The Paper Dart
An ode to creativity and distraction

Best Halloween Books for Toddlers and Young Children

I love a good holiday, and I have always particularly loved Halloween. There is something about dressing in costume that feels so freeing to me. When I’m Miss Frizzle, or Edgar Allan Poe, or a cow (yes, I did that one once), I don’t feel the same pressure to be “normal” that I do in my everyday life. Halloween is a day where we have complete freedom to be our most ridiculous selves, make each other laugh, and throw our healthy eating habits out the window.

Since having kids of my own, my love of Halloween has only grown. On Margot’s first Halloween, she dressed up as an astronaut, and was undoubtedly the cutest baby in America. I will also never forget the way she looked at her daycare teacher when she walked into the room that morning dressed as a full-blown robot. Her expression was the picture of delight, and surprise and I adored being able to live vicariously through her innocent eyes for that moment, and the rest of the day.

As my kids have grown, I have enjoyed getting to extend the holiday by creating some of our own Halloween traditions. We decorate the house, go pumpkin picking, make cookies and haunted gingerbread houses, and, most importantly, read a lot of Halloweeny books.

Below, I have complied a list of our current favorite Halloween books, both for my older daughter, Margot (3.5), and my younger son, Max, (1.5). I hope you enjoy learning about our favorite spooky tales, and let me know in the comments if there is anything else I should pick up and add to the rotation next year!

Margot’s Picks (For Older Toddlers):

Stumpkin:

This is one of our favorite Halloween books, and a book that will surely stay on our shelves well after the holiday itself ends. In this delightfully illustrated story, Stumpkin finds himself competing with his companions for a chance to be bought, transported to the apartment building across the street, and made into a jack-o-lantern. Stumpkin is a nearly perfect pumpkin, but is missing a stump, and by the time Halloween rolls around, even the gourd (!) has been chosen before him. In the end, Stumpkin’s dream still manages to come true, and the author leaves us with a lovely message about appreciating the home, and life, you already have, instead of spending too much time longing for something else.

Room On The Broom

This adorable rhyming book is written by Julia Donaldson, the author of everyone’s favorite kid’s book: The Gruffalo. The story follows a friendly witch who always has room on her broom for a new friend or two. After collecting quite the menagerie of companions, the witch encounters a frightening dragon who is thrilled to have found his dinner. However, the witch’s new friends are more than willing to return the kindness she bestowed on them, and come up with a pretty creative method of saving their friend.

The Little Kitten

This book is beautifully illustrated, and includes carefully placed cutouts that create stunning continuity between one page and the next. The trees and houses are embossed with shiny gold, and my daughter loves tracing the outlines of the leaves with her fingers as I read.

The story follows a young girl and her cat as they traipse through the woods, only to stumble upon another cat who appears to be lost. The young girl delivers the lost cat to it’s home, but soon realizes that she has left her own cat behind and is now lost herself. In the end, everyone finds their way home, and the young girl is rewarded for her thoughtfulness by a very special (and magical) neighbor.

Gustavo The Shy Ghost

There are so many things I love about this book. Firstly, the protagonist, Gustavo, reminds me a lot of myself as a kid: I was quiet, and shy, and felt a little bit invisible sometimes. But I also think that every kid, not just the shy ones, would be able to relate in some way to Gustavo’s plight of not being “seen” by his peers.

In the story, Gustavo is in love with the “prettiest” girl in town, who also happens to be invisible: an adorable detail that makes me laugh out loud every time I read it.

Throughout the story, Gustavo learns that he doesn’t have to be loud, or chatty, or particularly funny in order to connect with his peers. In fact, it’s the things that make him different, that actually end up making his friends love him the most. It is honestly the sweetest book, and would be an excellent gift for the lovably shy child in your life.

Gilbert the Ghost

This is another heartwarming book about a little ghost who doesn’t quite fit in. He doesn’t like to shriek or scare but is, instead, a little too polite. It’s a sweet story about being different, and still fitting in, and is another one that could stay on the family shelf well after Halloween.

Creepy Pair of Underwear

This book is an actual hoot. First of all, I’m pretty sure it’s impossible for a toddler not to love a book that has the word “underwear” on every page. Also, I’m almost positive that every parent has, or will have, the exact shopping experience from the opening scene of this book with their own child.

The story follows a young bunny named Jasper whose mom wants to buy him the plain, white underwear, but who insists on purchasing the creepy underwear since he is, after all, “not a baby” anymore. However, that night, Jasper realizes that maybe he isn’t as grown up as he thought he was, and that the creepy underwear is actually pretty creepy.

