Sometimes our lives intersect with people, with places, and with stories in unexplainable ways. These moments can feel like manifestations of serendipity, unexpected occurrences in life that bring us untold joy.
Earlier this week, my husband and I went out to dinner, and I experienced one of these unusual moments. We were walking down a beautiful staircase lined with books. I was admiring the design of the room and the old book covers. As I walked along, there was an old copy of The Golden Road by L.M. Montgomery directly in front of me. Although I was scanning the shelves, I wasn't looking to find any book or author in particular. But somehow this book found me.
I stopped and stared at the book's blue spine for a moment. As I pulled my phone out of my purse to snap a photo, I called my husband back and pointed to the book. He looked at the book in surprise and bewilderment, asking me, "How did you find it?" I didn't have an answer. I hadn't been looking. Montgomery just tends to find me at various moments, on sometimes significant days, and in improbable places around the world. I'm left in wonder at the reason.
Image credit:
Photograph by World of Anne Shirley.
Created February 9, 2024.
© worldofanneshirley.com
"It was a diamond winter day in February—clear, cold, hard, brilliant."
-L.M. Montgomery
The Golden Road
Read more quotes by L.M. Montgomery.
Image credit:
Photograph by World of Anne Shirley.
Purchase and read The Story Girl and The Golden Road:
Created February 1, 2024. Last updated April 19, 2024.
© worldofanneshirley.com
During a recent visit to a bookshop, a tin of specialty Anne of Green Gables tea caught my attention. It's called "Anne of Green Tea Gables" by NovelTeas. The company produces a delightful library of punny teas for book lovers that include "Pekoe Pan," "Pippi Oolongstocking," and "Oliver Lemon Twist." The Anne-inspired tea is a green tea flavored with raspberry pieces and orange peel. You can purchase it here.
Here's the charming description of the tea by NovelTeas:
"Guaranteed to be non-alcoholic, eternally optimistic and not get you into trouble. Our blend will romance you away to Avonlea and the world L. M. Montgomery brought to life through the eyes of Anne Shirley."
What a fun concept. Aren't books and tea a perfect match? Would you like to try Anne of Green Tea Gables? I think I'd like to try "Don QuixoTea - Man of La ManChai" myself.
Created January 29, 2024.
© worldofanneshirley.com
After many years, I designed a fourth set of Anne of Green Gables Valentines to give to your kindred spirits on St. Valentine's Day. Save the Anne Shirley-inspired Valentines shown below. Print the Valentine cards out on cardstock paper in landscape mode, cut them out, and share them.
You can save the individual Anne of Green Gables Valentines below if you like a specific one and want to text it to a friend:
Image credits:
To design this set of Anne of Green Gables Valentines, I used public domain clipart, quotes from Anne Shirley and Gilbert Blythe, and images of Anne Shirley and Diana Barry from Sullivan Entertainment's Anne of Green Gables (1985) and Nippon Animation's Anne of Green Gables (1979) aka Akage No An.
Download and print more Anne of Green Gables Valentines here: Set 1, Set 2, and Set 3.
Created January 26, 2024. Last updated February 13, 2024.
© worldofanneshirley.com
"After Christmas the snow went away and the January winds whined over cold, hard-frozen pastures and through grey, cold trees."
-L.M. Montgomery
Pat of Silver Bush
Read more quotes by L.M. Montgomery.
Image credit:
Photograph by World of Anne Shirley.
Purchase and read the Pat of Silver Bush series:
Created January 18, 2024. Last updated April 19, 2024.
© worldofanneshirley.com
I love visiting bookstores and spending time browsing the shelves for new things to read. I'm sure I share this trait with many other fans of Anne of Green Gables. Last fall, while wandering around in a bookshop, I saw this pair of delightful Anne Shirley and Gilbert Blythe bookmarks by Page Petal.
Page Petal makes handmade, pressed flower bookmarks featuring literary characters, fictional TV characters, and celebrities. They have bookmarks for fans of Little Women, Harry Potter, The Gilmore Girls, Barbie, Taylor Swift, and more.
