versatile blogger

Thank you very much to Miss Smith for nominating me for the Versatile Blogger Award in a recent post. (Oh and wait, be sure to check out this post that details some crafty holiday ideas!) Really, I am a winner because you are here, reading this.

el camino, Brunswick, ME

Sometimes it's my turn to be fragile and I am today. So it seemed like an extra good idea to remember that my connections and community are broad and wide, thanks to this little thing called the Internet.

I think being versatile is a way to describe a lot of things in my life. Am I a true Renaissance woman? Probably not. But being a librarian is pretty versatile: there's a fluidity in my work on a few levels. For one, I am meeting each person with an information need in the moment. There will never be two interactions that are the same and my job is to figure out the scope of what is being asked so that I can find a source for the answer.

I am versatile in what I read. I like a good Young Adult book (Will Grayson Will Grayson, The Book Thief, My Most Excellent Year), graphic novels (The Arrival, French Milk), meaty works of literature (Cutting for Stone, Italian Shoes, The Elegance of the Hedgehog), and sometimes things that are totally fluff (here, here, and here).

I am versatile at home, but you know that already.

So here are 7 things about me, as per the instructions for this award:

1. Rats, tomato horn worms, and my basement scare me. Bats, heights, and dogs do not.

2. I am reading the new Ken Follett book right now, The Fall of Giants.

3. I have at least three unfinished knitting projects that are lying dormant right now and I have no plans to do anything with them other than occasionally finding them and feeling guilty.

4. I like sweet better than salty. But chocolate with salt is wonderful.

5. My idea of a perfect morning does not involve my family; this sounds mean, but it's the truth. I still dream of having a nanny for the mornings who would get everyone fed, ready, and nagged, and I would float down the stairs in my silken robe to administer little kisses as my family left me a quiet house in which to enjoy a cup of coffee, my breakfast, and a book.

6. The autumn is my favorite season. But I also really like winter until about the end of February.

7. I would rather knit a new pair of socks than darn them.

a little early holiday cheer

from someone who knows me well

So, now the hard part: picking a few good bloggers out there who make me smile when I see a new post waiting in my Google Reader. If you'd like to take the torch and run, great, and if not, take this as a thank you for sharing your good ideas, humor, and talents with the world (and me).

Tollipop

(she deals with scorpions with panache)

StillmanSays

(versatility to the extreme)

BeautyThatMoves

(inspired, always)

Transformation:: 2

Transformation from green to orange to exploding sweetness in my mouth and finally into my belly! This was from a few weeks ago when they were really peaking. It's really like eating sunshine, these Sungold variety.
More transformation.... We added this shelving in our bedroom to be a yarn storage solution as well as to be sort of a colorful, ever-changing installation of color. The shelves were upcycled cubbies from school!
Below is my other wall of inspiration that I get to look at as I fall asleep and wake up each day. Art by the family, at left, and my brother's painting from when he was in Tuscany. Surrounded by talent at each turn.

And now some pictures from our new office space, formerly our boys' bedroom. This color on the walls is just incredible. It's such a wonderful green, changeable in different lights (Ben Moore "sesame").

We now get to have ALL of our books in one place in the house (well, except cookbooks, which live in the kitchen, and the boys' separate collections, and the pile on my bedside table). And the librarian's heart went pitter pat to place them in a logical semblance of order. We think a lot about "findability" in library world, because if you can't find it you may as well not have it.
We have a lot of nonfiction, which somehow surprised me. Perhaps because there are few novels which I deem appropriate to actually own my own copy of. And of course, quite a large children's collection (classics and not), crafting books (sewing, knitting, Martha Stewart Baby magazines, knitting magazines too!), teacher books, library theory books, parenting, and gardening---are our major subject areas.

Enjoy this day! I am going outside to check on my laundry.

Vacation from Waldorf Land.

[MOM! Stop reading this if it is before I see you!!!! I mean it! I know how you skip to the end of books!]

So in the spirit of full disclosure, I will tell you that though my husband is a Waldorf teacher and we have chosen to raise our children quite differently from "the norm" (as in minimal media exposure, emphasis on play, etc.), there are times for other experiences also. Frequently these experiences come when we visit or are visited by our family.

we are sleeping under our quilt!

