the book book

Remember the book book I got awhile back? Well, I finally sat down and read it. It made me want to be Italian, or at least French, an art teacher and a kid again all wrapped into one short little book. I LOVE it. Its written for children to teach them how to make their own books, from the illustrations, to the writing, to the physical building of a book. Lourdes, you would really like this book, I think. Oh, actually it starts off by teaching you how to "massage your imagination". This is probably the most crucial part for me. I don't really consider myself a creative person. at all. I wish I was. But that side of me was kind of shut down in third grade when I was in art class. My teacher commented on my beautiful painting & asked if she could show it to the class after we were done painting. I said yes. After several more minutes, she stopped the class to show a couple of our paintings off, came over to me to take my painting to hold up & said, "You ruined it!" In front of everyone. Horrible. So I decided then and there that I was not artistic and closed off any hope of becoming artsy. Its just recently, pretty much since I had Ruby, that I've decided I can be creative and I'm trying to nurture that side again.

Anyway, this is a book that may help me out with that, hopefully will be a good resource for Ruby, but at the very least, will be on the shelf for her to discover when the time is right for her.

we &hearts books!

We all love books in this house. This is Ruby asking John to read her this book. She practically jumped off my lap to take it to him & crawl up into his lap.

I recently discovered the Meet the Author series on itunes U. I really wish I knew about this when I was in the classroom. Ruby is too young to enjoy it now, but I have downloaded a bunch to my ipod to watch. All the videos are FREE. I've only watched one so far- the Jack Prelutsky one, and it was good, but not something I would have shown my kindergartners. So, if you're a teacher, these should be previewed, of course. Just in case you aren't as obsessed with children's literature as I am and you wouldn't watch these for fun.


Oh yeah, we checked out this book by Mary Azarian from the library recently, which I love. It is so gorgeous! It reminds me of Nikki McClure's work - I guess because of the style of art, but also how she makes the everyday tasks we do seem beautiful and important.

books & brownies

The cookies are already gone. We did share a couple with the neighbors & John did only make a half-batch, in our defense. So last night for snack, we raided the freezer. We found some chocolate-chip cream cheese brownies. John jumped up and down when he saw them. We tried to take pictures, but you probably wouldn't want to eat them if you saw the pictures, so you have to trust us, they are delicious. I can't even give you a recipe because I combined a couple different recipes and then adapted that. So, you just have to imagine, I guess. Sorry. You'll just have to come over to have some. All I know is I have a serious sugar problem. I need to do something about that.

I've been listening a bit to the Creative Mom Podcast recently. I've only listened to it a couple times, but I liked what I heard. Anyway, I entered a little contest on the website and won a book!

Ruby's talking!

This weekend as I was heading out to the grocery store - by myself! I never would have thought that would have been so fun. Maybe I need another hobby or something, it sounds like I have no life. Anyway, I was waving and saying bye-bye to Ruby as she waved back and then she said bye! A couple days later, John picked up a banana to give her and he was saying, "banana, banana" & Ruby said, "bababa". I know, it's not baNaNa, but she had the right inflection and everything. And wasn't just going babababababa, like she sometimes does. Yesterday we were looking at a photo of a cat. I was saying, "Cat, meow." Ruby said, "eeoh, eeoh" very high-pitched, like how I was saying meow. Today she said "oof" when she pointed to a picture of a dog.

She and I went to the library today for a puppet show. While we were waiting for it to start, she was walking (still holding on to me) and then starting pulling books off the shelf. All of a sudden she found The Backward Day, remember that book? She did too (we returned it to the library). She was sooooo excited. She looked at me in disbelief, then opened it up to find the funny little boy and did a little dance. Oh, I was so proud.

As I was writing all this, John came up to me and asked what we were going to have for our evening snack with tea. I shrugged. Then, (man, I scored in the husband department) he said, "Can we make some quick cookies?" Um, ok. THEN, he found my favorite cookies (snicker doodles) to make. I love this man.

11 months old!

Ruby is 11 months old today! I can hardly believe it. She is constantly amazing us now - to the point that we're speechless. This video was shot about a month ago. She had just woken up and nursed. I was in the kitchen making our breakfast & she was reading books to herself. I heard her giggling & grabbed the camera. She was finding animals she liked in her farm book & laughing at them. Now she is really communicating with us. We can ask her, "Where is the dog?" and she will find a picture of a dog & point to it. Same with cat, mama, dada, baby and now many of her toys too. She can tell you where her belly, feet, and head/hair are too! She has said mama & dada, but its still pretty rare.
Her favorite book to read lately is The Backward Day by Ruth Krauss. We checked it out at the library and Ruby laughs at it as we read it. Somehow, she knows its funny. I'm really loving Ruth Krauss' books lately too. I don't think we own any, so I keep going to the library searching for them.
Ruby is also on the verge of taking her first step. She cruises around the furniture and can stand by herself for quite a while. She's just working up the confidence. Yesterday in her crib she stood up, let go of the side with her arms out for balance & would make herself wobble until she fell which she thought was really funny. Then she'd do it over again.
I think our favorite Ruby development is her wanting to cuddle so much more. John says that she has figured out that it feels good and searches it out. She'll sometimes just crawl up to us for a hug or snuggle. We LOVE this. I swear I can feel my heart expand every time she does it. I cannot get enough of her hugs and kisses.
After my mom knew I was pregnant, she said many times to me, "I'm so excited for you." I remember thinking, "parenthood must be better than I can imagine if she's more excited for me than for herself to become a grandmother." Now I know why she said that. John & I are so grateful to be Ruby's parents. She is so much more fun and wonderful than I dreamed possible.

happy earth day

It's another rainy day here - we didn't get outside to celebrate, which just seems wrong. I should have wrapped us all up in our rain gear for a walk at least. But I did that yesterday and it poured on us and my hands were freezing by the end of our walk. I was really hoping it wouldn't rain, so I didn't bring appropriate gloves in protest. I couldn't really muster up enough energy to do it again today.

The craft show deadline to apply was on Sunday and now we're going through applicants & furiously sending emails back & forth to decide who will be accepted, preparing press releases & posters. Its fun but hard to do with only a couple spare moments here and there while Ruby busies herself briefly and I run to the computer.


I'm reading and loving The Creative Family by Amanda Blake Soule, whose blog I've been reading for quite a long time & I love. This is a wonderful, practical book that is really inspiring. I wish I could go peek into their home & see it all in action.

bookworms

It was John's turn for the cold this weekend. Lucky for him, Ruby enjoyed snuggling up and reading to him for quite a while. I wish I had videotaped her reading, she was so serious and used such expression. This book she's holding onto so tightly is a great one we checked out at the library, How to Paint the Portrait of a Bird. It's a beautiful book, so inspiring.

another book

I just finished reading this book. I've been reading a lot about food lately. It's funny how that happens - it seems accidental. I have a long list of books that I want to read and yet the food related books are the ones that keep becoming available at the library.

It is a very thorough look at the history of food in our country and with that women's history as well. It is fascinating and troubling. And yet at the end, I was inspired. We live in a time and place where finding locally grown, organic produce is fairly easy. We can raise some of it ourselves, but we don't have to. Its a good thing, because I don't know if I'd survive.

John and I think and talk a lot about food. We eat a lot of food. We've been making a lot of our own food now that we're attempting (struggling?) to cut our grocery budget in half. We're trying to balance our financial health with our physical health. So far, we think we've been eating better actually. We're becoming better bakers and really enjoying what we eat and the effort it takes to make it. We have chosen to live a relatively simple lifestyle so that Ruby & I can stay home together and this is part of it. Another unexpected benefit of Ruby becoming part of our family.