Book Books everywhere

I am a self-confessed Book-A-Holic.  I could eat them for breakfast.  I love books.  I've always loved books and as a child spent many happy hours in far off places vicariously living an adventurous life.  It's the stories and the ideas and the imagination but it's also the feel of the shiny new cover and the pages still crisp with potential - almost impossible for me to resist.  DH knows that when my favourite magazine or a new book shows up in the mailbox I am suddenly ready for a cup of tea and a little sit-down.

I have books in every room of the house.  They are stacked in piles and loaded into baskets.  They grace the top of a long stretch of cabinets in the living room and adorn one end of the buffet.  They're in the bathroom - a little rumpled from the humidity while reading in the tub - they're in the car, under the bed - well - almost anywhere.

The subjects range from historical fiction - my favourite escape - to gardening, canning, farm animals, politics (those are DH's) prayer, home-schooling, counselling advice, Christmas decorating, organizational skills, herbs and foraging, renewable energy, website building (need to read those yet!) leadership, Do It Yourself type books... and more.

I love old cookbooks especially the ones that were compiled by church groups or organizations. Just reading them is a great study in the culture of the time it was written.  Any recipe that starts with 1lb of butter would probably not make it into a cook book in 2012!  I was tidying up today and most of what I put away was books. I may need an intervention soon!

Last winter when I had some time on my hands I started building a library - OK - it's actually a large-ish walk-in-closet.  I've got the plaster patching and the painting done.  The wallpaper is almost done - it's a most gorgeous cabbage rose flowered wallpaper that comes with a great story (for another time)  The hold-up is my lack of carpentry skills.  I am great swinging a hammer in the barn where my crude attempts to hit the nail aren't really on display for all the world to see - at least the animals haven't complained but I am not skilled enough to handle constructing the shelves I want.

I'm not even sure all the books will fit in there so I will be doing a selective de-cluttering when the books are ready to move in.

My love affair with the actual printed editions has made me quite sceptical of any digital reader.     How could it possibly compare to reading a REAL book.  I resisted for a really long time and still feel a bit like a traitor to my love but here is my full confession.

It all started with an email - maybe I shouldn't have read it.

The email contained a link to a page where you could download a FREE app for devices that allowed you to read books on your computer or tablet or even your phone. The  Kindle Reader App is available here.  It's free and simple to download.  It came with a few free books to get you started - most of which I didn't read but I did have a look to see how things worked.  I wasn't really impressed.  If I had to pay only slightly less for an e-book than for a REAL book I would pay the extra and get the REAL book every time.

There is one exception and it includes the word FREE.

Amazon has some FREE books - the selection changes every day - but since I have better things to do with my time than spend hours looking for them I wasn't really using my Kindle Reader very much until I bumped into another FREE website eReaderIQ.com.  I signed up and was able to choose the genres that where the most interesting to me and voila - they show up as an email every day.  I just click on the ones I want and download them straight to my Kindle app from Amazon.

I have downloaded books on gluten free baking and cooking, homesteading, gardening, canning, hydroponics, organic food, farm animals, historical fiction and lots more.  The convenience comes when you want to travel - I have taken baskets of books with me when I went camping and stuffed my luggage while travelling to the point of hurting myself.  Could I really go on vacation without a REAL book in my hands??  Probably not but this should cut down on the weight considerably.  

That's my helpful hint for the day!  Bet you'll love it!  

I've downloaded my freebies for today and I'm saving them for a camping trip that's coming up soon.  Now it's off to read a REAL book for a little while with a cup of tea!