Musing about Amelia Bedelia

I didn't pick up my book bag that the library delivered last Thursday, because I knew I'd be moving the next day.  I was afraid the books would be misplaced during the move.  So today, I went downstairs to our new office in this new building and picked up my book bag.  In it were three books about Amelia Bedelia and one book by Beth Kephart.

So here I sit in my easy chair in the corner of my new living room, thinking that after the stress of moving, three children's books are about all I can deal with.  Yeah, I'm smiling as I say that.  Here's the first book in the series:

Amelia Bedelia ~ by Peggy Parish, illustrated by Fritz Siebel, 1963, children's picture book, 63 pages

From dressing the chicken to drawing the drapes, Amelia Bedelia does exactly what Mr. and Mrs. Rogers tell her to do.  If things get a bit mixed up, well, that's okay.  When Amelia Bedelia is involved, everything always turns out perfectly in the end!  This book is for kids who read on their own, but still need a little help.  The stories help kids take their next steps toward reading success.

I recently wrote about the other two Amelia Bedelia books HERE and the book by Beth Kephart HERE.

I've read the first story

Girl Country ~ by Jacqueline Vogtman, 2023, short stories, 200 pages

The stories range from medieval Belgium to the near-future of the American Midwest, populated by mothers and monsters, mermaids and milkmaids, nuns and bus drivers — women in every walk of life, but particularly working-class women, navigating the intersection of the mundane and the magical.

This has been a busy weekend (see the next paragraph), but I have read one of the eleven stories in this book.  I'll probably read another story before bedtime tonight.

Sunday Salon is hosted by Deb Nance at Readerbuzz.

I moved on Friday, so I'm still sitting here among boxes of stuff to be unpacked and put away, somewhere.  Do I still need this?  Do I still need that?  Or should I toss it?  I am ready to toss the whole mess, frankly!  For a

few days after our move, we can still go back to our old apartments.  I went earlier this afternoon to get the little white strainer out of my kitchen sink.  Sure, I could buy another, but why pay seven or eight bucks for something I already own?  Now I won't have to worry that my knife or spoon or fork will slip out of my hand and down the drain in my new kitchen sink.  Walking over there and back took about 1500 steps, so I am also exercising.

The only, lonely book of the week

Always We Begin Again: The Benedictine Way of Living, Revised Edition ~ by John McQuiston II, 2011, spirituality, 120 pages, 9/10

This book is the work of an attorney with a busy commercial practice who searched for a truly balanced life and found the blueprint for it in a sixth-century text.  After discovering St. Benedict’s Rule, McQuiston interpreted and restated the ancient system of spiritual living, enabling today’s reader to understand and make use of its remarkable insights.

While strict adherence to the Rule may be possible only in a monastic setting, its bedrock, the ordering of each day, is accessible to everyone who seeks an orderly structure to their bustling professional and personal life.  The brief readings and meditations in this small book offer a bridge between a busy day and a moment of restorative and blessed silence.

My moving day is tomorrow, so I've been trying all week to be ready for that momentous day.  I'm not ready.  Not at all.  It feels like I'll never be ready — NEVER — but I have no choice.  So why am I sitting in the lobby, blogging?  I no longer have internet access in my apartment, so I came down to check my email.  I won't be hooked up in my NEW apartment until Saturday.  So here I sit in an empty lobby writing a blog post to update friends and followers.  I won't be back on for a few more days.

Oh, yeah, I got on the blog to say this tiny book is the only thing I've read this week.

Jumping from Iceland to Italy

The traffic lights in Akureyri, Iceland, have heart-shaped designs intended to evoke positive feelings among drivers.  Found HERE.

The Star-Crossed Sisters of Tuscany ~ by Lori Nelson Spielman, 2020, fiction (Italy), 400 pages

A trio of second-born daughters sets out on a whirlwind journey through the lush Italian countryside to break the family curse that says they’ll never find love.  Since the day Filomena Fontana cast a curse upon her sister more than two hundred years ago, not one second-born Fontana daughter has found lasting love.  Some, like second-born Emilia, the happily-single baker at her grandfather’s Brooklyn deli, claim it’s an odd coincidence.

Others, like her sexy, desperate-for-love cousin Lucy, insist it’s a true hex.  But both are bewildered when their great-aunt calls with an astounding proposition:  If they accompany her to her homeland of Italy, Aunt Poppy vows she’ll meet the love of her life on the steps of the Ravello Cathedral on her eightieth birthday, and break the Fontana Second-Daughter Curse once and for all.

Sunday Salon is hosted by Deb Nance at Readerbuzz.

Duvet days

The main difference between a duvet and a comforter is that a comforter is just one piece of bedding while a duvet requires two separate pieces — an insert and cover.  A comforter is usually quilted with the filling evenly distributed, while a duvet has an insert that works as the fill.  Wait, you are thinking, what's this got to do with books?  After all, this is a book blog.

I read in Amy Azzarito's 2020 book The Elements of a Home (subtitled:  Curious Histories behind Everyday Household Objects, from Pillows to Forks) that some employers in the United Kingdom offer their staff  "duvet days" (p. 112).  That's like mental health days or personal days in the United States.  Letting folks skip work occasionally to stay in bed sounds good to me, though it wasn't a thing when I was still working.  I wondered about the difference between a duvet and a comforter and found the top illustration HERE.)  I'm being wordy, as usual, but now we know.

Library Loot

The Great Upending ~ by Beth Kephart, 2020, children's YA fiction, 288 pages

When a troubled children’s book author moves to their farm, two kids with troubles of their own hatch a scheme to swipe the ending of the final book in a bestselling series to get a reward from the book’s publisher.  Twelve-year-old Sara and her brother Hawk are told that they are not to bother the man — The Mister — who just moved into the silo apartment on their farm.  It doesn’t matter that they know nothing about him and they think they ought to know something.  It doesn’t matter that he’s always riding that unicycle around.  Mama told them no way, no how are they to bother The Mister unless they want to be in a mess of trouble.

Trouble is the last thing Sara and her brother need.  Sara’s got a condition:  Marfan syndrome.  And that Marfan syndrome is causing her heart to have problems, the kind of problems that require surgery.  But the family already has problems.  The drought has dried up their crops and their funds, which means they can’t afford any more problems, let alone a surgery to fix those problems.  Sara can feel the weight of her family’s worry, and the weight of her time running out, but what can a pair of kids do?  Well, it all starts with — bothering The Mister.

I always love reading Beth Kephart's books.  She is an excellent writer.  Since I don't know anything about the condition, I also look forward to learning about Marfan syndrome.  If you have read this book, tell us what you thought and maybe your rating.  Here is a link in case you want to share your own Library Loot, which means the books that you got from the library.

Thinking about gratitude

When life seems negative, I realize I need to start thinking positively.  One way I've discovered to change my attitude is to start thinking of things that I'm grateful for.

(1)  I'm grateful that it is now okay to use the preposition "for" at the end of a sentence.

So I think I'll list a few things for which I am grateful.  (See?  I can also write a sentence the way my teachers taught me.)

(2)  I'm grateful for teachers.

(3)  I'm also grateful that some things change, like how we use words.

(4)  I'm grateful for my friends, even those I've never met (in person, anyway).

Have you read what I have at the bottom of my right sidebar?  "You might be a book blogger if you've never met some of your closest friends."  For example, I've never met Helen of Helen's Book Blog, but I know her and her family, in a way.  Are you one of my book blogger friends?