Link Around the Town

Well.  Since I have given myself NO time to update the blog - YET I have had plenty of time to stay updated on everything else that I like to read (funny how that works out)  I have a list of links to share with you.

And I promise that as soon as the new power cord to the "big laptop" is purchased and I update my photos then I will excite and entertain you with the adventures we have been having. (We learned last week that you cannot use Radio Shack pieces and electrical tape to hobble together a suicidal cable forever.  Sometimes, even with TLC and frugal desperation, these things DIE).

LINKS:

Tina Fey's Prayer for a Daughter :  Amen Mama Fey.  My aunt tipped me off to Mila's daydream (and her bored? mama). You can see Where Children Sleep.  It sort of reminds me of one of my favorite books that I own Material World.  You can read more about that project at the NOVA site.  On a lighter, sillier, and more worldly note - you can check out CatalogLiving.  Basically, a very silly person has scanned in photos from catalogs (mostly pottery barn) and writes captions highlighting the unrealistic staging of catalog houses. 

Books for extremists

Well.  thanks to our local library sale we are all stocked up on random books.  We love the spring warehouse sale.  $9 for a bag of books.  We pack 'em in and load it up. 

I spent a bit of time at the section labeled women's studies. Which, being of the female persuasion, seemed like a good place to look for books.   Do you wonder if there was a table labeled man's studies?    Well, no.  There was not.  Men don't seem to be as prolific of writers about their sex as women are.  AND because there would probably be lots of inappropriate things at their table.  And, its a family event. 

Any one still with me?  No.  Okay I'll keep talking anyway.

I walked away with 2 books.  Both wildly biased and bossy.  I had a hare brained idea to read a staunchly feminist book.  And an anti-feminism book. At the same time.  And compare.   

I don't know how I think of these wild and crazy ideas.  I must be fun like that. 

To summarize.  I was humored and insulted by the radicalness of both books.   Not consistently humored or insulted.  Just sporadically.  Does that mean that I am not a good feminist?   Because I don't necessary identify with the dish they are serving (read: sahm).  But.  I am a terrible unfeminist also.  I am just riding a fence and thinking the grasses on both sides of the fence are colored crazy. 

But maybe that is the way it goes with causes that people are willing to fight for.   Causes make people crazy and nearly unrelateable to everyone who isn't quite on the same page. (*cough* pro home birth *cough* pro vegetarianism *cough*)

What are some of your causes?  Anyone willing to share? 

Urban Homesteading & Books to get & Pigs (mostly)

I get that urban homesteading is quite the trend now.  I totally want to get in on it.  But my landlord (izaak) won't let me keep chickens in the apartment (what?).  So, I must read voraciously until we move and have more space for all my new theoretical hobbies (beekeeping, chicken keeping, home brewing and well there is more but Izaak is already exhausted by this SO I don't mention anything else out loud)

Well.  Although I want to play city-lot-farmer...I hate the over use of the phrase urban homesteading.   Homesteading conjures up vision of Homestead Acts, Manifest Destinys, 160 Acres of land, Covered wagons, and cannibalism. (did I lose you with the cannibalism?).  It is a wee bit lame to then equate what American families did 150 years ago with city slickers wanting 3 chickens and a 4x8 raised veg bed.  Right?  Am I alone on this? 

Regardless (or irregardless, or without no regard.  Thanks mom) I recently read two books that I am putting out there as GOOD.  I think I have already talked JJ and Mariana into reading them...But why stop there?  let's spread then knowledge on how to butcher a pig that you raised on your own little city lot (CC&R be damned).  Both of these books are in the scrolly list of books on my sidebar.  Go look.  They are there.  I swear.  If you click on the scrolly book list you will go to Amazon. But Half.com is where I buy (fyi)

• The Backyard Homestead

AWESOME.  Nearly inspired me to get a pig.  Until Izaak reminded me that I am a vegetarian and raising a pig would be next to useless (but not entirely useless, like if I had a heart attack.)...and that in our 9 years of marriage we have purchased probably less than 10 pounds of pork meat for him. The book was exciting enough to make me forget all of that.

• Made From Scratch

a memoir about a lady who went from cubicle-rat to urban homesteader in a couple hundred pages.  Full of whoopsie mistakes and how-tos.  But nothing too deep.  BTW that reminds me.  When is something FULL vs being CHOKE FULL? Isn't full, just full?  I think full is like pregnant or dorky.  A thing is or isn't, without being a a spectrum, or partially.
Now what do you think about that?

Spiritual parenting

I am an expert on parenting (what?) so long as the topic does not deviate from diaper changing and teeth brushing.  In all other things the what is best to do gets fuzzy.
So, I read.
And hope for the best.
I am currently reading through a book Spiritual Parenting by Hugh and Gayle Prather. I did not get out of the first chapter before I read something that got me chewing and thinking.

All the we teach our kids by consistently trying to correct them in anger is that we believe deeply in anger as the most effective approach to difficulties.  Is that what we want to model?...Parents who get angry with their children and won't give them a birthday present...who go for hours or days refusing to speak...these parents must remember that it is not now, and never has been, our heavenly Parent's function to turn against us. Likewise, it is not the parents' function to turn against their child.  It is the child's function to turn against the parent - if that is what happens.  And very often adolescents appear to do just that, even as we have so often rejected a God who doesn't reject us.  (author's bold, pg 5)

While at home during the day with 2 little ones, I keep circling back to the thought that if I correct this issue/moment/episode with anger is that the most effective approach? Am I modeling anger as a tool for problem solving?   Not that a 3 year old does very much to warrant anger - but at the end of the day when feeling tired and under siege from all the preschoolness it is necessary to guard our selves.  As an extension, this could apply to how we treat our spouses.

Do we believe deeply that anger is the most effective approach to difficulties?
 

Rethinking the classic American children's novels.

one word "headcheese".

Has anyone reread the Laura Ingall books since they were little? I (with fond memories) started Little House in the Big Woods with Elliot today. Chapter 1 is 24 pages of Pa slaughtering the pig, smoking a deer. Ma makes headcheese, and sausage. Laura and Mary play with a pig's bladder ball. Vegetarian Elliot wanted Vegetarian mother to explain headcheese and bladder.

While we will forge ahead and read the Laura books...I will be thinking why why why...