Mothers Who Think, Scrap Etc. and a weird coincidence

That's the title of my latest read. Did I mention that for April's book group I checked out The Maltese Falcon at the library in my hometown, read it in the car, and mailed it back to the library? And that I was supposed to read The Stranger for April and Falcon was for May? Duh.

My sidebar now has links to Vivian's blog as well as to Sarah's -- both of them are in my book group and you will likely get widely differing opinions on books from the three of us. That's why I like book groups, though -- as long as everyone can be respectful and not act all holier-than-thou or self-righteous and judgmental (no I'm not telling who did that or in which group, but it is not my current group, thank god).

So I am currently reading Mothers Who Think: Tales of Real-Life Parenthood, a collection of essays edited by Camille Peri and Kate Moses of Salon magazine. I highly recommend it to mothers, but not to expectant mothers who have yet to experience labor and childbirth. (To Jen: call me when you want the nitty gritty of what I wish I'd known before I went into the hospital to give birth. I won't tell you if you don't want to know, but the offer is out there when you're ready. Nothing too horrible, but there's always the, "I wish I'd known....)

Also on my nightstand right now, The Six Wives of Henry VIII by Antonia Fraser and Lucrezia Borgia by Sarah Bradford. I'm on a history kick since The Other Boleyn Girl which I loved.

Anyway, Mothers Who Think has a foreword by Anne Lamott, author of the amazing Operating Instructions, a book about motherhood, as well as a number of other really great books. She is wry and funny -- the kind of funny you have to think about a little sometimes before you see the humor because the rough way she writes can sometimes shock a little. I mean that in a good way. So I have only read a few of the essays in the book so far because I read it at the park yesterday and I was interrupted a thousand times by, "Hey Mom! Watch this! Look at me! I'm way up high! Look, Mom! Hi Mom! Do you see me? I'm taller than you!" Well, you get the idea. More later on the book.

And last, a little coincidence in the scrapping and blogging worlds I live in (long story, bear with me):

My friend Cara lives in Durham, NC. She does NOT scrapbook or make cards or any of that paper art kind of stuff. She sent me a card a while ago that was SO cute and obviously handmade for her by someone else. I asked her about it and she gave me the artist's blog address. Turns out the artist used to live in NC but now lives in Birmingham, AL, where my online friend Monique has a scrapbook store. That store, Scrap Etc., is the home this weekend of a HUGE scrapbooking event. Huge. The event is tied in with Scrapjazz, the online scrapbooking site I hang out at because the Peas are just way too freakin' mean for me to deal with. And - how odd is this? - the woman who made that card is on the Inspiration Team for Scrap Etc. and will be at the event that about a million of my online buds are at this weekend.

I wasn't that jealous about not being there until now. I want to meet Virginia. The woman is due soon with her second child and his name is Atticus. Yes, from To Kill a Mockingbird. Yes, I tried to name my oldest son Atticus. My mom responded by saying, "If you name that baby Atticus I'm calling him Bob." That's my mom. LOL

So it's a small world. And the Scrap Etc. event in B'ham is gonna be a blast. And my children have asked about 80 million gazillion questions of me already this morning, so many that I got frustrated and when I used my frustrated, oh-my-goodness-leave-me-alone-for-2-minutes voice, my 4 year old said to his brothers, in a very serious voice, "She has gone cr-azy."

Kids. Ya gotta love 'em.