It's Monday, and Mommy's day is now over...

Mommies are everywhere, raising little ones, hopefully to be good elders.  It was a nice day yesterday.  My mom flew in from Panama (the one in Central America; the country, not the city) Was treated to a sandwich from a place called Ike's Place.  Ike's Place has a store in San Francisco, and was infamous long lines - as well as their bomb-ass (my son's term) sandwiches.  The place in my city (where they've expanded to) is a beautiful bright almost cobalt blue, with red trim.  

isn't that beautiful?  I LOVE  bright buildings.  I personally think that more businesses and/or homes should be brightly painted.  Celebrate life, celebrate your home....celebrate with color...but I'm getting away from subject.  Ike's place  - we went in to order.  And the young man at the counter hesitantly asked if I was Lil Larry's mother.  I kind of laughed (wondering if he had offended a few women asking this), smiled and said yes.  He then said that when someone brings their mom in to buy a sandwich, Ike's pays for the sandwich.  And - the not only did this, but the guy applied the free sandwich to the most expensive sandwich - not the cheapest, as most places would do.  How nice is this? They have some expensive sandwiches,  so I was impressed.  And it takes a lot to impress an old broad like me.  ;)

We went home, watched the tail end of Raising Arizona (the ONE movie where Nicolas Cage actually sounded normal during his acting, or rather, actually was a good actor!) while we ate our sandwiches.  One Ike's Place sandwich is enough to feed two people - so we actually both ate half of our sandwiches, while watching one of the few movies where Nicolas Cage sounded like a good actor.  Fun Times.  Then we went to...

My brother's house where my mom was visiting from Panama.  When I walked in, music was already on, Liliana was in the kitchen with my brother and they were dancing.  We had toasts, and then the music was jammin' louder, and we were in the kitchen dancing again!  Which is what we did last weekend.  We had a combo memorial, b-day celebration (my husband is born on Cinco De Mayo) and Coach-winnin-trophy night.  Which translated to Tequila shots, margaritas and lots of dancing!  Great times!  Nothing like a party with hispanic people - the dancing kicks ass!

So we partied a bit - yet made sure this week that we wound it down a bit earlier than last week.  Last monday was a little hard on me.  Tonight I'll make sure I get more sleep, plus we kept to champagne.  :)

I hope everyone had a nice day - My day was pretty awesome.

Okay - back to bookish items...

Hosted by Sheila of Book Journey, it's time for It's Monday, What Are You Reading? I'm pretty sure that most book bloggers already know about this, but in case....  We visit each other's blogs and see what we've been reading, what we've finished reading and in some cases what we're planning to read.  With me, the planning to read never, ever works out, so I usually skip that part.  Hell, even the current read usually end up changing...

Last week, or week before - when I didn't post.  I finished Nothing.  At all.  I started a book - decided to read something completely different and was happy to find a book I haven't read in a long, long time.  And I ended up very disappointed.  I loved it the first time I read it.  This time....I think I'm too old, or have been through to much to enjoy it much.  Didn't finish it.  Put it aside.  I want to impress on others, that the writing isn't what got to me.  Rather it was the whole young girl romance thing, and the young hardened but hurting knight who couldn't trust the young bride, because of a traumatic happening...etc.  The writing is good, the narration was good.  The dialogue totally fit the characters.  AND I remember reading one of Kurland's recent novels written a few years ago, and enjoying the hell out of it.  So I think it's just that this particular character was way too young and innocent for my current self to enjoy.  I'm still game for trying one of Kurland's more recent novels.

 Wow - according to my records, I haven't finished anything at all in May.... Until this past week.

Last week I finished a young adult novel written by a woman I never heard of before.  When I finished the book, I looked up the name of the author and found out she's written quite a few books - one of them I had noticed before. One of them is a children's picture book called - ready? - Troll Teacher.  Wow, the name itself makes me want to read it.  I read the excerpt and...Now I want to buy it for my grandchildren.  One who is close to the end of her first ever year of school (kindergarden) and the other who is in preschool and will start kindergarden next year.  

The one novel finished was Deadly Pink by Vivian Vande Velde.  A young girl is called upon to enter a virtual reality game.  Her sister works for the Rassmussen Corp, developer of this game, and her sister has suddenly lost her grip and decided to stay in the reality game. Of course, no one can get her out, she's messed with the protocols, and there's a real possibility of her dying if she stays in the game.  So little sister is called upon to save bigger sister - the sister who's always been there for her, who's the one every one looks up to, the sister who is so smart.

I did read a children's book that I also quickly reviewed.  Part of a series of books, Bella and Harry are a pair of chihuahua puppies who visit cities around the world with their family.  The book I read was Bella and Harry Let's Visit Instanbul by Lisa Manzione.  Cute way to teach a little of culture, food, and geography.  The book was fun.  The website also had lots to offer. 

That's it.  Only one novel, and one picture book was finished this week.  I've started a couple of other novels, but haven't gotten very far, and I keep jumping back and forth.

What I've been working on reading (ugh - reading shouldn't be WORK, let's rephrase this)  What I've been reading:

I started Roil by Trent Jamieson - started to really get into it, and now I can't FIND it.  :(  Was really enjoying it also - very different from what I've been reading...

