Books Read in 2006

January
Eats, Shoots and Leaves by Lynne Truss
Clearing the Clutter with Feng Shui by Karen Kingston
Holes by Louis Sachar
The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford
The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins

February
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
Stretching Lessons by Sue Bender
The Christmas Scrapbook by Philip Gulley
Keepsake Crimes by Laura Childs

March
Revelation by Beverley Lewis
The Rent Tent by Anita Diamant
Harry Potter and the Philospher's Stone by JK Rowling
Songs of the Humpback Whale by Jodi Piccoult

April
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by JK Rowling
Harry Potter and The Prisoner of Azkaban by JK Rowling
Harry Potter and the Globlet of Fire by JK Rowling

May
Amish Women by Louis Stoltzfus
The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by JK Rowling

June
The Paper House by Carlos Maria Dominguez
Picture Perfect by Jodi Picoult

July
A Covington Christmas by Joan Medlicott
Big Stone Gap by Adrianna Trigiani
Everything Happens for a Reason by Mira Kirshenbaum
The Tenth Circle by Jodi Picoult

August
The Preacher's Daughter by Beverley Lewis
Demon's and Angels by Dan Brown
The Year of Pleasures by Elizabeth Berg
The Store Keeper's Daughter by Wanda Brunstetter
The Quilter's Daughter by Wanda Brunstetter

September
She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb
Coming Home by David Lewis
Good Harbor by Anita Diamant
The Midwife's Tale by Gretchen Moran Laskas
Small Steps by Louis Sachar
The Bad Mother's Handbook by Kate Long
The Quilter's Apprentice by Jennifer Chiaverina

October
Round Robin by Jennifer Chiaverina
The Cross-Country Quilters by Jennifer Chiaverina
Whitethorn Woods by Maeve Binchy

November
The Bishop's Daughter by Wanda Brunstetter
The Christmas Quilt by Jennifer Chiaverina
The Mobile Library; The Case of the Missing Books by Ian Sansom

December
Living the Good Life by Linda Cockburn
The Sugar Camp Quilt by Jennifer Chiaverini
Troublesome Creek by Jan Watson
The Brethren by Beverley Lewis

Favourite reads of the year: The Harry Potter Series. After swearing from a conservative Christian viewpoint that we wouldn't touch these books several years ago, I picked up the first book from the library after the kids had told me that they had seen the movie at school. I wanted to see what they had been exposed to. Haha! Love them.

Also Linda Cockburn's book Living the Good Life. Someone had mention the book on a Simple Living website and I vaguely remembered reading about the family 'who spent no money in six months' in a magazine. I enjoyed Linda's humorous writing about her family of three living off the land and since reading it I've taken up a few 'green' habits. My mother thought I was going overboard with it all when I took all the tape off the Christmas wrapping paper after the presents had been opened so it could be recycled. Then a couple of days later there was a piece on the news about how the recycling centre had finished sorting out last years Christmas paper pile in October! I'm seriously thinking about making some fabric bags to use more than once instead of wrapping paper. Since I'm going overboard anyway... lol.

Said knitted jacket and Amish books

This is the fore-mentioned knitted jacket back for Beth. Unfortunately the colours aren't as bright as they should be but you can get the idea. I'll take it with me for our jaunt up to Wellington for another surgery.

I finished reading The Bishop's Daughter by Wanda E. Brunstetter while lazing on the couch this afternoon. This is the third and final book in her Daughters of Lancaster County series and I'll have to find out if she's written any more books as this was such an enjoyable series that I'm saddened that I've finished it. I love stories about the Amish people. A couple of other favourite Amish books are a couple of series written by Beverley Lewis and a novel called Plain Truth by Jodi Picoult. Borrowed from the library of course. lol.

It still amazes me..

That I can walk into a number of buildings around town and come out with my arms full of books without paying a cent! The library has got to be one of my favourite places to visit, I'm there several times a week. To be honest, I was in four of them today. A quick dash over to one because I saw online they had a book I've wanted to read for a while, then into the town library to pick up a hold and get some doll houses and minatures mags, then into the beach library as kiddo two wanted to play on the playstation for a while so I read some of the latest mags out while watching the waves, and finally into our closest library to fill in some time while waiting for a prescription to be filled. I hope I'm not the only one to be such a frequent visitor. lol.

