Stacked High

Sometimes you find little gems at the used bookstore that you never expected to find. There was this gorgeous (what I thought to be vintage) French paperback of "To Kill A Mockingbird," that had to come home with me.

It now finds its place on the bookshelf with other pretty treasures stacked high on display. I've really been on a vintage paperback binge lately, not sure why, but I'm loving it. I keep seeing the 1980's set of the Anne of Green Gables books and it makes me melancholy to read them again, to escape to Anne's world. I've learned a lot from dear Anne that I'd never know about but for her. I'll be hunting for more treasures this summer.

The Works of Jane Austen

That moment when you are window shopping and find something you just cannot live without. What I found ... A 1970's copy of Jane Austen's novels in one volume. One gorgeous, pretty bound, exquisite volume of gathered words that I love, love, love.

Certain Thoughts Are Prayers

Certain thoughts are prayers. There are moments when, whatever be the attitude of the body, the soul is on its knees.

      -Victor Hugo

"Notre Dame" by Mary Beddy

If These Walls Could Speak

I find myself looking at the art I've collected for the gallery wall, ...like this. Like I'm in a museum. Most of the pieces I have come to love, while one or two will be taken down because I chose wrong. It's got to be that feeling of lifelong adoration, or it's off the wall for good. It's still a work in progress, a work that has taken time, and isn't done yet. If these walls could speak.

Two Stories

I love the two stories behind these images. 

I bet you know them both.

Two Months To Go

My breath still comes out puffy white,

An ethereal, airy, lovely sight,

My skin feels frosty, nippy blows

That redden my runny, frozen nose,

There's still a foot of fallen snow,

There's still at least two months to go,

But there has been a noticed change,

Come over all, plain as plain,

For when you stop at end of day,

Light is coming back this way,

A little more each day, I say,

Precious, little, needed rays.

Childe Hassam, At Dusk

Mary Oliver

Mary Oliver. Her words are simply stunningly beautiful. Her voice was silenced this week. But her poetical gifts will last forever.

Curating

We are all curators it seems. Curators for our homes and what we bring to them. Searching for just the right painting for a gallery wall of original vintage paintings, (no prints allowed). It's amazing to see what is out there for original art by numberless unknown artists who are gone to the ages now. As an art lover, I am amazed at all the wonderful work that is available out there. Here are some that I've come across recently that are beautiful. What do you curate?

Artist - Rick Anderson

Artist - Dorothy Pace

Artist - Unknown

Walk the Streets

Here is the Main Street of Haworth, Yorkshire where the Bronte family lived. Walk the streets with me, if you will, and have a Merry Merry Christmas.

 Photo from Wikipedia

Peace.

A Bird

I am a bird. Who are you?

Thankfull

Are you full of thanks this Thanksgiving week? Here is a freebie that you can print off at home and hang on your wall this week. It is an 8x10. Just right click and save to your computer. After you've saved it to your computer, watch the video below, and be reminded of the many many things we have to be thank-full for.

For the Eyes

Art by French painter Elisabeth Sonrel

The Place Where Evening Gathers

I cannot tell you how simply stunning the October Sky was tonight. Nearing twilight, I looked up and saw a gathering of evening coming together as sure as you please. Just like the lyric in this song, ...."Where morning gathers." I did look, "forever," and thought I saw, "What time may never know."

It wasn't just evening that gathered, either. All day nature was shouting out with it's beauty everywhere I looked. It doesn't get more beautiful than this.

Calling Out Your Name - by Rich Mullins (Listen)

Well the moon moved past Nebraska
And spilled laughter on them cold Dakota Hills
And angels danced on Jacob's stairs
Yeah, they danced on Jacob's stairs
There is this silence in the Badlands
And over Kansas the whole universe was stilled
By the whisper of a prayer
The whisper of a prayer

And a single hawk bursts into flight
And in the east the whole horizon is in flames
I feel thunder in the sky
I see the sky about to rain
And I hear the prairies calling out Your name

I can feel the earth tremble
Beneath the rumbling of the buffalo hooves
And the fury in the pheasant's wings
And there's fury in a pheasant's wings
And it tells me the Lord is in His temple
And there is still a faith that can make the mountains move
And a love that can make the heavens ring
And I've seen love make heaven ring

Where the sacred rivers meet
Beneath the shadow of the Keeper of the plains
I feel thunder in the sky
I see the sky about to rain
And I hear the prairies calling out Your name

From the place where morning gathers
You can look sometimes forever 'til you see
What time may never know
What time may never know
How the Lord takes by its corners this old world
And shakes us forward and shakes us free
To run wild with the hope
To run wild with the hope

The hope that this thirst will not last long
That it will soon drown in a song not sung in vain
And I feel thunder in the sky
I see the sky about to rain
And I hear the prairies calling out Your name

And I know this thirst will not last long
That it will soon drown in the song not sung in vain
I feel thunder in the sky
I see the sky about to rain
And with the prairies I am calling out Your name

 

Songwriters: Richard Mullins

Calling Out Your Name lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group

I Found Walden

...and crows, at the library sale last week.

The crows did not cooperate with taking photos. They kept inching away from me as if they knew I wanted their picture. Mischievous little things. The book looks old, but it's actually from 2017. I am planning on collecting copies of Walden whenever I find them, no matter the age, just because I love that book and they look so pretty on the shelf all lined up. "Walden," Walden," "Walden," and so on. Know what I mean? It sort of gives me thrill when I see them all lined up in a row on the shelf, ...sort of like Matthew and his grubs ...

Anne Shirley: Do things ever give you a thrill?

Matthew Cuthbert: Well, I don't rightly know.

Anne Shirley: There has to be something.

Matthew Cuthbert: Well, now, um... I suppose it kind of gives me a thrill to see those ugly white grubs that spade up in the cucumber beds.

Anne Shirley: I suppose I can imagine that.