Book Review: The Invisible Wall

This week while I was at the Leadership Institute I read a good book called The Invisible Wall by Harry Bernstein. I got the book several months ago from the publisher I think. I was in the middle of reading lots of others things and didn't think I'd want to read this since it's a memoir. So I passed it on to my book club. It turns out that there were several copies of the book floating around book club and I kept hearing how great the book was. So I managed to get my copy back. At Leadership Institute there was no Internet, no TV and no cell phone, so I was able to read the whole book in just a couple of days. We only had a few hours of free time in the evening, but the only thing to do was read - and I knit half a dishcloth.
Harry spent his early years in a small English mill town. On his street, Jews lived on one side and Christians on the other side. The book tells about his growing up years and the interaction of the neighbors with the invisible wall running down the middle of the street. It was very well written, and the story moved along quickly. It ends with the family moving to America. There is a second book that I'm dying to read. Harry was 96 when this book was published.
It's a fascinating book and I do recommend it. If you not a big non-fiction reader, it reads like fiction.
The big outcome of the Leadership Institute is that I created my personal statement of leadership purpose. And I'll share it with you since it took a lot of hard work to create. I even have it memorized.
With patience, communication and teamwork I will create an environment that is fair, fulfilling and offers on-going training so that library staff can have and provide positive customer experiences.

Dylan Getting All Grown Up

Here is another layout of Dylan - can you believe how grown up he's getting. When we were home in September we drove down to the Land Between the Lakes area. We stopped at a pull out right before crossing the Kentucky Dam. There were lots of sailboats out on the Kentucky River that day. Tim took this picture of Dylan just sitting there. I used Night of Navy as the page base and some sage shadow for the photo mat and the pattern papers and coordinating tags come from Creative Memories. We had a nice day together

Another Bike Layout

Several weeks ago Tim and I went bike riding. It had been awhile since I had ridden, so we went to the Greenway in Charlotte where they have nice paved paths. We had a nice ride. And we took a couple of silly pictures of ourselves to prove it.

Pretty Easter Dresses

This is my lovely youngest niece, Sydney at Easter this year. The girls Grandma Carlson bought then beautiful Easter dresses. And the girls wore them even though there was about 6 feet of snow on the ground. The girls wrote a note to the Easter Bunny and he left them a note in return. I'm going to color copy the notes and slip them behind the photo and pattern paper on the right side. I think I used one of Sally's sketches for the left side of the layout. The background is light purple and the pattern papers are black and white. You can't see from the photos (click on the photo to make it bigger and you can see all the details) , but there are some rhinestones on the pages for a little bling.

Even though Miss Sydney looks beautiful and sweet in her Easter dress, she is a little rough and tumble tomboy. She loves to play on the monkey bars. Last week she took a big tumble and broke the two bones in her left wrist. She got a full arm cast. Yesterday when they went back for a checkup, they discovered she also broke her right arm. Sydney is going back to the hospital today to have another cast put on. So everyone, please think good thoughts for Miss Sydney today.

Help Me, I Need a Name

I'd like to introduce you all to Not Fred. He got his poor name because we would see him out in the yard and think it was Fred - but it was "not Fred". Tim has started feeding him and petting him. So we've decided he probably needs a real name. No Mom, he won't be coming in the house if I have anything to say about it. We'd like to hear suggestions for a real name for this guy - yes, he is a boy. So, everyone, let's hear your suggestions - and ask your kids, I want to hear their ideas too.

A Lovely Fall Sunday

Sunday was a beautiful day with lots of sun and cool temps - it's finally fall in NC. I had a nice walk with my friend Patricia while Tim was off riding his bike and then he mowed the yard and I planted a bunch of daffodil bulbs that my boss graciously gave me. For dinner Tim grilled some pork tenderloin with our house seasoning - garlic powder, onion powder and black pepper. I looked through my recipe collection for a side dish and found this recipe for Broccoli Stuffing - I'd call it more of a broccoli casserole. But it's definitely a make again dish for us.

