The Sunday Salon: Northern Cardinal Chicks, Butterflies and Bees, an Alligator, and Some Gulf Coast Toads

 

Welcome! We're glad you're here at the Sunday Salon. 

What is the Sunday Salon? 

The Sunday Salon is  a great opportunity to visit other blogs and join in the conversations going on there. It's also a place to link up and share what we've been doing during the week.

Swimming. Reptile shows at the libraries. (Yes, that's an alligator, with his mouth taped during the show for safety). A Pollinator BioBlitz. I couldn't wait for Paris in July and I went ahead and read The Razor's Edge and Four Seasons in France, both of which have chapters that take place in Paris.A busy, happy week.

What I Read Last Week:

My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life by Janine Marsh (Memoir)

The Razor's Edge by W. Somerset Maugham (Fiction)

In the Mountains by Elizabeth von Arnim (Fiction)

What I'm Reading Now:

Beyond Words: What Animals Think and Feel by Carl Safina (Book Club Nonfiction)

My Friends by Frederik Bachman (Book Club Fiction)

Paris in July begins this weekend, and, happily, Emma of Words and Peace is hosting again this year.

The aim of the month is to celebrate our French experiences through reading, watching, listening, observing, cooking, and eating all things French.

There are no rules or targets in terms of how much you need to do or complete in order to be a part of this experience – just blog about anything French and you can join in. Some ideas might include:

• reading a French-themed book – fiction or nonfiction;
  
• watching a French movie;
  
• listening to French music;
  
• cooking French food;
  
• experiencing French, art, architecture, and travel;
• tasting French wine, or testing French cocktails;
• celebrating le quatorze juillet or Bastille Day.

Whatever it is that you love about France---share it with us all. And pass the word...

I finished my fifth Classics Club list of fifty books, and I will be starting my sixth list today. I've now finished 250 classics since I first joined The Classics Club in January of 2018. There is nothing I have done, reading-wise, that felt more daunting, and there is nothing that has given me more satisfaction. 

I encourage you to join, too. Challenge yourself by making a list of fifty classics you would like to try to read in five years. What is a classic? There is no official definition. I've read classic novels, classic memoirs, classic nature books, classic poetry, classic plays, classic children's books, classic mysteries, classic travel books, classic science fiction. Most people tend to think of classics as books that have been around a while, but there is no set time frame. You decide on books you want to include on your list. And if you don't finish in five years, that's fine, too...extend the deadline...change out your list of books...whatever you need to do to keep going. 

Here's my list of books I've read over the last eight years. There are links to my reviews (such as they are---I'm not a professional reviewer) and I include my rating for each book in the list. You might get some ideas there, or there's The Big Book List at The Classics Club blog for other ideas. 

What I Posted Last Week Here at Readerbuzz:

The Book of Birds: A Field Guide to Wonder and Loss by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris: Book Beginnings on Fridays, First Line Friday, The Friday 56, and Book Blogger Hop

Am I Just Imagining It? Or Do I Hear...French Music?

The Sunday Salon: 18 Years of Blogging

I began to list 3 Good Things every day during the pandemic. Now I've established a regular routine of writing down my 3 Good Things. Here are 3 Good Things from last week:

Good Thing #1:

We had a Northern Cardinal nest and 

a Carolina Wren nest in our yard this year. 

Here's the Northern Cardinal dad feeding his chicks.

Good Thing #2:

My favorite photo of butterflies 

from the Pollinator BioBlitz, 

a Long-tailed Skipper.

Good Thing #3:

We were also delighted to find several

Gulf Coast Toads living in our yard this week.

Weekend linkup spots are listed below. Click on the picture to visit the site.

        

I hope you will join the linkup for Sunday Salon below.

The Book of Birds: A Field Guide to Wonder and Loss by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris: Book Beginnings on Fridays, First Line Friday, The Friday 56, and Book Blogger Hop

                     

Today's Featured Book: 

The Book of Birds: 

A Field Guide to Wonder and Loss

by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris

Genre: Nonfiction

Published: June 9, 2026

Page Count: 384 pages

Summary: 

The Book of Birds is a field guide with a difference: It shows readers not just how to identify birds, but also how to identify with them. Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris conjure the unique spirit of nearly fifty once-common species: avocet to yellowhammer, kestrel to kingfisher, skylark to nightingale. In lyrical and incantatory essays, Macfarlane describes each bird’s habits and habitats, their patterns of flight and patterns of song, how they hunt or fish or scavenge or gather, how they nest and raise their chicks, the myths that attend them, the threats that shadow them―and how their lives intersect with our own. On every page we encounter Morris’s exhilarating artwork, painted from life in watercolor and gold leaf, and animated with an extraordinary attention to detail. The Book of Birds is a love letter to the thrilling variety and mysteries of birdlife, and a clarion call to halt the rapid depletion of our skies.

