Small Joys of 2021

Thanks to Rae at Powerful Women Readers for tagging me in this fun meme last year. I enjoyed it so much last year (see last year's post here) that I decided to do it this year, too. We are being asked to list 15 Small Joys in our lives, then tag 5 other bloggers who bring us joy. Here goes:

Upper left hand corner, clockwise: My husband and I are fully vaccinated; my wonderful swim class resumes; Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series on Zoom; horse riding at grandson Wyatt's 2nd birthday; baking joys, especially pies; we finally get to visit our son and his wife and her parents in Chicago; our vegetable garden; baking with grandchildren Annie and Wyatt; our new granddaughter, Bailey; we hike in Arkansas; ten year celebration of our book club; the fun of my Little Free Library; new mural in town, viewed on one of our daily walks; a Monarch seen during our weekly butterfly monitoring; and a Carolina Wren seen during Project FeederWatch. 

I tag anyone who would like to reflect upon the small joys of this year, and I leave you with a bit of this lovely poem...

Thanks by W. S. Merwin:

"Listen

with the night falling we are saying thank you

we are stopping on the bridges to bow from the railings

we are running out of the glass rooms

with our mouths full of food to look at the sky

and say thank you..."

Butterflies in Arkansas

We've been participating in butterfly monitoring near our home in Texas for almost a year, so it was almost instinctive to watch for butterflies while we were vacationing in northern Arkansas last fall. Still, we were surprised to find so many butterflies...

Orange Sulphur

Variegated Fritillary

Pearl Crescent

Question Mark

Common Buckeye

Gemmed Satyr

Dainty Sulphur

Northern Pearly-Eye

For more wordless photos, go to Wordless Wednesday.

Best Books I Read In 2021

My Favorite Happiness Books of 2021

Happiness Found in Translation: A Glossary of Joy from Around the World

Yes, And...Daily Meditations by Richard Rohr

Happy Habits

The Atlas of Happiness: The Global Secrets of How to Be Happy

How to Be Happy (Or At Least Less Sad)

Best Kid Book Reads of 2021

Knight's Fee by Rosemary Sutliff

Amber & Clay by Laura Amy Schlitz

When You Trap a Tiger

Merci Suarez Can't Dance by Meg Medina

Alone by Megan E. Freeman

The Little White Horse

Best Travel Books of 2021

Bicycling with Butterflies

The Salt Path by Raynor Winn

Kermit Lynch's Adventures on the Wine Route

The Listening Road by Neil Tomba

Best Healing Books of 2021

The Listening Road by Neil Tomba

Sea Lions in the Parking Lot

Fred Rogers: The Last Interview

The World's Poorest President Speaks Out

The Comfort Book by Matt Haig

If God is Love, Don't Be a Jerk

Best Books-About-Books

Ex Libris: 1001 Books to Read and Reread

Book Girl by Sarah Clarkson

A Swim in a Pond in the Rain by George Saunders

Best Nature Books of 2021

Extraordinary Insects

Bringing Nature Home

The Life Cycles of Butterflies

Gathering Moss

World of Wonders

Best Foodie Books of 2021

Serve It Forth by M.F.K. Fisher

An Alphabet for Gourmets by M.F.K. Fisher

Taste: My Life Through Food by Stanley Tucci

Delicious: Poems Celebrating Street Food Around the World

The Book on Pie

Pie Academy

Best Classics of 2021

The Baron in the Trees by Italo Calvino

A Girl of the Limberlost

David Copperfield

Main Street

Parnassus on Wheels

Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson

Elizabeth and the German Garden

The Pursuit of Love

The Lion by Joseph Kessel

Best Fiction of 2021

The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki

Infinite Country by Patricia Engel

Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi

The Portable Veblen

The Lincoln Highway

Miss Benson's Beetle

Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro

Bewilderment by Richard Powers

My Favorite Nonfiction Reads of 2021

Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West by Dee Brown

The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman

Bringing Nature Home: How You Can Sustain Wildlife with Native Plants by Doug Tallamy

Tyranny of Merit: What's Become of the Common Good? by Michael Sandel

The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It by Robert Reich

A Swim in the Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life by George Saunders

Gathering Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses by Robin Wall Kimmerer

The Disappearing Spoon and Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of Elements by Sam Kean

All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot

Fred Rogers: The Last Interview and Other Conversations by Fred Rogers

Yes, and…Daily Meditations by Richard Rohr

And, finally, 

My Favorite Reads of 2021...

Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro

The Book on Pie

An Alphabet for Gourmets by M.F.K. Fisher

A Swim in a Pond in the Rain by George Saunders

The Listening Road by Neil Tomba

Merci Suarez Can't Dance

Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee

The Guns of August

Happiness Found in Translation

David Copperfield

Yes, And...Daily Meditations

Amber & Clay 

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.   

MON | Dec. 27 – #AMonthofFaves Best Books Read in 2021. What are your favorite “squee” worthy reads from this year?! https://www.girlxoxo.com/

Merry Christmas!

A few of my favorite Christmas photos...

Granddaughter Annie at Christmas

My husband and I with Annie at Christmas

Annie and I

My sons and their families at Christmas

Laughing with Annie at Christmas

Santa and I in 2013

Some of my extended family, with Rudolph on the wall.

"Best libary teacher ever!"

My friend and I after doing the Jingle Bell Run.

Baking Christmas cookies.

Reading "The Night Before Christmas" to the whole school.

Santa...aka, my husband, listening to the wishes of 700+ children at my school.

Annie's first experience with Santa, screaming her head off.

Annie, two years later, still suspicious, but not screaming.

Merry Christmas, everyone! 

I'm happy you joined us here at the Sunday Salon. Sunday Salon is a place to link up and to share what we have been doing during the week. It's a great way to visit other blogs and join in the conversations going on there. 

Some of the things we often talk about at the Sunday Salon:

• What was your week like?
• Read any good books? Tell us about them.
• What other bookish things did you do? 
• What else is going on in your life?

Other places where you may like to link up over the weekend are below. Click on the picture to visit the site.

        

My linkup for Sunday Salon is below. 

Favorite New-to-Me Words of the Year (2021)

 

January.

ichigo ichie...the art of making the most of every moment. From The Book of Ichigo Ichie. My post.

My wabi-sabi house

February.

wabi-sabi...an appreciation of things the way they are; a reveling in the texture and complexity of real life and the beauty of imperfection. From The Atlas of Happiness. My post.

March.

tsunduko...to acquire reading materials and then let them pile up without reading them. My post.

April.

panecitos...little street food breads that come in a variety of shapes and flavors. From Delicious! Poems Celebrating Street Foods from Around the World. My post.

May.

contronyms...a word with two opposite meanings. My post.

June.

eumoirous...happy as a result of being good. From The Superior Person's Second Book of Weird and Wondrous Words. My post.

Modern art from the Centre Pompidou in Paris

July.

modern art...art in which the traditions of the past have been thrown aside in a spirit of experimentation. My post.

My dad, on his 94th birthday, filled with joie de vivre.

August.

joie de vivre...the joy of living. From My Four Seasons in France. My post.

September.

kintsugi...finding value, meaning, and even beauty in our vulnerability and flaws. From Happiness Found in Translation: A Glossary of Joy from Around the World. My post.

Shinrin-roku in Arkansas.

October.

shinrin-roku...forest-bathing. From Renewal: How Nature Awakens Our Creativity, Compassion, and Joy. My post.

November.

nonfiction...the branch of literature comprising works of narrative prose dealing with or offering opinions or conjectures upon facts and reality, including biography, history, and the essay. My post. 

December.

cozy mystery...a mystery that's lighter than a traditional mystery, where the murder takes place off-stage, with an amateur detective in charge of the investigation, and with little violence. My post.

Wondrous Words Wednesday is a weekly meme where you can share new words that you’ve encountered, or spotlight words you love.  Feel free to get creative! It was first created by Kathy over at Bermuda Onion and is now hosted at Elza Reads.

What I Hope Santa Brings

Dear Santa,

It's been a tough year. It's been a tough year that has followed a tough year.

I'd love it if you brought me any of these lovely bookish things...

Unforgettable Journeys: Slow Down and See the World

A Slice of Britain: Around the Country by Cake

The Atlas Cookbook: A Food Adventure

A notebook for writing

A coffee mug, with the first lines of great books on it

A jigsaw puzzle

Baking with Dorie: Sweet, Salty & Simple by Dorie Greenspan

What are you hoping Santa brings you?

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.