Broccoli Stuffing
2 (16 oz.) packages frozen chopped broccoli
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
2 eggs, beaten
1 onion, minced
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1/2 cup mayonnaise
10 oz. dried stuffing mix
1/2 cup butter, melted
Preheat oven to 350. Cook broccoli according to package directions. Lightly grease a large baking dish.
In a bowl, mix the cheese, eggs, onion, soup and mayonnaise.
Arrange the cooked broccoli in the prepared pan. Pour cheese sauce over the broccoli. Spread the stuffing mix over the sauce. Drizzle butter over all.
Bake 30 minutes until bubbly and lightly browned.
12 servings

Dylan's Favorite Things

This spring when I was visiting my nieces in Michigan I asked them what were their five favorite things. Sarah wrote hers down for me and Sydney dictated her list to me. I've shared the scrapbook pages I did for them. I wanted to do the same project with Dylan, but I changed it up a bit and asked him to take his own pictures of his five favorite things and email them to me. He was able to send me pictures of four things, his fifth favorite thing was his cat Kalypso who ran away while he was taking his pictures. It's taken me several months to make this page for him, but here it is. Oh - and his five favorite things are: Kaylpso, his music, his computer, his game consoles and Mr. Leohr who is his computer teacher - who is just the best teacher evre Dylan says.

Simply Racing

This is a simple page I did of Tim's Off Road Assault on Mount Mitchell. I used the course map and elevation chart as backgroud paper. Some one at the race got this nice picture of Tim in action. And with a quick roll of the tire tread stamp my page was done.

Aspen Gold Readers Choice Award

One of the great perks of my job is that I have gotten involved in judging several romance writing awards. For the second year I have been a judge for the Aspen Gold Readers Choice Awards for published novels. This annual award is sponsored by the Heart of Denver Romance Writers Association. I was sent signed copies of the three finalists in the Historical Fiction category to read and score. Under their scoring system a 1-2 is Below Average, 3-4 is Fair, 5-6 is Good, 7-8 is Great and 9-10 is Outstanding. The books I had to read were: Untouched by Anna Campbell (2), Lady Be Bad by Candice Hern (7), and His Favorite Mistress by Tracy Anne Warren (9). I liked the Tracy Anne Warren book so much that I'm going to read the other two in her series.

Happy Birthday Tim

Sunday was Tim's birthday. He got to celebrate by riding and hanging out with his friends. Our friends who recently got married in Canada were home for a wedding reception, so Tim got the chance to ride with his friend Mike. While he was out riding I made him this cute owl card. I had stamped a card for him on Saturday when I was cropping, but it just wasn't right. So Sunday I went looking on SCS for some inspiration and found this cute owl made using the SU punches.

And send some good car karma thoughts this way - the Buick is on it's last legs.

It's Banned Books Week

Please read a banned book this week and use your First Amendment right to read.

Tonight I will go home and read some more from J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings series. I'm currently reading volume two: The Two Towers. In 2001 Christ Community Church in Alamagordo, New Mexico burned Tolkien's books as satanic. My interpretation of them is that they have a lot of Christian themes.

The Scrapping Librarian ... Reads

I just want to let everyone know that I'll be posting more book related posts in the future. I had thought about starting another blog just about books I'm reading, but I have a hard enough time keeping up this one and the one at work in addition to reading and scrapping. And after all, the word "Librarian" is in the blog title, and librarians do read, so I figured this blog was as good a place as any to talk about books. If you don't want to hear about books, just skip the book posts and keep checking for the scrapping and card posts. A few things that will be coming up: the Aspen Gold Readers Choice Awards, Edgar Sawtelle and Run.

Home is the Best Place to Be

We are home from our weekend in Kentucky. Dylan's 17th birthday was at the end of August and this was the first weekend we could get away to see him. On Saturday we drove down to the Land Between the Lakes so Tim could check out the riding trails. Dylan and I hung out and he wandered in the woods. Sunday we stayed at the house so Tim could see several of his brothers who stopped by. The pictures I took aren't all that great, so hopefully Tim did a better job - I know he got one of Dylan with his driver's permit.

