Bookmarks and a Late Start

 Hello All,

I'm getting a bit of a late start with blogs and email today.  It has been a busy work morning so far.  But, the good news is that I am taking tomorrow off!  My two conference calls were cancelled and we have friends coming for the weekend, so I can use the day to do some last minute cleaning and baking (basil-lime shortbread!!  YUM).  My friend Leslie (the amazing person I have known since I was 12) will arrive Saturday with her daughter Jaimie and granddaughter Emory.  They do a road trip each summer, driving from North Carolina to Rhode Island and always stop here.  I cannot wait to see them!!  But first, some blogging.

The other day, Kym showed a bunch of her bookmarks in a post and I thought what a neat idea.  I have TONS of bookmarks.  Often I end up using a scrap of paper or an index card...sometimes a paperclip or a piece of yarn...or a pretty note card or postcard that someone sent.  But, I thought I would share some of my bookmarks with you.  So here goes.  First up:

The two on the right came to me when I ordered the Goodhart Sampler books from Needleprint years ago.  They fold in the middle and have magnets on the underside so that when folded over a page they stay put.  The pink one on the bottom right was a gift (handmade!!) from Kim in Oregon and the cute fox reading past his/her bedtime Kym sent to me after one of the first "Read With Us" books.  Next to that is the beginning of a friendship bracelet that Colin made in camp one year.  The copper one was etched by my friend Carol (she even etched Vera at the bottom).  I forget where the other one came from, but I love Oriental art and the fabric is silk.  Lovely!  Next up:

On the left we have a beautifully stitched bookmark from Dee and the Hardanger one to the right is one that I made.  Under that we have a scrap of paper with a short grocery list in my Dad's printing (fruit, O.J., veg., bird seed).  That's in one of the poetry books on the bottom shelf of my nightstand.  To the right is a laminated one with pictures from Israel.  In the late 60's my Dad was giving a paper at a conference in Israel and my Mom tagged along for a little trip (fun facts:  they flew on El Al and were basically strip-searched before boarding...it was the late 60's!  Also, at the time flying from JFK to Tel Aviv was the longest non-stop flight!).  To the right of that is a bookmark from Colin when he was in Kindergarten.  The little mice are made from his thumbprint.  The last one on the right is a Danish design that I stitched for my Mom (her Dad was from Denmark).

One of my favorites given to me by my Dad (it says "The best man for the job is often a woman").

My Mom used to use flowers or pretty leaves to mark pages in either poetry books or cookbooks.

There are also cookbooks that were my Mom's that have pieces of paper towel marking pages, or coupons, etc.  It's fun to come across them when paging through the books.

Fletch and I usually use book darts for the books that we read together after dinner.  These are nice because it's so easy to mark exactly where you are.

I forgot to photograph some.  Leslie gave me a set of magnetic ones that fold over your page.  One side has a cat and the other an arrow pointing to your place.  And, in my nightstand drawer I keep a Bible from when I was a kid.  I found a bookmark in it listing all the books of the Bible - must have been something given to me in Sunday School.  And, there are many others in books around the house.  I don't like turning down page corners (or writing in books or underlining), so I'm forever and ever using bookmarks - sometimes multiple ones in the same book!

How about you? What do you use as a bookmark?