Tomorrow Alex and I are back off to Wellington for another operation to his nose. I've packed library books to take (Maeve Binchy's latest for me and Asterix for Alex) and some wool to start knitting kiddo five something for next winter as well as some embroidery to fill in the hours. We're only going for two nights this time but I like a bit of variety so I can choose to do something I feel like doing. Alex is happy just with Asterix and his hospital tv. Oh, and the many ice-blocks he can have. Tonight he was telling his sister that he just had to press the call button and ask the nurse for an iceblock, and he could have one, even in the middle of the night! And she's jealous. lol.

A Book Questionaire

This questionaire was posted on a message board by someone who had read Anne Fadiman's book Ex-Libris. There is a chapter in her book where she tooks about being courtly lovers or carnal lovers of books. A courtly lover takes care of books,not marking them at all and abhors the idea of putting open books face down. On the other hand a carnal loves forms a close relationship with a book by jotting in margins, folding the corners down etc, and often their books become worn by use. Which are you?

1. Do you write, underline, or otherwise mark in your books?
No. I can't even bring myself to write in my Bible apart from the front and back pages.

2. What do you use for bookmarks?
Bookmarks? lol. I fold down the corner. The top of the page is folded to show where I'm up to in reading, and I'll fold the bottom corner if there is something that stands out to me so I can copy it later or think more on it.

3. Do you lay your books open and face down when you break from reading?
Yes.

4. Do you read while you eat and drink? Do you have food or drink spills or smudges in your books?

Yeah I eat and drink while reading, but it's not often anything ends up on a book. Not even chocolate.

5. Do you go crazy if there's nothing to read in the bathroom?
I use to go crazy. In fact, a childhood friend reminded me how she would be yelling outside the toliet door for me to come and play with her but I would be too wrapped up in a book. lol. With four kiddos at home I don't have that luxury any more.

6. On a scale of 1-10, how urgent is it for you to always have a book available-- in the car, on a trip, at the doctor's office, etc.? (this is related to the one above)
Oh, I say a nine. If the kids are with me it's not so important, but if I'm alone then I'll definitely have a book along. If I go on a trip somewhere I'll always back a couple of books even for one night. Just incase I don't fancy reading one particular book.
Going back to childhood memories again, my mother would occasionally take us out for the day to do bush walks. My brother and I would not be able to go without packing about 20 books to read each. Not that there was a lot of time to read, but I guess they were a bit like a security thing. We *may* of been stuck out in the whop-whops (NZ slang for country) for hours if the car broke down or something and then where would we be with no books?

7. Do you read your books before buying more? Have you read all of your books?
No. I have a whole bookshelves of books to read but still I buy more. In defense I generally buy books second hand and it's a matter of grabbing them while I see them.

8. Do you read mostly fiction or non-fiction?
Mostly non-fiction these days. I still aim to read four fiction books a month and one of those will hopefully be a classic. The bulk of my reading is often scrapbook and craft related books.

9. Are your bookshelves carefully organized? If so, how?
Generally they are organised. I have groups of homeschooling books, finance books, weight-watchers cookbooks, books about books, a shelf of history books, my fiction books and about eight shelves of children's lit.

10. Do you keep reading journals or do your write down quotes from *your own* reading? Do you make lists of new words you come across?
Sometimes. I do keep a list of books that I've read each year for the last couple of years. When it comes to new words I'll pull a dictionary out straight away if I can otherwise I'll forget to look it up.


11.How many books do you have going at once, on average (these are books you're actually reading)? Then add to that the number of books you tend to *browse* at once?
Maybe two or three fiction, and about five non-fiction. I tend to browse quite a bit, probably around 5 books a day.

12. On average, how often do you visit the library?
Too often. At least twice a week, sometimes daily.

13. Do you re-read your favorite books?
Yes, I have done.

14. Do you have a shelf or a small collection of what Fadiman would call "odd books"? These are books about an unusual or surprising subject-- something others might not guess or know about you. Anne Fadiman's "odd books" shelf happens to hold books about polar exploration.