Though we set some pretty clear boundaries this year about certain console video gaming systems that one well-meaning relative wanted to give our boys ("No. Thanks anyway. But really. No."), we compromised on several new GameBoy game cartridges for Jonas. And Sylvan got two laser tag shooting gun things that light up and make obnoxious noises. The GameBoy comes out a few times a year and Jonas knows this. These things come and go. Was it hard to watch my twinkly-eyed boy display classic symptoms of addiction and withdrawal from the handheld game this weekend? Plugged in and totally tuned out of life for hours at a time? Did I not always love the sound of the laser guns with their beeping as they rocketed by me? Yes it was hard, no I didn't always love it, and thank God these loud obnoxious things have a planned obsolescence (or actually this is pretty gross). But I didn't let it ruin my enjoyment of the weekend either.

The thing that I learned way back in childbirth ed. class was that it's the people who set hard and fast rules for their ideal experience that end up with the exact opposite, like the Universe just comes down on you for being rigid. Vehemently opposed to epidurals and caesareans and want an au naturel birthing experience? You're pretty sure to end up with quite a few interventions. Planning for an epidural? You'll end up too far along to get one anyway and get the natural childbirth that you never wanted.

So. We make these little forays into the mainstream, dipping in our toes so to speak. And then realize why the choices that we have made are right for *our family*. And it's a lot quieter too.

This fun little bag (shhh! for my mom!) is from a new gift book, totally inspiring.

And even better, I used what I had on hand! Love that. I tucked her other little gifts inside. It's sort of the perfect bag for a few books or a knitting project. The two exterior layers are quilted, so there's a little "heft" to it. The cover depicts same bag. I found the instructions in the book a little lacking, but made it up when I wasn't sure and things turned out OK. Not necessarily a beginner's book, but hey! That's cool too, I guess I have moved up in the world!

And this book. Oh, man. Total eye candy. These amazing tree houses are made by some crafty Frenchmen. It is the perfect midwinter fantasy book, thinking of the sound of swishing leaves and golden wood all around me. A great gift from one of Jake's students. Make up an excuse to go out and buy this book.

And have a healthy and happy and peaceful New Year!

Books and hankies will never go out of style

In library school we are always compelled to have the discussion about whether, in this digital age of Kindles and online books, real print books will become obsolete. Let me say right now that I have never used a Kindle and would happily try it with an open mind (I already know the reasons why people think they're cool and convenient) if someone tossed one my way, as a tool that has a specific purpose.
But my argument is always something like this: The more time we spend at our computers for work and play, will we really want more screen time at the end of the day, as we curl up in bed? Do we even know how screen-reading impacts our eyes, long-term? (The answer is no, we are the guinea pigs.) And finally, reading is forever a tactile experience that includes smell, texture, sound, and the physical weight of a book in our hands.
The thrill of holding this copy of Peter Pan in my hands, from 1911, with its thick pages, spotty brown in places, with broken spine and worn cover, is not even in the same universe as a digitized book.

Photoplay images? Come on, this is pre-talking in movies!

The Swap--CHOO update...Is that my hankie is almost ready to send off to my partner, and I know just which poem I will send her! I like to think about 16 ladies, as near as two miles away and as far as Norway and Italy, who are making rolled-hem hankies for an unknown person somewhere else in the world. Check out our Flickr group to see what's been posted.

Jonas drawing a dragon.
Wow.

Jonas spent the other afternoon after school copying a dragon from a book. Not tracing, mind you (which is also OK), but actually using his eyes to copy the image he was seeing. I love it that the art instruction at his school is integrated with everything, not just a class that comes once or twice a week. And what is at first implied (in grade one) and later (middle school) directly taught, is how to see something in the world and translate it mentally onto your page. That's what I learned in art school, much later than first grade.

Calvin Coolidge and his unusual boat name

Remember my new favorite old book that I have been using in some recent ATCs? They come from this wonderful treasure trove, The American Heritage Book of Fish Cookery (1980), full of black and white photos of fisherpeople with excellent captions and weird-sounding recipes. I see there's a used one on Amazon for 59 cents, if you fall in love with it from this post. How can I cut up a book, you ask? Well, if no one has checked it out from the library in 8 years, why not turn it into something people WILL look at?

