Posts Tagged With: bookshelves

one step at a time

All the books are packed.
All the journals are packed.
Most of the decorative storage boxes of office supplies are packed.
Most of the photos and smaller wall art is packed.
YBW’s office is packed.
All the boxes are in the back bedroom.
(don’t yet have a box long enough for my sugar mold gel pen holder but one will appear, I’m sure of it)

The bookshelf, tall dresser, vanity table and bench came out of our bedroom and are currently in the middle bedroom awaiting a trip into storage.
The dresser in front of the window lives in that room, but will also go to storage.

My plan for the upstairs bedrooms is to leave only the beds for staging when the house is on the market. The exception is the room Baby K is in now, it’ll return to an office-type space with one of my three work tables and one small shelving unit.

In our bedroom, I’ve packed things and moved furniture to show off the space potential to prospective buyers.

On the bookshelf is my TBR, journals and my planner, other things I actually need, like pens and pencils and sharpies.
The Marylin Monroe doll obviously still needs to be packed, as well as my pomander.
Next to the bookshelf are boxes for Thing 2. The bottom two are music and media, the next one is comics and books. The one on top is a box I haven’t finished packing but wanted out of the way.

In our bedroom, all that needs to happen now is paint and new flooring. In the other upstairs bedrooms, just new flooring, as they’ve all been painted in the last year or two.

On the main living level, music and media is all done, and there is literally nothing on the walls. The back living room and YBW’s office are ready to go. A few pieces of furniture will got into storage. The front room (formal living room) needs to have one thing packed and then three pieces will go to storage.
I’ll start packing the dining room this week.
Once everything is packed, it’ll go to storage and we can paint.
Then flooring.

I was worried about time…will I have enough? Can I get everything done?
Y’all! I’m not trying to jinx myself or anything, but I’m kicking this process right in its ass!
Timing is currently going according to our plan…
I’m grateful that it doesn’t feel too chaotic. I’m grateful I feel like I’m in charge of the situation and it’s not eating me alive.
One step at a time, yo.
I’ve got this!

Categories: around the house | Tags: , , , , , , | 4 Comments

portable magic is actually pretty heavy

I packed books the other day.
Thing 1 came to help.
In a matter of a couple of hours we managed to clear one of the two bookshelves.
I use both sides of these shelves, so we packed twelve boxes.

The books left on the other side are my TBRs I’m leaving them not only to have access to them for actual reading, but for staging when the time comes.

Stephen King said: Books are uniquely portable magic and I’m with him every step of the way. Though I find them less uniquely portable when they’re packed in heavy boxes.

When she woke from her nap, Baby K came to help.
Help is a fluid word when you’re a toddler.
I specifically built this box so she and her dolly (also called Birdie) could play in it.

Though that didn’t last long because she was much less helpful after she climbed out of the box. And we stopped packing all together when she discovered the drawer of highlighters.

I’m about to get after the rest of the other shelf, then I’ll pack all my journals.
I’ll move to the dining room next. The china cabinet and buffet won’t pack themselves. Then I can work on removing the rest of the art and photos from the walls.
We’ve got a plan to store some things going to the new house or to Thing 1’s (future) house to make it simpler for us when the painters come, and when the guys come to do the flooring. Then we’ll be minimally staged and ready when it comes time to put the house on the market.
One step at a time, y’all.

Categories: around the house | Tags: , , , , , , | 8 Comments

thanks, Roald Dahl

matilda

Like Matilda, I am not alone. For I have books-a-plenty.
Thanks, Roald Dahl for this hopeful and comforting message.

Categories: me | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

food for the soul

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis once said: There are many little ways to enlarge your child’s world. Love of books is the best of all.

I believe this with an unparalleled fierceness.
I tell all parents of young children this is my philosophy of child rearing: First you feed a child with food, then with books, then you worry about whether or not their shoes fit.
If you could see the looks on their faces. They have that initial moment of WTF? but then I see their eyes widen as they begin to understand how this makes some kind of sense.

