Saturday, May 30, 2015

Books Read In The Past Week

Books read for the first time are marked with  a #

Books, (except Sunday books) are grouped by author, and not necessarily in the order read.


Sunday book(s)

"Lord Bountiful" #
by Fr. Francis J. Finn, S.J.
[children's fiction]

Weekday Books



"A Pageant of Hats
Ancient and Modern"
by Ruth Edwards Kilgour
(non-fiction)
{carried over from last week}

"Pollyanna"
{carried over from last week}
"Pollyanna Grows Up"
by Eleanor H. Porter
[fiction]

"Aunt Flossie's Hats (And Crab Cakes Later) #
by Elizabeth Fitzgerald Howard
[picture book]
(openlibrary.org loan) 

"Betsy and Tacy Go Downtown"
by Maud Hart Lovelace
[children's fiction]

"Champion of the Chalet School" #
by Adrianne Fitzpatrick
[children's fiction, Chalet School series,
fill-in]

"Welcome, Stranger"
by Lenora Mattingly Weber
[YA fiction]
{carrying over into next week}

A Book for Weekdays AND Sundays
"The Imitation of Christ"
by Thomas A Kempis
[Kindle book]

Saturday, May 23, 2015

Books Read in the Past Week

Books read for the first time are marked with  a #

Books, (except Sunday books) are grouped by author, and not necessarily in the order read.


Sunday book(s)

"A Family on Wheels:
Further Adventures of the
Trapp Family Singers" #
by Maria Augusta von Trapp
[autobiography]

"St. Francis of Assisi"
by G. K. Chesterton
[biography]

"Lord Bountiful" #
by Fr. Francis J. Finn, S.J.
[children's fiction]

Weekday Books
{carried over from last week}
"A Bright Star Falls"
(Kindle edition)
{carried over from last week}
by Lenora Mattingly Weber
[YA fiction]


"A Pageant of Hats
Ancient and Modern"
by Ruth Edwards Kilgour
(non-fiction)
{carried over from last week}

"Betsy and Tacy Go Over the Big Hill"
by Maud Hart Lovelace
[children's fiction]
(in "The Betsy-Tacy Treasury, Kindle Edition)

"Bright Morning" #
by Charlie May Simon
[children's fiction]


"Herbert"
"Herbert Again"
"More Fun With Herbert"
"Herbert's Homework"by Hazel Wilson
[children's fiction]

"The Five Chinese Brothers"
by Claire Huchet Bishop
and Kurt Weise
[picture book]
(openlibrary.org loan)
I hadn't read this in years. 

"Pollyanna"
by Eleanor H. Porter
[fiction]
{carrying over into next week}

A Book for Weekdays AND Sundays
"The Imitation of Christ"
by Thomas A Kempis
[Kindle book]

Saturday, May 16, 2015

Books Read In The Past Week

Books read for the first time are marked with  a #

Books, (except Sunday books) are grouped by author, and not necessarily in the order read.


Sunday book(s)

"A Family on Wheels:
Further Adventures of the
Trapp Family Singers" #
by Maria Augusta von Trapp
[autobiography]

"St. Francis of Assisi"
by G. K. Chesterton
[biography]

"Lord Bountiful" #
by Fr. Francis J. Finn, S.J.
[children's fiction]

Weekday Books
"The More, The Merrier"
{carried over from last week}
"A Bright Star Falls"
(Kindle edition)
{carrying over into next week}
by Lenora Mattingly Weber
[YA fiction]

"Wings" #
by Mary Kennedy
[picture book]
(openlibrary.org loan)

"Betsy-Tacy and Tib" 
by Maud Hart Lovelace
[children's fiction]

"Maminka's Children" #
by Elizabeth Orton Jones
[children's fiction]
(openlibrary.org loan)

"A Pageant of Hats
Ancient and Modern"
by Ruth Edwards Kilgour
(non-fiction)
{carrying over into next week}

A Book for Weekdays AND Sundays
"The Imitation of Christ"
by Thomas A Kempis
[Kindle book]

