books for tweens

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Friday Randomosity: Books and Cats and Summer Stuff

It’s Friday, Carla has the day off from school, and I slept in until SEVEN, which is amazing. My only plans for today involve a home improvement project with my dad (and Carla, hopefully; she is so far resisting the idea, but I think she will be interested once the impact driver makes an appearance) and meeting a friend for an evening adventure, so I am curled up in my office with a mug of tea and a few minutes to muse ramblingly (ramble musingly?) about this and that. 

Why only a few minutes, you ask, when I just clearly laid out how empty of plans my day is? Well, I am in the middle of reading a novel that I cannot put down, and I can feel it pulling me even as I type. It’s a romance featuring a single mom in her mid-fifties and it’s funny and heartfelt and SO GOOD.  Also, Carla will be awake eventually and I should probably do some parenting.

This reminds me that Carla and I have gotten into a good rhythm with audiobooks. WHY did it take me so long to figure out that we should listen to audiobooks in the car? We’re in the car together for at least an hour a day, which is a decent amount of time for book listening. The only “problem” with it is that I don’t get to hear Carla’s cheerful chirping in the morning. But… sometimes she is less chirpy anyway, and an audiobook is a good alternative to mother-daughter sniping. We’re listening to Just As Long As We’re Together (bookshop.org / amazon) right now, and oh, how I adore Judy Blume. 

There is this scene where the girls are discussing a hunky ninth grader and one girl says he’s sexually experienced because he has hairy legs – and… what??? Is that a real myth of days past? I remember reading that as a kid and kind of accepting it at face value, but now that I am an adult, it strikes me as so odd and funny and gross. Of course, I had to stop the audiobook and explain to Carla – over embarrassed groans of I KNOW, Mom – that this is in no way accurate, you cannot judge a person’s sexual experience based on their appearance, and trying to do so would be weird and gross anyway. Judy Blume sure provides a lot of opportunities for Discussion. How long will it take for Carla to figure out that I am trojan horsing books to sneak in Important Conversations???

You know who else really knows how to write about children? E. L. Konigsburg. Before the Blume book, Carla and I listened to Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth (bookshop.org / amazon) and it is so funny and such a perfect depiction of friendship. Carla doesn’t remember reading From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, (bookshop.org / amazon) so I have that on hold via Libby. Konigsburg has a bunch of other books I’ve never read before, too, so perhaps we will explore those as well.

Suz posted the other day about how she resolved a potentially fraught neighbor situation by going over and talking to her neighbor. (I fully realize that this does not always work, even if, in an ideal world, simply talking to our neighbors about our needs would solve all our problems.) So I thought of Suz last night when the kids next door were out playing a noisy game of basketball until eleven pm. In general, I adore kid noise. There is something both soothing and joyful about the sound of children shrieking and talking and even the thwock of ball on concrete and the thwang of ball against basketball rim have their own sort of pleasant rhythm. To an extent. And that extent, for me, is ten pm. However… it was not a school night. Carla was already asleep. My husband is at work today, but he is a night owl so wasn’t yet heading to bed. My internal monologue went something like:

Ugh. This is SO LOUD. And the basketball hoop is right outside my bedroom.

But it’s the first warm evening of the year, pretty much! And there’s no school tomorrow! And they are having so much fun!

What if I let this go tonight, and then they are out until midnight every night this summer?

Just chill out. They’ll go in eventually.

I could text their mom and say something cheerful about how fun it is to hear them playing, but maybe they could call it a night at ten?

You know your attempts at being breezy and cheerful often come across as strident and angry. What if you damage your relationship with the neighbor forever?

But she was so nice when we asked her to move the spotlight that was shining straight into our bedroom.

See? You’ve already used up your neighbor credits. Just put in some ear plugs. It’s not like you ever sleep anyway.

Maybe if they’re still out there at 10:30, I can just pop out the door and say, “Hey guys, can you head inside? We’re trying to sleep!”

OMG, don’t talk to the kids directly! Go through the mom! Go through the mom!

I thought I wasn’t supposed to talk to anyone about anything?

Oh. Right. Also, keep in mind that occasionally you allow Carla and her friends to play in the pool until pretty late at night.

Hmm. I guess that’s true. Not until ten, though!

Still. Better not rock the boat.

Anyway, they went in at eleven. I’m pretty sure the cut-off for noise stuff is ten, though… but I don’t want to rock the boat. Would you?

