10 Trick-or-Treaters: A Halloween Counting Book

Who doesn't like a cute counting book for specific holidays? 10 Trick-or-Treaters is a colorful, fun, quick read that counts down from 10 with silly reasons for the Trick-or-Treaters to slowly trickle from the 10 down to 0.  It would be best for ages 3-6 and there are many oppurtunites to stop and ask questions, counting practice and lots of giggles as spiders and toads interrupt the trick-or-treating fun!



Halloween Counting Ideas
For those that can count to 20 - Here's a fill in the blank worksheet
One-to-one practice and counting - Here's a cut and paste
Connect the dots (1-22) - Worksheet here

And of course you can always compare and contrast Halloween candy/treats, taste-test and graph favorites!

Clifford's Halloween

Emily Elizabeth's favorite holiday is Halloween! Last year she dressed up as pirate and Clifford was a ghost.  This year she is going to be a fairy princess but Clifford is still undecided. 

This is a cute quick read that preschool through first grade would enjoy.  It briefly touches over how Clifford celebrates other holidays and how last year's Halloween went.  As most Clifford books go, the enjoyment comes out of the pictures.  This one does not disappoint with amusing pictures of Clifford scaring people because of his largeness and a dunking for apples mishap.  Whenever I've read it, I always get giggles from the kids.  Clifford is always a favorite.

Potential ideas to go along with the book?
 Easy - Have children color in this picture of Clifford with the Halloween costume they think he should have.
Medium Ability - Have children write a sentence and draw picture of what Clifford should be for Halloween. 
A little harder - Also read Clifford's First Halloween and compare the two stories. How are they alike? How are they different? How does Clifford's size affect his choices? Practice story-retelling.

What's your favorite Clifford book?
(The November Group Read Poll will be put up on the side bar today!)

Discussion 2 - The Scent of Rain and Lightning

Oh my word.  The end of this section had my heart melting at how Chase calmed his niece and rid of her fear of storms.  It almost took away the thought of him flirting inappropriately with his brother's wife. 

I feel like I am too cynical for this book.  I keep wanting someone to say WHERE THE HELL IS LAURIE? DID SHE KILL HUGH-JAY? Did she run away? Cuz, just accepting that Billy killed her? Come on people, get interesting.

I will say that it hooked me and has me interested.  Except for when they start mentioning the landscape, but I think I've established before, I don't do descriptions.  Just tell me what's going on and give me dialogue!

1.  Do you like the scent of rain?

2. Who do you think killed Hugh-Jay based on the clues so far?

3.  If you were one of the Linder children, how would you feel about the way the parent's seem to treat their children?

4. What do you think of the relationships the siblings have in the Linder family?

5. What is your impression of Belle?

Thanks for participating! Come back next Friday to discuss chapters 21-32!

Flat Out Love

Flat Out Love by Jessica Park is a modern quirky love story.  Julie Seagle moves to Boston for college and on her first day learns that the big city isn't always kind.  She and her mother were duped by a craigslist ad and her apartment that they put a deposit on, and first and last month's rent is non-existent. Thankfully, Julie has a sense of humor about the deal and her mother calls in a favor to her old college roommate, Erin Watkins and Erin and her family invite Julie to stay with them.

The Watkins house is a bit different than Julie's home.  Especially since a cardboard cut out joins them for dinner and not one eye is raised.  Thirteen-year-old Celeste apparently has issues with her brother Finn being away and to cope, has made herself a Flat Finn.  Matt, Celeste's brother, is an extremely smart math dork who is as charming as he is annoying.  Roger, the dad, is a bit absent and out there, but a really kind-hearted father figure when he's around.  Erin, the mom, is emotionally distanced and a little in her own world.

Julie settles in with the Watkins and falls in love with them all. Of course, she must fix all of their problems and starts communication with Finn, to learn the ins and outs of his family and to try to get Celeste okay with him being gone.

Of course, there is drama, and of course nothing is as it seems.  However, it is as it all seems if you are paying attention to the painfully obvious clues.  I figured out what the big secret in the family was fairly early on.  It was an okay book but sometimes, I had to shake my head that a real person wouldn't be THAT dumb and oblivious.  Then at the end I had such HIGH hopes that a book wouldn't end with all the worlds problems solved and then of course we had to add in the last chapter and fix all the world's problems.  But besides that, it was a quick easy read and those that enjoy YA would probably really enjoy this book as well!

The banter between Matt, Celeste and Julie is great and overall, all the character parts are well developed and executed well.  My only issues are with believability.

I received this book from Crazy Book Tours.  All thoughts and feelings are mine and mine alone!
Check out what other people thought of the book here.

