After our run I went home to make coffee, revel in a hot shower and then head to a book shop date and lunch with my girlies. No pictures but enjoyed every second.
Sunday afternoon I started thinking about soft pretzels and decided to make a batch to take to my House Church group that night... turns out mom and I were having the same thought and we BOTH ended up bringing pretzels to the group. So funny!
Have a great day my friends. 💖
Friday night after dinner I had to finish this book before I did anything else. It was such a fun read, quirky and funny. The cast of characters was something else 😂
The roads were pretty awful... I didn't even think it was supposed to snow but spoiler alert- it did pretty much all day.
Finally getting around to finishing my January book reviews. I had many great reads this month, and some great quotes recorded here that I want to remember.
1- All's Fair in Love & Christmas - Sarah Monzon 1/3 (audio/library)★★★
Fun Christmas rom-com. I identified so much with the main character and her anxieties. 😅 Overall a fun sweet story about to co-workers trying out Christmas each other to win a promotion.
Memories are precious things. Not to be taken for granted. They have the power to bring comfort, to make us smile and feel warm inside. Everyone should take the time to cherish the memories they have and be more intentional about making new, good, and lasting ones with those they love.
2- Dead of Winter - Darcy Coates 1/4 (kindle/library)★★
Challenges Met: 52 Bookclub 20. A Revenge Story
A-Z- "D"Each day felt like a fight to earn the right to be happy, and they were fights I lost more often than won.
"Someone here has that hunger for violence. They came on this trip with a plan. To hunt us. And they don’t intend to stop until we’re all dead.”
"It would be a mistake to believe too much in anyone’s innocence."
3- The Mistletoe Countess by Pepper Basham 1/9 (print/own)★★★★
His attention fropped to the book in her had, one dark brow darting skyward. "I suspose you are an avid read?"
"Oh, I devour books." She tugged the novel against her chest. "its a diasatrous habit for being productive, I'm afraid."And she would choose hope instead of despair, because she refused to be anything less than the heroine in her own life."There's no need to ponder the what-ifs. They steal the truth of what is. You are soul mates by choice and will. How closely you wrap your souls around one another is of your own choosing."
4- Flight by Lynn Steger Strong 1/10 (kindle/library)★★★
A- Z- "F"
I randomly came across this book on a trip to Barnes & Noble. I wanted to read it but not enough to purchase it. Happily my library had a kindle copy available. It was an interesting, sad yet slightly hopeful read. Takes place around Christmas week as 3 siblings get together with their spouses and children for the first Christmas since the passing of their mother.
He wonders how it is, in all these years, they never learned to talk without their mother. Now there is only all the space and quiet where she should be and is not.
When we're young we think we'll just choose the lives we'll have, the people we're becoming, but so much of it just happens. You can live a whole life without choosing anything at all.
5- New York, New Year, New You by Rachael Bloome 1/12 (kindle/own)★★★★
In order to be considered for a promotion at her father's company Quincy “The Quitter” Carmichael moves to New York for 3 months (staying with her best friend) and sets off on a series of adventures, crossing off items on her bucket list so to speak one by one. I particularly enjoyed the parts where Ethan (her best friend's brother helps her train for a marathon).
“Honestly? It doesn’t matter to me if someone is good at everything. Are they kind? Compassionate? Do they love others well?” Using a dish towel, he sweeps the scattered shells into a pile to discard. “Perfection is a myth. We all have cracks, scars, and weaknesses. Just like we all have different strengths. But when you’re a team, when you can lean on one another and help each other grow, that’s when you’ve found someone special, someone worthy of forever.”
When my muscles ache and my feet throb, I pick a spot in the distance and press forward, remembering that regardless of the past, I’m capable of more than I once believed.
6- Let Us Descend by Jesmyn Ward 1/18 (audio/library)★★★
I want. I want to grow my hair long, to find food and feed myself without hiding, to sit in the sunlight and scratch the worry out my scalp, to breathe without fear and terror choking me, to choose my seconds, to choose my minutes, to choose my days. I done suffered enough.
7- The It Girl by Ruth Ware 1/19 (kindle/library)
Don’t let yourself get caught up in what-ifs. That way madness lies.Maybe it wasn’t only John Neville who stole April’s life. Maybe she has done the same.
8- The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley by Courtney Walsh 1/21 (audio/hoopla)★★★★
“You don't forgive people for their benefit. You do it for yours. Because if you don't, it'll eat you alive. Jealousy, envy, holding a grudge- they rot you from the inside out.”
“Maybe happiness isn’t about what you do, Isadora. Maybe it’s about who you do it with. Or simply about accepting who you are.”
“Life is beautiful and horrible and wonderful and awful all at the same time’?” He looks at me then. “And that is the adventure.”
9- Julia Monroe Begins Again by Rebekah Millet 1/26 (ebook/hoopla)★★★★
10- The Extraordinary Deaths of Mrs Kip by Sara Brunsvold 1/26 (print/own)★★★★
For the twenty minutes, she sat in the airchair next to his bed, listening to his stories of work, his wife, the other things that brought him joy. She helped him forget he was widowed and dying.
The tender worship of companionship.
A hard art to learn."Well" --Clara willed her feet to keep moving-- "I don't know much about newsrooms, but I do know that the Lord had his warriors in surprising places."Mrs Kip's clear and utter love dor the words dripped from her voice, as if the words sprang directly form the deepest chambers of her heart. Little pieces of herself offered up o someone who could give nothing in return.
Not a book I typically enjoy, I would not have started let a lone finished if not for this book club... I don't know if that's a good thing or not- just thinking about it to write this review is giving me anxiety all over again so...
Narcissists think they’re smarter than everyone else. But that doesn’t mean they are. That’s how they get caught. They make mistakes. They underestimate the intelligence of police. And they underestimate the intelligence of their victims.
I’d always thought of myself as a true-crime junkie. But it turned out, that was only when it happened to other people.
Total: 11 2024: 11
Kindle/Ebook: 6 Print: 2 Audio: 3
Library: 7 Owned: 3 Borrowed: 1
Favorite: The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley, runner up Mrs Kip
50 States: 32/50
52 Bookclub:
A-Z:
I finished week one of the Sungold Crochet Along- I was sick last week and rewatched a lot of Firefly Lane in the evening and worked on it. I'm hoping to finish week 2 this weekend.
Hannah went skiing on Saturday for the first- with much trepidation. But she ended up having a good time once she set her mind to it.
