I’m so excited! Do you remember the other day when I was telling you how I had too many books to read and not enough time to read them? Well – guess what! I had a long wait in a doctor’s office waiting room and I was actually happy about it! What a nutjob I am, eh? Who me? No way! I just knew that meant I could READ! It is so often hard for grownups – with lots of icky obligations to take DEAR time. You know Drop Everything And Read? So I love when I am forced – I don’t have to sit there reading and have guilt in the back of my head over things that I really ’should’ be getting done, you know?

Anyway, I had started The Giver back when school started, but, then my son had to take it back to school. It was his summer reading book and they were working on it in class. Then he finally brought it home, and I have been reading it little bits and pieces at a time – until yesterday! When I had two glorious hours sitting in the waiting room. I was in Heaven!

I really, really, really liked this book! Wikipedia calls it soft science fiction. Well, I guess ’soft science fiction’ is my thing, then, because, I love stories like this.

I came home from the doctor’s office all excited and said to my fourteen-year old, who was home sick, “Patrick! I finished the book and it was great – I really loved it! And I realized there is another book that follows it – isn’t that great???”

To which he moaned.

Too funny! He had been entirely nonplussed with the book when he had to read it in seventh grade. He was even more nonplussed with the book he had to read for eighth grade! And it is even more of the type of story that his seventh grade brother and I love! I can’t remember the name of that one. I had begun reading it, when he rudely and crudely snatched it back from me to turn into his teacher. She told them that if they gave her their books, she would give them extra credit. So back it went! Poor Mama Bookworm!

I will have to check out the used book store in the town square and see if I can find it! And I will, of course, have to look for the two follow-up books to The Giver. (I just read on Wikipedia this morning that there are actually two of them!)

Do you remember last night when I talked about my boys warming their mama’s heart and earned themselves some bookworm points? I hope you do! It was only two posts ago!

Well, I promised that I would tell you about the books that they ordered. I was actually pretty surprised, because, they are dragon books. Shawn is very into dragons, and Patrick hasn’t expressed that much interest in dragons, or even fantasy books, beyond Harry Potter, that is. The series is called The Dragon Lance Chronicles Trilogy and the authors are Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman. The books were published in 2001. I always have to know publish dates, it might just be an obsession of mine, but, that is one of the first things that I look at when looking at books that are new to me. Maybe you have that obsession, too? (Oh, actually – it seems that the set was put together in 2001 and the individual books were published earlier than that.)

(I’m so bummed that the picture came out so small, it is a nice looking set! But Amazon’s link-making is not cooperating with me today. Click through to Amazon and you can see it better.)

Anyway, I’m rather impressed with this series, as per the reader reviews. They have an overwhelming majority of good reviews. Several of the reviewers think that the series is better than The Lord of the Rings. Hm, that’s interesting, as that seems to be so popular right now.

Well, I can’t wait until they get here and the boys dig in to the books and tell me their opinions on the series!

Just what is wrong with me?! I’m so silly! Do you remember when I told you how excited I was, because, I was going to be oiling my brain with intellectual literature? Well, I had bought these two great new books – and the other night as I was reading The Intellectual Devotional, I thought to myself, ‘Self, why aren’t I reading this to the children?’ We could all enjoy this – as a family!

The knowledge just comes in small bits, quick to read and easy to absorb. And quite often, what I read spurs me on to research more on the topic! I seriously am just loving this book! And I’m not sharing it with the family! What kind of ‘Mama Bookworm’ am I?

It could be a nice time for the family to sit together for a few minutes, enjoy each other’s company, and learn something all at the same time!

Well, I’m the only one home right now, so I guess this won’t start tonight. Mark and the kids are at Mark’s cousin’s house and I’m home blogging my little heart out. I suppose if they don’t get home too late tonight – we could go ahead and read it.

They are off of school for a week for fall break! Woohoo!

Ya’ll just don’t tell any of my bookworm friends what a knowledge-hoarder I’ve been, ok?

Oh crud – ya’ll are my bookworm friends! Eeps!

Ah heck, just….

Ok, it’s a small festival – it’s just me and a few books and a movie, but, it is a festival, nonetheless! I just found myself in the middle of Alice Hoffman-land, sort of unexpectedly. It just sort of happened! And I am quite enjoying it!

It started when I remembered that I hadn’t yet read my copy of Here on Earth…

It was really good, and I was disappointed when I finished it – because it was over!

Then I decided that I would watch Practical Magic…

…again! I’ve only watched it like a hundred million times! But I LOVE THIS MOVIE! When it first came out on video, and I rented it, I did the funniest thing! I had never done this before. I immediately rewound it and started it over! I literally sat through two back-to-back showings of it! As a grown-up! (Ok, I use that term loosely.)

However, at the viewing recently, I fell asleep before the ending.

Moving on, though, I recently purchased The Probable Future:

…so I decided to start reading it. I am really enjoying it so far, as well. But I’m not getting very far, because, I keep falling asleep.

I have since watched Practical Magic again two more times, from the beginning – falling asleep before the ending – two more times.

Why do I keep starting it over from the beginning? Well, because, it is just more enjoyable that way! Except for the falling asleep part, that is.

I think I have just been working too hard and going to bed too late, lately. I am enjoying my Alice Hoffman Festival, though. And I guess doing it this way is just making it last longer, so it can’t be all that bad, right?

Have you read Alice Hoffman lately?

That is what my friend, Loretta, said she had just received from Amazon. She had told me that her Amazon order had come in, and I excitedly asked her what all she ordered. And one thing she mentioned that was in her ‘oh-so-fun-I-love-to-get-books-in-the-mail’ package, was a few Needlecraft Mysteries.