Shenanigans ensue as Jasper tries to rid himself of the creepy underwear, and the twist at the end is both sweet, and laugh-out-loud funny.

Frankenstein: A Monstrous Parody

We are huge Madeline fans in this house, so I was nothing short of thrilled when I discovered this book. It’s a parody of the classic Madeline story, but instead of little french girls living in a house covered in vines, the story follows a group of monsters in a house covered in spines. It is adorable and brings a huge smile to my face every time I read it.

It’s The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown

I don’t think there’s much I need to say about this one. It’s a classic, with a great movie to accompany it, and is a lovely way to introduce youngsters to the whimsical world of Charlie Brown. It’s full of shenanigans and “poor Charlie Brown moments,” and a few sweet examples of the strength of childhood friendships and sibling bonds. A classic, and a fun read for both kids and adults.

Max’s Picks (For Younger Toddlers):

Plumply, Dumply Pumpkin

This is a sweet rhyming book about looking for the perfect pumpkin. (Spoiler alert: it has to be plumply and dumply!) It’s full of fun illustrations and “suspense” as readers wait to find out what on earth the protagonist is going to do with this perfect pumpkin. We have this one in board book form and it has been a favorite of both of my children when they were in the 1.5-2.5 age rage.

Little Blue Truck’s Halloween

Little Blue Truck can do no wrong. I find that all of the Little Blue Truck books are great for 1-2 year olds, as they have lots of flaps, and opportunities for kids to point out, name, and count, animals and landmarks.

This iteration follows the little blue truck as he picks up his now costumed animal friends on their way a Halloween party. The flaps allow kids to discover who is beneath each costume, and my son squeals with delight every time he discovers a cow or a duck.

EEk! Halloween!

Sandra Boynton never disappoints, and Eek! Halloween is no exception. This is a book that we keep out on the shelf all year long, and it is so much fun to read aloud. In the story, a group of chickens are experiencing Halloween through innocent eyes, and are a bit alarmed by the day’s happenings. They find themselves surrounded by ghosts and monsters, and are about to reach peak panic mode when the narrator tells them to “relax silly chickens, it’s Halloween!” My kids and I always make a lot of noise when reading this book, and it’s the actual best.

Spooky Pookie

This is another very cute Sandra Boynton book about a little piggy named Pookie who is choosing a Halloween costume with his mom. He tries out a bunch of adorable choices before landing on a classic that ends up “spooking” his own mother. A delightful read, and a real hit with the littlest littles.

And that’s all for this year folks! I hope you all have a fun, safe and very spooky Halloween, full of costumes, candy, and lots and lots of books!

Creating Family Board Books With Pinhole Press

When I sent Margot to daycare for the first time, her teacher asked me to send a photo album (or, as she called it, a “family book”), containing pictures of all the important people in Margot’s life.

Pinhole Press Custom Board Book

The book was supposed to be a kind of comfort object, and a resource Margot could use to practice her social communication skills. At the time, I didn’t know about Pinhole Press (and I was a little overwhelmed by the whole idea of daycare in general), so I did the easiest thing: I bought a small photo album from CVS, and hastily filled it with printed photos of Dan and I, our dog, and some important friends and family members.

Margot absolutely adored this photo album. She loved pointing out our faces, and telling her teachers, and her classmates, our names. It was the first thing she wanted to show us at back-to-school night, and remains one of her prize possessions to this day. However, when the book finally made its way back to me, it was very beat up. the flimsy pages and printed photos didn’t stand up well to the test of time, and several of the photos have ripped, shifted position, or fallen out entirely.

Recently, when I was in the market to replace said photo book, I learned about a lovely little company called Pinhole Press. There are a lot of companies out there that make photo books, and a lot who do a so-so job of it. But when I stumbled across Pinhole Press’s Photo Board Book offerings, I was hooked.

As I looked through the sample offerings, I decided that I could do more than just put together a collection of pictures for my kids too look at. Instead, I could use my favorite snapshots of our time together over the last six months to tell a story of all the positive and hopeful things that have come out of the never-ending crisis that is 2020, both as a way for my kids to look back on the experience, and as a reminder for myself to be grateful for all the good this year has brought us.

The board book template allowed me to tell a story, and create a product that was sturdy enough for my two toddlers to “read” on their own. The templates are beautifully designed, and easy to customize. Once I had chosen the pictures I wanted to include, creating the book was incredibly straight-forward (even for an easily frustrated technology user like myself).

