Books Read in 2015

• Some of the favorites were: A Passage to India and Return of the Native. Lisa Lutz wrote a fun series. Still need to try and finish Divine Comedy- maybe in 2016?
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• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Old School- Jeff Kinney
• The Thief Lord- Cornelia Funke
• The Magical Strings of Frankie Presto- Mitch Albom
• Speaking in Bones- Kathy Reichs
• Cyrano de Bergerac- Edmond Rostand
• Artemis Fowl: The Eternity Code- Eoin Colfer
• Artemis Fowl- Eoin Colfer
• Kingdom Keepers 4: Power Play- Ridley Pearson
• The Silkworm- Robert Galbraith
• Kingdom Keepers III: Disney in Shadow- Ridley Pearson
• Kingdom Keepers II: Disney at Dawn- Ridley Pearson
• Better than Before- Gretchen Rubin
• Kingdom Keepers: Disney After Dark- Ridley Pearson
• The Last Word- Lisa Lutz
• Trail of the Spellmans- Lisa Lutz
• The Kill Order- James Dashner
• The Spellmans Strike Again- Lisa Lutz
• Revenge of the Spellmans- Lisa Lutz
• Curse of the Spellmans- LIsa Lutz
• The Spellman Files- Lisa Lutz
• Brideshead Revisited- Evelyn Waugh
• Four- Veronica Roth
• The Death Cure- James Dashner
• Around the World in 80 Days- Jules Verne
• Twelfth Night- William Shakespeare
• Rush Revere and the American Revolution- Rush Limbaugh
• Allegiant- Veronica Roth
• The Return of the Native- Thomas Hardy
• A Passage to India- E.M. Forster
• Miracles and Massacres- Glen Beck
• Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West
• The Last of the Mohicans- James Fenimore CooPer
• Being Mortal- Atul Gawande

Books Read in 2014

I was able to read 39 books in 2014. Among my favorites were the Mysterious Benedict Society books and the Gift of Fear.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul- Jeff Kinney

Gulliver's Travels- Jonathon Swift

The Handsome Man's Deluxe Cafe- Alexander McCall Smith

The Little Prince- Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Unstoppable: Flashpoint- Gordan Korman

The Invisible Man- H.G. Wells

Bones Never Lie- Kathy Reichs

Mrs. Dalloway- Virginia Woolf

Insurgent- Veronica Roth

Focus- Daniel Goleman

The Sun Also Rises- Ernest Hemingway

Science Fair- Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson

The Scorch Trials- James Dashner

The Maze Runner- James Dashner

The Extraordinary Education of Nicholas Benedict- Trenton Lee Stewart

A Tale of Two Cities- Charles Dickens

Think Like a Freak- Steven D. Leavitt & Steven J. Dubner

The Gift of Fear- Gavin de Becker

Cuckoo's Calling- Robert Gailbraith

The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Prisoners Dilemma- Trenton Lee Stuart

The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Perilous Journey- Trenton Lee Stuart

Candide- Voltaire

Unstoppable: Countdown- Natalie Staniford

I am Malala- Malala Yousafzai

Rush Revere and the Great Pilgrims- Rush Limbaugh

The Great Divorce- C.S. Lewis

The Prince and the Pauper- Mark Twain

Cahill Files: Spymasters- Clifford Riley

Cahill Files: Operation Trinity- Clifford Riley

The Mysterious Benedict Society- Trenton Lee Stewart

The House of Hades- Rick Riordan

The Book Thief- Markus Zusak

High Performance Healthcare- Judy Hoffer Gittell

Unstoppable: No Where to Run- Jude Watson

Every Patient Tells a Story: Medical Mysteries and the Art of Diagnosis- Lisa Sanders

The Minor Adjustment Beauty Salon- Alexander McCall Smith

The Happiest Toddler on the Block- Harvey Karp

Happier at Home- Gretchen Rubin

The Voyage Out- Virginia Woolf

Books Read in 2013

While only reading 32 books this past year, I would have to say that the overall number of pages that I read might be much higher than some years, as I read several lengthy, nearly 1,000 page books like Gone with the Wind, Vanity Fair, Brothers Karamzov, Nicholas Nickleby.

Some of my favorites from the year were the Peter and the Starcatchers series, To the Lighthouse, and So Good they Can't Ignore You.

The First Phone Call from Heaven- Mitch Albom

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Hard Luck- Jeff Kinney

Inferno- Dan Brown

So Good They Can't Ignore You- Cal Newport

The Harbinger- Jonathan Cahn

Code- Kathy Reichs and Brendan Reichs

And the Mountains Echoed- Khaled Hosseini

The Picture of Dorian Gray- Oscar Wilde

The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby- Charles Dickens

Brothers Karamazov- Fydor Dostoyevsky

A Christmas Carol- Charles Dickens

Cutting for Stone- Abraham Verghese

Virals- Kathy Reichs

Tender is the Night- F. Scott Fitzgerald

Day of Doom- David Baldacci

The Power of Everyday Missionaries- Clayton Christensen

Vanity Fair- William Makeplace Thackery

The Bridge to Neverland- Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson

Gone with the Wind- Margaret Mitchell

Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength- Roy Baumeister and John Tierney

The Buccaneer's- Edith Wharton

A Room of One's Own- Virginia Woolf

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Third Wheel- Jeff Kinney

The Mark of Athena- Rick Riordan

Peter and the Sword of Mercy- Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson

Night and Day- Virginia Woolf

To the Lighthouse- Virginia Woolf

Peter and the Secret of Rundoon- Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson

Peter and the Shadow Thieves- Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson

Bones of the Lost- Kathy Reichs

The Importance of Being Earnest- Oscar Wilde

David and Goliath- Malcolm Gladwell

Books Read in 2012

2012 was a tough year for reading, having a very active little girl who is not the best sleeper meant that when I did have some free time to read, I usually ended up falling asleep while doing it :-) I also read some longer books, like Moby Dick and Middlemarch and so I wasn't able to have quite the volume. I only read 26 books.

