Reading Record 2013

January: The Dirty Life (Kimball)

February: The Magician's Nephew (Lewis)
                The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (Lewis)

March: Heller with a Gun (L'Amour)
            The Horse and His Boy (Lewis)
            The Politically Incorrect Guide to Western Civilization (Esolen)

April: Queen Without Crown (Polland)
           The Castle of Llyr (Alexander)
           When the Morning Came (Prins)
           In the Footsteps of Jesus (Marchiano)

May: The King's Daughter and Other Stories for Girls (White)

June:

July:

August: Web of Traitors (Trease)
              Ten Thousand Heroes (Barbary)
              The Stolen Oracle (Williams)
              Alexander's Horses (Powers)
              The Counterfeit African (Williams)
              Hannibal: Invader from Carthage (Webb)
              Julius Caesar (Buchan)
              The Golden Hawks of Genghis Khan (Ritchie)
              The Eagles Have Flown (Williamson)
              Message to Hadrian (Trease)
              The Eagle of the Ninth (Sutcliff)
              The Silver Branch (Sutcliff)
              The Lantern Bearers (Sutcliff)
              The Fifty-Six Who Signed (Fink)
              The Prairie Traveler (Marcy)

September: The First Book of Medieval Man (Sobol)
                   Attila: King of the Huns (Webb)
                   Age of Chivalry (Bulfinch)
                   The Horn of Roland (Williams)
                   Legends of Charlemagne (Bulfinch)
                   El Cid (McCaughrean)

October: Owen's Pretty Good Book (Blickensderfer)
               Hereward the Wake (Kingsley)
               Knight's Fee (Sutcliff)
               The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Hugo)
               Son of the Land (Bolton)
               Genghis Khan and the Mongol Horde (Lamb)
               Ironies of Faith (Esolen)
               Men of Iron (Pyle)
               The Brendan Voyage (Severin)

November: Miniatures and Morals (Leithart)
                   No Parachute (Lee)

December:

The Bookshelf Saga: Part 2

Once the bookshelves were finished, I started loading them with books, beginning with the shelves we bought.  Those shelves are at the end of my new shelving system, and I alphabetize our books by author, so I started with Z and worked my way backward until I filled the shelves...

...and ran out of room.

So I got creative!

I found this set of retro mustard yellow suitcases at Goodwill earlier that week, and I still hadn't figured out exactly what I was going to do with them.  So I used the smaller one as a bookshelf at the east end of the lighted bookshelves!

(I filled the big one on the bottom with denim I'm saving to make quilts for my kids some day.  

Storage in plain sight; I love that!)

This is my Desert/Cowboy Corner:  a rubbing of a Native American petroglyph (my step-grandma made it along the Columbia River in the 60s for an art class, before the dam flooded the area), a paint-by-number my grandpa did, jars of jawbones my kids collected in Nevada, a too-small cowboy hat and too-big cowboy boots, and a desert-scape picture my brother-in-law took in South America (the frame belonged to my great-grandma and is made out of cactus).

On the wall facing that, at the west end of the lighted bookshelves, I stacked up a few old wooden crates from my mother-in-law and filled them with books (because I knew by the time I got to the M's that I was going to run out of room), and I used a horseshoe-shaped book holder turned on end to take part of my Louis L'Amour collection vertical.  To continue my cowboy theme, I filled some too-small cowboy boots with coins to use as bookends and added a red bandanna and my father-in-law's moose jawbones.

I'm happy with my little extra shelving solutions, and the bookshelves we bought and assembled are very nice, but my hands-down favorite are the lighted bookshelves!

I love how easy it is to read the titles, even on the oldest and most worn spines,

and really I love the soft glow that showcases my beloved friends books;

especially at night!

The Bookshelf Saga: Part 1

When we moved from Tennessee to Washington, we had 33 boxes of books, and by the time we moved into this log house, I had collected just a few more.

(Boxes?  Or books?  I'm not telling!  My husband's reading this!)

That collection has grown even more during the years we've lived here, but they're (mostly) for school, and I like to plan ahead, so...

We want to put in some really cool built-in shelves along these walls on the upstairs landing, but in the meantime, my shelves were cardboard boxes, stacked up on top of each other and reinforced with boards between layers.

The shelves along this adjacent wall were even worse:

and there was no improving them.  In the last configuration the box-shelves were five rows tall instead of the three in this picture, with no wooden bookcase and with less uniformly sized boxes.