When the book arrived in the mail this week, my children were thrilled. They both squealed with delight when they saw their own faces on the cover, and immediately cuddled up together on the couch to read it. (I think it is important to note here that this kind of peaceful, cooperative play is not always the norm for them…)

My youngest son, Max, is 19 months old, and is in a phase of rapid language acquisition. I don’t think I can fully explain how exciting it was to watch him flip the pages of the book, point to every face, and yell the person’s name to his sister. While much of what he says is unintelligible, even his sister was able to praise him when he pointed out things like “pizza,” “goats,” and “glasses”–words that aren’t normally part of his daily vocabulary, but which were within reach for him due to his memory of the events he was seeing unfold in the book.

Our little board book ends with what has been, for my family, the best (albeit, for me, most nauseating) part of 2020: a picture of our third baby, who is currently cooking away in mom’s belly.

I know that this book will be a treasured keepsake, both for my kids, and myself, for a long time. I also know that it will be far from the last book I make with Pinhole Press, as I am already planning a few holiday gifts for friends and family members.

In addition to their board books, Pinhole Press offers a host of other products, such as photo memory games, puzzles, calendars, and wall decor. It has been such a lovely company to work with, and I can not recommend them enough.

If you would like to create a board book of your own (or anything else with your kids’ faces on it!), visit Pinhole Press, and use code THEPAPERDART15 for 15% off your order. Happy creating!

Reflections of a Teacher Turned Stay-At-Home-Mom

The pandemic turned me into a stay-at-home-mom, and I’m not sure how I feel about it.

This past week was hard. My son, now almost 19 months old, is still in the midst of a seemingly never-ending sleep regression. Not only was is he refusing to go to bed, but he has also figured out how to climb out of his crib—in his sleep-sack no less. For his own safety, and as something of a last-ditch effort to encourage him to sleep independently, we transitioned him from a crib, to a toddler bed. While we are now able to put him to bed, lock the baby gate, and enjoy a relatively quiet, child-free moment in the living room, he still putters around him room until about 9 p.m., “reading” books, and singing about trucks.

Had this scenario happened last year, I would probably have thrown in the towel around 7 p.m. I would have placed the squirmy toddler in Dan’s lap, grabbed my backpack and laptop and announced that I was off the clock. Last year, when I was teaching full-time, the post-bedtime evening hours were crucial. I had to make sure lessons were prepped, grading was finished, and my email inbox was cleared out. It was stressful, no doubt, and I didn’t always want to crack the computer back open, but it was also somewhat freeing. There was a clear line in the sand where my “mothering” duties ended, and my breadwinner responsibilities began. I could clock out of one job and into another without feeling guilty, and never (read: rarely) resented my husband, Dan, when he did the same.

During the years when I was a working mother, Dan and I engaged in many a crucial conversation concerning how we could carve out a relatively egalitarian division of responsibilities at home. While this may be an unpopular opinion, I believe that there are fundamental differences in the ways in which men’s and women’s brains work—especially when it comes to planning and preparing household tasks. Figuring out how to work around these differences, and make sure that we both felt appreciated and seen, was not easy, but I think we did pretty good job of it.

But when the roles suddenly shifted, I had a difficult time figuring out what needed to change, and what didn’t. Parenting small children is a full-time job. It’s also the kind of job where you can feel like you are racing from task to task all day, working harder than you ever worked at your “real” job, only to find that it’s 5 p.m., your child is crying, you never did get to that mounting pile of laundry, and the kitchen is definitely not clean enough to cook dinner in.

This week, as I lay on my son’s floor at 8 p.m. (because, having spent every hour of the last six months with “mama,” no one else would do), I thought a lot about the boundaries I used to have. While I am filled with absolute gratitude for the fact that Dan is able to support our family in this incredibly difficult time, and that I get to snuggle my baby to sleep at night without worrying about answering emails or grading papers, and that I don’t have to deal with the myriad of completely unreasonable demands being placed on classroom teachers right now, I also feel a little bit lost.

I miss being able to kiss my children goodbye, and know that they are going to be loved, challenged, and well-cared for by their daycare teachers. I miss stopping at the Starbucks drive-through on my way to work, and treating myself to a latte with money that I earned myself. I miss chatting with other adults in the teacher’s lounge while I make copies in the morning. I miss teaching, and putting my three, well-earned degrees to use. I miss picking my kids up at the end of the day, and smothering them with kisses, and feeling recharged enough to be truly engaged in their nonsense stories about things they may or may not have actually done that day.   

