Shane Bolks's Blog, page 19

What We Pass Down to Our Children

I put this story on Facebook the other day, but I think it’s relevant to our discussions here at PBOK:

Should I file this incident under *Outrageous Rudeness* or *Wow–So THAT’S Why*? On Monday night, I attended an academic awards ceremony at my son’s school. The auditorium was packed. Many people had to stand at the back, including my husband and me. This meant a small, seated group behind us would have to look between us to see the stage, which was really far away.

No one liked having to do that–we were all apologizing like crazy to each other–except for this one woman. She kept yelling, “Get out of the way!” So everyone did their best to squeeze together so she could see.

Anyway…another woman came in with an elderly lady pushing a walker. Literally, the only place left to go was in front of the shouting woman. So the shouting woman did her thing. She yelled, “Get out of the way!” And the escort to the elderly lady said, “She’s 97-years-old. There’s no place left to stand.” And the shouting lady said–I kid you not–”I don’t care if she’s 200 years old! MOVE!”

My husband was pinned behind a bunch of people. I was able to maneuver around a bit, and I felt compelled to speak to the shouting lady. I went over to her, lowered my glasses, which I wear to see long distances, and said, “Ma’am. We’re all doing the best that we can.” And she did her thing, yelling and being rude. No surprise.

But what *was* a surprise was the fact that I noticed, for the first time, that the poor person who’d come in with her was one of my former students. This student was the meanest, rudest, most upsetting student I have ever had. But she was also smart. Smart must run in their family because obviously they were at the academic awards ceremony, cheering someone on.

I smiled at my student. But inside my heart was breaking for her. Because I had just found out why she was such an unhappy girl when I knew her. And it bothered me all night thinking about how adults definitely communicate their philosophy of life to their children…and if that adult is a mean-spirited person, then the child might very well turn out that way, too.

I hope my student, now that’s she grown up and likely in college, can see now how the world reacts to ugly behavior of the type her mother/grandmother/relative displayed. I hope she’s able to break the cycle.

How much were you influenced as a child by the atmosphere in your home? Do you remember any specific instances where you acted a certain way because you saw an adult at home act that way? And do you see you children doing the same, imitating you?

Hi, I’m Kieran. My family loves music and anything that makes us laugh out loud. Along with Chuck, my husband of 24 years, I try to teach our kids that we have to actively choose happiness–and if I accomplish nothing else as a mom but pass that one lesson along to them, then I think I’ve done my job. My oldest guy, Nighthawk, was diagnosed in kindergarten with Asperger’s syndrome, and now he’s a senior in college; his sister Indie Girl, who’s younger by 16 months, is a college junior; and my youngest, Dragon, is in tenth grade. For our family, it’s about managing your weaknesses and wringing everything you can get out of your strengths. And along the way, finding joy. www.kierankramerbooks.com

Guest Mom Lily Dalton

We asked author Lily Dalton to answer our almost-famous PBK Mom Profile. Here’s what she said.

Cheerios or Captain Crunch? 

Cheerios USUALLY, but Captain Crunch SOMETIMES. I’ve got healthy and junky in my pantry. When the kids were young, I was a stay home mom so things were healthier. Now I just give them a you-are-what-you-eat! lecture when I get home from work and find the bag of Oreos I bought the night before completely empty on the counter.

Favorite children’s song? 

BACK IN BLACK by AC/DC. (Yes, my kids are teenagers, but we started impressing our music tastes on them when they were very young! I’m happy to report they are successfully brainwashed!)

Favorite kids’ TV show/character? 

Sponge Bob. For years, I avoided S-Bob, thinking he had to be the most annoying creature on earth. That laugh! **cringe!** But then I actually watched the show…he’s adorable, and so is everyone else in Bikini Bottom. My daughter brought home a guppy from school, and a snail that kept the guppy’s water clean. The guppy has since left us, but we still have the snail, whose name is “Gary” (like the cat-snail on Sponge Bob). He lives in a jar that says “cat treats”.

Advice you would share with other moms. 

Don’t have so many activities planned for your family, that you and the kids don’t have home time. I think home calms kids, and keeps them anchored.

Midnight or Dawn? 

Dawn. My writing is always sharper after (at least a few hours of) sleep.

Count calories or exercise? 

Calories… My meals are one extreme or the other. For example, I’ll have a kale salad with balsamic vinegar and olive oil for lunch, then pizza for dinner. I’m hoping this translates somehow into a balanced diet. I need to exercise more…

Quiet craft or raucous game of wrestling? 

Wrestling! My son is very non touchy-feely. He does not like hugs…but he not-so-secretly LOVES to have hugs forced on him. My husband and I often torment him with forced affection, when we squash him in big MOM-N-DAD “sandwich” hugs.

Biggest turn-on? Biggest turn-off? 

Biggest turn-on is when my husband grinds the coffee and sets my coffee for me every night. He doesn’t drink coffee. Who needs roses? **Sigh!**

Lily Dalton has a new book out this month. Check it out here.

Barbies led the way…

When I was a little girl, my most favorite thing in the world was Barbies.  I loved them.  I loved dressing them and fixing their hair.  I never had one of those big Barbie houses, no, that was too limiting for me, I needed more space, more options than the doll house would provide.  No, I made furniture by stacking paperbacks and covering them with washcloths (perfect sofa!), and I had a great bed and using all the space in my room, they always lived in a sprawling mansion.  My friends loved playing with me because I would always create elaborate story lines and sometimes these games would last well into the night.  There was always adventure and danger and romance.  With lots of kissing.

It was a sad day when I had to put up those Barbies.  Much later than all my friends I had tried to keep playing, but somehow the magic had died for me sometime in between elementary and jr. high.  I still have all my Barbies, tucked away in my big, red suitcase, and someday they’ll be played with again, with my girls – I think they’re almost ready.

I learned a new way to play Barbies though.  A new way to create those adventurous and romantic storylines with lots of kissing.  And now I get paid for it.  It took me a while to realize that’s what years of Barbie playing was for me, I was cultivating myself as a romance reader and writer, learning the rudimentary steps of story and character creation.  Luckily some things have changed.  I no longer have to name my Barbies (uh…characters) Toni or Ashleigh.  Not that those are bad names, but they don’t really fit into Victorian times.  And my heroes, unlike Ken, aren’t plastic everywhere and have more than just a subtle bump.

I think about those times though.  Staying up way too late, listening to New Edition’s remake of Earth Angel or Lisa Lisa and the Cult Jam’s All Cried Out, and playing Barbies who would dress in their costumes and go to Masquerade parties and dance and laugh and, of course, kiss.  I had no idea then that those times were building on something bigger for me, no idea that I was rehearsing for the coolest job on the planet.

I love creating stories.  I love coming up with characters that are unique and special in their own way, yet so familiar, you could swear you know them.  I love watching these characters hit obstacles and grow and change and become stronger, better people.  And I love making them fall in love.

Can you look back into your past and see tells of the adult you were meant to become?  And the real question…did you love Barbies as much as I do…uh did? 

The Blog Wherein Shana Loses Her Smugness

You would think that if I participate in a blog about parenting, I’m not smug about parenting issues. But the truth is there is–was–a little smugness in me. I never thought I was a sentimental mother. Every year I read the Facebook posts about moms tearing up when their baby starts Kindergarten. I talk to moms who see a new baby and want to hold him or her because they miss the baby years.

That’s when I always felt a little smug. I do not miss the baby years. I don’t have the urge to hold babies. I don’t want to smell them or let them fall asleep on me. I got plenty of that when Baby Galen was an infant. And I always thought I couldn’t wait for her to go to Kindergarten (I’ll be waiting until 2015, by the way). All day for me to work and all day for her to socialize? We were getting the best of both worlds! What is there to cry about? See, ya!

