Update Post

WEEKLY UPDATE

It has bee more than a week since my last update post. But I thought Periodic Update sounded  bit odd. I've still been reading and posting when I feel like it. I'm taking part in several upcoming blog tours. I've got a review coming tomorrow and Thursday. Then I've got between 1 to 3 posts per week scheduled (reviews & other blog tour stuff) until the middle of June.

I've had the urge to write a few times in the last two weeks and then got sidetracked by something else. I've been a bit distracted by Minecraft. Two weekends ago my son and I played for way too many hours. We're also in the middle of spring sports. My husband is coaching my son in trap shooting and baseball. I'm doing the scorekeeping for the trap shooting. So that has kept us busy several days a week. Now the end of school year activities are upon us - band concert & awards program.

My daughter is set to come home for the summer next weekend. I can't wait to get her back home. We'll be heading to Orlando for a family vacation in July. We're skipping Disney this year. We will be staying on Disney property. I think we'll probably end up at Universal for a couple of days. I want to get at least one beach day in. I'd really like to find a beach restaurant to eat at. Then I'm still looking for other things to do that we haven't done before. We've been several times and I'm trying to find new things to do that we were always to busy with Disney and/or Universal to be bothered with before.

You may have noticed that I stopped putting a rating on my reviews. It's something I've been thinking about for a while now. My ratings don't have much meaning to them. They are just an arbitrary number that I give the books. Instead I've decided to be sure to include what I liked about the book and what I didn't like. I felt like this was more important than a rating with no real meaning.

 Lastly, I've decided to take part in the Blog Ahead Mini event being hosted by The Herd Presents and running May 1 - 15. It's meant to get us to schedule more posts. I can always use help with doing this and it seems to help me to focus on my blog when I take part in an event like this. At this point I really don't have any goals. We'll just see what plays out. If you'd like to check it out as well, just click here.

Weekly Wrap-Up & Stacking the Shelves #13

So I haven't been posting much. First I got sick. Then I got busy at work and home. Then I just didn't feel like posting. The books I would have felt like posting about had been read weeks ago and I'd read several others since them. However, I don't want to completely quit blogging. I'd still like a place that I can meet other bloggers and support the authors I love. So I've decided I'm not going to be making posts just to make a post. I'll post about the books I'm excited about when I feel like it. I'll also still be taking part in the challenges I signed up for. I really enjoy tracking my progress on them.

This week I finished reading book #10 in Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series. I really enjoy this series. I've got book 11 and book 15, but not the ones in between. So I'm not sure if I'll pick up book 11 next or move on to Game of Thrones. One night this week I started reading what I thought was book one in this series, but it turns out that it was a later book. I enjoyed what I read and was able to follow it (this genre is out of my usual read). So I'm actually looking forward to starting the actual book one.

Welcome to my post for this week’s Stacking the Shelves hosted by Tynga at Tynga's Reviews. This is where I can post about the books and book swag I received this week. I will be posting my list on Sundays and will include anything I received Sunday through Saturday. 

So last week I mentioned that I had some money on Amazon gift cards and couldn't bring myself to actually spend any of it when I had so many unread books on my Kindle. Well, I actually decided on a book last week to purchase. It's pictured below. This is a series I started years ago just before going on a family vacation to Disney World. I was so into the first book that I couldn't wait until I had some down time at the resort to read more. I think I even purchased book two while I was still on vacation. I think my husband got a little irritated with me that trip because I just couldn't put the book down. However, before I can start this book I purchased this week, I need to refresh my memory of what has happened so far in the series. So I've started to reread book one.  

PURCHASED

 

FREEBIES

Hope you all have a great week!

Weekly Recap Feb 13, 2016

I'm still alive! Just dropping in to give a quick update. I've been having a little too much stress in my life lately and last week I just sort of checked out blog-wise. I've still been reading. Thursday I discovered a mistake in two of the W-2s I sent out to employees and had a melt-down. I really felt bad for the man that works with me. I'm his supervisor for all extensive purposes. He just came into my office at the wrong time. I got it all figured out Friday and things are good now.

Then my son's basketball team has made it to the championship game of the Junior High District Tournament. We're headed there in about an hour. It's a hour and a half drive to the host school and this will be our fourth trip there in the last two weeks. If you all could just say "Go Panthers!" that would be great! UPDATE: They won! It was an amazing game. They lead by like 10 points at the half. Then had some troubles in the 2nd half. But they never gave up the lead and won 47-46. They beat the #1 seated team. So proud and happy for these boys!

I just looked at my read bookshelf on Goodreads to see if I'd finished any books this week and the last book I finished was last Sunday. So while I've been reading this week, I haven't actually finished any books. I have been reading To The Nines by Janet Evanovich the last few days and have realized it was probably what I needed to get me out of my reading funk. It's full of so much snark that I frequently find myself laughing as I read.

I'll leave you all with this picture of my parent's new puppy. He's a German Shepard and is 6 weeks old I think. He was so soft and cute. But I'm glad it's them that has to deal with all the puppy stuff and not me. For some reason they have named him Larry. I hope you all have had a great week and that your weekend is going well.

Oh, and Happy Valentine's Day! That makes me think of something else that happened this week. My 14 year old son asked his girlfriend to go see a movie with him. She unfortunately has family commitments that will keep her from going. My son has also bought her flowers and a stuffed animal. I'm just not sure that I'm ready for my last child at home to grow up like this. It's thrown me for a little loop.

Weekly Recap: December 5

I know I just did a November Wrap-Up post that kind of covers some of the basics for this post. However, that post didn't include some things that I wanted to share with you.