For example, that lady above in her apron is brandishing a fish that is in the process of eating another fish. The caption calls her Granny Turner, of Bear Island, Ontario.
And here is our 30th president (1926-1929), Calvin Coolidge, described as "one of our most enthusiastic presidential anglers" by this source:
And here's a close-up of the name of his jaunty vessel:
(For those of you reading from outside the US, those two words have Other Connotations here. Did they have the same connotations back then? That would be interesting.)

And check out these hotties, described as "...the lean, hard men who put out after bluefish were notorious for being just as strong, wild and quick tempered as the fish they sought..." Yum.
We also have these lovely ladies in their hats, preparing a fish breakfast on the West Branch of the Penobscot, here in Maine in 1885:
Finally, here is Edward Llewellen with his 425 pound giant sea bass, caught off of Catalina Island in California in 1903:
Here is what it's like today, with snow blanketing our window screens:
The shoveling down to the chicken house was heavy and wet and up to Jonas's waist, he reports.

Pieces of Me: Librarian

Babar's little girl is having quite a time in the Children's Room, giddy-up Duckie!

Being a librarian is like being a matchmaker. I get excited each time I get a new question for what to read next or how to find something. The best part is when I make a good match, and hey, it's not like a marriage---if I make a bad match, you can choose to toss the book on the floor.
As your librarian, I check a lot of books in and out. I answer the phone and call you when you have a book that has arrived. I find the books you want and request them from other libraries. Then I unpack the bags when they come each morning, and it's kind of like the thrill of getting presents, except it's fun twice because first I get to open all the packages and then I get to tell you the happy news that the book you wanted is here in my hand!

the lovely rug that our Youth Advisory Board chose for their alcove

I will always tell you the phone number to the Camden Public Library (236-3440---see, I know it by heart by now) and will happily mark it down as a reference question, for our statistics. I work on weeding the collection, making room for the new, saving the noteworthy, making hard choices about what should stay and what should go; it feels really good when progress has been made, and the shelves look so much better. Sometimes I help you on the computer...setting up an email account for the first time, printing e-tickets, showing you how to request books from the comfort of your own home, looking up archives on NPR for the first time. I get my library exercise when I walk around and put books away. I get my brain exercise when you have a challenging question or when I am dreaming up new ways to display books.
We have a little stamp to denote Rockport Readers Recommend (the RR) and you can recommend online also! And another stamp for a BookLovers' Cafe recommendation, the little red tea cup. Thanks for the stamps, Jane!
I am always learning new things from my colleagues; one who patiently teaches me (and re-teaches me) the completely anti-intuitive Hold Pick-Up feature; another who taught me to not be fearful of contact paper when covering books. I have a very talented and creative and visionary Director, whom I love to collaborate with.

I like it that I know your names (mostly) when you come in. I like getting to know your reading tastes. I appreciate that we all read different things for different reasons at different times, because I certainly do.
Sometimes I get to be your Librarian-Baker when it's a BookLovers' Cafe day. I get up at 6 a.m. and make muffins and scones (lemon blueberry and dried cherry/ginger, recently) for us to share as we discuss the books that we have recently (or long ago or for always) loved. The threads of our conversations always inspire me, sometimes on parenting, or loss, or WWII, or ancestors.
Sometimes I get to be your Librarian-Artist when it is an Artist Trading Card Make-and-Swap day.

And just because you should see that we also have some very beautiful volumes (and not just ones about leeches, with horrifying pictures of rotten toenails on them), I give you a few shots of my vote for the Most Beautiful Book Cover of All Time, The Poetical Works of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and I apologize for not having the publication year (publisher is Hurst, New York):
At our small library, I am a generalist and get to do so many things that I am never bored. I learn every day and I like that.

The Ugliest Book Cover of All Time

How's that for a teaser? Well, since this blog usually showcases a lot of pretty eye candy, I thought I should warn you. So if you are easily grossed-out, or have an extreme aversion to leeches, feel free to just skip this post. I won't be hurt.

While you decide whether to let your curiosity get the better of you, look at these images of when I was laying out my in-progress quilt squares! I am trying to get as much as I can done before grad school starts at the end of the month. I think I am at the point where I need some advice on what to do about one piece that is a half inch short, my cutting error. Anyone have ideas? Rhea? Ana?

