In the Christmas Frame of Mind

CARDS:

I have managed to get things moving for Christmas in a reasonable manner this year. This has not always been the case. I used to be the kind of person who sent Christmas cards closer to New Year's Eve every year. Then, one year something happened to trigger a change. Someone, who used to be a casual acquaintance friend back when we lived in DeKalb - you know, the kind you make through your child's friends, but they just seem to stand out more than the rest - responded to my Christmas card with a card of her own and a few choice words.

Her note read something like this: "I don't know why you still send us a card. You don't live here anymore. Plus, we always get your card way after Christmas, like it was something you just did because you received our card in the mail. Feel free to take us off your Christmas card list in the future."

I was speechless. It was especially puzzling since she had sent a letter thanking me for my newsy Christmas card in February of the year before (probably another year when I was far, far behind). In that note, she had responded to almost every bullet point I had made in my Christmas letter, had included a note of greeting from her daughter to Bryce, and had gone on to say, "Some people might not like holiday letters, but I really enjoy them & reading how everyone is." Was she feeling that I share too many tidbits about my family? Did she think I only sent the card out of obligation? Do you really stop sending cards to old friends when you move away from a place? Is the friendship just supposed to stop because there is no immediate contact any more? To this day, that note of hers disturbs me.

Thus, I have taken to attempting to get my cards out shortly after Thanksgiving, lest anyone think they are on my list out of obligation. This year, I sent them on December 1st. If I only sent them to current friends, my list would be quite short. No, I continue to send them to old friends I haven't seen in years (all except for the one who basically requested I remove her from my list). They go overseas, to about ten different states, and to a wide range of individuals I have met and come to care about over the years.

 DECORATIONS:

The decorations are now up. Our big tree is up on the back porch, where we can turn up the heaters and sit and enjoy the tree as if we were outside with it. Usually, this is the place where we all congregate when we have the big gathering with my side of the family. (We are taking a year off from hosting my family's Christmas gathering this year and my boys are already moaning about missing seeing their cousins.)

Trevor put almost all of the ornaments on and remarked over the various special ornaments (I always try to buy a special significant ornament each year for each of the boys, with the intention of passing them on when they marry.) He noted that the last few years, Bryce has received football ornaments (because of his involvement with his h.s. football team). I had an extra football ornament (a Hallmark keepsake one snatched up at a resale shop) and Trevor has claimed that as his ornament for 2014. I found another resale store find in a Purdue ornament for Bryce. Now I must find something to represent Sean's year. I doubt I can find something with stitches (he fell on the school bus steps and required four stitches to his chin last month), but I will probably look for something with a roller skate (since he just had a field trip to a roller rink and discovered that he loves skating ... this was quite an accomplishment because he was quaking in fear about the whole thing for weeks before the trip).

I've pared back quite a bit of our decorations (things I was simply tired of, like the singing Christmas tree which used to so amuse the kids and so annoy me). The biggest issue has always been the stockings. We had purchased three matching ones back when there were only three of us, but after the two little guys came along, I just couldn't bring myself to spend a heap of change on five new matching ones. Thus, we've always had a mix-match mess of a stocking display. If only one of the matching ones wasn't an angel, I could simply use the three matching ones for the boys and two others for John and me. This year, I finally settled on something which looks a bit better. I had the stockings my mother used to use when we used to have family gatherings at their house (now that they're in Florida, in a tiny house, this isn't feasible). John and Bryce's are both red, so I added a third red one for Sean and now have an alternating theme. It still isn't the way I want it to look, but it is better than it has been.

The stockings make me think of a funny story. A few years ago, my sister was aware of my stocking dilemma and so whenever she was out and about and saw a set of stockings she thought I might like, she took a picture with her phone and then sent them to me. When we gathered that year for Christmas, she asked why I never responded to any of her stocking suggestions, I shook my head and chuckled. Then, I pulled my old-fashioned flip phone from my pocket to let her know that I'm so far behind the times that I couldn't even receive the photos she was sending to my phone. Ha!

