Jul 18

It’s time for everyone’s favourite game: me talking about my recent favourite children’s books! What? that’s not everyone’s favourite game? Ok, just mine then. I can’t help it. The best ways to find great books are sheer luck and recommendations from friends. All of these were discovered by one of these two methods. So let me share a few of our recent favourites with you:


Ballerino Nate by Kimberly Bradley: There are plenty of books about ballet and dancing and pink and glitter and tutus and every single one of them is for and about girls.  As the parent of a little boy who takes ballet I was excited to find this book on the shelves of my local library. My son has never expressed any concerns that ballet is just for girls or that taking ballet somehow makes him girly, however reading this book just reinforced for him that dancing is for everyone and that he should be proud to dance. This book features a boy who loves to dance but is worried that taking ballet lessons will mean he has to wear dresses and pink shoes like a girl and his older brother who, in the stereotypical manner, teases him for wanting to dance.  My son loved reading this story and I loved reading a story that shows my kids that everyone can enjoy dancing and no one should feel ashamed to do what they love. Also, I learned that a Ballerino is the male version of a Ballerina. Did you know that? I didn’t!

Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson: I’ve featured books by Julia Donaldson before. I love her books. The stories are quirky and the rhyme is well-crafted and they are always popular in our house. This one was a major winner. The cute story of a witch who keeps losing parts of her costume and when she lands her broom to retrieve them, picks up extra passengers. The last page features a sweet-looking ride that my son never failed to say he wished we had in our closet!

Minnie’s Diner by Dayle Ann Dodds: This book is a fun to read that teaches kids about math concepts as family members enter a diner and order twice as much as the “brother before”. My kids wanted me to read it to them over and over. I’m pretty sure Dayle Ann Dodds has written other books and I’m going to be looking for them next time I’m at the library.

How to Raise Mom and Dad by Josh Lerman: Any book that features some kind of role reversal is usually a hit at my house. In How to Raise Mom and Dad a little girl instructs her younger brother (my kids immediately latched on as this is the structure of our family, too) in the proper training of their parents. Particularly funny was the scene where she reminds her brother to splash the water out of the tub as this will help keep the floor clean and mom and dad won’t have to clean it and running around naked after the bath keeps them from having to dirty a towel to dry you off. This could have been our bathroom any night of the week.

Mary and the Mouse, The Mouse and Mary by Beverly Donofrio and Barbara McClintock: I can’t really tell you why I like this book. The story is not at all complex but is somehow still engaging and I love the whimsical idea of a little girl and a little mouse living life side by side and never really interacting but being aware of each other and the way their lives are intertwined. It feels like a book that has been around for generations but it’s only a couple years old. A darling read.

A isn’t for Fox: An Isn’t Alphabet by Wendy Ulmer: A twist on the classic Alphabet book. We love the anti-alphabet book around here.

White is for Blueberry by George Shannon: As above, a twist on the classic colour book. A simple read but my kids love trying to figure out how white could possibly apply to blueberries and every other colour surprise.

It’s Not Fair by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and Tom Lichtenheld: This was another library find that I just enjoyed – maybe more than my kids – because it pointed out that life isn’t fair. I guess I hoped maybe it would remind my kids that when the whine constantly about who has what and who went first and who got more that it really doesn’t mean anything and in the end we need to get the hell over it. Only it says that in a more kid-friendly way. :)


Alternative ABCs by Dave Parmley and Eric Ruffing: Alternative ABCs is a board book and while we are no longer in the board book stage around here I did recently purchase this book as a baby gift and I absolutely love it. It’s way more fun than your standard baby ABCs where V is for vegetarian and S is for skull and G is for graffiti.  I think it is a great way to branch away from the obvious A is for Apple.

The Day the Babies Crawled Away by Peggy Rathmann: This charming book has intriguing illustrations that are all done as silhouettes. The story of babies who are crawling away from their adults and only a young child who chases them to save them from certain peril is captured perfectly in this unique illustration style. You will enjoy reading this one, I guarantee it!

