What is this blog all about?

Initially when I started the bluestockingrunner blog, my goal was to share tips and stories about my training and fundraising for the Dana-Farber Marathon Challenge. There were many other (young) runners who already had blogs, and I was entertained by their posts and thoughts. I must admit that I felt silly starting my own blog as it seemed a bit narcissistic..I mean, who really cares about my weekly long run or what I ate for breakfast that fueled me for the day? Nevertheless, I found that I enjoyed the process of creating a post as it became a sort of writing exercise. While I consider myself a good reader and critic of good writing, I am not at all confident in my writing skills. And the only way to get better, whatever the activity, is practice, practice, practice!

Very early on in my blogging life I discovered that I couldn't resist posting about books (mostly children's literature) as I'm a former children's bookseller and currently work part-time as a Middle school librarian. I spend LOTS of time reading kiddie/young adult lit and just LOVE it.
So of course I want to share (or at least express for myself) thoughts about current favorites.

For all of you who are passionate about running and marathons, there are an equal amount of individuals who love to share their thoughts about great books for kids. I'm not sure how often these two passions overlap, but I can identify at least a handful of writers who are avid runners including Printz Award Winner, Laurie Halse Anderson (Chains, Fever, Speak), Wendelin Van Draanen (Sammy Keyes mystery series), Coleen Murtagh Paratore (Wedding Planner's Daughter), and recently I discovered Alison McGhee (author of one of my new favorite titles, Julia Gillian and the Art of Knowing) is also a runner, although she has not YET run a marathon. Gee, I wonder how many more of my favorite writers are also runners?

In addition, I can identify a few Dana-Farber runners who work in publishing and are lovers of literature, including Kristina (aka: the marathon mama) and Abby (see abby run). Although their passion may not be the children's literature genre, Kristina may have an interest in the picture book recommendations for her little reader, Henry. And who knows....there may even be a couple librarians, booksellers and/or writers on our 2009 DFMC team.

There are also occasional posts about my Fit Girls running/reading program and stories about the joys and frustrations of raising my 3 children (Kallie 16, Beau 15 and Hannah, 10).

Basically my blog is a mish mash of thoughts, comments and recommendations that represents the wide range and variety of my interests, hobbies and responsibilities, all of which are important and special to me in their own unique way. And I sheeplishly admit that I find blogging somewhat therapeutic (and fun!). So I think I'll try to get back to both blogging and blog reading on a fairly consistent basis. Trying to write a review of a new book title , sharing a passage from a beautiful poem, moaning about an injury, or best of all, reading an account of a friend's recent PR half-marathon ( Congrats, Abby!) is A LOT more interesting than folding laundry - and now the basement is now calling me for one more load! Ugh!