It's been a heartbreaking few days. As some of you know, I've been on a mom's message board since 2005. I joined a group of women who were all newly pregnant and due in March 2006. We got kicked off one board, moved to another, and then another. And then that board split, as seems to be a natural occurrence when a board gets really large.
These women and I have been online friends now for three years. We've supported each other through the happiest of times and the saddest of times. Most of us gave birth to healthy babies. Some had additional challenges, with pregnancy complications, premature labor, and genetic disorders. A few of us had miscarriages or our babies were stillborn. One lost her husband in a tragic motorcycle accident. And now, horribly, one has lost her son.
It's been hard trying to wrap my brain around how something like this could happen. Or maybe what I mean is "why" something like this could happen. I mean, sure I know as well as most that accidents happen all the time. But for an accident to have such tragic results is just so unfair.
I know you're thinking "Duh, who said life is fair?" But I suppose I still hold onto that childish naivety that life is actually, in the end, fair. That in some cosmic way karma keeps score and the good are rewarded while the bad are punished.
And Henry was very, very good. And even more important, his big sister is too.
Please think of the Berlin family today as they do what no parent should ever have to do.
Friday, July 25, 2008
Thursday, July 24, 2008
Rock my world why don't you.
So last night Tom made a fabulous dinner of lamb, potatoes, and a spinach salad. He also made brussel sprouts and corn.
For the record, I've always hated brussel sprouts. Always. It's one of those constants in life.
But I thought I'd be brave and try one, you know just to say I did. And guess what.
I liked it.
What the heck? Is there just nothing sacred?
---------------
Notice the new link over on the right? If I had a radio station, that's what it would sound like. Probably Liz will remember most of those songs. Ah, a trip down memory lane.
For the record, I've always hated brussel sprouts. Always. It's one of those constants in life.
But I thought I'd be brave and try one, you know just to say I did. And guess what.
I liked it.
What the heck? Is there just nothing sacred?
---------------
Notice the new link over on the right? If I had a radio station, that's what it would sound like. Probably Liz will remember most of those songs. Ah, a trip down memory lane.
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
The Big Boy Bed
I managed to take a little movie of Nicky this morning sleeping in his big boy bed. it's hard to see because it was still pretty dark in his room, but I turned on the light for a minute for you. And I showed how we have the beanbag on the floor for me to sit in and his crib in the closet for now.
And just in case you're one of the folks who are wondering, tomorrow I take a HPT. I don't even know if the clomid worked yet though. My temps are all over the place, but they may have been affected by my CPAP machine. So I'll take an HPT every three days or so until the cycle is over.
And just in case you're one of the folks who are wondering, tomorrow I take a HPT. I don't even know if the clomid worked yet though. My temps are all over the place, but they may have been affected by my CPAP machine. So I'll take an HPT every three days or so until the cycle is over.
An interesting new technology
In one of my committees I explore virtual worlds and how they might be used in library marketing, education and services. Google recently released Lively, a new virtual world that is accessible via your web browser. I created this room for my AHJ pals to visit. Take a look! (You'll have to download the Lively program to actually visit, but it's pretty neat.)
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Update: Well, he did fall out of bed
Just to update you on the big boy bed switch. He did really well last night. We went to check on him around 11 and he was sleeping soundly. Pretty much in exactly the spot he'd been in originally too. He must have been ready for bed.
Around 3 am I heard him calling "Momma! Daddy! Where are you?" and jumped up to get him. He was standing at his gate, the light was on and Nana was looking around.
Turns out he fell out of bed (it's only about 8 inches off the floor) and Nana woke to see him sitting there. She asked if he was ok and he asked to "See Daddy?" She told him Daddy was sleeping and asked if he wanted to climb into bed with her. He climbed up, and was still for a few minutes, but then he wanted his binkies. He couldn't find them though so she had gotten up to help him find them. One had fallen between the bed and the door. That's when I came in.
We turned off his light, and turned on his music. I noticed he was pretty wet so I changed his diaper. Then I pulled his bed out from the wall to find his binky. I was walking between his bed and the wall, holding Nicky and feeling with my feet for the binky when I lost my balance (not at my best at 3am). I fell right into sitting down hard on his bed. Thank goodness it held! That bed is sturdier than I thought!
I retrieved the bink and sat in his bean bag chair to cuddle him for a few songs. I'd put this in his room so I could sit next to his bed to read him a story before he first went to sleep. It worked out well. (I'd have been stuck in there if I tried sitting on the floor!) After two songs he was ready to lie down again. And he went right to bed, sleeping through the night. He was still sleeping when I left the house at 8:30am.