I believe this principle applies to grownups too.
You ever been to someone’s home and find no books and feel like there is something so completely wrong with that? I don’t trust a person who doesn’t read.
I love to explore what other people have on their shelves.
We all know that someone who has books on the shelf for show, you know damn well that person doesn’t read them, they’re there lined up like little soldiers just to impress.
If you looked at my bookshelves, the majority of the books are either children’s books or biographies. Of course there are other things mixed in, adult fiction and textbooks, even some pretty amazing nonfiction too.

We must eat food to sustain our physical lives.
But books are food too. Soul food.
They feed our imagination. They feed us inspiration. They feed us information. They feed us laughter and love and tears. They feed us fear and loathing. They feed us when food isn’t what we need to ingest.

When Thing 2 was a small girl, we were waiting at the doctors office. I was reading and she was reading. She had just begun to read “proper” books, and was reading her first chapter book. It was the first time I didn’t read to her as we waited somewhere. It was the first time I read my book and she read hers. When the realization washed over me I began to cry.
After a big breath, I said to her: You’ve given yourself the best gift you’ll ever receive.
She looked at me from behind her coke-bottle glasses with confusion. I indicated the book.
She said: You gave me this book.
I said: Yes I did, but you learned to read it. And from now on you’ll be able to read anything you want. What a wonderful gift you gave to yourself!
She thought about this for a moment and then gave that jack-o-lantern smile (She was missing three teeth at the time.) and said: You’re right!

Both Thing 1 and Thing 2 love books. And shoes. They’ve been influenced by my parenting philosophy quite literally. (There’s a trees and two apples and never are they terribly far apart.)
I know that they will pass on their love of books to their children, and their nieces and nephews, and one day, their children’s children.

This quote has been attributed to Stephen King: Books are uniquely portable magic.
And they feed the soul.

Categories: me | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

settling in

Well, I’ve been at home with YBW for nine days…in the first two days I landed a cold, he so kindly shared his germs with not only me, but his own two Things. My Thing 2 was miraculously untouched by these icky germs. (If you knew her and her immune system this would be ubershocking.) 

The fact we were all sick kind of put a damper on the fun we had planned before his two Things went back to their mom’s, and also cut into our special YBW, Robynbird, and Thing 2 time.
So the last nine days have been less productive (oh how this frustrates me) than hoped, also less “normal”. But we’re all finally beginning to feel human again…except Thing 2 finally succumbed to the icky germs yesterday. (DAMMIT!)

I finally began to open boxes of books and began to breathe. What is it that makes me feel so strongly about those books? I have no idea, but I can tell you how happy I was to unpack, stack and shelve them! Thing 2, with her uncanny timing, wandered in just in time to read about her boyfriend’s birthday in the Birthday book and their compatibility in the Relationship book.

a few stacks waiting to be shelved

a few stacks waiting to be shelved

a few yet to be unpacked

a few boxes yet to be unpacked

Thing 2 is "helping"

Thing 2 is “helping”

The bookshelf is no longer naked and my books can breathe again…
Recovering diningroom chairs and unpacking kitchen items are up next. The kitchen will be a curious event…

Categories: me | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Goodbye. ~ Hello!

hello goodbye

Less than two weeks and I’ll live with YBW!

Thing 2 and I are making plans for the two weeks she’ll spend with us…what to pack for her room there, what we want to do, who we want to see…she wants to see her Aunt Sundance and cousins the mostest. (Me too!!) She wants to go to IKEA with YBW so they can eat in the restaurant and piddle around the store then have ice cream as they leave. (They both love IKEA like crazy.) She wants to have lots of snuggles. (My favorite!!)
I want to kiss YBW, see Sundance, and unpack my books. After that, it’s gravy.

I’m sad to leave my friends here, I’m sad to leave my doctor and our patients…I’m sad I won’t be close to Thing 1 and Thing 2’s daddy anymore.
Moving is hard…moving on is hard too.

