Summer Reading Basket For You

My kids are home for summer vacation. You might as well know, I love it. I know, I know, there's lots I've read out there of how you can't be my friend if I like my kids home, but I do.

Anyway, on their last day of school, I pick them up with a van full of balloons. Then we go for french fries and soda, **fast food?? another reason to unfriend her!** The first morning that they're home, I let them sleep in, then they come downstairs to cinnamon rolls. We do it the same way every year.

Another thing they come down to on their first day of vacation, is a large reading basket I've set out for them. They love it. I fill it with books, magazines, notebooks, sketchpads, markers, charcoal pencils, pastels, small travel games, and a few card games, too.

What I have for you today, courtesy of so very many wonderful, talented people I've met on the internet, is a summer reading basket for you.

Leave a comment below to win.

Up for some very lucky winners, are the following top of the line reads:

 
--Jill Smokler, Scary Mommy's, second book; Motherhood Comes Naturally, and other vicious lies. This book is right on. It's something I truly needed when I started this parenting gig 18 years ago. I thought I was supposed to hit the ground running. 18 summers later, and I'm still learning.  Written in Jill's reassuring style that tells us, we're all in this together. A winner.

--Tracy Beckerman's newest, Lost in Suburbia. I've met Tracy in real life, and her essays here are as close to having your BFF living right next door as you can get. No topic off limits for her, Tracy spills it on what the rest of us keep quiet. She takes the words right out of my mouth by asking, "What the heck happened here? And whose house am I in?"

--Lela Davidson's Who Peed On My Yoga Mat. Lela, an adorable pixie of a woman, is another one who reads my mind out loud. She is the best friend from college that you've been smart enough to hang onto. Her writing is irreverent, yet deeply in love with mothering. This is a great book to carry around in your purse--easily pulled out for hidden giggles in between classes and at school pick up.

--Rita Arens, of Surrender, Dorothy, offers us a painfully beautiful glimpse of adolescent life during the stormy times of uncertainty and doubt. For those who love YA literature, as I do. Vulnerable, aching, and absolutely irresistible. A must read, The Obvious Game, by Rita Arens.

 
--I am proud to say, that the last book here up for this giveaway is authored by someone who was an editor for me. Una LaMarche. This woman with a keen eye for the subtleties that take writing from pretty good to knocking it out of the ballpark, has written Five Summers, a YA novel that had me hooked from the first page with sentences like "words flowed from her like the very next breaths she was taking."  It's the story of four friends and five summers they share together. Captivating.

These fabulous reads are yours if you win! Please leave a comment to win, and the authors will send out the books to you. All books are available through Amazon, if you spend your summer nights falling asleep to some mighty fine writing, as I do. 

GOOD LUCK!

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He's Back, But I Don't Know For How Long

The mood has struck him, and Baby E, who is now 11 (!!!) has asked to do a post. It's 10 PM and it's summer vacation. The windows are open and it's a beautiful summer night.

We're sitting on the sofa together and I say why the heck not.

**thank you, Baby E. xo**

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Hi, it's me, finally. I want to write tonight right away before I forget about the things I want to say. I want to talk about everything and I'm thinking of everything that has happened to me. 

This is me when I first began blogging. I was seven.

This is me now with the iPod that I got for Christmas. I'll tell you later about the songs I like.

This is me eating corn like a maniac. We buy local sweet corn and look at the pile of cobs on my plate. It's delicious.

This is me with the thing I made, a hand glove, I made it from Hexabits. I'll tell you more about that cool building toy later.

This is me on the almost last day of school. I'm thinking about all that I did.

This is me with balloons on the last last day of school. My mom picked me up and had the van full of balloons for me.

This is me with a giant cootie catcher I made before school ended. Some of the fortunes in it were "bad luck," "good luck," "watch out."

This is my big brother making a basket and me behind him with orange on.

This is my shot. I'm not dancing.

Back to words only.

On the almost last day of school, on a Monday and beginning of summer, our class went to a picnic at the park. I thought it was going to be lame with teachers organizing everything where you have to do what they say but we got to do whatever we wanted. It was pretty cool.

On the second last day of school, which was Tuesday, we did this thing called Field Day where a bunch of games are set up and you try to win them. It was fun.

On the last day of school, we went to mass for an hour. And then we had an hour long recess but just because it was raining two drops they made us go in and we watched the dumbest movie in the world. I turned my chair around just to stare at the wall instead. I groaned a couple of times but made sure the teacher didn't hear me.

For games for the summer, buy your kids Hexabits. It's a building kit of little hexagons that interlock, it's pretty cool. You have to be over three years old, though.  

For books, buy your kids Planet Tad, Big Nate, and The Middle School Series. 

For things to do, get a kick ball and go to the pool and invite friends over.

For Nintendo Games, there is this game called WarioWare  D.I.Y. It's this really cool game where you get to make your own game and there's like 80 preloaded games in it. They're like mini games so it's super fun.

For Wii games, there is this awesome game called Super Paper Mario. It's where you're Mario and you flip between 2D and 3D dimensions. It's really awesome.

For iPad, MY MOM WON AN iPAD!  I just want to say that.

What else I want to say is that I like to eat corn and I'm going to play outside a lot.

Bye.

I like to go to Charcoal Grill for their rotisserie chicken that they serve you in a frisbee and you can ask for dark or light meat and get half a chicken and waffle fries, I like to go to Dave and Buster's and play the Pirate Game there, and go to the park with my friends.

Bye.

I'm going to write more because I have more free time.

OH! for songs I like on my iPod, I like Don't You Worry Child by Swedish House Mafia, and then there is Feel So Close by Calvin Harris, and there's also Safe and Sound by Capital Cities. Good Time by Flo Rida and Can't Hold Us (you can buy the clean versions with no swears like the D word and the S word gone) by Mackelmore and #thatPOWER by Will.I.Am. 

