Book Review: Five Finger Fiction by Brooks SiglerSigler’s  “about the author” bio says “Sigler made a New Year’s resolution in 2008 to complete a book.  Here it is.”  If this is true, I sincerely hope she made a similar resolution in 2009.  Thank yous are in order for  Mr. Jeffrey MacAdam Sigler, who she mentions [...]

The Red Tent by Anita DiamantI was drawn first to this book by its beautiful cover illustration.   It’s in the style of  a classical oil painting, and shows a woman in a Biblical landscape who is obviously suffering from a great tragedy.  I looked at the description, and found that it was about Dinah, a [...]

Book Review: The Girls by Lori LansensI found this book incredibly interesting and I read it constantly until the end. What was so interesting? The author is from Canada, the characters were well developed, and it is a story about conjoined twins (yes, siamese twins, but the proper term is conjoined twins). Of course, since [...]

It all makes me realize that my baby’s getting older (and therefore, so am I).

Food is, of course, the most basic of our needs beyond water and air (and toilet paper!). Isn’t it funny how we take these simple things for granted? You breathe in and out, you pull on the roll, you turn on the tap, you pop a Lean Cuisine into the microwave, or answer, “Yes”, to “Fries with that?” Easy, automatic, instant. But of course, it’s not. All of these things, with the exception of air, require a complicated combination of infrastructure and workforce to get to us. We only think about it when the system breaks down (imagine a toilet paper factory worker’s strike!), or when we pay our bills.

Homeschooling Tips – How to Get Your Child to Enjoy LearningDue to constant traveling, I have been homeschooling my son for the last few months. We have gone through different stages where he enjoyed it or didn’t, and I’ve had a few struggles getting him to listen and to actually like doing work, especially math. [...]

A Million Little Pieces by James FreyI found this book at the free store and almost didn’t take it. It looked kind of cool, a hand with candy sprinkles all over it. But the description, about a man with an addiction who goes through rehab didn’t sound that exciting. I’ve read a few of those, [...]

Money-saving tips for the middle class Part 1: Transportation Unless you work from home, transportation is a necessity. But it need not be expensive. You don’t need three cars. You probably don’t even need two cars. And you could likely get by with no car at all, especially in the city. If you live in [...]

The River Why by David James DuncanThis is one of those rare perfect books that I will want to keep forever to loan out to friends in need of enlightenment or encouragement. It has everything: a good storyline; characters that are real, complex and that you would want to meet in real life; it’s funny; [...]

Whale Rider Movie ReviewWhale Rider is a lovely little movie about a rural Maori town in New Zealand and their search for a leader. It’s about the struggle for a little girl to be accepted, about the struggle between tradition and modern ideas, fulfilling your dreams, and about love within a family and within a [...]