3 things from the past week(...ish, I mean, I went through the weekend and didn't realize I'd forgotten to post here until I woke up this morning. Let's blame the time change?)

1) My sister and fam have an 18-month-old toddler dog who is very confused by the time change. She started asking for her dinner (usually between 4:30-5:00) at 2:30 yesterday and when she didn't get it, started randomly throwing her toys around the living room. I can't say I blame her.

2) My other sister shares my love of Nebraska women's volleyball and likes to text me reactions during matches, but yesterday as her texts piled up I finally told her, "Sorry, I'm stress-cross-stitching my way through this one." Since I picked it up in earnest again 4 years ago, cross stitching really has become a release valve for me. It has basically saved my sanity on Sunday mornings, when I go to services at a local Methodist church where my BIL is the pastor. I love him and want to support him and their whole family, and he's way more progressive than the congregations he's had want him to be, but the fishbowl aspect of being the pastor's family puts a lot of pressure on my sister, their kids, and to some extent me. He's very cool with us doing things during service like stitching (my sister and I) and drawing or writing (the kids), and I'm super grateful that he hasn't put up a stink about it. My sister, a college professor, has been encouraging students to bring handcrafts to her classes if it won't distract others, and the students are happier and more focused when they take her up on it. The power of making stuff.

3) My love of museums and sometime interest in true crime combined in reading this book: The Mona Lisa Vanishes: A Legendary Painter, a Shocking Heist, and the Birth of a Global Celebrity. (Link to bookshop.org, which supports independent bookstores.) It's written for middle grade and teen readers, but given my attention span the last few years it's perfect for me. Nicholas Day weaves the stories of the creation of the painting and the 1911 theft that propelled the painting from obscurity to what it is today. Highly recommended if you're into art, museums, heists, and/or history.

And of course it's a timely subject now, given the recent theft at the Louvre. It's really funny that the best known heists don't usually rely on elaborate plans by cunning gangs of highly skilled and intelligent masterminds. I think the people in charge of museums would like that mythic narrative to continue because the truth makes them look more vulnerable and makes their security systems seem a lot harder to overcome than they actually are. The truth is most museums don't have the funds to have elaborate technology and unassailable security for anything but their most valuable treasures. And sometimes not even then.