Library Advent

Last year, I tried something I read about on Pinterest - a library Advent calendar. Each night of December leading up to Christmas, the kids open a wrapped book. The book can be anything, but I chose books that were mostly Christmas or winter-themed, with a few of our favorites thrown in. This year, my selection is as follows:

This year, since I had more than a few weeks to prepare, I collected all year. I also bought a few new books from the Scholastic book order that came home with Brother. We are not Santa people, but we do treat Santa like other fictional characters in our household, so we do have a few Santa books. However, most of our Christmas books focus on the actual story of Christmas - Jesus. The books in the pile above are arranged so that the books in the front will be first and the books in the back will be last. The last week's worth of books are all about Jesus.

Last weekend, I got them all wrapped, and tomorrow night we will open our first book!

We also have another special Christmas count-down tradition at our house. Last year, I saw this picture on Pinterest and asked my mom if she could make something like it:

Challenge accepted...and guess what? Her's is WAY better than the Pinterest version!

So every night, we move the marker closer and closer to Bethlehem, until, on Christmas morning, it finally arrives. We bring out Baby Jesus and stick him in the manger. And then we read our last Christmas book, which is all about that day!

New Book List

I went to my amazing Young Adult Literature Conference again this year! I wrote about it last time I went...this woman reads like 400 books a year! It was so good and I wanted to read every single stinking book on all her lists. Instead, created a Google Slides presentation of titles I thought my kids would most enjoy, shared it with them during our reading hour at school, and then I narrowed my own personal list to these 20:

• Scythe by Neal Schusterman

• Walk on Earth, Stranger by Rae Carson
• Seeds of America Trilogy by Laurie Halse Anderson
• Front Lines by Michael Grant
• Steeplejack by AJ Hartley

• The Girl I Used to Be by April Henry
• Dorothy Must Die by Danielle Paige
• The Girl from Everywhere by Heidi Heilig
• The Reader by Traci Chee
• Nine, Ten: A September 11 Story by Nora Raleigh Baskin
• Salt to the Sea by Ruta Sepetys

• Kill the Boy Band by Goldy Moldavski
• The Distance to Home by Jenn Bishop
• The Best Man by Richard Peck
• Lily and Dunkin by Donna Gephart
• Ghost by Jason Reynolds
• This Is Where it Ends by Marieke Nijkamp
• The Bitter Side of Sweet by Tara Sullivan
• The Sun Is Also a Star by Nicola Yoon

• The Serpent King by Jeff Zetner

Scythe was one kids were really excited about, so I ordered it on Amazon and am starting with that one. It's set to arrive today!

Book: AD 30

AD 30

by Ted Dekker

Length: 432

Format: Paperback
Price: Borrowed from a friend

How I heard about it: ^recommended by the same friend

Basic Premise: Set in (you guessed it) 30 AD, the illegitimate daughter of the sheikh of Dumah is commissioned by her father to journey to Palestine and ask for the aid of Herod whose Roman ties make him a powerful ally in the war against the Nafud. On her way, she encounters Yeshua, whose teachings and miracles she can't seem to reconcile - or escape.

My Take: 6.5 out of 10 (scale here)

I enjoyed this book. I liked the writing style and the feel. I also liked the time period, because although I feel like I know quite a bit about the time and place, there were things I hadn't considered - like how much of the area was DESERT. That said, the story itself was a little too...military? for me. It was hard to follow the strategy and even harder to believe that what was happening was at all likely, or even possible. I read the afterward by the author, who obviously went to great lengths to get his research right, but parts of it still felt pretty unbelievable. What I DID like, though, was the telling of a story during a Biblical time with Biblical characters that wasn't the Bible. The last book I remember reading like this was Unveiled about Tamar (which was fabulous) and I forgot how much I liked it! There is a sequel to this one - AD 33, but I have a feeling I'm really not going to like that one...

Salad-In-A-Jar...

I recently attended  a Salad-In-A-Jar Party. Did you know that was a thing? It's like a 31 Party or a Norwex Party or a LuLaRoe Party. Except it's way faster, way less expensive, and what you get is actually very practical, as you are going to eat it that week. Here's how it works:

• Every person commits to bringing 5 empty mason jars and 3 toppings. I brought cucs (seeded and sliced), cherry tomatoes, and chicken. (The host provides greens.)
• Set up your table so your hearty veggies are at one end and your leaves are at the other, with the "wetter" veggies in the middle. Here's a great graphic for how to design your table.

• Begin at the end with the hearty veggies and fill until your jar is about half full. Then stuff with greens.
• You are done and so is lunch for the next five days!

A few observations:

• This was fun and super fast. I told Husband I'd be about two hours (because that's how long 31/Norwex/LuLaRoe last) and I was done in 45. I would have been done sooner if I hadn't stayed around to chat.
• I really loved that the host picked DARK GREEN GREENS. I really hate Iceberg, and though I can tolerate Romaine, Spinach is my go-to. So I was happy.
• SOME people put dressing in their jars first. I chose not to for a number of reasons:
1. I was afraid it would make my salad soggy.
2. It meant I had to commit right then to the type of dressing I wanted, which I was not prepared to do.
3. I don't use much dressing and I'm not sure I could get the dressing to come out with the salad very well without a spatula, which I don't keep at school.

• Next time, I will not fill the toppings up to the halfway mark as I did in the first two in the picture above. The second salad from the right looked like this when I dumped it:

It looked like this when I was done and I should have stopped several bites beforehand...because it was too big for one meal.

I've had three so far and my favorite has been what I'm calling an Asian chicken salad. It's the one in the middle of my picture up top and it contained:

• broccoli
• celery
• chicken
• oranges
• grapes
• golden raisins
• sunflower seeds
• slivered almonds

I paired with Annie's Shiitake Dressing (to which I added some honey because it was too salty for me) and it was AMAZING! I mean it. I'm totally making this one again!

And maybe the best part was getting to spend time with new friends. The four women on the left (including me) all met last year when our kids were in the girl in the plaid's kindergarten class together. It was super fun getting build salads together :)