Friday, May 15, 2015

Old Hat, New Hat

I recently ordered and received a book I hadn't read in years...
A Pageant of Hats, Ancient and Modern, by Ruth Edwards Kilgour, which I am currently reading.
Well, that book got me to thinking about a hat I used to have,
one that I owned for years, and got a great deal of use and
enjoyment out of.
It was a blue felt shapeable hat....very shapeable.  And I shaped it in every possible way.  I also liked to use different
accessories on my hat.  Sometimes it would be one of several
pins I had. Sometimes it would be a scarf,with the ends tied into a bow.
I had that hat for more than ten years, not unlike the hat Miss
Opal wore in Lenora Mattingly Weber's Beany and the Beckoning Road.
"Her black hat had seen years of service.  It was only the flowers, Beany realized, which blossomed anew on it every
spring.  This spring Miss Opal had chosen pink, yellow, and blue
daisies."
Well, between that passage and the book about hats, is it any wonder that I began to miss my hat, which also saw "years of service," more than I did before?   Is it any wonder that I decided it was time to get a replacement?
I went to amazon.com to search for a hat as much as possible like my lost, lamented one.  And yes, I found one,  and, after reading the reviews, I ordered it.  

Yes, it is shapeable!  And yes, I will be accessorizing it, but I
won't change the accessory every day, and I will never use a
pin on this hat... it's made of paper, but, according to the reviews, it doesn't feel like paper, and it is durable.  The original price was $25.99, but it was on sale for only $6.06, and the shipping was free.  I thank God for that; the original price would
have been a bit much for me at this time.
I've also ordered a sunflower self-adhesive embroidered applique sticker patch, which I'd actually selected before I found the hat. I have to laugh when I reflect that I spent more... but not much more... for the accessory than I did for the hat... just as I've spent more money on Bible covers than I did for my favorite Bible!

So when and where do I plan to wear this hat?  Wear it where?
Where wear it?  Not outside; I couldn't run after it if it were to
blow away.
I'm going to wear it, instead of a prayer veil, when I watch the Mass on EWTN... and perhaps when I just feel like wearing it!
But am I giving up on veils? No; I will still wear a veil when I
pray the Liturgy of the Hours, and when I make Online Adoration.
Was it necessary for me to buy the hat, and the sticker.  No, and I realized that before I placed my order.   Every now and then it is good to make a completely frivolous purchase... provided, of course, that it is something you can afford, and
something you really want.

Sunday, May 10, 2015

The Perfect Mother

Today, Mother's Day, I'm going to blog about the perfect mother.
Most mothers, both real and fictional, are not perfect; they
make mistakes from time to time.  Not even Mrs. March
in Louisa May Alcott's Little Women was perfect.
The following is taken from one of my older posts:
Remember the chapter called "Jo Meets Apollyon," where
Amy burned the book Jo had worked on for several years
because Jo wouldn't let her come to the theater with her 
and Meg and Laurie?

Jo was, of course, furious with Amy... just as I would have been,
 just as almost anybody would have been.

But how did Mrs. March, Marmee, handle the situation?
"Mrs. March came home, and, having heard the story, 
soon brought Amy to a sense of the wrong she had done her sister."
That's it.  We never find out just how she "brought Amy to a
sense of the wrong she had done her sister."  We never learn
what Marmee said to Amy.

Mrs. March, in fact, seemed much more concerned about Jo's very
 understandable anger than about Amy's deliberate, vindictive 
destruction of Jo's property.

If I were a mother, I'm sure that I would not be perfect either.
For example, I might scold or punish a child undeservedly, or
too severely.  On the other hand, I might "look the other way"
when I ought to exercise some parental discipline.
In all the history of the world, there has been only one perfect Mother.




Saturday, May 9, 2015

Books Read In The Past Week

Books read for the first time are marked with  a #

Books, (except Sunday books) are grouped by author, and not necessarily in the order read.


Sunday book(s)

"A Family on Wheels:
Further Adventures of the
Trapp Family Singers" #
by Maria Augusta von Trapp
[autobiography]

"Hill of Little Miracles"
by Valenti Angelo
[children's fiction]
(a secular book, but with
enough Catholic elements
to make it suitable for my Sunday
reading. In fact, this had more Catholic
elements than another book that I read
a few Sundays ago.)