Excitement is big though! Not only will I be with my darling YBW, I’ll be “going back to my roots” teaching at a wonderful, emergent curriculum-based preschool only 4 miles from home! Oh how I’m ready to be in a room full of toddlers!

Life will sort itself as I move through the process of saying goodbye to one life and hello to another…I’m going into this adventure with eyes, heart, and arms wide open.
Wish me luck!

Categories: love, me, on being a mom | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

sixteen books in five minutes

With my books packed in boxes I realized the only book I have to read at the moment is the narcolepsy-inducing economics textbook…while I’m required to read that this school term, it isn’t the sort of thing I want to read before bed or take into the tubby. I was longing for something to change my point of view for even just a moment, something I could become a part of for a while…leave this reality and tag along in some other one just long enough to give my brain a rest.
So I tried to do that from memory, I’ve been participating in certain book realities for many years. It wasn’t the same though. Books are a tactile experience for me…I enjoy experiencing books with every one of my senses…yep, even taste, gotta lick my finger to turn a page every once in a while.

A curious thing happened, the failed book from memory experiment caused me to think of books I especially love, and why I love them.
So, I decided to list the first books that came to me, the ones that have had the most impact or influence on my life, the ones I loved as a child and continue to love as a grown up.
I gave myself five minutes to list what came to me and this is what I wrote:

Outside Over There
The Secret of the Strawbridge Place
The Secret Garden
The Bell Jar
The Great Gatsby
Sense and Sensibility
Dancing on My Grave
The Outsiders
Plantation Doll
The Mists of Avalon
Sam, Bangs and Moonshine
The End of the Affair
Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human
Peter Pan
Long Walk to Freedom
The Tangled Wing

I listed each one as it appeared in my brain. I did not over-think nor did I edit the list in any way.
Now there are certainly other books I love, books that mean so much to me but just aren’t listed here.
Why?
I don’t know. And for once, I don’t really have the desire to figure it out.

Categories: love, me | Tags: , , , , | Leave a comment

Blog at WordPress.com.

Stories I've Never Told...

(...and some I have)

Starting Over

Because there's never enough time to do it right the first time but there's always enough time to do it over

A Simpler Way

A Simpler Way to Finance

Faith + Gratitude = Peace + Hope

When I was young my dad would always say, "Crystal, you can choose your attitude." One day I chose to believe him.

debsdespatches.wordpress.com/

Reader, Writer, Photographer, Random Scribbler

Snippets of SnapDragon

Welcome to my cauldron of creative musings, yo.

Encouragement for you!!

Need some encouragement--read this!!

To Write or not to Write and What to Write

#shortstories #thoughts #reflections

Thinker Boy: Blog & Art

by Troy Headrick

Invisibly Me

Live A Visible Life Whatever Your Health

A Teacher's Reflections

Thirty Years of Wonder

Life and Random Thinking

An old dog CAN blog

charles french words reading and writing

An exploration of writing and reading

Sawblades In Your Walkman

effervescing with muchness

History Tech

History, technology, and probably some other stuff

Claudette Labriola

Words, mostly

walkingtheclouds

where the clouds may lead

Meditations in Motion

Running and life: thoughts from a runner who has been around the block

Bitchin’ in the Kitchen

..because the thoughts that fall, kicking and screaming from my head need a safe place to land..

Finding French Charming

Finding True Love.. Even After Forty

Thought Box

Sweet...Bitter...Happy...Sad...All thoughts trapped in a Box...

M.A. Lossl

An author's life, books, and historical research

Wise & Shine

A community for writers & readers

Water for Camels

Encouragement and Development for Social Workers and Those with a Mission of Helping Others

Living In the Sweet Spot

"You can clutch the past so tightly to your chest that it leaves your arms too full to embrace the present." Jan Glidewell

Waking up on the Wrong Side of 50

Navigating the second half of my life

%d bloggers like this: