The August Crazies

When I first started writing this post, I had been absent from the blogosphere for almost a month while experiencing the back-to-school hub-bub. Since my husband and I both work in academia, August is a bit of a crazy month at our house. That combined with several other activities and family events creates a storm of activity which resulted in something going on nearly every day and very few evenings at home. Although I have posted since initially writing this, I wanted to share my month of crazies anyway.

This month the library I work at hosted our annual library mystery which is part of our freshman orientation. This was our 3rd year to host the mystery and each year we tweak it a bit in our continual effort to improve. This year I took our mystery content and we transformed it into a computerized game. I used LiveCode to create a game in which students used library resources to answer clues, entered their answers in the game, and then found the resources to receive the next clue. Having the game come together and work satisfactorily as very exciting. We ended up having a few hardware issues the evening of the game such as laptops which wouldn't connect to the internet but overall the mystery ran smoothly. The students seemed to have a good time and our objective of introducing students to the library and our library staff in a fun, non-threatening atmosphere succeeded. The winning teams are always very excited to receive certificates for homemade cookies.

Family birthday's highlight August and this year was particularly eventful. This year we celebrated my dad's 80th birthday with a surprise family gathering after church on Sunday. A week later we celebrated a milestone birthday in my life as well. We had a smaller family celebrating at Olive Garden, but my special day received its due as well. My husband in particular outdid himself this year for a present. He put together an envelope of certificates for various goods and services around the home such as cooking a fancy dinner, doing any chore I request, and offering a day or evening sans kids for whatever reason I need, in addition to several others. He also sent a beautiful bouquet of flowers which graced the library for two weeks.