On Second Thought …

Although I don’t think I’ll be posting every weekday as I was before, I have decided to start writing on this blog regularly again. If I can figure out how to do feedburner or something nifty like that, you can sign up to be notified whenever I’ve updated.

Here are some topics I plan on tackling in upcoming posts, beginning this Monday (May 5th):

- Living Parallel Lives (how tv and computers can interfere with your marriage)

- Taking Risks

- Believing in Beliefs vs. Following Jesus

- How Dating Your Spouse Makes a Difference to Your Kids

Hope you’ll tune in!

Mandy

Book Reviews Updated

I’ve been long overdue in updating my book reviews, and I’ve been a frequent guest at the library lately.

Recently added reviews (in no particular order, just what’s popping into my head!):

The Glass Castle
As I Lay Dying
The Whistling Season
Of Mice and Men
A Separate Peace

Coming soon:

The Memory Keeper’s Daughter
Light in August

Updates

I just posted a list of my favorite dates at Weekend Kindness. Click here to check it out.

If you want to see my current article in Marriage Partnership magazine, click here. You can read it in its entirely online.

And if you have an overwhelming urge to plunk down actual money to read my writing, you can click here to buy a copy of Chicken Soup for the Adopted Soul, which includes my piece, “Adoption Means….” (Weird side note: in the Contributors section, I am listed as “Amanda Brown Houk,” and alphabetized under “B,” making it nearly impossible to find me if you’re looking for “Mandy Houk.” What’s even weirder? When I searched for “Mandy Houk” on Amazon to find the link to the book for this post, I discovered that I am included in the Contributor section of Chicken Soup for the Soul: A Tribute to Moms. In this edition, I am listed correctly, as “Mandy Houk.” The problem? I don’t have any articles in that edition! Puzzling …)

As for this particular blog, I have decided to update it periodically, so if you can figure out how to get email notification of updates, let me know so I can post it here. (I don’t even know if that’s an available option!) In the next couple of days, I will be adding some new entries to the Book Reviews page, so look for that.

Thanks for visiting!

Stepping Down

If you have followed this blog at all, you’ll have noticed the recent sudden drop in new posts. You’ll also recall that I’ve posted a few times about my struggle to balance blogging with wifing and parenting and home schooling and writing and teaching high school.

I have never been a gifted multi-tasker. As a result, I have lately felt very much like over-pulled taffy. I’m stretched in so many different directions, I am virtually useless in all of them.

In addition, I have found that I am a groovy writer. Which means that I get into very deep grooves in my writing habits and find it difficult to jump between them. When I am in a nonfiction (bloggy) groove, it is nearly impossible for me to jump out of that, into a fiction groove. Which makes any attempt at working on my second novel extremely frustrating.

So I have decided that I cannot continue to update this blog with any regularity. I will not delete it since I find that I still get several hits from search engines each day. I will update the Book Review page as I find new books that deserve a recommendation. And I will happily let you know whenever I have a new article out (like the one in the current issue of Marriage Partnership Magazine), or if I ever wind up with my own book on a bookshelf near you.

As for blogging, I have been invited to be a guest author and editor on www.weekendkindness.net, where I will post articles on marriage approximately once per month. I hope you’ll check it out.

Thank you for your readership, whether you’ve been here once in your life, once a week, or once a day.

Out of the Game

Observant visitors might have noticed that I took down my “I Like Mike” banner in the sidebar today. I have emailed the campaign as well, letting them know that they should remove me from their blogroll.

I removed the banner for two reasons:

1. I am not as certain as I once was that I support Mike Huckabee.

2. I never meant to write a political blog in the first place.

Because of #2, I won’t get into the details of #1. But for my parting shot, here is a list of my top three candidates, in order of personal preference–which does not necessarily match the order of their chances of getting nominated.

1. Duncan Hunter

2. Fred Thompson

3. John McCain

The Man Has Figured Me Out

I have this horrible paradox in my personality:  I love surprises and hate it when they’re blown.  But I also compulsively try to figure things out, even when I have next to no information to work with.

Many times over our almost sixteen years together (that counts dating), Pete has said seemingly benign things about gifts he’s gotten for me, or surprises he was planning.  Without fail, though half of me wants desperately to leave the thing alone, my overactive little mind has worked the puzzle until the secret is no longer a secret and the element of surprise is obliterated.

But this Christmas, everything is different.

First of all, he apparently got my present more than two weeks ago.  I hadn’t even found one for him yet.  That’s remarkable from the guy who bought his brother’s birthday gift (a t-shirt) about two hours before we lit the candles on the cake.

More importantly, he has been astonishingly, admirably, stubbornly mum.  All I have heard from him, after the initial admission that my gift has been purchased, is the mumbled sentence fragment, “Don’t know.”

“Where is it?”

“Don’t know.”

“Is it in your car?”

“Don’t know.”

“Have you wrapped it yet?”

Head shake.

“Is it a weird shape or something?  Is that why you haven’t wrapped it?  Are you having trouble finding a box or a bag for it?”

“Don’t know.”

The man will not even look at me during the mumblings because he knows that I can interpret the tiniest smile or twinkle in his eyes.

Frustration has never been so much fun.