I don’t say any of this to romanticize what it’s like to be a working mother. In fact, some of the major differences I have noticed since not going back to work, are that I have a much better handle on my anxiety, I sleep better, and I feel like I have only one job (albeit one that never ends), as opposed to two. In many ways, I found being a working mother, especially in the field of education, totally unsustainable. But I still wish there was a middle ground: a place where I could do both, and not feel like I was constantly struggling to breathe.

I read an amazing book recently, called To Have And To Hold, by Molly Millwood, and would recommend it to any mother, but particularly those who are grappling with work-life balance, and the sharing of responsibilities at home. Millwood is a mother, and a therapist, who has spent her career working with couples, and new mothers. Her honesty about the reality of parenting and the effect it can have on a couple’s relationship is so refreshing, and made me feel validated in seen in so many of the experiences I have had over the past several years.

In the chapter entitled “It Takes A Village to Raise a Mother,” Millwood talks about the system the U.S. government set up in 1945 to support mothers who had to go back to work while their husbands were at war. She talks about the “multipurpose centers” where women could drop off their children, AND THEIR LAUNDRY, on their way to work, and then return to pick up, not only their children and clean laundry, but also a home-cooked meal. To be totally honest, I cried when I read this. As most mothers know, working or not, this scenario is an absolute dream.

Millwood’s contention is that, as working motherhood has become more of a norm, our society has begun to view it as “normal,” and even “desirable.” Thus, we have also come to see working motherhood as something inherently sustainable: If so many other mothers do it, why can’t you?

However, Millwood also says that “there remains a significant discrepancy between mother and father in terms of how much the baby occupies mental and emotional space.” While mothers may find freedom and fulfillment in going to work, they aren’t necessarily letting go of a disproportionate level of responsibility for their children, and this can often lead to feelings of overwhelm and resentment.

Basically, you’re damned if you do, and damned if you don’t, and despite the fact that I read books about these issues, journal about them, and engage in deep conversations with my friends and family, I still don’t really know what the right answer is. At the current moment, I am filled with gratitude for this time with my children, but I also can’t really imagine not going back to work. A part of me wishes I was in the classroom, but an even bigger part knows that the stress of it would be (and was), detrimental to my physical and emotional health.

What I do know, however, is that something needs to change. Women run the world; honestly, and truly we do. Men may make more money, and are in more positions of power, but women do literally everything else. It’s about time that society, employers, our government, and all the people who depend on both the paid and unpaid work of women take a closer look at the current system and the ways in which it’s failing us, before this pandemic, and our culture in general, turns the conundrum of modern womanhood into an absolute crisis.

If you are feeling similarly, I am an open book, and am ALWAYS willing to chat. My DMs are open @thepaperdart, or you can leave a comment below. And if you are a mother, or know a mother who is struggling, I cannot recommend Millwood’s book enough. You can purchase it from the link below, or find it at my bookshop.org page.

Happy reading, happy mothering, and happy everything else you do.

XO, Katherine

The Book: Click to Purchase

The Paper Dart

What My Kids Are Reading: The Paper Flower Tree

The summer before sixth grade, I was still pretty hopeful that my letter to Hogwarts was coming in the mail. I knew that my older brother probably wasn’t a wizard, or he would’ve been able to “magic” himself out of all the trouble he got into. My little brother might have been a wizard, but only because he had glasses, and a neighborhood kid had once told him he looked like Harry Potter. If anyone in the family really deserved to be a witch—really had the potential for magic—it was me.

When the first day of sixth grade arrived and I had not, in fact, received a visit from Hagrid, or an owl from Dumbledore, I wouldn’t say I was crushed. In my heart of hearts, I knew that none of it was real. In fact, at that point in time, I had already met J.K. Rowling herself (and yes, I am no longer the fan of hers I once was), and I knew for a fact that she was a mere mortal like myself. I knew that she had created the fantasy land where lonely, forgotten children were suddenly transported into a world of adventure, danger, and heroism, out of the depths of her very human, albeit extraordinary, imagination, and that I was going to have to continue to muddle through muggle school for another 7 years.

Yet in spite of this fact, I had still held on to a shred of hope—even up to that last look back at our mailbox as I hopped in the car. I refused to stop believing because even when we know that something is fake, or a fantasy, or a figment of your own, or someone else’s imagination, the idea of it can still liven up our lives a little bit, and infuse whimsy, wonder and magic into the sometimes mundane business of the everyday.