One of the decorations I still put out every year is one we acquired from my husband's work, when they were getting rid of it (it is fully functional, so I'll never get understand that). It is a ceramic village display with lit up trees and houses. I love it. But this year, in my eagerness to get things moving more quickly, I tried to carry the whole thing to the back of the piano, without taking each piece separately. Note to self - Don't ever do something that stupid again! One of the sets of trees fell off and shattered to the ground. Thankfully it was only in a few pieces and I was able to superglue the whole thing back together again. Now, I'm waiting for my husband to look at one of the bulbs which will not light this year.

COOKIES:

Another favorite decoration is one I only just received last year. It was displayed in our library's Christmas shop and I came home and added it to my husband's list of gift suggestions for me. It is a beautiful snow-capped house cookie jar. I have already baked up a small batch of cookies to fill the jar (simple peanut butter cup ones from a fundraiser the boys participated in at school). Sadly, I am practically the only one eating the cookies. I may need to add a new wardrobe to my Christmas list, if I continue with my cookie baking plans.

I'm hoping to make up at least five different types of Christmas cookies this year. My paternal grandmother always greeted us with trays of Christmas cookies which she baked in advance and froze to have ready for our visits. I'm talking wide variety! She would bake up a dozen different kinds and freeze them in little baggies, then array them on her special Christmas trays. It is a happy memory I would love to duplicate for my kids ... even if they don't end up eating very many of them.

At least, if I manage to bake the five types of cookies, I will be able to take a tin of cookies to the guy who hunts in our woods every year. He always favors us with a fruit basket or a tray of cookies (or dark chocolate - because he knows how much I adore dark chocolate) and I like to be able to reciprocate in some small way. He is always good to keep an eye out for trespassers on our property and he feeds the deer to keep them coming back.

GIFTS:

I have all of the Christmas presents purchased for my boys. This is the first year I failed to buy them books. There are a few reasons. Primarily, it is because we have just participated in the school's book fair and they both picked out a selection of books they had been wanting (including the newest Diary of a Wimpy Kid book - which was another good one - a Weird But True book, a Minecraft book and an Eye Twister optical illusions book). Plus, it is just heartbreaking, when they are allowed to open one present early on Christmas Eve and they happen to grab for the book box and then groan because they were expecting something better. Even my youngest, who is an avid reader, doesn't seem to care for receiving books as a gift. Sob, sob. What's a book lover to do when the rest of her family scorns her passion?

For my part, I did put a few books on my gift suggestion list for my husband. My husband and I don't share the same view on gifts. The other day, I mentioned a gift I had purchased for Trevor and he immediately replied, "That wasn't on his list of things he wanted." Another comment he recently made was "would you like a new set of Cutco knives for Christmas?" Cutco knives? Really?

His list of gift suggestions always includes things that he is in need of (and most of them are things he could really just pick up himself). Here's his list for this year: "work out gloves, sweatbands, black belts, ties, pictures of the boys in frames, sweatpants, nutcracker; and holiday blend coffee." Have you ever heard such a boring list?

Thus, I tend to buy things I think he would like which don't appear on the list. So far, I have purchased a squirrel-proof bird feeder (because he is all about feeding the birds), the nutcracker, and a word-a-day calendar (he loves learning new words). I can list these purchases because he never reads my blog. I have also been keeping my eye out for another Uncle John's Bathroom Reader (he loves those books, filled with tidbits and anecdotal stories). I like to veer off the list. He remains glued to his and only adds things which are practical needs ... like the knife set.

I have to spell out exactly what I would like and where he could find it (example - the special seasonal flavor of Lindt truffles with the snowman on the blue package which offers milk chocolate on the outside with white chocolate on the inside - yum - available at Walmart or Walgreens). But then, I tend to only get what I already listed and that feels like something of a let-down. I always find myself hoping he will have taken the initiative to pay attention to the things I might like outside of my list (I've collected monkeys for years and thus my list often has things like a monkey flash drive). Alas, that doesn't happen very often.

