Bookmarks for Top Ten Tuesday

I have a confession to make: I love to read and I like to share what I’ve read with others. Reading has been an avid hobby my whole life. However, I don’t look at reading as a ‘lifestyle’. So while I do love fuzzy socks and hot chocolate, I’m not in the habit of collecting decorative bookmarks.

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly book blogging prompt hosted by Jana at That Artsy Reader Gal. Last week we showed off books that give off an autumn vibe. This week, Jana would like to see our bookmarks.

There’s a part of me that wishes I could just put ten bookmarks down on the table and say, “Yay, I’m done!” Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way with me. As always, I like to make everything more complicated than it needs to be.

Turned corners and yarn tails

I’m a habitual corner-turner. At least I was until The Husbeast and I started dating and he found out…and gave me such a look of horror. So now, when I’m reading, my bookmarks are those of opportunity.

Obviously I’m not going to show my turned corners (that would be proof). I’m also not going to show the lengths of yarn that get clipped and tucked. They’re not fancy enough. Not that the rest of these solutions are! They do, however, count as my two first kinds of bookmark. On with the 8 others 😉

Mailers

The envelope your gas bill came in, the insert from the city’s electrical bill, and the little pads of paper advertising the local dentist or real estate agent are all valid bookmarks. Plus, you can write notes on them.

Pictured: The Princess Bride by William Goldman, The Neverending Story by Michael Ende and American Gods by Neil Gaiman

Ball Bands

Yes, the piece of paper a yarn company winds around a skein of yarn is called a ball band. If you go through enough yarn, like me, you have plenty of bookmarks. As an added bonus, you can look at that bookmark and relive the joy (or horror) of working with that particular yarn!

Shown: A Caron Cakes band from my Blue Granny Stripe blanket in Last Minute Knitted Gifts by Joelle Hoverson and Anna Williams

Other Books

Books pile up in our household. Sometimes the easiest thing to do is to reach over, grab another book, and just place it on top of the page you’re reading. This is particularly handy when you’re reading and need to get up for another cup of tea. Like I did here with The Fireman by Joe Hill.

Dishes

A habit formed by kids who read at the kitchen table: Using the edge of a plate or the handle of a mug to keep a page in place. Pictured here, Generation X by Douglas Coupland.

Sticky Bookmarks

3M actually makes bookmarks. They actually have a few varieties, from thin flags, to arrows, to thicker tabs. My cookbooks and music theory notebooks (not shown) are full of these. This cookbook is the wonderful Well Fed by Melissa Joulwan. The Chocolate Chili recipe is awesome. I make it in an uncovered slow-cooker. Tasty!

Magnetic Bookmarks

There are two kinds of these, it seems. There’s the bookmark you clip to the top of the page, and the kind you use as little tabs. I’ve used both here on CL Polk’s Witchmark. One of them came from a notebook, and it’s how I realized that they were A Thing.

Actual Cardstock Bookmarks

There are a couple of different varieties of these: Shown with Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice are a couple of Jennifer Estep‘s bookmarks that I picked up at a writer’s convention. Because if someone’s giving out bookmarks, you should probably take them. They’re handy.

Also shown is a bookmark from Goulet Pens. I like getting bookmarks in the mail, with book-related purchases. It’s thoughtful and good advertising.

Not shown is the standard bookmark-with-inspirational-quote and a tassel made of yarn. I know I’ve had a few of them over the past 40-some-odd years, but they always go missing. They’re like socks (the machine-knit kind you put in the laundry, not the hand-knit ones you hand-wash).

The Flyleaf

Sometimes the book comes with a bookmark built right in. I may get called a heretic for this, but I don’t care. If you’re not going to tack down your book jackets (and I’ve done this…I worked in a high school library for a semester), I consider them fair game. The jacket from Doctor Sleep by Stephen King came in very handy while I was reading the book.

So there we go. My 10 different kinds of bookmarks. Do you go all-in for the fancy cross-stitched bookmark, or are you more a “rip a corner off a flyer” kind of reader? Please comment down below to let me know!