People by Peter Spier: I love this book. Can I say how much I love it? I love that it is sold at the Ten Thousand Villages MCC store by peace-loving, tolerance promoting, globally aware Mennonites. I love that it illustrates the many ways people in this world live. I love that it talks about different religions, cultural traditions, languages, homes, dress, games, skin colours and the many other ways people are different. I love that it also talks about the many ways we are the same. I love that it does so in a way that neither judges or condemns any kind of religious or cultural practice and points out one of the most important ideas that I believe makes healthy and fair-minded people, which is: If you were looking at yourself from the perspective of a different culture, you would look as funny as many of these people may seem to you right now. In other words, let’s all try and practice seeing the world from another person’s perspective. Wouldn’t that make the world a different place if we all tried that more frequently? I love this book. And my kids love it too. It is totally simple but it teaches incredibly important lessons. My kids love seeing the different ways people dress and talk and live their lives around the world.

If the World Were a Village by David J. Smith: I’m not sure my kids are quite old enough to understand the complete message of this book yet, but they still found it interesting. It illustrates the statistics of the world by shrinking it down to the size of a 100 person village. In that 100 person village, how many would be Asian? How many would be Muslim? How many would own cars? How many would have clean water to drink? It’s a very interesting perspective on the world and it really hits home that the way we live is not at all the global “norm”. Definitely an educational and interesting read.

Children Around the World by Donata Montanari: This is a great book for young children, introducing them to a number of fictional children from different countries around the world. Each child tells the reader some very simple facts about their life including the types of food they eat, where they go to school, what they do for fun, what kind of a family they have and what kinds of activities are part of a normal day for them. The illustrations are beautiful and interesting and my kids find it intriguing

Children Just Like Me by Barnabas Kindersley: This one has been around for a while already but it is such a fantastic way for kids to learn about different cultures. This book is less a “storybook” and more the type of book you sit down with and just flip through for a while and come back to again later. It is much longer and much more detailed than some of the other books I mentioned above. It is better for children who are a bit older and capable of reading on their own. My six year old likes to look through it although sometimes her attention is distracted after a few pages. The book covers several countries in each continent, one by one. The author actually travelled around the world, meeting and interviewing the children photographed in the story and just reading his own thoughts on the experience is fascinating. You see photographs of where the children live, go to school, the kinds of clothes they where, what they hope to do when they grow up, what kinds of pets they have, what games they play, what chores they do. It is a very thorough look into each child’s life in a very small amount of space. You could come back to this book one hundred times and find something new and interesting every time.

As you can see, we have been trying to expand our children’s view of the world by reading more books about people around the world and how they live. I read not too long ago that it is not enough to simply not express racism or prejudice.  We need to actually spend time educating our children about the different kinds of people they will meet in the world. It is not enough to NOT say “People with _____ skin are bad.” We must also tell them “All kinds of skin are beautiful.  There are many different colours of people but we all have the same kinds of feelings inside.” So that is part of why we have been on the recent kick. Of course we have the adoption to think of. Eventually our children will have a sibling who may have a different skin colour from them and so we are trying to find ways to expose them to differences. Since we live in a predominantly white part of the world, and a less culturally diverse city than many, we are doing what we can with books. Isn’t the library fantastic?

I hope this has been moderately interesting for you guys. If you have kids, hopefully you have seen one or two books you can consider checking out of your own local library. Enjoy!

Jun 20

We’ve all used the word “someday” in a sentence.

“Some day I’d like to…”

“Some day I won’t…”

“Some day I’ll go…”

“Some day I’ll try…”

For many of us “someday” can become a cop-out, a way to put off trying.  Of course, I never procrastinate am just as guilty of putting off my somedays as anyone else. If you, like me, need a little guidance in finding a way to achieve your goals then let me introduce you to Defining Someday:

Last year I had the privilege of editing the manuscript for this book, written by my friend Danielle Voisin. It was a huge honour to be involved in the process and by giving me the opportunity to edit her book, Danielle helped me achieve one of my own Someday goals!

