Children love the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. The half drawn, half written books center around a middle school student named Gregg Heffley and his adventures dealing with friends, school, and family. There are currently eight books in the series as well as a special movie diary book.
The first four books have been adapted into three films, Diary of a Wimpy Kid (2010), Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules (2011), and Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days (2012). The plot from the third book, Last Straw, was split between the last two films. The films seem to generally fly under the radar a bit, but like the books they are silly fun for kids.
A few weeks ago, I wrote about some of the series that have new books coming out this year. One of them was Ransom Rigg's Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. The second book in the series, Hollow City, was released earlier this year. And while I wrote about them, I had never read the actual book so checked it out on my Kindle over our Overdrive app. I finished it in two days. It was fantastic and the most I've enjoyed a fantasy book since Harry Potter. I put myself on the hold list for Hollow City and finished that quickly too.
Jacob, a self described average teenager, is bored of his life as a privileged kid in Florida. He works part time at a drug store and is constantly trying to handle his eccentric grandfather. Jacob's grandfather has always had a mysterious past, but once the circumstances involving his death are suspicious, Jacob is drawn into a world he thought only existed in fairy tales.
Hollow city, the sequel, takes off exactly where the first book leaves off. There's no break in the action, and it's easy to dive right back into the story. (Though in my case there was no break between finishing the first and starting the second book.) There is more action, more character development, and definitely more peculiarity in this sequel.
The books also contain real photographs that have had little to no doctoring. The strangeness of these real photos adds a lot of realism to the otherwise fantastical books.
Knitting a scarf from chunky yarn is one of the quickest ways to get some knitting satisfaction. Admittedly, I like my knitting fast and fabulous--the chunkier the better. I like plush and chunky scarves piled high, right up to my ears, with big visible stitches. So, imagine my excitement when I came across arm knitting. You heard me right, arm knitting! You knit with your arms...YOUR ARMS! Forget the needles, right on your arms with yarn so chunky you have to use your arms to knit with the stuff.
So, off I went to the craft store to find the right kind of chunky yarn since, of course, none of the super bulky number 6 yarn I had was quite bulky enough. In other words, I had my excuse to go find some new yarn and off to the craft store I went!
Meet, Orchid Shimmer. Isn't she lovely?!
Now, to the internet to learn how to arm knit. Kaye passed on a few links she got from a knitting for charity newsletter and once it directed me to YouTube, I poked around and found a few tutorials myself. Honestly, it's quite easy. You might have to pause and rewind a couple of times to see exactly how loops are passed and where hands are supposed to go, but after figuring out what the yarn was supposed to do, easy peasy! Much easier than learning how to knit with needles that are not arms.
But honestly, the tutorials are not as clear as I hoped to pass on to newbie knitters with the claim that "arm knitting is waaay easy--here, try this before learning how to knit to get your confidence going." It really is waaay easy--so, my advice for beginning arm knitters: keep at it until you get it because it really is quite gratifying. Just remember, pause and repeat. Pause. And. Repeat.
Here are the two tutorials I used to learn:
For this veteran knitter, figuring out how many stitches wide to make my piece with the width of yarn I was holding posed the biggest hurdle. Not including my learning swatches, I must have made and unmade at least five scarves. I went from 12 stitches to 10, to 12 again (I'm not exactly sure why) back down to 10, to 8. I kept trying to follow the stitch count of the tutorials I was following not keeping in mind that my yarn AND my arms are twice as big as the ones found in the video. I love my arms but small needles they do not make.
My finished piece is a cowl8 stitches wide with as many rows as I thought was necessary to go around my neck--and then some. Unfortunately, a little too much "and then some" for my taste. I plan to take it apart and make and infinity scarf half as wide and twice as long so I can double it up and mess with the final wrap a bit to get it juuust right. It took me a whole 30 minutes from casting on to stitching the cowl into a closed loop, with a pause in the middle to watch a tutorial one more time to make sure I was passing the loops the right way.
Glasses and latte included for size.
Arm knitting is fun, quick, and--with a bit of finessing the variables--easy. If you like chunky scarves, wonderful and wide cowls, and snazzy blankets you can knit in a day, then you need to try arm knitting.
It is 6:15pm and I am in a small room listening to a bunch of kids practicing their singing.
I don't know if it was the room's tall ceiling or the wonderful songs or maybe it was the music coming from the piano, but I was mesmerized for a short 15 minutes. It was just sublime and unexpected. Welcome to Stockton Youth Chorale.
You should come and listen to them. They are pretty amazing for a bunch of novice singers.
