Book Clubs Galore

Putting aside the fact that this picture is crooked and makes me feel a little dizzy, this picture makes me very happy.  This is our neighborhood/ward book club at my house a couple of weeks ago and we were discussing Jane Eyre.  Some of my favorite people discussing one of my all-time favorite books.  Well, I just don't know if it gets much better than that.  I was practically giddy with anticipation the day of.

We had a grand time at kid's book club today.  We read and discussed The Tale of Despereaux.  This is a book I read to the kids about six years ago and I remember liking it then, but I loved it this time.  The movie-- meh.  The book-- wonderful!  It makes an exceptionally good read aloud.  For our activity we made "mazes in the dungeon" with blocks.

 At this age there is a serious boys vs. girls divide. I see no reason to resist nature.  The boys built a maze and the girls built a maze.  Bethany was very helpful at book club today when I needed to go take care of Peter.

 And then, joy of joys we made Bethany's and Elinor's hamsters as our mice.  We temporarily renamed them "Despereaux" and "Roscuro".

There was much jumping around and squealing with delight as the "mice" successfully scurried through both mazes. 

These cute boys have a hard time smiling regular for pictures.  That's okay-- I quite like them anyway.

Tug-of-war was also girls vs. boys.  You can see that this is not going to end well for the girls.

 

When Bethany helped the girls they did pretty well...

 ... but on their own it was over very quickly.