Holiday Gift Wish List : Books

Have they been naughty or nice? Some ideas for gifts for the Crafty Person in your life! (these are on my wish list;-)

Beyond-the-Square Crochet Motifs: 144 circles, hexagons, triangles, squares, and other unexpected shapes by Edie Eckman

Mason-Dixon Knitting Outside the Lines: Patterns, Stories, Pictures, True Confessions, Tricky Bits, Whole New Worlds, and Familiar Ones, Too by Kay Gardiner & Ann Shayne

The Knitter's Book of Yarn: The Ultimate Guide to Choosing, Using, and Enjoying Yarn by Clara Parkes






Knitting Through It: Inspiring Stories for Times of Trouble by Lela Nargi

and this very special yarn ---handspun and hand dyed--so lovely to knit with! from SPINCYCLE YARN --I first encountered this yarn made by some lovely young women from Bellingham, Wa @ the Bellingham Farmer's Market--and I fell in love with it at first sight--then I knit a hat from it and I was hooked!

and the colorways are beautiful--this is just one example---they have many to choose from--so do visit their website.

Creative Every Day: San Francisco Book Fair Weekend

I'm off this weekend to work at this:


you can find more info on the Book Fair here. I 'm working for Roger Wicker of Turtle Island Books---a small antiquarian ABAA (Antiquarian Booksellers of America) bookstore about 2 blocks from my house. Turtle Island Books specializes in antiquarian and scholarly out of print books in the Fine & Decorative Arts, Literary First Editions, Architecture, Photography, Fine Press Books, Book Arts and Printing History and is located at 3032 Claremont Ave. Berkeley, CA 94705.

If you are new to my blog then you won't know that books--especially antiquarian books--are my other love! after creating art---then comes the books! I once owned a Used and Out Of Print Bookstore, Morningstar Books, in Bellingham, Washington. I always find working at an antiquarian book fair fun and stimulating, with interesting books to see and many fascinating people to meet.

For those who may be wondering what "antiquarian" means---an antiquarian book is one that is at least 100 years old--(that would make a book published in 1908 an antiquarian book), but many book sellers at the Fair also sell Modern First Editions. However, many if the books at thus fair will look like these...
Nowadays I'm mostly on the look out for interesting design and art books----or anything I can use as reference for textile and surface pattern design. I usually find some item in this genre that really interests me. I will also be on the look out for older knitting and needlework books and ephemera---but mostly I will be working---which means showing lovely old books to potential customers....if you live in the Bay Area, come on by and say hi!

Winter Holiday Children's Books

I think the Holiday Season should be a magical time for children---and this should include reading some books to the children in your life. I also have a fondness for lovely children's picture books about winter, Christmas, and the holiday season. Here are some of my favorites---they are good reads an all wonderfully illustrated.

I'm starting with my current favorite---I discovered this book when the author, Daniel Pinkwater, read this book aloud on NPR a few holiday seasons ago--the reading was so entrancing--I promptly went out a bought a copy. The illustrations by the author's wife, Jill Pinkwater, really enhance the story.


Next is the nicely illustrated rendition of Robert Frost's famous winter poem....


Third on my list is this endearing story by an Alaskan author and a well known Alaskan artist...


next, this classic--originally published in the Ladies Home Journal in 1958....


And then we have the pop-ups!





These are just few highlights from my small collection of holiday books---guess I will save some for next year! I recommend any of these if you are looking for a child's gift for the Holidaze.

"To Do" Lists and Knitting

For the knitters who read my blog--yes, I am knitting those holiday gifts! I have this scarf finished (just need to block it)



and this one on the needles....




and then I interrupted the frantic scarf knitting to knit a few squares for Kay at Mason-Dixon Knitting for Oliver's Blanket. These were fun because they provided instant gratification--I knit all three in one evening. They are 4" x 4" and knit with nice wool sock yarns.



And I am mightily resisting the strong urge to start another project---crocheting (with the gorgeous red wool/silk yarn I bought last month at ArtFibers) a lovely lacey sweater to wear to those holiday parties....[note to self: must must finish those scarves first, no more yarn projects! --- until scarf is finished]

On another more literary note--I attended a fun "reading" for this book the other night



The author, Sasha Cagen, had a "list slam" where folks read their "to do" lists out loud --some quite hilarious...and she has a great website here. If you area list-maker----(I am;-) you will probably enjoy this funny book!

