~ Two of my favorite things are knitting and reading, and the evidence of this often shows up in my photographs. I love seeing what other people are knitting and reading as well. So, what are you knitting or crocheting right now? What are you reading? Take a photo and share it either on your blog or on Flickr. Leave a link below to share your photo with the rest of us! ~
I am really motivated to finish my Jet Stream shawl, so once again I set aside my Follow Your Arrow shawl this week. I am starting the fourth and largest section of my Jet Stream and am hoping to finish it soon enough to get a little bit of use out of it before the weather warms up. If not, I’ll have it to look forward to next fall!
I’m reading To Kill a Mockingbird. Maybe I should just stop right there and not write another word, because many if not most of you know how good this book is. I was just commenting to a friend the other night that it’s really too bad that kids end up reading To Kill a Mockingbird in middle or high school because most probably won’t read it again as adults. Of course I immediately contradicted myself when I mentioned wondering if Seth is ready to read it yet. (He’s not.) While I remember liking it when I read it as a teen, I didn’t appreciate it in the same way that I do now. Being in the middle of it, I am pretty deeply in love right now, having strong urges to tell everyone I know that it’s my favorite book now and they need to pick it up and read it too. Thankfully, my book club is reading with me, so I’ll have friends to discuss it with in a couple of weeks. If you haven’t read it, read it! If you haven’t read it since you were a kid, read it again! I’ve been earmarking pages with favorite quotes. Here’s one from Calpurnia: “It’s not necessary to tell all you know.” That is just so true.
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Ginny, I hold that book and all it’s truths so very close to my heart, that we named our second son- Atticus.
Happy Spring to you!
I read To Kill a Mockingbird in 7th grade and HATED it. Almost as much as I hated The Great Gatsby, which I read in middle school and again in high school. I think I was too young at the time to really understand either one of them. But I can’t quite work up the enthusiasm to give them another chance.
My 13-year-old daughter is reading To Kill A Mockingbird, and loves it.
I love the colors you are using for your knitted project. I am in 11th grade and reading To Kill A Mockingbird for school. It one of my favorite books! Happy knitting & enjoy the book!
Realized my website address was incorrect previously.
Just looked at the shawl you are knitting. That will keep you busy. May put it in my queue today.
‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ is my all-time favorite book. I read it every three years or so and I always find something new or something forgotten and rediscovered. ‘A Tree Grows in Brooklyn’ is my second favorite.
I tried linking up last week, but since we moved to Germany, I still am only working off my phone’s hotspot and it could not handle linking. I am not-so-patiently awaiting the arrival of the internet guy as I type! Please hurry up, Mr. Internet Installer!
Never read To Kill A Mockingbird but it sits nicely in my to read list waiting for its turn. I think your shawl looks so soft and warm 🙂
This was the first book I read in high school English and is the book I often choose if I have to pick a favourite. I learned about similes with this book! His hand was as wide as a bed slat…
I have a copy but I have never re-read it. Perhaps I’ll choose it next time it’s my turn for book club, then I can read it with my book club too!
One of my top ten favorite books, for sure! Your yarn color is superb, as well.
I love that you love To Kill A Mockingbird too! I also read it as a teen, but it is the only book from my high school days I have read again (twice!). There’s something about those descriptions of childhood in the South, and so much more… Thank you for sharing your enthusiasm!
I actually read it for the first time last Fall when my grandson read it for his Freshmen English class. I so enjoyed it. So rich! I remember seeing the movie as a child. As always, though, the BOOK is so much better and so much deeper than the 1960’s film could ever be (though all the actors were great). I’m surprise really that they have not made an updated version yet.
i need to knit in grey, looks so beautifully cozy, are you enjoying the pattern? and thank you.
I read it in high school and have loathed it ever since. Now that you said it’s different from an adult perspective, I might give it another chance.
Ginny,
Thanks for the suggestion to read To Kill A Mockingbird. I read it when I was young, so long ago, and to be honest- I only vaguely remember it. I’ll have to pick up a copy the next time I go to the library. I want to read it again.
Love,
Taryn
Lost my English teacher friend to cancer a year ago. Each summer I’d ask for classic book suggestions for my own reading. Seems I didn’t even touch on all the good stuff growing up! This was one of my favorites..
I think you’ll be able to wear that shawl in my neighborhood until July 4th! Single digit temps and snow again last night. So. Over. Winter!!
It’s a wonderful book. I had never read it until I was teaching English in a high school which had it as part of the required curriculum for ninth-graders. When I was in high school, I took funky honors/interdisciplinary English and history classes in which we read all kinds of interesting literature from every part of the world, but disappointingly, not enough good American classics like TKAM.
“am hoping to finish it soon enough to get a little bit of use out of it before the weather warms up” … if your Northern Virginia weather is as crazy as our NC Piedmont weather (yesterday, snow “storm” with thunder & lightning – today, gorgeous sunshine and a high of almost 50!), you may have many opportunities to wear your beautiful shawl!
