Required reading.....finally!

My kids go to a catholic school and one thing that would always annoy me is that we would not have a summer reading list.

We don't want to put too much pressure on the little darlings while they are home for 3 months. I won't get into that.

And again, we didn't have required reading this summer for my 2 grade school kids. My oldest had 3 books to read. He read Tuesdays with Morrie and Napoleon's Buttons, which was for Chemistry.

My daughter came home today and said I have to go answer the questions for my reading. I just figured she was reading from a text book and since we don't have our workbooks yet (remember that budget issue?) I thought they must be doing some other type of writing homework.

My daughter says, "Don't you want to know what I'm reading?"

"Well of course I do, I didn't know you were reading a book. Who is having you read a book?"

"Mr. N., he's the English teacher and he wants us to read this year,"

Be still my heart!

"Our book is The Island of the Blue Dolphins"

Whoa! We have that book upstairs! So I tell her to go get it from the book shelf upstairs. Turns out we have the hardback copy with pictures! She's happy because she can read ahead at home if she wants to and leave her paperback copy in her desk.

I'm just happy!

Then my 7th grade son comes to me and says, "We're reading a book this year too. We're reading The Outsiders."

SHUT UP!

Fabulous! I kid you not when I tell you that my kids never had to read a book for class before this. I think that's a disgrace but no one ever seemed to care when I mentioned it before. Now they both have required reading and that just makes me so happy!

I talked to the teacher tonight at BTS nite and the teacher was saying he only has 30 copies of the book and they are falling apart. I'm going to start looking for copies of The Outsiders to give to the class. The kids can't bring their book home with them because they have to share them. I told him I would gladly buy my child a copy of it and he said he didn't feel he could ask parents to do that since we pay so much tuition. So, I'm going to start checking around at flea markets, yard sales and where ever else I can find them cheap. My daughter is in this class next year, they need these books!

So, on the off chance.....

that the entire library system in Philadelphia is closed, what am I going to do??

Now seriously, I'm not at a loss for books. I have a TBR pile that is just insane. I don't count them because I just don't want to know the numbers. Knowing how many there are scares me!

And there are far worse things than just the libraries closing. People are losing their jobs, their insurance and benefits, their homes!!

This whole budget thing needs to get straightened out and fast. I'd like to see the President tell Mr. Governor that he's not getting a check until his ass gets this crap settled. If I'm overdue by 1 day on my library book, I get a fine but the budget is overdue by 2 months and everyone is still getting their checks, driving their cars and using their health insurance benefits. Meanwhile, half the state is in a panic, don't have jobs, don't have benefits and for crying out loud, don't even have their school books!

But I'm willing to bet that Mr. Rendell will be sitting in that special box he sits in pretending that he's some kind of football expert on Sunday during the Eagles game. Maybe they should let him walk out onto the field! After what we did to Santa Clause one year, he should be very afraid to show his face there.

I just don't understand how so many other states can figure out how to do it and make it work but we can't??? I just don't get it!

What a disgrace.....

This is what I received in an email from my library here. I'm usually pretty darn proud of Philadelphia. I'm betting Ben Franklin is just turning in his grave!




All Free Library of Philadelphia Branch, Regional and Central Libraries Closed Effective Close of Business October 2, 2009
All Free Library of Philadelphia Customers,
We deeply regret to inform you that without the necessary budgetary legislation by the State Legislature in Harrisburg, the City of Philadelphia will not have the funds to operate our neighborhood branch libraries, regional libraries, or the Parkway Central Library after October 2, 2009.
Specifically, the following will take effect after the close of business, October 2, 2009:
All branch and regional library programs, including programs for children and teens, after school programs, computer classes, and programs for adults, will be cancelled
All Parkway Central Library programs, including children programs, programs to support small businesses and job seekers, computer classes and after school programs, will be cancelled. We are exploring the possibility of relocating the Philadelphia Author Series programs to other non-library facilities.
All library visits to schools, day care centers, senior centers and other community centers will cease.
All community meetings at our branch and regional libraries, and the Parkway Central Library, will be cancelled.
All GED, ABE and ESL programs held at Free Library branches will be discontinued, students should contact their teacher to see if other arrangements are being made.
In addition, all library materials will be due on October 1, 2009. This will result in a diminishing borrowing period for books and other library materials, beginning September 11, 2009. No library materials will be able to be borrowed after September 30, 2009.
Even as we remain hopeful that the State Legislature will act and pass the enabling funding legislation, we wanted to notify all of our customers of this very possible outcome. If you have any questions about impacts to Free Library services, call 215-686-5322, or visit the Free Library of Philadelphia website at www.freelibrary.org. If you have questions about changes to City services, or if you want to be kept informed about this situation, we encourage you to contact Philly 311 by calling 3-1-1 between the hours of 8am and 8 pm Monday-Friday, and 9am-5pm Saturdays, e-mail philly311@phila.gov, or visit the City of Philadelphia website at http://www.phila.gov.
We thank you for your understanding, patience, and continued support of the Free Library of Philadelphia during these difficult times.
Siobhan Reardon, President and Director, Free Library of Philadelphia