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**Auggie's mom here. I'm being featured today at an amazing website, Purple Clover. I have a piece up on what I think I'll do, after this little guy is gone. It'll be here faster than I know it. Thank you for checking it out, "Profound Experiences in Grocery Stores," via Purple Clover.

Father's Day Letters

A collection of Father's Day Letters.

Four letters written in celebration of fathers, the ones who were and are imperfectly perfect, and impossible to forget.

I'm proud to be among the letters chosen to be featured today on LoopLetters, with I am Orlando Bloom's Daughter.

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Loop is a weekly dose of storytelling delivered to your inbox. These stories are funny, sad, true, thinky, and whatever else you can come up with, because oh! They're written by you. So why don't you put that in your pipe and smoke it? Send your submissions to loopletters@gmail.com.

Digital Trails: Results of My Cyber Surveillance

If you're on the internet, surf the web, send texts, update your Facebook page, use email, call on your cell phone, use a credit or debit card, watch TV, download movies, order through Netflix or pick something off Hulu, there exists the very real chance of cyber surveillance.

You don't even have to be somebody.

I listened to a program on NPR this morning on what type of information is gathered from our online interactions, and do you know what this data on us is called? Collected intelligence.

And though I know this is serious business, and we are right to demand details and origin of requests for anything on us that is done without our knowledge or consent, I have to snicker at the thought of what anyone official would find by going through my digital discards.

Collected intelligence?

 If you say so.

More like oh my gosh can we send someone over to help this poor woman. Also probably likelier they'll apologize to me for all the help I need.

I imagine their Captain's log on me would go exactly like this:

6:45 AM Subject calls school, inquiring as to whether or not this is last week of school for children, or if next week is. School promises to send school calendar to her again, via email.

7:30AM Logs on to computer, attempt made for four minutes to clean out email, opts to log into twitter instead.

7:45 AM - 8:55 AM ALERT! ALERT! Continuously bounces back from twitter to Facebook, as if she is looking for important communication. UPDATE: False alarm. Merely checking and hoping for retweets and likes.

9:05 AM Child's school calls. Child has forgotten lunch at home, please bring. She will bring right over.

9:20 AM Logs off computer.

9:29 AM Logs back on computer

10:03AM Target calls. Wondering where client is since store opened three minutes ago and she's not at door. Bags of sliced apples on sale, two for a dollar.

10:33 AM McDonald's emails. Did she receive BOGO McCafe coupon in mail? They missed her this morning.

10:45 AM Returns books to library. Tape receipt of overdue fines shows would have been cheaper to purchase DVDs.

11:55 AM Child's school calls. Where is lunch? Subject promises to bring lunch to school in two minutes.

11:57 AM Googles "Are round toed shoes still in style?" before she walks into child's school.

12:01 PM Drives thru McDonald's for Happy Meal. Subject asks to speak to manager when drive thru clerk won't allow NonFat Iced Mocha as substitute drink with Happy Meal.

12:03 PM Pays for $2.99 Happy Meal with debit card. Order comes to $11.31 as subject decides she needs two NonFat Iced Mochas.

12:25 PM Drops off four bags of clothing to Goodwill, completes receipt for said donation online, as husband has requested for tax keeping purposes. Returns to car with more bags of clothes than what she removed from home.

12:59 PM Subject returns home and searches online for Dunkin' Donuts rant she saw tweeted out. Disgusted enough to watch it twice. Decides depressing nature of Dunkin' Donuts link is reason enough to search for "funny kitten videos."

1:46 PM Decides to do yoga and googles RodneyYee Beach Yoga youtube. Gets distracted by 'Ron Yee Illicit Affair' headline. 30 minutes pass as well as alloted time for yoga.

2:20 PM Runs into store, buys rotisserie chicken for dinner. Feels hungry therefore determines children also feel hungry. Runs back and gets two. Pays with credit card. Earns a penny off a gallon of gas up to fifteen gallons due to spending history on deli chicken. 

2:30 PM Realizes husband has to be two places at same time and makes several frantic call and hang ups to husband's cell phone. Uses up what is left of air time, unable to leave message telling him only way to pick up son # 2 from swim and son #3 from soccer is to drive really fast.

2:55 PM Texts teen son to apologize for being ten minutes late to pick up. Can he start walking home and she'll meet him half way?

3:20 PM Drops teen son off at gym. Goes in and pays monthly dues that are two months late. Realizes she is trying to pay with library card. Runs out to car for credit card. Pays with debit card instead. Gets home and realizes she payed with debit card. Calls gym back and asks for balance transfer to credit card not debit card. She is told change must be made in person. Rushes back to gym, stopping to drop youngest son at soccer on way to dropping middle son at swim on way to pick up oldest son from gym on way to pay gym fees with credit card. Chicken for dinner from this afternoon's stop at grocery store is botulising in trunk.

3:39 PM Does google search "Chicken. Death. Children. How long."

NOTE TO INFORMATION RECORDER: Suggest we terminate surveillance at this point. Data gathering resulting in unusual amount of recording material, labor, and time required for documentation. Subject's activities of no sound interest to anyone and appear to be without importance to any organization.

"...internet companies such as google, facebook, and yahoo are taking what they learn from search requests, such as Like buttons and using it to analyze a browser's preferences, tailoring ads and suggestions to their interests. Web surfing, tracking devices on mobile phones, companies defend this data mining as a consumer benefit." ~ Edmonton Journal

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Getting the Green Light

I've had to keep quiet for the last few months about something that makes me want to scream with joy.

And today, about 2:00 p.m., I got the green light to go public.

You can see it here.

And thank you... because it's all of you that gave me the belief and encouragement to try.

Introducing...

Purple Clover

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