Category — Friday Blog Roundup

The twins and I have started reading The Cursed Child.  It took us a few days because we had other stuff on the to-do list that had to get done.  But now we’re chugging through it.

We had a few read-aloud methods we considered beforehand since we wanted it to be a one-woman show.  At first I thought I would place pieces of paper on the floor with each character’s name, and then stand on the correct piece of paper when I was speaking for that character.

But in the end, either due to laziness because moving from paper to paper started to sound less and less appealing or because it was going to take too long to shuffle through the papers and lay out each scene’s papers, I decided to read the character’s name aloud before saying their line.  So name (said in a normal voice) + lines (said with feeling).

I bawled reading the opening scene.  I know it’s just a repeat of what is already in the seventh book, but it’s a reunion.  I’ve missed these characters so much.

But I’ve got some strong feelings about some of the passages.  I’m going to write it up in a post and put a spoiler message at the top.  Skip it next week if you haven’t yet read the book.  Or bookmark it for the future.  But… yeah… there is no way to talk about some of it without mentioning spoilers.  Sorry.

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Stop procrastinating.  Go make your backups.  Don’t have regrets.

Seriously.  Stop what you’re doing for a moment.  It will take you fifteen minutes, tops.  But you will have peace of mind for days and days.  It’s the gift to yourself that keeps on giving.

As always, add any new thoughts to the Friday Backup post and peruse new comments in order to find out about methods, plug-ins, and devices that help you quickly back up your data and accounts.

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And now the blogs…

But first, second helpings of the posts that appeared in the open comment thread last week.  In order to read the description before clicking over, please return to the open thread:

• “Things I Can Do and Things That I Can’t” (Torthúil)
• “Be Fair to Yourself” (No Kidding in NZ)
• “Tribes” (The Empress and the Fool)

Okay, now my choices this week.

Mom PharmD looks at the bright side of nearing the end of family building attempts: no more vitamins.  As she goes toward a final attempt to add a third child to their family, she also sets a loose end date to the process.  It is, as she says, the only way to ensure that she doesn’t remain in infertility limbo.  It’s a tiny post about being okay with the end, whatever that ending may be.

In Quest of a Binky Moongee has a post about another facet of infertility: the age gaps that exist between people.  She writes about her 18-year-old niece, about the joy of being her aunt and watching her age.  But in that aging is another fact: “She is only a couple of hours away for college but it seems almost impossible for her to get to know my future child(ren) like the way she knows her little cousins because of all the time they have spent together.  My child(ren) will not know their oldest cousin the way I would want them to if they had been born a few years earlier and growing up in the same town together.”  It is just food for thought; one more thing infertility takes.

Lastly, for anyone who has followed the enormous love I have for Truman, it’s no wonder that Searching for Our Silver Lining’s post about quantifying love hit home.  She writes, “We encourage all types of love, make no mistake. But when one half of that relationship is suddenly gone, either through death or the relationship ending, grief is immediately quantified based on the type of love.”  She admits that while we can rationally say that the type of love we have for various people or animals is different, that one type of love does not trump another.  Love is love is love.

The roundup to the Roundup: How to read The Cursed Child aloud.  Your weekly backup nudge.  And lots of great posts to read.  So what did you find this week?  Please use a permalink to the blog post (written between August 5th and 12th) and not the blog’s main url. Not understanding why I’m asking you what you found this week?  Read the original open thread post here.

The Olympics start tonight.  I have big plans to spend the evening in my pyjamas in front of the television.  I love the parade of countries when the teams walk in, waving their flags.  And the lighting of the Olympic flame.  I’m just really excited about the broadcast.

But.

Is it my imagination, or could you see many more events during the primetime hours when we were kids?  I feel like almost every activity was televised in part during the evening vs. now where they show the most popular sports at night — swimming, gymnastics, track — and stick the less mainstream sports — fencing, rugby sevens, judo — on random stations during the day.  Because I distinctly remember seeing things like synchronized swimming and rhythmic gymnastics when I was a kid, but sports like that aren’t hitting primetime coverage.

Am I right?

And are you watching, too?

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Uh… before you dive into posts… follow Persnickety Chickadee’s link and find out your magical job.  I got wandmaker!  A real, live wandmaker!  I’m magic!

*******

Stop procrastinating.  Go make your backups.  Don’t have regrets.

Seriously.  Stop what you’re doing for a moment.  It will take you fifteen minutes, tops.  But you will have peace of mind for days and days.  It’s the gift to yourself that keeps on giving.

As always, add any new thoughts to the Friday Backup post and peruse new comments in order to find out about methods, plug-ins, and devices that help you quickly back up your data and accounts.

*******

And now the blogs…

But first, second helpings of the posts that appeared in the open comment thread last week.  In order to read the description before clicking over, please return to the open thread:

• None… sniff.

Okay, now my choices this week.

