The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd

The Secret Life of Bees is another book I've had for awhile, hadn't read, and then felt sad I waited so long to read it! One thing that kept me from reading it is that I read The Mermaid Chair by the same author with my book club and didn't like it. But every spring we get a ton of bees flying around our Palo Verde, orange, and grapefruit trees and I would think, I should just read it! This spring I finally did.

Lily Owens is a girl who is trying to survive her father in 1964 South Carolina. Her mom died in some shroud of mystery she can't quite put together from her 4 year old memory so she is left with a crappy dad and their sweet, black housekeeper Rosaleen. Rosaleen finds herself in some trouble which forces Lily to run away with her. Lily decides it's a great opportunity to hunt for some information about her mom, so she begins searching for the Black Madonna. What she finds is a strong community of women, and herself.

Here are some of my favorite quotes:

The secret of a good lie is don't overly explain, and throw in one good detail. (Good tip. I'm a terrible liar.)

"She liked to tell everybody that women made the best beekeepers, 'cause they have a special ability built into them to love creatures that sting. 'It comes from years of loving children and husbands,' she'd say."

This is a lovely book about friendship and love sprinkled with Civil Rights. And of course it's also about amazing bees.

Here's a gratuitous bee picture I took in our backyard this spring:

Here is a gratuitous bee painting by Maggie Taylor, called Girl in a Bee Dress:

P.S. This book counts as my Made Into a Movie genre for the Eclectic Reader Challenge, although I haven't seen the movie yet.

Project Life February part 4

This is one of my favorite pages so far! It covers one weekend: volleyball practice on Friday, a trip to the Musical Instrument Museum on Saturday, and the VNSA Book Sale on Sunday.

I think the spirit of Louis Armstrong was with me when I made my Musical Instrument Museum collage. I used 2 photos, 1 brochure, 1 scrap of patterned paper, and 1 greeting card to create it. The brochure is in the top left and bottom right slots. The photos are in the top left and right slots. The greeting card is in the top right and bottom right slots.

If you've never been to the Musical Instrument Museum you should definitely go. I think I could go 2 more times and still not see everything!

Project Life February part 3

This week documents a Youtube video that made me laugh, a birthday bulletin I made for the break room at work, 2 pack walks, and working the scoreboard at the boy's basketball game at school.

This video was the highlight of my day so I had to document it. Of course when I googled Sesame Street Sure Shot I was able to find images from the video which I printed out at home. My favorite part was Grover playing the flute. I added a sticky note shaped like a talk bubble and wrote in some lyrics that tickle me: I've got more rhymes than I've got gray hairs! And that's a lot because I've got my share! True dat.

I was in charge of making the birthday bulletin for February. Since Arizona's birthday is in February I decided to forgo the traditional pink and red and instead created a giant paper Arizona state flag. This picture shows how I did it, by finding the flag on the computer, projecting it on my Smartboard, taping paper on top and tracing. It was a lot of work but I got a lot of compliments so it was worth it.

Finally I wanted to document that I watched the State of the Union address. I could have written my own recap but I let the newspaper do it for me. I just slipped the section into a 12x12 protector. I bet that will be fun to pull out and read again in later years. Although it wasn't free I did save it from the recycle bin.

it happens every year

Parent: I was wondering if my kid is going to second grade next year?

What I Want To Say In A Sarcastic Voice: It's May. Thank you for checking in on your child's progress.

P.S. School is by Anastassia Elias.

Dead Money by Steve O'Brien

Dead Money is a mystery centered around the Kentucky Oaks, the big filly race the day before the Kentucky Derby. Dan Morgan is a lawyer and the owner of Aly Dancer, a filly who has the potential to win it. He receives an offer to buy his filly but the buyer becomes menacing when he refuses to sell. Then his trainer "commits suicide" and Dan has a mystery to solve.

I thought the story was a little choppy in the beginning. One detail that bothered me was when Dan, a man who has owned racehorses for years, asks his friend Lennie to explain the handicapping (betting) system to him. I thought that it was nice of the author to include that information for the reader who doesn't know, but I had a difficult time believing someone who has been around horse racing doesn't understand it. Maybe Mr. O'Brien could have thought of a more creative way to get that information to us.

By the end of the book the story improved and I couldn't wait to see how it ended. A fun book to read around Triple Crown time.

P.S. One of my 2 favorites won the Kentucky Oaks this year, Princess of Sylmar!

Happy Mother's Day!

We love our moms!

Project Life February continued

Here's another page I really like. It only covers 3 days of the week but it's chock full of information.

Here's a bit of Arizona humor (but Corey and I may be the only ones who find me funny). Corey did a story about the border and texted me these 2 pics while he was away. When the story aired I laughed at the wacky Is the border secure? graphic the station added for hype. Thinking of that graphic while looking at the 2 pics he sent of a giant fence and some cows I feel like we have our answer.

This shows another reason why I've switched to a Project Life style of scrapbooking. I had an incredible dream that I was riding my old horse Thunder through these crowds of people in a stadium. I was looking for the staging area of a parade we were supposed to be in. Just like when I used to ride her in the old days, people kept admiring her and giving me compliments about her. This gave me an excuse to dig out an old picture of us in a parade that never got scrapbooked. I get to include my dearly missed friend in a scrapbook while documenting a dream, and I also scanned the picture before including it.

I love Chipotle and they put your food in the best bags. Now I have a great factoid about the earth while saving a piece of the bag from the landfill (although I recycled the rest). Is anyone getting sick of me saying "Free and saved from the landfill" yet? When I tell people I love scrapbooking they almost always say, "It's so expensive!" I just want to point out that it doesn't have to be. You can find materials to use all around you. The important thing is getting your memories documented.

Dragons of Winter Night by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman

This is the second book in the Dragonlance Chronicles trilogy, which I originally started because they were some of Corey's favorite books when he was in high school. I thought the first one was ok, but this one was a memorable adventure! I now see that some of simplicity in the first book was actually building a foundation for the second book.

The crew starts off on another quest for the Dragonlance in this tale. They aren't together for long before they are split into two groups after a dragon attack. One group continues the mission to find the Dragonlance while the other is left to fight the evil army trying to take over the land. I enjoyed it so much that Corey felt compelled to reread the series so we can read the last one together.

P.S. This books count as my Action Adventure genre for the Eclectic Reader Challenge.

May the fourth be with you!

Happy National Scrapbook Day and Happy Kentucky Derby Day! I had fun getting 13 slots done for Project Life while watching Orb win the Derby. I was rooting for Palace Malice, Oxbow, and Charming Kitten.

P.S. Singing in the rain Storm Trooper came from Wtfeck Pictures.

Project Life February

This is the weekend side of one of my pages. The Superbowl picture came from the newspaper (free and saved from the landfill!).

I finished reading an amazing book called Satchmo: The Wonderful World and Art of Louis Armstrong by Steven Brower. Did you know he used to make collages and scrapbook?! The picture I used of Louis is a greeting card.

Using the Nerd Nest's Photoshop help I printed the cover of a book I bought online with a gift card. Gift card included with print out of book cover and journaling.

We also walked the dogs with our friends and their giant puppies. Stickers are from Angi.

Almost revealed my secret pirate lair address, then took another picture with an arrow clothespin covering it. I used this Netflix envelope piece to demonstrate how long we held onto this movie...it's a Christmas envelope and we watched it in February. Oops. I read 1408, a short story by Stephen King which is super scary, before watching the movie. We liked the movie until the cheesy twist which is when Corey left to play video games. I wish the movie had stayed true to the story. And the Netflix envelope was free and saved from the landfill.

Stellaluna Smiles