Category: Art

Book Questions 📚☕️✨♥️ {Part 2}

amyofhearthridge5 Comments
So good! 😊

{I saw some book questions on an Instagram account called PensandPoison (I like SOME of her stuff, she’s a bit too clickbait-y for me) recently and have been having a lot of fun thinking about my answers. I think she answered them using all fiction, but I’m using everything to answer! I adapted these questions for me. It is a lot of questions and as usual, I can’t have just one answer 🤣, so I’ll be breaking this up into parts! I’d love to hear your answers and I hope you may find a new favorite if you try any of these!}

Part 1 HERE, if interested!

•books I wish everyone would read ~

Wives & Daughters, Sylvia’s Lovers, North & South, or Mary Barton by Elizabeth Gaskell. Really ANY of her full length novels. Her shorter things are a little hit or miss (looking at you A Dark Night’s Work 😒😅) but her novels are so good! 😊

• books I wish I had read sooner ~ Do Something Beautiful for God by Mother Teresa, Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh (just finished this!), A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles and Captain Blood by Rafael Sabatini.

•books that changed the way I think ~ (The Holy Bible is a given here) Home Education Series by Charlotte Mason, The Dean’s Watch by Elizabeth Goudge, Emily of Deep Valley by Maud Hart Lovelace, The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver, and Pollyanna by Eleanor H. Porter. I could go on for hours.

• most beautiful prose I’ve ever read ~ currently for me, Thomas Hardy’s writing, wow! Sad stories, gorgeous writing! I read A Return of the Native last year and was blown away. This is Happiness by Niall Williams and The Road Past Altamont by Gabrielle Roy this year had BEAUTIFUL writing.

• favorite opening sentence ~ this has to go to Jane Austen’s opening for Pride & Prejudice. If you know, you know. 😅 Sarcastically funny and draws you right into the story.

• favorite endings ~ I was wracking my brain for this. I think Elizabeth Goudge’s endings are pretty great. The Lord of the Rings! I liked the sad, open-ended ending of The Mirror Visitor Series by Christelle Dabos. Although, I wouldn’t mind a 5th book, if you are reading, dear author. 😂😉🥰

• favorite literary characters~ I could probably list 100 favorites here, so I’ll just say the firsts that came to my mind! Vis from The Will of Many by James Islington, Anne Eliot from Persuason by Jane Austen, Jane Eyre, Gandalf, Mrs. Weasley, etc, etc, etc, etc!!!!!

•literary characters I relate to the most ~ Patricia from Pat of Silverbush by L.M. Montgomery (I struggle with change, too, Pat!😫) Emily from Emily of New Moon by L.M. Montgomery, Emily from Emily of Deep Valley by Maud Hart Lovelace. So many more!

• favorite literary villian ~ I love to bash Mrs. Norris and the Crawfords from Mansfield Park by Jane Austen and Lady Catherine de Bourgh in Pride & Prejudice by Austen.

• favorite author ~ my top favorite (I have many) is Lucy Maud Montgomery! Thank you, Maud for your wonderful stories! ♥️

My current cozy mystery!

How about you? Have you read any of these? Agree or disagree {kindly} disagree? What are your answers here? Let’s talk books! 📚 😅♥️📚✨

Monday Ponderings ♥️🌿

amyofhearthridge6 Comments
Sauté zucchini with browned and drained sausage! Add s&p and red pepper flakes to taste! So good! 😋

Good Monday morning to you all! Getting a late start! I’m on a little accidental reading/planning retreat and I’m not complaining. 😅♥️🌿 I was thinking about all the unread books I own! 😫😱🤣 A small project I’d like to start which works well with my 50×50 list is to start reading my owned books. I get a lot from the public library or Little Free Libraries, but would like to prioritize books I own. I also reread favorites quite a bit. I was shocked that in my bedroom alone, I had over 100 books I haven’t read! 😂🙃 I had even more that I have read and want to reread. 😱So in full disclosure, I made myself write out the unread ones in my room. Eeep!

Let’s not even talk about my Kindle. 😂 Those don’t bother me as much, but I’d like to be conscious about not just getting ebooks because they are cheap or free.

This project is for fun and also a little challenge to myself as I’ve been thinking a-lot about how I can use my time and energy enjoying what I already have or creating meals or art instead of chasing something ‘out there’. Does this mean I will quit book buying/borrowing? No! I so enjoy browsing and discovering treasures. I’ve already seen myself naturally start to slow book buying over the years because of our home library being so rich. What a blessing to be able to draw from our shelves life giving words. I want to be able to choose myself how my time is used and be led by the Holy Spirit instead of social media or ‘experts’. This applies to many areas of my life, but this is one small area I can slowly make concrete changes. I can give myself ‘things to look forward to’ in nature experiences with my kids, photography, shopping our own home shelves, being creative with meals, rearranging and freshening what we have! Putting those puzzles together, using up those craft supplies, the list goes on and on! It’s actually kind of exciting.

