{bookcase: at one}

When I worked on my Master's in Education, we experienced a "Sense of Place" project, which occurred mostly through our coursework on technology. We went into our neighborhoods and took videos set to music we'd edit together; we made maps and made interactive experiences theoretical students could visit. We became aware of setting and connections to our environment, and I ended up going into St. Paul's F. Scott Fitzgerald neighborhood, where I photographed the houses that meant something to him, took a video of a tree rustling in the wind in the fall.

The house in which we stayed in Maine had a small pile of local books, and while I brought a tote full of books from home, we also sifted through these. We were lucky in the children's bedroom: six double-beds all lined up Madeline-style, so the oldest cousin, James, would read a book to the group, and then my husband and I went into our typical reading routine: a simul-read, one of us with one child and the other with the other and then swap.

This was one I read a few times with my daughter, who is always hungry for animal-books and generally happy with whatever we select.

This one would be a nice addition to a Children's House. It invites a lot of conversation: I am one with this particular element of this landscape, and here are a few descriptions of it. It could also serve as a nice model for a project the students create for their own environments--each child could make a page that is At One With Your School or Your Town or Your Specific Classroom. 

I am in the last week of this summer's training, and I'd like to say that very soon, I will be at one with my bed.

{bookcase: max's words}

There are, admittedly, two very personal reasons why I picked this book on this day I decide to finally settle down and revisit this space (I've missed it!): this was the book my parents gave and inscribed to Maya on her first birthday, and my son Finnegan, all of three years old, has an incredible imaginary friend named Max, who is a friendly T-rex who often comes with us on trips to the park and sleeps in Finn's bed and is also afraid of thunderstorms.

The Max of Max's Words by Kate Banks, probably isn't so scared of thunderstorms though. Maybe. He's a clever little guy whose older brothers have collections of their own. (You can see I have a thing for collections. Particularly a well-curated one of either literary or natural objects.) One collects stamps, the other coins. So Max sets out to collect something of his own.

This, I love: he collects words. He gathers them up in piles, collects them out of size and love and strangeness. Writes new ones on slips of paper. And then he makes stories out of them and his brothers suddenly notice something kind of magical happening. They gain agency in this moveable, alive collection.

In my former life as a high school English teacher, I used to have my students collect words too--they had slips of paper to add words they loved or hated or overheard and wanted to work into a poem. I'd collect them too, on post-its, and they'd ring my computer monitor, line my desk, my gradebook. I cut out a huge piece of butcher paper and hung it from the wall and hoped my kids would be good--I did get observed once in a while after all--and they put the words they loved the most up there, or abhorred, and I loved seeing it every day.

I see that Max has other adventures, so I think I might have to go library expansion shopping... My son is tricky to find books for because he tends to groove, which means we have a stack of Pete the Cat and a stack of Bumblebee Boy (slash Ladybug Girl) books, but I get it. I'm a binge-reader too. You find something you love, and you just get hungry.

{bookcase: not one damsel in distress}

Today is International Women's Day! And what better day than this to celebrate just one of the many fierce-female books I have in my collection?

When I found out I was having a daughter, I knew I was in for a tough road. (For the record, you can replace "daughter" with "son" easily. What follows would be different though.) I knew she might grow up in the world I grew up in, where women weren't paid equally for equal work, weren't respected the same, were told to dress the right way or else risk her safety, were given pink dolls and told they'd make wonderful mothers one day, were told boys will be boys, were called terrible names and had to accept it--need I go on? These are realities we face as mothers of young women.

I don't want her to grin and bear it.

So here's one book I hope will instill some fierce bravery in her. Will tell her that she can conquer so many things as she grows older, that she can be the change she wishes to see in the world, that she doesn't have to accept limitations.

Push boundaries, little one. Fight dragons. Fill your bookshelves with girls and women who do the same.

Replace "daughter" with "son." Because I'm going to read these stories to him too, of course.

PS: Got a book recommendation? We're always looking to fill our bookcase up with more good books!

{bookcase: you are my i love you}

This worn board book was one of the first I got for my daughter when I was pregnant. I still remember seeing it for the first time, pulled from the shelf at the store where I worked, displayed as a gift suggestion and how much I loved it.

Indeed, this is a gift-book, one that should come from that special deepest of warm places in the heart. I remember reading it to Maya for the first time and how I cried, still do, when I got to this page:

Going through fertility treatments was by no means easy, and in those months, I spent so much time wondering why I was broken and if it would ever fall into place.

This book is such a sweet little something to share with your family. It's my favorite bedtime book, my go-to expression of absolute tenderness and love. There's a hardcover version, of course, which I need to invest in for our bookcase, but for now, this little one can be tucked into a bag and read on the longest of road trips, many nose-nuzzles and cheek kisses included.

{bookcase}

What I love most about local independent bookstores is that you can wander in and find perfectly curated books by local authors on display. I recognized Molly Beth Griffin's name from Loon Baby, which I picked up at the Anderson Center's celebration of children's books, which happens every fall, and this was the first of Maya's modest autographed book collection (she started collecting at age ten months--I know I'm impressed!).

Rhoda's Rock Hunt follows the narrative of a little girl named Rhoda who cannot help herself when she goes on a camping and hiking trip with her aunt and uncle--she collects all the stone beauties she comes upon and must carry them herself, which proves to be a daunting task.

My own Maya is now five and we have a pail full of rocks she's collected over the years. I'm saving them for our move, when we'll use them to decorate the edges of our new garden, which is kind of like what Rhoda does to honor the collection she's made: she makes cairns by one of Minnesota's ubiquitous rivers.

I first found this book when I was knee-deep in a KonMari experience, and this book deliciously fit in with the message of those tidying books: honor the things that spark joy by displaying them proudly, but don't overwhelm yourself with massive collections.

This reminds me of my friend's Everyone Needs a Rock project, full of beautiful photographs, and sending me on the hunt for a book by the same name.

On Tuesdays, I'd like to start recommending books for the younger set. If you ever want to recommend a book back, please do so! We're always looking to expanding our own collection,