On a reading spree | Weekly Snapshot

Published : 2021 || Format : print || Location : Colombia ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ What was it about the country that kept everyone hostage to its fantasy? The previous month, on its own soil, an American man went to his job at a plant and gunned down fourteen coworkers, and last spring alone there were four different school shootings. A nation at war with itself, yet people still spoke of it as some kind of paradise.. Thoughts : Infinite Country follows two characters - young Talia, who at the beginning of this book, escapes a girl’s reform school in North Colombia so that she can make her previously booked flight to the US. Before she can do that, she needs to travel many miles to reach her father and get her ticket to the rest of her family. As we follow Talia’s treacherous journey south, we learn about how she ended up in the reform school in the first place and why half her family resides in the US. Infinite Country tells the story of her family through the other protagonist, El

On a reading spree | Weekly Snapshot

How is it June already? What do we do with all the new year resolutions that were made without accounting for a viral monster that would take over our lifestyles?

Last Week

We are still laying low around here. So it's been work, play, reading, gardening, sleep, and repeat. The girl started a virtual summer camp this week - she enjoyed some aspects of the one-hour sessions (the readalouds and the science experiments) but on the whole, disliked that it was one-way. That has made me even more worried about what Fall school is going to look like, but I'm trying not to think too much about it, at least for another month.

On Friday, the husband took our boy out for the first time since the shutdown. He (the little one) was super-excited about it and was literally running ahead of my husband to get to the car. Sadly for him, this trip was for his wellness appointment (shots included), so I don't think he enjoyed the whole trip.

Other "-ings" in life

Still not watching anything except Property Brothers. I'm enjoying the extra reading I've been doing so I'm content with the limited distractions.

My daughter has been asking for a while to make ice cream at home. She got the idea from a game on her iPad where you add this ingredient and that ingredient, then give it a whisk, stuff into the freezer - et viola! Ice cream! Obviously, the real thing is not that simple (though not complicated either). But, it's much easier if you have an ice cream maker, which we don't. So last night, we made the base and every 30-45 minutes I've been taking it out of the freezer to give it a whisk. We'll know today whether it will resemble ice cream or frozen slushie.

Today, we (or rather the husband, I'm providing moral support) are building a garden bed to plant our vegetables in. Until last week, I had been planning to use our containers but my father-in-law has convinced me that a garden bed is the way to go. I have a ton of seeds germinating in several ziploc bags via the paper towel method and many are ready to be planted, so that's going to be the bulk of our day today.

Reading

This week, I picked up and finished The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton. I enjoyed the book - especially the latter half but had a hard time initially because I had not heard about greasers until this week. Yes - I had heard of the Grease movie (never watched it though) but somehow didn't read up much about it to understand this entire subculture.

Yesterday, I started reading Rep. John Lewis' March books. I had already read the first book a while back but reread again to refresh some of the details. At this point, I'm halfway through the second book and hope to finish the series by tonight. Only recently I finished Yaa Gyasi's Homegoing so having some of that 1000-feet view of how we got here and then reading March has been very overwhelming. In addition, George Floyd's (and many many others') killing and subsequent protests have made me feel as if March is about what's happening today and not just about events from 60 years ago.