The Perfect Spot

Last Friday night was my friend Judi's monthly crop. I got 2 pages done and a good start on 2 more. The Perfect Spot has pictures of the three cats - Riley, Fitzgerald and Tarzan - all resting on the back of the couch. They all loved that spot on the couch so much that we were able to get a picture of all three of them up there. I've been carrying around this paper and these pictures for a long time - notice we bought our new couch this winter and moved it to a different spot. I love how the page turned out.
For dessert for the crop I made some Chocolate Chai Cupcakes. I got the recipe from the Land O Lakes web site. I wasn't real happy with how they turned out - the cupcakes were dry and I didn't like the frosting. But I did love using the new Kitchen Aid to make them. Judi is having a Fall theme for next month's crop, so I'm looking for a dessert idea - maybe something with pumpkin.
No scrapbooking this weekend. We are off to Kentucky to see Dylan and celebrate his 17th birthday.

Happy Birthday to ...

Matthew-
My darling little nephew had a birthday on Saturday. He is all little boy and loves trucks and tractors and heavy machinery of all sorts. He told his Grandpa that he wanted a quarry for his birthday. Or a real dump truck. Darn stinkin' cute kid. When the SU By Land set retired last year I bought it specifically to use for Matthew. I've used it for several birthday cards and for a scrapbook page. I'm sure I'll get a lot more use out of it. The wheel stamp I bought to use for Tim's biking pages, but I get a lot of use from that stamp too.

And Me -
I have the pleasure of sharing my birthday with Matthew. This year, Tim bought me a Big Shot die cut machine (ok, he really didn't buy it for me - I bought it for myself). This is the newest toy - I mean tool - available from Stampin' Up. Die cut machines are fairly expensive and there are several different types. I had never been willing to make the investment. But this summer, SU started offering this one, and they have a good price. The machine came yesterday, but I'm still waiting on the dies that were included with the purchase. My wonderful friend Judi lent me some of her dies to play with. This is a great little machine and so easy to use. I also bought the cute doctors bag to carry everything when I go to crops. I don't think our Christmas cards will have any stamping on them this year - I think it will all be die cuts.

There are still a few more birthdays coming up this month, so I need to start making some more cards. I'm sure I'll be using that wheel stamp again.

But now I have to go to work. I have book club this morning. We are discussing The Tortilla Curtain by TC Boyle.

The Birthday Season Begins

The Birthday Season begins for us at the end of August and goes until the end of January. Between Tim and I, almost everyone in our families has birthdays and anniversaries during this time. Maybe this holiday weekend I should sit down and make up a stash of cards to have on hand so I'm not creating at the last minute.

Last week I sat down and made a couple of cards that were needed for this week. Since it had been awhile since I had done any card creating, I needed some inspiration to get me started. I came across a color challenge on Kristina Werner's blog, http://www.kwernerdesign.com/blog/, to use black, white, grey, and a small amount of any other color. I needed to make a card for Dylan, so thought this would be a great color combination for a boy. Instead of using grey I used some silver paper I had - Dylan loves sparkly things - a strip of black and a strip of white. I used a circle of orange for my accent color and punched a black star and a black tab. A silver star eyelet and two silver brads accent it all. No ribbon because he's a boy. Actually, at 17 he's not a boy, he's a young man.

While I was at the craft table and had this basic color scheme in mind I made a card for my friend Karen. It's a great color scheme that will work as well for a masculine as for a feminine card. For Karen's card I also got inspiration from Beate's sketch #54, http://beate.blogs.splitcoaststampers.com/. It's white for the card base with a strip of black that I scallop punched and punched eyelet holes. The large scallop circle is Cool Caribbean and I again punched eyelet holes. There is no stamping on this, it's all SU's rub-ons. I added some sparkly silver ribbon and turquoise rhinestone brads for some bling.

I hope everyone has a great Labor Day weekend. I'll be laboring on cards for the Birthday Season. And a big Happy Birthday to Dylan and Karen.

I know, it's been awhile. We physically got back from vacation, but I think my brain stayed up in BC. Tim brought back a cold as his souvenir and shared it with me and that didn't help. But I feel like I'm back in the swing of things. I sat down and made a couple of cards this morning which I'll share with you later - after certain people's birthdays have past.

