Book Reviews in progress: what I'm reading now

When I get a chance to read or listen to audiobooks I've been enjoying a couple different things. My current recommendations that I'm not finished with yet are:

• Moby Dick - I remember it being much more boring, but as an audiobook it's working well, perhaps because I'm busy and not having to commit 100% of my time to it in between the really exciting parts. It would be interesting to go back and look at the significance of all the Biblical names of the characters.
  
• Hold on to Your Kids by Gordon Neufeld - he analyzes why many current problems with kids arise from them being attached to peers more than parents and how to keep your kids attached to you.
  
• Witness by Whittaker Chambers - I'm loving historical books lately, and this one really brings home the danger of communism while filling in some major gaps in my education about the cold war and reading like a detective story. Now Roger is getting into this one too so I may have to fight him for it! This one makes me really look forward to nap time when I get a bit of reading in as Ellie falls asleep.

So there are some mini-recommendations for you all while I'm taking a break from kids' books for a bit to wait for the last Harry Potter. I'm 43rd on the wait list at the library, but hopefully the other 42 will read it fast!

Ellie the biker

Here are some adorable photos that Dad just sent from our recent trip to Grand Rapids. We were there the first week of June for my cousin Beth's wedding shower but because of some crazy plane problems our flight was cancelled and we ended up missing the main event! :( We did get to see the family for part of the weekend, though, and gave Ellie her first (stationary) ride on a motorcycle. As far as I'm concerned, that's all the riding she'll ever need. Let's hope "Ta Ta" doesn't get any ideas about taking her on the road...

Where's my helmet?

Ellie with Grapefruit

Here's another video of Ellie playing with a grapefruit - she likes to pretend to nurse her toys by sticking them under her shirt, and that's what she was doing as I was trying to bring the groceries in one day.

Hint on the videos: you have to click on the photo below first to activate the video control, then click on play (the triangle at the lower left). If you want to see it in Google Video, click on the link.

Testing video: Ellie reads at one year old

Here is Ellie reading us a book, a test of Google Video as a method of posting baby videos, hope it works! Next challenge will be embedding video in the page, which I'll try below. So far it looks like a black box, but tends to work when you hit the play button on the lower left. When in doubt, just use the link underlined above.