As I grew up, I didn’t always allow myself to suspend disbelief in this way. By the time I reached high school, I still loved to escape into books, but I also started learning how to mask my sensitivity and insecurity with sarcasm and cynicism. By the time I was an adult, I had practiced myself into a pretty negative outlook on life—always more certain that the worst would happen, than hopeful for the best.

Becoming a parent made me reflect on a lot of things, the most significant of which was my own perspective on the world, and the way I express that to others—both intentionally, and not. When I think of the character traits I want to gift my daughter, cynicism and negativity definitely don’t make list. Instead, I would love to show her that even grown-ups can be happy, hopeful, dreamers, who still believe that their wildest dreams are possible. I would love for my daughter to hold on to her sense of wonder and imagination, and to always see the world as a magical place, even when it tries to prove itself otherwise.  

The Paper Flower Tree by Jacqueline Ayer is a story about a girl named Miss Moon who refuses to see the world through anything other than rose-colored glasses. When a travelling caravan of artists, magicians and musicians comes to town, Miss Moon is enthralled by one old man’s “paper flower tree.” The old man offers to sell her a paper flower, but she can’t afford it, so he ends up gifting her one of the smallest flowers—one with a “seed” (or bead) inside that he tells her she can plant. “Plant it,” he says. “and perhaps it will grow. I make no promises. Perhaps it will grow. Perhaps it will not.”

Miss Moon plants the flower and waits all year for it to grow. Her friends and neighbors tell her she is wasting her time—that she was swindled and lied to. But Miss Moon can’t forget how beautiful the paper flower tree was, and she continues to believe. Eventually, the old man returns with his caravan of travelling entertainers, and Miss Moon confronts him about her tree (or lack thereof).

The old man repeats what he had told her before, and Miss Moon heads off, seemingly undeterred, to enjoy the festivities. In the morning, lo and behold, a paper flower tree has grown in her backyard. When Miss Moon’s neighbors once again attempt to convince her that she’s been tricked, Miss Moon continues to ignore them. “The didn’t think her tree was real. She knew it was. She was as happy as a little girl could be.”

Honestly, this book (written for children, of course) blew my mind. So many of us (myself included) ARE those cynical neighbors. When people share their wildest hopes and dreams, and we find them too wild, or weird, or unrealistic, we cut them down, tell them it’s impossible, and perhaps even laugh and their “ignorance” of the way the world really works.

While I may be “right” in taking such a position, reading this book made me wonder: what’s the point in refusing to believe?

Why dwell on the fact that people sometimes want to trick and manipulate us? Or the reality that life tends to be composed of more moments of suffering than sunshine? Or the truth that magic, most likely isn’t real, and we’ll be stuck adhering to the oh-so limiting laws of nature for the rest of our tragically short lives? NO POINT AT ALL, that’s what.

In this story, Miss Moon refuses to give in to the negativity of those around her, or to stop believing in the possibility of magic. The travelling salesman, no doubt, sees this most enviable quality in her, and the strength of her belief inspires him to play into it—to make it “real” for her.

When my daughter was almost three years old, we saw Santa at the mall. She gleefully sat on his lap, asked for an Elsa doll, and told him that yes, Rudolf was her favorite reindeer. When we left, I held her hand, and asked if she enjoyed meeting Santa.

“Yes,” she said, somewhat matter-of-factly, “but he’s just pretend.”

Needless to say, I was shocked. When I reflected on it later, I remembered that we had visited Disneyland about a month prior to meeting Santa, and had spent the day talking about how the “scarier” characters (like Chewbacca and the Queen of Hearts) were “just pretend,” so her application of that truth to the Santa scenario wasn’t too surprising. But it definitely crushed me a little. I remember not really knowing what to say, and definitely not wanting to lie, so I told her the truth: yes, Santa was pretend.

But I also told her that, sometimes, we like to pretend that pretend things are real, because it makes life a little more fun, and exciting and magical. She nodded, and seemed to understand, and asked if I was going to buy her the Elsa doll for Christmas.

This year, Margot seems to be pretty excited for Santa to come. And, if she had any inkling that the woman who played Elsa at her birthday party wasn’t the real Elsa, she never let on. I’m not sure if she remembers our experience at the mall, or if she’s just becoming less literal in her middle-toddlerhood, but either way, I’m happy about it.

