books and more books

For those of you who know me in real life or if you've been reading this blog for awhile, you know that last year I got the most awesome job in the world...teacher-librarian in an elementary school. I can't even tell you how great it is to be surrounded by books all morning and to see kids genuinely excited about books. Yeah, it's pretty great.

I had the good fortune of stumbling upon the loveliest blog this morning. It's called Bookshelf Porn and the name is just so fitting! Please, do yourself a favour and go browse through their archives. You won't be disappointed. So much booky awesomeness awaits you there. Like pretty shelves arranged by colour.

And rooms you'd want to spend a rainy afternoon in.

How could anyone want to buy an e-reader after seeing a beautiful website like this?

(all images from bookshelfporn.com)

Reason #265 why I love my job

Have I told you lately how awesome my job is? Ohmygosh...it's absolutely dreamy! Just in case you're tuning in for the first time, I work mornings as a teacher-librarian at an elementary school. It's my first year in this position and just about everyday I have to hold myself back from kicking up my heels and singing show tunes in the hallway...that's how much I love my job!

On Tuesday I went to my 2nd book fair...yes that's right, I get days off to go and purchase books...and it just reaffirmed my love for this job. Even though I technically only work mornings, book fair days are overwhelming and exciting so I always end up staying much later being careful to spend my money wisely.

I brought home 6 boxes of books this time and I've been lugging them into work a little each day. Pictured above is just a tiny fraction of the books I bought on Tuesday. They're the ones I'm taking into school tomorrow so I can catalogue them and get them on the shelves ASAP.

My secret mission on Tuesday was to purchase books that would inject some much needed life into our cooking & crafty sections. Oooh boy did I have fun with that! Here are 4 books I'm especially excited about:


Here's a peek inside The Teen Vogue Handbook. The girls are often asking me if I will buy fashion magazines for the library and the feminist in me refuses to do so. I thought this was an excellent compromise. This book is pure eye candy fashion-wise but it is all about the wide range of careers available in the fashion industry, everything from magazine editor and clothing designer to makeup artist and modelling scout. It also introduces readers to people in the industry like Anna Wintour and Karl Lagerfeld. I think the Grade 6-8 girls will be especially excited about this book. I know I would have read this cover to cover when I was that age.


Also super excited about Sew Darn Cute by Jenny Ryan. I can't wait to borrow this and try a few of the crafts myself! Especially this adorable necklace:


Also purchased on Tuesday: craft books about making puppets, using recycled materials, making masks, building adorable structures like little mushroom houses, etc etc PLUS a few kids' cook books AND the latest in the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. I cannot even tell you how excited I am to show all of these books to the different classes at my school! They're going to go crazy!


This morning when I surprised a student with the Leave it to Pet graphic novel that he requested way back in September, he just about lost his mind! It was the best moment of my day!

I'm not kidding...this job is so much fun it's ridiculous!

PS. If you have wee ones to buy for over the holidays(like 4-8ish), I cannot recommend these two new discoveries enough. They are my new favourite picture books.
The Pigeon Wants a Puppy!
Ivan the Terrier

oh dear, it's been so long.....

hi all, i'm back from my mostly-unintentional absense. it's been a crazy few months since my last post. the last week of may up until the last day of june was spent recouperating from a series of unfortunate events. and then since july 2nd i've been immersed in a course at oise learning the ins-and-outs of being a teacher-librarian (my position for next year which i'm pretty thrilled about). it was a super-intensive course, normally a full semester, but for the summer session crammed into 3 weeks! needless to say, when i wasn't sitting in the ugliest, most uninspiring classroom at u of t for 5 1/2 hours a day or on fun class field trips to places like another story bookshop and the beguiling, i was completely immersed in projects, projects, projects! throw in an occasional stress-induced meltdown here and there and well, now you basically know what my july has been like.

the good news is that my course finished yesterday and there's still 6 weeks of summer left before school starts. yay!

