A Christmas Wedding

357 - A Christmas Wedding, originally uploaded by carolfoasia.

Via Flickr:

I love these ladies!

We went to Berina and Joel Tuttle's wedding.

In picture:
Fatimah (left) was a bridesmaid.
Jean (behind me) is a dear friend from college.
Heba (right) is my sweet friend from Jordan.

It was a delightful evening with dinner three hours before the ceremony. There was a LOT of time for talking at this wedding.

2011 Books

I don't think I am going to get through the books I am currently reading before the end of the year. So, I will post these here. Not as many books this year, but many of them were the finishing up of The Well-Educated Mind list. So, they were TOMES and very difficult reads!

KEY:
TWEM = The Well-Educated Mind
BABES = Book Babes - my monthly book club that I have been in since January 2001
DAMES = Book Dames - my bimonthly book club that is an offshoot of Babes and reads classics (inaugurated in June of 2005)

JANUARY

1. A Distant Mirror by Tuchman (TWEM)

FEBRUARY

2. The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Womersley-TWEM)

3. TrueFaced: Trust God and Others with Who You Really Are

MARCH

4. Democracy in America (Heffner-TWEM)

5. The Road to Wigan Pier (TWEM)

6. The Last Lecture (Babes)

7. All the President's Men (TWEM)

APRIL

8. The Runner's Field Manual

9. The Blindside (Babes)

MAY

10. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (TWEM)

11. The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (TWEM)

12. A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, 1785-1812. (TWEM)

13. A Painted House (Babes)

JUNE

14. Light on Snow (Babes)

15. Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage (Babes)

16. Theophostic Prayer Ministry Basic Manual Revised

17. TPM Ministry Demonstration Training

18. TPM Ministry Student Workbook

19. Leadership Essentials

20. Images of God for Young Children

JULY

21. The End of History and the Last Man (TWEM)

AUGUST

22. Treasure Island (Dames)

23. Roll, Jordan, Roll (TWEM)

24. All Creatures Great and Small (Babes)

25. Blink of an Eye (Babes)

SEPTEMBER

26. Wives and Daughters (Dames)

27. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (Babes)

OCTOBER

28. Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption (Babes-Amazing)

29. Year of Fog (Babes)

30. The New England Mind: Colony to Province (TWEM)

31. The Christ of the Indian Road
32. The Divine Conspiracy (May have just been three chapters for our ministry but a post in 2012 here says I read it twice by then!)

33. Saving CeeCee Honeycutt (Babes)

34. Bold Spirit: Forgotten Walk Across Victorian America (Babes)

NOVEMBER

35. The Gulag Archipelago (TWEM)

36. A Voice in the Wind (Babes)

37. Little Princes (Babes)

38. American Nightingale (Babes)

39. Runaway Bunny

DECEMBER

40. Rim of the Prairie (Babes)

41. Left to Tell

42. Handel's Messiah: Comfort for God's People

Wednesday Reflections

I have so many things to do today. They are things that I usually ignore for the whole year, but I open up the week between Christmas and New Year as a time to select, print, and scrapbook for the boys' albums, our Christmas album, and just print photos and put them in sleeves for family pictures. The hard part is that I have not been doing it consistently for the past four years. 2007 was such a huge picture year that I haven't gotten past it. Last year, I made photo books and most of 2007 Christmas. Why didn't I do the whole holiday? Maybe I decided not to do the later pictures or maybe I didn't because I have them in my 365 book already? I can't remember from year to year what decisions I have made.  If I would just do this a little bit each week, I would remember where I left off, but each day during the year is so busy.

I also don't know when I should make the switch to digital for the boys' books. I told them maybe I should stop scrapbooking, and they said, "No, you should keep doing it."  That surprised me because they have never seemed to care that I do it for them.  I want them to leave our house with a memory book to have of their childhood. It has been a labor of love. But here is the rub: I want to switch to digital, but I don't know when they breaking point will be when I run out of stuff for the in-my-hand scrapbooks. I want to make a natural break, and I thought it would be high school, but I realized that I might have to buy a whole new book for Paul's middle school. So, should I switch to Paul for middle school? But I already printed pictures through the fall of 7th grade for him. So, that seems very inefficient since I would only have to scrapbook for 1 1/2 years after that. I know it is stupid to even think about it, but I have considered this my labor of love for my boys. I know they will appreciate it when they are older (and from the reaction last night when I asked them if I should stop it all together, they seem to appreciate it now).

