Moving right along with my cleaning and culling of books. This is the loft that opens to the living room and here are my children's books. Many are from my childhood and then there are those that I acquired when my sons' elementary school got a new librarian who tossed out a lot of elderly books from the Thirties, Forties, and Fifties.
Louisa May Alcott books -- newish copies as those from my childhood were read to pieces -- and a mixed bag of Oz books -- some from my youth, some from my older boy's. Alice in Wonderland, The Dark is Rising series, the Jerry Todd books that belonged to my father -- Black Stallion books -- I haven't reread those in a very long time. There's a Freddy the Pig book and a Mushroom Planet book. . . and just the sight of many of these books take me back to the library at Roosevelt Elementary or Wilson Junior High, or the branch library that I read my way through.
The Just So Stories, the Wrinkle in Time series , the Narnia books (the library at St. John's Episcopal Church and my Scoutmistress who introduced me to Narnia.) The Anne of Green Gables series and Evelyn, my godmother who sent me a new one every year on my birthday.
Pamela and the Blue Mare, Tick Tock and Jim, The Green Grass of Wyoming and Thunderhead -- more evidence of my horse phase in junior high.
I've set aside the Pooh Books and Mother Goose and several books for the very young, looking forward to reading them to Josie some day. The boys' Dr. Seuss books are in a cubby hole somewhere -- must dig them out.
I hope she'll love to read -- I hope she'll love some of these books as much as I loved reading my grandmother's books. I don't recall ever thinking that Jo and Beth and Meg and Amy were dated -- they were just girls.
10 comments:
Oh, she will love to read all right. You will make sure of that by reading to her from infancy. Do not clear out this bookshelf. It holds too much family history and loving memories to break apart.
Such wonderful memories...carrying them forward into the future! Such is literature in life!
I'm cleaning rather than culling these shelves. Haven't yet found anything I can bear to get rid of except for my grandmother's copy of Little Women which was just a heap of brittle pages. Even that wasn't easy.
I could never bear to get rid of a single children's book, but my kids have been slowly spiriting them away to read to their own children. I was furious when I found out that my own mother had given away all my "Brownie Scout" books when I left for college, but I was able to go online a few years ago and order replacements. Although it's never quite the same as still having the actual ones you held in your hand and read over and over again. But I still have my Nancy Drew books!! You'll love reading to your granddaughter.
What marvelous treasures you have. And I'm positive that Josie will love reading and story-telling; how could she not with a grandmother like you?
This post makes me realize that, even though my dad was an avid reader and had boxes and boxes of paperbacks when I was kid (and I do have his hardcover old books from *his* childhood)...oddly, nearly all my books I read via the library and rarely was gifted them. I began buying them myself as soon as I could in my early twenties, though.
She'll love to read and be read to. I had none of my childhood books [not even my set of Anne of Green Gables :( ] so I've re-bought quite a few of those I loved, to keep here for my grandies. Hopefully they'll enjoy curling up in a big armchair and reading. They both love being read to, at present.
So cosy!
A post about reading, according to my heart!
Oh the memories. My Aunt Jo read me Uncle Remus stories over and over. She also had a vivid imagination and added her own twist to the tales. I guess my favorites were CALL OF THE WILD AND WHITE FANG. Any dog books were favored.
Oh the fun you will have!
I do like the bending of the shelves, it's looks like ours... a lot of treasure books.
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