“Needlecraft Mysteries?!” I asked, “What the heck are those?”

And that is when she sent me to this Amazon page to check it out: A Murderous Yarn (Needlecraft Mysteries)

Now that’s pretty cool! (Of course, I had to ask her, “Oh, does the person get stabbed with a needle?” Ha!) Really, though, it is neat to have a whole series of books that caters to people who love to work with needles. And does Loretta ever like to work with needles! She is a ’stitching queen’ – she even runs a very active stitching website, complete with message board. You can keep up with what craftiness she’s up to by reading her Craft Blog. She talks about all things crafty there, with a heavy focus on needlecraft, and she even has free cross stitch patterns.

Getting back to the books, though – it is a whole series and I can’t even tell how many of them there are. It looks like a lot! And there is a big crowd of fans, as you can tell from the reviews. Loretta was told, though, that you don’t have to read them in order. So I will be interested to hear back from her how well she liked them.

I just love to learn about new books and the people who love them! It’s all so interesting! I wouldn’t call it new genres, necessarily, because these books would be in the mystery genre. But it divides up further than that, even – I wonder if you could say ’subculture’ in reference to such? You know, like the ‘Harry Potter subculture’.

This could be a whole new post, itself, I suppose – but, just wonder with me for a moment. What would we call the groups of people that like different types of books within one genre? I’m sure there are fantasy book lovers who don’t get into Harry Potter, for example. And I’m sure there are mystery book lovers that don’t like the Needlecraft Mystery books. So you have these sub-groups, and they are almost like a community, sometimes. I know with Harry Potter, it is like that – we went to a celebration of his birthday at a bookstore and it was very much like a community. And I’m sure when people are hanging out at the store until midnight, in full HP gear, they are feeling pretty much a part of the HP crowd!

Anyway, we could philosophize a lot about the different groups I’m sure, but, this post is really about my finding these Needlecraft Mysteries in the first place. And I just think they’re pretty neat!

Oh my! Two teenagers? What am I going to do with teenagers? Teenagers are trouble, right? There are so many things I need to talk to them about now, and so many things that my husband and I have to look out for in an effort to keep them safe and healthy. And they are often so hard to talk to – they get embarassed, or bored, or just plain shut down when we want to discuss something important. I found a book, though, that might help with some of this. Actually, it is a series of books. The first one I want to get, though, is called Ten Talks Parents Must Have With Their Children About Drugs and Choices by Xenia Becher and Dominic Cappello. So many kids these days wind up in drug rehab, so I think keeping the conversation flowing is a really good idea – before your kids get into any trouble! The reviews on this book at Amazon are very promising to me, because, the people mention that their teen just would not talk to them, but, using some of the conversation starters in the book, their children actually opened up to them! That book is definitely going in my wish list!

Sammie and I have been looking at this really neat book called Junk Drawer Jewelry by Rachel Di Salle and Ellen Warwick. We both love making stuff, and she has been into making jewelry a lot lately. This book not only caters to our craftiness, and our love of jewelry – but, also to my ‘hippie-ness’! You make jewelry from things you find around your house, instead of going out and buying a bunch of fancy-schmancy beads and gems and stuff. I just think that is super-cool! (I think that is my new catch phrase – ’super-cool’ – I’ve been saying it a lot lately. Of course, nothing could replace ‘groovy’! Ha!)

I grew up watching Little House on the Prairie and I just loved it! Every week when it would come on, it was like I was there with Laura, and it was so amazing – it was such a different time. A couple of years ago, my son started reading the books and became totally hooked on them! And now, my daughter is doing the same thing!

And Sammie is always begging me to take her to see Rocky Ridge Farm in Mansfield, Missouri. That is the house that Laura and Almonzo and Rose lived in and where Laura wrote all of the books. There is a museum there now, and almost all of Laura and Almonzo’s possessions are there and you can go through and really get a feel for what it was like to live in their time. It would be so cool to show my kids the 19th Century furniture! There is a cypress stump table made by Almonzo. There is a lapdesk that Almonzo made for Laura, in which she had hidden the $100 for the down payment for the Rocky Ridge farm. There also is a clock that Almonzo had given to the family for Christmas, 1886 – that he wound every night before he went to bed.

The more I tell you about it, the more excited I am getting about it! I would so love to take the kids one day, and I sure hope we get to!

GO READ A BOOK!

Today I want to tell you about a different kind of book than I usually talk about here. This book was written by a good friend of mine. She is an esthetician, and she has given me a lot of good advice about skin care products. She even sent me some – all the way from New Jersey!

She wrote a book to help out people who are in training to become estheticians. She says that when she was in school, she was always looking for a book to help with her studies that wasn’t too technical, so that she could understand what was being taught. Some of the questions that she had seemed too simple and some of them veered off topic too much. So she wrote the book to help skin care students out with their studies – the book she wished that she had access to during her own studies. The book is called, Skin Care Student Q and A, and her name is Deborah Schwabe. I’m sure it will be a great help to those training in her field.

GO READ A BOOK!

I know this book is not new and it was really over a year ago that everyone was talking about it, maybe even two years. I have finally read it, though! And I am so glad that I did! And really, this book is timeless – it should continue to be talked about. It was so good. I can easily see myself reading this one again and again! If you haven’t read it, you should really check it out! I was kind of sad when I got to the end because it was over. I just love it when a book touches me like that!

GO READ A BOOK!