Whether we know in our hearts that the magic is real or not doesn’t really matter. It’s when we allow ourselves to believe—even when it’s crazy, or stupid, or a little bit weird—that we can create a more magical world for ourselves, and start really living again, in the possibility-filled reality so many of us left behind in childhood.

So, in short, keep dreaming, and imagining, and stop worrying about what your neighbors think. You’ll be the one with a paper flower tree in the end.

The Book: Click to Purchase

What My Kids Are Reading: The Moon Keeper

Over the past week or so, I haven’t been feeling my best. I had stopped reading the news, or watching TV, or looking at anything other than books and my real-life friends’ accounts on social media. The internet had begun to feel like a toxic place, and I knew I needed a break in order to protect my heart, and my physical well-being. But, with the election quickly approaching, and social unrest continuing to simmer in my own community, and around the country, I felt like it was time to re-engage.

And guess what? It was worse than I thought it would be. But this time, instead of feeling scared, and sad, and anxious (all of which I had been feeling earlier in the summer), I got mad. Really mad.

I feel like anger, especially in women, is often viewed as a very undesirable emotion. It’s something we all feel, but no one really wants to talk about or acknowledge. It feels messy, and sometimes inappropriate: as if it’s a feeling we should have all outgrown in childhood.

So last week, I didn’t really share with anyone just how angry I was. Or, for that matter, what I was angry about.

But the thing about anger, for me at least, is that it tends to fester when left unexpressed. My husband has the enviable ability to notice his feelings (even those of anger), quietly process them, and then let them go. (Is he human? I’m still not sure.) But for me, the letting go part usually only happens after I allow myself to put words to my feelings.

In the first draft of this post, I laid all of my feelings bare. And then I went back and deleted them.

While I have been mad about a lot of things that are legitimately maddening, worrisome, and hurtful, they are also all things that are in no way under my control. As much as I would like to, I can not change many of the problems we are continuing to experience across the country, and within my own community. But even though I know I can’t control them, I still have trouble letting them go, and I have found myself allowing all of these uncontrollable triggers and the anger they elicit in me take up WAY too much room in my mind, and in my heart. Room that should be filed with love for my children and gratitude that I get to be home with them every day during this wildly uncertain time.

Last weekend, my brother-in-law and his soon-to-be wife came to visit, and left us with a few new children’s books, which I’m sure they realized would be a gift for Margot, but also a gift for me.

One of those books is called “The Moon Keeper” by Zosienka, which is absolutely lovely and conveys a message that is so incredibly timely for me, and possibly for some of you as well.

The book is about a bear (at least, I think he’s a bear?), named Emile, who has been assigned the job of “moon keeper” by the council of night creatures.

He takes his job very seriously, and diligently watches the moon from his perch on a tree branch every night. One night, Emile is alarmed to notice that the moon appears to be shrinking. He calls on many of his friends for advice, but none of them seem to know how to help. Eventually, a bird comes along and listens to Emile’s concerns. In response, the bird flies away, and then back again, and tells Emile, simply, “Things come and go—you’ll see.”

Things come and go. They do. Always. In September of 2020, it feels like “things” are sticking around longer than any of us would like, but, eventually, they will go. Politicians will leave office, and new ones will take their place (likely providing us with a new set of things to be mad about). People will continue to come together against hate and ignorance, and, I truly believe, my faith in humanity, and my neighbors, will be restored. People will hear the stories teachers have to tell this year, and maybe our society will begin to take a long hard look at the ways in which educators are treated and regarded, and the impact that treatment has on the education and moral development of our kids. The pandemic will end, and maybe it will come back again, but it will always ebb and flow. And I think now, finally, I am beginning to understand that my anger will do the same as well.

I am allowed to feel mad, just like I am allowed to feel joyful, or sad, or overwhelmed, or confused. But I can’t let my anger linger, in a state as perpetually full as Emile wants his new moon to be. While I won’t compromise my beliefs, or what I know is right, there are many things I have to let go of. I have to let my feelings wane, while also being prepared for when they resurface again, as they surly will.

So, on this lovely Sunday night during this beautiful season of waning summer and waxing fall, I hope you all take a moment to remember that whatever your struggle is right now, it will eventually, and probably slowly, become less and less. And even though a new problem will inevitably arise, each journey through the cycle helps make us strong enough to weather the next. Sending strength to anyone who needs it, and hugs to all. And, most importantly, happy reading!

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