Things I’ve Used as Bookmarks

Say you’re reading a book. And then suddenly you have to get up and do something…and there aren’t any bookmarks nearby. This happens to me way more than I’d like to admit, and usually I just end up picking the nearest thing to me. Which…is not always the best shape or size to mark my book.

I recently did the Three Bookish Things tag, and one of the questions was about different things that I’ve used as bookmarks. Now, my family and I have used SO many different things as bookmarks, many of them quite ridiculous, that I wanted to do a whole post on it! So I just want to thank the Three Bookish Things tag for the idea (and Madeline @The Bookish Mutant for tagging me to do that tag) and now here we go!

Candy Wrapper

I’m pretty sure this was only once or twice, it’s definitely not a common occurrence, but yes, I have picked up a candy wrapper from a table or wherever and just stuck it in my book as a placemarker. Why do we have candy wrappers just sitting around our house? Also definitely not a common occurrence but. Yeah.

A Pencil

Pencils are kind of like bookmarks already. They’re long, so they work to stick out of the top of a book so you can save your place. Plus, if you put it pointy side up, then you get a built in defense mechanism against anyone who might be foolish enough to attempt to steal your book. Only problem is, of course, that pencils do have a bit of dimension that bookmarks don’t have, and this can be a little frustrating in your book. I guess there is, in fact, a reason that bookmarks are basically flat.

A Playing Card

This one actually scares me a little. Look. Decks of playing cards come with 52 cards. 4 suits, with 13 cards in each suit. Numbers 2 through 10, and then jack, queen, king ace. What decks of playing cards do NOT come with is backups in case you lose a card. Or, in this case, when you use one for a bookmark. And once one card is gone, the entire deck is literally unusable. Honestly though, if it weren’t for the whole ruining-the-entire-deck thing, playing cards are actually pretty nice bookmarks. They’re flat. That’s kinda the main criteria for a bookmark.

My iPhone

My phone is kinda-sorta attached to me. Not literally, of course, but if there’s one thing you can trust me to have on my person or next to me at all times, it’s my phone. And so because of that, I’m always going to have my phone on my while reading. Which means, if I ever need to really quickly save my place in a book I’m reading, sticking my phone in my book is a pretty easy way to do so. It’s usually pretty temporary, for when I just need to quickly get up and do something, but I’ve briefly lost my phone more than once in this way.

A Hair Tie

This is actually one that I JUST found. I was moving a book that my sibling had been reading, and happened to look inside and saw that there was a hair tie holding the place. This one doesn’t work super well, I mean it’s a weird shape, it doesn’t stick out of the book and it leaves a weird lump in the middle of the book that bookmarks don’t usually leave, but ah well.

Math Homework

I actually have no idea how a sheet of paper with a bunch of math equations covering it found its way into my book as a bookmark, but I picked up a book that I hadn’t read in a while, and there it was. I assume that I do not need this particular piece of paper with math on it anymore (let’s hope) so it’s definitely going to stay in my book until I finish it. Or until I need it, I suppose.

Gift card/student ID card

Okay, the student ID was from last year. It was not my current student ID, I don’t think. The gift card…I actually have no idea how much money was on the gift card, because I’m really bad at using up gift cards so maybe there was none on it and I just happened to have it, or maybe there was a billion dollars on it and I just used a billion dollar gift card in my book. (okay, no, I am not rich and so do not just leave billion dollar gift cards lying around, and no one I know is rich enough to just give me a billion dollar gift card. I do not actually own a billion dollar gift card.)

Paper Crane

To be honest, paper cranes are great bookmarks. If you put them in so their tail is at the spine of the book, so the crane’s body is like the same way as the pages, it looks adorable because then the crane’s tail and head are just sticking out of the book. If I had to recommend any one of these things to be used as bookmarks, it would definitely be the paper crane.

Another Book

If I’m in a room with a book, there is probably going to be another book in said room with me. Just because how could I possibly only have one book? My house is filled with books. There’s gonna be another one nearby somewhere. So…if you need a bookmark, use a LITERAL one. A book to mark your place! Similar to the iPhone book mark, this one doesn’t work super well because of it’s size and shape, but just like the iPhone, it’s probably one of the things I can most expect to have around me at all times. I recommend a skinnier book, so that the book whose place needs marking doesn’t just flop open because of the size of the book, but other than that, there’s not much to say here.

What are some crazy things that you’ve used as bookmarks? What do you think of the things that I’ve used?

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