Review: Me and the Pumpkin Queen

Title: Me and the Pumpkin Queen
Author: Marlane Kennedy
Category: Fiction, Children's
Rating: 2.5/5
Summary: 11-year-old Mildred starts growing giant pumpkins as a way to reconnect with her mom who passed away when she was 6.

Review: The best parts of this book were the ones about growing giant pumpkins. It's easy to see the author did her homework on the topic. The story was alright, but a few things bothered me: Mildred didn't always sound 11 years old—saying things like "to no avail," when it wasn't part of her character to be precocious. A few parts weren't really necessary and slowed the story down, like stepping the reader through every single thing Mildred does when she gets home from school one day. And finally, there were a few things that didn't feel resolved, like a mention of how the dad and his co-worker should go on a date but it's never mentioned again.

Overall, I wouldn't recommend this unless you're really into pumpkins.

June Photos Posted

You won't want to miss the June batch...we finally caught Abby laughing on camera!

 

Review: What's Going on in There?

Title: What's Going on in There?: How the Brain and Mind Develop in the First Five Years of Life
Author: Lise Eliot
Category: Nonfiction
Rating: 4/5
Summary: Neurobiologist Lise Eliot brings together insights from biology and cognitive psychology about how a child's mind develops.

Review: Just about every day as I was reading this book, I would read an interesting sentence or paragraph out loud to Erik. I found it fascinating, and before it goes back to the library I'm going to type up a few quotes to keep around for reference.

A few interesting things I learned:

• The flavor of your breast milk changes depending on what you eat.
  
• For optimal language development, it's important to have conversations with even young infants. You can do this with face-to-face contact and taking turns so your child gets to hear you speak but also gets a chance to practice herself. Even babies need to know that they are being addressed and that they are being heard.
  
• Sensitive parenting can improve a child's temperament. This means being aware of a baby's signals and responding promptly to her needs. And no matter how busy you are, they should feel that you are available and not ignoring them.
  
• Babies prefer novelty—new places, toys, experiences. It helps their brains grow.
  
• Daily infant massage improves a baby's motor skills development.

I like how the author structures each chapter—starting with the biology up front and then ending with how you can encourage that particular area of development, whether it's a sense, motor skills, social-emotional growth, memory, language, or intelligence. (I have to admit that I skipped over some of the biological details, and that structure made it easy for me to do that!)

The book did leave me with a few unanswered questions. For example, I wanted to know what impact baby sign language has on overall language development. And the author mentions that children in bilingual homes start talking later, but she didn't talk about the optimal age for starting to introduce a second language.

But I would highly recommend this book to any parent interested in how their child's mind is developing.

Review: The Sweet Far Thing

Title: The Sweet Far Thing
Author: Libba Bray
Category: Fiction, Young Adult
Rating: 4/5
Summary: Like her mother before her, Gemma Doyle can travel to an enchanted world called the realms. But when Gemma came up against the corrupted sorceress who killed her mother, she bound the magic to herself to protect all worlds from the sorceress. Now all manner of powerful organizations are trying to wrest the magic away from Gemma, and she doesn't know who she can trust.

Review: Clever, passionate, self-deprecating Gemma Doyle—I'm going to miss you. This final book of the Gemma Doyle trilogy was maybe a little on the long side, but I enjoyed it all and I was sad when it was over. At the moment I finished reading the last page, I found myself wanting to immediately start re-reading the first book of the trilogy—A Great and Terrible Beauty. The only other time I've felt that urge with a fiction series is with Harry Potter!

I can't wait to see what else this writer does.

Rethinking Discipline

Erik and I talk a lot about how we love Abby so incredibly much that it's going to be hard to discipline her when the day comes. We don't plan to use physical violence—spanking, hitting, slapping—in any way. But I'm not a huge fan of timeouts either. I can't see myself using timeouts on a regular basis, although I could see using them for certain situations.

I wasn't confident in my instincts about timeouts until I starting reading Playful Parenting. Here's a small part of what the child psychologist author has to say on timeouts:

Timeouts were supposed to be a humane alternative to whacking children, but they have somehow become the ultimate "positive parenting" tool. The main problem with timeouts is that they reinforce isolation on children who are probably already feeling isolated and disconnected.

Also:

I see most "misbehavior" as really just a matter of disconnection. Children who feel connected also feel inclined to be cooperative and thoughtful. So instead of punishment, which tends to create an even bigger disconnection between parent and child, try thinking about how to reestablish a connection...Reconnecting might require a hug, some quiet time together, wrestling or running around outside, a snack, or a talk. For more serious disruptions, I recommend what I call the meeting on the couch. Most punishments involve exerting power over a child, which just increases his or her sense of isolation and powerlessness. Meetings on the couch build connection and empower children. At the same time, they give us an effective way to provide real discipline: the teaching of our values and principles.