Author & Book Information:

Jessica Park is the author of FLAT-OUT LOVE, the young adult novel RELATIVELY FAMOUS, five Gourmet Girl mysteries (written as Jessica Conant-Park) and the e-shorts FACEBOOKING RICK SPRINGFIELD and WHAT THE KID SAYS (Parts 1 & 2). She grew up in the Boston area and then went to Macalester College in frigid St. Paul, Minnesota. During her freshman year, there was a blizzard on Halloween, and she decided that she was not cut out for such torture. So she moved back to the east coast where, she'd forgotten, it still snows. Oops. She now lives in New Hampshire with her husband, son, bananas dog named Fritzy, and two selfish cats. When not writing, she is probably on Facebook , pining over 80s rock stars, or engaging in "Glee" activities. Or some combination of the three. Probably with a coffee in hand.


Jessica loves to hear from readers and does her best to get back to everyone who writes her! You can e-mail her HERE. Tell her about your ex-boyfriend who was a font nerd. Or send pictures of awesome Flat People on adventures. (You get bonus points for this. Possibly some sort of award, too.) Stories of online romance. Apartment rental disasters. Skydiving experiences... Whatever you want.
And like any normal person, she has an online addiction, so you can find her on FACEBOOK, GOODREADS, TWITTER, and blogging at What the Kid Says about her kooky conversations with her son. Her young adult book, RELATIVELY FAMOUS, has its own website (greedy book!), so stop by for more info.

November Group Read Suggestions!

Holy cow! How are we already into picking November's Group Read????? This year has flown by.  We've read some great books this year and can't wait to see what we end the year with.  I've really enjoyed the last few books.  Let's keep up the good book trend!

Here is what we've already read...

The Scent of Rain and Lightning
Still Missing
The Sandalwood Tree
Major Pettigrew's Last Stand
Something Borrowed
The Blue Orchard
Sammy's Hill
In the Woods
Shanghai Girls
The Weight of Water
Water for Elephants
The Color Purple
The One That I Want
The Secret Garden
House Rules
American Wife
Firefly Lane
Middlesex
The Reader
The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
The Awakening
Pride & Prejudice
I See You Everywhere

Leave your suggestion in the comments! On Monday, the 17th I will start up the poll! I was happy to see some new faces this month, hopefully you all stick around with us this coming month!

Things I Never Needed to See on the Internet But Did Anyway...

1. A naked child (including a penis) on facebook.  Seriously??? Would you like me to share a naked photo of you on facebook? Oh no.. well why did you share your child's naked photo?

2. Mucus plug.  Seriously, why?

3.  Poop in a toilet bowl.  REALLY??? WHY DID YOU photograph that???

4. Someones vomit.  I guess I could have made this list a heck of a lot shorter by just writing RIDICULOUS BODILY FUNCTIONS one should keep in the bathroom!

5. Someones narsty hairy back.  It's bad enough in person, why scare us all on the Internet? I sure as heck won't be sharing my hairy neglected bikini line or my lovely stretch marks.  YOU'RE WELCOME.  I'd appreciate the same courtesy.

6. Used tampons.  WTF? (you probably wonder what I do on the Internet at this point, but I promise you I never had to google to find these things.. they appeared in my every day Internet usage!)

7. Hair in shower drains.  THIS one is almost worse than the vomit and mucus plug.  Hair on on someones head gives me the jeebies.. and makes me want to upchuck.. WTF.  The words are enough.  no visuals please.

8.  Cup of urine.  While, peed on pregnancy tests are not my style, I will say okay, sure share away.  BUT YOU DO NOT NEED TO SHARE THE CUP YOU PEED IN!!! Seriously, you can just tell me you're pregnant, I don't need to see the stick.

9. Children in U of M clothes.  Poor children.  Somebody buy them some scarlet and gray!

10. That horrid picture of that one terrorist in all his hairy chest glory.  EWWWWW.

What have you seen on the Internet that made you stop and go whaaaaat?

And if you recognize something on this list that you've done the Internet? I hope you are horrified and a little insulted.  Cuz seriously? EWWWWWWWWWWWW.

The Scent of Rain and Lightning - Discussion 1

Happy Friday!!!! Welcome to any newbies and any oldies to the Friday book talk!

I will be honest, when I started out reading the first chapter I was like oooooh man, this is a lot of wordy descriptions of people and I am going to shoot myself. Then it picked up.  I flew through chapters 2-10.

I get the impression that if Annabelle and Hugh were my parents or in my town I'd find them presumptuous, annoying and meddling.  For reals.

