button bookmarks

ingredients:

vintage buttons

craft glue

wooden coffee stirrers (I saved mine from Starbucks but plenty of other coffee shops have them)

Instructions:

1. clean and dry your coffee stirrers so they aren't covered in coffee, sugar, and syrup.

2. choose buttons.

3. glue buttons to coffee stirrers. let dry and bookmark your place in a book.
crafter's notes: a tiny simple craft to keep kids occupied. If you can bare to part with a few buttons... and suffer through drinking a coffee while out and about in the shops. The burdens we have as parents sometimes. :o) a fun quick craft project that can travel well, so that you need only bring a few buttons and a smidge of glue or double-sided tape with you when sitting in a coffee shop. Any excuse for more coffee. :o)

Banned Books Week

This week is Banned Books Week, a time to celebrate the freedom to read. There shouldn't be a need to have a Banned Books Week but unfortunately there are thousands of books that have been burned, banned and continue to get challenged by individuals, groups and governments that find them offensive.

The books we read expand our minds, and make us the people we are. Books have always been an important part of my life, I can still remember my dad reading me stories when I was small, some of the books have been challenged. Every Christmas and Birthday I would be more excited about the books I received than the toys and clothes I got. One Christmas my dad gave me a copy of A light in the Attic by Shel Silverstein, I sat in a nest of torn wrapping paper and read my brand new book of poetry from cover to cover.

Literary exploration is so important, I read a book a night to my son, stories and poetry, including some of the very same books that my father gave me, books that have been Challenged, and Banned. I fear for the future, if these books that shaped me became banned and children and young adults the world over could not read them.

Books that have been Banned or Challenged at some point are not all masterful works of literature, but that is the magic of books and the stories they tell of history and unknown worlds to explore. I have read quite a few books on the Banned list, and not all of them I loved but they did make me think and I was glad to have read them.

The following list of some of the Banned Books I have read:

• Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak
  
• The Little House Books by Laura Ingalls Wilder (I have read the series more times than I can count, and hope to read Farm Boy to H when I can get a copy of it)
• The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald
• James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
• Charlie and the Chocolate Factory also by Roald Dahl
• The Lorax by Dr. Seuss
• The Call of the Wild, Jack London
• Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White
• A Light in the Attic by Shel Silverstein(II read this every week to my son)
  
• Where the Sidewalk Ends: Poems and Drawings by Shel Silverstein (pure magic)
  
• The Giving Tree, yet again by Shel Silverstein (it still makes me cry)
  
• Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh
• The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
• The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
  
• Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
  
• Lord of the Flies by William Golding (yes its disturbing but it was one of the few required reading books that I absorbed)
  
• Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck (I read but didn't really appreciate and to this day I still don't like Steinbeck's writing but it is important to have the book available to read)
  
• The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger ( I was forced to read it in school because it was a Banned and Challenged book, and despite it's being a Literary Classic I never loved Holden)
  
• Little Red Riding Hood by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm
• Forever by Judy Blume

currently I'm reading 1984 by George Orwell for my Book Group, I have a huge stack of books to read though but I plan on getting a more Banned Books on the Book Group Reading list.

Question Authority and Read Banned Books!

a few links:
the ILA: Books Challenged and Banned in 2008 2009 a pdf
The American Library Association has a list of Banned and Challenged books
the School Collection list of Challenged Children's Books
Amazon list of recently Banned and Challenged Books
Amazon list of 100 Banned and Challenged Books

Book Meme

The 'rules' are as follows:
Pick up the nearest book (of at least 123 pages).
Open the book to page 123.
Find the fifth sentence.
Post the next three sentences.

The nearest book to hand is the book I just finished reading.

Dead Man Rising by Lilith Saintcrow A Dante Valentine Novel.

page 123 ends on the 5th sentence so I will type in the next 3 sentences of the next page the start of chapter 12

"Jace stood in the living room, his arms folded, the portable holovid player bathing the room in its spectral pink glow. He hit the mute button as soon as I appeared. I held the cloak over my arm, a long fall of sable velvet; I'd managed a tolerable French twist with my recalcitrant hair. "

The novel is the Second book in the Dante Valentine series, it is dark futuristic fantasy, think the Jetson cars hovering about in a city filled with demons, witches, cops, and a psionic murderer. good clean fun then.

what genre of books do you read? and why? Good question, I mainly read sci-fi, fantasy, and horror, or some combination of the three. The why of it is in part as simple as that is what I started reading when I graduated from children's books, and an obsession with the Little House on the Prairie Novels by Laura Ingalls Wilder (yes I watched every episode of the tv series as well). My dad was my influence for my love of books and reading, he gave me all his Stephen Kings to read when I was about 10 or 11. Stephen King's The Stand remains one my my favourite novels to this day. I enjoy books that transport you somewhere else to expierince things beyond the realm of this reality.

What books do you dislike? I cannot stand books of the "this is my horrible life read all about how terrible it was and feel guilty" , reading is meant to be a pleasure not something horrible and unpalatable. I'm not too keen on modern romance, we live in the now why would I want to read about it?

favourite children's books?
The Dragon Machine by Helen Ward and Wayne Anderson is a beautiful book and H loves it and must read it at least once or twice a week. One of my special favourites are the Shel Silverstein poetry books, I would get them at Christmas and sit all afternoon reading them and giggling to myself.

favourite classic novel? Pride and Prejudice of course, Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, I should really read more classics but I think High School cramming the likes of Jane Eyre, All Quiet on the Western Front, and Catcher in the Rye down my throat it rather put me off classic novels for a very long time.

all time favourite book? or author? I have many, a lot depends on the mood that I am in, I like Laurel K Hamilton, Stephen King, Bill Bryson, Julie E. Czerneda, Lilith Saintcrow, Anne Bishop, many many more.

what is the next book you will read? I have a stack of novels to get through near the top are The Devils Right Hand by Lilith Saintcrow (book 3), Magic Study by Maria V. Snyder, and I have no idea its a big stack and its upstairs, and I am not.

what will your next book purchase be? either the next Laurel K Hamilton, or some crafting books on beading, or on learning to sew/embroidery for complete morons type of thing.

favourite place for reading? I love to read in the garden or sitting in a cafe with a good latte and a piece of cake, and if its a coffee shop in a book shop even better. I think I may be addicted to the smell of books and coffee.

tag 5 people. I don't know who to tag for this so I will say if you read this meme and feel like filling it out then leave a comment and I will visit your blog and read your answers! Have fun.