♥️ Any thoughts?

Monday Ponderings at the Lake {Day 100} ✨♥️🌿

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A quick visit to my aunt and uncle’s home has been so peaceful and perfect before things pick up this weekend. Praying for a yielded and submissive heart to the Holy Spirit’s soft whispers. ✨♥️🌿🙏🏻 This ends my 100 Day Project, I didn’t quite do 100 days posting consecutively, but I really grew to love chatting and being purposeful about seeing my blessings. Hope to keep going here. How are you doing? ~

Saturday Snaps 📸 + a Quote for Reflection {Day 98}

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Miss Mason’s definition of an educated child both charms and challenges: “A child who possesses a sound and fairly wide knowledge of a number of subjects, all of which serve to interest him; such a child studies with delight.”

~ from Jack Beckman essay in When Children Love to Learn

Soaking up the sun 🌞 on these cooler days! ONE WEEK UNTIL WEDDING! ♥️😅🙏🏻

Wednesday Wonders {Day 95} 📚🦋

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~listening to~ ♥️🌿 I just barely started a new audiobook called Dream of Kings by Sharon Hinck. It’s a perfect listen on my riding lawnmower. I have wedding programs to work on later so I will probably listen to more! I heard about this free choice in the Audible Plus catalog if you have an Audible account from the lovely Booktuber, Emily

Colorful stack amongst my deck flowers! 💐 😍♥️🌿 Trying a few and continuing others!

~watching~♥️🌿 I really want to try the 1995 ‘Little Princess’ movie! 🎥 I’ve only seen the Shirley Temple version. It just came in from the library so hopefully my kids and I can watch it soon. I’m loosely participating in The Hardest Reading Challenge You’ll Ever Do 3.0😆😂, so I enjoyed watching the announcement for that, too. Albeit she’s very opinionated, just FYI. 🤣😬😅

•reading•♥️🌿~ my mood is still somewhat 😆nonfiction, and I finished up the YRE of Radium Girls (fantastic) and Do Something Beautiful for God (gorgeous!), but I feel a shift to cozy? stories. I did read one of the Great Mouse Detective stories on my deck the other night. Our weather went from boiling and smokey to gorgeous and cool! 😍 I’m most interested in finishing up my reread of Sense & Sensibility and continuing Jane Austen’s Bookshelf. I’m currently very intrigued by Artifact by Gigi Pandian (so far some language) and starting The Pink Motel by Carol Ryrie Brink! The truth is I have SO many good sounding books on my physical and kindle stacks. 🙃😍♥️📚 I’ve been ordering picture books from library because most of ours are packed away. It’s been fun to curl on my bed and read these with my youngest three. I find this gals recommendations are overall GREAT!

~noticing~♥️🌿 the details for my daughter’s wedding are slowly coming together! It’s getting close! 😱😭😍 I’m struggling staying with some of my rhythms and habits that are helpful, so trying to ease back into them for my sanity. However, trying not to guilt trip myself either. I’m finally feeling the school planning shift. Making some lists and poking around on websites. Love looking at book recommendations! Where do you look most for homeschool inspiration? ♥️