I do love looking at photos of their childhoods. They were the cutest! Of course I am prejudice, but they were fine children, and they have grown into fine young men. We love being around them, and the flow of our conversations (and even conflict) is really lovely and healthy.  We went out to dinner with gift cards given to us by Sue Thompson, and it was really nice. We don't go out to dinner that often, and I don't know why we don't.

I will say that I need to get back to work, but I want to do Job 31 for the Bible Book Club first. I don't like being away for too long.  I so enjoyed my Gospel Harmony Book Club reflections before Christmas, and I hope to continue them once King's Day comes around. :)

Well, I think there is only about 2 minutes left on my 15 minute timer. This warmed up my fingers for writing about Job 31 this morning. Then, it is on to the photo labor of love for this lovely crew below!

How Many of the 100 Have I Read? 48 (Now I have read them all)

THE BOOK OF GREAT BOOKS 100

1. Aeneid – Virgil YES
2. All Quiet on the Western Front – Remarque YES
3. All the King’s Men – Warren YES
4. Animal Farm – Orwell YES
5. As I Lay Dying – Faulkner YES
6. As You Like It – Shakespeare YES
7. The Awakening – Chopin YES
8. Beowulf YES
9. Bill Budd – Melville
10. The Bluest Eyes – Morrison 
11. Brave New World – Huxley
12. The Call of the Wild – London
13. Candide – Voltaire
14. The Canterbury Tales – Chaucer YES
15. Catch22 – Heller
16. The Color Purple – Walker
17. Crime and Punishment – Dostoyevsky YES
18. The Crucible – Miller
19. Daisy Miller – James
20. David Copperfield – Dickens
21. Death of a Salesman – Miller YES
22. Diary of a Young Girl – Frank
23. Inferno – Dante YES
24. Doctor Faustus – Marlowe YES
25. A Doll’s House – Ibsen YES
26. Don Quixote – Cervantes YES
27. Ethan Frome – Wharton
28. Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Phaedo – Plato
29. A Farewell to Arms – Hemingway
30. Faust: Parts 1 and 2 – Goethe
31. For Whom the Bell Tolls – Hemingway
32. Frankenstein – Shelly  YES
33. The Glass Menagerie – Williams
34. The Good Earth – Buck YES
35. The Grapes of Wrath – Steinbeck YES
36. Great Expectations – Dickens YES
37. The Great Gatsby – Fitzgerald YES
38. Gulliver’s Travels – Swift YES
39. Hamlet – Shakespeare YES
40. Hard Times – Dickens
41. Heart of Darkness – Conrad YES
42. Henry IV, Part 1 – Shakespeare
43. House Made of Dawn – Momaday
44. The House of Seven Gables – Hawthorne YES
45. Huckleberry Finn – Twain YES
46. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings – Angelou
47. Iliad – Homer YES
48. Invisible Man – Ellison YES
49. Jane Eyre – Bronte YES
50. The Joy Luck Club – Tan
51. Julius Caesar – Shakespeare
52. The Jungle – Sinclair
53. King Lear – Shakespeare
54. Light in August – Faulkner
55. Lord Jim – Conrad
56. The Lord of the Flies – Golding
57. The Lord of the Rings – Tolkien YES
58. Macbeth – Shakespeare
59. Madame Bovary – Flaubert YES
60. The Major of Casterbridge – Hardy
61. The Merchant of Venice – Shakespeare
62. A Midsummer Night’s Dream – Shakespeare YES
63. Moby-Dick – Melville YES
64. Native Son – Wright YES
65. 1984 – Orwell YES
66. Odyssey – Homer YES
67. The Oedipus Trilogy – Sophocles YES
68. Of Mice and Men – Steinbeck
69. The Old Man and the Sea – Hemingway
70. Oliver Twist – Dickens YES
71. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest – Kesey
72. Othello – Shakespeare
73. Paradise Lost – Milton YES
74. The Pearl – Steinbeck
75. The Plague – Camus
76. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man – Joyce YES
77. Pride and Prejudice – Austen YES
78. The Prince – Machiavelli YES
79. The Red Badge of Courage – Crane YES
80. Republic – Plato YES
81. The Return of the Native – Hardy YES
82. Richard III – Shakespeare YES
83. Romeo and Juliet – Shakespeare
84. The Scarlet Letter – Hawthorne YES
85. A Separate Peace – Knowles
86. Silas Marner – Eliot YES
87. Sons and Lovers – Lawrence
88. The Sound and the Fury – Faulkner YES
89. Steppenwolf – Hesse
90. The Stranger – Camus YES
91. The Sun Also Rises – Hemingway
92. The Taming of the Shrew – Shakespeare
93. The Tempest – Shakespeare
94. Tess of the D’Urbervilles – Hardy
95. Their Eyes Were Watching God – Hurston 
96. Tom Sawyer – Twain
97. Treasure Island – Stevenson YES
98. Twelfth Night – Shakespeare YES
99. Waiting for Godot – Beckett YES
100. Walden – Thoreau YES

