End of the Year book Report

Time for my recap of all the books I've read the second half of the year. I do this as much for myself as for you. I like to look back and reflect on what I've just read. I saw a recent post on Facebook today that I shared. It's a quote by W.H. Auden, "A real book is not one that we read, but one that reads us." Those are my favorite books, ones that speak to my soul and heart.

Another big thing I noticed as I was typing this was, "You are what you read". In September I read two books about suicide. Dear Everybody and 13 Reasons Why. Both these books looked at it from an interesting perspective, from letters written from those that killed themselves for those still living.  I've always felt this drive to document my life and my stories for my posterity in case anything should happen to me, so this method sparked my interest. BUT, I found myself wondering if like the characters, I should write a letter to each of my family members and people in my life and not just in case anything should happen to me, but more as an insurance in case I decided I wanted to commit suicide myself. The choice would be all that much easier to make because you had prepared things in advance for your words to be left behind. I even told Ken I felt like I was being HAUNTED by the thought of suicide, and I didn't grasp and get over it until mid November, so it lasted about 6 weeks.

It's only looking back at this list now that I realized what I had done. By reading these books I had sparked the idea in my head, which grasped on to whatever weaknesses I had, and toyed around with them for weeks.  Luckily during that time I was also reading some positive psychology books and my favorite book of the year, Imagine a women in love with herself, with meditations for women. Now THAT book was pure poetry. I don't think I regret reading the two books on suicide, but from here on out I will make sure to watch the feelings I have after reading a book and make sure I am not being influenced for the negative by what I just read. (Another reason I stopped reading novels like The Pilots Wife with story lines of men who commit adultery. As if I needed to be mad at my husband because some OTHER fictitious man couldn't be faithful)

So here goes using the Goodreads rating system:

1star: Didn't like it
2 stars: It was ok
3 stars: Liked it
4 stars: Really liked it
5 stars: Loved it

August:
A Lover's Dictionary: A Novel by David Levithan   4 stars
Sum: 40 Tales from the Afterlives by David Eagleman   5 stars
Mother Wove the Morning: A One woman play by Carol Lynn Pearson   4 stars
Schooled by Michael Korman   4 stars

September:
Dear Everybody by Michael Kimball   4 stars
My Secret: A PostSecret Book by Frank Warren   2 stars
13 Reasons Why by Jay Asher 3 stars
The Power of a Woman's Words by Sharon Jaynes   4 stars
The Year of Fog  by Michelle Richmond 4 stars
The Reader by Bernhard Schlink   3 stars

October:
Secrets of the Heart by Khalil Gibran   4 stars
The Believing Brain by Michael Shermer   4 stars
Imagine a Woman in Love with herself by Patricia Lynn Reilly 5 stars

November:
The Space Between Us by Thrity Umrigar   5 stars
Authentic Happiness by Martin Seligman    5 stars
The How of Happiness by Sonja Lyubomirsky   5 stars
The Pioneer Woman: Black Heels to Tractor Wheels by Ree Drummond   5 stars
For Men Only: A Straightforward Guide to the Inner Lives of Women by Shaunti Feldhhan  5 stars

December
Why do Men Have Nipples by Mark Leyner   2 stars
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See   4 stars
Falling Leaves by Adeline Yen Mah   4 stars
Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex   2 stars

Christmas Eve/Day

We always act out the nativity scene. Guess what Vivian is? An angel of course

 Let's see, Natasha is the donkey that Maeva is then riding on. Kalel was Joseph, Zane there in the brown shirt in the front is a camel, and Tane is his wise man. Keilani I think is a shepherdess???

The kids exchanged handmade white elephant gifts.

Grandma got them all the usual pj's plus some cute pillowcases

There was the cutest little note in there about how much their Grandma and Grandpa love them and even though they can't always see them, to look inside the pillow and look at the hearts to remind them they are loved each time they lay their heads down on their pillows.

Handstitched of course.

                                                                       

Me in all my glory.

and my baking skills, I made the crescent rolls this time.

My father requested there be Poisson Cru (raw fish) for dinner with our turkey.

Our tree full of gifts from aunts and uncles and family.

My handsome husband.

I love how the younger kids are, the easier they are to please with their gifts.

