Good News

Congratulations to the finalists for the Oregon Book
Awards! (Thanks to Suz Blackaby for the list)

ELOISE JARVIS MCGRAW AWARD FOR CHILDREN'S LITERATURE

Dale E. Basye of Portland, Rapacia:The Second Circle of Heck (Random House)
Dawn Babb Prochovnic of Portland, The Nest Where I Like to Rest (Magic
Wagon)
Graham Salisbury of Lake Oswego, Calvin Coconut: The Zippy Fix (Wendy Lamb
Books)
Stephanie Stuve-Bodeen of Hines A Small Brown Dog with a Wet Pink Nose
(Little Brown and Company)
Barbara Kerley of Portland, The Extraordinary Mark Twain (Scholastic Press)

LESLIE BRADSHAW AWARD FOR YOUNG ADULT LITERATURE

Scott William Carter of Salem, The Last Great Getaway of the Water Balloon
Boys (Simon and Schuster)
Kerry Cohen Hoffman of Portland, It's Not You, It's Me (Random House)
Anne Osterlund of Ione, Academy 7 (Penguin Group)
L.K. Madigan of Portland, Flash Burnout (Houghton Mifflin)
Emily Whitman of Portland, Radiant Darkness (Greenwillow/Harper Collins)

AND three cheers for Barb Liles, who snagged Edna L. Holmes Fellowship in
Young Readers Literature.

Hip! Hip!

What's On Your Wall Wednesday - Framing

My husband's uncle sends us pieces of art every now-n-then. My husband frames the art and we hang it on the wall. It's beautiful.

How 'bout you, what's on your wall Wednesday?

Valentines

I love making crafts, especially if I can give them away and what better way than Valentine's Day?

The Danes use these paper hearts at Christmas, to put on the tree and fill with cookies but I like to use them as Valentine's for friends. I fill them with bath salts, bath beads and candles. It's a fun little thing to give friends.

Here's how you do it. I make both felt hearts and paper hearts, just depending on the look I want. Then I embellish them with fur, stones and buttons or anything I have laying around the house.

The Undead Series

Okay, I've always been a fanpire ever since the early days with Dracula but then when Stephen King wrote Salem's Lot, I was really hooked. I've read lots of books and the Twilight series had to join that list. Then there was the TrueBlood line-up and I've just finished the Undead series.

I loved Mary Janice Davidson's wit and humor. I'd be laughing while I was reading and my husband would say, "Isn't that a vampire book?"

I'd say, "Yeah, but it's funny."

He'd look at me like I'd finally lost my mind.

Anyway, I've read 9 or 10 of the books (all 9 in the series plus one little spin-off werewolf 'tail' :) in the Undead series. The last one, though, Undead and Unfinished (HERE'S A SPOILER ALERT)

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definitely my least favorite. It had it's moments but the ending... I did not like that. Maybe because I've been happily married for so many years (yeah 27, count 'em - that's a lot of years) and we've had our moments of anger and arguments (of course, anyone who's been married more than a year has), but we've always "made up". So................I didn't like that ending. In fact I didn't like it so much, I doubt I would buy another book in the series...but you never know. I might want to find out what could have caused such a flip in Betsy's paranormal dimension but...maybe not.

I mean I can handle the shallow silliness, the shoes, the 'sucky' parts of the story but when you murder your own husband...I have to draw the line somewhere...right?

And, then, when she skins him and uses his (un)dead body to make a book (literally), I don't know call me squimish...it just didn't seem right to do those sorts of things to your most loved one. And no wonder she went a little crazy whenever she read from that hardback - after all it was her husband's.

Anyone else read the series? What were your thoughts?

Anyway that was a disappointment :(

Junk to Funk

Recycling can be more fun than you think. Just check out this Trashion Edutainment Event on February 5th.

Saturday February 5th
Boothster: 521 NE Davis
Gallery Open 7-11
Suggested Donation: $10-50
All Ages

It's a trashformation - yep, just what it sounds like. A mixture of fashion and trash combined creatively to become clothing. What better way to repurpose material than to turn it into wearable art?

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins

I read Mockingjay in one day. I couldn't put it down.

SPOILER ALERT

I was so team Gale. I mean all those years together, the loyalty, the friendship, the hunting and talking, it just seemed to me that she'd end up with Gale. But that's just me. People obviously need a spark to stay together but . . . I wanted Gale to be the winner. And, I felt that he ended up such a loser. Heartless, or at least cold, creating bombs meant to take out caregivers...and Prim, ahhhhhhh.

Of course, I'd figured out (like everyone else) that Coin was the bad one...or two. I mean sure President Snow and The Capitol were bad but not any worse than Coin.

I really loved the ending, though. It wasn't all perfect and rosy...like Hollywood usually makes it but there was enough to make me feel some hope for the future of Panem.

How 'bout you? What did you think of the trilogy? Now, I just can't wait for the movies. It's going to be a girls' day out...for sure.

Catching Fire

I've started the trilogy and can't seem to put those books down. I loved The Hunger Games even though I never expected myself to really like it. I just never read apocalyptic stories. But, this was a great story. And then Catching Fire was good but definitely a sequel. I hated the ending. The only redeeming fact was that Mockingjay was already out and I could buy it in a heartbeat on my Kindle.

And, one thing I miss with the Kindle: covers.

Book covers. I love looking at them. The beautiful art, the colors. My Kindle is black and white. So, like I said, I do miss the book covers.

Anyway, I've nearly completed Mockingjay - in about one day.

I still didn't like the way the second book left me hanging. I felt sort of played. And, that's without having to wait to get the third book in the series.

I don't know maybe that's just me. After all, I read Catching Fire in one day.

How 'bout you? Have you read the series? What did you think about the way Catching Fire ended?