100 Great Books

My next challenge!

THE BOOK OF GREAT BOOKS 100

1. Aeneid – Virgil
2. All Quiet on the Western Front – Remarque
3. All the King’s Men – Warren
4. Animal Farm – Orwell (read)
5. As I Lay Dying – Faulkner
6. As You Like It – Shakespeare
7. The Awakening – Chopin
8. Beowulf
9. Bill Budd – Melville
10. The Bluest Eyes – Morrison
11. Brave New World – Huxley
12. The Call of the Wild – London
13. Candide – Voltaire
14. The Canterbury Tales – Chaucer
15. Catch22 – Heller
16. The Color Purple – Walker
17. Crime and Punishment – Dostoyevsky
18. The Crucible – Miller
19. Daisy Miller – James
20. David Copperfield – Dickens
21. Death of a Salesman – Miller
22. Diary of a Young Girl – Frank
23. Inferno – Dante
24. Doctor Faustus – Marlowe
25. A Doll’s House – Ibsen
26. Don Quixote – Cervantes
27. Ethan Frome – Wharton
28. Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Phaedo – Plato
29. A Farewell to Arms – Hemingway
30. Faust: Parts 1 and 2 – Goethe
31. For Whom the Bell Tolls – Hemingway
32. Frankenstein – Shelly (read)
33. The Glass Menagerie – Williams
34. The Good Earth – Buck
35. The Grapes of Wrath – Steinbeck
36. Great Expectations – Dickens (read)
37. The Great Gatsby – Fitzgerald
38. Gulliver’s Travels – Swift
39. Hamlet – Shakespeare
40. Hard Times – Dickens
41. Heart of Darkness – Conrad
42. Henry IV, Part 1 – Shakespeare
43. House Made of Dawn – Momaday
44. The House of Seven Gables – Hawthorne (read)
45. Huckleberry Finn – Twain
46. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings – Angelou
47. Iliad – Homer
48. Invisible Man – Ellison
49. Jane Eyre – Bronte (read - I think?)
50. The Joy Luck Club – Tan
51. Julius Caesar – Shakespeare
52. The Jungle – Sinclair
53. King Lear – Shakespeare
54. Light in August – Faulkner
55. Lord Jim – Conrad
56. The Lord of the Flies – Golding
57. The Lord of the Rings – Tolkien
58. Macbeth – Shakespeare
59. Madame Bovary – Flaubert (read)
60. The Major of Casterbridge – Hardy
61. The Merchant of Venice – Shakespeare
62. A Midsummer Night’s Dream – Shakespeare
63. Moby-Dick – Melville
64. Native Son – Wright
65. 1984 – Orwell (read)
66. Odyssey – Homer
67. The Oedipus Trilogy – Sophocles
68. Of Mice and Men – Steinbeck
69. The Old Man and the Sea – Hemingway
70. Oliver Twist – Dickens
71. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest – Kesey
72. Othello – Shakespeare
73. Paradise Lost – Milton (reading now)
74. The Pearl – Steinbeck
75. The Plague – Camus
76. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man – Joyce (read)
77. Pride and Prejudice – Austen (read)
78. The Prince – Machiavelli
79. The Red Badge of Courage – Crane
80. Republic – Plato
81. The Return of the Native – Hardy (read)
82. Richard III – Shakespeare
83. Romeo and Juliet – Shakespeare
84. The Scarlet Letter – Hawthorne
85. A Separate Peace – Knowles
86. Silas Marner – Eliot (read)
87. Sons and Lovers – Lawrence
88. The Sound and the Fury – Faulkner
89. Steppenwolf – Hesse
90. The Stranger – Camus (read)
91. The Sun Also Rises – Hemingway
92. The Taming of the Shrew – Shakespeare
93. The Tempest – Shakespeare
94. Tess of the D’Urbervilles – Hardy
95. Their Eyes Were Watching God – Hurston (will read)
96. Tom Sawyer – Twain
97. Treasure Island – Stevenson (read)
98. Twelfth Night – Shakespeare
99. Waiting for Godot – Beckett
100. Walden – Thoreau

