Love is a book and a light to read it by
February 10, 2012 at 3:15 pm | Posted in Books, update | Leave a commentTags: bookshelves, boring post, geeky, home, legos
I am slowly (oh so slowly!) making our little apartment more homey and organized. Despite having moved in months ago we still have piles of cardboard boxes stacked in corners. Our books are unorganized (gasp!) and we hardly have anything hanging on our walls.
Today, I fought back the chaos and moved some things around. Here is my lovely little bookcase!
It has some of our favorite books, favorite Lego sets, and my favorite teapot!
Here’s a close up of the top with the picture on the wall:
I’m very pleased with my cozy corner! Maybe next week I’ll tackle one of the other bookshelves…
Update
January 26, 2011 at 9:37 pm | Posted in Book Arts, Books, Libraries, update | 1 CommentLately, my life has been getting busy! Here’s what I’ve been up to:
1) Work!!
I got a job!! In a library! Finally, after years of trying to get a library job and a year of library school I can finally say that I work in a library. Today was my first day and it was fantastic! I’m absolutely thrilled and incredibly grateful to have found a library job.
2) Acacia
Steve always picks the best book presents for me, and this is no exception. I’m only about halfway through, but so far I would say it is just as good as Game of Thrones! I love finding new (to me) fantasy series, and once I’m done I’ll be sure to post a full review!
3) The Big Book of Science
No picture for this one as it’s still incomplete! I’m working on making Steve his very own copy of The Big Book of Science, one of the main readable books in the Fallout video games. My version of the Big Book of Science will be filled with old science fiction magazines. Hopefully I’ll get it done in the next week or so, when of course you will get a post!
4) The Six Week Body Makeover
After talking to a friend about her positive experiences on the program I decided to make the commitment and do it! So far it has been going great. Despite not sticking to it quite as closely as I should be I’ve still lost 13lbs since Christmas! I’ve still got a long way to go, but it’s nice to have a set plan that I know is working for me.
So that’s what I’ve been up to! Hopefully soon I’ll have some book reviews and bookbinding experiments to share with you.
Books, books, books!
January 19, 2011 at 1:14 am | Posted in Book Arts, Books, thoughts, update | Leave a commentTags: bookarts, bookbinding, gifts
For Christmas I made many people books. I’m still working on a few, but here are all the ones that I completed and gave to people!
Kelly’s Book:
My friend Kelly loves to travel and write, and she’s currently stationed in Louisiana with Americorps. For her book I used some lovely paper I had that was covered in travel stamps, a red ribbon, and a map of the southern USA.
Lily’s Book:
My sister Lily just started high school. She’s recently started writing for a local teen paper. I made her book with earthy green paper (you can see some leaves in the paper!) and a map of Pennsylvania. Her book is a bit smaller than the ones I usually make so she can easily carry it around with her.
Maggie’s Book:
I was so excited when I drew my cousin Maggie in our family gift exchange this year! Maggie reminds me a lot of myself when I was ten, what with all the reading and writing, and I was thrilled to get to make her something special. When I was younger her parents would often give me journals as gifts, so it seemed very appropriate to make her one this year! My mom helped me pick out the fun, colorful paper I used to bind her book!
Jessie’s Book:
Jessie’s book was one of the first I made and also one of my favorites. I made her a dos-a-dos and I think it turned out beautifully! She’s a busy senior in high school, so I’m sure she can find plenty of things to fill up both sides of the book!
Mom’s Book:
For my mom’s book I tracked down some old family photos and put them together for her. She’s really into family history, so some of them were very old! Others were from when I was a child. There are plenty of blank pages in the back for her to fill up with other photos or family information she finds. Of all the books I made for Christmas, this one might be my favorite, if only for the content!
Now What?
December 15, 2010 at 8:40 pm | Posted in Book Arts, Books, Libraries, update | 2 CommentsWell, I’m done with school. It’s been quite an experience, and I have mixed feelings about it being over. I’m glad to have more time, and to (hopefully) be getting out into the field, but I’m also apprehensive about finally being done with school. I’ve been in school my entire life; without it I feel a little lost.
Despite my mixed feeling about being done, I do feel incredibly proud of myself. I worked incredibly hard this year. I feel like I really EARNED this degree.
So…. now what? I’m job hunting, and hopefully something will come up soon. In the meantime I’m still subbing at the preschool where my mother works. I adore working with the kids. I’m so lucky to have some kind of paying job, even if it isn’t in a library!
