Sunday Salon ~ family and books

FAMILY

Above are three of my great-grandchildren:  Jaxon, Shelby, and Shiloh on their mother's lap.  Below are my other three great-grandchildren:  Micah, Raegan, and Jonathan.

BOOKS

Recently finished:

The Little Book of Hygge: Danish Secrets to Happy Living ~ by Meik Wiking, 2017, psychology, 8/10

Currently reading:

To Be Where You Are ~ by Jan Karon, 2017, fiction (North Carolina)

Looking forward to:

The Donkey's Dream ~ by Barbara Helen Berger, 1985, children's

He was just an ordinary donkey, but on his back he carried a miracle.  He carried Mary to Bethlehem on the night she gave birth.  Along the way he dreamed he was carrying a city, a ship, a fountain, and a rose.  He dreamed he was carrying a lady full of heaven.

Bloggers gather in the Sunday Salon — at separate computers in different time zones — to talk about our lives and our reading.

Beginning ~ before it hit the fan

"It was the first day of October, and all things considered, Mitford was pretty quiet.  Around the tenth of the month is when it would hit the fan."

To Be Where You Are ~ by Jan Karon, 2017, fiction (North Carolina)

After twelve years of wrestling with the conflicts of retirement, Father Tim Kavanagh realizes he doesn't need a steady job to prove himself.  Then he's given one.  As for what it proves, heaven only knows.  Millions of Karon fans will be thrilled that it’s life as usual in the wildly popular Mitford series:  A beloved town character lands a front-page obituary, but who was it, exactly, who died?  And what about the former mayor, born the year Lindbergh landed in Paris, who’s still running for office?  Twenty minutes from Mitford at Meadowgate Farm, newlyweds Dooley and Lace Kavanagh face a crisis that devastates their bank account and impacts their family vet practice.  In this latest Mitford novel, Jan Karon weaves together the compelling lives of two Kavanagh families and a cast of characters that readers around the world now love like kin.

And I'm wondering what it is, exactly, that's about to hit the fan.

Gilion at Rose City Reader hosts Book Beginnings on Fridays. Click here for today's Mister Linky.

Here are some VERY good words

Thanks to Analytical Grammar on Facebook for posting this, saying:

"It's Word Wednesday!  Vary your VERY."

Caturday quote ~ illustrated by Clawdia

"If there is one spot of sun spilling onto the floor,

a cat will find it and soak it up." — J. A. McIntosh

Hygge Holiday Challenge ~ second update

Dec. 8 ~ have a candlelight dinner

I call this meal "chicken by candlelight" because I remembered at the last minute to light a candle
for this challenge.  Eating by candlelight doesn't feel more hyggeligt to me, but more like remembering an assignment.  Chatting with a friend is what I enjoyed.

Dec. 9 ~ have a tech-free evening

How about simply "have fun opening a small gift bag" I was given?  The leaders of our two "Life Transitions" groups got us together this week to talk about whether (and how) we should continue as support for each other.  At the end of our session, we received gifts from young people at a local synagogue.  I say "young people" because I don't know if they are seven or seventeen.  Each gift bag included:

• warm knit gloves (mine are purple),
• a pocket-sized packet of tissues,
• five cough drops,
• lip balm (mine is watermelon flavored),
• two Newman's Own tea bags that say on one side "keep calm and brew tea."
• a folded half-page-sized note, each one different.

My note says:  "Hope you have a warm winter! — Lauren."
Thank you, Lauren!  She didn't know about my Hygge Challenge,
but how's that for a cozy hygge gift?

Dec. 10 ~ add some greenery

Okay, but first I'll add to my gratitude list.  I'm grateful for friends, old and new, and that includes my furry friend, Clawdia.  This photo shows her inspecting the crinkly white paper on Tiny's door and sniffing those peppermint candy canes.  When Tiny's phone quit working, she came to our door just down the hall to borrow my phone to call her daughter.  When she left, Clawdia hurried along with her because Tiny is one of Clawdia's best friends.  I told Tiny I needed to shower to take a neighbor shopping and didn't have time for visiting, but she let Clawdia go home with her for a visit anyway.  I was still getting ready when my hall door opened and Tiny announced, "She's home!"  Not just every cat has her very own friends.

Now for the greenery.   I have re-seeded Clawdia's kitty garden with a mixture of barley, rye, oats, and wheat.  It sprouts in four to six days.  I got it for her when she started nibbling my green plants, some of which could kill her.  It's been several weeks since she had any grass of her own, like in this photo that I've posted before, and she really loves it.  So that's my added greenery for December, which will go back on the floor in the kitchen, once some sprouts get a few inches tall.

Dec. 11 ~ invest in a cozy sweater

I'm retired with enough cozy sweaters to last the rest of my life, so instead I invested in some soft, fuzzy, warm, and cozy socks.  These are on sale right now, which makes me even happier.