The company makes three Anne of Green Gables bookmarks featuring Anne Shirley, Gilbert Blythe, and Diana Barry. There's also an Anne of Green Gables bookmark collection that includes all three bookmarks.
Here's how Page Petal describes the characters:
"Anne: Passionate, stubborn, loyal, intelligent, an articulate chatterbox. Embodying her loving and imaginative nature, the Anne Shirley bookmark is made to add a bit of wonder and whimsy to your page."
"Gilbert. Keenly intelligent, and demonstrates a sense of patience and devotion. Handmade with love, the Gilbert Blythe Bookmark is inspired by his passion and curiosity."
"Diana is a kind and sweet girl. She's polite and versed in social etiquette. Loyal and diplomatic."
On another visit, the pressed flowers in the Gilbert Blythe bookmark were different. This time they were yellow.
In person, I couldn't recognize the pressed flowers. There was no description about how the flowers chosen were associated with the characters. The website does not list the flower types or explain the association either.
Personally, I associate certain specific flowers with Anne, Diana, and Gilbert, and I think flowers play a crucial role in several important scenes in the book.
What do you think of the bookmarks? Do you think the flowers chosen represent Anne, Gilbert, and Diana?
Image credits:
Photographs by World of Anne Shirley.
Created January 17, 2024.
© worldofanneshirley.com
See how well you know Anne of Green Gables by playing this randomized trivia game.
Are you an Anne of Green Gables Trivia expert? Post your score below and share how you did.
Created January 13, 2024.
© worldofanneshirley.com
"Marilla, isn’t it nice to think that tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it yet?"
The new year is a time for reflection and renewal. It provides an opportunity to turn over a new leaf, dream big, set goals, and make changes. Everything feels fresh, and the world is full of possibilities.
Anne Shirley felt this way with each new day. She didn’t have to wait for the new year to begin. Instead, Anne started her mornings with those feelings of freshness and renewal.
In Anne of Green Gables, Anne feels disgraced after baking Mrs. Allan a cake that she flavored with liniment instead of vanilla. Anne lamented, "I shall always be pointed at as the girl who flavored a cake with anodyne liniment." Mrs. Allan comforts Anne saying, "My dear little girl, you mustn’t cry like this...Why, it’s all just a funny mistake that anybody might make." Anne responds forlornly, "Oh, no, it takes me to make such a mistake." After they talk more, Mrs. Allan helps turn things around so that Anne finds some enjoyment in the evening.
Later, Anne tells Marilla, "Marilla, isn’t it nice to think that tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it yet?" The ever-practical Marilla responds, "I’ll warrant you’ll make plenty in it...I never saw your beat for making mistakes, Anne."
In Anne of Avonlea, Anne arrives home at Green Gables after a hard day teaching. She recounts her day to Marilla who listens to the whole story. Marilla responds by quoting Anne’s old words back to her: "Well, never mind. This day’s done and there’s a new one coming tomorrow, with no mistakes in it yet, as you used to say yourself. Just come downstairs and have your supper. You’ll see if a good cup of tea and those plum puffs I made today won’t hearten you up."
At first, Anne cannot take Marilla’s words to heart, and she responds, "Plum puffs won’t minister to a mind diseased." But, in the end, Marilla’s words and her delicious plum puffs worked wonders, and Anne did hearten up over their cheerful supper. Then Anne "had a good sleep that night and awakened in the morning to find herself and the world transformed."
As she got dressed for the new day, Anne sings,
"Every morn is a fresh beginning,
Every morn is the world made new,"
Anne Shirley believed that the world could transform over night. Isn’t it nice to think of a new, fresh day with no flaws, blunders, or misunderstandings? No matter how bad a mistake might feel, one can start fresh and begin again tomorrow.
Image credit:
Drawing of Anne Shirley running down a red road on Prince Edward Island from Akage no An, the anime production of Anne of Green Gables.
