Top Ten Tuesday is the weekly meme hosted by the excellent blog The Broke and the Bookish. I wasn’t planning on doing this week’s post, because I couldn’t really think of anything. But I was inspired by some of the things other people mentioned in their lists. So here goes!
1) Have a home library. I’m not talking about a set of bookshelves in the living room. I want an entire room dedicated to books. As a child, we had books in every single room of the house, but imagine how awesome it would be if all those books were in one cozy room. (And if it looked like the library in Beauty and the Beast, well, I wouldn’t complain!)
2) Visit The Wizarding World of Harry Potter. I’ve wanted to visit this place since it opened, but now I think I’ll wait until the new sections of the park are finished. I hope Ollivander saves a wand for me!
3) Read all the Newbery Medal winning books. At one point during college, I had read all but a handful of the Newbery Medal winning books. Now I’m behind and want to get caught up again.
4) Read all the Caldecott Medal winning books. My progress at this is the complete opposite of my Newbery progress in that I’ve read the current winners but never gone back and read the classic winners.
5) Read all the books on my Spring TBR list (last week’s Top Ten Tuesday). I put these lists together, but then usually ignore them completely. I would like to actually complete a list, for once. I’ve read one book, so far (Princess Labelmaker to the Rescue), and I’ve started another (The Taming of the Tights). Progress!
6) Go on a literary trip. A few years ago, I visited England with a friend, and spent a day in Bath. It was glorious! We drank the waters, wandered the Royal Crescent, went to the Jane Austen Centre and had a great time pretending we were in Regency England. I want to do more things like that. (Need to win the lotto first!)
7) Visit all the Presidential Libraries & Museums. This is only tangentially related to books because the museums are really what are open to the public, but I’m counting it anyway. So far, I have visited the three in Texas (Bush 41, Bush 43 and LBJ), and they were all really fascinating in their own way. Ten more to go!
8) Review books for publication. This would be amazing! My only fear is that I am verbose and reviews for publication tend to have strict word limits. My Shelfari reviews (a goal I started this year) are helping me be more succinct, though, so this might actually be possible.
9) Write a Young Adult novel. Someday…
10) Have more fun reading! This is something I have been trying really hard to do this year. In the past, I have spent all my time reading for book clubs or felt compelled to read all the latest YA novels, even if they aren’t my style or prevent me from reading something that really interests me. No more of that! I want to look forward to reading again.
That should be enough for a lifetime, right?