Danielle is one of the most driven, enthusiastic, and inspiring young women I’ve ever met. She is fearless and her success is entirely due to her careful planning and systematic approach to achieving her goals. I’m not going to lie, she is one very determined lady, but her process is very concise and lucky for all of us, she is sharing her method with us in her new book!

Defining Someday is all about not putting off your dreams for “someday” in the future but overcoming the obstacles that are stopping you from achieving them, whether they are in your head, your bank account, or your plan. This book helps the reader to fully define their “someday” goals and develop a plan to make them happen.

If you are anything like me, then the idea of self-help literature is not necessarily up your alley. The best thing about Defining Someday is it’s written in the format of novel with a main character who is struggling through his own personal goal-achievement crisis. It is about a hundred times more relatable than any other book you’ve read in this genre and you aren’t going to want to miss reading it!

You can purchase the book in both electronic and print versions on Danielle’s website. You should also check out her blog, also entitled Defining Someday, which is full of helpful hints for pushing on to make your dreams a reality. I promise you won’t be disappointed! This is one author who practices what she preaches. You can even read Danielle’s own “Someday List” where she tracks her goals and her progress towards achieving them. If you’re looking for inspiration and a little direction then this book is for you. By the time you get to the last page you will be ready and equipped to go out and conquer the world! Off you go now!

Oct 26

It’s been just a week since I took the major step of unpacking the books. Our living room has one full wall of bookshelves that we have carted across the country and to the east coast of the USA and back to the prairies again. My books are my way of carrying home with me. Unpacking them and putting them back on the shelves signifies coming home in some sort of meaningful way for me, no matter our location.

Each book is associated with a memory, experience or time in my life journey. They remind me of good times and and comfort during all the different phases of my life. Yes, there are some books on the shelf I’m sometimes embarrassed to continue to put back there (*cough* Twilight series! *cough*). Some that remind me of my years of dogmatic religious legalism, some that remind me of projects I started and never finished or goals I have yet to accomplish, and some that just sit there, year after year, still unread.

But there are other books that hearken back to childhood and squirming around on the bottom bunk with my sisters while my mom read aloud. The books I read when I was expecting my first baby. The novels that have made me laugh and cry. The recipe books I use when I cook for my family. The biographical stories written by my Oma before she passed away. The textbooks from various university classes. The volumes that have shaped me and changed me and have been there along the way, part of who I am, like old friends. Letting any of them go feels like a betrayal of the worst kind.  (My husband probably wishes I would get in the betraying mood a little more often – at least when it comes to books!)

We’re home, friends. For real now.

Nov 18

I’ve been thinking about The Wizard of Oz ever since it came up the other day. Even before posting about it I have been reading it to my five year old so it was on the brain.

As a child I read and reread several of the “Oz” books, but somehow never picked up the first in the series and only just now realized there are thirteen sequels to the book! My main reason for not reading the original story was mostly because I’d seen the movie eleventy kajillion times and thought I would be bored. I had forgotten how much I adore L. Frank Baum’s style. There is something totally whimsical and enchanting about his stories and the writing is witty and wonderfully entertaining.  

“Tell me something about yourself, and the country you came from,” said the Scarecrow, when she had finished her dinner. So she told him all aout Kansas, and how grey evertything was there, and how the cyclone had carried her to this queer Land of Oz.

The Scarecrow listened carefully, and said, “I cannot understnad why you should wish to leave this beautiful country and go back to the dry, grey place you call Kansas.”

“That is because you have no brains,” answered the girl. “No matter how dreary and grey our homes are, we people of flesh and blood would rather live there than in any other country, be it ever so beautiful. There is no place like home.”

The Scarecrow sighed

“Of course I cannot understand it,” he said. “If your heads were stuffed with straw, like mine, you would probably all live in the beautiful places, and then Kansas would have no people at all. It is fortunate for Kansas that you have brains.”