Some of my favorites included East of Eden, How Will You Measure Your Life?, and Peter and the Starcatchers series (so clever).

The Timekeeper- Mitch Albom
The Amber Spyglass- Philip Pullman
Frozen Heat- Richard Castle
Shatterproof- Roland Smith
The Subtle Knife- Phillip Pullman
Raising Your Spirited Child- Mary Sheedy Kurcinka
Bones are Forever- Kathy Reichs
Frankenstein- Mary Shelley
The Demigod Diaries- Rick Riordan
Under the Greenwood Tree- Thomas Hardy
How Will You Measure Your Life?- Clayton Christensen, James Allworth, and Karen Dillon
Peter and the Star Catchers- Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson
The Golden Compass- Phillip Pullman
East of Eden- John Steinbeck
Bringing Up Bebe- Pamela Druckerman
Heat Rises- Richard Castle
Imagine: How Creativity Works- Jonah Lehrer
The Limpopo Academy of Private Detection- Alexander McCall Smith
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea- Jules Verne
The Dead of Night- Peter Lerangis
Middlemarch- George Eliot
Far from the Maddening Crowd- Thomas Hardy
The Little Book of Hindu Gods- Sanjay Patel
Ramayana: The Divine Loophole- Sanjay Patel
North and South- Elizabeth Gaskell
A Murder, A Mystery, and a Marriage- Mark Twain
Moby Dick- Herman Melville

2013 is already off to a better start

Ohlone Village Day at Deer Hollow Farm

Since Jane's birth, I have been on the lookout for some more family activities that I haven't done yet and one was going to Deer Hollow Farm at Rancho San Antonio preserve. Once a year, they open up their Ohlone Village to the public and have demonstrations of what life was like for this group of Indians.

I absolutely loved it and found it fascinating- William like it but said that he learned nearly everything at Scout camp.

They showed us how to make a bow and arrow

An archery demonstration 

Had us sit in a replica sweat lodge where the men went to remove their smell before going hunting

They even had a replica redwood tree home which was really tiny- even smaller than our previous studio apartment :-) William and Jane nearly filled it completely

The most fascinating station for both of us was where they used ground acorns to make flour. What a laborious, time intensive process. They had to grind the particles several times so that they were small enough and then they had to soak them for several days so that they could at least be edible. It made me so thankful for our modern convenience of flour. 

We then went to Deer Hollow Farm which had your basic barn yard animals of cow, duck, and sheep 

The old barn

We then went back through one of the upper trails of Rancho San Antonio back to our car

I loved the sunlight streaming through the trees

Filoli and Pumpkin Patch

We had a Google offer for Filoli that we had to use before it closed for the season, so one Saturday in October we went. It was William's first time and so he really enjoyed the house but since it was the end of the season, the gardens were fairly dead. Not nearly as impressive as when I went in April with all of the tulips- that is really the time to go.  

Filoli Fall Decorations

We then tried to go to Ardenwood Farm's Harvest Festival because I went last year and LOVED it and sadly, the website said that they were open until 5 but in reality it was only 4 :-( But at least we were able to go to the pumpkin patch just across the way. 

Jane in particular loved this one pumpkin. She clapped for it

And even kissed it.

So we just had to buy it to her delight (and yes, that is dirt all over her bib- she had way too much fun playing with it and sampling some :-) 

What big ears and hair you have :-) 

Halloween 2012

Jane was Tinkerbell this year for Halloween and she was able to wear her costume several times to Googleween, ward trunk-or-treat, and then on Halloween.

I was so excited for us to use our Mickey Mouse Ghost buckets that we had gotten at Disneyland earlier in the month as they had two sizes- one for mama and one for baby :-)



Jane really is such a character when she is out in public as she loves to be the center of attention, making all Weof these funny faces and poses  

Stop- Hammer Time
She particularly loved the candy part- you can see her in the photo reaching down for some

And then look how happy she was that she managed to get one in each hand :-)

She loved walking around to all of the trunks, particularly though to this one where a little boy was handing out candy. She stayed there for 10 minutes and I took her away crying and put her down but she managed to find her way back to him ;-)

She had such a great time that she was completely exhausted

I did manage to get some holiday decor up. I know that I am way behind the times on making these but I saw the idea on Our Best Bites this year and made them out of baby food jars

Here they are with the Mickey's

And then our pumpkins

Jane wore her costume at the small in-home day care that she goes to and her awesome provider termed her "TinkerJane" :-)

And here she is with her two buddies, Gracie and Sadie

We also went to a fun little Halloween party where there were fun songs and games. We didn't officially go out trick-or-treating but we did have a few people come and trick-or-treat us and that is the first time it has happened since we moved to California!

 I have to include this final photo because it shows her toothy grin where you can see all 6 teeth. And her "I Love Mummy" shirt :-)