i absolutely hate doing a post and not giving you any pretty pictures to look at so i'm posting just a few of the wonderful books i discovered (or already knew but re-discovered) in doing my final project/presentation about fractured fairy tales (stories based on original fairy tales but involve some twist...and often quite funny!)







that jon scieszka guy ("the true story of the three little pigs" and many other awesome books!) is pretty much a genius. if you don't know his stuff and you have kids, pick up "the stinky cheese man and other fairly stupid tales". so funny!

another book finished

while we were at the cottage, i spent a large chunk of my week lying on the dock slathered with sunscreen and reading black swan green by david mitchell. i have to tell you, it was a really wonderful way to spend my days at the lake.

so briefly, without giving too much away, the story follows a 13-year old boy named jason for a year of his life. he wants desperately to be part of the cool crowd but he's bullied because he stammers. it's a really touching novel and reminded me of how tough it is to be a kid just trying to fit in.

i really liked this book. i liked jason so much that after i'd finished reading it, i actually thought about him for days afterward, and kind of missed him. i guess that's the sign of a good story, huh?

my rating: 8.5/10

(and a big thanks to the lovely person on bookmooch who kindly sent this book to me all the way from japan.)

*****
in case you're interested, i've just started reading "a long way down" by nick hornby. i'm only about 20 pages in so far though....

catching up on books i've read

it's been awhile since i mentioned the books i've been reading. summer is an especially good time to get into a good book so i thought this little list of the last 3 books i've finished might help someone choose a new one to delve into.

way back in april i finished up "a spot of bother" by mark haddon.

even though i had a hard time getting into this book, i did enjoy it in the end. it's quite different from haddon's other book "the curious incident of the dog in the nighttime" which i thoroughly enjoyed from start to finish. a spot of bother is about a neurotic man and his dysfunctional family. all in all, i enjoyed it and would recommend it.
my rating: 7/10


my next read was very different..."the secret life of bees" by sue monk kidd.

my goodness...i can't say enough about this story! i absolutely LOVED this book. straight from the beginning i was instantly hooked. i haven't felt that pull since i read "lullabies for little criminals" last summer. googling around to find the image of the book cover, i found out that there's going to be a movie version of this book coming out in october 2008 and paul tells me it's coming to tiff in september. i can't wait!!
my rating: 8.5/10


and the book i finished up at the end of june was "love is a mix tape" by rob sheffield.
i think paul liked this book a little better than i did. this book told the true story of how sheffield met and fell in love with his wife and then dealt with losing her. i don't want to say much more for fear of giving too much of the story away. however, this story surprisingly didn't draw me in the way i expected it would. overall, meh.
my rating: 5/10

*****
right now i'm reading "black swan green" by david mitchell and even though i'm only on page 62, i'm quite enjoying it. i've recently come to the realization that my favourite kind of book is a work of fiction where the main character is a child or teen. such is the case with "black swan green". not sure if being a teacher has something to do with why these stories speak to me or not.

anyhow, i'll be back for quick review of "black swan green" once i've finished. fair warning though...i'm a terribly sloooowwww reader.

our date with david sedaris

on thursday night, carla and i went to see david sedaris at the indigo at bay and bloor. he was making an appearance there to promote his new book. carla and i got there at just the right time (an hour before it started) because we ended up with a pretty good spot where we could see him quite clearly. we're pretty sure the guy who introduced him said that there were 800 people there!


he read a story from "when you are engulfed in flames" plus a bit from a new book he's working on. then he read a bunch of really funny entries from his diary. the last part was left for q & a, which i really enjoyed because he ended up telling a few stories to answer each question. so instead of a short 1-minute answer, i swear each answer ended up being almost 10 minutes long and thoroughly entertaining!

he's so naturally funny and witty, carla and i left feeling like we just really wanted to spend an evening at the movies, maybe dinner too, with david and his boyfriend hugh.