                                -L. Frank Baum, The Wizard of Oz

Sep 4

I have the wonderful fond memories of my mom reading stories to me and my sisters when we were little.  There were a lot of favourites over the years, but one that sticks out is the Little House on the Prairie series.  So it was with great excitement that I opened up Little House in the Big Woods last night to start reading to Avery.

I was anticipating idyllic and charming tales from days of old. Turns out I had forgotten that the book is ONE GIANT BLOODBATH.

Ok not the whole book. But the very first chapter of the book chronicles the slaughter of deer, fish, and the family’s pig. Not to mention gruesome descriptions of the butchering process and the mention of terrifying, howling wolves and attacking bears and the family’s ferocious bulldog helping fend off both. IN THE FIRST CHAPTER.

Good mother, hey? Come here, my innocent child. Let me read you a bedtime story full of BLOODSHED and VIOLENCE!

Ok, it’s not like I wouldn’t have read it to her if I had remembered these details. It obviously didn’t scar me as a child. However. I might have tried to prepare her a little better for the bloodbath with a discussion about pioneer life and the lack of modern amenities. 

So here’s a little public service announcement for parents who read to their kids: Sometimes “classics” equals gratuitous descriptions of violence towards animals.  Be aware! Bring kleenex!

Apr 12

Here’s a wee quote from a blog I read that’s been kicking around in my head today:

Witnessing is what I was taught to do – to evangelize and tell people about Jesus. Witnessing assumes a fundamental chasm between yourself (as the one with all the knowledge and insight) and them (who need converting.)

The author goes on to distinguish between “witness” and “with-ness”, the latter being the simple act of being with people and being connected to each other. We should not allowing the narrowness of our North American experience to make us think we are better or smarter or holier than those who are poor or neglected in this world.  Withness is about simple caring and compassion. Not about me imparting my “vast wisdom and knowledge of spiritual things” to someone who I believe knows nothing of spiritual things.

We are mistaken if we think that Christians are the only spiritual people in the world. Or that there is no truth in the spirituality of other people in the world.  Truth is everywhere. And wherever truth is, we can all claim it. This is a little nugget I picked up from Velvet Elvis.  I have a post coming on that yet. 

Sep 18

I have learned something about myself in the past six straight days of rain.  I am a rain sissy.  When the constant drizzle brings earthworms slithering out onto the sidewalk I get squeamish.  I don’t own a rainccoat. I don’t know where on earth our umbrella is and I keep assuming the rain will stop so I don’t bother to go searching for it.  During an average rainy day we Saskatchewanites shrug our shoulders and delay our trip by 10 minutes because the rain usually lets up in short order.  I become cranky and depressed, sluggish and mean when there is no sun for more than 24 hours.  The past week I have not been a nice person by any stretch of the imagination.  I’m so glad we’ve almost come to the end of this gross weather. 

On another note, isn’t this a cute picture of Kieran?  I think so. 

And moving on…I bought a book for Avery lately called “My Body is Private”.  It covers the basics about which parts of a person’s body are private and about respecting people’s privacy and learning that you have the right to tell anyone at any time that you don’t want to be touched.  All in all it is a pretty good book.  But I have a hard time reading it, not because of the anatomy discussion but because at one point the book addresses the fact that someone might try to touch a child inappropriately or take pictures of them.  This reference just makes me feel sick to my stomach.  I know it’s important for my child to be informed and to know how to respond in a abusive situation but it is so hard to think about the possibility that someone would try to exploit my daughter.  I don’t want to consider this and I certainly don’t want to have to tell Avery about this kind of evil. I know she doesn’t really understand what it means or all the implications of it but I feel as though I am taking away some of her innocence by “educating” her.  I’m not sure how I reconcile my duty as a responsible parent with the way I feel about the whole thing.

Feb 11

While I was away  I finished reading “Hey Nostradamus!” by Douglas Coupland and I found there were a lot of thoughts in this book that really caught my attention, whether or not I agreed with them. The book describes a Columbine-type school shooting that takes place in Vancouver in the 80′s and a teenage girl who is killed in the shooting.

