British Literature -> The New Art Shelf

So - my first trimester was rather miserable. I was nauseous all day and exhausted - plus the weather was cold and rainy - so I spent a lot of time on the couch reading.

my British literature shelf 

The British Literature Project
I posted a few months ago that I wanted to start a new project to read the British literature classics. I started with The Remains of the Day, but then decided I should go back and start chronologically. So far, I've made my way through a couple hundred years, with a lot of help from Netflix.

• Chaucer: Canterbury Tales is a collection of stories told by pilgrims on their way from London to the Canterbury cathedral. This was a painful exercise in reading middle English. I only got through a few before giving up and just reading the modern English summaries at the beginning of each tale, followed by some youtube videos. 
• Shakespeare: I find it difficult to read plays, so decided just to go the movie route on him. We rented Macbeth and Midsummer Night's Dream, and then finished with Shakespeare in Love. I know this is a total copout-- moving on. 
• Jane Austen: I started with Emma, until I realized it was remade into the 90's movie Clueless, which then was completely distracting so I quit. I rented the Gwyneth Paltrow Emma and then Sense and Sensibility, which was a lovely cast of Hugh Grant, Emma Thompson, and Kate Winslet. I decided I'm not a huge Austen fan and moved on.
• Brontes: Having previously read Wuthering Heights, I opted to just rent the movie. I unfortunately picked the 1970 version with Timothy Dalton - which was not so great. Finally, my project really turned around when I picked up Jane Eyre, the story of an orphan girl who gets passed from one horrible place to another and slowly makes her way through life. I loved it and read every word to the end. 
• Dickens: Next up was David Copperfield, another orphan story about a boy who bounces from one horrible situation to the next until he finally makes it. Very similar to Jane Eyre, but he turns out much better - clearly it is better to be an orphan boy than an orphan girl. I really liked this one, but gave up after about 500 pages and decided to watch the movie, which has a cameo by Laurence Olivier.

Modern Lit

At this point, I was getting tired of hauling around these huge texts, and decided to take a quick break with some current books on my kindle.

• Manhattan Beach: a WW2 story about a girl who is abandoned by her father and works in a navy yard outside New York. Not my favorite, but an interesting story about her searching for her father and diving with 1940's gear. 
• Less: the story of an older gay writer on a trip around the world, trying to get over a breakup. Had some funny moments, but really not clear to me why this one won a Pulitzer. 
• Sing, Unburied, Sing: a story about a boy in the Mississippi Delta who takes care of his younger sister because his parents are completely unfit (mom is a druggie, dad in jail), while dealing with serious racial discrimination and violence. This story was fascinating and really brutal at times - with a really interesting change back and forth in perspective between the boy and his mom. 
• Boat People: the story of a father and son who are refugees from Sri Lanka, fleeing to Canada. The story bounces back and forth between the terrible life they've fled to the miserable process of seeking asylum. I loved this one and read the whole thing in a day.         

Parenting Books
So at this point, I realized that everything I was reading seemed to have the same theme of children struggling to survive, due to unfit or absent parents. This made me want to be a better parent for my kiddo (and a half). Our biggest issue right now is tantrums, and I had read that timeouts are now considered passe - but had no idea what the alternative was supposed to be.  So I decided to read up on parenting and discipline guidance for preschoolers.

• Positive Discipline: This one talks a lot about not punishing your child, but helping them work through their tough emotions. 
• Calm Parents, Happy Kids: This one is very similar to the first and has three basic concepts: set a better example yourself by managing your own emotions, strengthen your connection with your kid so they want to behave better, and then coach them through managing their emotions. It got a little too attachment parenting for me - but had some good concepts. 

Activity Books
So both of the parenting books talked a lot about having quality time with your kid to strengthen the relationship. I realized that while I spend quite a lot of time with my kiddo, there isn't a lot of good quality time.  So I'm trying to make an effort to play with him every morning before daycare for about 10-15 minutes, usually one of his board games or another toy. But I didn't have great ideas for the weekends, so I picked up a few more books:.

• The Tickle Fingers Toddler Cookbook: Recipes that are meant to be made by a preschooler with just a little help from parents. I figure cooking together is not only an activity we can do together, but helps give him a useful life skill and maybe makes him more likely to eat dinner. We've already tried the nachos, and it seemed like a success all around. 
• The Big Book of 100 Little Activities: A variety of activity ideas, from making bird feeders to splatter art.  I'm hoping we'll have some fun together while getting a little fine-motor skill practice. 

the new art shelf on top

This, of course, led to another round of online shopping to pick up key ingredients and more art supplies. And now that those things are all organized in their new homes - I've come full circle back to my British Literature, picking back up with some more Dickens. I was hoping for some more uplifting stories - but the prospects are Bleak.