This year Anna Ruth decided to make bookmarks for some of us as stocking stuffers. They were all inspired by some of our favorite books, and they all greatly pleased their recipients.
Here we have General Anna: 160 (By Hand) from The Pushcart War of course. This is an oft-referenced classic on our house, but sadly I see it seems to be out of print currently. (Jonathan remarked, Of course it's out of print - it's a good book! Harumph.) We have an old vintage copy with the wonderful illustrations by Ronni Solbert. I do think Anna did a fabulous job capturing the spirit of the General in action with her little smirk. They certainly don't call her General for nothing.
Next we have a marvelous rendition of The Three Spinning Fairies from the Brothers Grimm. Michael had been reading some fairy tales and he enjoyed this one so much he read it aloud to the whole family, so he was quite tickled with his bookmark from Anna. Such a great story. Such a great picture!
Mary Rose received a bookmark featuring everyone's favorite Spacegirl, Zita delivering one of their favorite lines. (You of course have to waggle your fingers like tentacles while you say it.)
Josiah received this most clever depiction of The Fellowship of the Ring - A Foot Shot. How does she think of these things? I love it.
This is the bookmark I received - a familiar scene from The Two Towers in which Sam and Frodo discover the wonders of real elvish rope. Naturally the quote is from the book, not the movie, which has neither ninny-hammers nor noodles. Roast chicken, yes. Noodles, no.
And finally we have Jonathan's bookmark, which is actually double sided. It features two quotes from Tolkien's Letters in which he is discussing the avoidance of modern sounding speech in The Lord of the Rings. Here he is giving an example of what a modern Theoden would sound like, which is of course not how Tolkien has him speaking in the book.
And on the reverse is another quote featuring 'Real modern English' as Tolkien called it. He's continuing his discussion of how the language and style he uses complement the grand and heroic nature of the deeds and characters he writes about. Real mod. E. just wouldn't do.
There you have it - little bits of paper transformed into fabulous pieces of artwork to delight and amuse the giftees. One of our favorite kinds of gifts!