Well, that’s all, folks! 😅♥️Bless you! ♥️🌿📚☕️✨🥰

Top Ten Books That Live in My Head Rent Free {Classic Edition} 📚✨~ {Day 94}

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Joining here for TTT!
  1. The Holy Bible ~ this is not always an easy book to read and I don’t understand a lot of it, but my spirit connects with it. It’s foundational to my life and faith. My favorite books are Psalms and John.♥️🙏🏻🌿
  2. The Peace of Wild Things by Wendell Berry ~ this collection of Berry’s poetry speaks to me deeply. It makes me consider time and future generations in a huge way. It makes me think of now. It makes me consider life outside of self. Our lives have meaning for a greater purpose!
  3. Jane of Lantern Hill by L.M. Montgomery ~ my handle online is Amy of Hearth Ridge directly inspired by this book. There’s something to be said for hoping to be useful and a blessing to someone else in your life. How living a selfless life actually is fulfilling. Beautiful story of a daughter and father’s restored relationship bringing healing to those around them.That home keeping can be art.
  4. Wives & Daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell ~ I can’t begin to tell you how much I love the characters and journeys they go through! The father-daughter, mother-daughter, father-son, and marriage relationship studies in this Victorian novel are fantastic. This is a beautiful story!
  5. Persuasion by Jane Austen ~ a lovely story of redemption and finally being able to have a voice. How one can live kindly and generously in the wake of S.S. Selfish People. 🚢
  6. Home Education by Charlotte Mason ~ late 1800’s to early 1900’s British revolutionary educational philosophy. This is so very Christ-centric and focused on the personhood of children and mothers. A beautiful life-giving read.
  7. Understood Betsy by Dorothy Canfield Fisher ~ a lovely story of how a child can blossom under loving and listening caregivers.
  8. Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury ~ a father and son meeting evil together face on! Underlying themes of temptation, fear, and growing older! I’m due for a reread!
  9. Christy by Catherine Marshall ~ beautiful story of a young teacher’s growth and learning in a rural Appalachian school. Gorgeous lessons for her as the very people she came to ‘help’ grow her so much in return. Wonderful female friendships embodied!
  10. The Long Winter by Laura Ingalls Wilder ~ the sheer bravery and strength of the early pioneers is astounding, convicting, and so inspiring! I often reevaluate my complaints after rereading this one. 😨♥️

I could have put Elizabeth Goudge on this list, Gladys Taber, Susan Branch, and many more poets! How about you? Which books do you think of over and over? ♥️✨🌿📚

Monday Ponderings 💕 {Day 93} •cozy corners, Scripture, fuzzy beastie•

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See, God has come to save me,

I will trust in him and not be afraid,

The LORD GOD is my strength and my song;

he has given me victory.

~Isaiah 12:2, NLT

Captain Blood 🏴‍☠️ {Day 90}

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Short Description: Peter Blood, an Irish physician and soldier in England in the 1680’s, is wrongly convicted of treason and sentenced to indentured slavery in the Caribbean. He escapes and becomes the most feared pirate captain on the Spanish Main, but all the glory of his adventures cannot help him, for the woman he loves cannot love a thief and pirate. Even when he destroys England’s enemies, even at his most triumphant…but wait! What’s that…

~ Goodreads

Wow! I loved this story of Peter Blood, gentleman pirate! 6 stars ⭐️ from me! If you enjoy historical fiction, adventure stories, or Treasure Island, you will love this Robin Hood- like tale of loyal friendship, ingenuity, and high seas stakes. I bet it would be wonderful as an audiobook! I’ll have to see if I can find one! I definitely will be trying others of Sabatini’s books.

Do you have any good recommendations for high seas or pirate stories with a classic feel?

Happy Friday and Happy Reading! 🚢 🌊 ⚓️

This Old World of Ours {Day 86} 🌿♥️

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The Holy Spirit has descended on this old world of ours, and there’s a Psalm 29 powwow in Elmo (Montana) every day of the year: a grace-revealing gesture, a fresh snowfall, a friend’s forgiveness, the first migrating yellow warbler, a miracle conversion, a truth-telling poem, a pasqueflower in bloom, the good death of a parent, resurrection – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit-all the endless permutations of life. The beauty of holiness. And we have ringside seats. Henry James once said that a writer is a person on whom nothing is ever lost. That sounds like a focused Christian identity to me: the men and women on whom nothing, at least nothing that has to do with life-and virtually everything does-is lost. “Worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness.”

Amen.

~Eugene H. Peterson, As Kingfishers Catch Fire , note mine in parenthesis

Read My Shelf: 50 x 50 Booklist 📚📚📚 {Day 85}

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Hello 👋 Friends ~ a few of you expressed interest in my 50 books off of my owned shelf that I’m trying to read by the time I’m 50! A few stipulations. Two of these are on my Kindle owned shelf, as they hard to find physically. I also reserved the right to use any form to read these as long as I own a physical copy. For example, I own Moby Dick, but if I want to check out the audiobook version from the library, that is fine. I also gave myself two switch outs. If for some reason, I really can’t read a book, I’m allowed to switch it out from my shelves. I started this project in mid-2025?, so I have till June 2030 😅😳 to complete it. The huge nonfiction are the ones I’m mostly concerned about! 😂 I tried to balance a few lighter things, while still challenging myself. I kept most? if not all of these books out of the great book pack-away for our remodeling. ♥️📚🥰

