Wednesday, December 15, 2010

From there to here


I lived in the mountains of BC in a cabin for a few years about 15 years ago and did a lot of reading back then. At that time I discovered the writings of Jane Urquhart when I voraciously read her books, 'Away' and 'The Underpainter', and I fell in love with her style of writing.
I had spent some years away from Ontario and was missing home and found that regardless of wherever Jane's stories took you, they have the heart of rural Ontario wrapped lovingly into them.
Well since my life in British Columbia, after a fair circuit, I have found myself once again living in Ontario, and much to my joy I have had the opportunity to attend a luncheon and reading of Jane's most recent book 'Sanctuary Line'. Subsequently, I got a chance to ask some questions and then have a chat with Jane and I can tell you that that was a happy day for this passionate reader.
Now, on another note I should add that the reading was preceded by a lovely conversation with Jane's cousin Roseanne here in Read and Green.
And this is me having memory of and sharing two good moments with you.
Happy tales to you,
Andreas

the store inside


So we are almost caught up on the process of putting together this shop. Pretty much everything for the store has been ' Jerry rigged' on a very low budget but with a bit of creative problem solving the results are kinda' nice. The brown shelving works well and I've brought in some of my antique displays and some other neat stuff and this is what it looks like.

Thursday, December 9, 2010

How shelving happened


Well once all the sanding and staining was done and the Jigs were made , it was time to assemble.
It was a long haul but the jigs made it an efficient job. I had bought 4 white melamine shelves earlier and decided to use them even though they did not match with the oak shelving. That having been said , the assembled shelves looked pretty good. I made eleven shelves to start with, in 3 different models:a double depth size (I made 4), a single depth size (I made 4), and a two sided version (I made 3). They are 2 feet wide and 6 1\2 feet tall. I have salvaged enough oak and parts to make 35 or so more for some time in the future. That's me with the first shelf and the Jig in the background. Next step , put 'em all together and bring em to the store...

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Shelving is the big job and or expense



So, all this 'Book store' nonsense began with the notion that I was moving back to Ontario after 27 years of traipsing around the country.
It all began with me answering a Kijiji add for some 'dissembled' oak veneer video store shelving that I got at a good price by the courtesy of Len north of Kingston (thank you Len). I dragged all that wood to Brighton and set up my work spaces on the driveway and the front lawn at my Tante Ingelore's house ( thank you so very much Tante) and with the generous help of Jeff and his table saw I got all of the planks for the first round of constructing, cut to the correct dimensions (thank you kindly Jeff).
So now I had a few stacks of potential waiting to be realized so I took that and set up fresh each day and went to it ....

Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Happy beginnings and contest winners


Well hello there,
I'll blame it all on lag time, because it has taken me some while to post this first posting for my 'new' second hand book store, which has now finally been named READ and GREEN. Wait for it if it hasn't worked itself out yet it will in a moment....
I like that the name is not immediately evident, it kind of feels fumbly and bumbly at the beginning and then after niggling at the back of your brain for a bit, it suddenly hits you that in a quiet understated way it is kind of clever. And I can write all of this because after all is said and done it was not really my idea, the spark of brilliance cam from Rob Greco who submitted 'Green and Read' and subsequently won the store's 'name me please' contest.
So, now there is a store, and,
now there is a name, and,
there are bunches of books.
Well then that begs the questions, 'how did it get here?', and, 'how will it do?', and, 'what does it do?'

Let's see what happens.. :0)

happy tales to you,
Andreas