These ideas ring true to me—they feel right in my heart. But even after rereading the words now, I have this knee-jerk reaction to thinking about discipline in this way, and flashes of Supernanny invade my brain. It's hard to ignore the most prevalent form of discipline you see in the media and from fellow parents.

So this morning when I ran across an article about discipline tactics that are most effective, I was reminded of Playful Parenting. A quote from the article:

After all, it's not supposed to be about payback, though that's often what's going on, says Jamila Reid, codirector of the Parenting Clinic at the University of Washington. The clinic's "The Incredible Years" program has been found in seven studies to improve children's behavior. "Often parents come looking for bigger sticks. We tell parents the word discipline means 'teach.' It's something to teach a child that there's a better way to respond."

It'll be a while yet before we can put those tactics to the test ourselves, so I'm curious to hear from other parents about this topic. What are your thoughts on discipline? Have you tried tactics like those in the article? What has worked, and what hasn't?

First Belly Laugh

Last night, I went to a talk by Whole Foods CEO John Mackey, and Mackey talked about the concept of Conscious Capitalism. According to him, a conscious business does two fundamental things:

• Stays true to the business's deeper purpose—that is, a purpose other than maximizing profits


• Maximizes the value to an interdependent system of stakeholders—employees, customers, suppliers, shareholders, community, environment, and so on

When I got home, Erik was holding Abby while I was relaying everything I'd just heard about, and Abby was watching me intently as I gesticulated. I was right in the middle of talking about the second bullet when Abby suddenly started laughing! This was no short little chuckle like we've heard from her up to this point—we're talking full-on belly laugh!

I stopped talking, and we just stared at her while she laughed for a good 30 seconds. I've got to admit that at first I thought my child was possessed. It took a few seconds before I realized what was going on, but once I did, my single most important goal in life suddenly became to make her do that again and again. I tried saying "interdependent system of stakeholders" again, we smiled, we laughed, and we made funny noises—but no dice.

Now that I know we're not dealing with a demonic possession, I can say without a shadow of a doubt that Abby's belly laugh is the most beautiful sound I've ever heard.

New Duds for Abby

Abby has now grown out of most of the used clothes we've gotten from friends. We know reusing is best, and consignment shops have tons of onesies in her size. But with her big cloth diaper butt, we can rarely snap them at the bottom. So we've been looking for some cute baby t-shirts.

An artist named Will Heron has a booth at the Austin Farmer's Market where he sells t-shirts with his designs—like the one on the right. He has a great collection of baby clothes, but in Abby's size, they're all onesies.

The last time we were at the farmer's market, I noticed that he uses American Apparel shirts. This weekend, I went to their site and saw that they make a t-shirt in Abby's size too. So I emailed Will Heron and asked if he'd be willing to order those shirts from American Apparel and put a few of his designs on them for us.

He wrote back yesterday to say he included the shirts in his weekly order from American Apparel, and we should be getting everything in about 3-4 weeks. So very soon, Abby will be sporting American-made baby t-shirts with a local artist's designs. Woohoo!

Turning over a New Leaf

After almost 12 years of working as a technical writer, I am moving to my company's Community Relations team as a Sustainability Specialist. It's a dream job for me, and I still don't quite believe it's really happening. I keep expecting someone to say "Just kidding!" and take it all back.

What does a Sustainability Specialist do, you ask? I'm leading our company's new Green Team, which is a group of employees who will work to decrease the company's ecological footprint. Projects we're considering are starting a composting program on our campus, starting a farmer's market at a nearby shopping center, installing more motion detectors for lights, installing a green rooftop on our buildings, and so on.

I will also work to establish partnerships with local nonprofit environmental groups so our employees can have a convenient avenue for donating their time and talent to the cause. And I'll probably play a big role in creating the company's new sustainability report.

But really, it's up to me to define most of my new role. So if you've got ideas, I'm listening!

Perspective

So last week at Whole Foods I picked up the most recent copy of Delicious Living. We like this magazine because it has some good articles. In this particular edition there was a picture on the back cover from an artist that does a great job of putting things into perspective. For example, ever want to see what 2 million plastic bottles looks like from a distance then up close?

A couple days later, I was reading the blog of a brewer who is opening up a new brewery here in Austin called 512 Brewing Company and I saw he mentioned the same artist.

It's good stuff. I can only imagine what these images must be like in person when viewing them in their original size.

May Photos Posted

May was a big month—I had my first Mother's Day, Abby turned 3 months old, and even though we didn't think it was possible, she got even cuter!