The “Bear” Necessities | October 2025

Happy October, dear friends! October is 100% my favorite month and I was thrilled when the calendar flipped this week. Unfortunately, the weather isn’t very October-like at the moment. We’re having a string of 80ºF+ days, but that’s supposed to change on Wednesday. I’ll be putting my head down and will keep focusing on that.

Also unfortunately – I have been under the weather most of this week. And now Matthew and Bryce are feeling it too, so that’s no fun. But life keeps going so we’ve done our best to fill it with good things. Today, as usual, I’m sharing home stuff (including a trip to a local attraction), knitting (progress!), and the books I’ve finished this week (two fascinating and thought-provoking books). I hope you’ll keep reading and see what’s been going on around here!

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Home Stuff:

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Matthew was on vacation this week so we tried to slow everything else down a little bit so that it actually felt like a vacation. On Friday we went to the Squam Lakes Natural Science Center and had so much fun. I let Colton’s teacher know on Monday that we were planning a trip and they helped us get him ready for it by showing him pictures of it all week. We did the same at home, including pictures of the parking lot because new activities are really hard for him. He got out of the car fine but it was a big challenge to get him through the gates of the center. He was crying, yelling, and trying to run back to the car. We did our best to block his escape and I showed him pictures of what was inside again. Once I helped him pull his hoodie over his eyes a little bit, he did it! Our biggest accomplishment that day was getting him through the gates. Once he was inside and saw the first exhibit (coyote), he was totally into it. Phew!

Bryce and Bronwyn were great too – all three of the kids had a ton of fun together, which doesn’t happen all that often. This trip was a big step for the five of us and now I’m hoping that it will be easier the next time we go. And that’s where the title of today’s post comes from – they have two black bears on exhibit! All of the animals in their exhibits are animals that have been adopted from rehab centers across the country and cannot be safely released in the wild. Most have vision or hearing problems that would make it impossible for them to survive, so it feels less icky than going to a typical zoo.

Personal Learning:

This week I finished the second chapter of White Trash and started the 1619 Project. White Trash answered a big question that bubbled up for me in the second chapter of These Truths: John Locke was virulently anti-slavery but wrote slavery into the Carolina Constitution as secretary of the charter. Why? Well — because he was a founding member and the third largest shareholder of the Royal African Company, which had a monopoly in the British slave trade. Money corrupts everything! I also read more about the splitting of North & South Carolina as well as the founding of Georgia. You can really see the intersection of race and class in this chapter and how the stage is being set for poor white settlers to see slaves as their competition. (Much like the arguments we hear about immigrants competing for jobs today.)

The first chapter in the 1619 Project (so far) has outlined how heavily influenced the Constitution was by the slaveholding elite of Virginia and the reasons why Virginia entered the fight for Independence in the first place. The timeline of the chapters are a little off so my reading chronology is going to be even more imperfect but that’s okay. I’m still taking careful notes!

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Knitting:

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This week’s goal was to knit four rows a day on my Lettuce Mint sweater — well, I didn’t knit four rows every day but I did average a little more than four rows a day, so I’ll call it a success. I have about 20 more rows before I switch to ribbing needles and start the back shoulder ribbing. Here’s a link to my Ravelry project page for a refresher on the yarn details and pattern information. This week’s goal: stick to 4 rows a day.

(And yes, there’s an oopsie row in this picture that I’m not going back to fix. No one in my real life is going to be looking as closely as anyone who reads this blog!)

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Reading:

On The Calculation of Volume I by Solvej Balle
(Amazon | Bookshop.org)

“Evening has come. Yet another eighteenth of November is almost over. I have been sitting by the window for most of the day, in a room that sheds its light over the wet garden, and I am going nowhere.”p 47

This tiny little book was amazing. Translated from Dutch and shortlisted for the 2025 International Booker Prize, it is the introduction in a septology slowly being released. The third book in this collection is on the National Book Awards longlist for Translated Literature and I want to be able to read it when its released in November.