Purchase and read Anne of Green Gables:
Created January 8, 2024.
© worldofanneshirley.com
-L.M. Montgomery
The Blue Castle
Read more quotes by L.M. Montgomery.
Image credit:
Photograph by World of Anne Shirley.
Purchase and read the The Blue Castle:
Created November 24, 2023. Last updated April 19, 2024.
© worldofanneshirley.com
Here are five facts about Anne of Green Gables:
-
Anne of Green Gables is a novel written by Lucy Maud Montgomery that was first published in 1908.
-
The novel is a classic Canadian story that has been translated into many languages and is beloved worldwide.
-
The story is set in the fictional town of Avonlea on Prince Edward Island, Canada.
-
Anne of Green Gables has been adapted into films, television series, and animated series.
-
Anne of Green Gables tells the story of a young orphan girl named Anne Shirley.
Anne of Green Gables image © Sullivan Entertainment
Purchase and read Anne of Green Gables:
Created November 15, 2023.
© worldofanneshirley.com
Check out this wonderful Anne of Green Gables Paper Doll Book by Eileen Rudisill Miller that was published by Paper Studio Press in 2014. Miller is an illustrator and painter. You can visit her website and Etsy store to see more of her paper doll books, coloring books, and artwork.
The Anne of Green Gables Paper Doll Book includes two dressable figures: Anne Shirley and Anne's bosom friend, Diana Barry. The figures are 10 inches tall and include stands.
You can dress Anne Shirley and Diana Barry in 16 outfits from L.M. Montgomery's story, including several displayed below. The outfits include Anne and Diana's school clothes, play clothes, and dresses worn when picking flowers in Lover’s Lane. There's also Anne's first dress with puffed sleeves and the gowns Anne and Diana wore when visiting Miss Josephine Barry. Additionally, the book includes Anne and Diana's outfits for the recital at the White Sands Hotel (Anne wears the pearls Matthew gave her), their clothes worn when Anne left for Queen’s College, and dresses worn when Anne returned home to teach in Avonlea.
The Anne of Green Gables Paper Doll Book is available for purchase on Amazon.
Image Credits:
Images from the Anne of Green Gables Paper Doll Book (2014) by Eileen Rudisill Miller.
Created September 14, 2023.
© worldofanneshirley.com
I keep running across Anne of Green Gables-themed items in bookstores lately. They seem to be everywhere. Last night, I saw this cool bibliophile pencil set featuring literary quotes by Chronicle Books. It features the art of Jane Mount. It's a set of ten pencils with the green one featuring a quote from Anne of Green Gables: "Tomorrow is a new day, with no mistakes in it yet."
The other nine pencils feature quotes from Pride and Prejudice, Little Women, The Three Musketeers, A Tale of Two Cities, The Art of War, Moby Dick, Frankenstein, The Prophet, and The Marrow of Tradition
I'm tempted to buy a set.
Created September 7, 2023.
© worldofanneshirley.com
This week, I finished reading a book called You Will Find Your People: How to Make Meaningful Friendships as an Adult by Lane Moore. She's a writer, musician and comedian.
Having moved this summer, and feeling lonely in general, I thought the book might be helpful to me. I’m always searching for kindred spirits and hoping for that ideal bosom friendship depicted in L.M. Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables. I think that this belief in true and lasting friendship is a common bond shared by people who love the Anne series. What I didn’t know when I started reading You Will Find Your People is that its author Lane Moore loves and identifies with Anne Shirley too and that Anne would turn up in her book.
In Chapter 2, Moore talks about Anne Shirley and Diana Barry’s friendship as being an exception to the general categories of female friendship depicted in the media. She writes:
I wonder that too, where do you find that truest of friendships depicted in Anne of Green Gables? Sometimes I’ve wondered if this type of friendship really exists or if it’s simply fiction, but I still hope it’s something real and attainable.