I also have tons and tons of fun things that I’ve been saving for after school. There are so many movies, art projects, books, webcomics…. Here’s a short list:
MS Paint Adventures: Homestuck
Homestuck is an awesome, awesome webcomic about the end of the world, imps, trolls, and awesomeness. I’ll probably post a review of it once I’m all caught up reading. In the meantime, you might want to start reading too: http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6
Fallout 3
I’ve started playing Fallout 3 a few times, but I’ve never had time to really get into the game. I’m very much looking forward to kiling some super mutants and exploring the destroyed DC area.
Artemis Fowl
One of the things I am most excited to do now that school is done is read, read, and read some more. I want to spend hours just curled up in bed with a good book. I have a nice stack all ready! I just started the 4th Artemis Fowl and so far it is wonderful.
Bookbinding
I LOVE bookbinding, and I can’t wait to finally have the time to practice! I’m still not great at getting this neat and straight, and I want to experiment with different kinds of materials and bindings. This is a book I made for my sister Rachael for her birthday. It’s bound in maps since she travels so often, and although you can’t see it from this picture, I also made a pocket in the back of it.
So, those are some of the things that will occupy me as I wait for a job. I’m so glad to have plenty to do—I have no fears of getting bored!
O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree!
December 5, 2010 at 7:15 pm | Posted in Photography, update | 1 CommentTags: Christmas trees, family, holiday traditions
Today was a really good day.
Every year we go to Sheerlund Forests and cut down our own tree. It’s always been one of my favorite Christmas traditions and I love that even now that we’re all older we still keep it up! Even if we’re not as enthusiastic as we were as children, it’s still nice to hike out and get the tree, then relax with some of the amazing cookies and hot chocolate that Sheerlund provides!
This year my dad ended up not being able to come, which could have ruined the whole tradition.
But luckily…
… I have an awesome boyfriend who will come out in the freezing cold to chop down a tree for me and my family.
We all had a really good time, as you can see.
Merry Christmas everyone!
A brief calm….
December 4, 2010 at 3:57 pm | Posted in Photography, update | Leave a commentTags: family, shoulder cat, thanksgiving
I have a few moments of quiet right now amid these crazy days. I have 9 days left until my final assignment in graduate school is due, and as you can imagine things have been rather nuts. Between scrambling to get things done for class, being sick, job hunting, and scrambling to start getting things done for Christmas, my life hasn’t had too many quiet moments!
Expect some more posts in the future, but for now here are some of my favorite pictures from Thanksgiving.
This Heart’s On Fire
November 8, 2010 at 1:22 pm | Posted in Music, Photography, update | 2 CommentsTags: anniversary, orge you asshole, Philadelphia, wolf parade
Last week Steve and I celebrated our third anniversary by spending the day in Philly and going to a concert. I’m so lucky to have him, and I’m so lucky that we got to celebrate our relationship with such a fun day! It was everything we love wrapped up in one day.
We saw fossils:
And old books:
And science toys:
And we saw an AWESOME, awesome show. The opening band, Orge You Asshole, was a four piece rock band from Japan who turned out to be surprisingly good! They were catchy and they had good energy on stage.
Steve brought an album from them after the show and got them to sign it. They didn’t speak a lot of English, but they seemed pretty nice.
Wolf Parade has been one of my favorite bands for a while now, so it was really amazing to see them live. We wanted a low-key evening so we sat up in the balcony and the view was great! It was really nice to not worry about being overwhelmed by the crowd or not being able to see because I’m too short… It also allowed me to get some really cool shots! The show was fantastic.
It was basically a perfect day. I’m so lucky that I have such a great boyfriend to go on adventures with me! Here’s to another year of adventures!
The one where Emily feels sorry for herself
October 26, 2010 at 3:16 pm | Posted in Libraries, thoughts, update | 1 CommentLife has been more than a little crazy the last few months, and I won’t lie to you, in many ways I am really looking forward to being done with school in December. I’m excited to be out of school for the first time in my life, and I’m excited to get an actual job.
But sometimes I worry that all this was a very expensive mistake.
Don’t get me wrong, I love library science and this year has given me so many great experiences that I would never call a mistake. But there aren’t a lot of jobs out there right now. Library school was supposed to help me get experience so I could get a job, but so far the only experience I’ve gotten has been classes and volunteer experience. When I applied to library school last year they told me that of course there would be plenty of graduate assistantships available. Well… we all know how this story goes. No graduate assistantship, no real library experience, and I’m back living in my parents’ basement.