Then, there's the half-way joking comment I made the other day about a trip to London-Paris-Rome. He immediately gets incensed that I would even think about making such an expensive journey (despite his intention to fly us all to Mexico this year for his niece's wedding - that doesn't count as frivolous in his book ... only my dream trips are frivolous). This is definitely another area where we don't see eye-to-eye. Groan.

But, although I won't receive a ticket for my dream trip in my stocking this year, and I won't be surprised by anything I receive, I still enjoy the process of the gift-giving. I love to find the choice treasures and wrap them and see bright faces when they are unwrapped. I enjoy sending unexpected gifts to friends out of the blue. One year, I sent a loaf of my banana-chocolate-chip bread, along with an alto horn pin, to an old Salvation Army friend who used to play alto horn with me in the band when I was a teenager. This year, I'm thinking about sending a soccer door-knob hanger to a college- age girl who used to be Bryce's best friend back in DeKalb (she is an avid soccer player and won a soccer scholarship for her first year in college). I just enjoy doing little things like that. It warms my heart to give.

CAROLS:

This year, I had the unexpected pleasure of participating in a Salvation Army ensemble as we played a spot for the K-Love radio station's morning show. I listen to K-Love all the time, so it was quite thrilling to meet the DJs, especially Kankelfritz (because his name is so unique) and to put faces behind the voices I hear on the morning show. Our little quintet had never played together before, but, of course, we're all familiar with the music from the Salvation Army carol book. We each introduced ourselves and the instrument we play and played four little carols. They are supposed to air sometime during the week of December 13th on national radio and our photo will be up on the K-Love Morning Show's Facebook page. How exciting is that?

Thus, my Christmas is off to a good start. How about you? Do you still send cards to old friends from long ago? Do you manage to get them sent prior to Christmas? Do your stockings match? Do you bake reams of Christmas cookies? Do you only purchase practical gifts? Have you ever played or sung on national radio for the holidays? All these things are on my mind. What's on yours?

Book Review: The Crooked House

My friend Anne is launching her second children's book on Amazon today and I agreed to be a part of the launch team and post reviews of her new book, The Crooked House. Once again, this book is also illustrated by Anne's talented daughter, Jessica. The illustrations burst with color to pair with a rhyming tale of a girl who is ashamed of her house. The main character is transformed when she learns the true story behind her crooked house and begins to feel less crooked herself. The story has a great moral and the illustrations are superb.

I received this book in exchange for a review.

Book Review: Since You've Been Gone

While Since You've Been Gone, by Morgan Matson, had a captivating plot device, it ended up being just a good, but not a great, read. I appreciated that the language and events remained clean. Although I liked the main character, I was more intrigued by the missing one and not much was really revealed about her until the very end, and even then, my response was sort of "meh."

The teaser from the front cover sucked me in: "It was Sloane who yanked Emily out of her shell and made life 100% interesting. But right before what should have been the most epic summer, Sloane just ... disappears.  All she leaves behind is a to-do list.

"On it, thirteen Sloane-inspired tasks that Emily would normally never try. But what if they could bring her best friend back? Apple picking at night? Okay, easy enough. Dance until dawn? Sure. Why not? Kiss a stranger? Um...

"Emily now has this unexpected summer, and the help of Frank Porter (totally unexpected), to check things off Sloane's list. Who knows what she'll find?"

So, there's a list of thirteen off-the-wall activities for Emily to cross off. All of the activities take her out of her comfort zone, but she ends up making new friends in the process and finally comes to discover some clues to help her locate her missing friend. There's a little romance between Emily and Frank, complete with the friction of a girlfriend away at a summer program at Princeton. Emily begins to be brave on her own and to stand on her own two feet, without the assistance of Sloane.

But what about Sloane? Who just up and leaves a best friend without any word besides a list of things to accomplish in her absence? Who doesn't even bother to answer her phone to let the friend know she is okay? The mysterious Sloane annoyed me. It was the part of the book I liked the least. Even though the situation resolved in the end, it still left a bad taste in my mouth. Sure, both characters grew throughout the process, but I just wasn't as on board with the way the growth took place.

