I Am an Artist of Lego!

Apologies in advance -- I don't mean to turn this into a Lego blog -- but I have to show off my masterpiece!

It's a Lego tree-house.



Or, more precisely, it's a Lego stone house built into a tree.



I didn't have enough brown pieces to make it just a tree house, but I got some interesting new grey cave-wall type pieces when I bought a sack of 1 Kilo of used Legos from a second-hand store.



My 7-year-old Leo helped out by making some of the bushes and the little ducks in the stream. He was an enthusiastic participant right from the beginning, even helping me wash and dry the used Legos.

[me: I felt so Swiss, carefully scrubbing all those Legos with a toothbrush! my husband: Yes, that was very Swiss of you.]

Wow, Thanks!!!

I opened up ExMormon's Amazon Page this morning (which I don't usually do because it rarely changes), but boy was I in for a pleasant surprise!!! I received this new review:

I bought the book after looking at the blog. I couldn't stop reading it because I could relate to it so much. I grew up Mormon and I haven't been a practicing Mormon since I left BYU as a teen/young adult. I could really relate to the Mormon culture and also relate to not fitting into that culture. I brought it with me on a Christmas family trip to Mexico and my Mormon relatives were into it also and wanted to read it. It was hilarious at times and also touched me to the core, this book. This is one of my favorite books ever, a book I could read again or pass on to jackmormon buddies and relatives, seriously love it! I'm so glad someone wrote about what it can be like growing up Mormon and in that culture.

I am totally floored! I can hardly imagine receiving a better compliment. This makes my day! (week, month, year... ;^) ).

I was already aware of the earlier nice review (by Book-o-philiac):

This was an amazing novel. I usually don't read fiction books, but decided to give this one a try, due to my leaving the LDS Church. It touched on so many of my experiences of growing up in the LDS Church and many of the reasons that I left. Anyone is considering leaving, even briefly should read this book.

Four stars and would recommend to anyone!

For that review, Book-o-philiac emailed me to tell me how much she liked the book. Naturally, I thanked her and asked her if she would please go write that on the book's Amazon page. ;^)

BTW, I haven't mentioned this in a while, but if anyone is interested in writing a review of ExMormon (for a blog or a publication or Amazon or whatever), just email me and I'll send you a review e-copy: chanson dot exmormon at gmail dot com.

Speed of Lightning! Roar of Thunder!

It's a bird! It's a plane! It's a frog!

To all those who are younger than Gen-X, please excuse the obscure reference to the "Underdog" theme song. ;)

If you follow the atheosphere like I do, you probably already know that Camp Quest -- that fun science-not-Bible Summer camp for kids -- needs some funds. And, to make the fund-raising more interesting, they decided to turn it into a competition between PZ Myers and a team of other cool atheist bloggers. In round 1, PZ totally wiped the floor with the competition, so some more cool underdogs signed on.

Now, as fond as I am of PZ (I met him in person and even included the photo of our radio interview together in my masthead if you look closely), I am compelled by some mysterious human compulsion to support Team Underdog. (Also note: Team PZ doesn't need my help, but I qualify for Team Underdog.) Hence I've added the donate widget to my sidebar =>

And remember, it's not just about beating PZ (and watching Hemant shave off PZ's beard). It's a great cause! As much as I loved LDS girls' camp as a kid, I wish I could have gone to something like this!! I'm planning to send my own kids as soon as feasible.