100 Best Books To Gift & Read

1. The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter
   
2. The Gruffalo by Julia Donaldson
   
3. We’re Going on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen
4. The Tiger Who Came to Tea by Judith Kerr
   
5. Winnie-the-Pooh by AA Milne
   
6. The Enchanted Wood by Enid Blyton
   
7. The Worst Witch by Jill Murphy
   
8. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
   
9. The Story of Tracy Beaker by Jacqueline Wilson
   
10. Goodnight Mister Tom by Michelle Magorian
    
11. Watership Down by Richard Adams
    
12. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone by JK Rowling
    
13. Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer
    
14. Stormbreaker by Anthony Horowitz
    
15. Noughts & Crosses by Malorie Blackman
    
16. I Capture The Castle by Dodie Smith
    
17. Lord of the Flies by William Golding
    
18. The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne
    
19. The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, Aged 13 3/4 by Sue Townsend
    
20. The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
    
21. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
    
22. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
    
23. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
    
24. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
    
25. The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald
    
26. The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
    
27. Tess of the d’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
    
28. Frankenstein by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
    
29. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
    
30. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
    
31. The Man Who Mistook His Wife for His Hat by Oliver Sacks
    
32. The Hare with the Amber Eyes by Edmund de Waal
    
33. Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami
    
34. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John le Carre
    
35. The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks
    
36. Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie
    
37. Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson
    
38. The Commitments by Roddy Doyle
    
39. Schindler’s Ark by Thomas Keneally
    
40. Knots and Crosses by Ian Rankin
    
41. Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift
    
42. Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
    
43. Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
    
44. The Mill on the Floss by George Elliot
    
45. Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
    
46. The Fellowship of the Ring by JRR Tolkien
    
47. American Gods by Neil Gaiman
    
48. The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
    
49. The Stand by Stephen King
    
50. The Time Machine by HG Wells
    
51. The Colour of Magic by Terry Pratchett
    
52. Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
    
53. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
    
54. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K Dick
    
55. A Game of Thrones by George RR Martin
    
56. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
    
57. Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh
    
58. High Fidelity by Nick Hornby
    
59. Bridget Jones’s Diary by Helen Fielding
    
60. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
    
61. White Teeth by Zadie Smith
    
62. The Road by Cormac McCarthy
    
63. American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
    
64. The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje
    
65. Atonement by Ian McEwan
    
66. A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry
    
67. The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
    
68. The Secret History by Donna Tartt
    
69. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
    
70. Birdsong by Sebastian Faulks
    
71. The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson
    
72. Last Orders by Graham Swift
    
73. The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes
    
74. Dissolution by CJ Sansom
    
75. London Fields by Martin Amis
    
76. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S Thompson
    
77. Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell
    
78. One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
    
79. In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
    
80. Cider with Rosie by Laurie Lee
    
81. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
    
82. Casino Royale by Ian Fleming
    
83. The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway
    
84. Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
    
85. Brighton Rock by Graham Greene
    
86. Rebecca by Daphne de Maurier
    
87. Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie
    
88. All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque
    
89. To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
    
90. My Man Jeeves by PG Wodehouse
    
91. Freakonomics by Steven D Levitt
    
92. A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawkins
    
93. Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela
    
94. Wild Swans by Jung Chang
    
95. London: The Biography by Peter Ackroyd
    
96. Venice by Jan Morris
    
97. Notes From a Small Island by Bill Bryson
    
98. The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins
    
99. A History of the World in 100 Objects by Neil Macgregor
    
100. Bad Science by Ben Goldacre
     

I want to remember this list to gift my grandchildren. Some gifts are priceless.

There is no friend as loyal as a book. ~ Ernest Hemingway

 

Saturday Vivre:: Destinations

How many destinations are on your to-do list today? I know it’s Saturday, but it seems like we pack more into our days off lately, than in our regular work week. It keeps me echoing my daily mantra of “I NeEd A vAcAtIoN!!!” But in reality we’d do the same thing there, we try & pack so much into our vacations, that we need another one, as soon as we get home.

If I was journaling today, I’d reread my notes on what I was doing this time last year, tracking my progress or if I need to revisit any of tasks at hand, but like I said, its raining outside, I don’t want to spend too much time rehashing past events. I’m looking forward to the upcoming week; I need to prepare for that instead.

Are you going many places or just a few, in spite of the weather(or none, if it’s a stay-at-home day)?

I think I’ll be going to the Mall or Flea Market. I’m in need of a big black round mirror for the bathroom in the pole barn shop/lot & a few other car related memorabilia items to add to the walls. [Less is more.] We spent a few hours in there yesterday, painting it Dove Grey, adding hounds-tooth contact paper as a removable covering behind the sink & toilet for quick changes(if its get too messy in there), & tossing out some old clutter/junk. Its still a long way from where it needs to be, but its a start.

What about you?

Research shows you get multiple tasks done faster if you do them one at a time. It also decreases stress and raises happiness. ~ Shawn Achor

 

This year…

Buy an extra box of Girl Scout Cookies. I bought 4 boxes this year myself. Yum…

As most of you all know, I was a Co-Scout Leader for many years with a friend Terri Jo Roof of Germantown. We leveled up with the girls from the time they were Daisy’s (kindergarten) all the way up to Sr. Girl Scouts.  I still see most of the girls from time to time. We learned songs and made crafts, it was an just amazing experience for all involved.