And the top two rows were starting to lean forward away from the wall.

Scary.

To save our children's skulls and their mother's sanity, we bought some "temporary" bookshelves for the larger wall,

and my husband built "rustic" temporary bookshelves for me along the short wall.

But my husband doesn't do things half way.

He built "rustic" temporary bookshelves for me...

...with built-in lighting on each shelf!

The rest of the story (or at least more pictures) is coming soon!

Sunsets

There are so many little things I've thought about posting since we've been home.

When I swept up two dustpans full of dirt and dust bunnies after the house sat (mostly) empty for a month, I thought that could make a funny post.  But I didn't write it.

I'm behind on my Reading Record posts, so I thought about telling you that I read one book in January, and two in February.  Maybe I would even admit that that the two in February were C.S. Lewis' The Magician's Nephew and The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.  Somehow I didn't get around to that, either.

I could tell you that I've renewed my battle with the mice.  Of course they waited until we were home again before they stole six more Scrabble letters.  And got out of two traps.  That could have been a funny post too, but it didn't get written.

I haven't felt much like writing.

***

In early February, my dad was trying to remember one of his favorite quotes from George MacDonald, but couldn't quite get it, so I looked it up for him.  As I did, I stumbled over this one:

"How strange this fear of death is.  Yet we are never frightened at a sunset."

***

I think I'm ready to write now.

***  

God's timing is incredible.  In the month that we spent at my parents' house, every single hard thing worked out perfectly in God's timing.  Sometimes we were aware of His hand in things as they happened, and sometimes we had to look back to see it.

Based on the doctors' estimate of how long my dad had left to live, we went down to my parents' house for a week long visit in early February.  My brother and his family were planning a trip over from Montana in late February, and we planned to return a second time at the end of their visit so we could see them too.   The day after we got there, all of our plans changed.  My dad's oncologist called and recommended that we have my brother come over early, as he was now estimating that my dad had only one to two weeks left, at the most.  So my brother and his family came over and stayed for a week, and four days after they left, my dad's condition deteriorated and he wasn't quite himself any more.  In God's timing, we had one last really good week together as a family.  All twelve of us.  In our timing, it would never have happened.

The last full week of February, there were so many details through which we could clearly see God's timing, from "big" things like financial stuff to "little" things like meal provision.  In fact, it would probably take a full week for me to list them all!

And then there was Dad's Hospice nurse.  I am sure that any Hospice nurse would have cared for my dad just as well as "ours" did, but God knew that my mom and I needed Robert.  On Monday morning,  February 25, after my mom spent a very difficult sleepless night caring for my dad, Robert came out to my parents' house to check on my dad and help us arrange the next level of care.  He confirmed what we already suspected, that my dad had less than 48 hours left, and then our quiet, unassuming nurse prayed with us before he left.  That prayer was absolutely incredible; simply spoken, profound, and exactly what we needed, right when we needed it.  As he prayed, Robert reminded us that God not only knows what pain and grief and death are, but that He experienced them all Himself when Jesus died on the cross in our place. 

With that reminder fresh in our minds, my mom and I watched my dad breath his last breaths as he died three hours later.  After weeks of mounting pain, confusion, and weakness, his last moments were quiet and peaceful, followed by complete relief from all pain.  Forever.

Death is like a sunset, and we are never frightened at sunsets.  At least we need not be.  Once the sun sets on our earthly lives, we who love God and confess that Jesus Christ is Lord can look forward to a new day coming, a new sun rising.  An eternity spent perfectly worshipping God.

We can look ahead past the sunset, with Hope.

Reading Record: December

Reading Record: November

It wasn't a very productive month, but 

Northanger Abbey was entertaining,

The 13 Clocks was cleverly funny,

and Made in America was intriguing, although from a liberal, evolutionary point of view (but was not a keeper).

I enjoyed reading Joni again,

Ten Tortured Words was an interesting read,

Friend Within the Gates proved Edith Cavell both human and worthy of admiration,

and The Father Brown Omnibus...well, I love Chesterton's writing, I love his Father Brown, and I learn something new every time I read these stories.

Reading Record: October

It was a very GOOD month.

Yes, there are 15 books in that pile, which is fun, but I'm calling it a good month because I really enjoyed every single book in the pile.

Even though I cried my way through four of them.

Reading Record: September

Reading Record: August

It Has Begun

It has begun.

This school year marks the beginning of my last 13 years of teaching.