*****
ps. if you want to hear a great interview with david sedaris from the same day, you can go here and right-click on the podcast for thursday, july 10th. his interview begins about 1/3 of the way through (after william h. macy).

my new obsession

earlier this week i was feeling antsy about not having a book to read having just finished this one. i vaguely recalled hearing about book swapping sites so i did some googling and came up with bookmooch. i signed up right away and listed 9 books. within a few minutes of listing i already had people requesting two of them and by weeks end i had sent out four books to new homes!

last night i successfully mooched these two books! they should be arriving in my mail in the next few weeks! i can't wait...

the secret life of bees


a long way down


but i was craving more books still...ones i had on my bookmooch wishlist but was too impatient to wait for (currently there are no copies for mooching which means i could be waiting months or years for them to become available). so i got out the credit card and ordered a few from chapters.

craft inc.


love is a mix tape (ordered because i won't be able to renew my library copy and i read way too slowly to finish it in 2 weeks...so paul's reading the library one right now instead)


a spot of bother (by the same author of the book i just finished)


has anyone read any of these 5 books i'm waiting to be delivered? what are you reading right now?

today

today was a good mail day.
i got some soft grey legwarmers in the mail from my stepmom, nicole. they're original from back in the 80's...

and i also received the little otsu dayplanner i ordered a couple of weeks ago.

i love that you fill in the dates yourself. so since january is more than halfway over, i won't have any empty pages because i'll just start numbering from today's date.


today was a good library day.
i picked up 3 items i had holds on: a vegetarian cookbook ("enemy of the steak" heh heh), a novel ("love is a mix tape" by rob sheffield), and a dvd ("who killed the electric car"). the novel came at a good time. i'm about 15 pages away from finishing the book i'm reading now ...sooooooo goood! thanks michele!! xoxo


today was also a good freecycling day.
i picked up a great gold frame from a generous person on the toronto freecycle group. i'm collecting frames for our little wall of art in the studio/guest bedroom. i'm not sure if i'm going to keep this one gold (looks cool against the red wall in here) but i may paint it with a super shiny laquer in hot pink or turquoise. *by the way, i just put a postcard in there for the photo. i'm hoping to fill it with a cute print from etsy. maybe even one from my favourite artist on there.



and this weekend was a good crafting weekend.
i was successful in making my largest shrinky piece yet! very exciting! i've got a few possible ideas for this...

and here's a picture that gives you a better idea of just how big she is (4" tall) compared to my regular-sized pendants.


also bought a couple of cute new things this past weekend. i'll post about them later in the week.

so excited!

elizabeth gilbert, the author of eat, pray, love is going to be on oprah tomorrow!

lately:

reading:


listening to:


desperately hunting for:
thick & chunky charcoal grey tights (so elusive i can't even find a picture of them with a google image search!) EDIT: sorry, i meant to say thick & chunky cable-knit tights in charcoal grey. it's the cable-knit part that i'm having trouble finding. please let me know if you find some....

making a million of:


excited about:


delighted by:
inside a black apple

thinking about:
baking peanut butter & chocolate chip cookies

finished.

i can finally reveal my latest read since i just finished it about 5 minutes ago. it is 13 by mary-lou zeitoun. it was another fantastic story about a troubled young teen, in some ways similar to the main character in lullabies for little criminals but in some ways quite different as well.

i hadn't heard of this book or the author before reading it...just found it by perusing the fiction shelves at the library. i still don't know anything about the author and am looking forward to googling her after i post this. just like after i finished lullabies, i feel like i need to find out everything i can about her. i hope she has another book out but from the limited search i did last night i don't think she does.

i have 2 more possible reads from my browsing at the library on saturday. fingers crossed at least one of them is as addictive as these last 2 have been...

***
edit: thanks to chelebele for reminding me to tell you: this "13" is totally not the same story as the movie "13" which was also about a troubled teenager. the novel "13" actually takes place in ottawa and the main character is more "angst-y" than troubled, rebelling against her parents and catholic school upbringing.

thanks (and then some)

thanks, everyone for your sweet comments & emails about molly. wednesday was a really terrible day all around and hearing from friends and family over the last few days has really meant a lot to paul & i.