And then there was school drop off.

 

Baby Galen is finally old enough to be dropped off at preschool. I have been waiting for this day for a year because I thought she was ready last year. The day finally came. She was excited. I was excited. We pulled up, a teacher helped her out of the car, and she was gone. The next thing I know, another teacher is waving me forward. I had to drive off. I didn’t get to say goodbye. I didn’t get a hug, I didn’t even see her go in. I had to trust that they got her in and to the right place.

I drove off and told myself there was nothing to be upset about. The teachers walk the kids to their rooms, and my daughter knows where her room is and what to do when she gets there. We hadn’t said goodbye, but that was because she was excited. She was ready to go in by herself. That was a good thing.

So why was I sobbing? Why was I sitting in the Starbucks parking lot crying like…like…like one of those moms on the first day their child goes to Kindergarten. Oh, no! I was just like that! Those moms were also proud of their kids’ accomplishments and also sad that their little ones are growing up. That was how I felt!

Even worse, Baby Galen’s birthday came a few weeks later, and I heard myself saying, “You need to stop growing. You have to stay four!” To which she replied, “But Mommy, God wants me to keep growing.”

Yes, He does, and I do too. But it’s suddenly hard to let go. It’s suddenly hard to see how tall she is, hear how she uses complete sentences, see her swim across a pool, watch her do a handstand. How did she grow up so fast?

To The Random Parent on the Soccer Field

Yes, I see that little boy, the one you’re pointing at, the one who’s so tiny. Yes, I see how huge his jersey is on him, that it hangs down past his knees, that his shorts go down to his ankles. I see the way he runs.

I first saw him as a steady flicker on a sonogram screen, confirmation that the rising HCG number was, in fact, indicating a pregnancy. I saw him again six weeks later, a curved bean growing perfectly. Then, again, six weeks after that, with arms and legs and a head. This was when the doctor first realized something was wrong, that ‘the fetus’ wasn’t growing right, that he was falling behind, too small for gestational age. That we should prepare for him to meet the same fate as his brother and sister before him. Maybe he’d make it to 20 weeks, a little longer, twenty-four, twenty-six. There was really no way to tell and nothing we could do, except prepare ourselves.

At twenty weeks, the perinatologist had us tour the NICU and meet with a neonatologist, who thought it helpful to prepare us for what happens when babies come too early and too small. We learned about lung problems and brain bleeds and gut strokes. The next day we met with another perinatologist who talked about Downs Syndrome, and two days later yet another, who spent a grueling hour measuring in-utero blood flow.

From there, we saw our little boy two to three times per week, tense, tedious hour-long sonograms during which incredibly precise measurements were taken, of blood flow through his brain and heart and stomach, gauging how much longer he could survive in utero. At twenty-seven weeks I went into the hospital. At thirty weeks, the perinatologist, a kindly older man on the verge of retirement, decided the baby was in distress and it was time to deliver. The little guy, though, was busy playing with his cord, wrapping it so tightly around his body that his heart rate plummeted before we made it to Labor and Delivery. The last words I heard as the gas mask settled over my face were, “we’re losing him.”

Later that day, after emergency surgery, I lay in the recovery room with my eyes closed for a long, long time, scared to open them, having no idea into what world I’d awakened. Was it a world with my newborn son….or a world in which he was gone? I lay there that afternoon with my eyes closed, cold and scared and hurting inside, until finally I heard my sister’s voice, warm, quiet, and joyous. “He’s beautiful.”

After I stabilized, they wheeled me down to the NICU, where my husband was standing solemnly beside an isolette, where our little 1lb, 13oz son lay. We’d been so hoping he’d make it to 2lbs. I saw him that afternoon, tiny, emaciated, wide, confused eyes staring up at the bright glare of the lights, countless cords and tubes running to and from his small body. But I couldn’t touch him, because just that, a mother’s touch, might have been too much for his fragile nervous system.

I saw him, scared and alone, the size of a Little Mommy doll, and my heart bled.

For a week after that I saw him twice daily, lying alone in his isolette. I’d sit there for hours at a time, alternating between staring at him and watching the monitors that recorded his vitals. Sometimes his heart rate would drop, or his blood oxygen, alarms would sound, and nurses would swarm. And I could do nothing but sit there and watch, and pray and bargain with God. Please…please, please, please…

After a week I was finally allowed to hold him. A nurse placed him against my bare chest, positioned carefully among all the tubes and wires. It’s called kangarooing, and there are mysterious medical accounts of failing babies coming back from the brink as their mother’s warmth soaks through their fragile bodies, against the strong, steady beat of her heart.

I saw him daily for the next ten weeks, visits to the sterile NICU, where I sat beside his isolette, talking to him, telling him about his family, and making promises. So many promises. But after seeing him, I had to go home, back to my house, where the nursery sat empty and nights were spent in cold, desperate dread of the phone ringing.

I saw him when we brought him home, finally breathing on his own and a full 4 lbs.

I saw him that first year, finally sleeping in his own crib, sitting in his sister’s lap, his grandparents lap, on countless trips to the pediatrician. I saw him interacting with the physical therapist and the occupational therapist, as he struggled to master skills such as rolling over and sitting up, crawling, standing, eating…always in the confines of our house, to protect his fragile immune system. No trips to the park or the grocery store, play areas or play dates. The one time I did take him out, some random person thought he was so tiny they just had to touch him…

I saw him fight and struggle, and I saw him smile and laugh.  I saw him grow. I saw him fall in love with his sister and our cat, with balls and music.

I saw him on the first day of preschool, when he was the only child in class not yet walking. I saw him as the year went by, and his peers outpaced him physically, growing taller and stronger. I saw him stand up to boys younger but larger than him who called him a baby, keeping his brave face on until we were alone, when he would come to with tears in his big blue eyes as he asked me, “I’m not a baby, am I, Mama?”

I saw him all those times and thousands of others, and I see him now, out on the soccer field, despite the fact no one can so much as provide him a uniform that fits.

I see him out there, running, laughing, trying…healthy.

Alive.

Living.

I see him, his fierce determination and resiliency, his unquenchable thirst for life, a miracle in motion.

Yes, random parent on the soccer field, I see him, the boy you’re pointing at.

Do you?

Screen Time and Kids

If you’re confused about screen time for your kids, watch this short video outlining the pros and cons of screen use for children and at what age it’s appropriate. And then make your own decisions for your family.

How much screen time does your child get? 

Hi, I’m Kieran. My family loves music and anything that makes us laugh out loud. Along with Chuck, my husband of 24 years, I try to teach our kids that we have to actively choose happiness–and if I accomplish nothing else as a mom but pass that one lesson along to them, then I think I’ve done my job. My oldest guy, Nighthawk, was diagnosed in kindergarten with Asperger’s syndrome, and now he’s a senior in college; his sister Indie Girl, who’s younger by 16 months, is a college junior; and my youngest, Dragon, is in tenth grade. For our family, it’s about managing your weaknesses and wringing everything you can get out of your strengths. And along the way, finding joy. www.kierankramerbooks.com

School Days

So, I’m not the most organized person in the world. That’s understatement. As many of you know, my husband is the man of the house…in that he is the house husband. In that if it were not for him I would select all clothing out of a laundry basket each morning. Clean laundry, no one panic.

Anyway, as the school year approached I started getting really wound up. Mainly because we have two kids going full time this year for the first time (Because he’s in a special needs class, Danger goes a full day even though he’s in kindergarten), and our youngest is going to preschool two days a week.

