The week before last, we asked Red Roomers to blog about the worst thing they ever lost. In contrast, last week we asked the community blog about the one discovery they made—an object, new idea, or best friend—that meant the most to them. 

Three posts especially stood out:

• For "The Best Thing I Ever Found," her first Red Room blog entry, member Becky Blanton used vivid, almost tangible language to recount the most physical photography lesson we've read.  
• Author 'Nathan Burgoine shares how learned an important lesson about not selling yourself short during tough times in his charming post "Stopping on a Dime."
• Another first-time Red Room blogger, member Karen Barton takes us back with her to carefree traveling days when finding a stranger's artifact put all of life in perspective. Enjoy "The Wire-bound Journals."

These three will receive books by Red Room authors. Dick Bolles has helped thousands find their life work (and created a cultural institution) with his What Color Is Your Parachute series. The life/career-purpose guru has returned with the 2011 edition, subtitled A Practical Manual for Job-Hunters and Career Changers. Annabelle Gurwitch and Jeff Kahn's You Say Tomato, I Say Shut Up: A Love Story is a memoir of finding marital success through humor and hard work. Catherine Ryan Hyde is the author of sixteen books, including Pay It Forward and last year's groundbreaking Jumpstart the World. Her 2008 novel When I Found You is about a man whose extraordinary discovery of a newborn child changes several lives forever, including his own.

You'll find treasures by exploring all the "best thing I have found" posts, but here are several more that are especially good:

• New member Luke Whyte is hitchhiking around the state of California interviewing correctional officers, ex-cons, and anyone else with a connection to the prison system. His first dispatch, "A night spent camping with a murderer," is a chilling, extremely human tale of one of his subjects.
• Member Barbara Pottie Holmes explains why she decided to home-school her kids, and shares what she found for herself along the way, in "Discovery."
• We were happy to share member Cindy M. Sullivan's pride in her goddaugher's spirit and achievements as described in "A Trail Blazer."
• The manic pursuit of online treasures had us amused and a bit obsessed right along with member Madeline Irene MacGregor in her post "The passion of my found obsession."
• Regaining the courage to sing was the best thing author Blair Kilpatrick found, as she recalls in "My Voice, Lost and Found." 
• In "The Keeper of the Key," finding the titular object means much more to member Kelly Tweeddale than the ability to rewind a clock.

I hope you'll find your favorites, and leave a comment letting the blogger know what you thought, or by sending it to a friend. All of Red Room's past blog topics are listed here. Thanks as always for blogging!

–Huntington W. Sharp, Senior Editor