Category: Uncategorized

I’m still here. I’m still reading – verrrrrrrryyyyyy slooooooowly…. I’m not really in a slump, I just have a lot of other things on my plate. Planning Katelyn’s first birthday (when did that happen?!), Garrett started tball, I’ve been doing the 21 day fix (I’m down 13lb, with 4 more days left in this round), Nathan’s summer hours are kicking in and I’m responsible for the kids by myself more… And at the end of the day, sheer exhaustion takes hold and I’m lucky to read 10 pages. 

I’m really starting to mourn the loss of my “baby”. When Garrett was staring that first birthday in the eyes, I was ecstatic. I didn’t have a very good first year with him. I was inexperienced, unconfident, and he was just a tough baby. The second go around with Katelyn has been a breeze in comparison. She’s a totally different baby and I felt like I had more of a handle on things. So now that we are really facing that one year mark (in 2 weeks…), I’m really struggling with it. But goodness knows I do not have baby fever, I’m pretty sure a third is not in the cards for us, I don’t like pregnancy enough, I would have to give up my office/library for another baby, and honestly the last thing I really want to do is go through another round of newborning. It’s not my favorite stage at all. I like my babies when they sleep and can eat just about anything and potty trained is even better, ha! 

May is an insane month for us with both kids’ birthdays and our anniversary so life isn’t likely to slow down anytime soon, ha! But I am still here and I need to be better about updating a little bit. Today we’re off to my parents house to celebrate my aunts birthday. I’d like to say we’ll have a nice relaxing evening at home, but we have two kids – I’ve forgotten what that feels like…. 

Hopefully soon I’ll get a book finished so I can have a review to post. Until then, happy reading!!

Diane over at Bibliophile by the Sea hosts this meme.

I have gone kind of crazy and joined a bazillion Goodreads Challenges lately. I picked this book up because (1) I’ve wanted to try this series forever and (2) it fits a bunch of different challenges tasks… But what I wasn’t expecting was this intro! It hooked me immediately. I know this is not a new book (remember, I’m trying to focus on my own books…) and you’ve probably already read this one, but I’m curious if others were drawn by this intro like I was 🙂

 She hadn’t believed in monsters since she was six years old, back when her mom would check the closet and look beneath her bed at night. But at the age of twenty-one, bound and brutalized and lying naked on a concrete floor that was as cold as lake ice, she believed.

Had Garrett’s two month appointment today. He now weighs 9lb 2oz and is 20″ long. I can’t believe how big he’s gotten in two short months. This really is going to fly by! It kind of makes me sad to think that he’s not going to be a tiny baby much longer. But at the same time I’m looking forward to him getting bigger. I’m ready to play!!! We changed his reflux medicine. I have noticed that the Zantac is starting to not work consistently anymore. So she’s changed us over to Prevacid. Hopefully this one will work better. I hate seeing my baby hurt. And talk about hurting, he had to have his first round of shots today at his appointment. He cried, but I honestly think that it hurt me more than it did him!!

Car shopping was finally successful. I ended up going with the Ford Explorer. I get it tomorrow and am sooooo looking forward to having more room. My little Buick Regal was okay when it was just me and Nathan but its not really big enough for a family car. 

I’m almost finished with the book that I’m reading now. I hope to finish it today or tomorrow and get a review up sometime this week.  I’m anxious to start a new book, but haven’t decided what I’m going to read next. That’s the hardest and most fun thing for me, haha!!

Well I just wanted to post a quick update and that’s really all I’ve got for right now. Hope everyone has a good week! 

I 

January 23, 2009 – Buster was born 🙂

2009 was a wonderful year for us. We had just bought our house in late December 2008 and were gearing up to put down hardwood floors and get everything painted and ready to move in. And then the ice storm hit around January 25th or 26th. And it was terrible. Personally, we were without power at our duplex for 5 days and without it at the house for 7. We were lucky enough to be able to go up and stay with my family so that we would have heat, but Nathan had to continue to work. So he had to make the drive back and forth until power was restored at our duplex.

I remember driving around through town and the place looked like a war zone. Everything was deserted, power lines were everywhere, trees/limbs were down. It was an absolute mess. It was unbelievable. I had never seen anything like it.