So I started The Dead of Winter by Lee Collins.  This is the first of a series.  I had recently accidentally picked up the second in the series, and was a bit irritated - but found the first.  Started it...and was feeling a bit...down, so because of the rather dark subject matter, I picked up another book.  But still have my eyes on this one, still pick it up here and there....

Next is Dead Reckoning (Sookie #11) by Charlaine Harris.  I almost gave up on this series, but after reading how everyone enjoyed this novel, I decided to give it a try.  So far so good.  There was a wonderful fight between Pam and Eric.  Good fight - so I have hopes for this novel.  And there's only a couple more books in the series.  The last novel has already been released. (I think) Or soon will be.  Weird to think the series is coming to an end...but it's good to end a series while everyone is still enjoying the series.

Last, but not least, is the first of the Rain Wilds Chronicles, The Dragon Keeper by Robin Hobb.  I've read her Live Ship Traders trilogy - excellent novels with amazing world building.  These seem to be related, told from the people living up the Rain Wilds river....the people who have special abilities...and from what I was able to read so far, this novel is going to be just as good as the other series I read.  Unfortunately.....I also misplaced this novel. Soooo...I hope I find it soon.  because lately, it's been hard for me to find a book that I'm interested in or can focus on.  

It's possible that I might have to put aside ALL the novels and concentrate on some of the e-books that have been piling up in my Kindle Fire!  That'll be fun, and then...arhive.  

Well, it's now very late.  My neck is bothering me, headache is forming and I have visit the bedroom - try to get some sleep!  And work tomorrow....ugh - shudders!

Buenas Noches, Todos

Bella and Harry; Let's Visit Instanbul! - review

On impulse, I requested a children's book from NetGalley.  I thought I would see what was on offer for possible reading to my grandchildren....  I was not dissappointed.

Adventures of Bella and Harry: Let's Visit Instanbul!

Written by Lisa Manzione

Illustrated by Kristine Lucco

Cited from the Website - "The Adventures of Bella & Harry is a picture book series that chronicles the 

escapades of a pup named Bella, her little brother Harry and their family, who 

travel the world exploring the sights and sounds of new, exciting cities. 

Traveling 

the world with these two cute and cuddly Chihuahuas will allow the young 

reader to gain an appreciation of the world and its cultural diversity.

The “Bella and Harry” series is intended to be an informative, interactive and 

exciting way to introduce children to travel, different countries, customs, history 

and landmarks. 

The series was created to encourage exploration of locations

both domestically and internationally"

What a fun way to learn about cities throughout the world.  Using chihuahua puppies as characters (who doesn't love a chihuahua - heck, who doesn't love PUPPIES?), Lisa Manzione teaches in a painless manner about a city; she features architecture, food, culture, and landmarks among the information.  There is even a little lesson about safety; staying together and not getting separated from your family. 
All of the information is given through the use of conversation between Bella and her brother chihuahua, Harry.  They talk about (and eat) food, they explore together, they look at things and ask questions.  Even a myth was mentioned.  Harry really wants to ride a magic carpet - he asks a few times, though Bella keeps telling him there is no such thing.  :) I enjoyed this.  

This is a book that will hold interest for a second or third grader, and I believe even a Kindergardener would benefit a bit from reading this.  Though a Kinder might not understand everything, it would be a good start, and I can imagine a child having this read to her/him and then later doing some reading of this same text on their own - getting even more from the book as they grow.

The pictures are wonderfully crafted by Kristine Lucco.  The puppies are very cute, the buildings are beautifully drawn and I love that the people are the COLOR they are supposed to be.  No whitewashing here - and this is important.  Lucco's style of art is beautiful.  

Both text and graphics portray food, geography, landmarks, people, even products -- in this case, Bella and Harry visited the huge Bazaar where everything from carpets to lamps to food and spices is available.

Another thing I like is that there are a few words peppered in the text of the language spoken in the city.  "Merhaba" - hello,
"Elveda"  - goodbye, "Evet" - yes, and "Hayir" - no.  I would have liked a pronunciation guide, phonetic would be good - but didn't see one.  

My only complaint isn't with context or words within the book, but there were a couple pages where the text was difficult to read because it tended to blend in with the illustration.  I've seen this in a few picture books, and wish publishers (or whoever plans out the layout) would take the color of ink into consideration with the color of the page that surrounds the text.  It's hard to read black ink on dark brown (in another book I've read), thin black ink in a picture full of lines (found on a couple pages in this book), etc.

I took a quick look at the Bella and Harry website where I found a page with some fun activities that are interactive - you can have your child (even a group of kids in a class can do this on a group of computers) do a word match, packing game, coloring activities and a flag match game.  Good way to reinforce some of the information.  A FUN way to learn.  I think a teacher would find this very useful.
There is even a sample interactive e-book!
I also found a page for teachers, with links for pdf lesson plans that include things like crosswords, vocabulary matching, etc.  (FREE!)

I would recommend this book, and series for people who enjoy reading about other places, children, teachers and parents/grandparents.  Again, I think this is a very fun way to learn about cities and cultures throughout the world.

Lisa Manzione has written quite a few books in this series - London, Paris, Cairo...and there are some fun products available.  Though I usually am not into pimping out products for sale, there are some fun things available;backpacks, shirts, etc.
Kristine Lucco not only illustrates books, she paints rooms; murals in rooms, children's rooms, bathrooms, etc.