Wednesday, November 13, 2013

Check Out Other People's Books

Anne over at the wonderful and very thought provoking blog Modern Mrs Darcy is doing a great link up today.

You get to check out other people's bookshelves...and there are no worries that you will look nosey when doing it!

I'll be honest. I always like to see what other people liked reading enough that they put it on their bookshelf. I often get some great suggestions on what I should pick up as my next book. Plus you learn a lot about the other person!

Be sure to check out the other participants by clicking here.

I am sharing this post...an oldy but goody.


I needed to organize my bookshelves.

I do not have a before picture to show you, but let's just say it looked something like this...
 
 

And here is the after...


These bookshelves have been around through four moves and three paint jobs. A couple of the shelves have footprints in the paint from where my then toddler son ran across them, while they were drying on the floor, during one of the repaints. Needless to say these bookshelves and I have been through a lot together, and I love that now the shelves are cleared and organized. It really shows my books off to their best advantages. I also now have the room to add a few extra decorative items to the shelves.

First thing I did was pare down the books to only the ones I truly could not part with. This was so hard to do! It was a bit like having to say good bye to old, dear friends. I kept stopping to read them.

I looked something like this....

The Bookworm by Carl Spitzweg
 
Finally, I had two boxes full of books, and I carted them off to donate to the local Friends of the Library Book Sale.
 
I decided to organize the books roughly by subject. This has really helped me be able to quickly find what I am looking for.
 
 
 
I placed some of the books at different angles to add interest to the shelves.
 
 
My mother gave me this pillow, and it is one of my favorite things.  The glass vase was hand blown at a glass factory near my hometown.
 
 
The organized bookshelves were such an improvement to my living room, that I went to work on the bookshelf in my children's room. 
 
 
 
We mainly group the books here by subject, author or reading level.
 
 
 
Now that our bookshelves look so great, I declared a ban in our house...no more buying books just to be buying books. As a result, I have to really like the book for me to purchase it and put it on my bookshelf. We almost exclusively get all of our books from the public library now. I would love to see the data of which family checks out the most books at our library. I think we would win.

How do you organize your books, and how do you decide which make the cut to put on the shelves?

24 comments:

  1. I love it! I always have such a problem getting rid of books too.

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  2. I love how your shelves look! I know exactly what you mean about how getting rid of books is like saying goodbye to an old friend.

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    1. Thanks...it's nice to hear someone else understands.

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  3. Last year, I finally went through all of my books (still boxed up from our move) and chose my favorites to keep...everything else was sold at a yard sale. It was so hard to choose which ones to part with!

    Your shelves look great! I love arranging books on shelves...I missed my calling as a librarian :)

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    1. Thanks so much. I am sure many of us wish our jobs involved more books!

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  4. Gorgeous! My shelves were quite the mess until last spring. Now they are somewhat categorized.

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    1. Thanks...it's nice to hear someone else categorizes!

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  5. I'm pretty strict about allowing new books into my house too, after moving them several times. I'm like you, I have to REALLY love a book (and plan to re-read it) to keep it around. I love the bookcase in your kids room -- that's an area that I could definitely use more organization.

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    1. Thanks for your comments...It is nice to hear there is someone else out there like me! I would like to say the kid's bookshelves always look like the picture, but well they don't!!!

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  6. Your shelves look amazing! Mine are a disaster area by comparison and I really should tend to them soon. My kids bookshelves? Don't even get me started - I have a four year old and a seven year old so if they are even ON the shelf at all, I'm calling that a win!

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    1. I feel your pain...it took several days of organizing to get the bookshelves to look like the pictures...and especially in the kid's room..alot of continued maintenance!

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  7. I adore that painting of The Bookworm! I'm going to have to track down a copy! I spy some of my favorites on your shelves too and love how your organized them :)

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    1. That painting is one of my all time favorite piece of art. It just speaks to me!

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  8. Very nice. I am definitely in need of a little book organization help.

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  9. Love this! I have nearly-matching bookshelves (sadly empty at the moment, but awaiting the books to return to their rightful place!!), and love their simplicity and versatility. Thanks for sharing :-)

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    1. Thanks so much. You must have good taste in bookshelves!;)

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  10. I love both your before pix and your after pix. Neat, organized books are lovely, but a jumble of well-loved books is, too.

    One way to get rid of books is to lend them to friends. I never lend a book that I couldn't survive losing, so when I lend one, I just figure I'm giving it away.

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  11. No more buying books just to be buying books! Tell me about it. So true! #bookwormproblems

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  12. I must say -- I love the red clay fish. I have a similar blue one on my kitchen window sill. :-)

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    1. Thanks...those are by my favorite artists..my kids.

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