The Las Vegas Children’s Book Festival

The Las Vegas Children's Book Festival, November 7, 2009

Yesterday, for the second year in a row, my wife and I took the kids to the annual Children’s Book Festival, sponsored by Target and part of the city’s larger Vegas Valley Book Festival. 

We agreed that out of all the local events we go to, this is our favorite. 

It’s held in the beautiful Centennial Plaza, which is hidden away downtown across the street from the federal courthouse, somehow all but invisible from the surrounding areas.  Parking was close, easy, free, and convenient.  Dozens of booths offered kids free books from charitable contributors, as well as private authors hawking their own excellent work, and crafts, gifts, and other activities thrown in for more fun.  Kids can get some free books, get their faces painted, and dance to the music piped in for the performers on a nearby stage. 

We got our gift bags and made the rounds, starting with a couple of free snow cones, and meeting some characters in costumes as we went.  My wife quickly found copies of the two volumes of The Chronicles of Narnia that we’re missing being given away.  There was an area off in one courtyard for the “grown up” authors and readers, where authors were doing readings and autographs.  The kids made bookmarks and coloring books at an arts and crafts booth.  A booth sponsored by UNLV gave away posters for their sports teams.  (I got three basketball posters–one for the boys’ room, one for my classroom, and one for my garage.) 

At the end of our tour was a stand giving out Hebrew National hot dogs.  We passed a great reproduction of the liberty bell on our way over.  As we sat by a water fountain in the shade for our lunch, a local children’s orchestra started playing.  The toppings available for our dogs even included jalapenos, and these were the sweetest ones I’d ever tasted.  

Two random children (possibly crazy people). Also, a big red dog.

I told my wife, “This is the kind of world I want my kids to grow up in,” then it got better: I noticed that the woman sitting next to us was wearing a T-shirt that said “Rearden Steel.”  I told her that I’m also a fan of Atlas Shrugged, and asked where she got the shirt.  She gave me a web site.  Here it is: www.johngaltgifts.com.

There were people there of many different races and ages, but clearly we all shared a love of reading.  There were plenty of people with multiple tattoos and piercings, but you know what?  I didn’t hear a single person swear.  Not once, the entire time.  Clearly, this cross-section of our diversity was the cream of the crop, the exceptions to my “judge a book by its cover” rule, and it made me happy that so much variety could exist when literacy and civility are the norm. 

Total cost of three hours of perfect family fun: zero dollars.

The weather was pleasant, the plaza was never crowded, and everything was spotless.  I hope this festival remains a secret.

Except for you.  I hope to see you there next year.  I’d like to enjoy this oasis of joy with my friends’ families. 

 

 

MSP: Second Class Requirement 8

8.  Participate in a school, community, or troop program on the dangers of using drugs, alcohol, and tobacco, and other practices that could be harmful to your health. Discuss your participation in the program with your family.

 

On Monday, I brought home a DVD from the library of a school documentary called Drug & Alcohol Awareness.  It was a very cheesy production, but short (only 20 minutes), and it gave us as a family a chance to discuss the dangers of substance abuse.  It got the job done. 

 

MSP: Second Class Requirements 3, 6c

3.  Participate in a flag ceremony for your school, religious institution, chartered organization, community, or troop activity.

I started our weekly family home evening this week with one of the younger kids helping me unfold the flag, which we then all saluted as I led us in the Pledge of Allegiance.  Another little kid helped me fold it back up. 

6c.  Demonstrate first aid for the following:

- Object in the eye

- Bite of a suspected rabid animal

- Puncture wounds from a splinter, nail, and fish hook

- Serious burns (partial thickness, or second degree)

- Heat exhaustion

- Shock

- Heatstroke, dehydration, hypothermia, and hyperventilation

We went through each of these in the handbook as a family, discussing bad advice/outdated methods that we had heard in the past for first aid.  We acted out the handbook’s methods and then had a quick oral quiz.  This is the kind of thing that we think is fun.  My family is awesome. 

Lest you think that October has been fairly unproductive for me, let me assure you that progress is being made.  I have dates set for camping and a service project in November.  I just got a book from the library about local animal life, and a DVD is on hold about drug abuse.  I’ll relate the stories of how each one goes as they come up in the next few weeks.