 

BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAY is hosted by Rose City Reader. What book are you happy about reading this week? Please share the opening sentence (or so) on BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAY! Add the link to your blog or social media post and visit other blogs to see what others are reading.

Happy Friday and welcome to the FIRST LINE FRIDAY, hosted by Reading is My Superpower! It’s time to grab the book nearest to you and leave a comment with the first line.

A great thinning of the skies is under way. There are three billion fewer birds in North America than half a century ago. Five hundred million fewer in Europe. Seventy-three million fewer in Britain. Worldwide, almost 50 per cent of bird species are in decline. That which was once called 'common' is becoming rare: the 'common eider' is now in the same global conservation category as the jaguar. Dawns and springs are quieter; the air, emptier. An ancient avian orchestra is falling silent. An almost unimaginable abundance has been lost.

THE FRIDAY 56 is hosted by Anne of Head Full of Books. To play, open a book and turn to page 56 (or 56% on your e-reader). Find a sentence or two and post them, along with the book title and author. Then link up on Head Full of Books and visit others in the linky. 

Pages 56-57

The Book of Birds is everything that we bird-y folk love: Information. Illustrations. Beauty. Cleverness. Wonder. And, of course, birds.

It's a book of birds, told in magnificent poetry-prose, depicted with magnificent illustrations.

It's a field guide organized by the wonders of birds: their nests, their eggs, their beaks, their songs, their feathers, their flights, and their migrations. The book highlights fifty bird species that were once common and are now less common.

If you are already in love with birds, you will come away from this book feeling obsessed with birds.

I lingered over this book for three months. I did not want to get to the end.

The purpose of THE BOOK BLOGGER HOP is to give bloggers a chance to follow other blogs, learn about new books, and befriend other bloggers. THE BOOK BLOGGER HOP is hosted by Ramblings of a Coffee Addicted Writer.    

Do you prefer writing long, detailed reviews or quick, punchy ones? (submitted by Billy @ Coffee-Addicted Writer)

I write review for myself. I like to make notes about books, list a quote or two, and remind myself of the plot or main ideas.

Am I Just Imagining It? Or Do I Hear...French Music?

 

 Paris in July 2026

#parisinjuly2026 (Bluesky, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter)

Am I just imagining it? Or do I hear...French music? Are those French books I see in my current TBR stack? Have I been carefully searching for French movies to watch? And why are there bookmarks in my French cookbooks? 

Could it be...is it time again for...Paris in July?!

Hurray!

Yes, Paris in July begins soon, and, happily, Emma of Words and Peace will be hosting again this year.

The aim of the month is to celebrate our French experiences through reading, watching, listening, observing, cooking, and eating all things French.

There are no rules or targets in terms of how much you need to do or complete in order to be a part of this experience – just blog about anything French and you can join in. Some ideas might include:

• reading a French-themed book – fiction or nonfiction;
  
• watching a French movie;
  
• listening to French music;
  
• cooking French food;
  
• experiencing French, art, architecture, and travel;
• tasting French wine, or testing French cocktails;
• celebrating le quatorze juillet or Bastille Day.

Whatever it is that you love about France---share it with us all. And pass the word...

So what are my plans for Paris in July? Here are some of the things I might do...

