Wear the old coat, buy the new book

Love the title of this thread! I do want to put a positive plug in for the library. I agree that the shelves are full of less-than-stellar literature, but when I sit down with my umpteen booklists to request books, most of them are still there. Libraries are still very valuable, in my opinion. Make sure that you request books that you want them to carry! They won’t purchase them all, but I continue to request purchases and every once in a while, they will buy it.

As an aside, I enjoy using the library to preview books before I buy. Some I enjoy just as a library book, but others I know I want to purchase.

I should add that I love the library, too!

I could spend hours browsing & reading there. It’s just that I find less gold & more fool’s gold these days. 

It’s also just too much of a challenge for me to get my school books there when I need them for a specific date or an extended time. I’m too much of a planner to be that flexible with my schedule and not enough of one to request far enough ahead of time. It’s just easier if it’s on my shelf.

I agree that we need to request the library purchase quality books, too.

Christie

I almost weekly check out all the Goodwill stores in a 20 mile radius.   Children’s Paperbacks are only 0.75 cents.  My recent finds include Pyramids and City by David McCauley and Genevieve Foster’s Augustus Caesar’s World.  I have also gotten The Bronze Bow, The Golden Goblet, Usborne Science and Nature Books.  It seems Goodwill is especially great for Older books.

Also, there are many used book sales throughout the country.  I belong to an alert service called booksalefinder and when the kids were little, that was our weekend amusement–cruising the used sales in our area.  Now that I have so many books we don’t spend as much time–I often have a few I’m looking for rather than boxloads I want.  But I don’t even know what percentage of our library I paid a quarter for at a used book sale.  A lot!  Today I tend to rely more on paperbackswap.com or other used sites for that one or two books I really think I need. 

We have bookshelves wedged into most rooms of our house.  Except the bathrooms–too damp.  LOL I am considering lining our narrow hallway with shelves.  After all, what’s more important–books or space to walk straight down the hallway?  Nobody’ll mind turning sideways and sidling down the hall, will they?  :-p All the bedrooms are filled with shelves, so is the office, all spare wall space in the living room, and we eat in the kitchen because the formal dining room is commonly referred to as the “bookroom”  –wall to wall shelves. 

We scour Half Price Books when we visit family and we also have a local used book store we sometimes go to.  I also have several websites I frequent for used books.  I ask for gift certificates for my birthday/Christmas.  Last Christmas (2008) our present to the family was bookshelves that line our living room (from IKEA).  My closest library is 15 minutes away and not practical for us.  We would have late fees, and just plain wouldn’t go.  While my kids are this young, I want them to have books on hand.  I really love having books on hand.  It’s like a favorite pair of jeans or comfy blanket to go pick up good book off the shelf and read it again.  I imagine us using the library a little more when they are older and can look around more on their own, but I think we will always own most of our books.

I have a question.  I have been converting over to CM style.  We already have the 106 day’s and love it, Boy of the Pyramid’s, copywork, SW, etc.  But, I’m kind of stuck when it comes to good books that are NOT on the book lists that I’ve made.  I have a list for all 3 boys (11, 7, 4) and have found some at the library, amazon, used book stores, etc., and have a pretty good memory, so if it’s not on the lists I can pretty much tell. But my problem is when it’s not on the list at all I’m stump as to if I should spend the $1.00-$3.00 for a book that I’m not sure would be considered a good quality book.  Does anyone have “rule of thumb” when it comes to choosing books??  Besides going by the author, would you consider the date to be relevant in your choice? I’m just now familiarizing myself with authors and book titles that I’ve seen on this site, but sometimes I feel like someone on What Not to Wear.  She picks out a great outfit then puts it back cause she’s just not sure:(  I wonder if I have put back good, hard to find books that someone else would be totally excited to find.  For an example:  I was at a used book/antique store and there were many books that were dated 50’s, 60’s, 70’s, etc and I thought they were good finds but they were not on any of my lists.  I guess I hate to spend the money and take up the much needed space for the REALLY good finds.  I did find: Louie, by Ezra Keats (sp), 5 Golden books from the 50’s or something, Charlotte’s Web (can get at the library and I have boys), something by a Steven Kellogg, I think, anyway there were about 5 I was considering, but just wasn’t sure. 

Now, I did find some on my lists at this other bookstore and the Goodwill, so I was happy with those and I know I can always hit amazon, but then there’s the shipping.  When you can find something for .50, I’m pretty much sold.  I did order, from amazon, all the books and videos for 106 days so I would have all I needed and wanted to use (unless it was way too expensive and the library had it) and I’m glad I bought all of those as it has taken us awhile to get through the lessons.  Plus, the boys, even my 11yo likes the books, which is a blessing:)

Hope this makes sense.  Thanks in advance.

Thank you, Christie.  I have 3 pretty good lists going so far in a sheet protector and take it with me EVERYWHERE.   I have done the *search* online from the library, but there are times that I really want to own the books, so we can take our time mostly. Oh, and from these lists the library has about 2/3 available.  So, if I ever want them I’m going to have to look elsewhere.  Or get them to borrow from another library. 

My 7yo and I began reading Charlotte’s Web awhile ago and I honestly don’t know why he wasn’t all in to it.  He usually likes everything, but I think I’m going to get it again in the future and just finish where we left off.  My oldest, 11,  asked earlier if we could start Johnny Tremain, so of course I said, yes.  We just read the first chapter.  Sometimes he likes me to read to him and that makes for some great one on one time.   I feel so lucky that he finds that enjoyable!