They have two concerts coming soon on February 28th and March 2nd:
Roots starts the story of an African adolescent, Kunta Kinte, who is captured and sold into slavery in the United States during the 18th century and continues by following the lives of his alleged descents.
The book was adapted into a highly rated televisionmini-series in 1977 starring a young LeVar Burton (Star Trek, Reading Rainbow).
The mutiny and attempted escape of enslaved Africans aboard the La Amistad led to a highly publicized court case in 1851, United States vs The Amistad Africans. The story was adapted into the film Amistad by Steven Spielberg in 1997. The screenwriter based the screenplay on Jone's book.
12 Years A Slave is the biographical narrative of a New Yorker, Solomon Northrup, who was kidnapped and sold into slavery in 1851.
It was adapted into film by British director Steve McQueen in 2013 and has been very popular this award season. To read more, see Bucket Book List: Academy Award Nominations.
My coworker doesn't know it yet, but she inspired me to further explore the making of little boxes. Origami boxes. Useful boxes. Pretty little boxes of different sizes to keep small office supplies close to hand and tidy. Little boxes like the ones my coworker was wanting (I hope!) when she sent out a call for empty paperclip boxes recently (library folks are a frugal lot.)
I started by looking at some of the many origami books our library has. I learned how to make sturdy little square boxes of various sizes by varying the size of the paper squares I started with. I also learned to make lids for my boxes by using paper just slightly smaller for the bottoms than for the tops. I'm still working out the slightly part because it's actually kind of tricky to get a lid that fits just right. It depends a lot on the thickness of the paper you use so you have to fiddle with it a bit.
Making lots of boxes has allowed me to learn a few more things by doing. I've used origami paper, which is thin, but very pretty. It makes a fragile box and is fairly expensive, as paper goes. Then, there's standard copy paper, which is not as pretty, but is sturdier and much less expensive, even in colors. My favorite is scrapbook paper, which makes a box both sturdy and pretty. It is somewhat inexpensive, especially when it's on sale. Finally there's printed card stock, which is even sturdier and just as pretty, but also more expensive than scrapbook paper. Another thing I learned is the thicker your paper is, the harder it is to crease, so while card stock makes the sturdiest little boxes, scrapbook paper is easier to work with and makes a box almost as strong as card stock.
I also wanted to learn to make rectangular boxes, so I went online to find a couple of ways to do that. My favorite was a box with sturdy sides and sharp corners. This technique turned out to have an easily adjustable length I found out how to do by experimenting. That is, if your box is too long, you unfold one end, cut off the amount needed and fold the end of the box again. Works like a charm for a box just the right length. Making this box also helped me learn to reinforce the top edges of all my boxes with clear tape. The tape held multiple thicknesses of paper together while making the edge quite strong. Nice little box. Here is a link to some step-by-step instructions at www.origami-fun.com. I also recommend watching this little video before trying the printed instructions so you can really see where those little flaps go toward the end. You'll also see why you want tape at the top edge! This same website also has some good instructions for the little square box I mentioned above if you can't get to the library right away.
Now that you've seen how to make both boxes, I'll tell you about a neat little discovery I made while playing with the paper sizes: If you make three little square boxes from 6-inch square paper, they will fit exactly into or next to a rectangular box made from 8 1/2 X 11-inch paper! This goes a long way toward organizing a drawer or shelf with very little left over space, which was exactly why I started this exploration into little boxes in the first place. I hope my coworker likes the set of little boxes I'll be sending her soon...
Before
After!
If you have learned something fun and/or useful by making something, leave us a comment and tell us about it.
Have you seen the new highway signs: " SERIOUS DROUGHT, HELP SAVE WATER. "
This drought seems serious.
Apparently, the most recent rain hasn't helped us that much. To stay proactive, here are a few suggestions I have heard so far. Some of them are just for pure laughter to lighten the mood on this somber matter.
Don't wash my car.
Don't rinse the dishes before putting them in the dishwasher.
Don't flush the toilet or wash my hands. (bad idea)
Stop drinking water.
Drink beer instead of water. (husbands favorite)
Use old leftover bottled water to water the plants. (I do that all the time)
Take a quicker shower. (that is feasible)
Not taking showers. (bad idea)
Watering the grass every other day and for shorter period of time. (easy fix)
I told my daughter about this drought and I regretted it immediately since she is a worrier. "What are we going to do mom?" Don't worry baby, I will buy you bottled waters. Anything to make her feel safe. So, what do you think? How should we combat this drought? Here are a few suggestion from Save Our Water website
