Seeing Things

Earlier this week, Jesse and I were discussing the monthly budget and the subject of school clothes came up. I told him that I didn't expect to have to buy Mia much because her closet is overflowing yet. But today Mia was bored, so I suggested that she have Jesse measure her on the doorway between the kitchen and the living room. There's a white crayon mark showing how tall she was shortly after her birthday (and even in May she was still almost exactly to that mark). His "Holy cow!" made me come check out the new measurement. It was 2-1/2 inches higher than the last one, making her 47-3/4" tall! I had Mia weigh herself as well, and she's up to 52 lbs from 44! Over the course of the summer (which still has 22 days to go) she's grown 2-1/2 inches and gained 8 lbs!

She went in her drawer and found a pair of shorts that she had tried on at the beginning of summer. Even with a belt on, she couldn't keep them up back in May. She's running around in them now, sans belt! I have a feeling that she's going to need a completely new wardrobe for school. Goodwill, here I come!

Seeing Things by Patti Hill is a tasty treat for a summer's afternoon. Birdie Wainwrights prides herself on her independence and zest for life, even at the age of 72 and suffering from macular degeneration. When she starts seeing hallucinations of flowers in the middle of her living room, she starts to doubt her sanity, and when she ends up breaking her ankle because of them, her perfect life is turned upside-down. Birdie is forced to recover while living with her son Andy and wife Suzanne whose busy lives keep them on the run and away from son Fletcher, who has memorized baseball stats as a form of prayer in his lonely life. Things get even crazier when Huckleberry Finn shows up and starts talking to Birdie, and the faith of the whole family is tested. I absolutely adored the character of Birdie, and I hate that the book had to end! Hill precisely renders the conflict between aging parent and busy child when it comes to assisted living centers and independent living. Birdie wants only to heal and please her family, but she is forced over and over again to turn their care over to God. Her interpretation of putting them through the roof on a mat is one I will remember and use myself. The characters feel real, full of passion and life, like people you know personally, and the story has just the perfect amount of humor, faith, and love.

Mia is so excited about school starting, she's already packing her backpack and getting school supplies together. What grade is it when kids stop anticipating the first day of school with joy instead of dread?

The Queen of Sleepy Eye

I received a call from Mom this morning; she was rushing to see Grandma in the hospital. They had called and said that the family needed to come in right away. Of course, I'm immediately panicking and starting to plan what I need to do to run there myself. After Mom got to the hospital, she called back: false alarm, for now. Grandma has Congestive Heart Failure, and now she has an infection from it in her lungs. They couldn't give her too much of the blood transfusion for fear that it would throw her into heart failure. She's doing better now. She's coherent and the fever is down, but as hard as it is to say, it seems like this is the beginning of the end. Please keep us all in your prayers.

The Queen of Sleepy Eye by Patti Hill is a stand out book about the relationship between mother and daughter as well as faith of the heart instead of faith of the head. It's 1975, and Amy Montiero is finally breaking free from her mother Francie by going to college in California. But on the drive out there from Illinois, Francie gets sidetracked in the little town of Cordial, Colorado, and before Amy can say "Help!", she's working for the summer at a funeral home and trying to come up with another escape plan while Francie flirts her way through town. Amy is a fantastically three dimensional character. She's firm in her faith, until she starts visiting a hippie community where a handsome man named Falcon plies his trade making stained glass windows. He challenges her notions of what Christianity means and awakens feelings Amy was certain she knew how to control. Amy lives her life believing that her faith puts her above everyone else. She tolerates her mother's frequent failings, she shakes her head in disgust at the rigidity at the old ladies in the local church, and takes on a hippie family and an elderly widow as charity projects. Cracks start to show in her facade when first her best friend from home commits a sin Amy can't forgive, then a good friend is killed, bringing Amy to discover sin in her own heart. Hill writes Amy with compassion and humor. You can't help but love both her and Francie. The story is bookended with chapters about Amy and Francie 30 years later returning a stolen car. The two stories seem disconnected until Amy reaches out her hand in forgiveness and love to someone who least deserves it, offering up the grace she had learned so many years ago. Put this book on your must read list; it's a real winner!

Today is your last chance to win a copy of Rene Gutteridge's Skid. Just drop an email to christysbookblog@gmail.com before midnight tonight to enter!