Lists for Summer

by Carol14 Comments
Image: WagerRun.com Summer is just around the bend, so I thought it would be a good time to list some things I want to do or to accomplish this summer. Maybe writing them down will actually provide a little extra motivation on some of the not so fun ones. A couple I already have plans in place, but most are still just kind of floating out there. Have Fun Play miniature golf Go canoeing Lay on the beach See a movie at the drive-in Go to Kennywood Go to a baseball game Host a cook-out Watch a softball game See a play at Brooke Hills . Accomplish Something (Yes, David, you have to help with some of them) Plant the garden and keep it weeded Work up to being able to jog three miles Read The Three Musketeers (I could put this under fun, too) Finish work on the kitchen Paint the dining room and living room Wash and clean out my car Put a couple more perennials in my front flower bed Write a short story Clean the house (bleck) . One more...
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Review: The Red Pyramid by Rick Riordan

by Carol12 Comments
(Suggested reading level: Grades 4-8) I actually borrowed The Red Pyramid from my daughter, and I definitely enjoyed it. The story centers around a pair of siblings, Carter and Sadie, whose world is thrown upside down the night they watch their father blow up the Rosetta Stone and be captured by an ancient Egyptian god. Cater and Sadie learn the secret of their family history, discover they can perform magic and have to save the world from Set. It's a great combination. Fascinating Egyptian gods, siblings who learn to work together, magic, fight scenes. The book has everything to appeal to its middle school audience, even if it felt a little long. Sadie and Carter take turns narrating the chapters, which mean we get to see the events and characters from both points of view, and they are quite different from each other. Carter had been raised by his Egyptologist father, traveling around the world after their mother's death, while Sadie had been...
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Short Story Monday: “When God Opens a Door” by Tim Waggoner

by Carol5 Comments
Tim Waggoner was on a panel discussion I attended at the Ohioana Book Festival on Saturday. He's a horror and fantasy writer who has published over twenty novels and one hundred short stories, but I had never read anything by him, so I found one of his short stories today to feature. It is available to read on his website here. "When God Opens a Door" features a man named Darrell who feels like his seemingly perfect life is missing something, some spark. He becomes fascinated by a door at the local strip mall. It's  a plain metal door, but there's no indication what's behind the door and it's always locked. Darrell hears screams and moans coming through it, but they're a mixture of pain and pleasure that haunt him, maybe a better phrase is he becomes obsessed with them. Finally late one night he meets a woman he knows casually coming from behind the door, the chest of her shirt...
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Chicken Vegetable Soup

by Carol9 Comments
I don't make soups very often, even though we really like them. I actually made this one night after Amber went to bed and reheated it for dinner the next day. While it was simmering that night, I kept thinking how delicious it smelled. And it ended up tasting really yummy. It is a thick soup, more of a stew, and I did add extra broth and crushed tomatoes and used frozen okra. Ingredients 4 baked chicken breasts, diced into small chunks 1 1/2 cups cabbage, chopped 1 large carrot, chopped 1 cup okra, sliced 1 large onion, chopped 2 large celery stalks with leaves, chopped 1 15-oz. can of crushed tomatoes 1 14-oz. can fat-free chicken broth 1 1/2 teaspoons salt 1/4 teaspoon pepper Directions Place all ingredients, except chicken, in a large pan and simmer for one hour or until vegetables are soft. Add in chicken and heat thoroughly. The recipe is from The 17-Day Diet by Dr. Mike Moreno. Weekend Cooking is hosted by Beth Fish Reads and is open to anyone...
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