Book Club

Okay- I really really like this series by Dan Gutman. REALLY?... Yes REALLY! I Do! But I think my enthusiasm for this author has kinda turned my sons off.

My son, while he admits he loves Dan Gutman's Weird School series. ("yeah, those were funny.") He hasn't fallen in love with the million dollar series. (why? why? why?)

One boy in our book club today said, "Yeah- it was kinda boring.. because I already know everything about basketball so it's like... why read more about it?".

(what? I loved this book!? It's not all about basketball???)

I asked.. "Did you have a favorite part?"

"Yeah- the time they were in the hotel."

"Really, what did you like about the hotel part... specifically?"

 

"I don't know.. I just like going to hotels and they got to order food in and practically spend a million dollars just in the hotel..."

We have deep and meaningful discussions in book club. :o)

 

But this is our new book selected and I made all the kids promise they would read this book by Thanksgiving break... so we'll see.

(How to Speak Dragonese by Cressida Cowell. Last year we read books one and two: How to Train Your Dragon & How to Be a Pirate.)

(Today only one person had read the whole book. And it wasn't my son. So the discussion part of book club really struggled.)

Partly that is my fault. I need to be more on-top of getting the books to the boys and setting a firm book club date. (all the things I recommend on my site: http://www.bookclub4boys.com/.) It's great advice!

Whew... time to get ready for scouts now!

(Look at the little angel- starting his new book club book!

Laura

Forts

Hello! It's October that means new picks for book clubs on http://www.bookclub4boys.com/!

Okay- there's my plug for that!

I know in some parts of the country people are enjoying the changing of the seasons. Growing up in Maryland I enjoyed the beautiful Fall trees in all their splendor. There are many perks to living on a tropical island. I wont even try to feel sorry for myself- but besides family I really miss that the most- I love the crisp air in Autumn, I love the colors, I love the smells, I love wearing jeans and sweaters. Mostly I loved walking/running the trails that were near my house.

FORTS. That use to be a favorite past time of my boys when the weather was changing. When bad weather would hit the kids would take out blankets, sheets, couch cushions, tables, nothing was off limits- and build a fort.

A favorite game of preschoolers is to set up a fort and then play "Three Little Pigs" I'm the big bad wolf and threaten to blow their house down. They squeal & race out of the fort- run around a bit while I pretended to try and catch them... then run back into the fort for me to knock again.

There are a few perks to having boys. One is - things don't have to be cute. They like things regardless...and actually when I try to make things cute, it kinda ruins it for them. I "mom-afide" something that was cool.. but I tinkered with it too much and now it's no fun.

I found this fort/playhouse on a blog named: Nothing Fancy . I beg to disagree. This is the cutest- fanciest little fort/playhouse I've seen. I love it! I think if you have a girl- you should seriously consider making this for a birthday party/present or Christmas present. What little girl wouldn't LOVE to play inside this darling little house? Jamie uses a card table for the structure and sheets etc.. for the house. Wouldn't that make an adorable birthday party activity. (Not making the house- but playing in it.) You could have a little t-party/birthday party with finger foods, etc..And how wonderful that it's not some HUGE plastic contraption you have to store somewhere when not in use? LOVE LOVE LOVE IT!

Frindle Book Club

Here are the pictures of our book club yesterday.
As boys slowly arrived, I sent them to the T-shirt table.
We were making our Book Club T-shirt for the year and the design is basically all their faces.
( I had prepared the shirts by washing and stamping circles using a cut potato for the shape of the face a few days ago. So they were dried and ready to have eyes, hair etc.. added.)

The time consuming part was... they had to paint on each other boys shirts too... so it was set up like an assembly line. To keep all the boys busy. I had about four boys painting shirts while four others were playing chess.
Boys like Chess. All the boys really liked learning and playing Chess. Some already knew the rules so that was helpful because I was bouncing back and forth between the two tables.

( A bonus for those of you who have boys in Cub Scouts too.... explaining the game of chess, learning all the pieces and how they move and then playing a game qualifies for a Cub Scout Academic belt loop!) Pretty cool.

So as the T-shirt boys finished up... they switched places with a Chess boy.

After everyone had finished painting the T-shirts and everyone had a chance to learn and play chess we chatted about the book. (check out http://www.bookclub4boys.com/ for the details. )

But then we talked about this author. Did they like the book? Would they want to read another book by the same author?

They liked the book. But wanted to try a new book/author for next month.
Oh- another confession. We have 8 kids in the book club and one is a girl! She really wanted to be in the club and she's friends with all the boys.. my son was okay with that. (It felt cruel to exclude her just because she's a girl. And she would prefer to be in a boys book club than a girls one anyway.) So here's Nan... our honorary Tomboy in the boys book club. (Actually Hunter is such a sweet kid. He asked if he could changed the name of his book club from Boys book club to "Book Friends". What a compassionate and kind son I have!)

okay
got to run
Laura

Al Capone Does My Shirts Book Club

So today was our first book club meeting for this school year. Here is the line-up. The boys had a great time.

You'll notice I'm following my own book club advice and limited the size to 6. (The number of boys who can sit at my table.) It's sometimes hard to stay within the limit. When parents hear about book club they are eager to have their son join. That is why I started sharing my ideas on www.bookclub4boys.com. It is a great idea.