MSP: Second Class Requirements 7 a,b,c

Second Class Reqiurement 7:

1. Tell what precautions must be taken for a safe swim.
2. Demonstrate your ability to jump feet first into water over your head in depth, level off and swim 25 feet on the surface, stop, turn sharply, resume swimming, then return to your starting place.
3. Demonstrate water rescue methods by reaching with your arm or leg, by reaching with a suitable object, and by throwing lines and objects. Explain why swimming rescues should not be attempted when a reaching or throwing rescue is possible, and explain why and how a rescue swimmer should avoid contact with the victim.

I wish I’d looked at this sooner.  Now I have to go swimming in October. 

This afternoon I called a family friend who has a pool.  When I asked if I could come over and jump in for a bit, she said it was fine, but asked if I was sure.  “It’s really cold!” she said.  Yes, even in Las Vegas, pools get cold in October.

I picked my son up from school this afternoon and told him that we were going to make a quick stop to work on one of my Scout activities.  His main reaction was that he wanted to dunk his head in the pool. 

First, I did requirements a and c, which did not make me get in the water.  Yet.  I summarized the handbook’s rules for safe swimming and demonstrated how to rescue a swimmer in trouble. 

Then it was show time.  I regret now just how long I stood at the edge of the pool and hesitated before jumping in.  I was pretty afraid of the cold. 

Finally I did.  The cold didn’t hit me until I broke back up to the surface.  I swam the length of the pool and back with a loud gasp from the chill every time I took a breath. 

I figure if I’m going to follow in the footsteps of Boy Scouts as much as possible, I should probably get used to occasionally getting into very cold water.  It actually felt a lot better as soon as I got out.  In fact, mostly to make up for my sad hesitating before jumping in, I jumped in again and did another lap.  I still hesitated, but not quite as long, which is something, at least.  My son almost missed that second try, as he was busy dunking his head. 

I found out soon after that the water was 62°.  This experience at least let me teach my son by example an important principle that he probably gets tired of hearing me preach: suffering builds character.

Journals For Little Kids

Eight years ago I had the idea to sit my little kids down each week and talk to them about whatever was on their mind.  I would type what they said as they spoke, and that would be their journal.  It’s been a huge success.  I’ve started with each kid when they are two and can communicate in cogent sentences.  As the oldest two got to be about seven or eight years old, they started keeping their own journals, but these first, early journals have been priceless. 

Not many people can say they have journals going back to when they were two years old. 

My younger daughter loves it so much that she asks to write in her journal almost constantly.  She just turned five and already has 29 single spaced pages written. 

As they get older, sometimes the kids will ask why they should keep journals, and then I just pull up these files and we look up whatever they wrote around this time of year throughout their lives.  Two days ago, my oldest son went back and looked up his thoughts about a Jimmy Neutron costume he wore five years ago. 

It’s because of these journals that I know what my oldest daughter, now 12, was thinking about on Saturday, October 20, 2001, when we started doing this: “Today I don’t feel good.  My tummy hurts.  I love to go swimming.  I love my Ellie.”

MSP: Requirements 4a, 6, 11, 12b, & 13-14 = Tenderfoot Done!

I ended up doing exactly what I planned NOT to do: I waited until the last week of my scheduled time to finish the requirements for this rank.  I could have done it earlier, and I had wanted to add the extra time to my next rank, but life got the better of me. 

6. Demonstrate how to display, raise, lower, and fold the American flag.  Last week I emailed the principal of my kids’ school and asked if we could use the flagpole for this demonstration tonight, adding that I have my own flag to use.  He wrote back that it was fine, and this was the first activity in my family’s weekly home evening tonight.

As we drove over, I recounted all the material from the handbook about displaying the flag.  When we got there, I showed the kids how to fold and unfold it, then one kid helped me attach it to the line, while the little kids helped me hoist it up and then down again.  While it flew at the top for a minute, we decided to recite the Pledge of Allegiance.  Afterwards, the oldest child folded the flag, as I had shown them all, while I held the other end. 

11.  Identify local poisonous plants; tell how to treat for exposure to them.  I went over the handbook’s section on this, adding my own warning about oleander, which are very popular in Las Vegas.  Of course, one kid pointed out that it was unlikely that any of us would ever eat one. 

David O. McKay’s “Ten Rules For Happiness”

I love this list, from former LDS Church President David O. McKay (1873-1970):

 

TEN RULES OF HAPPINESS
By President David O. McKay

1. Develop yourself by self-discipline.
2. Joy comes through creation — sorrow through destruction. Every living thing can grow: Use the world wisely to realize soul growth.
3. Do things which are hard to do.
4. Entertain upbuilding thoughts. What you think about when you do not have to think shows what you really are.
5. Do your best this hour, and you will do better the next.
6. Be true to those who trust you.
7. Pray for wisdom, courage, and a kind heart.
8. Give heed to God’s messages through inspiration. If self-indulgence, jealousy, avarice, or worry have deadened your response, pray to the Lord to wipe out these impediments.
9. True friends enrich life. If you would have friends, be one.
10. Faith is the foundation of all things — including happiness.