What a big boy!
Now I can't wait to hear how nap time goes today. I'm not optimistic about that one. We'll see.
Around 3 am I heard him calling "Momma! Daddy! Where are you?" and jumped up to get him. He was standing at his gate, the light was on and Nana was looking around.
Turns out he fell out of bed (it's only about 8 inches off the floor) and Nana woke to see him sitting there. She asked if he was ok and he asked to "See Daddy?" She told him Daddy was sleeping and asked if he wanted to climb into bed with her. He climbed up, and was still for a few minutes, but then he wanted his binkies. He couldn't find them though so she had gotten up to help him find them. One had fallen between the bed and the door. That's when I came in.
We turned off his light, and turned on his music. I noticed he was pretty wet so I changed his diaper. Then I pulled his bed out from the wall to find his binky. I was walking between his bed and the wall, holding Nicky and feeling with my feet for the binky when I lost my balance (not at my best at 3am). I fell right into sitting down hard on his bed. Thank goodness it held! That bed is sturdier than I thought!
I retrieved the bink and sat in his bean bag chair to cuddle him for a few songs. I'd put this in his room so I could sit next to his bed to read him a story before he first went to sleep. It worked out well. (I'd have been stuck in there if I tried sitting on the floor!) After two songs he was ready to lie down again. And he went right to bed, sleeping through the night. He was still sleeping when I left the house at 8:30am.
What a big boy!
Now I can't wait to hear how nap time goes today. I'm not optimistic about that one. We'll see.
Monday, July 14, 2008
Big Night Tonight
Tonight Nicky is sleeping in his new big boy bed. It's been a good 30 minutes so far and he's not yet tried to come out. I'll keep you posted on how it goes.
Saturday night after dinner, Tom went to take return a movie rental. Nana and I decided to take Nicky in the swimming pool. (Did I already tell you Nana bought us a 3' deep pool? I'll have to take some photos.) While I was changing him into his swimming diaper and trunks I thought his trunk felt a bit too hot. His cheeks were cool, but his tummy was pretty hot. He'd been running around the kitchen, so I wasn't totally sure it wasn't just from running around, but we decided to take him in the pool anyway.
We swam around for about 10 minutes or so. Just until he started shivering and his lips were purple. (I always thought my mom was just making that up when I was a kid. But nope, his lips really DO turn purple when he's cold.) Then we took him out and warmed him up. Lucky for us, Daddy's return from the video store right then sidetracked Nicky from his usual Getting Out Of The Pool Tantrum.
We warmed him up, got him in his jammies and put him pretty much right to bed. I may have let him watch a little of Animusic or something, but it wasn't much. But when we went to check on him later he was obviously burning up with a fever. (Cue Mommy-Guilt)
We gave him ibuprofen to bring it down. It did reduce the fever, but it never fully went away. He had it all day Sunday, but it really didn't seem to cause him any discomfort. It was up to 102.9 at one point during the day and we called the pediatrician's office. The nurse said that at this age the risk of seizures from fever were in the 105+ range, so unless he was that high or showing signs of discomfort, lethargic, vomiting, etc. it wasn't anything to come in for. If he seemed bothered by the fever we could alternate Tylenol and ibuprofen every 3 hours, but otherwise it was fine to just hit the ibuprofen every 6 hours.
So we kept that up all through the night. At 9:45pm it was up to 103.9 (these were rectal temps, so subtract one degree for the oral temp equivalent). We didn't get much sleep that night. (Especially since Tom was coughing all night. He's had a cold for about a week now. I've finally gotten over my 2.5 week cold.) By the time my alarm went off I knew I wasn't in any condition to work, and Tom was even worse. I stayed home and watched Nicky while Tom slept.
I'd say by noon today Nicky's fever was totally gone. No telling what it was. The nurse had mentioned Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease, but I haven't seen any bumps or rashes yet. Hopefully we won't have that.
Anyway. In the afternoon around 4:30 we figured we'd all get out of the house. Poor Nicky hadn't left the house since probably Thursday. We went to pick up a few things at the new SuperWalmart in town. Well, we got the few things and we also got a bathtub bubble toy, Nicky's new big boy bed, new Mickey Mouse bedding, a new baby gate, and an ice cream maker. (Thanks Nana!) So much for the little shopping trip.