Here is my current craft project list (well--- some I have to withhold from putting here because they are holiday gifts surprises--so I actually have more projects going and/or planned than this list)
1. sew some (more) coffee cup cozys
2. sew some aprons
3. sew an afghan from felted repurposed sweaters
4. knit hat to go with scarf (maybe?)
5. finish scarf on the needles
6. finish socks on the needles
7. sew more pin backs on "inchies"
8. crochet red holiday sweater
9. sew some baby bibs
10. sew some (more) grocery shopping bags

What is on your list?

BAFAB Week

Buy a Friend a Book Week is October 1-7 (as well as the first weeks of January, April, and July). During this week, you’re encouraged to buy a friend a book for no good reason. Not for their birthday, not because it’s a holiday, not to cheer them up–just because it’s a book.

How to participate in BAFAB Week

Celebrating BAFAB is easy. Just get yourself to a real-life or virtual book store during Buy a Friend a Book Week (the first weeks of January, April, July, and October) and, well, buy a friend a book! But here's the fun part: you can't buy your friend a book because it's their birthday or they just graduated or got engaged or had a baby or anything else. You have to give them a book for no good reason. In fact, this present out of the blue from you should shock the pants off of whomever you decide to give it to. And it'll make them happy. And that's the point: promote reading, promote friendships. Just make sure to let them know about Buy a Friend a Book Week, so they can spread the joy in turn.

Because many readers and booklovers are not aware of how many books are challanged as not fit for schools & libraries by our fellow Americans who wish to censor what our children and young adults---and even adults (! ) read, I am featuring BANNED BOOKS WEEK.

Banned Books Week

September 29–October 6, 2007

From the American Libraries Association website:

"Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell’s award-winning "And Tango Makes Three," about two male penguins parenting an egg from a mixed-sex penguin couple, tops the list of most challenged books in 2006 by parents and administrators, due to the issues of homosexuality.

The list also features two books by author Toni Morrison. "The Bluest Eye" and "Beloved" are on the list due to sexual content and offensive language.

The American Libraries Association Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF) received a total of 546 challenges last year. A challenge is defined as a formal, written complaint, filed with a library or school, requesting that materials be removed because of content or appropriateness. Public libraries, schools and school libraries report the majority of challenges to OIF.

The "10 Most Challenged Books of 2006" reflect a range of themes, and consist of the following titles:

• "And Tango Makes Three" by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell, for homosexuality, anti-family, and unsuited to age group;
  
  
• "Gossip Girls" series by Cecily Von Ziegesar for homosexuality, sexual content, drugs, unsuited to age group, and offensive language;
  
  
• "Alice" series by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor for sexual content and offensive language;
  
  
• "The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things" by Carolyn Mackler for sexual content, anti-family, offensive language, and unsuited to age group;
  
  
• "The Bluest Eye" by Toni Morrison for sexual content, offensive language, and unsuited to age group;
  
  
• "Scary Stories" series by Alvin Schwartz for occult/Satanism, unsuited to age group, violence, and insensitivity;
  
  
• "Athletic Shorts" by Chris Crutcher for homosexuality and offensive language.
  
  
• "The Perks of Being a Wallflower" by Stephen Chbosky for homosexuality, sexually explicit, offensive language, and unsuited to age group
  
  
• "Beloved" by Toni Morrison for offensive language, sexual content, and unsuited to age group;
  
  
• "The Chocolate War" by Robert Cormier for sexual content, offensive language, and violence.
  

Off the list this year, but on for several years past, are the "Catcher in the Rye" by J.D. Salinger, "Of Mice and Men" by John Steinbeck and "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" by Mark Twain.

For more information on book challenges and censorship, please visit the ALA Office of Intellectual Freedom’s Banned Books Website here."

___________________________________________________________

TODAYS QUOTE:

"Think for yourselves and let others enjoy the privilege to do so, too." ~Voltaire

Writing Letters

I have a new penpal---and I haven't had an actual PENPAL since I was a little girl! Thanks to Felicia Sullivan--who sponsored a penpal sign up awhile back--she then paired people who responded to her penpal swap blog post. I am finding it so much fun to get acquainted with someone clear across the county from me, with a very different life than mine. And I have not had to describe--in writing---my life, where I live, and some of my life history to another person in quite awhile. What a pleasant way to be reflective and take some stock of my life and where I am now. Writing about myself and my life is very different than talking about the same subjects. What is it about writing a letter--in longhand, with a pen (!) and then mailing the letter that is so satisfying?