Tim and I had a wonderful weekend together this past weekend. The weather was great so we spent lots of time outside - none of the time working in the garden. Fay is here right now giving us lots of great rain.

On Saturday, he went riding at Sherman Branch park and I went along. I took some books, but didn't read them. Instead I went walking/hiking the trails and took some neat pictures. I've got a great idea to scrap some of them, so hopefully I will have a neat page to show you soon. After lots of fresh air and sunshine, we drove across Charlotte to the home brew store. Tim picked out a couple more beer recipes to make, so brewing will begin again soon. To end our nice day together, we had dinner at our favorite restaurante - El Ranchito.

After a slow start on Sunday we drove back into Charlotte to McAlpine Greenway. And I actually rode my bike! Had a great ride of about 6 miles. I felt great. I'm really looking forward to getting back on my bike. I've run into several old riding partners lately, so I'm taking that as a sign that it's time. And Tim was very happy to get my bike out and get it tuned up for me. After our nice little ride, we went to another favorite place for lunch - the Chicken Roasting Company. We don't get to go often enough because it's in Charlotte.

I was also able to get some reading done this weekend. I'm reading some books to judge for a romance writers contest. I've also received a few complimentary copies of new books from the publishers and from several book bloggers. I'm thinking about starting another blog where I will review books. I don't know that I want to post reviews on the library blog, because that blog is not really just for fiction reviews - it's for library news. And I don't want to post lots of book reviews here - I know lots of you would be interested, but this really is more for my crafting stuff with occasional food and books. I'll be sure to let you know if I do start another blog.

Watch here for upcoming birthday card posts and hopefully some more scrapbook pages.

Last Day

It's a rainy day today. Tim has gone to check if they are riding down the mountain today.

Here is the view from our balcony this morning.

The wedding yesterday was beautiful. It was held on Whistler Spit of Green Lake. The weather was perfect.

The first full day we were here Tim and the group from Charlotte did a cross country ride.

While they were out riding I wandered around the Village. I managed to find the Public Library. It's a new building and it's fabulous.

It took a full day of traveling to get here. A delay leaving Charlotte made us late getting into Dallas. The airline met us at the gate with a van to drive us across the runway to make our connecting flight to Vancouver. Customs took some time but we had no problems. The Vancouver airport is under construction - they are getting prepared to host the 2010 Winter Olympics. We got our rental car and headed through downtown Vancouver traffic to the Sea and Ski Highway. The view on the drive up were incredible.

This has been the best vacation.

Vacation Here I Come

What does a librarian take on vacation? This has taken a lot of thought - I want to have enough to read, but I don't want to add too much weight to my bags.

The Bridge of Sighs by Richard Russo. Tim and I started listening to this on audio and both enjoyed it. We weren't able to finish listening to the entire thing (it's about 21 CD's long) so I am taking the book so we can finish.

Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers by JRR Tolkien. This is a book that Tim loves to read. I have never read it, but I love the movie, so I'm going to give it a try.

That makes two books we'll both be able to read. I also plan on downloading The Tortilla Curtain by TC Boyle onto my MP3 player. My book club will be discussing it this month so I need to get it read.

And, of course, we have a Vancouver/British Columbia guide book.

And that's what a librarian takes on vacation. We aren't forgetting to take our cameras - don't worry - there will be pictures.

Farmer Tim

I do believe I promised to show you Farmer Tim - and here he is. He borrowed the tiller from our friends Steve and Karen and tilled up most of our backyard. I think he just wanted to get out of mowing it. Tim selected all of the plants and seeds one Saturday while I was at work, and then got everything planted. He's been the one to diligently water most evenings and do the harvesting. We learned a lot with this garden - what needs to be planted early, what needs to be planted later, and things like what blossom end rot is. We are already planning for next year's garden. For this page I used a bunch of the vegetable tags from the things we planted. For the title I used several different tags. I even stamped some leaves in green on green and cut them out. The journaling is hidden on the yellow paper at the top of the page and tucked behind the photos.