Aren't You Glad ...

Today was a good day. I love it when I can make a list of things accomplished:

1. I was able to make my 16 year old feel safe and me feel needed at the same time. Who knew 16 year olds had nightmares that required their moms to come in their rooms until they fell back asleep.
2. I apologized to my mother for being a 46 year old brat. She has been very helpful lately. I have not been grateful.
3. I let my son and his cousin catch frogs and jump in the pond by going to the cousin's house while his parents were at work.
4. I bought, cooked, and served locally grown produce. Sweet cherries, peaches, plums, green beans, peas, and beets.
5. I got to enjoy a really great memory while shelling the peas. One summer my dad planted peas. He dragged them out, vines and all. I remember the three of us (me, brother, sister) sitting under the birch tree on a huge sheet. If I remember correctly, we ate almost as many as we popped in the kettle stuck in the middle.
6. I played with the dog. I have been ignoring him lately and I think he is actually under the weather.
7. I took daughter E to the orthodontist.
8. I learned that my 12 year old is not completely '12 going on 22'. She wanted a CareBears DVD and ZooAnimals plastic cutlery.
9. We ate fresh from the oven chocolate chip cookies before dinner and I promised not to tell their father if they did not say they were not hungry at dinner.
10. We laughed at dinner.

I also finished two books today. No, I did not read them both today. I have a bad habit; I read the way I knit - more than one at a time.

Crow Lake by Mary Lawson is a book I can recommend. This is a debut novel by a Canadian now living in England. If you grew up in rural anywhere, you will have no trouble visualizing the setting. The only flaw of the novel is Lawson's use of suspense. She keeps hinting at a horrid tragedy. When she finally discloses it, the reader (and all the other characters in the novel) realizes that the only tragedy is in the narrator's perception.




Next, we have The Lady and the Unicorn by Tracy Chevalier. This is an historical novel in the same vein as The Girl with the Pearl Earring. Chevalier's novel centers on the characters involved in the making of six tapestries commissioned sometime during the 1500s.

Like The Girl with the Pearl Earring, she does a marvelous job painting a vivid picture. The structure of the novel is very clever - a woman in the painter's life serves as the inspiration for each woman depicted in the panels. I cannot say I ejoyed this as much as the Vermeer inspired piece. But all in all, well worth the read.