And receiving a handwritten letter is just as agreeable.
To quote Vanessa Bell writing to her sister, Virginia Woolf in 1908:
"I had a charming long letter from you this morning with flattering hints of rose-gardens and daylight round corners and I don't know what all. I purr all down my back when I get such gems of imagery thrown at my feet."

I must admit there is certain thrill when I see that envelope--(or any envelope, really) with handwriting on it--addressed to me...a letter! but then when it is a nice long, loverly descriptive letter--what a joy!

Perhaps my love of letter writing--and receiving letters---is from living in the Alaskan bush for so long (over 15 years!) where "mail day" was a big event and handwritten letters really were our lifeline to the outside world. This was before the days of the internet and e-mail, so I soon found out that if I wanted to receive letters from my family and friends who lived in other places, I had to write letters to them. So, write I did. Or maybe my fondness for letters comes from the letters my beloved Grandmother (Gram) wrote me every week when I was a very young (18) newly married and somewhat homesick women---since I had moved far away from all my family and friends.

I also take delight in creating envelopes--some I just make from "repurposed" colorful calendars, or from wrapping or scrapbook papers---and some I draw and then make copies, like this one.




And on the subject of envelopes, I recommend this book:


"Open this book and you will discover a most curious and diverting collection of decorated envelopes, all of which have been sent through the United Kingdom's Royal Mail."

Here is an image or 2 from inside the book to whet your appetite:



And somewhere along the way--I think at a garage sale--I picked up this delightful and inspirational book--a book of "warm, witty and loving letters from women to women through the ages, with some envelopes and facsimiles of original handwritten letters..." This book is an interesting compendium of excerpts of many famous women writers and artists letters to friends and family.


Oh--and did I mention I also SAVE letters I receive? yep, I have quite a few in the bottom of a file drawer...I see this as recording my life for my great great great grandchildren...who I imagine finding in their mother's attic a box tied with musty rose colored ribbons...full of letters to me which tell a story of a life long ago...

And finally-- here is a nice link to a great website with a directory of sites about all types of letter writing, a bibliography of books about letter writing and letters, mail art, penpals and more---so now go and hand write a letter to someone and then mail it! You just might get a letter back...

Bookish Meme

I haven't blogged about books and reading for awhile but I liked this blog meme I came across on a blog I like---Naked Without Books, and decided it was time a for a bookish blog post. This is what the blogger at Naked Without Books says about this meme:
"I stole (then shamelessly altered) this meme from Bookfool who in turn stole it from another blog. Now you know what to do, right?"
So here goes:

A book that made you cry: Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell (I read this one in fifth grade, it was my first encounter with a novel that did not end happily)

A book that scared you: Hiroshima by John Hersey, An Inconvenient Truth by Al Gore

A book that made you laugh: Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris

A book that surprised you with its plot twist: The Family Tree by Sheri S. Tepper

A book you loved as a preschooler: Many Moons by James Thurber

A book you loved in elementary school: Black Beauty by Anna Sewell, Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

A book you loved in middle school: Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

A book you loved in high school: War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

A book you hated in high school: The Lord of the Flies by William Golding

A book you loved in college: The Great Cosmic Mother by Monica Sjoo and Barbara Mor

A book that challenged your identity: The Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan

A book you have that's all worn out and falling apart and bound together with duct tape, but you refuse to part with it: my first copy of The Joy of Cooking by Irma Rombauer

A series you love: The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien ( I recently found an old poloroid of me in high school--1967? and I was wearing a button that said: "Frodo lives!")

Favorite SF: The Gate to Women's County by Sheri S. Tepper

Favorite fantasy: The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley

Favorite comic book: any Wonder Women comics

Favorite mystery: currently, Maisie Dobbbs by Jacqueline Winspear

Favorite classic: Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck

Favorite book of poetry: New and Selected Poems by Mary Oliver, Sisters of the Earth ed. by Lorraine Anderson (So hard to pick here-I have so many favorite poets!)