So funny that you’re reading a high school classic…I made a list several months ago of the books I had to read in high school and have put them all in my Wish List on Amazon. It’s amazing how much I enjoy the books now (especially since I don’t have to STUDY them and write PAPERS and do PROJECTS) – I think that life experiences help me to appreciate the books as well.
I honestly don’t remeber ever reading To Kill A Mockingbird. I’m putting it on my books to read list.
I read To Kill a Mockingbird for the first time in 5th grade for a book report and loved it so much! I have re-read it several times and love it just as much as I did when I was a girl.
I was just thinking about reading To Kill A Mocking Bird again. We were away at the weekend and we watched the film for the millionth time with friends and noticed things I hadn’t before. I so love Atticus, he would be the perfect father, oh and Scout. She’s so spunky…
enjoy re-reading.
debx
“To Kill a Mockingbird” changed my world. No wonder Harper Lee never wrote another book. To write that one masterpiece is all anyone could or should ever ask of her!
Thanks for hosting Yarn Along Ginny!
Blessings,
G
Your shawl is looking great. I agree that you need to read To Kill a Mockingbird at least once as an adult. Enjoy and thanks for hosting Yarn Along.
I wanted to ask you a question about your knitting. Do you only knit with wool and how do you choose your fiber? I usually only knitting with natural fibers and started two cotton projects this week (a baby sweater and a summer scarf). It’s not as enjoyable as knitting with wool, but my family can only use so many wool items, especially since we live in the west. But then I also remembered that cotton as a crop uses a lot of water (in places where water is scarce) and is heavily sprayed with pesticides and defoliates. Maybe I better stick with wool or bamboo?
I should really read To Kill a Mockingbird as an adult. I think you are spot on; we read it once in high school and then never pick it up again!
TKaM is quite possibly one of my favorite books. I have read it many times, and each time I notice something new or see something I missed. Harper Lee so skillfully crafts this book to truly immerse you in that little town. I too am slogging through my arrow. This is in no fault the designer’s. I just seemed stalled.
Thanks for hosting!
To Kill a Mockingbird is my all time, absolutely most favorite book. If I were stranded on a deserted island and only had one book to read, it would be that one. Every time I read it I find myself laughing at the same points, feeling sad at the same things and getting angry at the same injustices. That book and I have a wonderful, comfortable relationship.
I feel the same way about having read To Kill a Mockingbird while in high school. I missed so much. Last year after my sister played Miss Maudie in the stage play I reread the book. It is even more moving to read it as a grown woman and even more so as a mother.
I read To Kill a Mockingbird with my son this year as part of our history lesson [Beautiful Feet] and then we watched the movie with Gregory Peck, good too.
There are so many books that should be read in childhood and then in adulthood. I read all of the Laura Ingalls Wilder books as a girl and then again about 1 year ago. The Long Winter was a really difficult read as an adult- My boys and I are getting ready to start reading By the Shores of Silver Lake and I’m trying to not be a chicken about letting them continue to The Long Winter when we get there.
I have been re-reading a lot of books lately that I read in school, and sometimes thinking that I would have enjoyed the material more if I wouldn’t have HAD to read it.
What a gorgeous shawl!! I was just thinking, yesterday in fact! that I read so many classics in high school, but didn’t enjoy them. I think a lot of that is because of the “projects” we were supposed to have done with them. My goal is to start re-reading many of them now!
Your gray is so beautiful. I knit mostly with vibrant colors because that’s what I tend to be drawn to but when I see the natural colors of your WIPs I always think “Now why didn’t I go with gray” or cream or whatever color you’re currently using. You have incredible choice of yarn color for your different projects.
I fall in the category of having read that book in high school but never since. I liked it a lot then but probably would understand and relate to it in totally different ways now! Thanks for the recommendation.
Oh, one of my favorite books! I need to find my copy & read it again… xo
I read To Kill A Mockingbird again a couple of years ago. It is still wonderful, although I didn’t like the part about the elderly lady across the street verbally abusing the children, and Atticus made excuses for her. I don’t think it’s good to teach children that it’s OK to act that way just because we are old. I did some reading about the author and found out that she was childhood friends with Truman Capote, who was her model for the character Dill. I thought that was very interesting.
Haven’t read To Kill a Mockingbird in quite awhile, but it is one of my all-time favorites. I’ve read it many times since high school and I always find something new to appreciate. I still remember the first time I read it in high school–as I finished the book my heart was pounding out of my chest in the scene where Scout makes her way home in the dark in her ham costume.
It’s me again – somehow I can’t add my link today. So I put it here:
http://zauberflink.blogspot.de/2014/03/yarn-along-baby-cardigan.html
Lena
Isn’t it so great to re-read books and find all those hidden gems you missed last time? Re-reading also shows you how much you’ve developed and how you pick out different notions and ideas, I think – I love that! Thanks for reminding me to read this book again!
Lena
I’ve read that book once as a teen and twice as an adult and you are right it is such a good book! I’ve wondered why she only wrote one. I love the story and the feeling of the warm weather of the south. Both of my kids loved that book as well and each of them have read it more than once!! Now I’m off to check your jetstream shawl 🙂