I have access to several adult books I might read:

The Earth by Émile Zola 

Paris Metro Tales by Ruth Paget 

Eat Post Like by Emily Arden Wells

Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes by Robert Louis Stevenson

Moveable Feasts: The Story of Paris in 20 Meals by Chris Newens

The French Kitchen by Kristy Cabron

The Paris Match by Kate Clayborn

The Paris Bookshop for the Brokenhearted by Rebecca Raisin

The French Ingredient by Jane Bertch

Eleanor of Avignon by Elizabeth DeLozier

Impossible City: Paris in the 21st Century by Simon Kuper

All Signs Point to Paris by Natasha Sizio

The Shortest History of France by Simon Jones

My Four Seasons in France by Janine Marsh

A Short Walk Through a Wide World by Douglas Westerbeke

France: An Adventure History by Graham Robb

Satori in Paris by Jack Kerouak

I have four books in French I could read in July. All of them are from the 1001 Children's Books You Must Read list: 

L'Enfance de Bécassine

Les Six Compagnons

Les pilleurs de sarcophages

Oh, boy!; Quatre sœurs. 

I also have Candide, a group read with Emma and others during Paris in July.

I have some children's books I've saved for July: 

The War of the Buttons by Louis Pergaud

Claudine and the Bridge of Two Hearts by Marian Grudko

Anthony and the Gargoyle by Jo Ellen Bogart

A Pigeon in Paris by Paige Howard

I shall dial Duolingo to French for the month and browse 50 French Phrases; 15-Minute French; and Say It Right in French.

I have a lovely French music playlist.

I have some French films and tv series at the ready: 

Arco (Hulu)

The Rules of the Game: La règle du jeu (Kanopy)
Monsieur Hulot's Holiday: Les vacances de Monsieur Hulot (Kanopy)
Cousin Jules: A Farmer Living in the French Countryside (Kanopy)

Maigret (Kanopy)

Paris When It Sizzles (Kanopy)

The Last Time I Saw Paris (Amazon Prime)

A New Kind of Love (Amazon Prime)

Three Colors: Blue (HBO/Max)
Three Colors: Red (HBO/Max)
Three Colors: White (HBO/Max)

I shall revisit my favorite museums in Paris:

Musée d’Orsay

Centre Pompidou

And, maybe, just maybe, I will try to do some French baking.

I hope you will be joining in, too.

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. Each Tuesday That Artsy Reader Girl assigns a topic and then post her top ten list that fits that topic. You’re more than welcome to join her and create your own top ten (or 2, 5, 20, etc.) list as well. Feel free to put a unique spin on the topic to make it work for you! Please link back to That Artsy Reader Girl in your own post so that others know where to find more information.   

 

The Sunday Salon: 18 Years of Blogging

 

We are very glad that you joined us here at the Sunday Salon. Welcome!

What is the Sunday Salon? 

The Sunday Salon is a place to link up and share what we have been doing during the week. It's also a great opportunity to visit other blogs and join in the conversations going on there. 

Tropical Storm Arthur passed through this week. We got four inches of rain in one day, but it drained off quickly and we did not suffer any damage. 

I read almost nothing until I got home from taking care of chickens, but days of rain have allowed me to catch up on my reading this week. I'm happy to have read all nine of the Little House books at last, and I loved the new Elizabeth Strout book.

What I Read Last Week:

These Happy Golden Years by Laura Ingalls Wilder (Little House #8)

The First Four Years by Laura Ingalls Wilder (Little House #9)

Annie Knows Everything by Rachel Wood (Fiction)

The Things We Never Say by Elizabeth Strout (Fiction)

Make Life Happier by Mark Williamson (Nonfiction)

Lost Horizon by James Hilton (Classic)

Autumn Journal by Louis MacNeice (Poetry)

The Solitary Summer by Elizabeth von Arnim (Classic Club Spin)

What I'm Reading Now:

Beyond Words: What Animals Think and Feel by Carl Safina (Nonfiction)

My Friends by Fredrik Backman (Book Club; Fiction)

What I Posted Last Week Here at Readerbuzz:

The Sunday Salon: Heart-Shaped Bruise

The Things We Never Say by Elizabeth Strout: Book Beginnings on Fridays, First Line Friday, The Friday 56, and Book Blogger Hop

I began to list 3 Good Things every day during the pandemic. Now I've established a regular routine of writing down my 3 Good Things. Here are 3 Good Things from last week:

Good Thing #1:

It's my 18th blogoversary!

Good Thing #2:

We are sharing alligators 

with kids

for the summer reading program

at the library.

Good Thing #3:

Despite the rain, I was able to enjoy

Aqua Zumba and Aqua Aerobics

at the swimming pool a few times this week.

Weekend linkup spots are listed below. Click on the picture to visit the site.

        

I hope you will join the linkup for Sunday Salon below.