I was panicky because we had ONE kid in school last year and uh…I suck at keeping track of paperwork. I suck at packing lunches. I suck at getting up early. I forget to make kids do their homework. The aforementioned things being reasons that the school year actually kind of terrifies me.

So this year, I decided I needed to go in with a plan. More kids in school means MORE of all those things that intimidate me. I decided to try and at least start organized. And I started with a lunch station.

I read up on some tips on Pinterest, which has become my favorite place to get ideas from people who are craftier than I. The thing is, organization tips and tricks are something I NEED to get things together. But because I’m not a natural organizer…well, I have to get my tips from somewhere.

Fortunately, I was able to collect a myriad of tips from Pinterest and I’m going to share some.

1. Establish a homework station now. (I cleared of my son’s desk for this, but it hasn’t been super successful because he likes to do his homework in the kitchen.)

2. Make a lunch station, put EVERYTHING in it.

This I did. And it’s the most effective organization tip I’ve gotten. For some reason…I never thought of this last year. So I bought two baskets, and I bought tupperware that locks together. Then bought the lunch supplies (and I even bought cookie cutters to make CUTE lunches, darn it) and put all of that, plus the lunch boxes in my new station.

Voila!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As the school year progresses, we’ll see how it all works out. But for now, this is saving my sanity. Feeling empowered to pack lunches is saving my sanity. Because it’s hard to try and gear up for a time of year (that lasts nine months…) you feel you kind of fail at.

I’m trying to set myself up for feelings of success, even in little things. Even in peanut butter and jelly. Got any more organization tips for me?

Especially when it comes to paperwork?

A Knock At The Door

I’m in the family room finishing up a cruel and evil exercise video. The kids are running around and I’m late getting dinner going. Another knock. Through the window, I can see the UPS truck outside. I tell my daughter to go get the door; if it’s not the delivery man, it’s one of her friends. It’s that time of day when they run around. Knocks on the door are common.

Another knock. She calls to me it’s some man. Distracted and a little winded from the video, I tell her no, it’s not some man, it’s the delivery man. Not thinking, I pull open the door..and realize she was right. It’s some man. I’ve never seen him before, but instinctively I know he doesn’t belong. He’s thin and all sweaty, unkempt with shaggy hair and dirty baggy clothes. I take all this in, mentally bracing myself as I see the city solicitor permit clipped to his shirt. Nothing, however, prepared me for what happened next.

“Hello, ma’am…” he stutters, as my five year-old-squeezes between my legs to see what’s going on.  ”…I’m a two-time convicted felon.”

My mind starts to spin. I’m trying to catch up with what’s going on. I’m standing there at dusk, with a convicted felon at my front door. My husband isn’t only not home, he’s out of town. The big white dog is outside. My kids are gathered around me. All this flashes through my mind as I make eye contact with the UPS man, who tosses a package onto my porch. The man who introduced himself as a convict picks it up and hands it to me…

I don’t normally answer the door to someone I don’t know. Before my daughter was born, I was a 9-5 (or 6 or 7 or beyond) in the office kind of girl. I had no idea what happened in the neighborhood while we were gone. After I started working from home, I quickly discovered just how many people came onto our property during the day. There’s all kinds of solicitors, primarily extermination and landscaping companies. There are folks delivering coupons and other sorts of flyers, such as to wash our windows. There are folks selling frozen meat and (allegedly) homegrown vegetables. There are various religious missionaries. It’s kinda wild. But it didn’t take long for my writer’s imagination to take over, and vulnerability to set in. I’d find myself listening to news reports where the anchor would say “no apparent sign of forced entry,” and I’d think…forced entry? There’s no need for forced entry, not when some unsuspecting person (usually a woman) answers the door. One stiff arm, and boom, that stranger on the other side of the door is suddenly in your house.

That’s when I stopped answering the door.