But it was fun, and we got out of the house. When we got home Nana put pizzas in the oven for dinner and Tom started working on the bed. He finished putting it together while I bathed Nicky after dinner. It was a REALLY fast bath because we had a thunderstorm roll in just as I started washing him. His new bubble toy was a hit though. It's like his outside bubble machine, but it's a little smaller and suctions to the tub surround. I closed the shower curtain partway and let him enjoy his tub-o-bubbles.
After Tom set up his bed and made it up with his new sheets we had a story and a snuggle to his music and then set him into his bed. He's got 3 binkies (usually it's between 2-7 actually. Didn't want you to think we're spoiling him or anything- HA!) and he's snuggling his two teddy bears (kissy bear and bunny bear), his penguin (ping-ping) and Wendel (his worm- same as in this old photo). Usually they're just IN his crib, but he was actually grabbing and hugging all of them when we left.
It was kind of a whirlwind transition actually. Not really any preparation for it. So we'll see how it goes. His crib is still in the room, but there's no mattress in it because the big boy bed uses his crib mattress. Suppose if we absolutely had to we could move the mattress back into the crib, but right now there's a bunch of Nana's stuff in the crib. So it wouldn't be easy. Hopefully we'll make it through the night in the big boy bed.
As for the gate, well we need something to keep him IN his room at night. Otherwise he'd surely go wandering out. We do have the chain lock on the front door, so he probably can't get out that way, but still there is plenty of trouble he could get into at night alone. We bought a gate, but it's not one with a swing door. So we moved the swing gate from the den to Nicky's room, and put the new gate on the den doorway. It'll work for now.
I'll take some photos or movies tomorrow of the new bedroom set up. It won't be long before we have the guest bed set up in the den with the computers and Nicky will have his room all to himself. Pretty exciting stuff.
In the meantime, I have three movies up for you now. These were taken today at lunch. Nicky's fever was finally gone and Nicky was eating his pasta. In one you can hear him saying "delicious" which is so fun to hear! In another he was asking where Grammie and Aunt Liz are. And in another you can hear him show off some of his curse-word vocabulary. *sigh*
Not sure what to do about that. Usually we ignore it, but I had to giggle in the video knowing I was going to have to put that online. When he did it later at the store I just asked him to please not curse in public. What are you gonna do?
Saturday night after dinner, Tom went to take return a movie rental. Nana and I decided to take Nicky in the swimming pool. (Did I already tell you Nana bought us a 3' deep pool? I'll have to take some photos.) While I was changing him into his swimming diaper and trunks I thought his trunk felt a bit too hot. His cheeks were cool, but his tummy was pretty hot. He'd been running around the kitchen, so I wasn't totally sure it wasn't just from running around, but we decided to take him in the pool anyway.
We swam around for about 10 minutes or so. Just until he started shivering and his lips were purple. (I always thought my mom was just making that up when I was a kid. But nope, his lips really DO turn purple when he's cold.) Then we took him out and warmed him up. Lucky for us, Daddy's return from the video store right then sidetracked Nicky from his usual Getting Out Of The Pool Tantrum.
We warmed him up, got him in his jammies and put him pretty much right to bed. I may have let him watch a little of Animusic or something, but it wasn't much. But when we went to check on him later he was obviously burning up with a fever. (Cue Mommy-Guilt)
We gave him ibuprofen to bring it down. It did reduce the fever, but it never fully went away. He had it all day Sunday, but it really didn't seem to cause him any discomfort. It was up to 102.9 at one point during the day and we called the pediatrician's office. The nurse said that at this age the risk of seizures from fever were in the 105+ range, so unless he was that high or showing signs of discomfort, lethargic, vomiting, etc. it wasn't anything to come in for. If he seemed bothered by the fever we could alternate Tylenol and ibuprofen every 3 hours, but otherwise it was fine to just hit the ibuprofen every 6 hours.
So we kept that up all through the night. At 9:45pm it was up to 103.9 (these were rectal temps, so subtract one degree for the oral temp equivalent). We didn't get much sleep that night. (Especially since Tom was coughing all night. He's had a cold for about a week now. I've finally gotten over my 2.5 week cold.) By the time my alarm went off I knew I wasn't in any condition to work, and Tom was even worse. I stayed home and watched Nicky while Tom slept.
I'd say by noon today Nicky's fever was totally gone. No telling what it was. The nurse had mentioned Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease, but I haven't seen any bumps or rashes yet. Hopefully we won't have that.
Anyway. In the afternoon around 4:30 we figured we'd all get out of the house. Poor Nicky hadn't left the house since probably Thursday. We went to pick up a few things at the new SuperWalmart in town. Well, we got the few things and we also got a bathtub bubble toy, Nicky's new big boy bed, new Mickey Mouse bedding, a new baby gate, and an ice cream maker. (Thanks Nana!) So much for the little shopping trip.
