Library Loot - February 26

Late to Library Loot again, but for good reason: it was a small haul this week, and I've been aborbed in one of the few books I picked up: Sarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay. More Holocaust fiction for me.

I first heard about this book from Sarah at Smallworld Reads. I usually like the books she likes, and this book fits my reading mood lately, so I was pretty confident it was going to be a good one. Now I'm in danger of neglecting my family so I can sneak away to read...

The rest of our books were things for the kids, for our schooltime. But now... back to my book

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted by Eva and Alessandra that encourages bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. If you’d like to participate, just write up your post-feel free to steal the button-and link it using the Mr. Linky any time during the week. And of course check out what other participants are getting from their libraries!

Lbrary Loot - February 18

Yes, I did just do a Library Loot post. But I was a little late last week, and it's up again - those weeks just fly by. And, we had a huge haul on Monday night. My girl and I have gotten into the habit of going to the library after dropping my boy off at Scouts. We head to our closest branch, grab some things and sit down together. Sometimes we look through cookbooks or craft books together, sometimes we read our own books. It's nice to sit side-by-side with her, each in our own reading. I still read aloud to my kids a lot, but I'm also enjoying the time to read my own book while she reads hers. It's a different kind of companionship.

Before I get to my list, I have a question to answer: someone asked me if we really read all those books. Well, no - don't I wish. We are always optimistic, but there usually isn't enough time. Many times a promising book is due before I get to it so I add it to my list of books to look for. Sometimes I pick things up to preview for my kids, or to look over for future schooltime reading. And we pick up a lot of "browsing books" - usually large-format books on topics the kids are interested in - or that I would like them to be interested in. And often I will grab something that looks good and once I get into it I find I'm not interested.

Finally the list:

DK Ultimate Special Forces for my boy. (My girl checked our her own books this week.)

The Naturalist's Year: 24 Outdoor Explorations and The Bird in the Waterfall because we like nature books.

Some books for homeschooling: Look at Your Body: Lungs, The Heart, and Lungs. And The Westing Game, Bud, Not Buddy, and The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963. We are moving into the '60s in our history studies and I like a little fiction to go with our history sometimes.

The Story of Art because I keep reading about how great it is. I loved A Little History of the World by the same author, E. H. Gombrich. This looks very good but is huge; I will never finish it before it's due! This is one I should probably plan on buying.

Children's Literatuer: A Reader's History from Aesop to Harry Potter, The Apothecary's Daughter, and The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society for me. The first one just looked good on the new book shelf; the other two were inspired by reviews.

Did you go to the library this week? If so, what did you get? And if not, why not?

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted by Eva and Alessandra that encourages bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. If you’d like to participate, just write up your post-feel free to steal the button-and link it using the Mr. Linky any time during the week. And of course check out what other participants are getting from their libraries!

Library Loot - February 15

It seems I have missed a week of Library Loot:

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted by Eva and Alessandra that encourages bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. If you’d like to participate, just write up your post-feel free to steal the button-and link it using the Mr. Linky any time during the week. And of course check out what other participants are getting from their libraries!

I didn't skip going to the library, though - we spent time in two different locations this week. One is in a beautiful new building with the most comfortable armchairs... aaahhhh. My girl and I spent some time there browsing through books on tea and Thai cooking, among other things. Some of what we brought home:

The Well-Mannered Dog because she likes reading dog-training books, and because our dog could use a little help.

Thai Cooking Made Easy: delectable Thai meals in minutes, and The Brown Bag Lunch Cookbook and How to Eat Supper because we always need new ideas for meals.

A Real Simple magazine for mindless reading and recipe-finding. I think I found one to make tonight!

Creating a Beautiful Home because... uh... we could use some help in this area.

The Art of the Russian Matryoshka, The Pleasures of Tea: Recipes and Rituals, and The Doll's Dressmaker for my girl.

The Machine Age in America: 1918 - 1941 and The Good Fight: How World War II Was Won for my boy.

The Revenge of the Baby-Sat for everyone. And I thought we owned all the Calvin and Hobbes books...

How Did We Find Out About Genes, Genetics, Muscles: Our Muscular System, and Bones: Our Skeletal System because we're studying the human body right now.

An audio version of Peter Pan because my kids have never heard or read the whole thing, and I haven't in a long, long time.

And fiction for me: Septembers of Shiraz (Jews in Iran in 1982) and The Toss of a Lemon.

Fine more library loot at A Striped Armchair or Out of the Blue.

Library Loot - February 4

This was a small week for us. We just have so many from previous weeks, I can't keep piling them on! Can I? The kids have such a surplus they didn't pick anything up either. We didn't even step into a library all weekend; that's unusual for us. But we were in two different ones today!

Living on the Wind: Across the Hemisphere with Migratory Birds. We love books about birds.

Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Home, Work, and School. Interesting book (so far, I'm not too much into it yet) about brain development and differences. Full of evolution; if that's not your bag you can skim those parts; if it offends you, stay away. I'm a bit miffed that "homeschool" does not appear in the index, even though there is a fair bit of talk on "customized instruction" for schoolchildren. Also see the author's site.

The Other Side of the Bridge. But, from the blurb and the first few pages, it looks like a Family Tragedy Story, and I am so done with those kinds of books, no matter how well-written. So back it goes, unfinished. I picked it up after reading this review, so, your mileage may vary. Sorry, Mrs. Smallworld!

The Private Lives of the Impressionists, inspired by my partial reading of Luncheon of the Boating Party. I also placed requests for a few more books on Renoir, et al.

The Five Red Herrings & Murder Must Advertise because people are constantly telling me to read some Dorothy Sayers right now! But which is the best to start with?

Looking at Pictures (apparently out of print; written by Kenneth Clark) because we're in sort of an art mode.

Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian because we need some new recipes. We aren't vegetarian, but we love Ms. Jaffrey's cookbooks!

Earth, a coffee-table type book filled with stunning pictures; a good browsing book.

Almost forgot Inkheart, which I keep hearing about. I doubt we'll see the movie, but... it looks like a good read-aloud.

To see more Library Loot, check in at A Striped Armchair.

Library Loot 1/24

We hit 3 libraries this week. Even though we can request any book from our county-wide system and pick it up at the library of our choice, I love to go to different libraries. It is such fun to browse different shelves and we always, always find something in the new or featured books. Even when we travel we visit libraries, though we can't check out the books. We just make note of them to get when we return home.

This was a big movie week. For some reason we ended up with 6 movies. There is no way we can watch them all before they are due. I think we'll stick with Kit Kittredge: An American Girl for this week because it had a long queue and I won't want to wait again. We also have Molly: An American Girl on the Home Front, and Nim's Island, and a couple others. I'll add them to the list to get again.

I picked up Gideon, the Cutpurse and The Hound of Rowan: Book One of the Tapestry on a whim to check out for my boy. The first is a time-travel book, a genre which he has enjoyed lately. Also The Cabinet of Wonders, which I think I found via this meme. All fantasies, whichi s not usually his thing, but they seem to be worth a look. The boy also grabbed Graphic War which has kept him quite absorbed.

My girl grabbed The Michael's Book of Paper Crafts, Mary Engelbreit's Sweet Treats Dessert Cookbook, The Most Wonderful Dollhouse Book, and Beading for the First Time. Yes, she is a crafty girl. Don't worry, she has plenty of real reading material from previous trips and in our own collection.

As always I picked up quite a few that I won't finish before they are due: Anathem by Neal Stephenson, which I saw on the new shelf and brought home for the seminarian; he likes this author but doesn't have time for reading right now so there was no sense in me bringing it. I still need to read his Baroque Cycle but they are just too big, too much for me at this time, when I have to snatch little reading breaks. Also Liquid Land: A Journey Through the Florida Everglades, Hitler's Empire: How the Nazis Ruled Europe, and Homeschooling, A Family's Journey.

Wildlife of Pennsylvania and the Northeast rounds out our picks for this week.

Not enough books? Go to A Striped Armchair to find more Library Loot.

Library Loot: a new meme for me

Sarah at SmallWorld Reads pointed me to a new meme: Library Loot. Since we take great joy in hitting our local library frequently and always come home loaded up with stuff, I'm happy to take part in this one.

Currently we have 72 items checked out; I won't go into all of them.

Right now we are listening to the audio of Around the World in 80 Days, written by Jules Verne and narrated by Jim Dale (of Harry Potter fame). Actually since it lives in the car, I also carry on with our own copy of the book when we have time to read in the house (which we've been short on lately). I'd missed this as a kid and am loving it now. (Another perk of homeschooling, people - exposure to lots of great books that the kids might get into in school, but the parents may miss forever.)

Two books on paper quilling: Paper Quilling for the First Time, and The New Paper Quilling. This is my girl's new fave craft and she is putting together a presentation for our homeschool reading group on Monday. If you have a crafty girl, or are one yourself, check out paper quilling. She has made some beautiful designs without a lot of expense or a long learning curve (read: frustration).

Treasure Island, which is to be our next car book. As with Around the World... I will go between the borrowed audio in the car and the owned hardback at home.

Luncheon of the Boating Party, a novel for me, and Pierre-Auguste Renoir: The Luncheon of the Boating Party: Anatomy of a Painting (out of print) to go along with it. I'll probably go through at least some of the 2nd book with the kids, along with some other books on Renoir, at some point. Oops, this isn't supposed to be about what I'm doing with books, just what the books are...

Since we are studying World War II in our history we've got a boatload on that topic; some are yet to be read and some are ready to go back. They include: Early Sunday Morning: The Pearl Harbor Diary of Amber Billows (Dear America series), One Eye Laughing, the Other Weeping: The Diary of Julie Weiss, (also Dear America), The Story of D-Day, a Landmark book by Bruce Blivens, The Journal of Ben Uchida, Citizen 13559, Mirror Lake Internment Camp (My Name is America series) and Weedflower by Cynthia Kakohata. These are all books the kids will read or have read on their own, not read-alouds. I picked up Farewell to Manzanar for myself, but I don't know if I will get to it.

The boy has a few books about Chuck Yeager, which he was to read and present at our reading group. But preparations for the Boy Scout winter camp took over, so he gets a pass this month. He'll read the books anyway.

Since we've had some flurries lately, we picked up The Snowflake, Winter's Secret Beauty for browsing.

Last night my girl and I were wandering around our "usual" branch and came upon a stack we'd never noticed before: the oversized books! What a treasure! We picked up The Comics: Since 1945, a huge coffee table book that's making her laugh and bringing back some memories for me, Blue Planet, a gorgeous DK book about the oceans, and The Illustrated Book of Guns which the Boy Scout will devour. We decided we will allow ourselves 2 oversize books per visit from now on.

The seminarian doesn't have too much out from the public library right now, just The Basic Writings of Neitzsche.

Then there is the usual assortment of cookbooks, craft books, fiction, nonfiction, art (Oh, Carrier War: Aviation Art of World War II kept the boy occupied for quite some time). I usually pick up a few books for the kids each visit - things I'd like them to read if they find them interesting, or books featured in the library, or found on a blog. They greedily pick up a lot on their own, too. I grab several for myself each time, too, but I don't get a lot of reading done - if a book seems worthwhile, I just add to the "to be read" list. Maybe someday, eh?

Next week I'll just follow the rules and post what we pick up then. Till then, if you are looking for some reading ideas, head over to Library Loot at A Striped Armchair.