thought of are The Boxcar Children, Because of Winn Dixie, the Ramona books, Bunnicula, or The Little Prince (we already own the last two). We actually have Mr. Popper’s Penguins from the library, but we already have 3 books going, so I hate to start a fourth.

Any other suggestions on good titles to read young children? What are we missing? What were your favorites as a kid? What have you read your children?

The Summer Reading Program

/ Shane / 3 Comments

Ah, the summer reading program. Evie has been participating at our local library, and it sure brings back memories.

Growing up, the library was probably my favorite place on earth. I have spoken before about how, uh, intense I was about reading as a kid:

Speaking of being a weirdo about reading, when I was little I read like a kid possessed! I gave new definition to the term book-worm. I used to hide behind the couch so my mom didn’t catch me reading. Sometimes she would force me to go outside and get some fresh air so I would pretend like I had to go to the bathroom and throw a book out the window and then go outside and retrieve it and hide behind the garage and continue to read. When I ran out of books I would read anything including my mom’s old text books and even the backs of all the shampoo bottles or things in the medicine cabinet. I am not making this up!

(Side note: is quoting yourself from an earlier blog post weird?) (Side note #2: I don’t mean that to sound like I had to hide from my mom because she didn’t want me reading. (That was my dad.) My mom just didn’t want me reading all. the. time. to the exclusion of all else in my life, which is what I usually did.)

I did not need a summer reading program to encourage me to read. On the contrary, you couldn’t have physically prevented me from reading over the summer. The best part *about* the summer was all the free time I had to read. Every day I would ride my bike to the library to return the four or five books I had read overnight. When I discovered they would actually give you things for free if you simply listed all the books you had read, it was a no brainer. (Especially if someone would give you honest to goodness Pizza Hut Pizza for reading, aka Book It!)

Even at that age, I knew the prizes they gave out were pretty lame. But it was a free bonus for doing something I wanted to do anyway. The grand prize was usually a tee shirt that said something about the library. I loved those tee shirts. I was proud of them. I’m not really sure why, since it wasn’t very difficult for me to get to the grand prize level, and I always continued to read long after I hit the top, but I guess it was a shirt about the library, and I loved the library. These days, I wear shirts about other things I love, like the Packers or Thundercats or Jim’s Cheesesteaks.

I remember proudly presenting my carefully handwritten list of books to the librarian, the margins scribbled in with book titles that didn’t fit in the slots (it only went to 100). I also remember my shame and outrage when the librarian told me that she didn’t believe me, and it wasn’t possible that I could have read that many books so soon after the summer reading program started. I think my mom had to vouch for me or something, and even still the librarian thought we were trying to pull a fast one on her (you know, because the library tee shirt and eraser that looked like a crocodile were well worth the effort of a con job). And you know, in retrospect, what did she think I was doing in the library every day in the summer, setting up my alibi? Why did I keep checking out all those books if I wasn’t reading them? Could she have been so unobservant that she didn’t notice that I was in her place of work almost as much as she was?

Mean old librarians aside (and believe me, the mean old librarians of Chicago put the mean old librarians of back home to shame), libraries and the summer reading program will be forever ensconced in the deepest part of my heart. The summer reading program is one of the quintessential experiences of youth. I’m so hopeful that Evie will look back on them with the fondness that I do.

Tips from the Great Outdoorsman

/ Shane / 1 Comment

My father, the master outdoorsman and great white hunter, gave me the most amazing hiking / hunting tip I have ever heard.

“If you’re in the woods and you have to go and you don’t have any toilet paper handy, you just cut the pockets out of your pants and use those.”
“You cut out your pockets??”
“You can always sew new pockets in. It’s better than ruining a perfectly good pair of pants.”
“Have you ever done this?” I asked, bemused.
“Of course not,” he scoffed, “I always carry tissues.”

That’s a real thing that just happened. Is it too late to get a book deal for “Tips from the Great Outdoorsman” staring my dad?

Finally, a camping trip where it didn’t rain for once!

/ Shane / 2 Comments

We spent two nights at The Haven, and we had beautiful weather. It was in the 80’s during the day, and down to the 60’s at night. Most importantly, NO RAIN! I don’t know why I’m such a camping rain magnet, but I’m glad my powers were not active for once.