Favorite romance: Outlander by Diana Gabaldon

Favorite Art History book: The Power of Feminist Art by Norma Broude and Mary D. Garrard

Favorite Craft Book: 500 Beaded Objects ed. by Terry Krautwurst

Favorite Nature Writing: Refuge by Terry Tempest Williams, Arctic Dreams by Barry Lopez

Favorite Alaskan Book : Raven by Dale DeArmond

A book that's not on this list: Traveling Mercies by Ann Lamott


Quote for the Day:
“I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.” -- Jorge Luis Borges

Poetic Knitting

Somehow, this poem made me think of my knitting. The socks (or the beginning of socks) here are a nice mix of hemp and cotton, the hat all cotton; both are lovely yarns to knit with. The hat is destined for an Alaskan fisherman's head, and match the hat I knit for his new baby boy.

EXPERIENCE

by Emily Dickinson

I stepped from Plank to Plank
A slow and cautious way
The Stars about my Head I felt
About my feet the sea.
I know not but the next
Would be my final inch---
This gave me that precarious Gait
Some call Experience.




Quote for today:
"Half our life is spent trying to find something to do with the time we have rushed through life trying to save."----Will Rogers

National Poetry Month

Spring
by Edna St. Vincent Millay

To what purpose, April, do you return again?
Beauty is not enough.
You can no longer quiet me with the redness
Of little leaves opening stickily.
I know what I know.
The sun is hot on my neck as I observe
The spikes of the crocus.
The smell of the earth is good.
It is apparent that there is no death.
But what does that signify?
Not only under ground are the brains of men
Eaten by maggots.
Life in itself
Is nothing,
An empty cup, a flight of uncarpeted stairs.
It is not enough that yearly, down this hill,
April
Comes like an idiot, babbling and strewing flowers.


April is NATIONAL POETRY MONTH

Since I love poetry and I always celebrate National Poetry Month by reading a new poem every day--I have decided to spotlight a few poetry resources I have discovered while surfing around the web.

One of my favorite sites is Poets.org--the website for the National Poetry Foundation--a great place to look up your favorite poet's poems, search for poems to read at that special occasion, or read interview's of poets or sign up to have a poem a day delivered to your inbox for the month of April. The National Poetry Foundation established April as the National Poetry Month in 1996.

Another great poetry resource is The Poetry Foundation---they have a blog, articles, news, and you can search thousands of poems in their archives---by subject, occasion or author.



"Poetry is not an expression of the party line. It's that time of night, lying in bed, thinking what you really think, making the private world public, that's what the poet does."
—Allen Ginsberg, Ginsberg: A Biography, Barry Miles (1989).

For great animated visuals while poet Billy Collins read his poetry try Billy Collins Action Poetry or listen to Garrison Keillor's weekly podcast of The Writer's Almanac. Create your own poem at the Magnetic Poetry Board....looking for that perfect word to rhyme with blog? check out the Online Rhyming Dictionary.

I also highly recommend the Poets' Corner, "one of the largest and oldest text resources on the web. The goal of this project is to create a user-friendly library of works that promotes browsing and exploring through a site that spans thousands of works by hundreds of authors covering thousands of years." At Poetry Daily--you can read a new poem every day! (not just during April). Poets Against War "continues the tradition of socially engaged poetry by creating venues for poetry as a voice against war, tyranny and oppression."

Or join NaPoWriMo---National Poetry Writing Month! Write a poem every day (or at least try to) and post it to your blog if you dare...this dare is from the blog 32 Poems Poetry Magazine.


LIFE, believe, is not a dream,
So dark as sages say;
Oft a little morning rain
Foretells a pleasant day:
Sometimes there are clouds of gloom,
But these are transient all;
If the shower will make the roses bloom,
Oh, why lament its fall?
Rapidly, merrily,
Life's sunny hours flit by,
Gratefully, cheerily,
Enjoy them as they fly.

----From LIFE by Charlotte Bronte

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY

"Cinderella and the prince
lived, they say, happily ever after,
like two dolls in a museum case
never bothered by diapers or dust,
never arguing over the timing of an egg,
never telling the same story twice,
never getting middle-aged spread,
their darling smiles pasted on for eternity.
Regular Bobbsey Twins.
That Story."
----Anne Sexton