50×50 List ~

  1. Moby Dick by Herman Melville
  2. The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens
  3. Dante: Poet, Political Thinker, The Man by Barbara Reynolds
  4. Biography of A Cathedral by Robert Gordon Anderson
  5. Mistress Pat by L.M. Montgomery ☑️
  6. Any of my Victor Hugo
  7. A Dark Night’s Work by Elizabeth Gaskell (Kindle) ☑️
  8. Tempest Tost by Robertson Davies
  9. Letters from Cuba by Ruth Behar
  10. The Alchemist by Paul Coelho
  11. Elizabeth Gaskell: A Habit of Stories by Jenny Uglow
  12. Rob Roy by Sir Walter Scott ☑️
  13. Dr. Wortle’s School by Anthony Trollope
  14. Vicar of Bullhampton by Anthony Trollope
  15. The Shadow Casket by Chris Wooding
  16. Any of my unread Ray Bradbury
  17. The Virginian by Owen Wister ☑️
  18. A Pale View of the Hills by Kazuo Ishiguro
  19. Charlotte Sometimes by Penelope Farmer
  20. Thoreau and the Language of Trees by Richard Higgins
  21. Any of my Elie Wiesel
  22. Daniel Deronda by George Eliot
  23. The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas ☑️
  24. Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
  25. Revelation by C.J. Sansom
  26. Jane Austen Bookshelf by Rebecca Romney☑️
  27. Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China by Jung Chang
  28. A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles ☑️
  29. Van Loon’s Lives by Hendrik Willem van Loon
  30. A History of the American People by Paul Johnson
  31. A String in the Harp by Nancy Bond
  32. Kit’s Wilderness by David Almond
  33. Idylls of the King by Alfred Lord Tennyson
  34. A Chaplet of Pearls by Charlotte Mary Yonge (Kindle)
  35. Any of my Edgar Allan Poe
  36. Any of my Nathanial Hawthorne
  37. Lorna Doone by R. D. Blackmore
  38. The Woodlanders by Thomas Hardy
  39. You are A Tree by Joy Marie Clarkson
  40. The Magic Words: Writing Great Books for Children and Young Adults by Cheryl B. Klein
  41. Any of my unread C.S.Lewis nonfiction
  42. One of my folklore collections
  43. The Seven Story Mountain by Thomas Merton
  44. Poemcrazy by Susan Goldsmith Wooldridge
  45. The Divine Comedy by Dante ☑️
  46. Any of my unread Russian authors
  47. A Diary of a Provincial Lady by E. M. Delafield
  48. Any of my unread L.M. Montgomery short story collections
  49. Make Believe by Elizabeth Goudge
  50. Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

What do you think of my list ? Have you read any of these authors or these specific titles? Do you have a list of books you want to read in the near future? Chat books with me below! 👇 🥰📚♥️

Wednesday Wonders {Day 82} 💦🌊💧

amyofhearthridge13 Comments
My daughter sent me this! 😻😻😻

~listening to~ ♥️🌿

I happen to notice that I was listening to ‘Swim’ by BTS while reading The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Serendipity! 😅💦💧🌊 I picked up this narrative poem for Jane Austen July because I believe Coleridge was a contemporary of Austen’s. I think 🤔 it sounds familiar, I may have read it before! The albatross! 😳😂

~watching~ ♥️🌿I did end up watching the 2020 ‘Emma’ film with my daughter and meh. 🫤 It was ok. I liked parts of it. It struck me as sort of goofy. 😂 A n*ked backside right in the beginning was weirdo, too. Oh, well. I liked the actors that played Mr. Knightly and Miss Bates. I’m allowing myself one Booktube video a day in July and it makes me be very choosy. I really enjoyed Chantel’s yesterday.

~reading~♥️🌿 I have massive piles physically and on my kindle, 😂📚 but I’m mostly finishing up The Opt-Out Family and working on Moby Dick. I also just barely dipped into Jane Austen’s Bookshelf of which I enjoyed the first few pages immensely. I haven’t borrowed anything new from public library (July challenge), just reading from my stacks and Kindle!

~noticing~ ♥️🌿

My hollyhocks are wonderful! 😁 I may have mentioned before that they are biannual and these self-seeded, so I forgot about them! 🥰😻😍What happiness!

What are you listening to, watching, reading, and noticing? ♥️🌿📚 Chat below, friends! ~

Monday Ponderings 🌿 {Day 80}

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When someone is doing something to hurt you, don’t turn inward, turn toward that person. He is hurting himself. Learn to forgive, knowing that we all need forgiveness. If you want to be true to God, learn from Jesus to be meek, humble, and pure. Learn to forgive.

~ Mother Teresa, Do Something Beautiful for God