But it was fun, and we got out of the house. When we got home Nana put pizzas in the oven for dinner and Tom started working on the bed. He finished putting it together while I bathed Nicky after dinner. It was a REALLY fast bath because we had a thunderstorm roll in just as I started washing him. His new bubble toy was a hit though. It's like his outside bubble machine, but it's a little smaller and suctions to the tub surround. I closed the shower curtain partway and let him enjoy his tub-o-bubbles.
After Tom set up his bed and made it up with his new sheets we had a story and a snuggle to his music and then set him into his bed. He's got 3 binkies (usually it's between 2-7 actually. Didn't want you to think we're spoiling him or anything- HA!) and he's snuggling his two teddy bears (kissy bear and bunny bear), his penguin (ping-ping) and Wendel (his worm- same as in this old photo). Usually they're just IN his crib, but he was actually grabbing and hugging all of them when we left.
It was kind of a whirlwind transition actually. Not really any preparation for it. So we'll see how it goes. His crib is still in the room, but there's no mattress in it because the big boy bed uses his crib mattress. Suppose if we absolutely had to we could move the mattress back into the crib, but right now there's a bunch of Nana's stuff in the crib. So it wouldn't be easy. Hopefully we'll make it through the night in the big boy bed.
As for the gate, well we need something to keep him IN his room at night. Otherwise he'd surely go wandering out. We do have the chain lock on the front door, so he probably can't get out that way, but still there is plenty of trouble he could get into at night alone. We bought a gate, but it's not one with a swing door. So we moved the swing gate from the den to Nicky's room, and put the new gate on the den doorway. It'll work for now.
I'll take some photos or movies tomorrow of the new bedroom set up. It won't be long before we have the guest bed set up in the den with the computers and Nicky will have his room all to himself. Pretty exciting stuff.
In the meantime, I have three movies up for you now. These were taken today at lunch. Nicky's fever was finally gone and Nicky was eating his pasta. In one you can hear him saying "delicious" which is so fun to hear! In another he was asking where Grammie and Aunt Liz are. And in another you can hear him show off some of his curse-word vocabulary. *sigh*
Not sure what to do about that. Usually we ignore it, but I had to giggle in the video knowing I was going to have to put that online. When he did it later at the store I just asked him to please not curse in public. What are you gonna do?
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Just a little off the top?
Ok, so I've let Nicky's hair get a little out of hand. It was starting to really get in his eyes and cover his ears a bit again, and he had an awful lot on top for me to play with, but he looks so cute.
This was his hair at the baptism exactly a month ago. It was already long there.
Well yesterday, when Daddy, Nana and Nicky came to pick me up from work...Ta Da! They'd both gone for a nice haircut at the barbershop. That seems to work well for Nicky. See Daddy get his hair cut, and then he has his turn. It worked last time, when I was at my wit's end trying to do it myself, and it worked this time.
Voila! Here he is last night at dinner, eating with chopsticks no less! As much as it is nice to see his eyes, that haircut really makes him look so much older. Where is my little boy?
This was his hair at the baptism exactly a month ago. It was already long there.
Well yesterday, when Daddy, Nana and Nicky came to pick me up from work...Ta Da! They'd both gone for a nice haircut at the barbershop. That seems to work well for Nicky. See Daddy get his hair cut, and then he has his turn. It worked last time, when I was at my wit's end trying to do it myself, and it worked this time.
Voila! Here he is last night at dinner, eating with chopsticks no less! As much as it is nice to see his eyes, that haircut really makes him look so much older. Where is my little boy?
Wednesday, July 09, 2008
A meme after two weeks of being sick
Sorry for the long absence. I've had a cold for two weeks and didn't feel like much of anything. I did manage to put up a few movies the other day, and did finally get those beach photos up too. Since we didn't actually take any movies (again) at the beach, these are all we have. Nicky had a good time and I hope we'll do it again this summer.
I saw this meme (ok, not technically a meme, but close enough) on Sarah's blog and thought I'd take a look at the list myself. This is a list (who knows who picked these titles) that according to someone somewhere, the average adult has read only 6 of these books. Now I don't know if that's true, but I believe it. I think there are an awful lot of adults who don't read much. I read quite a bit I think, but mostly they're not "adult" books. Well, I think you'll see what I mean when you see my selections below.
The instructions:
Look at the list and:
Bold those you have read.
