When I was growing up, there were always more books in our house than…well, everything. I think the combined total of food items, socks & underwear, and unfinished projects were heavily outnumbered by our books. No, I’m not exaggerating. Not even a little.

As an adult, or more specifically as a person who no longer lives with their parents (adult is such a yucky word), I made every attempt to mirror the bookshelves I loved as a child. Numerous pieces of furniture held uncountable volumes. My books seemed to procreate by themselves – even the wild rabbits were jealous.

Marriage brought with it even more books and a fellow bibliophile to help the cause along. Then one day, we looked around at all of our books and grew disgusted. There were too many. There were books that weren’t getting read, books that would never get re-read, books that were partially read and marked for future reference. All of these marvelous words and no one using them!

Then we stumbled upon BookMooch and felt the same sense of excitement and joy we used to get when we entered the local bookstore. We spent an entire day sorting through our books and making piles. One to give to family and friends, another for the library book sale, another to list on BookMooch, and so on. The books that didn’t end up in piles on our floor were keepers – at least for the time being.

That evening we entered all of the moochable books into our account and within minutes we had requests from all over the country and around the world! The next day, we shipped all of the books of to their new homes with a blessing. It felt so good to clean off our shelves and share the written word with fellow readers.

If you’ve got some dusty novels laying around, I suggest you check out BookMooch and share them with the world. It’s free to sign-up, list, and request books. You just pay the nominal shipping fees (use the media mail rate at your post office) to send your books on their way.

BookMooch / How it Works / Join (it’s FREE!) / Get a Book

- Free Shipping* on orders of $40 or more
- US Orders Only (International orders will receive discounted shipping)
- Coupon Code: CUPID
- Sale starts January 30, 2011 and ends February 3, 2011
- Coupon Valid in BiblioGifts, Veggie’s Shop, Fools and Fables, and Root Beer Float

* Free Economy or Standard shipping for orders of $40 or more, excluding shipping charges, gift wrap charges and applicable sales tax. Delivery address must be within the United States and cannot be a PO Box. All orders will be Economy shipping unless the order is not eligible for Economy shipping (e.g., order exceeds Economy weight restrictions). Coupon code CUPID must be entered at check out. Promotion starts on January 30, 2011 at 12:00 a.m. (PST) and ends on February 3, 2011 at 11:59 p.m. (PST). Offer valid online at CafePress.com only, cannot be combined with any other coupons or promotions and may change, be modified or cancelled at anytime without notice. This promotion cannot be applied to past orders.

We’re getting more social – at least we’re trying to. It’s not so much a New Year’s Resolution, as it is a goal that we’ve procrastinated about so long that it happens to be the New Year…

If you’d like to help us out (we’ve heard it’s far easier to be social when other people are involved) please ‘Like’ us on Facebook and ‘Follow’ us on Twitter. You could even go one step further and join our emailing list. Hey, we know that if you’re like most folks you’ll want the relationship to be one of give and take, so here’s what you can expect from us: we’ll keep you mighty informed! By becoming part of our social network, you’ll get hear the latest from the studio, learn about new product releases, get special ‘Friends Only’ offers, and more!

Hope to socially network with you soon! ;)

We are super excited to announce that from Wednesday, July 7th through Thursday, July 8th we will be offering three dollars off all t-shirts in our shops! That means every t-shirt, every size, every design!

In order to receive your discount, you need to order directly from our shops and use the coupon code TMINUS3 at checkout.

Links to our shops can be found in the little gray bar running along the very top of this page! ;-)

As with all coupons, here’s the fine print: Save $3 off all T-shirts from CafePress shops, excluding shipping charges, gift wrap charges and applicable sales tax. Coupon code TMINUS3 must be entered at check out. Promotion starts on July 7, 2010, at 12:00 a.m. (PST) and ends on July 8, 2010, at 11:59 p.m. (PST). All orders must be from CafePress shops. Excludes CafePress marketplace purchases (e.g. all products added to cart from URLs beginning with the following (i) http://shop.cafepress.com, (ii) http://t-shirts.cafepress.com and/or (iii) http://www.cafepress.com/sk/), CafePress Groups and bulk orders. Offer cannot be combined with any other coupons or promotions and may change, be modified or canceled at anytime without notice.

I was just listening to NPR and heard a list of suggested summer reading. Two of the books in particular caught my interest: Young Romantics: The Tangled Lives of English Poetry’s Greatest Generation by Daisy Hay, and 97 Orchard: An Edible History of Five Immigrant Families in One New York Tenement by Jane Ziegelman.

From the Publisher: Young Romantics tells the story of the interlinked lives of the young English Romantic poets from an entirely fresh perspective–celebrating their extreme youth and outsize yearning for friendship as well as their individuality and political radicalism.

The book focuses on the network of writers and readers who gathered around Percy Bysshe Shelley and the campaigning journalist Leigh Hunt. They included Lord Byron, John Keats, and Mary Shelley, as well as a host of fascinating lesser-known figures: Mary Shelley’s stepsister and Byron’s mistress, Claire Clairmont; Hunt’s botanist sister-in-law, Elizabeth Kent; the musician Vincent Novello; the painters Benjamin Haydon and Joseph Severn; and writers such as Charles and Mary Lamb, Thomas Love Peacock, and William Hazlitt. They were characterized by talent, idealism, and youthful ardor, and these qualities shaped and informed their politically oppositional stances–as did their chaotic family arrangements, which often left the young women, despite their talents, facing the consequences of the men’s philosophies.

