Jonah's EB Auction

I've mentioned Jonah once before here, and you've probably grown accustomed to seeing a button about him on the sidebar.

I found out about Jonah through a mutual friend of his mom's. He was born with a rare genetic disease called Epidermolysis Bullosa or EB. EB causes his skin to blister very easily, and it also affects his mucous membranes (so, for example, swallowing can be hard and/or painful when his esophagus flares up). Most of his body has to be wrapped up in bandages all the time, and his parents have to change his bandages once a day (more often when normal baby things like spitting up or a crazy diaper interfere!). EB is not pleasant for any of the people who have it, and many babies die within their first year of life from it.

Jonah will turn one on February 27. Hooray!!

To celebrate, while also helping raise money to research and spread awareness about the disease, some friends of Jonah's family are holding an online auction (hence the new button that's been up recently). From February 23-27, the auction site will have around a hundred items to bid on, and all the money goes to DEBRA, which is an organization devoted to researching and raising awareness about EB. The auction-sponsors aren't even collecting the money themselves--you pay it directly to DEBRA if you win an item.

All the information can be found here.

Please consider bidding on an item, and please pass the information along to others you know who might be interested!

Maternity leave

My husband and I are expecting our second child (a girl!) at the end of May. We are very excited. I told my library director and immediate supervisor 2 weeks before our library closed for Christmas, when I had completely given up on my regular pants and had broken my maternity clothes out of the closet. So far, I've only heard supportive things from both of them.

I'm hoping to wait a few weeks before I officially request the amount of time I'm going to take for maternity leave, balancing the time I know I will need to do all the paperwork and learn all the ins and outs of benefits, etc. with the time needed to figure out what will be best for our family--financially, time-wise, and sanity-wise.

In the meantime, I'm going to get back up on my soapbox about U.S. family-friendly practices (or lack thereof). I do understand that a woman going out on maternity leave results in a gap in the employer's workforce. Still, I think that children are good for society as a whole and that it is also good for society when parents get to spend extended time raising their children. I don't think it's necessarily more important for a mother to stay home than a father, but if the couple chooses to breastfeed, it's a whole lot simpler! In any case, while I would argue for parental leave for either parent, there is the medical need for women have some time at home. Even for those women who would prefer to go back to work sooner rather than later, the childcare infrastructure in our country isn't great. It's really expensive for parents while still not being well-paying for most child-care workers. It's also not always easy to find.

I don't have a perfect solution to offer, but I do think it's an extension of our country prioritizing security (and all that money spent works so well, as this past Christmas shows) far above education--teachers and childcare workers are given lip-service, but not the pay to go with it. Sigh. If one of you has that perfect solution, please let your law-makers know, pronto!

I also want to take the chance to highlight Motherlode, which is the New York Times' parenting blog, run by Lisa Belkin. Ms. Belkin highlights issues such as this all the time (she recently featured a pair of posts about working w/ baby vs. quitting to be w/ baby), and the discussion gets quite vivid! She just had a post about maternity leave in the US, and touches on the topic with some regularity. If you are interested in this sort of thing (as well as a smorgasbord of other issues related to parenting), go visit!

POC Reading Challenge

I found out about the POC (persons of color) reading challenge after recent Twitter/blogging furor over Bloomsbury's "whitewashing" of a character in a new YA/children's book. Between this and (looking over my Goodreads list from the last year) my own appalling lack of reading books featuring non-white protagonists lately, this seems like a good reading project for 2010.

I compiled a list of books I've been wanting to read that fit the category, and if I get to them all, I'll easily fulfill the requirements for Level 4 (10-15 books) this year. This is a bit ambitious for me, both because I know there are many other books I want to read and because many of these are (gasp) adult books, which take me longer to get through than kids'/YA books. Still, it's do-able and I intend to do it!

Here's my list, in no particular order:

• Children of the New World by Assia Djebar
• I translated part of a memoir/reflection on her writing for my honors French project in college, so I want to read some more by Djebar. This particular work was given to me by my sister-in-law and has been sitting on my nightstand for too long.
• La femme sans sépulture by Assia Djebar
• I bought this in France on our honeymoon--5 and a half years ago! Plus, I need to practice my French.
• Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
• Seems to important not to have read.
• Zorro by Isabel Allende
• I hope this counts; I started reading it but have temporarily set it aside. From what I started, I believe that Zorro is going to be the son of a Spanish man and an American Indian woman.
• The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation. Vol. I: The Pox Party and Vol. II: The Kingdom on the Waves by M. T. Anderson
• YA historical fiction set in the American revolution period.
• All Aunt Hagar's Children: Stories by Edward P. Jones
• Probably bought this about two years ago--I was interested that it was stories set in Washington, D.C. Need to pick it up off the nightstand and read it!
• Up at the College by Michele Andrea Bowen
• A local Durham author who came to speak at our library (I missed it since it was at noon)--it sounds like a fun, light read.
• A Mercy by Toni Morrison
• I didn't really like the other Morrison books I've read--Sula and Beloved (I can never hear the hymn "Shall We Gather at the River" without thinking of National Suicide Day and consequently don't like that hymn!)--but I definitely found them interesting, and I'm curious as to how this one ties in with the story of Beloved.
• Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson
• A story about slavery during the American revolution by a YA author I really like.
• The Motorcycle Diaries by Ernesto Che Guevara
• I've wanted to read this since I saw the movie (yes, I saw the movie first!).
• One Day the Soldiers Came: Voices of Children in War by Charles London
• I don't know if the author is white or not, but my understanding is that the focus of this book is children in Africa, so I am still going to count it in my total. I'll be reading an ARC version that I got at the American Library Association annual conference in 2007, so I have to keep in mind that I have an unfinished version.