I would like to add I loved Scout-ing.

So, I stopped by Wal-Mart in Middletown the other day to get myself a few boxes of cookies. My next-door neighbor’s granddaughter moved to Sidney, Ohio. There went my locale cookie connection.

I love the Caramel DeLites/Samoas and the Thin Mints. Steven was home so he grabbed a box of Peanut Butter Patties and took them back to college with him. I may have to pick up one or two more boxes before there all gone this year. I don’t like the frozen ones. Sorry.

Scouting is a wonderful organization and I for one, thoroughly enjoyed my time spent with scouting. It was a wonderful experience for me and for my daughter. I still hang my ornaments on my Christmas tree every year as a little reminder.

I do appreciate that the troops are willing to stand out in front of a store or bank to sell the cookies in the cold. It seems safer to me now, for the young girls, than for them to go door to door. So please take this opportunity to support scouting and the girls efforts.

Equal billing here: Craig was a Cub-Scout for a year or two and he seemed to benefit from it as well. But they only sold popcorn and Anthony bought a can last month.

Personal Note: I don’t remember Steven ever being in scouting… I may be wrong. I’ll ask him later. Hey, my kids were in everything coming and going, I can’t be expected to remember it all. Thus… the way of a busy mother. Most of Steven’s childhood is a blur at this point, too many irons in the fire. Steven is a very private person, he really doesn’t like for me to blog about him so sh… don’t mention this. Okay!

Thanks as always,
Sheila Jean Adkins Metcalf

Nice how we never get dizzy from doing good turns. ~ George Bengis

 

We are…

Soooo alike…       ~       Soooo different…

A quick review of genealogy blogs shows that many bloggers have made resolutions to write more about genealogy in 2009. Yes, you should blog more about genealogy! Carve out a little time for yourself (that means make an appointment for YOU and put it on your calendar). If you have a little writer’s block, don’t worry. Help is on the way!

Have a family member be a guest blogger. Let a family member take the reins and provide a different perspective for a post or two. If you can’t find anyone to take the job, interview a relative and spotlight the person yourself.

“I try to allow family members to help write every post. It’s a group effort and this is how we learn. We agree to disagree.” ~ Sheila Jean Adkins Metcalf

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Sisters are two different flowers from the same garden.

 

Too many books

Instructions:
1) Look at the list and put an ‘x’ after those you have read.
2) Add a ‘+’ to the ones you LOVE.
3) Star (*) those you plan on reading.
4) Tally your total at the bottom.

1 Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen x
2 The Lord of the Rings – JRR Tolkien x
3 Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte x
4 Harry Potter series – JK Rowling x
5 To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee x
6 The Bible x+
7 Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte x
8 Nineteen Eighty Four – George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials – Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations – Charles Dickens x+
11 Little Women – Louisa M Alcott x
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles – Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 – Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare x
15 Rebecca – Daphne Du Maurier *
16 The Hobbit – JRR Tolkien x
17 Birdsong – Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye – JD Salinger x
19 The Time Traveller’s Wife – Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch – George Eliot *
21 Gone With The Wind – Margaret Mitchell x +
22 The Great Gatsby – F Scott Fitzgerald x
23 Bleak House – Charles Dickens * (parts)
24 War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy x
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – Douglas Adams x
26 Brideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh x
27 Crime and Punishment – Fyodor Dostoyevsky x
28 Grapes of Wrath – John Steinbeck x
29 Alice in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll x+
30 The Wind in the Willows – Kenneth Grahame x
31 Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy x
32 David Copperfield – Charles Dickens x
33 Chronicles of Narnia – CS Lewis x
34 Emma – Jane Austen *
35 Persuasion – Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe – CS Lewis x+
37 The Kite Runner – Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin – Louis De Bernieres (parts)
39 Memoirs of a Geisha – Arthur Golden x
40 Winnie the Pooh – AA Milne x+
41 Animal Farm – George Orwell x
42 The Da Vinci Code – Dan Brown x
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude – Gabriel Garcia Marquez x
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney – John Irving *
45 The Woman in White – Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables – LM Montgomery x++++
47 Far From The Madding Crowd – Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies – William Golding x
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 x
55 A Suitable Boy – Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind – Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities – Charles Dickens x
58 Brave New World – Aldous Huxley x
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 x
62 Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov x
63 The Secret History – Donna Tartt *
64 The Lovely Bones – Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo – Alexandre Dumas x
66 On The Road – Jack Kerouac *
67 Jude the Obscure – Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary – Helen Fielding *
69 Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick – Herman Melville x
71 Oliver Twist – Charles Dickens x
72 Dracula – Bram Stoker x
73 The Secret Garden – Frances Hodgson Burnett x
74 Notes From A Small Island – Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses – James Joyce x
76 The Bell Jar – Sylvia Plath *
77 Swallows and Amazons – Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal – Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair – William Makepeace Thackeray x
80 Possession – AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol – Charles Dickens x+++
82 Cloud Atlas – David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple – Alice Walker x
84 The Remains of the Day – Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary – Gustave Flaubert x
86 A Fine Balance – Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte’s Web – EB White x+
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven – Mitch Alborn ?
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle x+++
90 The Faraway Tree Collection – Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness – Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince – Antoine De Saint-Exupery x
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 x
98 Hamlet – William Shakespeare x
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory – Roald Dahl x++
100 Les Miserables – Victor Hugo x++++++++

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52 books and counting…