Annotated Bibliography of The Well-Educated Mind List

Over the next year, I will be creating an annotated bibliography of all of the books I read in the Well-Educated Mind, doing one to two at a time. It will be good review for me and hopefully helpful for someone on the same journey.

Ancients (15)

1) 2000 BC: Epic of Gilgamesh/Ferry/Poetry


I really enjoyed this. It is very approachable and readable. I also read illustrated versions to my kids that helped me imagine in my own reading. Visual images often make reading more enjoyable for me. It spoils it for others. It is a personal preference for all. 


These were my favorite children's versions with lush and beautiful illustrations:


retold and illustrated by Ludmila Zeman













800 Iliad (*+ T)/ Homer/Lattimore/ Poetry
800 Odyssey(*+ T) /Homer/Lattimore/Poetry
600 Greek Lyrics/ Lattimore/Poetry
458 Agamemnon(*+ T)/ Aeschylus/Drama
450 Oedipus Rex(*+ T)/ Sophocles/Drama
441 Histories/ Herodotus/ History
431 Medea/ Euripedes/ Drama
400 Birds/ (Clouds – T) /Aristophanes/ Drama
400 Peloponnesian War(*+ )/Thucydides/ History
375 Republic(*+)/ Plato/ History
330 Poetics(+)/ Aristotle/Drama 
65 Odes of Horace/Poetry
AD
100 Greek Lives/Roman Lives by Plutarch

Medieval Times (19 out of 19)

400 Confessions*+ T Augustine Fitzgerald Autobio 
426 City of God+ Augustine History
731 Ecclesiastical History of the English People Bede History
1000 Beowulf* Poetry
1300 Inferno*+ Poetry 
1300's Everyman Drama
1350 Sir Gawain & the Green Knight* Poetry
1386 Canterbury Tales* Chaucer Poetry
1430 The Book of Margery Kempe Autobio
1513 Prince*+ Machiavelli History
1516 Utopia* Sir Thomas More History
1564 Sonnets Shakespeare Poetry 
1580 Essays+ Montaigne Autobio
1588 Life of Teresa of Avila Autobio
1588 Doctor Faustus Marlowe Drama
1592 Richard III Shakespeare Drama
1594 Midsummer's Nights Dream* Shakespeare Drama
1600 Hamlet* Shakespeare Drama

1600 Poems* Donne Poetry (British)

Early Modern -1600-1850 (33 out of 33)

1605 Don Quixote*+ Cervantes Penguin Novel

1611 Psalms KJV Poetry

1641 Meditations+ Descartes Autobio 
1667 Paradise Lost*+ Milton Poetry

1666 Grace Abounding Bunyon Autobio 
1669 Tartuffe Moliere Drama
1679 Pilgrim's Progress* Bunyon Novel
1682 Narrative of Captivity & Restoration(T) Rowlandson Autobio
1690 True End Civil Government Locke History
1700 Way of the World Congreve Drama 
1726 Gulliver's Travels* Swift Novel 
1754 History of England, V.5 Hume History
1757 Songs of Innocence and Experience by Blake/Poetry (British)
1762 Social Contract+ Rousseau History
1773 She Stoops to Conquer Goldsmith Drama
1776 Common Sense (T) Paine Dover History
1776 Decline & Fall of the Roman Empire Gibbon Wormsley(Ab) History
1777 School of Scandal Sheridan Drama

