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03 Jun 15:35

Revealed! Book Club Choices for June 2015.

by gretchenrubin
booksstackspaperbacks

Before I get to the fun of recommending some good books to read for May, here’s a quick bit of book-self-promotion: Father’s Day is coming up on June 21. If you’re looking for a good gift for a father in your life, may I suggest…you guessed it…Better Than Before.

Most of us have habits that we want to make or break, and Better Than Before explains how to do that. Really!

If you’d like a signed bookplate to make the book more special, request it here (U.S. and Canada only, sorry, mailing costs). But request that soon, because I can be a little slow. Want more info? Excerpt here. Audio clip here. Discussion guides here.

Also, over the years I’ve noticed that many people give my biography Forty Ways to Look at Winston Churchill as a Father’s Day gift. Turns out I’m not the only one fascinated by Churchill.

Now enough about me and my books (!) — on to the fun part. Three terrific books for June.

Because nothing boosts happiness more than a great book, each month, I suggest:

· one outstanding book about happiness or habits

· one outstanding work of children’s or young-adult literature–I have a crazy passion for kidlit

· one eccentric pick–a widely admired and excellent book that I love, yes, but one that may not appeal to everyone

Shop at the wonderful Brooklyn indie WORD, BN.com, Amazon (I’m an affiliate of all three), or your favorite local bookstore. Or visit the library! Drumroll…

An outstanding book about happiness or habits:

How Proust Can Change Your Life by Alain de Botton

Buy from WORD; BN.com; Amazon.

An outstanding children’s book:

The Good Master and The Singing Tree by Kate Seredy (yes, I cheated by listing two, but I couldn’t pick between the first book and the sequel)

Buy from WORD; BN.com; Amazon.

An eccentric pick:

Memoirs of Hadrian by Marguerite Yourcenar

Buy from WORD; BN.com; Amazon.

Some readers have said that they wished that I’d describe and make the case for my book choices, instead of just providing links. I’ve noticed that many times, when someone describes a book to me, I want to read it less. And often, weirdly, the better a book is, the worse it sounds.

Nevertheless, because so many readers have requested it, I’ve decided to give a bit more context for these choices in the book-club newsletter. So if you’d like to know more about why I made these selections, check there. To get that free monthly book-club newsletter, and to make sure you don’ t miss any recommendations, sign up here.

In any event, I assure you that, for all the books I choose, I love them; I’ve read them at least twice if not many times; and they’re widely admired.

If you read last month’s recommendations…what did you think?

Lately, I’ve been doing some good reading on airplanes and in hotel rooms, while I’m on tour for Better Than Before.  I always over-pack both physical books and e-books when I travel, because I’m so afraid of having good reading time with nothing to read.

Happy June, and happy reading! So many good books…What’s on your summer reading list? Send me your recommendations! Though my library list already has 207 books listed.

22 Oct 01:17

Does "stationary" matter?

by Seth Godin

Formality is a curious thing.

StationaryI have trouble buying paper and pens at a store that cares so little about competence that they've misspelled the very thing they sell on their sign.

It occurs to me that this is a pretty silly reason not to buy a package of paper. I know exactly what they mean. I'm just being pedantic.

And we judge people by how they choose to wear a tie and jacket, or whether or not they use the correct typeface on their resume. Even though we're hiring them to run a forklift or balance the books.

Is it okay to read and enjoy a self-published book that is poorly laid out? What does hiring a talented layout designer have to do with writing a good book?

Is adherence to cultural norms an indicator of quality and care in other areas? If it's not, how much do we lose when we shun people who don't care about the cultural foundations that we grew up with?

We don't have a word for the satisfaction of engaging with something that's just right, that's both original and also grounded in the quality of execution that comes from an awareness and embrace of the cultural norms that people like us care about. Someone who took the time to get the irrelevant details right. That satisfaction is important to me.

And yet, the irrelevant cues might not be so irrelevant.

Not everyone will judge you because you ignore or don't understand the formalities. (And in fact, the judging and the tsk-tsking aren't always something to aspire to, if it distracts us from the work we're trying to do). But some people will judge you, and if you care about them, cultural norms are a cheap way to earn trust.

It's also a privilege to do something properly.

Will our entire culture go completely to pieces if we stop defending the apostrophe? I don't think so. But understanding formalities is a choice, and you should embrace or reject them with intent.

       
11 Apr 12:39

A Tale of Two Nonprofits

by Bernie O'Hare
One of the Lehigh Valley's more worthwhile nonprofits is New Bethany Ministries, whose simple goal is "to create opportunities for a secure future for the homeless, hungry, poor and mentally ill of the Lehigh Valley." One of their biggest fundraisers is Luminaria Night. Simple votive candles, inside a white bag, light up the Christmas City each December. More importantly, the money raised helps people with nowhere else to turn. You'd think Bethlehem would go out of its way to help this worthy effort. But Bethany, unlike the Fox Environmental Center (Illick's Mill), has no City Council person at the helm.

Last December, while City Council person Karen Dolan basked in a rent-free Mill, warming up with free heating oil supplied by Parks and Public Property Director Ralph Carp, it was freezing inside the pool house a stone's throw away along Illick's Mill Road. New Bethany's Debbie Delgrosso was shoveling the snow, which the City had not done. Eventually, she got help from some people who stopped by for their luminaries.