Later on in the book, in Chapter 14, which is titled, "Friend Breakups: How to Know When to Leave, How to Do It, and How to Cope with the Grief," Lane Moore begins the chapter with a quote from L.M. Montgomery’s novel:
-Anne Shirley, Anne of Green Gables
Anne's statement really captures the grief when a friendship feels lost.
After finishing the book, I read a beautiful essay where Lane Moore talks about friendship and Anne of Green Gables called, "I Want a Bosom Friendship Like Anne Shirley and Diana Barry." She wrote the essay for Powell’s Books Blog on April 25, 2023. (Until just a couple months ago, I used to live a few blocks from Powell’s). Moore's essay is really lovely, and I think any fan of Anne of Green Gables should read it.
Moore writes about her lifelong goal, saying, "For me, I want a bosom friendship like Anne Shirley and Diana Barry from Anne of Green Gables more than just about anything in this world." She writes, "When I was a kid, I would read Lucy Maude Montgomery's words describing bosom friends, which boiled down this very romantic sentiment: two people who were absolutely platonic while at the same time being absolutely soulmates." She continues, saying, "I knew I wanted bosom friends. I wanted friends who I could be openly romantic with, maybe a little dramatic with, and also extremely silly with, who I could get drunk on cherry cordials with…"
I love her description of Anne and Diana’s friendship: "Their friendship was about full acceptance and full support of each other. In the face of cruel classmates, and a frustrating world, Anne had Diana's back and Diana had hers just the same."
No wonder so many of us long for a friendship like theirs.
Moore has also mentioned Anne of Green Gables in the following interviews. Check them out:
"What Attachment Styles Teach Us About Our Friendships: They’re Not Just for Romantic Relationships" by Lane Moore, Elle (June 28, 2023)
"Lane Moore: 5 Books That Make Me Feel Less Alone" by Lane Moore, Strand Book Store (October 30, 2018)
Image Credits:
Left: Photograph of Lane Moore from her website.
Right: Screen capture of Megan Follows as Anne Shirley in Anne of Green Gables: The Sequel © Sullivan Entertainment.
Created September 5, 2023.
© worldofanneshirley.com
-L.M. Montgomery
Anne of Green Gables
Read more quotes by L.M. Montgomery.
Image credit:
Photograph by World of Anne Shirley.
Purchase and read Anne of Green Gables:
Created April 20, 2023. Last updated April 19, 2024.
© worldofanneshirley.com
Recently, I joined Reddit's Book Club Community because I thought it would be fun to read books with a big online group. By chance, soon after joining, Anne of Green Gables was chosen as Reddit's Book Club Runner Up Read.
Have you ever wanted to read or re-read Anne with a group? Well, here's your chance!
Purchase and read Anne of Green Gables:
Created April 18, 2023.
© worldofanneshirley.com
"'My life is a perfect graveyard of buried hopes.' That’s a sentence I read in a book once, and I say it over to comfort myself whenever I’m disappointed in anything."
As a lonely orphan, Anne Shirley finds solace in books. Reading provides her with comfort and room to explore, learn, and grow. We learn about Anne's love of words, stories, and books early on in the novel Anne of Green Gables.
In Chapter 5, Marilla has decided to take Anne back to Mrs. Spencer. She expects that Anne will be returned to the asylum in Nova Scotia. Aware of her fate, Anne decides that she will still enjoy the buggy ride to Mrs. Spencer’s home. Anne looks around and sees beauty in an early wild rose and comments on how the color pink is "bewitching."
When Anne asks Marilla if she ever knew anyone whose hair was red when she was young that changed to a different color when she grew up, Marilla coldly dashes Anne’s hopes. Anne then quotes a sentence she read once telling Marilla, "Well, that is another hope gone. 'My life is a perfect graveyard of buried hopes.' That’s a sentence I read in a book once, and I say it over to comfort myself whenever I’m disappointed in anything."