Speaking of summer, we have had a couple of nice summer-feeling days, and a couple of awful dropped-in-the-worst-humidity-of-summer-feeling days, and I am not excited for more of the latter. I get SO SWEATY. The older I get, the more I sweat; the more I sweat, the more painful rashes I develop (TMI alert: my underarms are a MESS right now), and I am not a fan. I’m doing a lot of googling about clinical strength antiperspirants, which is not so much my idea of fun reading. I’m also adding a lot of anti-chafing products to my various online shopping carts. If you are similarly afflicted, what are you go-tos? 

The promise of warmer weather has enticed a variety of flying bugs to return. I’m all set with our mosquito repeller device (home depot / REI / amazon) for sitting outside, but I really wish there was a device I could wear while walking outdoors. Oh look! Thermacell has a portable repellant device (REI / thermacell / amazon) that I could try!

One thing that we are all excited about as summer approaches is the arrival of our cat. The breeder sent me some new photos of the kittens yesterday and they are so fuzzy and adorable I can hardly stand it. Between myself and Carla, the cute aggression is off the hook. We don’t know which kitten is ours yet; we are on a list and I think the people above us get priority to choose, or else the breeder assigns specific cats to people. They are all adorable so I am trying not to have a favorite.

(Not sure if I have spelled it out before, but we are getting a cat from a breeder; I acknowledge that this sounds kind of ridiculous yet here we are. I am allergic to cats, which means that I need A Special Cat that is less likely to be allergenic if I want to own one. The breed we are getting is Siberian, which supposedly has lower levels of the protein that triggers cat allergies. I hope you know that I would rescue ALL THE KITTENS at all the shelters if I could; I adore cats and would prefer to adopt one that needs rescuing, but alas.)

We are still debating cat names. My favorites (Craig, Stephen) have been rejected. Carla is now set on Leonardo, which I am not opposed to. My husband and I have latched onto Rick Steves, as a tribute to our favorite adorkable travel guide. I think Rick comes pleasingly close to Craig in terms of ridiculousness for a cat name, and Ricky is a great nickname. Plus I love the idea of envisioning a whole personality for our cat that involves khaki slacks, dad jokes, and a penchant for local beer, skipping the crowds, and drug policy reform.

Abrupt subject change: do I want an Oura ring? (best buy / amazon) Part of me thinks it would be cool to collect more data about the quality of my sleep and workouts. Part of me thinks it wouldn’t help or change anything. If you have an Oura ring, please tell me how it’s changed your life (or not). 

Okay, Carla is awake and I want to snuggle her, exercise, and eat something before my dad arrives! See you on the flippety flop! (That means probably Monday.)


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Six for Sunday

The other day, a parenting-advice account I follow on Instagram served me a post about things parents of teenagers have to accept. You know, like, “teens will make dumb decisions” and “you and your teen will experience conflict.” Stuff like that. 

One of the things was “you will be driving them all over the place.” Somehow, while agonizing over my miles-long list of concerns about parenting when my husband and I were making the wild decision to procreate, I did not consider the driving. Please chalk this up to complete obliviousness when I myself was a teen, because obviously my parents drove ME all over creation. But I do not feel prepared in any way. The Driving was not on my radar. I had no idea. No. Idea. There is so much driving. 

One of my friends has two very active, involved boys. She was telling me the other day that there is one night a week when the kids have simultaneous dropoffs at separate locations. Separate pickups from those activities. Then separate dropoffs at separate locations for the next activities. And then simultaneous pickups. At separate locations. My brain is broken just thinking about it, and she is LIVING IT.

Carla has a friend who is one of five. The kids attend three separate schools. The older four are all in (different) sports. At least one of them is in multiple sports. Is the mom ever NOT in the car? I feel like I am in the car a lot and I only have the one child! 

It has been hard for me to grasp the reality of the situation. I am trying to come to terms with the disheartening fact that I am simply Going To Be In The Car. From now until Carla graduates, presumably. Or until she gets a license of her own, which terrifies me beyond reason so let’s not think about that at this time.

But I guess what I want to say to anyone who might be reading this and considering having children: FACTOR IN THE DRIVING. 

Obviously, I would not trade Carla for anything in the universe… and yet it would have been nice if any of the parenting or child-planning books I consulted had mentioned the driving. 

Okay, that’s a whole post on its own but let’s also have some bullets.

My irises are stalwartly peeking through the April snowfall.