Carp also charged New Bethany for the use of the pool house to distribute luminaries.

The difference between these two nonprofits is that one of them is run by a City Council member and one is not.

This kind of favoritism is why Dolan should resign from City Council, where she just happens to chair the Parks Committee.
27 Mar 00:50

3 Questions + 3 Answers

by KERF

Of course I can talk about my cute baby is till the cows come home, but I would love to share some helpful posts on BERF as well. I recently asked Twitter for a few recommendations for post ideas. Here were three responses and my answers –

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We dropped down to one nap at the end of September when Mazen was just over a year old. We were headed to the beach with friends and wanted to maximize our time to play, so I decided it was a good week to experiment. M had been fighting his morning nap a bit in the weeks prior (on and off) so I knew he was probably getting close to not needing it.

We had been at 9am and 2pm naps for a really long time, give or take 30 minutes. He was sleeping for about an hour and a half each time (I think). So when we went to the beach I kept him up, gave him lunch at 11 and put him down at noon and whatddayaknow, he did great. It took a while for naps to lengthen. I remember for a while I went from 2-3 hours of naptime to 1 hour total a day and thought “What did I do!?” But then from about 13 months to 16 months we had some good 2 hour stretches. Teething definitely interrupts naps for us, but thankfully when teeth are not bothersome he will sleep for 2 (occasionnnnnnally 3) hours.

So my advice to other moms is when your baby starts to show signs of refusing his/her morning nap, push the nap back a few hours and try it then in the middle of the day. Only bummer is now you can’t go out to lunch!

Aww look he cute he was!

Maze-165027

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Toys

We have a handful of toy stations in our house:

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  1. Mazen’s room – this is a small basket of small toys.
  2. The upstairs living room – a medium size basket full of his favorite toys. This is where most of the playing happens.
  3. The basement train table – more toy baskets and a lot of the toys stay out on the table. He also has toys in his play closet. Bigger toys are kept down here.
  4. The porch and yard – anything outdoor friendly and lots of toys in the warmer months

Each area has something to contain the toys where we put them away when he’s done playing.

Toys

Books

We do most of our reading in Mazen’s room before bed. I have a big box of books and a smaller basket that can be brought into bed for nighttime books. Both are overflowing with books! I have a backup bookcase with a lot of the bigger boy books that I rotate in and out every now and then.

Schedules

Here’s our daily schedule at 18 months:

7a – Mazen up. Breakfast for us both.

7:30-8:30a – Morning play for M and cleaning/dishes/getting dressed/packing up to go out for me.

9a-10:30a – Gym time and a shower for me. Morning snack is here.

11a – Home play time. I unpack our gym bags and start thinking about lunch.

11:30a – Lunch for us both.

12p – Books before nap

12:30-2:30p – Afternoon nap for M. Work time for me.

2:30p – Afternoon snack

3-5p – Outings: Discovery Museum/Library/Friends House/Great Harvest/Sweet Haus/Walk/Errands

4p – Maybe a light snack on the go

5:30p – Lighter dinner for M. I cook our dinner.

6:15p – Grown-up dinner ready and if M’s dinner was light he has a second course with us.

6:45p – Bath/jammies/tooth brushing

7p – Books in bed

7:30p – Lights out

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Here’s the gist of how his sleep has changed (I might have them months wrong, but it’s all a blur!)

Newborn: Up every 2 hours at night. Naps on me for 30 minutes to an hour.

1-3 Months: Doing longer stretches at night like 3-5 hours. Naps 40 minutes a few times a day.

4 Months: Sleep regression! Decent 3 hour stretch in first part of night and then hourly wakeups after that. A lot of this is related to the pacifier. This goes on for 2 months and we go insane. Naps still 40 minutes with the occasional hour to 1.5. {More here}

6 Months: Sleep train. Life saver. M now sleeps 11 hours straight at night and naps have lengthened to 1.5 hours. {More here}

9-12 Months: M still sleeps 11 hours straight. Naps at 9a and 2p for 1.5 hours each (appx).

13-16 Months: M still sleeps 11 hours straight at night. Down to one nap at noon that lasts about 2 hours but can drop to 1.5 or go up to 3 from time to time.

16-17 Months: Still sleeping from 7:30p to 6:30a with the occasional 12 hour night. Naps drop down to 1-1.5 hours which I blame on teething and developmental stuff.

18 Months: Pretty solid 7:30p to 6:45-7am nights. Nap from 12:30 to 2:30p on a good day.

In a YEAR since we sleep trained we have only had to go into Mazen’s room at night 3 times. All 3 times were related to teeth/sickness. It’s quick shocking, actually.

Of course all babies are different, but next time I think I’ll worry a lot less about sleep. I spent so much time reading about what to do and what not to do in the first few months and still ended up having to sleep train. Next time I’ll just do what I can to get us all to sleep and will sleep train again at the drop of a hat. I might do it closer to the 4 month period, but we’ll just have to see what baby #2 is like in weight and all.

Hope those were helpful to some of you!