I went to Illinois because it was supposed to be the “best” library school in the country, and as much as I would like to believe that, after this long in the program I really can’t. I’ve had professors who have texted in class during student presentations and online professors who have never even taken an online class, let alone taught ANY class, among other things. Graduate school has not been at all what I expected and I’m not sure if it really has prepared me to be a good librarian. I feel like there are huge gaps in my knowledge.
And yes, a lot of my dissatisfaction may be because I haven’t taken advantage of as many opportunities as I should have. By doing the program in a year and doing half of it through LEEP I’m sure I’m missing out on a lot of great things Illinois has to offer. However, I still can’t help but feel a little betrayed by GSLIS, ALA, and myself.
I have had a lot of great experiences through GSLIS that I don’t think I would have gotten anywhere else. All of my Special Collections classes have been amazing, and if even just for that I cannot regret my decision to do get my MLIS at the University of Illinois. I’ve met a lot of great people and I feel like my (almost) a year of library school has helped me to become a better person and help me become the sort of adult that I want to be. With any luck I’ll soon be blogging about my awesome library job, but I think until that awesome library job comes up I’m going to worry, and there will be days like today where I feel sorry for myself.
Sorry for the depressing post, folks. I promise that soon I’ll have some much less depressing posts about books, movies, pictures of my tunnel book, and food.
Illinois
July 16, 2010 at 6:03 pm | Posted in update | 1 CommentAlmost exactly six months ago I moved here. Can you believe how fast it went? I can’t! My time here in Illinois is quickly drawing to a close. I’m so ready to move home and finish my degree online! I don’t like living so far from my family, I miss Steve, I miss my friends and yes, I miss the security of being in place I’ve known my whole life. Despite being homesick, I am so glad that I did move here and force myself to experience life on my own. Living here has taught me a lot about myself, other people, and the world. I wouldn’t trade this experience or anything! Here are my top five uniquely Illinois moments!
… In no particular order
The Bathtub/Egg
This might actually be my favorite moment. In my class on library buildings we spent the entire semester learning what NOT to do when building a library. The two biggest things to avoid are 1) building underground 2) atriums. On our field trip to Chicago we went to the University of Chicago to see their library. While there we were given a presentation of what their newest library building will look like.
It is a giant atrium. With an underground storage facility.
None of us could make eye contact during this presentation–we would have just died. Everything–EVERYTHING we had been warned against was going into this library. Let me give you some more details.
It is a giant atrium with an underground storage facility. You’re thinking, what’s wrong with that? Underground isn’t so bad… And then you realize this is in Chicago. Next to a lake. Under the water table. On what used to be a marsh. The head of maintenance used to call it “The Bathtub” until the school asked him to stop.
And what’s wrong with an atrium? Lots of light, isn’t that a good thing? All those windows are hard to maintain. And those windows? Yeah, they’re only manufactured in Germany. So when (not if, when) one of them breaks they’re going to have to wait at least a few days for a replacement.
Other problems? There isn’t a bathroom in the building. There aren’t any private staff areas. And the real kicker? They’re putting the preservation and conservation unit in it. Maybe this isn’t obvious to everyone but… BOOKS DO NOT LIKE SUNLIGHT. Old books especially do not like sunlight.
You can see more pictures of the Bathtub here.
Gutenberg
I’ve blogged about this quite a few times already so I won’t go into much detail, but seeing the Gutenberg Bible and Shakespeare’s First Folio were amazing and awe-inspiring experiences. So, so so awesome.
Making Paper
I also already blogged about this. Making paper was such a cool thing! It was so much more fun than I ever would have thought, and it made me realize that I want paper making to become one of my hobbies. It was relaxing, fun, and it creates something beautiful! I’ve been looking for a long time for a hobby that doesn’t involve the computer, and I think this might be the one that sticks!
Meeting Jess and Deirde
And everyone else, really. I have met so many awesome people here. Everyone is so nice and smart! Librarians/future librarians are definitely my favorite people! But Jess and Deirdre definitely stand out as the people I’ve gotten the closest to. We figured out in the second week that we had all of our classes together and from then on we were always in each others corner! Having both of them in all my classes (except Rare Books) made my first semester of library school so enjoyable!
502
The more I reflect on it the more I realize that this class was the prefect introduction to the field. Instead of lectures we had discussions. It was such a great way to become accustomed to the issues within library science! My favorite night was the last night. We all presented on our final papers. I loved hearing about the things other people felt were important, and it was the perfect way to end my first semester. So thanks everyone from 502–you spoiled me for other classes with your awesomeness!
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