I will spend the morning sewing more squares up. Oh and maybe pushing the vacuum around.
Yes, it's subjective, but I am putting my vote in for the Ugliest Book Cover of All Time. I am trying to picture the book designer pitching this image to the editor..."Hey, I've got this FABULOUS image for the cover of that leech book!" Really, truly, it's over the top---I think it's the funky toenail that really adds creep-out for me. There are many other very gross images within the pages of this book, but I won't reproduce them here. Here goes. Ready?
How did I come upon this book? Weeding the children's nonfiction at Rockport Public Library! It matched the criteria for withdrawal (which includes appearance), mainly that it hadn't been checked out in quite awhile, like years. And I wasn't censoring the collection out of personal leech-aversion, because we have another volume on leeches. Crazily enough, I will not be taking this back to the library for the Library Booksale (Pris, you're saved), but saving it for its altered book potential.

Finally (and I thought this would be a short post), check out this map that shows the growth of Walmart stores across America (thanks, Mr. Google). I'm not a big fan, mainly because of the loss of the character of our small community stores, and I try not to support this model of consumerism. But I admit that there are certain things (sometimes sewing things or crafty things) that cannot be found at other stores nearby; I think I average about a visit a year, and it always makes me feel bad and a little guilty. Any thoughts on this dilema?

Food for Thought

Some books to get your hands on for inspiration.

1. Apples for Jam: A Colorful Cookbook by Tessa Kiros.
Our friend Hannah has a phrase for those amazing cookbooks that have stunning photographs and great recipes: "food porn." Yes, this from a woman who is usually off and on with sugar, has been on plenty of elimination diets for allergies, and sometimes eats marshmallow Fluff by the tubful. I love to read cookbooks, literally cover-to-cover. This one is organized by color and is full of these wonderfully Mediterranean recipes, really comfort food stuff. And not all of it is like WOW, amazingly difficult. Sometimes simple is best. Last night we had pasta with tomato sauce and shrimp and it was perfectly lovely. On the cover are a pair of child's red buckle shoes, and if you know me and red shoes, you will know that I fell in love with this book on sight.

2. A Year of Mornings: 3191 Miles Apart by Vettese and Barnes.
How tacky is it to not even thank the gift-giver yet, but make a blog post about their amazing and perfect gift? This book. Oh, this book! The authors found each other in the blogosphere and realized they shared a similar aesthetic and decided to collaborate on posting a diptych of one photo from each of them throughout a year. Check out their webpage and if you scroll down you can see some of these shots to get a flavor (Mary Nanna, this book might be some more inspiration for you!). To the gift-giver, who knows me like a sister even though we are 1158 miles apart...You are still my girl.

3. The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery.
OK, yeah, so you read it here first...Remember when I told you about this book? And now it seems like everyone is reading this?! Ha. Well, I called it. And fine, if you'll recall it was a total impulse buy, purchased purely on the title, but no matter. I am here to report that it really was an amazing novel whose story unfolds like a delicate flower. The story is about two female main characters who are outrageously intelligent, but for their own reasons they choose to keep a low profile about their rich inner lives. At times funny and poignant, I was truly astonished many times over by the rich story and excellent translation from the French, often stopping in my tracks to digest a luscious sentence.

A few other things of note:
These tattoos posted by helloyarn (who has recently suffered a canine loss)
This and this lady who often have me laughing at my keyboard
This amazing artist of wearable art
These lovely photos
The Alewives Girl blogged about my reusable shopping totes!

A much-needed home day without company is coming my way tomorrow and I hope to have some pictures to show you soon!

This Morning

The view from my kitchen window this morning, 7-ish.

