Newbery, 1926. I've slacked off in working at the goal I set last spring of reading all the Newbery and Caldecott books, so I got back to work on that this month. This book would have fit in really well with the Core 5 books that the big boys and I read last year. Some of the stories were boring, which I expect in any collection, but I enjoyed many of them.
One Thing: Top Tip (From a Mom of 6), written by Jess Connell
My friend Jess gives all sorts of sound advice on her blog, but the one piece she gives in this book is critical for those in the trenches of parenting. A quick read, a simple concept, and an imperative decision.
One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are, written by Ann Voskamp
This book was a gift from Shawna and it was good. Voskamp is a more poetic, for lack of a better word, writer than I'm used to reading, but I love her focus on thanking God for the blessings all around us, even when it's not the natural or easy thing to do. It's a choice, a habit that has to be formed.
I frequently post blessings on Facebook, things both big and small that I'm thankful for, but I have a little confession to make. Two years ago, on New Year's Day, I started a new blog. It was a place where I listed three good things about the day before I went to bed each night. They were neither newsworthy nor were they necessarily the best parts of the day, but they were all good things. I didn't tell anyone about it for a while and the first time I did was just to mention that I'd started a list, but I didn't say it was in a blog. Eventually the blog came up in some conversation, but it wasn't a blog that was particularly interesting for other people to read. It was more for me than anything else.
Well, I kept that blog for almost five months, from January 1st through Memorial Day weekend of 2012. Then I found out that Tim was not going to have a job once the school year ended two weeks later. I was angry. I was stressed. I was not thankful for anything. And so I quit the blog, deleting it completely after a year or so of not posting.
It's been twenty months since I found out that job was ending, twenty very hard months, but reading this book encouraged me to start my other blog again. Thankfully, the name was still available, and earlier this month, almost exactly two years after my first attempt at finding things to be thankful for, I started listing three good things each night. Choosing My Focus. That's what I'm trying to do.
p. 106, I am beset by chronic soul amnesia.
p. 124, Straw comes in all shapes and the back of a camel can be weak and it's toast and surely there's something behind it that I should seek out but I don't even care. It's my own face that obscures the face of God. How can I help this son of mine see when I can't see? The parent must always self-parent first, self-preach before child-teach, because who can bring peace unless they've held their own peace.
p. 128, Why do I have spiritual Alzheimer's, always forgetting?
p. 176, I know it well after a day smattered with rowdiness and worn a bit ragged with bickering, that I may feel disappointment and the despair may flood high, but to give thanks is an action and rejoice is a verb and these are not mere pulsing emotions. While I may not always feel joy, God asks me to give thanks in all things, because He knows that the feeling of joy begins in the action of thanksgiving.
p. 177, Anger is the lid that suffocates joy until she lies limp and lifeless. <snip> Pride, mine - that beast that pulls on the mask of anger - this is what snaps this hand shut, crushes joy.
p. 184, I am blessed. I can bless. A life contemplating the blessings of Christ becomes a life acting the love of Christ.
I also finished two other books, but I'm leaving them off the list out of respect for someone's privacy.
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