In Young Romantics, Daisy Hay follows the group’s exploits, from its inception in Hunt’s prison cell in 1813 to its disintegration after Shelley’s premature death in 1822. It is an enthralling tale of love, betrayal, sacrifice, and friendship, all of which were played out against a background of political turbulence and intense literary creativity.

From the Publisher: In 97 Orchard, Jane Ziegelman explores the culinary life that was the heart and soul of New York’s Lower East Side around the turn of the twentieth century–a city within a city, where Germans, Irish, Italians, and Eastern European Jews attempted to forge a new life. Through the experiences of five families, all of them residents of 97 Orchard Street, she takes readers on a vivid and unforgettable tour, from impossibly cramped tenement apartments down dimly lit stairwells where children played and neighbors socialized, beyond the front stoops where immigrant housewives found respite and company, and out into the hubbub of the dirty, teeming streets.

Ziegelman shows how immigrant cooks brought their ingenuity to the daily task of feeding their families, preserving traditions from home but always ready to improvise. While health officials worried that pushcarts were unsanitary and that pickles made immigrants too excitable to be good citizens, a culinary revolution was taking place in the streets of what had been culturally an English city. Along the East River, German immigrants founded breweries, dispensing their beloved lager in the dozens of beer gardens that opened along the Bowery. Russian Jews opened tea parlors serving blintzes and strudel next door to Romanian nightclubs that specialized in goose pastrami. On the streets, Italian peddlers hawked the cheese-and-tomato pies known as pizzarelli, while Jews sold knishes and squares of halvah. Gradually, as Americans began to explore the immigrant ghetto, they uncovered the array of comestible enticements of their foreign-born neighbors. 97 Orchard charts this exciting process of discovery as it lays bare the roots of our collective culinary heritage.

The segment also got me to thinking…and designing. So in honor of lazy summer days in the shade, we’re releasing: Summertime and the Reading is Easy…

Our product offering is changing up a bit and we’re super excited that there will be even more colors for you to choose from! Of course, we’re adding some, and removing others, but we think you’ll be pleased with the new line-up.

You say goodbye…

• Junior’s Fitted T-Shirt Mint
• Junior’s Fitted T-Shirt Creme
• American Apparel Women’s Fitted Organic T-Shirt Cinder

…and I say hello! Hello! Hello!

• American Apparel Men’s Fitted T-Shirt Asphalt
• American Apparel Men’s Fitted T-Shirt Army
• American Apparel Men’s Fitted T-Shirt Heather Gray
• American Apparel Men’s Fitted T-Shirt Navy
• American Apparel Women’s Fitted Organic T-Shirt Pomegranate

Here’s to a more colorful (and friendly) shopping experience!

We’re lifting up the latest design in BiblioGifts to Support Literacy! Here are few disturbing facts, and some very good reasons for you to encourage reading among everyone you know…

44 million adults in the U.S. can’t read well enough to read a simple story to a child.
- National Adult Literacy Survey (1992) NCED, U.S. Department of Education

More than 20 percent of adults read at or below a fifth-grade level – far below the level needed to earn a living wage.
- National Institute for Literacy, Fast Facts on Literacy, 2001

Students who reported having all four types of reading materials (books, magazines, newspapers, encyclopedias) in their home scored, on average, higher than those who reporter having fewer reading materials.
- The Nation’s Report Card: Fourth-Grade Reading 2000, April 2001, The National Center for Education Statistics

In 1999, only 53 percent of children aged 3 to 5 were read to daily by a family member. Children in families with incomes below the poverty line are less likely to be read aloud to everyday than are children in families with incomes at or above the poverty line.
- The National Center for Education Statistics, NCES Fast Facts, Family Reading

So strong is the link between literacy and being a useful member of society that some states use grade-level reading statistics as a factor in projecting future prison construction.
- Bob Chase, President, National Education Association

Since 1983, more than 10 million Americans reached the 12th grade without having learned to read at a basic level.
- A Nation Still at Risk, U.S. Department of Education, 1999

Source: Get Caught Reading

There is a wealth of information regarding literacy trends worldwide at UNESCO, the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization.

A few other sites you may find interesting:

• First Book
• Reading is Fundamental
• National Institute for Literacy (US)

The transition will take some time, but it’ll be well worth the effort. We feel that our t-shirts should do more than promote our ethics – they should be made of ‘em!

Update: The make-over is complete. Enjoy!

I’ve just stumbled upon Whose Dollar? by Natalie Jost and my heart is all aflutter. Not only are the illustrations and text marvelous, but the moral of the story is simple and touching – perfect for this time of year.

Anyone looking for a quality book to give a young child this holiday season needn’t look any further.

We were wandering the web and came across the most superb pillow we’ve ever laid eyes on! Bibliophiles, meet “Book Pillow” from Pillowphyte at Etsy!

The ultimate book lovers pillow, stunning book silhouettes are paired with old school “Dick and Jane” primer fabric to create a look that’s popular with adults and kids alike. Slate grey book background provides a nice contrast to the pumpkin-colored European-made linen backing. This pillows most unique feature, however, is on the back. Two back pockets provide a place to tuck away your – or your child’s – current favorite read. Pillow also acts as a lap pillow to support a book while you’re curled up in a favorite reading spot.

If you’ve got some extra holiday cash tucked away, add this to your sofa or bed!