reading edited

I've been reading quite a bit lately.

I started this reading binge with The Shack. This is easily one of the best books I've ever read and would highly recommend it to anyone. It's a thought-provoking story and it might challenge your beliefs and ideas, and possibly your faith. I can not say enough about this book and its power. Eloquently written and now an all time favorite of mine.

I also read a new Nicholas Sparks' book, Change of Heart. CORRECTION: I wrote the wrong title here. Nicholas Sparks' new book is actually The Lucky One. Change of Heart is another book I got for Christmas by another one of my favorite authors, Jodi Picoult. Thanks Amy for catching my error so I could correct it. Another great novel by Mr. Sparks. I think this might be my favorite of the ones of his I've read, though I've thoroughly enjoyed them all. Thanks Tim and Melissa! It was a a wonderful Christmas present!! :)

I just finished The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King. I've always shied away from Stephen King novels because I don't like scary and gory, but this one was totally different. Very suspenseful, but not scary or gory at all. I've also been informed that Stephen King has written several novels which are not of the scare/gore genre. My friend Christie is a Stephen King addict and loaned me 3 of his non-scary novels. I'm getting ready to start Delores Claiborne tonight. Hopefully, it will be just as good. Thanks, Christie for turning me on to a new author!

Happy reading!

family

Over Christmas break, we traveled to Savannah, MO to visit my grandma and some of my aunts, uncles, and cousins. My grandma is AMAZING! She has 6 children and 6 in-law children, 11 grandchildren, 1 in-law grandchild, 1 in-law grandchild to be in June, and 1 great-grandchild. She'll be 79 in February and she's helping my mom's youngest sister and her husband raise their 3 children, ages 11, 7, and 5. I think she and my mom could easily pass for sisters (for a comparison, check out their pictures below). My grandma has very little gray hair and is very active and probably in better health than some of her children and their spouses. Caden was really impressed by the new knowledge that he has 3 grandmas. He kept talking about Grandma J all the way up there and all the way home and several times since we've been back. I think she made quite an impression. And sometime will have to confuse him more and explain that in all truth he has 4 grandmas, Doug's mom's mom is still alive, too.

my mom

Grandma J

4 generations
Emma and Caden

pure orneriness

A note about the picture of Emma and Caden: Emma is Grandma J's youngest grandchild. She's 5 and looks exactly like her my mom, my aunt Elaine. Caden is Grandma J's oldest great-grandchild. He's 4 and at least 2 inches taller than Emma already. They got along fabulously. For once, Emma was the bigger . . .er, I mean, older kid.

cooking dress

Caden LOVES to help us prepare dinner. So for Christmas, Doug and I were looking for some more "unique" gifts for Caden in addition to the vehicles and board games he got. We found 2 that lean a bit more toward "unique". One is this chef's dress up outfit. Caden calls it his "cooking dress" even though we've tried many, many times to explain it's not a dress of any sort. Anyway, he loves it and asks to wear it every night while he kneels on a chair next to me "helping" me cook dinner. The outfit came complete with the chef's hat, jacket, 3 plastic cookie cutters, mini skillet, and 4 cooking utensils. Caden dons the get-up each night to help us and dutifully makes us cookies for dessert, rolling them out, cutting the shapes, and baking them in the utensil drawer he uses as his oven. I love his imagination and his passion about helping in the kitchen. It's so fun to see him using his creativity, plus I think he looks really cute in his cooking dress!