Life

This was pretty much covered in the November Wrap-Up and I won't rehash it here. So, let's proceed.

Reading

It was a good week reading-wise for me. I finished two books that I've been reading the last several weeks.
Collide by Shelly Crane - I've got mixed feelings about this book. I will probably continue the series. I didn't like the main character Sherry throughout most of the book. But she grew on me. I did like her love interest Merrick though. I'm thinking 3 1/2 to 4 stars for this one. I hope to get a review up for it this week.
With Visions of Red (Broken Bonds #1) by Trisha Wolf - Warning: this book contains BDSM. I enjoyed this book. It's a crime solving story with some BDSM thrown in. I was shocked however that it ended in a cliffhanger. Now, I will say that I did not research it fully. I ran across it while reading Bookworm Brandee's blog and my interest was peeked. I love crime stories and thought this could be interesting. I will continue the series as I need to solve the crimes.

Adding to my TBR Pile

I've added LOTS to my TBR pile in the last two weeks. I'll be posting a new Stacking the Shelves tomorrow detailing what all I got. I will tell you it includes a signed copy of Outlander. It also includes a contest win that I was really excited about. I'll be sure to share pictures tomorrow!

Blog Post Love

My Outlander Blog posted a wonderful piece on why Outlander has been successful. The response I received when I tweeted this post was amazing. I may just have to work an Outlander mention in all of my posts. :)
Confessions of a Book Geek posted a good discussion post about whether or not to include a buy link with reviews.
Weaving Waves Words posted a Showcase Tag that I would participate in if I'd been blogging longer. I think it could be interesting to do this eventually. However, it may be more interesting for me more than my readers.
Bring My Books shared an emotional post about connecting with song lyrics.
Bookworm Brandee is participating in a New Release Blitz and Giveaway. Here review of the book has drawn me in once again and I've added this book to my TBR.

Well, that's it for me this week. How was your week? Feel free to share in the comments.

Weekly Recap: November 21

So I've seen some posts around that I wanted to give a try and have decided to combine them in a post I'll call Weekly Recap.

Life

So last weekend my family (hubby, son & myself) took a whirlwind trip to visit my daughter at college. It was a great weekend and I didn't even cry when we left Sunday afternoon. That's a major accomplishment for me. We checked out a museum, shopped and ate a lot of good food. After we left, my daughter even sent me a text thanking me for taking her shopping and buying her food all weekend. Here's a picture of the campus.

I took Friday and Monday off of work. I was piled up high when I returned, but I enjoyed the time away. Monday I found a cooking show on the cooking channel called Extra Virgin that inspired me to go grocery shopping. So I spent a good hour an a half picking out groceries on my day off. I normally hate shopping. This show really makes me want to go to New York for all the food. I've only watched 1 1/2 shows. But those 1 1/2 shows have shown me a few great local mom & pop type specialty food stores and really made me hungry. Have any of you ever watched this show?

Reading

So I had hoped to accomplish a lot of reading while on our trip. It didn't happen. I ended up driving several hours on the way up. I read quite a bit on the way home, but should have been sleeping because I was needed to drive the last few hours. But I found it difficult to sleep while it was still light out.

I did manage to make some good progress on two books that I've listed below. The titles are links to the Goodreads page.

Collide by Shelly Crane - This was one of the books I picked in my Tackling the TBR Pile post. I'm liking this book, but can tell it's her first book. It's a little slow going for me right now. I actually like Merrick better than I do Sherry, but most of the book is told from Sherry's POV. I actually thought it would be more action packed than it is so far. As of the time that I'm writing this post (Friday night), I'm 58% finished with the book.

With Visions of Red by Trisha Wolfe - This book isn't for everyone. I know not everyone likes to read erotica, but I do from time to time. I read a review last week sometime by Bookworm Brandee of a later book in the series and decided to check the series out. I found the first book was free and decided to give it a shot. I like that this book combines crime solving with the erotica. So it seems to have some substance to it. At the time I'm writing this post (Friday night), I'm 65% finished with this book.

The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater - I'm still working on this book; although I haven't picked it up in probably two weeks.

Adding to my TBR Pile

I have added a few books to my TBR pile. It looks like I've added 10-12 books to my TBR list in the last week. Here are some highlights with links to where I found them if possible.

True Love by Melissa Pearl - I originally found this author through a contest. Then I became part of her Fan Club on Facebook and took part in the new release party for True Love Wednesday. I've not read any of her books yet, but this book really sounds good to me.

The Lies We Lie by Emersyn Vallis - I found this one while catching up on my blog emails I get. The description leaves you wondering just what this books is about that I feel I have to read it. The only problem is that it doesn't release until February 2016.

Hello, Goodbye, and Everything In Between by Jennifer E. Smith - Another email I cleared out and found a book to fawn over. I just hope it has the ending I'd want. I like my Happily Ever Afters. :)

Blog Post Love.

 

Parajunkee is having a giveaway for signed copies of The Casquette Girls and Run/Fight - Both books take place in New Orleans and I LOVE New Orleans.
Rachel at Confessions of a Book Geek and Alicia at A Kernel of Nonsense talk about their Transatlantic Book Project. It sounds like a really neat project. I can't wait to hear more about it.
Rachel also talked about her Bookish Gift Guide with exclusive discounts in preparation for Christmas.
Cait told us 25 bookish facts about her. I love her writing style and I was actually thinking of doing a post like this while on the way to see my daughter. But I've yet to take it from my brain. Turns out this is actually a bookish tag and open to anyone that would like to make a post of 25 facts. I'll give it a try in the next few days.

How was your weeks? Feel free to leave a link to a post telling me about your week.