The one person I kept thinking of while reading this book was my blogging friend, Amy. Since she is a runner who listens to playlists while running, and Emily and Frank bond mostly through their morning runs, I thought perhaps this would appeal to Amy. For me, I didn't recognize many of the songs (just not a pop music kind of person) and thus, felt totally in the dark about the significance of the titles and bands.

I don't want to imply that it was a bad read. It wasn't. The writing was smooth. The plot moved along at an amiable pace. There was just enough conflict to keep the reader engaged and interested. I guess, in the end, it was a decent read but just okay, and at 449 pages, it was a lot to invest for an okay read.

Book Review: No-Drama Discipline

As soon as I saw this book by the authors of The Whole-Brain Child, I wanted to read it. I am a big fan of their previous book and read with interest their many guidelines for nurturing your child's brain. The full title of this book is No-Drama Discipline: The Whole-Brain Way to Calm the Chaos and Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind. Both books share similarities: outstanding structure, clearly defined strategies, explanatory stories and illustrations, and solid information on how the brain works.

I will have to say, I have friends who parent in this manner consistently. Their discipline is always gentle and mindful, their relationship with their children strong and respectful. Although I'm not around them often (especially now that we live in a different state), they have never lost their patience with one of their children in my presence. I have often thought that I would like to be more like them in my parenting style.

This book encourages parents to engage their children more fully in the task of discipline. The principles are simple. First, connect with your child, then redirect their behavior. Connecting serves three purposes: 1) "it moves the child from reactivity to receptivity," 2) "it builds a child's brain," 3) "it deepens your relationship with your child." While connecting, you must ask why the child is misbehaving and what they need, then you must think about how you say what you want to say in response. This slows down the process and takes away some of the knee-jerk reactions which often lead to ineffective parenting models. Plus, it allows the child to get to a point of being receptive to what you wish to say.

For the redirect portion of the instruction, the authors provide an acronym:

Reduce words
Embrace emotions
Describe, don't preach
Involve your child in the discipline
Reframe a no into a yes with conditions
Emphasize the positive
Creatively approach the situation
Teach mindsight tools

I know, personally, I have a tendency to use too many words (which end up being processed as "blah, blah, blah," to preach, and to fail to involve the child in determining the best way to resolve the problem. I often do react in the moment with my own big emotions (lower brain) without tapping into the more rational perspective (offered by the upper brain). Even just the act of slowing down my response time will do wonders for my own discipline with my children. I appreciated the emphasis on remaining calm and reasoning out what needs to be taught.

Once again, the authors have provided an excellent refrigerator chart containing the principles explained. Thus, even if you didn't have time to read the whole book, you could begin to incorporate the wisdom simply by reviewing the handy chart. Plus, they humbly offer up an addendum with examples of some of their own parenting failures. They gently offer hope to any parent who wishes to be more mindful as they discipline their children.

Nanowrimo Winner 2014

I can check off Nanowrimo Number Six. I completed the final words on my Nanowrimo manuscript on Friday morning, topping the manuscript out at 51,824 words. I am very happy with how it turned out and really can't wait to dig in for the revision stages (although I will put it off for at least six weeks in order to approach the manuscript with fresh eyes).

I also recently took one of my YA manuscripts to a member of my Young Adult book club for her review. She came back with wonderful comments, saying I really caused the action to come alive in her head and that she truly fell in love with my main character. She said that I nailed the voice of the male narrator well. She added that she hopes I plan on working on a sequel to that novel (something I haven't considered and don't know if I will because I, myself, don't see the main character further along than where his trials have taken him thus far).

Now, I can relax and enjoy the holidays, knowing I have another rough draft manuscript to return to in the new year. My friend Anne has written two more children's books and I agreed to be a member of her launch team for each of them. I finally feel like I have time to devote to reading her manuscripts and providing some feedback and reviews for her. Let the holiday shopping, Christmas card sending, house cleaning and decorating begin! I'm in a good spot for it! Plus, there's a present in the mail, since I ordered a Nanowrimo winner t-shirt before I even completed the challenge (I was pretty sure I could do it again).

