Lately, we’ve been working on our basement family/guest room. (Yes, our guest room is in the basement, but it’s walkout – to the pool – has two full-size windows, a full bathroom, and is huge.) Anyway. We came up with the grand idea of building built-in cabinets and bookcases, plus a window seat, to store all the books and games we have down there.
Long story short, the building project began about a month ago. It isn’t done, but we have company coming (with four small children) tonight, so we installed the pieces we had finished last night…except, somewhere along the line, something must have been measured wrong, because we couldn’t fit all four cabinets along the wall. Oops. Thankfully, we haven’t stained the pieces yet, so we might be able to take the too-big piece apart and re-do it…
Wait, the whole point of this entry was to talk about the books I found! All of my books have been boxed up since…well, I think since I left for college…so it was neat to find some books that I want to re-read. I probably put about 500 books on the shelves last night. There are at least two more boxes, plus a couple stacks in my bedroom and craft room, but we still have another bookcase to build, so I’m not too worried.
I found a Nancy Drew book that was published in 1933 (I used to love those books!), and one from 1965. There were plenty of…ahem…Star Trek…cough…books (yes, I’m a geek), as well as cheesy romance novels, better sci-fi, Sherlock Holmes, and Shakespeare. I guess the Virginia Woolf books I read for my high school thesis are in another box. Pretty much, if you name it, I’ve got it – well, anything except non-fiction. I even found a couple of kids books in Spanish that I think I had to translate in AP Spanish class.
The best treasure I found, though, was tucked inside an old journal: a birthday card from my Great-Grandmother. Based on the dates in the journal, it must have been the last one she gave me before she died. She was my most favorite person in the whole wide world when I was little, and got me addicted to crafts by teaching me to crochet when I was seven. I am so glad I kept that card!
(So much for keeping a long story short!)
Hmmm….
Katie & Valerie plus 500 books on the shelf….
=
500 books on the floor?
Good luck.
No, no, no – the shelves are all at least four feet above the floor. And the bookcase is bolted into the wall. :)
We’re all about kid-friendly around here. Now, if only Denis can finish up the doors to the cabinet with all of his games, we’ll be set!
How cool to find that card. I have started making my daughter keep a journal. She’s not thrilled with the idea but I know one day she’ll look back and be glad she did. I would like to find some sort of journal software that allows you to add in digital pics but not have to publish it on the internet. Sort of like movable type without the internet. That way she could add pictures of herself and/or friends and we wouldn’t have to worry about safety issues.