Smiling Shelves may go quiet for a while after she's born, but it's my plan to come back eventually and keep blogging. I love this bookish community too much to let it go. Until then, posts will continue as normal.

We're all very excited to meet her in a few months. My little guy has the most adorable way of saying "sister." :​) And I can't wait to introduce the world of books to another child!

I love living in Michigan, where we have four distinct seasons. What I don't like so much is this in-between season time. Nearly sixty degrees one day, but thirty degrees and snow the next. So confusing and hard to plan ahead. But at least those occasional warm days mean spring is not too far away!

Surprised by Oxford by Carolyn Weber (This was a wonderful memoir of finding faith and love at Oxford University.)

The Language of Thorns by Leigh Bardugo (This book is gorgeous and so good!)
Tribute to Brunei and Other Poems by John Onu Odihi (Onto the next country for my Litsy Passport Challenge.)
Daniel Deronda by George Eliot (I'm on page 325 of 710. Should be over halfway by next week!)

Travels with Charley by John Steinbeck (I really liked Steinbeck's writing in The Grapes of Wrath, so I'm looking forward to this one.)

Last week, I shared how I had spent some time reorganizing my bookshelves. I included lots of pictures, if you are interested in checking out that post.

Once I was done with that project, I realized I wasn't quite finished with what I wanted to do with my books. Two years ago for Christmas, my in-laws gave me a four-drawer card catalogue. It's been a wonderful decoration in my library since then, but I was ready to make it useful.

So I catalogued my library.

Then I had my amazing husband use his fancy knowledge of Microsoft Office to turn my spreadsheet into a set of alphabetized note cards for each category.

And once they were all printed out (which took a surprisingly long time), I put them in my card catalogue! The left side is for fiction, the top drawer being my read books and the bottom being my unread books. The right side is for nonfiction. My goal is to move all of the cards from the bottom drawers into the top, although I know that's going to be pretty much unachievable, since I'm sure I'll be adding new books to them.

That means that I have a total of 979 books. I have read 56% of the fiction books and 30% of the nonfiction books. Over all, I've read 47% of my books. I was really hoping it would turn out to be at least more than 50% read, but now I have my first goal to aim for!

As I type this post on Sunday afternoon, I'm watching cross-country skiing. Sadly, by the time you read this post on Monday, the Olympics will be over. I'm really looking forward to watching the Closing Ceremonies tonight, but sad that I will no longer be able to have the Olympics as the background of my life every afternoon and evening. I love everyone's stories and the way they draw the whole world together. Now just another two years until we can do this all again!

The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah (This was my February book club book, and we had our meeting on Friday. There was lots to discuss, and we all agreed that we loved this one.)
Paperboy by Vince Vawter (I have now read all the 2014 Newbery Honor books. My first Newbery goal of the year accomplished! Now I have to read all of this year's Honor books, and the winners from the 1970s. Yay for Newberys!)

Man and Superman by George Bernard Shaw (Other than Act 3 being completely different than Acts 1 & 2, I'm enjoying this one. I love his wit.)
Greenwitch by Susan Cooper (I can't believe I never read this series as a kid, fantasy lover that I was. Glad I'm remedying that now!)
​Daniel Deronda by George Eliot (I'm on page 272 out of 710. I'm hoping to reach page 300 by the end of the month.)

Surprised by Oxford by Carolyn Weber (This has been on my TBR for two years. Out of the blue, one of my friends read the book, told me it made her think of me, and let me borrow her copy. I'm really looking forward to reading it!)

I've known for quite a while that my personal library needed a major overhaul. I decided to finally tackle that this year. I started by going through all my shelves and purging books that I would never read or that I had read and didn't need to keep. I ended up giving three boxes of books to the used bookstore by my mom's house, six boxes to Goodwill, and I added a stack to my Little Free Library stash. I have to admit that I was pretty proud of this, because in the past, I found it incredibly hard to get rid of any books. I guess you just have to be in the right mood!

After purging, I decided to reorganize. I don't go all-in and alphabetize all my books or anything. That would be an insanely big project, especially with a one-year-old following behind me to undo everything I did. But I tried to loosely group books by genre or subject. And I just love the way it all turned out, so I wanted to share it here with all you fellow book nerds!

This is the shelf of my favorite books and authors, everything from C.S. Lewis to Adriana Trigiani. Not too much changed on this shelf in my reorganization process. I did demote a few books and moved them to a different shelf, and there was a stack that got promoted to this shelf. But other than that, it's the same. My favorites don't change too much. :​)

This shelf got cleared off completely, and the vast majority of the books were given away. Now it's my middle grade and young adult shelf! This is the set of shelves right next to my comfy chair. I love glancing up at it as I read. Middle grade books are the best. My only problem is that it's already full. . .​ 

The top half of this bookshelf holds my collection of travel narratives. Yeah, I have a lot. I love traveling, both in real life and vicariously. I organized these by country/continent, which means that I now know that the majority of my travel books are set in France, Italy, and the U.K. Hmm, the three European places I've been to the most. Coincidence?

The bottom two shelves hold books about books and such.

These shelves are only sort of organized. The top shelf is all my books about music (yup, music geek here). Then I have pretty, old-looking books. Then most (but not all) of the remaining books are nonfiction.