Easter Baskets: We are not celebrating Passover this year, because we are lazy and I am a terrible steward of my child’s religious heritage/education. Fortunately, I am still able to order crap from crappy places in order to participate in the completely secular aspect of the next upcoming religious holiday. My husband and I are total opposites when it comes to Easter baskets. He thinks they should contain mainly (only?) candy. I think my child has fully mastered the art of manifesting sugar in her life, and doesn’t need any a lot of additional sugar from us. Listen, I am not necessarily into the glorious excess that I am now accustomed to seeing on social media. (Some of it grosses me out, but at the same time, I understand the impulse.) However, I do like her to have SOMETHING in her Easter basket. This year, I am going for Practical Slash Fun. She needs a little jewelry container she can clip to her backpack, so she can safely stow her earrings and bracelets while she’s Doing Sports. She needs a new pair of sunglasses and carrying case. She has a couple of long bus rides in her near future, so I wanted to get her this bus-friendly folding puzzle. Or maybe this fun questions-and-answers card deck, to play with friends? There is a new Rosanne Parry book out, so I will definitely add that to her Easter Basket. (She adores Rosanne Parry books.) On the completely IMpractical side, no one needs emotional support pickles, but Carla would LOVE THEM. She has also been obsessed with the idea of getting our future cat a bow tie. My big problem is that none of these things fit into a plastic Easter egg, and Carla has expressly requested that we hide Easter eggs this year. Well, there’s always money. Or candy. Or a monster easter egg.

Cupcake Plans: While I’m on the topic of Easter, we might as well discuss cupcakes. My parents have invited us over for dinner and have requested that I bring dessert. Specifically, cupcakes. More specifically, cupcakes with adorable Easter décor. (My mother knows me so well.) My husband and mother enjoy carrot cake, so I’m thinking maybe these? Plus, I love the little coconut birds’ nests with Cadbury eggs. This recipe has less oil and HALF the eggs. Do you have a go-to carrot cake recipe? I cannot believe that I am about to type this (Engie – look away), but the recipe can and in fact should include raisins; my husband has expressly requested golden raisins in the carrot cake. (I cannot abide raisins in any form.) Because I am raisin-averse, and because Carla straight up refuses to eat carrot cake, I will also make a batch of lemon cupcakes with lemon-curd filling. Those are my go-to and Carla loves them, too. (By the way, all the recipes I linked to include frosting recipes, but I will probably make an extra big batch of plain old cream cheese buttercream and use it for both varieties.) To top the lemon cupcakes, I am thinking of trying this adorable chick frosting. If you are worrying that two batches of cupcakes is too much cupcake for a group of five, I plan to send a bunch of them in to my husband’s office on Monday. 

Cupcakes of Easter past.

Reading Incentives. I don’t know that I’ve ever needed an incentive to read; being able to snuggle up on a couch and escape into a completely different set of circumstances is reward enough. But I think Carla might need a little push. She enjoys reading when she’s doing it, but she doesn’t seek it out. This fills me with anxiety because there are so many good books she’s not reading! And I’m afraid she’s going to miss the window for feeling that they are “age appropriate.” Over the winter holidays, she got started on the Black Stallion series. She devoured the first book, leapt excitedly into the second book, and then once school resumed, she kind of tapered off. Over spring break, we of course went into nearly every bookstore we could find that sold English books, and Carla found multiple books she HAD to have. But… she hasn’t made much progress in any of them since we returned from vacation. I’ve been having fun “restocking” her bookshelves with more age-appropriate books, and there are SO MANY BOOKS I am dying for her to read… but we’ll never get to half of them if she isn’t into it, you know? In the past, my husband and I have tried various methods to spur her into reading, from adding it to her to-do list for the day, to paying her to read books. Maybe I need to give her a financial incentive again? What prompted you to read, when you were a kid? (The Pizza Hut Book It! program was definitely a bonus for me in elementary school. I love pizza. Pizza and books make for a magical combination.) If you have children, what prompted your kids to read? Carla and I have begun listening to audiobooks on our drives to school, which helps a little… but I still want her to do more reading. 