The girl is kind of a typical teenager who has become a generic zealous Christian but has experienced some disillusionment with her faith as she observes the narrow-minded judgment of her “Christian friends”. This girl, Cheryl, has secretly married her boyfriend, Jason, and much of the story revolves around the two of them. The book is divided into four parts, each written by a different character. One by Cheryl, one by Jason, one by Heather who is Jason’s girlfriend years after the school shooting, and Reg who is Jason’s extremely religious father.

This book has a lot of interesting reflections on Christianity and I find it strange to hear Coupland writing about this topic because, although some of his other books have a spiritual undertone, he doesn’t usual approach the topic of a specific faith. But he writes about it as though he has had an experience with the types of Christians he describes. And I think a lot of the things that Cheryl and Jason say could possibly be his opinion about these people. I don’t know if that’s what he intended but I wonder…

Anyway, this isn’t meant to be a book review (although I do recommend the book) but rather my exploration of lines that made me think and/or challenged me or resonated with me. So here are the things I noticed:

  • “Truth be told, I wanted everything those kids had, but I wanted it by playing the game correctly. This meant legally and religiously and – this is the part that was maybe wrong – I wanted to outsmart the world.  I had, and continue to have, a nagging suspicion that I used the system simply to get what I wanted. Religion included. Does that cancel out whatever goodness I might have inside me?” (p. 7)  These lines were written from the perspective of Cheryl, the shooting victim, but I believe they could very easily have been written by my teenage self and many other people who claim faith in the Christian God.  I have always been a person who played by the rules. I never skipped school, I never did drugs, I never smoked a cigarette. I don’t say this to prove how “good” I am but to remind myself that, if I am truly honest, the reason I didn’t do those things may have been because I was afraid of getting caught and because I am not, by nature, a rule-breaker rather than because I was concerned with being good.  I think that everyone has the desire for some things and they just go about getting them in different ways.  We all want a high and some people use drugs and others use religion.  We all want sex and some people go ahead and have sex when the opportunity arises and others wait until they are married, or (like Jason and Cheryl) get married really young because then they can have sex “legitimately”.  I don’t think that my faith was not real or is hypocritical because deep down I want the same things that everyone else wants. I think that Christians can really deceive themselves about their motivation for doing things.  I’d like to be more honest with myself because while I’m not sure what I believe about God, I think that any God I could believe in would prefer honesty to false piety anyway.  I think it would have benefited my teenage self to ask more often if I was using my faith to get what I wanted and still make it sound holy.  I don’t think that wanting things cancels out goodness. It simply forces us to see more clearly how much actual “goodness” we had all along. It’s still worth asking myself.
  • “I’m not sure if I used god or He used me,  but the result was the same. In the end, we are judged by our deeds, not our wishes. We’re the sum of our decisions.” (p. 16)  This is another line from Cheryl and it follows closely on what she was saying in the above quote.  I haven’t really decided whether I agree on her suggestion that it is only our deeds and not our wishes that God is concerned with.  If I do the right thing for the wrong reason something tells me I’ve missed out on something. But I’m not really sure.  That was just my initial reaction to her statement.  But it was the part about using God that really struck me.  Do I use God? Can I use God?  I don’t know.  But the possibility scares the shit out of me.
  • “A bland smile is like a green light at an intersection – it feels good when you get one, but you forget it the moment you’re past it.” (p. 24)  This is Cheryl describing her expression of choice in high school and, again, it sound like me in a lot of ways.  Her reason for affecting this expression were so that she wouldn’t have to interact with people in her school and i realized that I do that all the time.  And I don’t like that I do it.  I don’t want to be totally forgettable, but I also don’t want to be remembered for being annoying or awkward.  I feel uncomfortable interacting with people I am not really familiar with and in the end,  I’d rather be forgotten than socially inept.
  • “It always seemed to me that people who’d discovered religion had both lost and gained something. Outwardly, they’d gained calmness, confidence and a look of pupose, but what they’d lost was a certain willingness to connect with unconverted couls.  Looking a convert in the eyes was like trying to make eye contact with a horse.  They’d be alive and breathing, but they woulnd’t be a hundred percent there anymore.  They’d left the day-to-day world and joined the realm of eternal time.”  (p. 27)  This is a frightenly accurate statement. Who could read that and say “I want to be like that.”?  Is it possible to believe in a God and not lose your humanness?  Is it possible to lose your humanity?  I really believe that a faith that does not affect change in a person’s world and that causes them to lose compassion and kindness and a focus on their community (rather than becoming judgmental and cold) is a perversion of the true nature of faith.  Are Christians so fearful that we retreat into a vacant stare to avoid the challenge of caring for people?  This really challenged me.
  • “There can be an archness, a meanness in the lives of the saved, an intolerance that can color their view of the weak and of the lost. It can make them hard when they ought to be listening, judgmental when they ought to be contrite.” (p. 28)  Again, I would rather live outside of faith altogether than come across this way.  It is a fair description of many Christians. But it shouldn’t be.  
  •  “…nothing makes a person less special than conversion – it…universalizes you.” (p. 32)  I have to say that I fundamentally disagree with this.  I mean I don’t believe conversion to a religion can “universalize” you any more than anything else about this life.  In some ways we are all exactly the same, no matter what we do.  In some ways I think conversion individualizes a person because it can be an individual connection to something outside yourself.  Of course, this is the same special connection that millions of others have had throughout history. So it is and it isn’t special.  We are and we aren’t exactly like every other person in the world.  It’s kind of a paradox.
  • “…I think in the end it’s maybe best to keep your doubts private.  Saying them aloud cheapens them – makes them a bunch of words just like everybody else’s bunch of words.” (p.33)  Yes. ….And no.  I’m not sure what I think.  But it’s one of those statements that inspires reflection.
  • “To acknowledge God is to fully accept the sorrow of the human condition.” (p. 41)  I think this is true. And yet, I think to deny God might also mean you have to accept the sorrow of the human condition as well.  I guess a lot just depends on your philosophy of the nature of humanity.  Acknowledging God means accepting sorrow but the gift I have gotten in return for that acceptance is hope.
  • “For what it’s worth, I think God is how you deal with everything that’s out of your own control. It’s as good a definition as any.” (p. 52) This is from Jason’s perspective.  His definition connects with me, where I’m at.