Other than the pretty, old-looking books mentioned above, these shelves hold my classics, along with some other assorted books and series that had no other place. The hole in the middle shelf is where my son pulled books from to amuse himself during this photo shoot. :​)

This is my Christian fiction section. My husband actually added a third shelf to this set of bookshelves for me, and it's still crammed full. You can barely see it, but on the second shelf, there are two horizontal books above the rest. It's the only spot in my library where that happened. Also this and the middle grade section are the spots where I'm in the most trouble if I buy new books. There is no more room, but these are the sections I'm most likely buy books for!

And finally, these two shelves are mostly fiction, sorted by author as much as possible. This is where my new acquisitions go, if they don't have an already designated section.

So there's my library! It was so much fun to spend hours organizing it. My little guy and I would spend about an hour or so after lunch up there every day moving things around. Now he likes to stand in the middle of the room, spin in circles, and say, "Books, books, books!" :)

This wasn't quite the end of my project, either. Once everything was organized, I cataloged it all. Hee hee. I'll save that project, along with its glorious statistics, for another post!

So I've been working for the past month or so on reorganizing my bookshelves (including getting rid of a bunch of books) and cataloging what remained. It's been so much fun!! My one-year-old son helped, too, by pulling books off the shelves every time I had my back turned. :) At any rate, the process is finally over and I'm excited to share about it. Stay tuned for a big blog post about my revamped library!

Full Moon Over Noah's Ark: An Odyssey to Mount Ararat and Beyond by Rick Antonson (This was a really interesting book about traveling in the Middle East.)
​Hello, Universe by Erin Entrada Kelly (This year's Newbery winner! I enjoyed it, but wasn't over the moon about it.)

The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah (My book club book that I need to finish by Friday. It's so good, but so long!)
One Came Home by Amy Timberlake (2014 Newbery Honor book)
Daniel Deronda by George Eliot (I'm on page 222 out of 710.)

Man and Superman by George Bernard Shaw (Another one from my Classics Club list. I loved reading Pygmalion, so I'm looking forward to trying another one of Shaw's plays.)

On Monday, the American Library Association announced the winners of the Newbery and Caldecott Medals for this year, along with the Honor books. I watched part of the live broadcast, which was a fun way to participate. For anyone participating in the 2018 Newbery Reading Challenge, every one of these books counts towards your point total! If you're not participating, feel free to sign up, or just enjoy reading these books!

The ALA also has many other awards, including the Coretta Scott King award, the Michael L. Printz award for YA books, the Theodor Seuss Geisel award for beginning readers, and the Odyssey award for children's/YA audiobooks. Check out the press release to see all of the amazing books that won all of these amazing awards this year!

It's Olympics time! I love watching the Olympics, and the Winter Olympics happening right now are on as the background in my house as much as possible. Although my little guy is finding that much TV to be pretty distracting, so sometimes we turn it off so we don't turn into couch potatoes. After his bedtime, though, it's time for the Olympics!

The Interrupted Tale by Maryrose Wood (I love this series!)
The Burning Page by Genevieve Cogman (I love this series, too! Both series just keep getting better!)

Full Moon Over Noah's Ark: An Odyssey to Mount Ararat and Beyond by Rick Antonson (This is a fascinating book about an area of the world I know very little about.)
Daniel Deronda by George Eliot (Page 179 out of 710)

The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah (My book club book for February. I'm so looking forward to this one!)

I don't often plan out my reading for a month, but I'm trying to make as much progress on my challenges and Classics Club list as I can in the first half of the year. So at the beginning of February, I found myself with a stack of books that I wanted to read during the month. I'm a bit worried about finishing it all, but I certainly hope to! I thought I would share it here for a little encouragement. :​)

It would have been great if this was a leap year - I could really use an extra day this month!
​What books are you hoping to read in the month of February?

It's snowing!! I'm typing this post on Sunday, and it's been snowing since the middle of the night. We've gotten about five inches so far, and it's still coming down. I'm guessing there will be a snow day tomorrow (always nice for the day after the Superbowl). I'm ready to stay cozy inside with a good book! (If only my little guy will cooperate for his nap. We've been having some differences of opinion about this recently.)

A Devil to Play: One Man's Year-Long Quest to Master the Orchestra's Most Difficult Instrument by Jasper Rees (I learned so much about the French horn. This was just a fun and fascinating read overall.)
A Necessary Deception by Laurie Alice Eakes (I've found a new Christian fiction author I really enjoy. Must start collecting her books!)
The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri (Okay, I didn't exactly read this one last week. I've been working on it since November, reading one canto a day. And I finally finished!!)

Efronia: An Armenian Love Story by Stina Katchadourian (My first read for the Litsy Passport Challenge. This woman's life is incredible.)
The Interrupted Tale by Maryrose Wood (I chose this one to read during the Superbowl - that's what the game is for, right? I thought it would hold my attention better than Efronia, especially with all the background noise. This is such a fun series!)
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred Taylor (My current Newbery read)
Daniel Deronda by George Eliot (Really enjoying this one. I'm on page 137 out of 710.)

The Burning Page by Genevieve Cogman (Cannot wait to read this one!!)