Shorts Weather. Even though there is still frost on the ground, I know shorts weather is around the corner. It has me trolling through the internet, looking for shorts that won’t make me hate everyone and everything. (And pretty dresses, natch.) Shorts and I have a fraught relationship. One of the big problems is that I am self-conscious about my legs and prefer to keep them hidden. (Am I seriously considering this “magic” cellulite solution, that has so many reviews about how it makes people feel like their legs are on fire?) (I admit I am partly just curious about whether the on-fire feeling is as severe as people say. But curious enough to set my own legs on fire????) My legs are what they are, and I get too hot in summer to wear jeans or pants all the time, so I return to The Shorts Search once again. I’ve had good luck with Madewell shorts, and these have potential. As long as I’m considering denim, maybe I need a pair of these Levi’s shorts? I am always drawn to Boden’s beautiful colors and fabrics, but the description of most of their shorts includes this little kicker: “slim through waist, hip and hem” which is not the loose flowy style I prefer, so I might have to simply enjoy thinking about their shorts. I keep wanting to try Quince, and these shorts are cute. Ugh. Just thinking about shorts makes me want to avoid them altogether and stick to dresses.

Non-Shorts Signs of Spring. Despite the persistence of snow and mid-thirties temps, we do have a few signs of spring here and there. Daffodils are abundant in my neighborhood. My irises are stretching their little leafy arms up through the earth, testing to see whether they should show their faces. The lilac tree is beginning to bud. All the maples (I think?) in our neighborhood are a blur of pale red. The magnolia tree of one of my friends already bloomed; I was jealous until the frost returned and all the blooms dropped off her tree. There’s a forsythia shrub in the backyard that is producing its own sunshine. I cannot wait for flowers everywhere. 

They don’t look like much YET.

That’s all I’ve got, Internet. What are you thinking about today?

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Seven on a Saturday

It’s been a snowy, cold, two-days-of-school week and I am ready for the weekend. I have also been allowing myself to scan the news once per day for ten minutes, in case you want to try that technique. It keeps me moderately informed but tempers the anxiety a bit. Let’s have a little randomosity instead of thinking about The News.

