Jenn Writes

Writing my way through life, one word at a time.

Board Games I Love

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I admit it, I’m a board game fanatic.  Luckily I have a great group of friends who also love playing board games and we get together 1-2 nights a month to play.  I own a lot of games myself, and though there is some duplication in collections (Many of us own Settlers of Catan for ourselves, along with Dominion and Carcassonne) I’d say that between all of us we have at least 500 unique games / add ons to games / variants of games. That’s a LOT of choices – though some get played very rarely (I’m looking at you Risk and Axis and Allies). Board games are my favourite choice for a night out with friends since it’s social without being in a loud restaurant or at a movie and I don’t have to have pre-read a book like at book club. [Read more…]

Book Review – Somewhere in France by Jennifer Robson

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I’m a historian, and as such, I’m generally leery of reading historical fiction set in the time period I studied – World War One.  Small inaccuracies can drive me crazy.  Especially ones that I consider to be lazy – when the author didn’t do his or her research and messed up dates or places. Or when they have a character write a letter from France and their loved one in England gets it within days.  That rarely happens now, it sure as heck didn’t happen with a war going on and mail being censored.  [Read more…]

Sensory 101

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One of the hardest things for many parents to understand about their child with Autism is their sensory issues. I’m writing from my experience, which is with kids who have ASD.  Sensory issues can come on their own, as part of Sensory Processing Disorder, or with another condition such as ADHD.

If you don’t have a sensory issue, it can be very hard to understand why you child is refusing to put on the shirt grandma gave him for Christmas because it “doesn’t feel right”.  Often, parents chalk these tantrums up to behaviour or defiance, but as I explained in an earlier post, behaviour is how some children with ASD communicate that there is a problem. [Read more…]

Book review – Juliet’s Nurse by Lois Leveen

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The Roman Philosopher Marcus Aurelius said that: “Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth”. This is true even of the greatest works of fiction. The stories we know and love come to us from one perspective – that which the author has chosen to give us. Major characters are (usually) well developed and minor characters are often not given a second thought by the reader. [Read more…]