Let's pause and let that sink in for a minute.

Yeah.

I only have 13 years left before I retire.

Amazing.

Anyway.  Moving on.

We started our new school year on Monday, and for the first time, all four kids are "officially" in school.

I have two 5th graders, a 4th grader, and a Kindergartner.

All of the books that are scheduled to be read in the first 12 weeks barely fit on the school shelves in the living room,

(although some of these books will carry through the whole year)

(The top two shelves are alphabetized by author, and the bottom row of over-sized books is too.)

and our school cupboard in the kitchen is full of the workbooks and notebooks we use (almost) every day.

(Workbooks are grouped by subject, and notebooks are color-coded according to each child's signature color...which also happen to be their favorite colors.)

Am I organized?  Why, yes, yes I am.

Maybe a little bit too organized?

Maybe.

But I'm OK with that, and so is my family.

It helps keep the chaos under control, and everyone knows where to find what they need.

And if they can't find what they're looking for, I know exactly where to tell them to look!

***
(Can anyone guess what song is now stuck in my head?)

Reading Record: July

I have NO idea how I managed to read this many books last month, but I got all the 5th grade books pre-read, so we're officially ready to start school next week!

Reading Record: June

I managed to work in a few books "just for me" in June,

and with any luck I'll finish previewing books

for 5th grade before we start school again in August!

(That Chesterton book on the top of the pile will be making a return appearance...

it's two books in one, and I've only read the first one.)

Reading Record: May

Reading Record: April

A significantly smaller pile...

due to unforeseen sunshine in Washington!

(The two backwards books are place-holders representing books that have already moved out of my house.  One I read just for fun, (Bill Bryson's I'm a Stranger Here Myself) and I really enjoyed (most of it), but decided not to keep it, and the other I read hoping to use it for school (Prisoners of Hope: The Story of Our Captivity and Freedom in Afghanistan by Curry, Mercer, and Mattingly) but I was extremely disappointed in it.

Wholesome missionary stories (especially ones that are appropriate for kids!) set in Afghanistan are a challenge to find!

Reading Record: March

I'm making progress! I previewed quite a few books for the upcoming school years, re-read some favorites, finally read some that I've always wanted to read, and said an unexpected goodbye to a few that I thought would be treasures.

The Fight Against Fuzz

I do not regret reading any of the books that I read in my childhood. At least not that I can remember at the moment!

I'm sure that some of the literary choices I made were less than stellar, but none were really awful, bad books. Part of that, I'm sure, is due to the fact that I was finding my reading material in our little library in Peru (yeah, that would be the little library on the missionary base), and therefore must also partly be due to the fact that any book I checked out had to make it past "Aunt" Theresa*, the former-nun-turned-missionary-librarian.

Aunt Theresa scared all of us kids, I think. She was a tiny woman even from a child's point of view, with short cropped gray hair and a no-nonsense attitude. She ran that library. She might have even been officially in charge of it. NO ONE crossed Aunt Theresa. If she didn't approve of a book I was trying to check out, she would call my mom to make sure it was OK if I walked out with it. It drove me crazy, and eventually Mom told her that I could check out anything I wanted and they (my parents) would look at it before I read it. And yet, although I was in awe of her, there was a certain sparkle in her eyes that made me feel like I was her favorite among all the kids that passed by her desk. My speed-reading, book-devouring little self certainly kept her busy, at least!

My girls read just like I did as a kid; fast and often. And, just like their mother, they read far above their grade level, which is where my battle begins...and where I begin to appreciate Aunt Theresa's efforts at a whole new level.

Our school curriculum is heavy on reading. (Imagine that!) We have multiple books for each subject, as well as "free reading" books and scheduled literature. We have books for Kindergarten through 5th grades on our shelves, and I've started collecting books for 6th through 12th grades as well. It would be an understatement to say that we have a lot of books.

And it is precisely because we have a lot of books that I keep a list in my purse of all the books on our school shelves. It's printed in a font about this big, and it's currently 9 pages long. I started it a few years ago because I kept coming home with books I was looking for...only to find a copy already sitting on our shelves! I am constantly updating the list: when I pull a book off the shelf to get rid of, that book gets deleted from the list, and when I find a new treasure, it gets added to the print-out before it gets shelved. It's a system that has worked well for me, and I've successfully kept it to "only" 9 pages. (So far!)