Different Shores has a post about people saying that being a mother is the best thing, usually a saying uttered by celebrities, as in, “My 55 Oscars are all meaningless next to my children.  Being a mother is the best thing in the world, and I would give up acting in a heartbeat.”  It’s not only an interesting post, but the comment section is jumping with conversation.  Go over and give your thoughts.

Bent Not Broken has a post about her husband connecting with another childless-after-infertility man.  She explains why this moment was important: “I found people I trusted and who I could share the good, the bad, and the ugly with.  Hubs never found that.”  It’s about those moments when you meet up with a “me, too” and it opens up something inside of you.

Lastly, a beautiful and moving post from Endlessness That You Fear about how her hands aren’t quite as full anymore after the loss of her son.  She writes, “So back then, my hands were full … Yesterday morning, someone held the front door of the daycare for me and said that I had my hands full. I just gave a half smile. They should have seen me before.”  Go over and give her support.

The roundup to the Roundup: Olympics starts tonight!  Woohoo!  Your weekly backup nudge.  And lots of great posts to read.  So what did you find this week?  Please use a permalink to the blog post (written between July 29th and August 5th) and not the blog’s main url. Not understanding why I’m asking you what you found this week?  Read the original open thread post here.

When the state of the world and the churning hate being pumped into the atmosphere are bringing you down, there is only one way to combat the negative: Purchase a copy of Steel Magnolias.

I talked the ChickieNob into watching it with me this week. She has grown up hearing me quote this movie all the time, so she sort of knew all the characters before it began. She loved it despite trying hard to hold the movie at arm’s length.

That movie (and the play, too) are sort of like Hallmark cards.  You know how most of the time, you just pick a card that feels pretty much on-target?  That’s other movies.  But Steel Magnolias is like finding the perfect card that says exactly what you’re trying to say but can’t put into words.

I love this movie so much.  I love its take on female friendships and mother-daughter relationships and the ways we grow and change.  I love that it can still make me cry, every single time.  I love that it says everything I want to say about the strength of women.

I’m keeping it on my phone for the time being.  Whenever the negativity starts bringing me down, I will queue it up and watch five minutes of M’Lynn and Ouiser and feel better about the world.

*******

Stop procrastinating.  Go make your backups.  Don’t have regrets.

Seriously.  Stop what you’re doing for a moment.  It will take you fifteen minutes, tops.  But you will have peace of mind for days and days.  It’s the gift to yourself that keeps on giving.

As always, add any new thoughts to the Friday Backup post and peruse new comments in order to find out about methods, plug-ins, and devices that help you quickly back up your data and accounts.

*******

And now the blogs…

But first, second helpings of the posts that appeared in the open comment thread last week.  In order to read the description before clicking over, please return to the open thread:

• “Privilege in the Infertility World” (No Kidding in NZ)
• “Near Misses” (My Path to Mommyhood)
• “Some Things That Bothered Me Lately” (My Path to Mommyhood)

Okay, now my choices this week.

Wild and Precious Life has a moving post about leaving her house and moving far away.  This is where she lived when her lost children were conceived, and where she lived when they died.  The space contains all those memories and serves as a tangible tie to S and G.  My throat tightened up reading the listing of memories.  She writes, “Where R and my sister and I laid in a jumble and passed out the day after my month in the hospital was over and our babies were really and forever gone.”

You must read A Woman My Age’s post about race and being a black woman.  “I’ve been raised to keep my mouth shut and avoid conflict.  Whether that’s because I’m female or because I’m a black female, it doesn’t matter.  Dress nice, speak nicely and keep money in your pocket or otherwise they will think you’re stealing.  That’s what my mother taught me.  And unconsciously, I’ve been training my son to do the same.”  It is such a powerful, powerful post.

Lastly, No Baby Ruth has a follow up after her MTHFR diagnosis.  While it’s good that she knows that she’s homozygous for C677T because it can affect more than fertility, she feels the weight of the diagnosis and wonders if she has it in her to continue on this family building path.  Again, for anyone who thinks getting a diagnosis makes things straightforward and simple, this post becomes a must-read so they can think again.

The roundup to the Roundup: Steel Magnolias is sometimes all you need.  Your weekly backup nudge.  And lots of great posts to read.  So what did you find this week?  Please use a permalink to the blog post (written between July 22nd and July 29th) and not the blog’s main url. Not understanding why I’m asking you what you found this week?  Read the original open thread post here.

We went to see the new Ghostbusters and LOVED it.  We showed the kids the original Ghostbusters because of the Ghostbusters levels in LEGO Dimensions, and they liked it.  But they loved this.  I think they got the jokes this time, whereas some of the stuff that made the original Ghostbusters funny went over their heads.

The best part was watching the ChickieNob’s face whenever Kate McKinnon was on the screen.  It was like someone discovering chocolate for the first time.  She has found her comedy hero.  And Leslie Jones was amazing.  She brought sweetness and exuberance to the film.

I rarely think a remake is better than the original, but due to better technology and a really funny script, they hit this out of the park.