This fall, as you may have heard me mention, I am reading All-YA, All The Time. Yup, in honor of my middle school practicum at the Camden Rockport Middle School, I have set aside all adult books for later. I have read a variety of "boy" and "girl" interest books at higher-maturity and general audiences levels. I have recently read a couple that qualify as Outstanding, and I know this in part because I am still pining for the characters.
Julia Gillian (and the Art of Knowing) by Alison McGhee is a perfect "Bridge" book. (I'm working on a list of Bridge Books right now, as part of my project for the practicum. Bridge Books are books that help kids make the leap into more complex and longer chapter books, from the beloved Magic Treehouse series, Junie B. Jones, Clementine, etc.) Julia Gillian is an expert at papier-mache mask-making, she's not a fan of reading, she wants to master the claw machine (and get the meerkat!), and she walks her big dog around a specific 9 block radius from her apartment each day. She doesn't like it that her parents read depressing stories from the newspaper or that they are busy with their graduate studies (both are teachers) the summer that we meet her.
Julia Gillian is a quirky character, with the fears, frustrations, and disappointments that come right along with being 9-10ish. This isn't action-driven, but it's very compelling. She is a girl who is at ease in her community. I love the fact that her parents let her embrace her 9 block world, with very clear limits, especially since I sometimes encounter risk-averse parents who hesitate to let their children cross the street alone in tiny little Camden, Maine. (Oooh, can you tell this makes me a little passionate?)
My Most Excellent Year: A Novel of Love, Mary Poppins, and Fenway Park by Steve Kluger had me crying and laughing. It's an older teen novel that centers around three main characters and is told through their letters, IMs, and emails. I was not prepared to have a wet pillow at the end of this book, or be bereft for days afterward! Sometimes the whole letters/emails/IMs thing in storytelling feels like a cheap gimmick, and I was a little leery going into it. So it's the story of Tick, his brother Augie, and a new girl, Alejandra. Tick and Augie decided to be brothers back when they were seven, and Tick's mom had just died. The fact that Augie is Chinese-American and Tick is Caucasian doesn't enter into their discussion.
It's pretty clear to everyone who knows Augie that he's gay (lover of all things theatrical, belting out show tunes from the age of 2, etc.), but Augie is just now coming to that conclusion himself with his first crush. Tick would really like to date Ale, but she initially won't give him the time of day. So far this is sounding like so many other teen novels, right? For me, the astonishing thing about this book is how Kluger manages to write the "teen problem" book with humor and realism, and how these three teens ultimately succeed because they are connected to and supported by each other and to their family members (real and adopted).
My one beef: The cover is way too girly! This is truly a boy/girl crossover book, and yet it will be a hard sell for boys seeing the swirly Mary Poppins font and the twinkly stars on the cover. Do book designers READ the books they make covers for?! Kathy and I have some open-minded 8th grade boys in mind, but honestly, I will feel compelled to apologize for the cover.

Two Books, Wildly Different

This past weekend at BookLovers' Cafe, I talked about two books. (You can read all of our collective recommendations from my notes, now posted at the Rockport Public Library's website.)You've probably already heard about the above title, as it is being splashed about all over the place. And you know what, in keeping with my WWII theme of late, I liked it. In fact, it was just what I was in the mood for after The Book Thief. Yes, kinder and gentler, but I don't want that to seem pat. I loved the quirky characters and happy ending, the epistolary format, the window into a new place in a certain time. Sometimes I am just in the mood for a good story that keeps me interested but doesn't give me a "reading hangover" (when you stay up to late because you can't stop reading, then feel not-your-best the next morning).

But here's another title I booktalked on Saturday:
Totally different, edgy, interesting, empowering, and really close to home. And you probably have not heard of it. It's a YA book (young adult) and it made me pretty excited that this type of book is being written for teens. It's about some young savvy hackers, smart and basically good kids. Their city experiences a terrorist attack and they are taken into custody by the Department of Homeland Security and held and questioned for five days---only, the teens aren't told who has them imprisoned. Totally creepy. But it gets worse, once the DHS comes into their city with more surveillance measures and pretty much turns the city into a police state. So the question of personal privacy and liberty versus "measures that keep us safe from terrorists" is applied very neatly by Doctorow here. (Doctorow, by the way, is a super-techy Internet Freedom Fighter who has worked with the Electronic Frontier Foundation. I guess I am a little in awe of the cool stuff they do there.)

I was a little personally offended for all librarians when the main character's dad (a librarian) caves into the pressure to conform to the demands of the DHS. Librarians are way more into protecting personal privacy than this! But this was minor compared to my other complaint, which is that there is a gratuitous (but not graphic) sex scene. This bummed me out because I would have happily been recommending this to many more 'tweens and younger teens who may have missed the depth of some of the more technologically-oriented material (lots of computer history packed in here), but could have appreciated many other elements of the story. But the sex scene would be icky for them. Oh well. (I did recommend it to my father-in-law, who loved it, and sent me an email with "Department of Bushland Security" in the subject line and filled the email with plenty of hot words to catch the eye of those machines who are busy reading our emails.)

So I like to mix things up on my nightstand. Ready to read anything that's good, anytime, all the time.