Our Monday...

 ...was pretty much the best!!!


Our homeschool co-op started up for again after our Winter break.  We saw some of our friends over the break, but we hadn't seen some of them since before Thanksgiving, so it was great to be back.  It was also pizza day and we had a mom's meeting to start planning next year...which was long and slightly stressful but it actually jump started my planning (I had a plan for what we are doing next year and this motivated me to finalize some of it) so it was a good thing.  It may mean I am teaching two classes at co-op next year but we shall see!  After co-op we went to the skating rink for one last skate of the year.  It is kind of funny that just as winter really hits, they pack up the rink! I guess it is because Southerners won't go when it is really c-c-c-cold!

 When we got home there was an amazing surprise from Aunt Gloria and her Sherpa (Hahaha!) Uncle Tom.  It was like Christmas all over again!  We were so excited as we looked at all the books.  I was SHOCKED when I opened the 2nd box and saw the lavender, cream, and olive green corner of a book...Could it be the very book I had planned on going to Barnes & Noble and buying with a gift card I got?!?!?!  I opened the other flap of the box and....  YES!!!!!  It is Jane Austen's 7 books bound in one gloriously beautiful lavender, cream, and olive green binding...And then there was Laura Ingalls Wilder's first 5 books-another on my list to buy!  Jake and Aaron were both THRILLED with the Art of War-one they had their eyes on when we were at B&N on Saturday scoping out what we might buy with the gift cards we were going to end up using Tuesday-the day, it turns out the boxes were supposed to come.  Funny they came the day early with the very treasures we were wanting inside! 

 Did I mention the Jane Austen...? I am not one to ask for my picture to be taken...but I did on Monday night.  Twice.  :)  I love the inside of the Laura book...It looks like the calico of one of their dresses...Aaron pointed out how cool the Sherlock Holme's plaid inside cover was.
We are slightly THRILLED!!!! :)


Jake is going to start a Shop/Woodworking class with Papa Harmon next week and he is going to make a lamp.  I asked him last week if he would extend the lessons with Papa and make my book cases I need to finish out the dining room library (how lucky are we to have a dining room library!) and he said he might.  This seals the deal-he has to!  Pretty books cannot be crowded onto shelves--they must be displayed!

We carefully put the binding down on the shelf and alternated on opening a small section of pages at a time.  I was taught that was the best way to slowly open the binding so it won't crack.  The binding laid  flat beautifully and the pages still floated even after slowly sectioning it open....How pretty is that?!?!?...And the Little House books have the illustrations by Garth Williams.  And they have ribbon bookmarks...I LOVE THAT!  And...Jane...See how pretty the cover is.  I know some people don't like the word pretty.  It isn't a "quality adjective" I am told. But I like it so I will  use it...over and over again apparently! :) Shakespeare, Grimm's Fairy Tales, a 3 book series by Richard Paul Evans (I love his Walk Series and he happens to be Mormon!) that Jake is excited to start asap!  The Iliad and Odyssey,  a book on U.S. Grant...I could go on and on!  THANK YOU, Thank you, thank you Aunt Gloria!  Our home library has been happily expanded with such beautiful books and we are so grateful and blessed!

And we have lost him....before his jacket even came off.


Life is good...and add the feel and smell of two boxes of new books and it becomes GRAND!