I'm back........

from our little mini vacation! We had a great little vacation, perfect weather, did some fun things and the kids were happy! What more can you ask for?

I don't know how, but I managed to only read about 2 pages of my book. We were just too busy and I kept falling asleep every time I opened my book. I even packed my book light thinking I was going to use it every night.

I started reading The King of Lies by John Hart. So far, it's really good. I enjoyed his other book, The Last Child, and figured this one wouldn't disappoint either.

Since we'll be getting back into the school routine this week, I'll be getting back into my reading routine too. Reading to help me fall asleep and reading in the pick up line! Those are the only good things about going back to school!

I'm just not ready for the summer to be over yet!

Wordy Wednesday.....

because even when I try, I can't be wordless.

I've been MIA for a few day because I've been insanely busy! We were supposed to go away for the weekend and I even took Sunday night off from work to enjoy a nice long family weekend. I walked out of work on Friday morning and it's raining. When I got home, I was greeted at the back door by a very pouty faced, red eyed little girl. My Sassy was not happy that it was raining on her parade!

We were supposed to go to the water park up the mountains and then do some sight seeing up there that would require it to be sunny. Looks like someone didn't get my daily plan. After some discussion and more tears, we all decided to go back to bed.

We did manage to salvage the weekend. We had a really great Friday night of playing on the Wii and then playing a few rounds of Apples to Apples! I love that game! We slept in on Saturday morning and then decided even with the light rains to head out to Valley Forge National Park. We haven't been there since the boys were little and I completely forgot how much there is to see there. We had a fabulous time! I think the boys were pleasantly surprised and enjoyed themselves. I took about 275 pictures and we didn't even finish seeing everything in the park. We were there for about 4 hours and I probably could have used another 2 hours to cover it all. We're making plans to go back in the fall to finish our site seeing and to get some great foliage pictures! I can not wait!!

I'm having so much fun playing with my camera. I got my first rainbow shot and my first butterfly on a flower shot.

I could have stayed there all day and night if it didn't get so dark there! I'll have to work on my timing for some sunsetting shots and the foliage shots. It should be beautiful in October!

Just finished......

Fear The Worst by Linwood Barclay.

It was pretty good. It kept my interest and it was a fast read. I'd have to say, I didn't like it as much as I liked his other books. I got really tired of hearing about cars.

I guess I'd give it a 6 on a scale of 10.

Tomorrow I'll be getting back into The Castaways since I put that down to start Fear The Worst. That should be a good vacation read for my weekend away!

The little things......

Today was a really good day! The weather wasn't bad, sunny but not that humid. The kids were all happy, doing their things.

I took V to the library today to pick up a book she had on hold and to get the next book in her series since we are going away this weekend. Nothing like sitting on the deck or the beach reading a good book!

She also got a few magazines while we were there, American Girl and Discovery Girl. Before Dad got home to make dinner, we were sitting at the kitchen table. She was looking through her magazine and I was making my lists for the weekend. That's when V gave me the eyebrow wiggle. Can't say no to that wiggle. "Hey Momma, there's a Mother/Daughter quiz. Wanna take it with me?" Insert another eyebrow wiggle here. So she ran off to get the paper and pencils. The questions were cute and not just silly questions, they required a little thought. V turns to me and says, you probably know me better than I know myself. She's probably right!

We finish the quiz and compare our answers. Funny how they remember certain things! The first question was what is one thing your daughter/mother says all the time. I informed her that it couldn't be any bad words. That's when she broke out the eraser. What about those cute little saying I say all the time?? Of course we knew each others favorite color. And our favorite candy bar. It was so cute seeing how she remembered certain things about me and how I remembered certain things about her. I loved the giggling she did the whole time.

It only lasted 45 minutes but it was the best 45 minutes of my day!