Book Review: Other People's Rejection Letters

I think I was expecting something a bit different from this book, although if I had read the subtitle, I wouldn't have gone into it thinking it would primarily be about rejection letters received by other writers. The entire title is: Other People's Rejection Letters: Relationship Enders, Career Killers, and 150 Other Letters You'll Be Glad You Didn't Receive. The book covered a far wider spectrum of rejection than I was anticipating, but it was still a somewhat enjoyable experience to eavesdrop on other people's disappointments and rejections (I almost feel guilty saying that ... almost).

Although many of the letters are downright lame, I think my favorite part was a small section at the end of the book where several of the letters are explained more fully and the reader learns what happened after the rejection. For example, there were three hilarious Water Frog Certificates where the poor little girl was refused admittance to the next level up in her water training because she could not master the face float. She went on to earn an MVP title with her high school swimming team. The biggest belly laugh of all arose from eight rejection letters received by a Mr. Richard Barrett after he supposedly sent a manuscript titled, Insanity of War, to the most bizarre recipients (including Texas Instruments, Charlton Heston, Walter Cronkite, The Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association, General Motors, King Hussein of Amman, Yale University and the Vatican). One recipient actually responded with "We have reviewed the material and are unsure of your purpose in sending it to us, so we are returning it to you for safekeeping." Another man received fifteen rejection letters from NASA, but was accepted into the program on his sixteenth try.

By far, the strangest entry was a letter from F. Scott Fitzgerald, written to his daughter Scottie while she was away at college. The letter is sharp and critical and full of vitriol. But, the caustic tone isn't what renders it amusing. I was fascinated because the letter is so poorly written. He urges her to read it twice because he wrote it twice. You'd think he'd have communicated better after going over it a second time. You'd be wrong.

As with one writer who rejected the editor by failing to send any rejection letters, the topic of rejection caused me to think. She writes, "I don't have any rejection letters in my possession and it's not because I always have excelled at everything I've done, I think it's because I haven't put myself out there enough - haven't taken enough chances." In a similar way, I don't think I've put myself, or my writings, out there enough. I receive a few rejections and immediately withdraw from the process of sending things out. I must remedy this. The rejection needs to propel me to try harder (yet with wisdom, not willy-nilly like Mr. Barrett - ha) and to fail to shrink back from the repeated failure. Who knows? Maybe on that sixteenth try, someone will bite and a publisher will offer to take my work on. I mustn't give up at attempt number six. I must keep putting my work out there for consideration. And, I must keep writing regardless of any rejection letters I may receive.

Book Review: Out of the Easy

After seeing Ruta Sepetys's book, Out of the Easy, on-line a few times, I encountered it again on Sheila's blog, The Deliberate Reader. She declared it "fantastic." Thus, when it was offered up as our November read for my young adult literature book club, I was eager to dive in.

I completely agree with Sheila. Even if I wouldn't have expected to like a book about New Orleans or one filled with prostitutes, it was a wonderful book of historical fiction and left me wanting to know more of the main character's story. She is off on a new adventure and I'd love to see a sequel so that I could find out how things work out for her. I came to love her just as much as Sheila did.

Josie Moraine lives in the French Quarter of New Orleans in the 1950's. Her mother is a prostitute, working for the Madam Willie Woodley. Despite making her own way in life, living above a bookstore and working there for the owner in exchange for her board, Josie is still tied in many ways to her despicable mother. Josie works cleaning house for Willie after the johns have left in the morning. But her real goal is to get out of New Orleans and head to the east coast to attend an upper class university. She might have the grades, but she certainly doesn't have the connections. While trying to establish some way of getting in and getting there, Josie uncovers information about a murder which might just implicate her mother. She wants to do the right thing, but so often finds herself spouting more and more lies and getting herself caught in the thick of things.

With a little bit of love, a little bit of friendship, and a whole lot of heart, Josie faces her obstacles with grace, dignity, and courage. She is the only one who can chart her course, but she does get by with a little help from her friends. The reader cannot help be cheer her on. By the end of the book, Josie is in a mess of trouble and the reader is desperate to find out how she will get out of the mess and make her way out into the world. Thank you, Ruta Sepetys, for transporting me into another world and making me love the characters within it.