Saturday Snapshot: New Shelves

On June 22, 2013June 21, 2013 By cherylmahoneyIn Saturday Snapshot11 Comments

Last week I shared about my haul from my library’s warehouse sale. Well, I went to the sale on Saturday…then went out to buy new bookcases on Sunday! I had been getting cramped on my shelves for a while, and I think the new O. Henry books marked something of a tipping point.

There’s not much space in the apartment at large, but I managed to fit in a couple more small bookcases. As I rearranged my books, I decided to give a bookcase to my L. M. Montgomery collection…

That top shelf may look disorganized…but the books are actually arranged in the order in which LMM wrote them. I tried organizing them that way when I moved to this book case, and I still haven’t quite decided if I like it. I may freak out at some point and put them back in series order!

Here’s the larger context of where I put the bookcase. This is my favorite painting by William Bouguereau, a French Academic painter. Just a poster, alas. (Here’s a better view, without the weird reflections.) There’s no actual connection to LMM, but I feel like they fit together thematically…

Have a great Saturday! Visit West Metro Mommy for more Saturday Snapshots.

Saturday Snapshot: Book Haul

On June 15, 2013June 14, 2013 By cherylmahoneyIn Saturday Snapshot15 Comments

Last weekend, I attended my library’s Warehouse Sale, which is exactly what it sounds like–they open up their warehouse and sell books for truly excellent prices. And I brought home an excellent haul…

The big find was a set of seven volumes of O. Henry short stories, from 1919. They’re a little yellowed, but in good condition for 94 years old!

In the other stack, The Giver is a wonderfully chilling, insightful book. Children of the Jedi is one I read earlier in the year for the Sci Fi Experience, and Half Magic is a lovely fantasy. In movies, I’ve been meaning to buy Bridge to Terabithia forEVER, and I’ve recently become somewhat obsessed with Before Sunrise, so both were particularly good finds! Bagthorpes Haunted by Helen Cresswell is part of a hilarious series I’ve been slowly collecting over the course of various Warehouse Sales.

That bottom book, Leroux’s Phantom of the Opera, may seem a little odd if you know me well…I already have two copies (one good translation, one bad), plus a copy I can’t read in the original French. BUT–this is the Barnes and Noble edition, which just recently I heard has an excellent introduction with background on the Paris Opera House (thank you, Carl). So I bought another copy for the sake of the introduction.

And the grand total for it all…$22.50. A new hardback could cost that much by itself. This is why I love the Warehouse Sale. The difficulty, of course, is where to put all these books–but that’s a topic for another week!

Have a great weekend, and visit West Metro Mommy for more Saturday Snapshots!

Saturday Snapshot: Growing Tomatoes

On June 8, 2013June 7, 2013 By cherylmahoneyIn Saturday Snapshot10 Comments

Remember I shared pictures of my new tomato plants a while back? Well, as an update, my plants have produced tomatoes! They’re small and green, but growing. I’m not certain I’m ever going to wind up with a large quantity of edible results, but I’m having fun watching the plants anyway. 🙂

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Saturday Snapshot: Knitting Project

On June 1, 2013May 31, 2013 By cherylmahoneyIn Saturday Snapshot12 Comments

I have recently (very recently) learned how to knit. Some of the credit goes to Robin McKinley, who waxes on about yarn occasionally on her blog, and Jessica Day George, whose book Princess of the Midnight Ball featured a hero who knits. Mostly, though, it’s because of a friend who kindly taught me the basics. Last weekend we had a “knitting and watch Jane Austen movies” get-together. 🙂

So I bought pretty yarn and knitting needles, and have started a scarf–because it seemed like the simplest of projects to begin with!

For more Saturday Snapshots, visit our new host, West Metro Mommy. Have a great weekend!

Saturday Snapshot: Lord of the Rings Nostalgia

On May 25, 2013May 19, 2013 By cherylmahoneyIn Saturday Snapshot11 Comments

I’ve been working my way through the Lord of the Rings novels, and as part of the very elaborate process, I’ve also been rewatching the movies. I saw them all when they originally came out, but never read the books then. I did, however, collect bookmarks. I think they were available at my school’s library–the memory has gone a little vague. But I collected them some ten years ago, and haven’t much thought about them since.

However. While I had never read the books, my dad had them, so they were in my house. And in my typical, over-organized fashion, where else would I store LOTR bookmarks…but in copies of LOTR? So in the course of reading the books (those same copies that were sitting there all along) I’ve also unearthed the bookmarks.

I somehow don’t have the set from Fellowship, but I do have Two Towers and Return of the King…

The bookmarks are two-sided, and I’ve kept them in the same order so you can see which characters were paired. Some make sense…others don’t.

My one regret here…no Faramir bookmark. He gets more screentime in the Extended Edition and…I just love him (this scene!) Ah well…aside from that, I’ve quite enjoyed rediscovering a collection I all but forgot I had. 🙂