My beginning collection of doll house books. Or maybe my collection of weight watcher's cookbooks considering I haven't lost any weight for a bit. I just like collected the books because they have good recipes. lol.

Interruptions Galore

One of those days where you sit down all comfy to do some stitching and the interruptions start to come. Phone calls to be made, a letter to write and post, kiddo's fighting, and then finally the youngest kiddo didn't quite make it to the toliet in time and wandered with wet feet through the house to tell me. That's when I gave up. lol.


A bright spot to the day was finding this book by Kristin Nicholas in the library. There are some gorgeous ideas, and the photos are stunning. Very bright, colourful and modern. Eye candy for the crafty soul. Check her website to see what I mean. On a wierd/freaky side note, I followed the link from the website to check out her blog and found it was one that I had discovered just a week or so ago! Gotta love the internet and blog world.

NZ Dares

I've had a very busy and creative day today. 6 layouts completed, including one that was done for the new NZ Dares blog.

I picked out an old photo of Grace for this challenge, she was only about three and she had the biggest grin on her face when I found her, I couldn't help but laugh and grab the camera. I don't do that nowdays when the kids eat my chocolate!

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I've been quiet with the blog lately due to sick kids. It's been a long winter and I'll be relieved when it's over. Still, it means I've been home a lot and had a chance to catch up with my reading. I finished Jodi Picoult's latest, The Tenth Circle, in two and a half days. I haven't read that fast for ages. Not one of her best books story wise but still a very good read. I'm reading Beverly Lewis's The Preachers Daughter now and enjoying it heaps. I love reading Amish stories!

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The other thing I have been reading are people's blogs. I want to share two here with you today. One is BooMama who is doing tours of people's homes on her blog. I love looking at homes and how they are decorated, not because I'm nosy, lol, but I look for ideas that I can use. At the moment there's links for over 150 homes!

The other blog is A Gracious Home. Sallie has just announced the winners of the Blogs of Beauty Awards. Lot's of blogs to check out from here too.

Oh, there's another one, a really good scrapbook one. Scrapability. It's written by a Kiwi chick living in the UK. Beside's her blog which you click on opinions to read, she also has a huge list of scrapbook blogs for you to check out.

Hmm, maybe I haven't blogged so much because I too busy checking out everyone elses! lol.

Slow Start, huh?

It's not like I'd forgotten about my blog really. It's just that there's a bit of a perfectionist streak in me who wanted to get it all looking great from the get go, but the reality is sinking in slowly, this will be a learning experience that will take some time and one that I want to enjoy the of process anyway.

So a little bit of blogging at a time instead of fluffing around trying to do everything and ending up doing nothing.

I want to share a little about a book I'm reading. I picked it off the library shelf and had one of those moments where I knew this book was important and I had picked it up for a reason. Does anyone else have those moments I wonder? The book is called Everything Happens for a Reason by Mira Kirshenbaum. It's about finding the true meaning of the events in our lives. Now I've been through some truly awful times, like most people, and have had trouble thinking why would God allow this to happen to me? Those events hurt so bad that it is hard to see how any good could come out of them. This book is speaking to my soul and giving me a new perspective and for that I'm very thankful.

Kirshenbaum found there were only ten answers to the meaning of why things happen. There are diagnostic questions to see if an answer applies to you, but I have gotten something from each meaning, even though they are not the meanings for the events in my life. Here's a little snippet from Chapter four about bringing you to the place where you can feel forgiveness.

"No one intends to be unforgiving. In our society it's more something we feel we "cant' help" than something we're proud of. But that's the point. It really does seem like something we can't help. We're just stuck with it, like someone with an abscessed tooth and no dentist to provide relief. But don't imagine only how painful that would be. Imagine how you wouldn't be able to live a normal life with such a toothache. That's what happens when we're stuck unable to forgive someone else or when we can't forgive ourselves.

We see this every time we open the newspapers these days. Almost every troubled part of the world is a place where violence feeds on unforgiveness. The cycle of violence is utterly dependent on the inability to forgive. Our world is deformed by unforgivess."

My reason for my life events isn't about forgiveness, but this really got me thinking. Such a big topic that I had never really thought about before. It's something we can all relate to in one way or another. Lots to ponder with this book. Highly recommend it.