Flash forward to March of 2009. We had been moved into our house for a few weeks and the urge was starting to hit us. We *had* to have a puppy! So we went on the search. I’m not entirely sure why we chose to get a Westie, but it was a breed we both settled on. Then we lucked out and found a breeder only an hour away from us. So we called her up and talked to her and made plans to go down and see what she had one Saturday afternoon.

We get down there and fall in love with this sweet little ball of fur. He was very calm and sweet. He loved cuddling with us. We made our decision with very little thought. And while he was technically ready to go home that day, we felt more comfortable leaving him for one more week since we really weren’t all that prepared at home.

The next week the breeder was coming up and actually going right through our hometown to meet another woman buying a different puppy about another hour from us. So she said she would be more than happy to bring our little one along for the ride and we would meet at the rest stop right of the interstate, about a 7 mile drive from our house. It was perfect. I packed up the crate and a few toys and off I went to bring the little dude home.

Needless to say we fell in love immediately that night! And we’ve been so blessed to have him in our lives since then. Not a day goes by that he doesn’t manage to make us smile and laugh. I can’t believe that three years have passed; it doesn’t really seem possible to have been that long since we brought him home.

Happy birthday, Buster!

A book that makes you happy.

Wow, so somehow I’m supposed to come up with a particular book that makes me happy? Well, how about I focus this post on what elements within a book will make me happy. I read to escape, so I really like non-stop action of some sort. Throw in a psychotic killer. Got to have a hero/heroine. Nail-biting suspense. Definitely has to have a plot twist in there. And the ending needs to wrap up without the cookie-cutter feel to it – leave a door open, I would prefer that to everything wrapped up with a bow on top. Put all that into a book, preferably 300-500 pages (short chapters are welcome) with NO grammatical errors and you will make me a happy girl.

So, I’m a HUGE Salukis Basketball fan, and you cannot imagine how excited I am about the 2010-2011 season. Unfortunately, our team has had a slight fall from grace the past few years, and we probably won’t be much better this year, but that doesn’t keep me from being OVERLY excited about the season starting October 30th!! I’ve got a countdown going on like there’s no tomorrow, and I am ready! GO DAWGS!!!

Okay, so this year Teddy over at So Many Precious Books, So Little Time is hosting this year’s “A Well-Rounded Challenge” You can click on the image above to go to the challenge page. I participated in last year’s version and needed it desperately. This year I need this challenge even more desperately! I have really been struggling with my challenges and I didn’t even sign up for too many this year. So when I saw this one come through on my reader I was very excited! Hopefully this will help me jump-start back into challenge. Here is what Teddy wrote:

August 1, 2009-December 31, 2009

Last year Jan of Jottings from Jan hosted this challenge. I agreed to host it this year.

The goal of this challenge is to help us finish some of the book challenges that we are participating in.

Here’s how it works:

There are 5 months left for the year, so we will read a total of 5 books, each one for a different challenge. If you are not in 5 different challenges then read at least one book for each challenge that you are in.

*Any combination of challenges works and you can change them at any time.

*You must be signed up with the other challenges.

*You may listen to eAudio, cassette tapes or compact discs.

*You may not read all five books from the same challenge.

*You don’t have to blog or write a review (but you can if you want to). Please use Mr. Linky to link to your reviews.

*Even if a challenge begins after August 1st you may use it for this challenge.

*Even if a challenge ends after 12/31/09 you may use it for this challenge.

*Sign-ups begin now and run through 9/1/2009. Please use Mr. Linky to sign up for this challenge.

*Have Fun!

That being said, I am signed up for 6 challenges right now. The 100+ Reading Challenge is about the only one that I am consistently working on (because well everything I read can count towards it!) So, I’m going to read a selection from my other challenge lists:

• 1st in a Series Challenge
  • Real Murders by Charlaine Harris
• Celebrate the Author Challenge
  • When the Bough Breaks by Jonathan Kellerman
• Countdown Challenge
  • Dancing with Ana by Nicole Barker
• 2009 Read Your Own Books
  • The Piper’s Sons by Bruce Chandler Fergusson
• What’s in a Name 2 Challenge
  • ‘D’ is for Deadbeat by Sue Grafton

I’m definitely looking forward to this one!!!