Miss Sandy of Quill Cottage is hosting an “I Remember Laura” blogathon on Mondays through the month of June in memory of Laura Ingalls Wilder, author if the “Little House” series of books. There will also be an art swap going on each week in connection with the theme: Click on the picture for more information. Also throughout the month she will be sharing parts of an interview with Laura Ingalls Gunn of Decor to Adore, a fourth cousin of Laura Ingalls Wilder.

Both books and music played a large part in Laura’s upbringing, as Miss Sandy so beautifully explained.

Anyone who has read my blog for very long has noticed I refer to books often. Reading has been a favorite hobby for as long as I can remember, but it has grown to be more than just a hobby: it has greatly impacted my life.

I don’t know quite when my love for books was developed or how it started. I don’t remember my mother reading to me, though she may have. And though both my parents loved reading in their later years, I don’t remember that they read a lot when I was growing up. My earliest distinct reading memory comes from first grade in a parochial school: our class was combined with a second grade class, and I soaked up the reading classes, spurred on by wanting to be up to the level of the “big” second graders. One of our texts was A Child’s Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson and A Child’s Garden of Bible Stories by Arthur Gross. I remember Little Golden Books and good old Dick and Jane readers. I don’t specifically remember reading the Little House books, but I must have, because the stories were familiar to me. I do remember Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. There was one baby-sitter we had whose home seemed to be lined with bookshelves and books: I don’t remember the lady’s name or face at all, but I remember reveling in all those books! I must have been a very easy child for her to watch, with my nose in a book all the time. I remember one book about a girl from England named Merry who had moved to the US but felt out of place when other children made fun of her different words for items and who taught them how to make primrose chains — I wish I could remember the name or author of that book! I’d love to revisit it.

I don’t remember a lot about books in my junior high and early high school years: it was pretty much a vast wasteland of silly romances written for that age group, though I do remember being spellbound by The Robe.

It wasn’t until I got to college that another lady instilled a desire to read missionary biographies in me, and that, next to the Word of God itself, has probably been the greatest impact on my life. Through Gates of Splendor and Shadow of the Almighty by Elisabeth Elliot and her husband’s journals, Amy Carmichael of Dohnavur by Frank Houghton, Hudson Taylor’s Spiritual Secret, By Searching and In the Arena by Isobel Kuhn, Goforth of China and Climbing by Rosalind Goforth were all early favorites whuch have been read over and over again (more are listed here).

Most of my reading now revolves around missionary biographies, catching up on the classics, like Austen and Dickens, that I somehow missed along the way, and Christian fiction. One of the first authors in the last genre that I read was Janette Oke, and I think I have every one of her books. Other include Terry Blackstock, Dee Henderson, Lori Wick, Sharon Hinck, and Jan Karon. Favorites classics are The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis, A Tale of Two Cities and David Copperfield by Charles Dickens, Persuasion by Jane Austen, Les Miserables by Victor Hugo, Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, the Anne of Green Gables series by Lucy Maud Montgomery, and of course the Little House series by Laura Ingalls Wilder.

Music is another great love. Once again, neither of my parents played and instrument and none of my siblings did. I only found out recently that when my mother and her siblings were growing up, her mother did play the piano and their family sang along around the piano as she played. I grew up with “Your Cheatin’ Heart” and other such lovely little ditties. 🙄 Though now that I have been thinking about it, I do remember enjoying Perry Como, Andy Williams, and Eddie Arnold. I remember going to a symphony orchestra concert with the Girl Scouts and peering over the balcony ledge in wonder and awe. I took one semester of piano in college and enjoyed it, but couldn’t fit it into my already-full schedule. I was in various choruses and choirs throughout elementary and high school (the only song I can remember from those years was “They Call the Wind Mariah.”) In a Christian college, exposure to and availability of the classics and good Christian music developed my tastes in music, and in later years I discovered groups like the King’s Singers and the Irish Tenors, and old English, Scottish, and Irish folk songs. I also enjoy old songs (though I don’t know what era they are from) like “Young at Heart,” “The White Cliffs of Dover,” “I’ll Be Seeing You,” “As Time Goes By,” “The Way You Look Tonight.” I also began seeing old musicals and love a lot of the songs from those. One of my first posts was about favorite CDs (Anthems by Brad Wilson, A Quiet Heart by Soundforth, and Sun of My Soul by Brian Pinner and David Chapman are probably the top sacred music favorites; Barber’s Adagio for Strings, Pachelbel’s Canon in D Major, and Smetana’s The Moldau the top classical) here and listed some other favorite classics here.

Both music and books have greatly enriched my life and taught me much about God and the world around me. I am so grateful for these gifts of God in my life!