Priorities

Thinking of this always gives me a little comfort:

I have two credit cards and a debit card.  I use them so rarely that, if you showed me the numbers on any of them, I wouldn’t recognize them. 

However, I have my 14-digit library card number memorized.

Life is good.

Cherish the Living

A student in one of my classes killed himself last night.  The news was delivered in a staff meeting held before school started today. 

 

He was clearly in a bad place in life, but not visibly any more so than many of his peers.  Just in these first four weeks, he missed more classes than he attended, was late to a couple of others, and always appeared very tired.  He was uninvolved in his work in class, missing most of it, but he did do some of it, and he did it pretty well (if he were only being graded on the work he’d turned in, he’d have a B).  He asked me questions a few times, and I could tell that he was bright and mature; he just seemed unmotivated. 

 

His father actually emailed me a couple of weeks ago, asking how his son was doing.  I responded that the young man had been missing a lot of class.  After that, he came a little more often.  Today I thought of replying to that address again to offer my condolences to the father, but I haven’t done it.  I’m not sure it would be appropriate.  He has too much grief on his mind to care about noticing the sympathy of strangers. 

 

I have no idea why this boy committed suicide.  I assumed the reason for the disconnect between his apparent potential and his substandard performance was drugs.  His appearance was that of a typical stoner, and it would explain the sleepiness.  I could be wrong, and I hope I was.  Surely, I can see now, his problems must have gone deeper than that.  I’ll never know what the story was there, but even though I didn’t really know this kid at all—I only ever saw him four or five times—I was shocked to hear about his death.  Suicide is always shocking; the death of young people always tragic.

 

MSP: Tenderfoot Requirements 8, 10b, and 12a

Yes, I have been working on my project, but I’ve been very busy with school starting.  Here’s what progress I’ve made recently:

8.  Know your patrol name, give the patrol yell, and describe your patrol flag.

Since my patrol is my family, I figured our patrol name would be “The Huston Family.”  Silly me.  When I discussed this with everyone, we had just watched an old episode of a certain great 80’s show that we’d borrowed from the library, so everybody quickly decided that we would call ourselves “The H-Team.”  Our yell is based on an old inside joke we share–when people ask for comments or feedback from us, we respond with the most random, inane thing we can imagine: “I like pie.”  This is our yell.  “I like pie!”  Inspiring, no?  Surely it will strike fear into the hearts of any opponents that we might meet in some game. 

We brainstormed a list of things that should be on our flag, and I slapped some related clip art together from the list.  We made our list last Monday, but I just made the “flag” today (in Microsoft Paint).  A copy is printed up and “flying” on the wall of our kitchen.  Here it is:

  

MSP: Tenderfoot Requirements 4b and 9

In our weekly family home evening yesterday, I did something that I think the family will have to get used to–I spent a few minutes demonstrating Scout stuff so I could check it off. 

First I explained why we use the buddy system (requirement #9), then I showed how to tie a double half hitch and a taut line hitch.  I used a cheap little nylon rope that came with some camping stuff and which I’d never used. 

As I tied my knots, I told the kids that when we went to Lake Powell with their grandparents last week, I tried to help anchor the boat by tying a couple of ropes together with a square knot.  I did this twice, and one of them came out as soon as it was pulled.  I thought I’d gotten it right, but maybe the ropes were just too big for that to work.  I was a little discouraged by that, but then on Saturday this knot practice really paid off.

We went out to eat with our kids and they were each offered a balloon.  They’re too small to handle balloons reliably on their own without losing them and crying as the colorful toys float away, so I usually just tie the string around their wrists loosely, but in a simple knot that can’t be undone.  This time, for the first time, I was able to do better.  I tied the strings with a taut line hitch, and slipped the loops over their wrists.  They could adjust them, and take them on and off when needed (like in the van), but they stayed on with no problem when we wanted them to. 

As I told my kids about the practical value of knot tying and showed the family what I’d learned, my wife smiled at me.  But then I had to untie my practice rope from the leg of her piano.

