Review: Sport of the Gods

by Paul Lawrence Dunbar
1409963004 Paperback: 132 pages



This post has been moved to my book blog. Please visit!

I'm back (I think)

I have been in transition from working full time to returning to graduate school full time. I'm excited about the change, but a bit nervous about making it all work. I hope to get back to blogging, but I'll have to figure out what that schedule will look like.
Let's get this academic year started!

Review: Hell-Heaven

From
Unaccustomed Earth: Stories (2009)
by Jhumpa Lahiri


0307278255 Paperback: 352 pages

This post has been moved to my book blog. Please visit!

Color Me Brown book challenge

I never intended for this to be a book blog, but I love books - I almost wish that I had become a librarian. The books I've reviewed so far have been how to books because I intended this to be a book about things I make.

I just stumbled upon the Color Me Brown book challenge, and it called my name. As a mother of four beautiful daughters, I want them to develop a love of reading. I also want to instill positive self images. So this particular challenge has personal value for me. I'm not yet sure which books I'll be reviewing in August, but I'm looking forward to whatever they will be.

BIP Blog Post Bingo

I've spent the last few days participating in the blog improvement project at Sophisticated Dorkiness.

I created a couple of review posts, a short list post, a resource and opinion post with poll, and a personal post with links (I had hoped that this would cover the long post too, but I couldn't find anything else to talk about on the subject).

Playhouse Heaven

1. the playhouse, 2. playhouse-sleepover, 3. playhouse, 4. Dreaming Spires Willow Playhouse from Judith Needham www.willowplayhouses.co.uk, 5. This is my playhouse, 6. Unique, 7. Crooked Man's House, 8. Dream Playhouse, 9. DSC01076.JPG

I have dreamed of building a playhouse since the birth of my first child many years ago. At the time it was to be a tree house, but the tree has since fallen. Over the years I have drawn many different plans and bought and read several books on the subject.

While I was supposed to be working on other things today, I found myself on Flickr where I happened upon these great images. I would love to do a tour of the interiors of these houses. I've never tried a mosaic, so I picked my favorites and gave it a try.

I've been trying to determine if there is a theme to what I was drawn to. It looks as though they are all unusual or have a natural quality to them. They seem to vibe with my no frills, earthy nature. I realize that I prefer not to have a Victorian or cookie cutter kit type house.

I have little to no carpentry skills, so what I build will involve a lot of guessing. I want to use as many found or recycled objects as I can. I've already bought a door and a couple of screens from the Habitat Restore.

This playhouse is on my bucket list, and I am determined to get it done this year. It won't be as cool as these, but I will be proud of myself, and I am sure that my children will be thrilled. Even the oldest, who is probably technically too old.

Which makes me wonder are you ever too old for a playhouse? I know that I've seen trends in fully functional tree houses that are being used as home offices. I'm not into that, though. I want to design it to catch breezes and capture sunlight. I want it to be a kid's place to play and not a tricked out (wo)man cave. Living in Texas, I will probably have to utilize a fan though. Maybe I can learn about solar power in the process. If so, I might also put in solar lighting so that we could do slumber parties like the one in the mosaic.

Is it obvious that this is more for me than for my children? I mean they are welcome and I'd love to give them memories of playing with momma in the playhouse. But I think that the basket on a pulley, the loft, the binoculars, and all the other gadgetry in my head are all my fantasies.

I suppose that it would only be fair to have them help me plan so that they might enjoy it more. But I think that it's probably more important that I get it going.

Let's try a poll

Since I'm on a quest to experiment with improving my blog, I'm going to experiment with polls tonight.
I found tutorials on creating them here, here, and here. These all involved manipulating the gadget provided by blogspot.


Have you ever used a poll on your blog?


This was relatively easy to do. But I wanted experiment with polls form other sources. So a search led me to Vizu.com where I created this poll.

Online Surveys & Market Research

While I could still only do one question, I was able to select colors and the width of the survey. But I didn't much care for the advertising that appeared after I voted.

Please vote in the polls so that I can experiment with this more.


The quest to improve continues.