Friday Fun Link – The CFTD Parenting Method Sweeps the Nation

Yes parents, most concerns, competitive instincts and crying jags can be allayed if you too decide to practice “Calm the Fuck Down” parenting. 😉

  • Worried your friend’s child has mastered the alphabet quicker than your child? Calm the f*ck down.
  • Scared you’re not imparting the wisdom your child will need to survive in school and beyond? Calm the f*ck down.
  • Concerned that you’re not the type of parent you thought you’d be? Calm the f*ck down.
  • Upset that your child doesn’t show interest in certain areas of learning? Calm the f*ck down.
  • Stressed that your child exhibits behavior in public you find embarrassing? Calm the f*ck down.

My 40th Birthday Is Here

This is a collage I made to celebrate the day…

Birthday Montage

The Stages of My Life

Like the Beatles ushering in the “Swinging 60’s” in 1964, it won’t line-up perfectly.  But you can still chart my life in terms of broad decade-long “eras” fairly easily…

~0-10 years – Figuring out the basics, attending elementary school

~11-20 years – High school

~20-30 years – English degree transitions into a nearly decade long stint in the Canadian book industry working with publishers and writers

~30 – 40 – years – Librarianship – getting my Masters and then working in public libraries

What will be interesting will be to see whether my current spot in public libraries will continue for another couple decades and I end up putting in the standard thirty-years for a “full” career or if some other option – planned or otherwise – presents itself or comes to pass, just as the Jason of his 20’s may have had the thought cross his mind occasionally but never honestly thought he’d become a Librarian in his 30’s.  And I guess there’s different roles within libraries that you could do for different time frames – maybe my first ten years are in roles to help me build a solid foundation for where I might end up, the next ten are increasing responsibility of one kind or another and the final ten (give or take) are in some sort of management role?  Who knows.

I’m also very conscious that this list comes across as very school- and work-centric and negates my personal life which I actually consider the one thing that’s been a constant through the other changes – moving provinces, changing jobs, different living arrangements.  And that’s fine by me! 😉

Six hours left in my 30’s!  Or maybe eight?  I think I was born at 2am or something like that. 😉

Headtale Blog Birthday Review

Continuing my birthday week festivities, thought it might be nice to review my posts on July 18 since this blog started…

I guess the other big realization going back through the years like this is that I’ve been blogging, pretty much on a daily basis for over seven years.  This blog has increasingly been a great way for me to remember different significant events in my life – both personal ones like birthdays but others too – when was the first time I mentioned Facebook?  What did I write about some library issue in 2009?  And so on.

Okay, two days left to the big 4-0!

Music Monday – “They say life begins at 40/Age is just a state of mind/If all that’s true/You know that I’ve been dead for 39”

Probably no better song to post this week with three days left in my 30’s, written by the best songwriter of my lifetime!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJoWS4ig9Jg

“Life Begins at 40” – John Lennon

“A Mother’s Prayer” – by Tina Fey

And a father’s prayer too (especially that part about not lying with drummers)… 😉

Saturday Snap – Nickle Lake Hail Storm

Spent the weekend at Shea’s parents’ seasonal camp site at Nickle Lake.  Had a bit of an adventure as there were tornado warnings on Saturday afternoon.

(When Pace was a baby and we found ourselves in similar circumstances, we headed for town.  I often joke about “Second Baby Syndrome” and Sasha suffered it here as we decided to stay in the campground instead of heading for safer ground.  Luckily, the worst we got was hail.  Others, only 15 minutes away, weren’t as lucky!)

Here’s Pace running in the rain before it got really bad…

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My father-in-law got about an inch and a half of rain in about half an hour…

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After the hail, Pace decided to go “skating”…

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We didn’t have time to clear off the deck completely before the storm hit…

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The clean-up crew… (a neighbour joked that “Only in Saskatchewan do we still end up shoveling snow and ice in July”)

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We didn’t get golf-ball sized hail like some did but pretty close (and luckily we weren’t on the highway for it either!)…

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Surveying the aftermath, there was damage to tents, awnings, vehicles and more…

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with much of the park underwater…

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Luckily, nobody was injured, either at the park or in any of the other areas affected as far as I’ve heard.

Friday Fun Link – 25 Signs You’re Addicted To Books

This one made the rounds on social media awhile back but I’m posting it here for truth – I agree with pretty much everything on this list!

10 Fun and/or Memorable and/or Unique Things To Do With Your New Baby

  1. Take a photo of your new baby every day after they’re born
  2. Or you can take a photo of the baby every few months with a favourite doll
  3. Write a book for your new baby
  4. Write them a song
    (I won’t put audio of this one but the song I’ve sung to both Pace and now Sasha goes…
    This is my hair/It’s way up there
    These are my eyes/They play “I Spy”
    This my my nose/It smells where I go
    These are my lips/They’re fun to kiss
    This is my chin/It helps me to grin
    These are my cheeks/They’re full when I eat
    And these are my ears/They help me to hear
    And this is my face/I take every place/Except outer space (or whatever rhyme suits the occasion – “Except this parking space”, “When I’m having a race”, etc.)
  5. Take some fun baby photos 
  6. Take a really long video of the baby as it sleeps (I have this but haven’t uploaded it to YouTube yet because, although cute, it’s also quite boring)
  7. Create a baby-themed Tumblr that’s guaranteed to go viral  (this is getting into toddler/pre-schooler land, I know)
  8. Pretty standard but make a cast of their hands/feet
  9. Another standard one – keep a baby book which tracks growth, milestones, etc. etc. – although digital versions are growing in popularity
  10. Oh, and don’t forget you can start taking photos of the baby before it’s born! 😉

    Bonus: Saw this idea on a mommy blog and thought it was great.  Ask family and friends to not give a card (which can cost $5+ unless you shop at the Dollar Store or something and instead, ask them to put that money towards one of their own favourite children’s books and put an inscription in the book!)

Stages of Childhood

Because Imagination Has An Unlimited Budget For Special Effects

GRRM, a producer on the “Game of Thrones” TV show provides a great visual example of why books are almost always so much better than TV/movies.

This is a comparison of the artist’s rendering of his vision of The Iron Throne and what they eventually got…

[Edit: I’m an idiot – GRRM is an acronym for “George RR Martin”, the author of the Fire & Ice books and this rendering was *his* vision!]