Se7en’s Fabulous Fun Post #312

We had a much busier weekend than we expected… all in a good way, and I am quite relieved that we have the week to recover before tackling the next weekend. It is that glorious time of year when the weather is absolutely perfect and we are making the very best of the glorious days and enjoying every moment of the endless summer… (before, dare I say, it ends!!!).

1. Just in case you are feeling a little bleh and you desperately need some colour in your life: Camp Create Spring on Whatever will literally make your heart sing!!!
2. If you have never baked a cake planet – and I have not… then you have to look at this… Scientifically accurate Cake Planets – have you ever!!!
3. On How We Learn: Incredible Woodworking Projects for Handy Kids… Packed with about a bazillion resources!!!
4. Zen Habits and Make one small healthy change… always makes so much sense.
5. This post was such an enjoyable read for me… you know life with eight kids… on Planning with Kids I can say there was a stage in my life when we had eight kids under 12… and it was kind of crazy. The craziness changes, but other folk stop noticing the big family-ness of it all when your kids look all grown up and your youngest is six.
6. I’m all for sleep – proof that I no longer have infants in arms… but after years of sleep deprivation it has proved quite a challenge to retrain myself. Here are Real Simple’s 7 Surprising Things you Probably Don’t Know About Sleep.

And the se7en + 1th link:

7. 
   

   A Blast From the Past:

   
   
   • 2009: Se7en Reasons Why Children Don’t Play Anymore.
   • 2010: Our most pinned post ever… Se7en’s Edible Cell Biology Fun.
   • 2011: A Little Bit of Countryside… Drawing Outdoors.
   • 2012: Se7en Tips for Starting an Art Explosion…
   • 2013: The Myth Being Sold to Our Daughters All in the Name of Fashion.
   • 2014: Let’s Celebrate Earth Day: Se7en + 1 Easy Changes to Make…
   • 2015: The Easiest Family Hike in Cape Point Revisited…

The High Mountains of Portugal by Yann Martel: This book is actually a collection of three shorter stories that are linked, but not as you might think they are. Actually it is a Yann Martel book and nothing is ever as you think, his writing is full of delightful surprises and his stories are packed with intricate descriptions… the words lyrical and the feel somewhere between a myth and a fable. His stories are somewhat unbelievable, but as you read them you are totally absorbed… it is only when you try to explain to person alongside you that the man in the first story is so overcome with a desperate grief, that he walks everywhere backwards as part of his recovery, that you realise that it every thing in these stories is somewhat “out of the normal.”

The book begins in 1904, with the grieving Tomas, who discovers an ancient journal and persuades his wealthy uncle to fund his trip to seek out a lost artifact… His uncle provides him with one of the first motor vehicles ever and he goes driving into the depths of rural Portugal. Continuously surprising and amazing the locals with his “beast of a vehicle.” Interesting times and much more of an adventure than Tomás was expecting. Thirty five years later and a pathologist, who is consumed by Agatha Christie Novels, finds himself unable to escape from his very own, very bizarre and somewhat disturbing mystery… and finally, another fifty years later and the story appears to turn full circle, when a Canadian senator returns to the village of his parents, in rural Portugal… with a chimpanzee. I wasn’t expecting it to be three shorter stories, and found it somewhat unnerving – thinking I wouldn’t get into short stories at all… I did though, Yann Martel writes a compelling story.

Of course the book is delightful and tragic, more than that it is not the sort of read that is going to leave you feeling all comfortable inside… in fact the opposite… you will find yourself thinking about it long after you have finished reading it. This is a great read… and a fairly quick read, there are no chapter breaks and one feels compelled to read it through. I am guessing that folk, that are looking for a quick weekend story to get lost in, won’t enjoy it quite as much as folk who love words and are perpetually looking for deeper meaning in everyday life.
This book was given to us for review purposes, by Penguin Random House South Africa, it is not a sponsored post and opinions expressed are as usual entirely our own.

We really need to fill up these shelves for Book Giving Day Project. We have shelves to fill with books and we are looking for your help!!! We are beyond thrilled that books are flowing in to our library project, right now. We will be collecting books until the end of the month, so if you still want to join in and send us a couple of books, please leave a comment or follow the link to find out how.

That’s us… Hope you all have a fabulous week!!!