A Beautiful View of Lake Powell

My family and I got to spend a few days at beautiful Lake Powell recently, courtesy of the in-laws.  I got to see the amazing Rainbow Bridge (I snapped a shot of two of my kids standing in front of the arch) and the awe inspiring narrows of Cathedral Canyon (I wish I’d taken pictures of those–only a few feet on either side of your boat are sheer cliffs towering up for over a hundred feet), but my favorite sight was of an obscure little indenture in a rock wall.

We anchored the houseboat in one of the deep coves on the left going into Last Chance Bay, and after I discovered the joy of kayaking, I went into the end of the cove and saw that the southeast corner had an even deeper recess that twisted in a bit and went further into the rock.  Wondering if it might be a cave, I went in to have a look.  It wasn’t a cave, but what I saw surprised me even more.  That deep recess was rounded and the bottom twenty five feet or so went back even deeper into the corner, for about another fifteen feet, forming a perfect, natural amphitheater, with the wall gently sloping toward the water.  I tried to capture its grandeur, but neither my camera nor my skill were quite up to it–I wish you could see a panorama of how well it wraps around you, and appreciate that the rock above you reaches up for at least ten stories.  Here are a few pictures; perhaps between them you can get a good idea of what I saw.

It was incredibly peaceful in there.  However, I wonder why nobody’s ever thought of putting some floating barges in and having a little concert–it would be a perfect venue.  Well, it’s probably for the best that it remain mostly untouched. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Beautiful Bird Discovered

Not “discovered” in the sense that I saw it first, but in the sense that I’ve seen it for the first time myself.

When our family was camping in the mountains a couple of weeks ago, I was the first one awake and went out to get the fire started.  As I sat around for a while, I saw the most colorful bird I’ve ever seen in nature flit by the camp, stopping to peck at the ground, then zipping up to the top of a nearby tree, then diving down to a little shrub next to our tent to look around.  Then, he was joined by several of his friends.  As the kids started to wake up, they got to see some of these birds, too.

When we got home, I googled the best description I could come up with: “bird with yellow breast and red head.”  Amazingly, I found what I was looking for right away: the bird was a Western Tanager.  Here’s the picture from Wikipedia:

 

I especially liked this line from that entry: “…when a non-birder tells a birder, “I saw the most amazing bird!” the birder can guess it was a male of this species.”  I’m proof of that!

I’ve never been a bird watcher, but perhaps I’ll pursue that merit badge when I get to that part of my Man Scout Project.

Six Summer Goals Achieved

You know how you always look forward to time off, and make grandiose plans for sucking the marrow out of every second, and then when the time finally comes you invariably squander it?  I do that constantly, but summer is the worst.  This year I decided to break down some of my larger goals and focus on making small progress on some of them. 

On May 22, I wrote a list of 27 things to do this summer.  I gave myself until the last day before I would go back to work–August 18–to do them.  Now, two of them were very poorly planned, so I really had 25 things to do. 

Out of those 25, I did 6.  A few others were close or in progress, but only 6 can be confidently checked off. 

Still, sadly, that makes this my most productive summer ever.

Here are the six things I did:

MSP: Tenderfoot Requirements 1, 2, 3, and 7

This weekend we went camping specifically to test the readiness of our family’s 72-hour emergency kits.  We spent 24 hours with little else at the gorgeous Old Mill campground in the Spring Mountains area.  I thought this would be my best opportunity to do the first three requirements for the rank I’m working on.

1.  Present yourself, properly dressed, before going on an overnight camping trip.  Show the gear you will use.  Show the right way to pack  and carry it.  I dressed for warm weather for obvious reasons, with a pair of old work boots I rarely wear, which I now realize are too small and need to be switched out for a real pair of hiking boots.  I’ll check at Deseret Industries for some.  As we packed our backpacks with the relatively sparse supplies that would constitute our emergency kits, we discussed what was essential, including our tent and sleeping bags, our food and water, and our tools.  The packing was difficult and taught us a lot about saving space and making priorities.  I tried to make my bag look like the picture in the handbook.  Good packing is a lot like playing Tetris. 

2.  Spend at least one night on a patrol or troop campout.  Sleep in a tent you have helped pitch.  It was a very enjoyable campout, though since we were trying to skimp on supplies, we didn’t have any padding for our bedding.  I was surprised to wake up not very sore at all.  I pitched the tent myself since my wife was busy preparing lunch and watching the baby.  Did you know that seven people can sleep almost comfortably in a 9′x7′ tent?  It helps when five of them are children, and nobody minds snuggling up.