"St. Francis of Assisi"
by G. K. Chesterton
[biography]


Weekday Books

"Make a Wish For Me"
{carried over from last week}
"Happy Birthday, Dear Beany"
"The More, The Merrier"
{carrying over into next week}
by Lenora Mattingly Weber
[YA fiction]

"Winona's Pony Cart"
by Maud Hart Lovelace
[children's fiction]

"Meet the Friends" #
by Sharla Scannell Whalen
[children's fiction]
(openlibrary.org loan)

"May Flowers" #
by Louisa May Alcott
[fiction, novella]
(free online book)


"The Little House"
by Virginia Lee Burton
[picture book]
(openlibrary.org loan)

"Land of the Whatsit"
by Billy and Betty White
pseudonym of Charles Dexter Morris
[children's fiction]
From a description on abebooks.com
A "writing out in story form" of some of the humorous adventures (adventures "found on our front doorstep and in our back yard") of Billy and Betty, two children who supposedly published an amateur newspaper, adventures which originally appeared on a radio program with the same title as this book. The Whatsit became a four page cartoon insert in 'True Story' magazine and eventually an immensely popular miniature newspaper "by children for children" which reached a subscription level of almost 4 million children. Also includes cartoons and illustrations by Joe Banks and humorous verse. 


"The Spell of The Northern Lights" #
by Lucy Johnston Sypher
[children's fiction, based on
the author's life]




A Book for Weekdays AND Sundays
"The Imitation of Christ"
by Thomas A Kempis
[Kindle book]

I Dread Tomorrow

Soon after I post this, I will begin my Sunday observance.  I usually look forward to Sunday... my favorite day of the week...
but I dread this coming Sunday, and for a reason I haven't blogged about... haven't wanted to blog about... haven't been
able to blog about.
On Easter Sunday, at about 2:00 PM, Kathryn and Paul knocked on my door and said they had to talk to me.  I opened the door and Kathryn told me that Mom had passed away.
One thing I thank God for is that Mom didn't linger the way Baba did.  I remember watching Baba suffer for almost a year... and watching Mom watching her mother suffer.
This will be the first Mother's Day that I won't see Mom, or at least talk to her on the phone.
Every Rosary I pray now includes a petition for the repose of Mom's soul.  

Saturday, May 2, 2015

Books Read In the Past Week

Books read for the first time are marked with  a #

Books, (except Sunday books) are grouped by author, and not necessarily in the order read.


Sunday book(s)

"In A Great Tradition
Tribute to Dame Laurentia McLachlan,
Abbess of Stanbrook"
by The Benedictines of Stanbrook
( Rumer Godden wrote in "In This House of Brede": 

"All of the characters
in this book are imaginary, but many of the episodes
are based on fact; some are taken from the life and
sayings of Dame Laurentia McLachlan and Sister Mary
Ann McArdle of Stanbrook Abbey.")

I recognized some of the incidents.

"A Family on Wheels:
Further Adventures of the
Trapp Family Singers" #
by Maria Augusta von Trapp
[autobiography]

Weekday Books

"Understanding Kim"
by Pelagie Doane
[children's fiction]
I loved this when I was a little girl, and
I was very thankful to find an affordable
copy.
{carried over from last week}

"Beany and the Beckoning Road"
"Beany  Has a Secret Life"
"Make a Wish For Me"
{carrying over into next week}
by Lenora Mattingly Weber
[YA fiction]

"Sorry I'm Not Sorry #
An Honest Look at Bullying
From the Bully"
by Nancy Rue
[children's/young teens' fiction,
Christian (Protestant) 
Mean Girls Makeover Series) ]
(Kindle book]

"May I Bring A Friend?" #
by Beatrice Schenk De Regniers
[picture book]
(openlibrary.org loan)

"The Home Has A Heart"
by Thyra Ferre Bjorn
[non-fiction; Christian (Protestant) themes, recipes, 
anecdotes]
(May chapter only)



A Book for Weekdays AND Sundays
"The Imitation of Christ"
by Thomas A Kempis
[Kindle book]

Combining Two Things I Love

It has been very well established on this blog that I love
clubs.  I believe I've also mentioned that I love old-time
radio shows.  Well, I've just joined

I know that it says Mystery Theater, but there are many genres.
I expect to have hours and hours of listening pleasure.

Encouraging news about EWTN's Fr. Anthony

Fr. Anthony hopes to be back on the air in the near future.  Oh, HOW I'm praying for that to happen! https://franciscanmissionaries.c...