This is getting long so I think I’ll finish with it tomorrow and post what I have this far right now. 

[Edit: I never did do the second part of this post.  Oops!]

Feb 2

I finished read “Eleanor Rigby” by Douglas Coupland the other day. I haven’t read anything by him in a while and I actually enjoyed it quite a bit, although I’ll admit I had to look up the lyrics to the Beatles’ song of the same name in order to understand the significance of the title. I’m just not the audiophile my husband is.

All in all I’d say the book was worth the read. But there was something about the main character that didn’t sit right with me. I think that it may be because the main character was a woman and she was created by a man. Of course, I’m not saying that authors can not create authentic characters of the opposite gender. However, I felt like I had a hard time identifying with this female character. Now could that be because her life was very different from mine? I suppose it might be difficult for me to identify with a single woman in her mid-thirties who is exceedingly lonely. But I didn’t feel like that was what didn’t sit right. It seemed like she was what a man would imagine a lonely woman would be like. Her personality and her attitude toward the world just didn’t seem entirely “female” to me.

I have tried to examine why I felt that way. Do I have preconceived notions of what femininity is or how a woman should think or feel? Probably. But I tried really hard to leave those aside and I just didn’t feel like this woman sounded like any woman I’ve ever encountered. It’s very possible there are women like her out there and that my experience is very limited to women who are similar to me. But no matter how I look at it, there was just this undefinable “something” that wasn’t quite believable about her. Nonetheless, I did enjoy reading it and would recommend it. I’d like to hear what other women think about “Liz Dunn”.