The other day I entered some new books into my list, and in the process decided that one of the books, although harmless enough in subject matter, wasn't worthy of "living" on the school shelves. (I call these kinds of books "fluff" books. They are books that are mindless, quick reads, with nothing to grow on. They have little, if any, educational value and contain nothing worth thinking about later. They are books with no "meat" to them, only "fluff".)

I told the girls that I had decided that it was a "fluff" book, and that if they wanted to keep it they had to squeeze it onto their shelves. They kept it, and later, one of them asked me why I had called it a "fuzz" book, yet put a similar book on the school shelves.

I asked her if she had learned anything from the fluff book (hereafter known as a "fuzz" book!), and she said, "Well, no, but it was fun!" Then I asked her if she had learned anything from the other book. "I already knew about most of it...but in the end Mr. X learned that he shouldn't be rude to strangers, and ... OH! I get it! One of the people in the book learned a good lesson that we can learn too! That's why it's not a fuzz book and the other one is!"

I think Aunt Theresa would approve!

*All of the kids on the missionary center called the adults "Aunt" and "Uncle". It was like having one really big family. :)

Reading Record: February

Reading Record: January

Just for fun, I'm going to show you what I've been reading.

(And in the months to come, when you wonder why I haven't posted anything on my blog lately, you'll have a pretty good idea of what's eating up my "spare" time!)

A Lesson Learned

This past summer, I was introduced to G.K. Chesterton's Father Brown stories. I read them and loved them, so when I saw this book at our little local used bookstore last week, I snatched it up. I was not disappointed.

Until I got to the end, anyway. Most of the book was exactly what I expected...interesting, fun to read, humourous on occasion, and sometimes thought-provoking.

But then I finished the book, feeling a little lost and kind of disgruntled because in the end, it didn't make sense to me. I had loved most of the book, and I wanted to love all of it, so I tried re-reading the ending before I went to bed.

I was still confused.

I thought about the book for hours before I fell asleep, and I dreamed about it "all night", so the next morning I picked it up again and flipped it open to the back of the book. On the very last page, as a publisher's bonus in this paperback version I have, there was an excerpt from a 1936 newspaper article that Chesterton had written, and this section in particular caught my interest:

Having been thus prompted, I flipped back to the front of the book to (ahem) read the title page:

And now that I have discovered what this book professes to be, I can honestly say that yes, I've read G.K. Chesterton's The Man Who Was Thursday, and I loved it!

The whole thing.

And from now on, the title page will be the first thing I read when starting a book.

(Thank you for the lesson, Mr. Chesterton!)

8 Pens, 1 Notebook, and a Stack o' Books

When my favorite black pen died, I could have bought just one to replace it. Instead I bought the colorful 10-pack, even though I didn't need any of the colors for anything special.

The leather-bound notebook was a Christmas gift a few years ago. It was buried in a box because I could find no worthy purpose for it.

The stack of books I want to read soon...ah, the books! I never need a reason to buy another book.

(Disclaimer: It just so happens, however, that three of the books in this stack were purchased under the expenditure category of "preview for future school use". Just so you know.)

I'm not sure exactly how it happened, but those pens have finally found a use of their own and the notebook now has a purpose, all because of books like those.

I've started what some call a Commonplace Book, which is simply a collection of note-worthy quotes that I have copied from the books I read. I use a different color pen for each book, partly for easier reference, but mostly just because it's fun!

I've noticed two things about keeping a Commonplace Book. One is that I read more slowly and deliberately (a hard thing for a natural speed-reader!), and often re-read passages as well, because I don't want to miss anything worth writing down. I have also noticed that the books that I've chosen to read since I started my Commonplace Book have (for the most part) been more challenging and more thought-provoking than books I've chosen in the past.

Which leads me to make a confession: I have not made a lot of exceptional "literature" choices in the past few years. In fact, much of what I've read over the last decade can hardly be called literature at all! (I have called it many things: "fluff", "mindless", "just for fun", "a quick read"...and now, honest with myself at last, I'll call it "junk".)

But that's behind me now. I've turned over a new leaf...of notebook paper.

In the back of my Commonplace Book, I've started a list (color-coordinated to match my quotes from each book, of course!) of the books I have read in 2012. There's only one rule...no "junk" books allowed.

Some of them may be short and/or easy to read, some may be borrowed from the kids' bookshelves, and some may be challenging to read or perhaps simply thought-provoking, but I am determined that they will all, for whatever reason they are chosen, be worth reading.