I’m not a sports fan. I almost never care who wins the Super Bowl. I’ll admit this year I rooted for the Pats, but that’s mostly because the older I get, the more I appreciate Tom Brady’s longevity. But regardless, when the Super Bowl comes, I want to see the ads. This year my favorite … Continue reading
Valentine’s Day crept up on me this year. My best excuse is that, like everyone in Michigan, my head is spinning from weather whiplash. Between the Polar Vortex and springlike temperatures, we’ve had 60 degree temperature variations in a three day period TWICE in the last few weeks. So no wonder I don’t know what … Continue reading
Here’s a special post for those of you who, as I do, live in places facing record-breaking windchill temperatures this week. All of us wait anxiously to learn which activities are moving forward and which are cancelled due to snow. And, of course, everyone listens for school snow days. This week some clever administrators from … Continue reading
A few months ago the Internet was taken by storm by a video of a Scottish grandmother trying, without success, to maintain her composure while reading a story to her grandson, Craig Smith’s The Wonky Donkey. At the time I was anxious to read the book for myself, but apparently so were many other people. … Continue reading
Halloween seems to get bigger every year. While I’m saddened to see the free-range trick-or-treating of my childhood wane, I still love the imagination with which so many young people (and their parents!) embrace the season. And, of course, in my household full of black cats, I need to put up a few appropriate decorations. … Continue reading
The biggest pumpkin ever grown in Michigan weighed in at over 2000 pounds. It must have been a pumpkin like that that inspired Wendell Minor’s How Big Could Your Pumpkin Grow? This is a story to delight and inspire any pumpkin lover’s imagination. Minor starts with an image of a typical festival-winning giant pumpkin, then … Continue reading
Every October, I look forward to the Halloween picture book display at my local bookstore, hoping to find something new to tickle my imagination. This year did not disappoint. This year I discovered Ginny Goblin. Ginny is the star of Ginny Goblin is Not Allowed to Open This Box, a delightful tale of a curious … Continue reading
Between work, play, and visiting family, I’ve spent a lot of time in airports this summer. Occasionally I’ve browsed in the many shops designed to help us survive hours of layovers. In one of those browsing moments I came across a slim volume titled Before They Were Our Mothers: Voices of Women Born Before Rosie … Continue reading
By now some who have followed this blog for a while have figured out that in our house, a perfect date night may well include dinner and browsing in a book store. Recently I did just that, armed with a discount coupon for a book of choice. I had a hard time deciding, so after … Continue reading
Recently, several friends posted a video on social media depicting a imagined text conversation among Harry Potter, Hermione, Ron, and others from the Harry Potter world. It is not a literary masterpiece but it did make me chuckle. One of the things I noticed was that without familiarity with the characters, the video was much … Continue reading
