Bookmarks matter.
If you have a pesky little blank post-it note saving your spot in a book,
or if you tore the corner from a magazine when you were last finished reading,
or if you dog-ear pages to find your place, not because the page means anything,
then I challenge you to choose something new. Choose a bookmark.
My personal favorite is a photo. I think there is no better greeting (as if opening the book isn’t greeting enough!) than a smiling face or happy memory with someone you love. Or once loved. Or hope to love.
But if you are a die-hard advocate for acid-free photo care, then I have other choices to offer you.
The sleeve from your Starbucks cup. (Especially if it’s decorated with a phrase that inspires you.)
A doodle on a 3×5 card.
A quote on a 3×5 card.
A note on a 3×5 card.
(I believe on the eighth day, God invented 3×5 cards.)
A punch card from a favorite spot. I have one from a coffee shop I visited on a weekend in Portland. A souvenir, tucked right into the pages of one of my favorite reads.
Movie ticket stubs.
A postcard, sent or unsent.
I feel so strongly about bookmarks that I utilize too many at a time. I open my book and little bits of paraphernalia flutter to the ground. So I pick them up and remember why I chose them in the first place.
Pick something that matters. Bookmarks do.
tricialottwilliford 
I do that, too, with paraphernalia. I find it in old books. But then I wonder which one was actually marking my spot?
I’m with Noel ~ but that’s part of the fun! ;-)
I once bought a used book from the local library. I was so excited to read it (though I can’t recall right now what it even was!). Imagine my pure joy when I leafed through the book and out fell a photograph … of the son of one of my dearest friends … taken years earlier when he was just a little tyke. The book had belonged to her before she donated it to the good folks at the library, who were then kind enough to sell it to me. So I was able to return the precious picture to its rightful owner, and we still laugh about it now several years later. I love having Bibliophile Friends!
(Also, thanks for recognizing that there ARE good reasons to dog-ear a page!)
I like a piece of pretty ribbon.
Those are great ideas! I do love 3X5 cards too. LOL