But the other evening, I answered the door, and the man introduced himself as a convict. He told me he’s made some mistakes, but he’s trying to turn his life around. He and his wife have started making these candle/potpourri holders…

And still my mind spins. Why is he telling me this? Is he sincere? Is this some kind of penance, where he wants to atone for mistakes? Or is it more sinister than that? Is he trying to scare me into doing exactly what he wants me to do? Is he secretly casing the house, trying to figure out if he should come back under the cover of darkness?

All I can think about is winding this encounter down. I want him gone, off my property. So when he holds up the candle holder–it’s really quite primitive–I ask him how much. When he says $15, I blurt out…sure.

And that’s when everything changed, when something washed over him: surprise, relief, gratitude…they were all there, and as I closed (and locked) the door to go get the money, the hardness inside me softened, and when I opened the door and his eyes again met mine, I found myself smiling. He said something about his children. I don’t remember what. I took the candle holder and watched him walk back to his car with a bit of a spring in his step. There he opened his trunk, pulled out another candle holder, then walked to my neighbors house.

Rattled, I did what I always do: I took to Facebook, sharing what had just happened, and several friends quickly responded. All sorts of pros and cons were discussed, and soon I found myself on the phone with the police department, telling them what had happened, as well. Turns out they’re familiar with the vendor–and his penchant for telling people about his prior convictions–but his permit is legit, and they’ve never had reason to revoke it. While I was learning this, other friends chimed in, reporting that he’d been to their house before, as well. Some of them purchased from him. Some did not. (They’re all still around to talk about it.)

For the rest of the evening, I kept thinking about the encounter, conflicted about my own feelings (my automatic suspicion of this grimy looking stranger) and wondering whether I’d done the right thing (for the right reasons, to help him or to get rid of him).  My husband and I have long felt like in situations like that, when someone approaches you for money or food, it’s best to help if you can. If the recipient is, instead, pulling one over on you, then that’s their bad, not yours.  And I really think that’s true.

Then a friend sent me this, and even as I had the security system activated, I found peace with the whole situation.  If you do yourself one favor today, watch this.  But be warned, have a tissue handy.

 

 

Stellar Moments in Parenting

Being a parent is a wonderful joy. But sometimes I think it feels like survival of the fittest. EVERY MAN FOR HIMSELF. I have three kids, ages 7, 5 and 3 and they’re wonderful. WONDERFUL. But you know…some days you do some crazy things in the quest for a little peace.  Sometimes you do some really silly things because the house is chaotic and you just lose track of what you’re doing. And here are some of my…

Stellar Moments in Parenting -

1. I may have pretended I didn’t see the child run to his room with my phone (which he’s not allowed to have) to buy a few minutes to drink my coffee.

2. One time I left my daughter in the car in the driveway for ten minutes because I was SURE I’d counted three kids going into the house. (she was fine…not even upset…BUT I WAS!)

3. Oops! Today was early release at school??

4. I was out grocery shopping alone  yesterday and bought new nail polish. Then I sat in my van and painted my nails so that I would have a quiet moment and some time to let them dry!!

5. I have driven to town, through the Starbucks drive thru, with all the kids in the car just to get a little break. Hey, they’re buckled in!!

So those are just some of my stellar moments in parenting…have any to share?

Am I Doing Better than My Kid? Guest Post by Sherry Thomas

Today I welcome fellow historical romance author, and new YA author Sherry Thomas, to the blog. Sherry is one of the most interesting people I know, and she always makes me laugh.

In general, I do not have peanut butter on my keyboard. That’s because my children are fairly elderly, years removed from their prime peanut-butter-smearing days: Senior Kidlet is a sixteen-going-on-seventeen, Junior Kidlet twelve. (Although a couple of years ago Senior Kidlet upended a cup of eggnog on my laptop and it was a miracle nothing happened.)

In our house, Senior Kidlet and Junior Kidlet take turns being the concern child. For the past couple of years, as Senior Kidlet became a full-fledged teenager, with college looming on the horizon, he has once again become the focus of our parental handwringing and teeth-gnashing.