  • I Am Really Terrible at Giveaways! You may or may not recall that I planned a little baking giveawayback in, oh, 2024. As with gift giving, I have lots of enthusiasm for thinking about giving and then I run out of steam with the actual giving part. Anyway, the winner of the rolling pin is Michelle G. from MG Doodle Studio! Yay! Michelle, I hope the rolling pin helps inspire many fun and delicious baking projects.
  • Fleece Lined Leggings. Due to the cold this winter, I have discovered that my threshold for walking outside is 20F. I can do it at 18F, but it takes longer for me to feel warm and my face is always numb and immobile at the end. Is there such a thing as a hooded sweatshirt that has, like, a pull-up face warmer thing? If so I would like to own one. Anyway, my favorite leggings for walking in the cold are fleece-lined leggings from Athleta. (Are we saying “athLEEta,” like “athlete” or are we saying “athLEHta” like “sweat-ah”? I say the former and my daughter is constantly correcting me with a tone like I am the most embarrassing person in the world.) After an encounter with one of the neighborhood puppies, my leggings now have a hole in the thigh. This was enough of a slight for me to tell my husband I NEEDED new leggings, but the Athleta ones were out of stock, so I bought my first ever pair of Lululemon leggings, these fleece-lined running tights. The Lulu tights are everything Nicole has been saying and more – they are comfortable, they are warm, they are fitted rather than bootcut (hard no), they stay up, which has been a big problem for me with my beloved Athleta leggings (except for the fleece ones – those do not fold up beneath my jelly roll). But… they are not quite as warm as the Athleta fleece leggings. I can wear those for hours and stay warm. I can “play” in the snow with Carla in just my jacket (also from Athleta) and those leggings and be roasty toasty the whole time. Maybe I just bought the wrong pair of Lulu fleece leggings? They also have these thermal tights… not that I can tell at all how they differ from the running tights. Or these adaptive state fleece joggers (although I look terrible in joggers, so I am resistant to these). Maybe I need to expand my search criteria? These Title 9 fleece lined tights popped up in some articles about “the best fleece lined leggings,” they don’t get great reviews on amazon, but ooooh you can buy them straight from Title 9 and they DO get great reviews there. These Arc’teryx leggings also show up on searches for high quality fleece leggings, although they are just as pricy as the Lulu option. L.L. Bean has a version of fleece leggings at a more appealing (to me) price, but the pant is mid-rise, not high-rise and it looks like a lot of sizes are sold out. I suppose for now I will continue wearing my Athleta pants, complete with hole (yes, I realize I could sew it up or patch it but those things are beyond my capacity; I am barely making it out on a walk at all please don’t give me another assignment) and the Lulu pants on slightly warmer days. 
  • Height. I kind of go around assuming all my Internet friends (that’s you, dearie) are approximately the same age and height that I am. I don’t know why this is. But recently I saw a photo of someone I’ve never met in real life, and I was shocked because she looks at LEAST 5’10”.  I am somewhere in the 5’5” to 5’7” range, myself. (In fact, I refused to be weighed at the doctor the other day which meant I was also refusing to be heighted and the medical assistant asked, “Are you 5’7”?” and I said, “Something like that” which I am only just now realizing is not a helpful comment when someone is trying to record my actual physical statistics.) Anyway, what I want to know now is: How tall are you? The likelihood that I will promptly forget and go back to thinking you are in the 5’5” to 5’7” range is high, but I’m curious.
  • Smoothie Cupdate: One of my longings over the past couple of years has been for a travel cup for my daily smoothies. It would be so nice to drink them in the car! Or take them to meetings for the group I volunteer with in a vessel that does not imply I am guzzling alcohol at eight o’clock on a school day. (I may or may not have, in desperation, brought my smoothie in something similar to this to a recent meeting.) But I am very picky. I hate straws – HATE – so I don’t want anything with a straw. I cannot stand plastic cups. I cannot stand handwashing things. So my ideal smoothie cup would be dishwasher safe, non-plastic, straw-free. I got TWO smoothie cups for Christmas, which was such a delight! The first one is this Simple Modern affair, which comes with a straw but also comes with a “chug lid.” The second is exactly what I had in my mind’s eye when I pictured The Ideal Smoothie Cup, although it is plastic. I will have to see if it bothers me. The double-walled heavy-duty material feels less like plastic than any of the sporting-events plastic cups we have around the house, so it will probably be just fine. 
  • Speaking of Holiday Hits: A sleeper hit in our household was this last minute surprise my husband and I got Carla for Hanukkah. We were wasting time in Dick’s for a couple hours (yes) until picking up our kid from a sleepunder and he spotted a rack of sweatsuits and thought she might like one. Sure, I thought. Why not. We got her a pink Nike matching oversized sweatshirt and sweatpants. It turned out to be one of her favorite gifts of all. She’s worn it pretty much non-stop. I kind of want to get her another one. 
  • Milk Magic: I have long bemoaned Carla’s dislike of milk slash anything with protein or calcium. But I think I have finally tricked persuaded her to drink milk through the magic of Starbucks. Apparently, the sixth grade set is big on Starbucks, and some of them bring drinks to school with them. Which of course prompts my kid to want Starbucks of her own. Because I am a Mean Mom, I made a rule: you can only get Starbucks if you get a steamer. A steamer is PURE MILK. Well. Sometimes with a splash of sugary flavoring, but still: MILK. Calories and calcium and protein. So Carla complies with this rule. And, since I only allow her to get Starbucks once a month (again, Mean Mom), she has begun requesting steamers at home. My husband has a fancy Nespresso machine that makes steamers and he’ll make them for her on the weekend. On weekdays, I make her hot cocoa. The kid won’t drink chocolate milk, but warm the milk up and add cocoa powder and mini marshmallows and voila! She’s all over that. Thirteen grams of protein, thirty percent of her daily calcium, we’re completely ignoring the sugar. 
  • The Book: Sixth grade is not just about Starbucks. It is a strange new world, let me tell you. These kids are into ALL the grownup stuff. For instance, I feel like curse words have become very interesting to Carla’s friends. (I have no problem with curse words in the right context.) Another example is The Book. Carla expressed an interest in reading a few very specific books recently, so my husband and I took her to Barnes & Noble. I am never going to refuse a request to READ. (Also, The Book was not available at the library, we did look there first.) Carla made some comments that implied maybe her friends would be surprised that I would approve of this book. It had some trigger warnings for some Adult Topics, but I am wary of censoring books from my kid. (There are surely exceptions, I just haven’t come across them.) Carla read it in about a day and loved it and then she gave it to me so I could read it. Simultaneously, one of my mom friends mentioned The Book, and that kids were passing it around and reading it in the bathroom, which I find SO charming. Of all the things to sneak around doing, reading has to be the most wholesome. Anyway, I have finished The Book and it is… very adult. And I disagree with some of the messaging, for sure, but it’s rife with topics I now have an easy opening to discuss with Carla. But it made me wonder: did you have The Book when you were a tween/teen? I vaguely remember It being passed around my eighth grade classes because there was a sex scene in it. But since I was reading Scruples I wasn’t particularly fazed. 

Well, that’s it for me, Internet. I hope you are staying warm and dealing with All the News as well as can be expected.