Italicize those you intend to read.
Underline the books you LOVE.
1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2. The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien (read 150 pages)
3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6. The Bible
7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8. 1984 - George Orwell
9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11. Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12. Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14. Complete Works of Shakespeare
15. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18. Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19. The Time Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20. Middlemarch - George Eliot
21. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23. Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25. The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33. Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34. Emma - Jane Austen
35. Persuasion - Jane Austen
36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38. Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40. Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41. Animal Farm - George Orwell
42. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44. A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46. Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48. The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
49. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50. Atonement - Ian McEwan
51. Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52. Dune - Frank Herbert
53. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66. On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68. Bridget Jones' Diary - Helen Fielding
69. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72. Dracula - Bram Stoker
73. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75. Ulysses - James Joyce
76. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78. Germinal - Emile Zola
79. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80. Possession - AS Byatt
81. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83. The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87. Charlotte's Web - EB White
88. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92.The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94. Watership Down - Richard Adams
95. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98. Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
So that's what? 22 books? Not as many as Tom I'm sure. He's a voracious reader and has read a LOT of these books that I haven't. It's possible I've read a few more, but if I couldn't readily recall actually reading the entire book I didn't count it. And there are several that I know I've seen the movie, but I'm not sure if I read the book. You'll see that only two are ones I plan on reading. There are just too many things out there I really do want to read, and these aren't really them. Love in the time of Cholera is one that we have in the house now and I want to read that, and I started reading Memoirs of a Geisha recently and plan to finish it some time.
Although, I have recently figured out that I can actually STOP reading a book BEFORE I finished it if I'm not enjoying it. I actually have felt trapped by books before. Books that I wasn't assigned to read, ones I'd just picked up for fun and then felt somehow honor bound to finish. Well I finally learned that it's ok to stop reading and just never go back to that book if I don't want to. It's actually quite liberating, and I've done it several times now. So now it's not such a commitment when I check out books from the library. If I don't like it I can just take it back and get another. Kind of neat.
Anyway, take a look at this list and see if you see any of your favorites there.
I saw this meme (ok, not technically a meme, but close enough) on Sarah's blog and thought I'd take a look at the list myself. This is a list (who knows who picked these titles) that according to someone somewhere, the average adult has read only 6 of these books. Now I don't know if that's true, but I believe it. I think there are an awful lot of adults who don't read much. I read quite a bit I think, but mostly they're not "adult" books. Well, I think you'll see what I mean when you see my selections below.
The instructions:
Look at the list and:
Bold those you have read.
Italicize those you intend to read.
Underline the books you LOVE.
1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2. The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien (read 150 pages)
3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6. The Bible
7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8. 1984 - George Orwell
9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11. Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12. Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14. Complete Works of Shakespeare
15. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18. Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19. The Time Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20. Middlemarch - George Eliot
21. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23. Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25. The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33. Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34. Emma - Jane Austen
35. Persuasion - Jane Austen
36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38. Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40. Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41. Animal Farm - George Orwell
42. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44. A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46. Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48. The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
49. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50. Atonement - Ian McEwan
51. Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52. Dune - Frank Herbert
53. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66. On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68. Bridget Jones' Diary - Helen Fielding
69. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72. Dracula - Bram Stoker
73. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75. Ulysses - James Joyce
76. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78. Germinal - Emile Zola
79. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80. Possession - AS Byatt
81. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83. The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87. Charlotte's Web - EB White
88. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92.The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94. Watership Down - Richard Adams
95. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98. Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
So that's what? 22 books? Not as many as Tom I'm sure. He's a voracious reader and has read a LOT of these books that I haven't. It's possible I've read a few more, but if I couldn't readily recall actually reading the entire book I didn't count it. And there are several that I know I've seen the movie, but I'm not sure if I read the book. You'll see that only two are ones I plan on reading. There are just too many things out there I really do want to read, and these aren't really them. Love in the time of Cholera is one that we have in the house now and I want to read that, and I started reading Memoirs of a Geisha recently and plan to finish it some time.
Although, I have recently figured out that I can actually STOP reading a book BEFORE I finished it if I'm not enjoying it. I actually have felt trapped by books before. Books that I wasn't assigned to read, ones I'd just picked up for fun and then felt somehow honor bound to finish. Well I finally learned that it's ok to stop reading and just never go back to that book if I don't want to. It's actually quite liberating, and I've done it several times now. So now it's not such a commitment when I check out books from the library. If I don't like it I can just take it back and get another. Kind of neat.
Anyway, take a look at this list and see if you see any of your favorites there.
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