In this story, Tara Selter has stepped out of time. She’s living her cozy little life in France as an antiquarian bookseller and all of a sudden, she wakes up on what she believes to be November 19th and discovers that it’s actually November 18th again. And then she finds herself in an improbable loop of November 18ths. She rushes home from her work trip to her husband, Thomas, who incredulously believes her. They problem solve, plan, plot to figure out what their next steps should be. They go to bed, wake up, and Thomas is surprised to find her at home. Aren’t you supposed to be in Paris? And she explains the whole thing over again. And on and on.

As the November 18ths repeat themselves, Tara notices patterns: some of the food she eats returns to the world, some disappears forever. She notices that, as she takes the last package of chocolate from the grocery shelf and returns the next day, the shelf is empty. And it will stay empty. As Thomas digs up a leek from the garden for his daily soup, that leek returns the next day, ready to be dug up again.

“The sky has its pattern. It repeats itself. You can feel at home with it. You can sit on a step in the darkness and observe it or you can stand in the grass and be a very tiny monster in an immense space. I can feel the sky lifting the monster cape from my shoulders. I become smaller and the little pieces of the world that I have to work with dwindle to almost nothing. The heavens are vast and untouchable, the universe opens up and you become an insignificant little monster taking tiny bites out of a gigantic world.” p 114

There’s a theme throughout this novel about how we are tiny monsters gobbling up the world around us. And eventually, it all adds up. I’m interested in following this thread that I believe will eventually lead to the conservation of our planet. This novel is full of cozy details that I adored. I am so excited to start the second volume!

(I didn’t mean to write this much about this book!)

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North Sun: Or, the Voyage of the Whaleship Esther by Ethan Rutherford
(Amazon | Bookshop.org)

This book was on my radar because it’s on the National Book Awards Longlist for Fiction. It was pretty bonkers but I absolutely could not put it down! North Sun is set in the late 1800s on a whale ship from Massachusetts that is sent to the Chukchi Sea (between Russia and Alaska) to bring home a stranded whale ship captain. It’s full of magical realism, bizarre characters, and what feels like hallucinations. I finished it late last night and am still sorting through my thoughts about it, but I couldn’t help think about, similar to On the Calculation of Volume (I), the conservation of our planet. On their way to this stranded ship, there’s a ton of brutal whale hunting and I would advise readers to skim through those sections if animal cruelty is especially difficult. But I’m hoping to read some more reviews today so what else I missed with this one. It certainly made me reconsider eating any kind of meat!

Have you read this yet? What did you take away from it?

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Currently reading:
I’m about 1/3 of the way through the audio of The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny — it is so good! Sonia and Sunny still haven’t crossed paths, but they’re both in India now so I think it’s going to happen soon. I loved getting their back stories and learning about their families. This book is funny, yet very serious about so many topics: feminism, abusive relationships, and stereotypes of all kinds. I can’t wait to see where it’s headed and I’m trying to add extra cleaning time to my day just so that I can listen a little bit more. Maybe I’ll be finished with it by next Sunday?

I’m about to start Celestial Bodies for Mary’s book club. I haven’t been attending her Zooms but I’ve been trying to keep up with the books. This one is set in Oman and I’m especially excited about it. The kids and I have read The Turtle of Oman and The Turtle of Michigan, both of which feature a family from Oman. I still believe that children’s literature is one of the best ways to explore the world and I feel ready to tackle a more difficult novel in this region.

And I’ve decided I need some before-bed whimsy, so I have the most beautiful volume of The Wind in the Willows next to my bed. It belongs to my public library and is illustrated by Tasha Tudor – so lovely.

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And that’s about it! Today’s activity will include laundry and hiding from the sunshine. I cooked a big casserole yesterday that created plenty of leftovers so dinner is already prepared! I’m hoping to crack open Celestial Bodies, crank on Sunny + Sonia while cleaning, and to knit in front of football this evening. I’m also hoping that Matthew and Bryce wake up this morning and miraculously feel much better!

I hope your Sunday is restful and energizing and that your week treats you well. Take good care.