Yellow Wallpaper

I shouldn't be blogging; I should be working on my syllabus or going to bed. School starts in two days and I'm fully in the 'if I don't think about it, it doesn't exist' mode of dealing with stress. My syllabus is mostly written and my goal tomorrow is to get it completed so I can make copies on Tuesday. My other goal this week is to get back in the habit of going to bed by 10:30, not 11 or later because I have to get up early and no one will be happy if I am a crankypants. The title of this post has to do with nursing the baby; we switched Little Dude to formula when he was about six months old (thanks blogger for reminding me). He had been a total crankypants for a while and we realized that he was mostly just hungry. Breastfeeding got off to a much better start this time around and I thought we were doing well. During the last few months, though, I've started noticing little things that made me worry. My baby has been wearing the same clothes for the last...

All the Stars in Heaven by Michele Paige Holmes This is an interesting book because it is presented as a romance but really reads like a thriller. I thought it was a fun read and I really enjoyed the story. The main characters were complex and the story was unique enough to be engaging without being completely unbelievable. I thought it was fun to read a Mormon version of the genre that was suspenseful and gritty without being explicit or violent. The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton I can think of several books that are quite similar to this one, and in some ways are better than it. It's fairly long and fairly conventional, and I could see the ending coming from a mile away. But I still had a great time reading it and stayed up late just to finish it. It's not the most original book out there but it was a compelling read and worth my time. Middlemarch by George Eliot A few months ago my book club read Anna Karenina , and many of the commentaries I read about it mentioned Midd...

Remember how I had an interview for a position as an adjunct instructor? Last weekend when we got back to my parents' house I checked my email and discovered that they wanted to offer me a job. I am teaching two writing classes beginning next Wednesday. The good news is that my schedule is pretty sweet: 8 and 9 in the morning on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Early mornings are standard around here and I like the fact that I can get up, get ready, go to work, and be back before the baby is done with her morning nap. Little Dude has preschool during the afternoons on those days so I should be able to get some lesson preparation and grading done during that time. I attended orientation the other day and now my head is spinning trying to keep track of everything I need to teach writing. Turns out that teaching Spanish was a lot less complicated. Or maybe that's just because I had an entire semester-length class to learn about it and this time I'm just jumping right in. I'...

I've heard enough horror stories about camping with small children to be wary of driving a six-month-old clear to California just to go camping. I think the dire warnings helped me prepare my mind for the worst, and then when it didn't happen I managed to have a good time. I could tell the baby was not very happy while we were there; she became very clingy and cried a lot when anyone else held her. I think this was a combination of not being on her regular schedule, being outside in the sun and wind a lot, and being with a lot of people she's never seen before. When we got back to my parents' house in Las Vegas last night she became happy and smiling and even went right to sleep in her own bed. While we were camping she ended up sleeping with us, but still slept all night. That was partly due to the fact that the weather was unseasonably cold. I am so, so grateful that we brought the Ergo carrier because she spent most of her time snuggled up in it hiding from everyone...

I apologize, again, for the delay in posting last month's 'reading roundup'; it seems to be getting harder and harder to get those posts up on time. I need to stop waiting until the end of the month to review all the books because then I tend to lose my enthusiasm for it. I don't know if it will happen this week because we're on vacation. Yesterday we drove to Las Vegas and are spending a few days with my parents. Usually the drive to Vegas is fairly quick and we don't like to stop much. This time we decided to take our time and stop more often to enjoy the scenery. I'm still deciding if I like this approach or not. First we had to stop in Fillmore to feed the baby and eat some potato logs. Then we spent a while at Cove Fort for their annual 'Cove Fort Days'. It was a lot of fun; the kids loved the demonstrations of pioneer crafts and the baby got a nice long nap in the front pack. We went for a ride on a covered wagon pulled by mules and ate free ho...

I've been a wee bit stressed this week since we are leaving for our big vacation on Saturday morning. To add to the excitement, tomorrow is S-Boogie's birthday and we're having a party. I've tried to keep things simple, but she is friends with everyone in the world and so even paring down the guest list resulted in having twelve kids on their way to my house tomorrow afternoon. I had planned a simple party with slip-n-slide, some water games, snacks, and cupcakes. But today has been blustery and stormy and I'm so freaked out that tomorrow will be the same. I don't really have a backup plan. Maybe we'll just let the kids play in the rain in their swimsuits. And of course the best thing to do when you're stressed is to run a bunch of errands. Between yesterday and today I've been to five different stores gathering stuff for the party and for camping. Thankfully I've found a lot of good deals and it has been rather cheap. Then to top it off I spent ...