Dec. 12 ~ go for a 30-minute walk

I'm behind in the walking and exercising I intended to do this month, but I've been doing some of both.  One of my neighbors goes to an indoor gym for walking and promised to take me next time she goes.  It's too windy and cold to do a lot of walking in St. Louis weather right now, and the fitness center in our building has machines, but no place indoors for serious, intentional walking.  Going with that friend means another opportunity to socialize.

Dec. 13 ~ go on a coffee date in real life

I interpreted this as going out to eat with a friend, when Evelyn and I decided to go to Dewey's.  Here's the pizza we shared, her side with sausage and artichokes and mine with feta cheese and Greek veggies.  No coffee for us, though.  I had my usual iced tea, and Evelyn had a Coke.

Dec. 14 ~ cozy up with a new book

This is the day library books are delivered to the Crown Center, and I got Grief Cottage by Gail Godwin.  Click the link to read what I wrote about the book.  I started reading it today, curled up in my recliner.

The challenge
Click this link to see the complete Hygge Holiday Challenge calendar.

Sunday Salon ~ booked and unbooked

Booked

Here's a brand-new novel I put on reserve at the library, since I've been reading all nonfiction lately:

Grief Cottage ~ by Gail Godwin, 2017, fiction (South Carolina)

After his mother's death, eleven-year-old Marcus is sent to live on a small South Carolina island with his great aunt, a reclusive painter with a haunted past.  Aunt Charlotte, otherwise a woman of few words, points out a ruined cottage, telling Marcus she had visited it regularly after she'd moved there thirty years ago because it matched the ruin of her own life.  Eventually she was inspired to take up painting so she could capture its utter desolation.  The islanders call it "Grief Cottage," because a boy and his parents disappeared from it during a hurricane fifty years before.  Their bodies were never found and the cottage has stood empty ever since.  During his lonely hours while Aunt Charlotte is in her studio painting and keeping her demons at bay, Marcus visits the cottage daily, building up his courage by coming ever closer, even after the ghost of the boy who died seems to reveal himself.  Full of curiosity and open to the unfamiliar and uncanny given the recent upending of his life, he courts the ghost boy, never certain whether the ghost is friendly or follows some sinister agenda.

Here's my library loot for this past week:

• Do One Thing Different: And Other Uncommonly Sensible Solutions to Life's Persistent Problems ~ by Bill O'Hanlon, 1999
• The Beck Diet Solution: Train Your Brain to Think Like a Thin Person ~ by Judith S. Beck, 2007
• The Little Book of Hygge: Danish Secrets to Happy Living ~ by Meik Wiking, 2017

Here's what I'm in the middle of reading with my study buddies:

• Losing Moses on the Freeway: The 10 Commandments in America ~ by Chris Hedges, 2005
• Womanist Midrash: A Reintroduction to the Women of the Torah and the Throne ~ by Wilda C. Gafney, 2017

Unbooked

What's going on in my life outside of books?  I swiped a photo off Facebook of my son holding his youngest grandchild before her sister's dance recital.  Baby Shiloh's hand is blurred, but I think David is digging Cheerios out of a baggie for her.  That's big brother Jaxon sitting beside his grandpa.  So you want to see the little ballerina, right?

Here's Shelby after the dance performance.
She'll be four years old on Wednesday.

Bloggers gather in the Sunday Salon — at separate computers in different time zones — to talk about our lives and our reading.

Beginning ~ with how to pronounce Hygge

The Little Book of Hygge: Danish Secrets to Happy Living ~ by Meik Wiking, 2017

Hooga?  Hhyooguh?  Heurgh?  It is not important how you choose to pronounce or even spell hygge.  To paraphrase one of the greatest philosophers of our time — Winnie-the-Pooh — when asked how to spell a certain emotion, "You don't spell it, you feel it."

However, spelling and pronouncing hygge is the easy part.  Explaining exactly what it is, that's the tricky part.  Hygge has been called everything from "the art of creating intimacy," "coziness of the soul," and "the absence of annoyance," to "taking pleasure from the presence of soothing things," "cozy togetherness," and my personal favorite, "cocoa by candlelight."

I've already started reading this book and applying what I've learned to living a more cozy life.  I've even taken on what one person is calling the Hygge Holiday Challenge.  Click on that link to read what I wrote on Tuesday about that challenge and what hygge is all about.  Just to intrigue you a bit more, the image above shows not only the book's cover (front and back, with the author's photo) but also a pair of warm, cozy socks.  Yes, new socks.  Let me quote from a later chapter in the book:

"Ally yourself with a nice pair of woolen socks as a hygge insurance" (p. 85).

No, I haven't gotten that far in the book yet, but I have figured out how socks and candlelight and my favorite tea help make my life more ... hyggeligt ... more cozy.  I'm hooked.

Gilion at Rose City Reader hosts Book Beginnings on Fridays. Click here for today's Mister Linky.