1781 Confessions* Rousseau Autobio 
1791 Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin (T)
1792 Vindication of the Rights of Women+ Wollstonecraft History (British)
1798 Lyrical Ballads* Wordsworth, Cooleridge Poetry (British)
1813 Pride & Prejudice*+ Austen Novel 
1819 Odes* & Poems Keats Poetry (British)
Longfellow Poetry (American)
Tennyson Poetry (British)
Whitman Poetry (American)
1835 Democracy in America* Tocqueville History
1838 Oliver Twist Dickens Novel
1847 Jane Eyre Bronte Novel
1848 The Comunist Manifesto+ Marx&Engel History
1850 The Scarlet Letter* Hawthorne Novel

Modern History (1850 to present)

 ( 87 out of 87)

Rossetti Poetry (British)
1851 Moby-Dick/Melville/Novel
Uncle Tom's Cabin/Stowe/Novel 
1854 Walden/Thoreau/Autobio
1857 Madame Bovary* Flaubert Novel
1860 Civilization of Renaissance Burckhardt History
1861 Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl Jacobs Autobio
1866 Crime & Punishment Dostoyevsky Novel

1850- 1866 * Dickinson Poetry (American)
1872 Dunbar Poetry (American)
1877 Anna Karenina* Tolstoy Novel
1878 Return of the Native Hardy Novel 
1878 Sandburg Poetry (American)
1879 Doll's House Ibsen Drama
1881 Life & Times/Narrative of Frederick Douglass * T Autobio
1881 The Portrait of a Lady* James Novel 
1883 Williams Poetry (American)
1884 The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn* Twain
1895 The Red Badge of Courage Crane Novel
1899 Importance of Being Earnest Wilde Drama
1901 Up From Slavery Washington Autobio
1902 Heart of Darkness* Conrad Novel
1902 Hughes Poetry (American)
1903 Souls of Black Folk DuBois History (American)
1904 Cherry Orchard Chekov Drama
1904 The Protestant Ethic & the Spirit of Capitalism Weber History (German)
1905 House of Mirth Wharton Novel 
1907 Auden Poetry (American)
1908 Ecce Homo Nietzsche Autobio (German)
1913 Poems* Frost Poetry (American)
1921 Queen Victoria Stachey History
1922 Larkin Poetry (British)
1924 St. Joan Shaw Drama
1925 Mein Kampf Hitler Autobio
The Great Gatsby Fitzgerald Novel
Mrs. Dolloway Woolf Novel
The Trial* Kafka Novel 
1929 An Autobiography: The Story of My Experiments with Truth Gandhi Autobio
1932-1963 Sylvia Plath Poetry (American)

(1865-1939) William Butler Yeats (Irish)

Auto of Alice B. Toklas Stein Autobio

Born 1934 Mark Strand Poetry (American)

Born 1929 Adrienne Rich Poetry (American)

1935 Murder in Cathedral T.S. Eliot Drama
1937 The Road to Wigan Pier Orwell History
1938 Our Town Wilder Drama
1939 Seamus Heaney Poetry (Irish)
The New England Mind Miller History 

1940 Long Day's Journey into Night O'Neill Drama
Native Son Wright Novel
1940 Robert Pinsky Poetry (American)
1942 Stranger Camus Novel
1944 No Exit Sartre Drama
1947 A Streetcar Named Desire Williams Drama 
1948 Seven Story Mountain Merton Autobio
1949 1984 Orwell Novel 
Death of a Salesman Miller Drama
1952 Invisible Man Ellison Novel
Waiting for Godot Beckett Drama

1955 The Great Crash Galbraith History 

Surprised by Joy C.S. Lewis Autobio

1956 Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) Poetry (American) (DO NOT RECOMMEND ICK!)

