Better than Books...

I closed my cherished online bookstore today. It wasn't very big and not at all lucrative - after expenses, I made  some hundred bucks (for the year)! However, I have enjoyed it to the point of collecting, reading, browsing, leafing through and categorizing a heaping 1000 volumes of mostly older books with occasional homeschool odds and ends. I had a grand time and it kept me busy when K. wasn't around. I would definitely do it all again, just for the opportunity to salvage through book bins.What fun!


Here are a few life lessons I've learned:

1. If it doesn't make a couple of Benjamens in a month - it's really just a hobby.
2. Hobbies are a lovely form of relaxation especially when you have lots of down time.
3. I LOVE old books more now than ever.
4. My daughter really loves to browse good old books - that tickles me!
5. Books, and particularly many books, take up a lot of room and time to organize.
6. Books are a great use of space.
7. People are the best use of space, even better than books (OR any stuff for that matter).

The permanent things matter, the temporal things only matter to the degree that they are connected with permanent things. - Thomas Chalmers

One of my favorite books of Dr. Suess is "In a People House", don't ask me why, I can't tell you objectively. Maybe it's nostalgia that grabs me...I read that book to my Mom, she read it to me and I like it. The fondness lies not in the content but rather the connection.  People, bustle... I love people in my house. Somewhere in the mix or people and bustle magic happens ... laughter and love just grows and grows. It is my greatest and daily reminder of God's grace in and through our lives, and how His sweetness seeps through the meals, and the laundry, the talks, the stories and yes, even the movie times.

We've decided to limit our library to our several book cases instead of a whole room and a half and I am not minding at all - if fact, I'm ecstatic.
One very important last detail...
K.'s cousins are coming to live with us, and this little hill cottage surrounded by trees is getting cleaned out and making ready to make room to recieve more people. What fun....what adventure! Did, I mention, I just love a people house-or is that a house full of people - or is that both or either or whatever?
So, what's...
Better than books?... a bustling, busting home with, ahem, .... just one bookcase in every room.