We’re really starting to know our way around the land a little bit. We spent most of the day on Friday carving paths to various things with our new loppers (especially the potty tree). Most importantly, I think we might have found the location for our future tiny house! It’s in a sort of clearer area between a triangle of truly massive pine trees. Well shaded, midway back in the woods, and not too far from a clearing that may serve for fruit trees. Definitely some potential.

Equally importantly, we did find the mythical blueberry bushes towards the back of our property, and they were delicious. We might need to bolster our stock with a few extra bushes next year.

We’re starting to know our way around South Haven a little bit as well. On Saturday morning, we hit up the most excellent farmers’ market, followed by coffee @ Julias. I think this is going to become a Haven tradition (especially considering we all were in need of a real bathroom by Saturday morning!!) Also, strange coincidence, one of the vendors at the farmer’s market was the City Hippie, a family from Evie’s school and a maker of extremely beautiful things. Evie and Ollie did a kids’ activity at the market and colored some canvas bags with fabric markers and stencils, and they both turned out really well. They’re both very proud of their bags and they’ve shown them to everyone they’ve come in contact with since then.

By lunch time, some friends had arrived, and the work portion of our trip was over. Although I don’t think she really realized it at the time, I think that Evie probably had one of the best days of her life. To have friends her age there to play with (who don’t get frustrated with her no matter how bossy she is), to hike with and make up potty stories with, and to hide behind the tent and tell secrets with was about as fun as it gets. We found a dog-friendly beach and all had a great time, even if the water was a little cold and the waves were a little sneaky (some unexpected water in the face a time or two).

Ollie also had a great time with Maya and Elsie (he said his favorite part of the weekend was singing “Twinkle Twinkle” with them), but for his money, he was just happy to play in the sand. All day, every day, nothing but sand. We would no sooner wash his hands or put on his pajamas or whatever, and he’d be back in it again. He had sand everywhere, including what was basically a sand hood over his head and neck, which got pretty disgusting when we were forced to put a layer of vaseline on top of it all. Yuck.

Ollie played in the sand so much he was literally delusional. He shouted in his sleep, “I want to go under the sand!” I thought he must have meant, “I DON’T want to go under the sand,” nightmare style, but he repeated it several times and he definitely wanted to go under the sand. Based on how much sand he had on him, he almost got his wish.

And the best part about The Haven? You can be as LOUD AS YOU WANT:

(I love how Ollie just flinches a lot and looks confused, but still wants to be part of the group.)

Unfortunately, the worst part about The Haven is ticks. We found at least a dozen crawling around at various times, and poor Ollie won the dubious honor of being the first person to have a tick attached to them at The Haven. We checked him pretty thoroughly at bedtime, so it must have crawled up to his head during the night. We handled it pretty quickly and calmly, and Oliver didn’t quite seem to mind, handling it with his usual good-natured nonchalance (“The ladybug bit me!”).

Finally, on the way home, we stopped and picked 7 3/4 pounds of blueberries. Evie in particular did a great job. I was really surprised. The last time she went picking, she did what Ollie did this time, which was basically eat every blueberry that went in her bucket. She was pretty proud of herself, and cried quite a bit when she accidentally spilled her bucket. But she got back to it and ended up picking a full quart by herself!

A great trip and, as always, it makes me want to go back again!

Quote Monday is honestly a sasquatch

/ Shane / Leave a comment

Me: “Oliver, we can’t play the recorder while guests are still sleeping. It’s too loud.”
::time passes::
Oliver, coming back into the kitchen: “I’m having trouble finding a quieter toy.”

At least he’s honest, I’ll give him that.

Me: “A sasquatch is like a hairy man.”
Sara: “A cross between a bear and a man.”
Evie: “Are you a sasquatch daddy?”

Sara: “A tick was crawling on Ollie.”
Ollie, excited: “A ladybug was crawling on me!”
Sara: “He likes to take the optimistic view.”

Elsie: “Let’s make sand cakes for our mommies!”
Evie: “Yeah! Let’s make them poisonous!”