1956 Seize the Day Bellow Novel
1959 The Longest Day Ryan History
1960 A Man for All Seasons Bolt Drama
1963 The Feminine Mystique Frieden History
1965 The Autobiography of + Malcolm X Autobio
1967 One Hundred Years of Solitude Marquez Novel
Rosencrantz & Guildenstein Stoppard Drama
1972 If on a Winter's Night a Traveler Calvino Novel 
1973 Journal of Solitude Sarton Autobio
Gulag Archipelago Solzhenitsyn Autobio
1974 Roll, Jordan, Roll Genovese History

1974 Equus Shaffer Drama 
1977 Born Again Colson Autobio
Song of Solomon Morrison Novel
1978 Distant Mirror Tuchman History

1978 Jan Kenyon (1947-1975) Poetry (American)
1982 Hunger of Memory Rodriguez Autobio
1985 White Noise Delillo Novel

1985 Rita Dove (1952- )Poetry (American)
1987 All the President's Men Woodward & Bernstein History
1988 Battle Cry of Freedom McPherson History
1989 Road from Coorain Conway Autobio
1990 Possession Byatt Novel

A Midwife's Tale Ballard Autobio
1992 The End of History & the Last Man Fukuyama History
1995 All Rivers Run to the Sea Wiesel Autobio

(*ITC, +D overlap, T)

ITC= Invitation to the Classics D=Denby's Great Books T = Thelma's Library

Sunday Morning Peace

I knew the weekend would be packed with people and parties. So, I decided on Thursday night that this would be a morning to be alone with You.

I have no doubt that You are present here. I don't even have Christmas music playing. The silence is comforting. My heart is stirring as I sit here and love my life.

Luke is in the hospital, and I bow in prayer for his safe recovery. Lord, surround him with Your love and comfort as he is in a strange hospital in a foreign country without his mom by his side. Be his comfort and joy this day (or 7:55 pm Sunday night Morocco time).

Be Elizabeth's comfort and joy as she spends her last Sunday at her church before she goes to India on Tuesday. I will miss her so much. The good-bye is bitter-sweet. Corvallis will have a hold, but India and her sister and brother in law will gain a treasure. You know that they need her more than we do.

No doubt in my mind You are present as my fingers go across the keyboard. I have become so comfortable with typing my thoughts. I enjoy writing them too though.

Be Rebekah's comfort and joy as she prepares to leave for Singapore while still grieving the loss of her precious mother. I love her. Wish I could have gone to Salem to the funeral, but I had to be here in Corvallis that day.  You knew that.

Oh be the comfort and joy of two unnamed friends who are struggling. So many tears were shed before my eyes this week. I can offer them your comfort and joy through prayer. May they encounter You today. May they be confronted with Your majesty this minute. Both need clarity and wisdom beyond words. I love them both so much.

Praising You for a lovely family. Travel down to Eugene and back yesterday was lovely. Most families have the most tension in the car, but we love the quality time together. Laughed. Loved that two teenagers would want to go to The Nutcracker to satisfy the 20 year desire of a mom who did The Nutcracker when the almost 20 year old was in her womb. I think they liked it. I sure did!  If for nothing else, five and a half hours of time with my favorite people in the world.  Thank You for that gift.

The quiet will be shattered in about 1/2 hour. I hope I used the time well. I like the alone time even though I love the people time.  Balance is always necessary for me though.

A Few Minutes to Write

I woke up very early, and I wished I would have gotten up, but I forced myself back to a semi-sleep until 6:30.  Michael had oral surgery at 8:00 am in only 38 minutes yesterday and didn't even need to take the heavy duty pain meds, just ibuprofen for inflammation.  He did great!

After that I came back and got my house ready for another Christmas tea with Lisa. I had to make more scones and Christmas ribbon sandwiches, but it was lovely. In the fact, I had a very relational day from 11:45 - 10:15 pm with three different friends coming and going. It was good. Christmas tea and prayer are two very good things, and I had lots of both.

I'm sipping chai in my Donovan's Pottery red-glazed cup. It is festive and Christmas-like. I have loved this season. I love my new Christmas tea pot and cups that match my grandmother's and Christmas tea cozy. Donna also brought me a Christmas colored apron for a hostess gift! So great!

Well, I am off to have time with God. So strange to be at the crucifixion in my gospel reading time when I am at His birth in the season!