Question for anyone else who has seen it: The Mayor lists three incidents that Americans were interested in and then forgot about.  The first was Roswell, the second was blank, and the third was a play on Ashley, Kansas.  (I think they called it Yardville, Utah where the people disappeared.)  What was the second item in that list?

*******

Stop procrastinating.  Go make your backups.  Don’t have regrets.

Seriously.  Stop what you’re doing for a moment.  It will take you fifteen minutes, tops.  But you will have peace of mind for days and days.  It’s the gift to yourself that keeps on giving.

As always, add any new thoughts to the Friday Backup post and peruse new comments in order to find out about methods, plug-ins, and devices that help you quickly back up your data and accounts.

*******

And now the blogs…

But first, second helpings of the posts that appeared in the open comment thread last week.  In order to read the description before clicking over, please return to the open thread:

• “Hospital Experience” (Persnickety Chickadee)
• “Make the Effort to Care” (No Kidding in NZ)

Okay, now my choices this week.

Not a Wasted Word details what happened during her week (mostly) without media.  I’ve never been moved to do this — I’m more likely to create an overdose week to combat the fact that I’ve read fewer books this year — but it was interesting to hear what happened to her as the week unfolded, as well as what happened when she could finally read again: “Yesterday morning I woke up excited to be able to read again, but quickly felt overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of words and ideas bouncing around in my head.”

No Baby Ruth writes about maybe finding a reason for loss, and that reason comes with other health implications.  I like this post because it brings into focus the enormity of infertility.  It’s often not a compartmentalized problem that people can choose to ignore, even if the general public sees it solely as an issue with family building.

I love this post by Raven Rambling detailing her nephew’s response to a picture she snapped of him while he was playing.  It was so brilliant that I don’t want to ruin it by trying to describe it.  Just click over and read it; I promise, it’s a brief post.

Lastly, Birds, Bees, and Medicine has a post about going for a vaginal ultrasound and feeling shy.  She muses at how you can grow accustomed to anything — including jumping into the stirrups half-naked — and then when you return to normal, how difficult it can be to give up your privacy again.  I like this post because I’ve never seen this discussed this way.  She explains, “We are taught to protect our personal privacy, then forced to learn to tolerate having this repeatedly violated, then return to the deeply entrenched privacy sense that we developed as children.”

The roundup to the Roundup: Ghostbusters rocked plus a question if you’ve seen it.  Your weekly backup nudge.  And lots of great posts to read.  So what did you find this week?  Please use a permalink to the blog post (written between July 15th and July 22nd) and not the blog’s main url. Not understanding why I’m asking you what you found this week?  Read the original open thread post here.

I’m not going to play Pokémon Go.  It sounds like something I would play, but I’m just… not feeling it. Maybe I’m in a video game cocooning moment right now, maybe I don’t love the idea of anything that makes me turn on location services on my phone, maybe I just don’t like the art.  I don’t know what it is, only that I am not going to play it.

But it sort of feels like I’m hanging out at the dog park without a dog every time I surf the Internet right now.  Every other headline is for Pokémon.

*******

Stop procrastinating.  Go make your backups.  Don’t have regrets.

Seriously.  Stop what you’re doing for a moment.  It will take you fifteen minutes, tops.  But you will have peace of mind for days and days.  It’s the gift to yourself that keeps on giving.

As always, add any new thoughts to the Friday Backup post and peruse new comments in order to find out about methods, plug-ins, and devices that help you quickly back up your data and accounts.

*******

And now the blogs…

But first, second helpings of the posts that appeared in the open comment thread last week.  In order to read the description before clicking over, please return to the open thread:

• “#MicroblogMondays: Calm Space” (Searching for Our Silver Lining)
• “That Was the Plan” (The OCD Infertile)

Okay, now my choices this week.

River Run Dry has a post about the computer version of your life that sort of blew my little mind.  Because we all peek at people’s walls on Facebook… but I guess I never thought about how people peek at mine.  I don’t know how I missed that idea, but I sort of only thought about that peeking flowing one way.  She asks a great question: “If she was looking at MY page right now, what story would she read?”  Go over and read the whole post and discuss.

Torthúil has a post about returning to the fertility clinic.  I love this attitude: “A meeting is the place to start, and putting it off wasn’t accomplishing anything.”  I think I like this post because it is just a slice of life: the logistics of assisted family building and the ducks you need to line up in a row.  Plus, the crocheted eggs are pretty much the cutest things I’ve seen all week, and I totally want to play with them.

Lastly, A+ Effort did an informal examination of race and social media, noting which status updates got the biggest response.  A picture from her daughter’s party: 150 likes!  A really great piece on white privilege… 10.  She ends her post with a simple request: “My words aren’t that important right now. If you don’t already, do me a favor, go read something from a person of color.”

The roundup to the Roundup: No Pokémon for me.  Your weekly backup nudge.  And lots of great posts to read.  So what did you find this week?  Please use a permalink to the blog post (written between July 8th and July 15th) and not the blog’s main url. Not understanding why I’m asking you what you found this week?  Read the original open thread post here.