I think I'm actually going to start with the last book, once I finish the book I'm currently reading (Ghostwalk by Rebecca Stott--a fascinating blend of historical fiction and fantasy, plus it's told in 2nd person!), and I will add updates as I proceed.

New book on my shelf...

I don't know if I'll really get any crocheting in this spring, but this book is full of tantalizing possibilities!

Beyond-the-Square Crochet Motifs by Edie Eckman



A new book that I got with a Christmas gift card--so excited to have some quick/small crochet projects to try! Astra, this is all because of you!

Advanced Twitter

I am hoping to teach a workshop on using Twitter later this semester--which means I need to learn more about Twitter myself (my ulterior motive!).

I have a Twitter account and I have TwitterFox installed on the computer I use most at work so I can see pop-up updates throughout the evening. We just got a new computer at home, and I will be using Safari there (my husband and I have learned that one thing we can not share amicably is a web browser--I don't like that he never signs out of e-mail and he doesn't like my bookmarks!), so I will find a plug-in to install with Safari. I know how to tweet in the technical sense, although I certainly don't have the art of tweeting effectively down. I also tweet rarely, so I linked my GoodReads account up to make automatic updates when I review books.

I know how to find and follow people, and I've done a few trials with looking up a topic and reading tweets on it.

Here are some facets of Twitter that I'd love advice on, if you have it:

• Lists--I have not explored these at all.
• The art of tweeting--I've seen some tips on this that I will rely on, but feel free to give me more!
• Monitoring Twitter in a way that's useful to you.
• Using all those mobile/texting options. This is one area where I am sure to be behind the times for awhile--I don't think our (family) cell phone has a texting plan, and I'm too cheap to invest in one, especially since I don't see using it a lot except to play around with!

Your own experiences or great resources you've come across are all welcome!

Rereading

For a librarian, I read remarkably slowly, especially if the book doesn't jump up and grab me. This may be why I spend so much leisure time on kids' and YA books.

I also love to reread, which significantly limits the number of new books I read at any given time. Still, I think if a good book is a good friend, you need to keep up the relationship! I have favorites from elementary and middle school that I still go back and reread. In the interests of including pictures (because I like them!), here are my GoodReads links to a few:

Many Waters by Madeleine L'Engle

My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Possibly my favorite book of all time.





The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Wonderful book about a young woman who moves from Barbados to Puritan Connecticut after her Grandfather's death, the adjustments she has to make, the lessons she learns, and the friendships she creates. Includes themes of intolerance and understanding.



Beauty: A Retelling of the Story of Beauty and the Beast by Robin McKinley

My rating: 4 of 5 stars
LOVED this book growing up and still love to reread it.




I've been doing a fair amount of rereading this fall, including:

Till We Have Faces: A Myth Retold by C.S. Lewis


My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This was one of my three assigned books for my Jan Term course, junior year of college, called "Fantasy, Myth, and Spirit," about the Inklings. Probably most fun I've had in a college course. Reread several times, most recently December, 2009.



Miles in Love by Lois McMaster Bujold


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Rereading some favs from the Vorkosigan series (Komarr, A Civil Campaign, and a novella). A Civil Campaign was the first one I read, back in June, 2004.

Just as much fun as the first time around!



and the Alice series, by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor--I read many of these as a kid, but never straight through, as I'm trying to do now. The one I most recently finished is:

The Grooming of Alice by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Over the summer, Alice and her friends try to get in shape, Elizabeth takes losing weight a little too far, Lester gets a new girlfriend, Pamela has more trouble with her parents, and Alice's dad goes to visit Miss Summers in Englad. A bit more issue-packed than some previous, but still very enjoyable.



Do you like to reread (or rewatch movies--that could be another post, including the story of why Lilo and Stitch is now banned from our household), or do prefer something new each time? What type of book do you like to reread?

Effective Blog Reading

In December, I had a 2 week break from work (hooray!) which also meant a 2 week break from blogging (not that I am the most regular of bloggers during regular work days...). It also largely meant a break in blog reading. I checked up on some of my favorites, but I didn't read any professional blogs, and I didn't read most blogs that take longer than 5 minutes to read an entry. When I did dash online for a few minutes, I started thinking about being a good blog reader, which I think might be a prerequisite for being a good blog writer.

I'm not the most effective user of RSS or other blog feeds, because I get a little bit obsessed with "checking off" feeds as "already read" whether I read them or not. Also, most of my favorite blogs include pictures, which the feeds don't show, so I'd just as soon check the actual blog as read a feed. Still, I think a blog reader needs to be able to dip into and out of conversations, unless they are only going to focus on one or two blogs. Like the news, blogs change frequently, and it's not always worthwhile to go back and catch up on all missed entries (although sometimes it is; Doug Johnson published an excellent series on library budgeting that I missed during December).

What really baffles me is how to comment effectively. I often think of comments as I read a blog entry, but the best comments I've read are those that take part in the conversation of other commenters--which means you have to take the time to read those comments instead of just throwing your idea up on the wall and leaving. This significantly increases time needed to participate in a blog community, especially if there's a lot of conversation around a post.

Do any of you have suggestions on how you managing your blog reading and commenting time? How does it affect your own blogging?