This was my favorite thing I made for Ken, it's a photo cube for him to take to work with each of the kids when they were babies and how they are now all grown up, this one's Natasha and Kalel

and Keilani and Vivian.

And Bugaboo!

Ken and his daddy love. I 'm not done with this gift, I need to trim the pages down, add their names and some sort of quote. Family is what matters in the long run, isn't it?

 I hope your family had a Merry Christmas too! and a Happy New Year to everyone!

Our Family's Christmas Newsletter

So, I sort of feel like I'm missing out on a cool tradition... the yearly Christmas newsletter. So here goes our online blog version, since I'm too lazy/busy to print one up and mail them. I've enjoyed the ones I've read so far, especially this one, she inspired me to write our own!


http://shauntewadley.blogspot.com/2011/12/december-greetings.html

Seriously, go click on the link and read it, she's one funny woman!

So here goes ours:

As many of you know, Ken has been busy building his acting career. It's amazing how many countless film projects he's been in since he began just over a year ago, but still manages to have a decent home life with us.


                                     

The highlight of Clarice's year was getting to go to Connecticut and New York in October. She's discovered for her sanity she NEEDS to get on an airplane at least once a year. Hmmm, where will she go this year? She's also still going to school full time while trying to take care of 5 children, carpooling and all, wish her luck in the New Year, she'll need it!

Keilani turned 15 this year and just got her learner's permit. She's badgering us about taking Driver's ED. I guess it will be a good thing, because then she'll be able to help with the carpooling. She's also very responsible and has taken over as second mom status. The kids just love it, NOT!

Natasha turned 13 and finally got a Facebook account. She's in 7th grade and turning into quite the woman. I can say that because she's almost caught up to me in bra size, lol. Almost...

  

Vivian is in 5th grade. She continues to be her unique self and Keilani says she's getting sassier and sassier. I say she's just following her older sister's examples.

                

Kalel just turned 8, he will be baptized in a few weeks. He's growing into quite the sensitive boy, which I like, as he'll turn into a sensitive man and every woman wants that!

Zane is our crazy dude. He likes to sing along to any song he hears on the radio, and that includes songs like, "I'm Sexy and I know it". Hmmm, maybe I need to introduce him to some classical music via piano lessons. He's obviously musically inclined and has been since he was a little one.

 On another note, we moved to a new home in Orem, we downsized from 6 bedrooms to 4 bedrooms, which has been an adjustment. Our yard size doubled though and we got to experiment in gardening this year, that was interesting.

We look forward to the year 2012 and all the amazing things that will happen, as long as the end of the world doesn't hit this time next year.

Festival of Trees 2011

Going to the Festival of Trees each year, has been a great tradition. The only thing I find is I end up taking LESS and LESS pictures as a lot of the stuff isn't so NEW to me anymore, so here I will post some of the more unusual stuff we saw

A happy birthday tree? That works, I guess, it's Jesus birthday right?

A Neon Trees tree, awesome.

This I just liked because of the whole Apple Farm thing.

My kids were intrigued why there was an Indian/Native American on top of the White house. Hmmm, what was the message they were trying to send?

My favorite part of the night was going to pick up Kens car and finding this light coat of snow to which the kids took their artistic/.linguist skills to

Applegates Rock!

Yes, that says chicken butt. We have a joke going around when someone asks what's up, one would reply chicken butt, I guess because it rhymes? Ask Ken, I think he's the one that started it.

SNOW MAN!

WIPE ME!

.

Ornaments

We added a few new ornaments to our tree this year, on loan courtesy of my mother who had them sitting in storage and I claimed them to use this year, I'll put them back in her storage for her to use in Christmas future. This is a Filipino star ornament.

I don't know where she got this cute angel one, but I love it.

She got this in Africa

and this was from Uncle Paul this year, thanks Paul!

Well, I did use up this vinyl my Mom had, sorry you won't be able to use it again Mom.

another Filipino star ornament.

Tasha added the snowflakes and pearl border across the top of our living room wall.

And added the lights. The stockings obviously had nowhere to go but on the bookshelves.

Tasha also made this big countdown to Christmas thing with cardboard and lots of my scrapbook paper.

so this is our Christmas 2011....