Marilla is prosaic. She doesn’t see anything comforting in Anne’s quote. Anne explains that she finds the words, "nice and romantic, just as if I were a heroine in a book." Anne's imagination saves her and comforts her and provides her with hope when things are dark.
Just as Anne finds comfort in stories, quotes, and reading, the readers of Anne of Green Gables find comfort in L.M. Montgomery’s creation. Anne Shirley is a character who somehow brings comfort and joy to readers everywhere.
Image credit:
Drawing of Anne Shirley reading a book in front of Green Gables from Akage no An, the anime production of Anne of Green Gables.
Purchase and read Anne of Green Gables:
Created April 12, 2023.
© worldofanneshirley.com
January so far has been a month of cold gray days, with an occasional storm whirling across the harbor and filling Spook's Lane with drifts. But last night we had a silver thaw and today the sun shone."
-L.M. Montgomery
Anne Shirley in Anne of Windy Poplars
Read more quotes by L.M. Montgomery.
Image credit:
Photograph by World of Anne Shirley.
Purchase and read Anne of Windy Poplars and the Anne of Green Gables series:
Created January 28, 2023. Last updated April 19, 2024.
© worldofanneshirley.com
My brother got me a sweet gift for Christmas. It's an Anne of Green Gables jigsaw puzzle. The image is from the anime Anne of Green Gables series (Akage no An, 1979), which was produced as part of Nippon Animation's World Masterpiece Theater series. The pretty painted scene shows Anne Shirley and Diana Barry sitting together and talking in an apple orchard. If you want one too, you can purchase the 1014-piece puzzle here.
Created January 27, 2023. Last updated March 4, 2023.
© worldofanneshirley.com
The Google Play store includes information about the "Oh my Anne" mobile app, which had its soft launch last month. Version 1.0.0 of the app was released/last updated on December 3, 2022 by NEOWIZ. The game is rated "E" for everyone, and there are in-app purchases.
NEOWIZ provided the following description of the game to the Google Play store:
Enjoy calming, relaxing match 3 puzzle levels & renovate the Green Gables.
Unlock endless chapters about Anne’s encounters and makeover!
Adventures in Avonlea are at the doorstep!
"But if you call me Anne, please call me Anne with an 'e'."
Encouraging & Heartwarming Story!
It all began when Matthew and Marilla accepted Anne to the family..
Folllow Anne through her times of true romance, friendship, and tears - all unexpected!
Watch how her relationship with the townspeople of Avonlea flourish!
“I thought my story at Green Gables was about to end, but it was just the beginning.”
Enjoy Renovating the Green Gables
Oh my, what a dusty room!
Mop the floors! Change the carpets!
Unlock & renovate rooms, spread happiness in the air!
Help Anne Bring warmth back to the Green Gables, and to her loved ones as well.
Renovate your mansion, give it a fantastic makeover!
"Seeing the place nice and clean makes me so happy.”
Easy Match 3 Puzzle Levels
Match puzzle pieces, use delicate booster effects to beat levels!
Equip yourself with Anne’s mighty spirit!
Show off your match 3 skills by clearing various fun challenge modes ahead!
“I couldn''t tell where to begin at first, but after placing the tiles one by one, before I knew it, I was already done!”
Experience Calming and Relaxing Game
Sit back, and enjoy relaxing makeovers.
The most heartwarming words from Anne, will certainly brighten up your day!
"You can enjoy anything if you make up your mind to enjoy it."
The Google Play store features the image above ("Follow Anne's Romantic Story") as well as the following images and screencaptures of "Oh my Anne" with explanations of how to play the game.
Meet new friends and the townspeople of Avonlea:
Unlock more rooms and renovate Green Gables:
Watch and immerse yourself in Anne's precious moments:
Play match-3 levels:
Earn daily rewards:
Collect beautiful dresses:
Anne Shirley dreams of a dress with puffed sleeves:
Some of the game's aspects don't seem to relate to the story, but I'm still interested in checking out the app.
Created January 25, 2023.
© worldofanneshirley.com