***
paul's been on holidays all week and so we've been trying to do some real "summery" things on as much of a budget as possible. we've spent the last 3 days swimming at a really fantastic outdoor pool...perfect for beating the crazy humidity & heat!

(i borrowed the image of the lovely olympic pool we've been enjoying from here)

we finally made it over (twice!) to ed's real scoop for the yummiest homemade ice-cream and gelato. yes, we've tried both. mmm...a scoop of dark chocolate and green tea ice-cream go soooo well together!

renting movies is always a cheap way to spend the evening. we rented two this week: volver and music and lyrics.


we give volver two enthusiastic thumbs up (soooooo good!) and music and lyrics two thumbs down (paul's thumb is enthusiastically down!). we've also borrowed a bunch of movies from the library (free!). we have 2 more pedro almodovar films to see (paul reserved them after we watched volver), elizabethtown, and ohmygosh...i can't wait...49up! i'm sure i've mentioned on here before how obsessed i am with the 7up documentary series. for any toronto folks who haven't seen any of these, you must borrow them from the tpl. they have the whole series thus far.

today after swimming...and gelato...we visited the lovely library at kew gardens. such a nice branch to hang out in. i'm definitely going to go back and spend some time there before the summer is over. and while browsing there i found 3 novels that looked interesting. i figured if i took out all three at least one of them would hook me. i'm happy to report i think i've found one! but just as you can jinx a new relationship by talking about the person too much, i'm thinking i'll keep the title and details to myself so as not to jinx my new relationship with this book. if all goes well over the next few times we get together i'll reveal its identity then. ;)

an open letter to haven kimmel

dear haven,

a week or so ago, i borrowed your book a girl named zippy from the library after searching online for hours for my next book to read. it had good reviews and i remember eyeing that awesome cover everytime i walked into a local bookstore. i was so excited to finally dig into it!

you're a great writer...so witty and with a kind of subtle humour. i liked the book right away. but then i came to the part about the baby pig...and then your pet chicken...and your hamster...and the bunny. i tried to overlook it and just move on but today the bunny situation was all i could take. i'm sad to say i'm parting ways with you here on page 71.

i see on amazon that you have a few more books out and i'll probably give them a try later on. i just think we need some time apart right now.

best,
-krissy

so, i guess i'm back

hi everyone! sorry to have slipped off the face of the internets for darn close to a year. i don't really have a good reason for my absence except to say that i just wasn't "feeling it". i wish i had a better explanation but i don't. however, i did have a feeling i'd be back eventually which is why i didn't make an official "goodbye" post. so here i am!

i won't bore you with what i've been doing for the last 295 days or so mainly because i can't really think of anything in particular. but i expect i will be sharing what i'm up to this summer in upcoming entries. unfortunately, my camera is at the nikon hospital and won't be coming back for a few more weeks yet, so most of my photos will be of stuff i can find online for now.

which leads me to the perfect opportunity to tell you about the most incredible book i finished about a week ago. it's called lullabies for little criminals by heather o'neill.

carla warned me it was sad and she was right, but it is so beautifully written. there were many times when i just couldn't put this book down. and even though i finished it about a week ago, i can't stop thinking about it. the story has really stayed with me. highly recommended if you're looking for a new read to dive into.

now i've started reading a girl named zippy: growing up small in mooreland indiana which is pretty good. it started off really funny but then there was a chapter i wasn't so keen on involving a baby pig. i'm going to stick with it though and see if i go back to enjoying it as much as i did at the beginning. i thought it started off with a david sedaris kind of vibe.


if you have any good book recommendations, please leave them in the comments section. i'd love to have more to add to my "to read" list.

ps. while i was gone, blogger messed with some cogs and gears---if you previously subscribed to my blog you probably won't get updates unless you re-subscribe. sorry for the annoyance.