Monday, June 15

Books

If you ask me the question, "Have you ever read...", just stop right there because most likely the answer will be no. When I was little, my spare time did not consist of picking up a beautiful, classic book and getting lost in the story, rather it was getting lost in the woods or playing with my dog (much better company than a book in my opinion). 

I laugh at myself because sometimes it can take up to a couple years for me to finish a book (by this time I have started the book over at least once), even books I love! I just simply never have time to read, if I am reading it means I am neglecting some other responsibility like painting or cleaning. Reading for me usually is on a plane or vacation. Those occasions usually go hand and hand and do not come very often. Hopefully in this time to come I will have more time to read and I plan to start The Empty Shelf Challenge my sister blogged about here...but my bookshelf really is empty. 

It's only recently that my love of reading a good book (nothing worse than reading a bad book, I simply do not have the patience) has bloomed and now my mind is hungry. My heart is hungry too and since I clearly missed out on the essential classics that every little child should ready, I have some catching up to do. 



The favorites (I should have read when I was younger) thus far: 

 I don't think I have ever loved a little story so much. I want to borrow every lesson 
from this story and apply it when raising my own little men. 

 I do not know how I ever got away with not reading these little treasures 
because it is my soul. 

 My mom had me read this in early college years because she was horrified I hadn't. 
A treasure.

A depiction of my love for simple joys and tiny treasures. 



Now some that I still need to read:


I have read some but not all so J and I are going to read them together. 



I have already read this book but I have not finished the entire series and so I am starting over. 
My grandmother gave me a beautiful old copy of the second book but I will have to buy this 
beauty by Anna Rifle to start...oh darn



Some of my favorite age appropriate books:

If ever there was a character I related to it is Mima. I absolutely love this story, 
it is my soul in a book. 





My sister gave me this book years ago and wrote inside that I make paintings 
like Howard Roark makes buildings...She was exaggerating. I just finished this 
book (a new record for me...one month!) and any desire to read again is spoiled 
because I don't want to corrupt the image left in my mind, to lose the characters 
I love, to forget Roark's buildings. I am ruined. 



Age appropriate books I still need to read:







I went from reading the Little House Books (which I haven't finished the series yet) to The Fountain Head (brain shocker) and now I am reading.....

Mainly because I want this Rifle Paper collection but have to read every book to justify 
buying them...but also I loved Little Men so much that I hope to love 
this one equally considering I have 3 sisters too!



Now I am open to recommendations of truly wonderful books that I absolutely must read. My bookshelf is lonely and needs to be filled with pretty treasures. 






6 comments:

  1. 1) Move Kennelly's The Peaceable Kingdom to the top of your "To Read" list.
    2) You've surely read Rachel Field's Hitty?
    3) How about The Wind in the Willows?
    4) And Caddie Woodlawn...

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    1. yes to Hitty and Wind in the Willows! Not Caddie Woodlawn :)

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    2. I hope your sad face is only that you've never read Caddie Woodlawn? We must remedy that. Newbury Prize winner the year I was born - 1936. "If at first you don't fricassee, fry, fry a hen". Much as I love the Little House books (Little House by the Big Woods most), I think I agree with this comparison:
      http://www.acrossthepage.net/2011/05/caddie-woodlawn/

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  2. Malone just reminded me of two "age appropriate" books you must get to sooner than later:

    *Paul Johnson's Modern TImes. (The book NYTimes called "the best history of the 20th century that will ever be written". (Be sure you get the revised edition that includes the decade of the 80s.)

    *C.S. Lewis' Surprised By Joy: the most autobiographical of Lewis' books - his early education and his reluctant conversion to Christianity. You will love it.

    And one more (it used to be, at least, required freshman reading at Hillsdale College): Lewis' The Abolition of Man.

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  3. I think I'll do the challenge too Clem! I have a few on that list i need to read!

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    1. I would LOVE to know what classics you girls (all of you) have never read and don't own. (Or have read but don't own and would like to own). Make your lists and post them.

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