As we lecture him endlessly on taking initiative, taking responsibility, taking care to do things properly the first time—his problem being mainly an ingrained case of slackerism—sometimes I make myself step back and take a slightly longer view of things.

The thing is, people have short memories.  For those of us who are parents, it often seems as if we have always been mature, responsible, and just plain competent at life.  Some of us are—His Hawtness, my husband, might always have been mature, responsible, and just plain competent at life.  Me, not so much.

Senior Kidlet has been known to let his homework slide for weeks.  But I faked my entire 10th grade science project: I poured cooking wine into apple juice to pretend it had fermented into cider. My chemistry teacher suspected something, but couldn’t prove the alcohol content came from manual addition—or maybe he couldn’t quite bring himself to believe that a studious-looking Asian girl would pull that sort of con.  I would say my fraudulence beats my kid’s laziness in the what-would-convince-your-parents-you-are-doomed-in-life category.

Senior Kidlet recently decided he wants to study political science and become a legislative aide.  His Hawtness, an engineer by training and by vocation, could not wrap his head around that choice.  Which makes me wonder what my poor mother had thought when I declared, approximately two decades ago, that I planned to become the Secretary General of the United Nations.

Senior Kidlet lost a textbook last year.  I lost three textbooks my first semester in college.

He does things last minute.  I only start cooking when people are already digging through the kitchen looking for food.  I often finish cooking after everyone had already fed themselves with leftovers.

He can’t plan ahead.  As long as I have the least bit of food in my stomach, I can’t come up with grocery lists.

He turns in stuff late.  I just turned in a manuscript ten days late.

He is messy.  Our house is slightly better now, but used to almost always look as if it had just been visited by a tornado.

Darn, this kid really is related to me.

One of the reasons kids don’t like high school is that you have to study everything, whether you have an interest in or a talent for the subject.  Along that same line, during a kid’s teenage years is when parents nag about everything, from punctuality to personal hygiene to tidiness to how they talk and walk.  We want them to do everything well.

The thing is, we can get through life very decently without ever learning to do many things well—and without ever learning to do some things at all.  And after a child reaches a certain age, the role of the parents becomes that of a failsafe.  Whatever else the kid still has to learn, only life will teach.

I turned out okay.  It follows Senior Kidlet will also turn out okay.

Fingers crossed.

****

PBOK Ask the Mom Questions:

Cloth or disposable diapers?

Cloth.  Though for Junior Kidlet, His Hawtness forbade me from using cloth diapers at night—he remembered me crying one time, when Senior Kidlet was small, while washing diapers in the middle of the night.  That darned kid pooped seven times around one feeding. Seven times!

Favorite children’s song?

The opening theme of Hana no Ko Lunlun, a Japanese anime, called Lulu, the Flower Angel in English.  (Have a listen here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyHQg1MFfZ4)

Favorite kids’ book?

Anno’s Counting Book.  A book without a single word, which transports and moves me in an almost nostalgic way.  Perhaps it reminds me of the magically beautiful Europe of Hana no Ko Lunlun.

Most annoying kids’ TV show/character?

Used to be Barney, until the start of Elmo’s World.

Midnight or Dawn? 

Middle of the day.

Sherry Thomas is one of the most acclaimed romance authors working today. Her books regularly receive starred reviews from trade publications and are frequently found on best-of-the-year lists. She is also a two-time winner of Romance Writers of America’s prestigious RITA® Award.

English is Sherry’s second language—she has come a long way from the days when she made her laborious way through Rosemary Roger’s Sweet Savage Love with an English-Chinese dictionary. She enjoys digging down to the emotional core of stories. And when she is not writing, she thinks about the zen and zaniness of her profession, plays computer games with her sons, and reads as many fabulous books as she can find.

Sherry’s next book, THE BURNING SKY, volume one of her young adult fantasy trilogy, is on sale TODAY.