And oh my gosh.. That poor cow! We live across the road from a farm and every fall when they move the cows and calves it's so sad.  The mama cows cry so loud for their calves for like 4 days! The first two days it is 24/7 non-stop.  I hope it doesn't make me cry for real this year.  Speaking of, it should probably be happening this weekend or next.

Blurb from author interview:

Random House Readers Circle: How did the idea for this story come about?
Nancy Pickard: It started with the landscape. I saw a photograph of Monument Rocks in Gove County, Kansas, and it blew me away. Since then, I’ve been out there to see them. They are so unexpected, so enormous, so beautiful, and they’re such a dramatic contrast to the ultraflat ground from which they rise. Even from seeing only a photo, I sensed I had to set a story there. (In the novel, I renamed them Testament Rocks.)


RHRC: Many reviewers have raved about your ability to make Kansas come alive in this book and your previous book. The setting for The Scent of Rain and Lightning is very different from the one you used in The Virgin of Small Plains. How do you choose the settings and landscapes for your stories?
NP: I think they choose me. Something about a landscape will grab me and haunt me. It won’t let go until it has its very own book! Currently I’m working on a book set in the farthest corner of southeastern Kansas, and for a long time I couldn’t figure out why I felt such a compulsion to write about it. It doesn’t have the gorgeous expansive landscape of Virgin or the surprising, spectacular landscape of Scent, so what was pulling me toward it? I finally realized that the landscape under its ground is as interesting as any landscape above ground in other places.

1. Have you read anything else by Nancy Pickard? What was it? Would you recommend it?

2.  What role does weather have in the novel?

3. Have you ever been to a ranch?

4. Do you think Laurie is having an affair or just flirting at this point? Who do you think she is having an affair with? (if you've already finished,  you can put who you thought as you read)

5.  Do you ever keep forgetting that the book is placed in Kansas and not Texas?

6. What is your first impression of the characters so far? (Annabelle, Hugh, Hugh-Jay, Chase, Bobby, Billy Crosby, Laurie, Belle, Jody, Val, Collin etc.. )

Thanks for participating! Come back next week for Discussion 2 over chapters 12-20!

Pumping Sucks

In the beginning I loved pumping.  It was proof I was producing food for my darling. It was satisfying to see the containers fill up and know that I was doing a good thing.  It was also a time when I could catch up on texting or reading.

Slowly, over time it became a chore.  It was making me sit still when I wanted to be doing something else.  My daughter spent a month fighting bottles, so why the heck am I even pumping?

Then my daughter started chugging bottles.  Now I feel inadequate and that I'm not going to have enough milk for her regardless.

She also stopped requiring a nipple shield and effectively abused the crap out of my nipples in one week time.  I had to go back to a nipple shield on one side from the pain.  It makes me want to turn in the towel so bad, but then I think of how much she likes nursing.  How quick and easy it is, how CHEAP it is.  How I'm 4 months in and that is freaking amazing. I think of how much formula costs and smells and I pump.

I will keep pumping til I really truly cannot pump anymore because I am not a quitter and even if I want to quit, I cannot quit my baby girl.  So until these bad boys dry up, I'll be annoyed and frustrated.  For her, because she's worth it.  And mama ain't no quitter.

Conjure

Silence.  The whirl of the fan is my only distraction.  Ting,Ting, Ting. 

My chest tightens.  My heart beats faster and faster. My breathing is ragged. Ting, Ting, Ting…

I lie there and try to count. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5… Ting, Ting, Ting.  I get dizzy.  What if I don’t have time?? Did I spend too much money? Did I eat too much? Did the baby get enough food? When will she wake? Are the clothes clean? Did I forget something?

Ting, ting, ting.  Gulping down air I try to clear my mind. 1, 2, 3, 4..

Ting, ting, ting..

I'm linking up with Write on Edges's RemebeRED prompt today.

September At A Glance..

I'm changing things up this month because I feel like it.

My highlights of the month...

-Having my preschoolers start.

- Getting Isla to take a bottle and take a bottle well... (this week she's had 4 ounces, 5 ounces, 5 ounces and 3 1/2 ounces at daycare!!!!!!)

- Isla ending the month with only waking up once a night to eat!!!!!

- College football! ;)

- Our apples came in great this year and I've made some delicious homemade applesauce and apple crisp!! Yummm.. Hopefully I will be picking more over the weekend and making more applesauce!

- Oatmeal cookies! I made some and I am on an oatmeal kick.  Thinking of making Apple Oatmeal Muffins.

- Came up with a new homemade baked potato soup recipe and it was delicious!!

- Isla rolled over for the first time and now won't stop.

- Got to see my best-friend!

Favorite Photos of the Month...