…when our clan makes its way up to beautiful northern Michigan for a week at family camp.
Here is my post from two summers ago — I believe this post gets more search engine hits than any other I’ve ever written. It seems there are lots of people who want to know what “twisted box stitch” looks like, and even more who apparently are looking for material for their own “how I spent my summer vacation” essay.
So we’re in a frenzy of laundry and packing and organizing and of course the biggest decision of all, what books to bring. Oh my gosh you won’t believe this. I was already excited enough about all my recent BookMooch acquisitions, and then what should happen but my sister-in-law, known to you as Aunt Sara, came to town because she is part of the clan going up north. And what should she bring along but a copy of the childhood favorite that I’ve been pining for: Lotte’s Locket by Virginia Sorensen. She found a beautiful used copy with library binding and card pocket intact (the book was last checked out in 1993), with pages slightly yellow and oh-so-soft around the edges and that delicious library book smell… oh! Thank you Sara!!!
Then of course I will bring The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas. And what else? I have In Praise of Lies by Patricia Melo, Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, Prep, another serial killer book, and a few others that are upstairs and I can’t remember the titles. I think Capt. Corelli would be appropriate now that I am the proud owner and plucker of a real mandolin but I am open to suggestions.
I’ll be back next week, and I look forward to catching up when I return. Happy reading, everyone!
7 Comments
I fondly remember making keychains-I think we called them boondoggles or something like that in camp. I’d not heard of Lotte’s Locket before, I will be picking it up soon!
Enjoy your week, it’s such a lovely thing to do! I’m branching into reading fantasy this week with Gardens of the Moon by Steven Erikson. Not sure if i’m up for it right now, but i got sucked in to an internet reading group…
Erg, just dropping by to tell you I finally answered your question to my WG#12 post. You can find them here:
http://www.inthelouvre.org/sunday-salon/the-sunday-salon-reading-writing-mini-reviews/
Thanks for asking, I had a lot of fun trying to come up with intelligent answers! :p
My mom used to send me to school for arts and crafts every summer, and I got very good at making key chains with that stitch.
Have a great time with your family, Julie. Thanks again for the haircut.
Captain Corelli is a great vacation read. If you haven’t already read it, I also recommend The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. Have fun!
This is unrelated to your post, sorry …
I posted an answer to your Weekly Geeks question for my review of Dracula – come by and check it out when you get a chance. :)
I’m so glad that a used copy of Lotte’s Locket was such a fulfilling sensory experience for you! I hope that rereading the story was everything you hoped and expected, too.
I know you’re not a fan of Amazon, but I find I can support small vendors and library sales and other odd booksellers by purchasing used books through the site. The original “Bibliofind” web sales service for used book dealers was started in Great Barrington, MA so I felt I was supporting a local business by using it before Amazon bought them out for a few million bucks. And, until the last month or so, the only book store in this area was a Barnes & Noble, so I was only robbing corporate Peter to pay corporate Paul, if you ask me.
Although the shipping cost is now a firm $3.99 with no discount for combined purchases, some of the bargains are amazing. I just bought the recently superceded, 1008-page edition of the Oxford Illustrated Dictionary (in unused condition, with dust jacket and thumb index) for $2.12 as a gift for a graduating student who has a phenomenal vocabulary and a love of words. I hope he thinks that I spent $50 – he needed something good to happen to him in school.
I get a lot of enrichment stuff for my classroom through the used book bargains, too. I just bought The Illustrated Book of Myths by Philip ($1.28) and Oh, Yuck! The Encyclopedia of Everything Nasty by Masoff (99 cents). The hunter-gatherer in me is very content to find good, cheap books on the Internet – or along the Amazon, as it were. Is that so wrong?