Thursday, July 21, 2011

Book Review: Room

RoomRoom by Emma Donoghue

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I don't have too many thoughts on this book. I enjoyed it. I thought the narrator being a 5 year old boy was an interesting fresh idea. I liked that perspective because it made some subject matter that could have been very troubling, somehow seem okay. I felt like the ending was happy, but VERY realistic at the same time.





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Friday, July 8, 2011

How many synonyms can I find for friend?

Since moving to Columbus, one thing has become alarmingly clear.

I CANNOT EXERCISE BY MYSELF. Or should I say, that I don't exercise by myself, and if I do then I really hate it.

If I have a pal to meet me (accountability) I am excited to go and look forward to it. I also really enjoy the exercise because I have someone to chat with and before I know it, we're done and feeling good.

In Augusta, I had some great workout cronies, some were gym class companions, some walking sidekicks, and one amazing running confidant. Not only do I miss the good feeling I get from exercise, I really miss my friends. Having someone to just gab with multiple times a week is extremely therapeutic. Especially when that person is an amazing cohort who will never judge you and you can just be 100% your self around them.

Luckily, my dear sister-in-law lives here in Columbus, and she is a fantastic workout buddy! She is great to talk to, always shows up, and constantly motivates me to do work a little harder. Unfortunately, she went on vacation for 3 weeks and I haven't exercised ONCE since she left. Sometimes I really feel like a failure because I have no motivation to exercise by myself. I shouldn't feel guilty or weak because of this. It's okay to need a consort. And I do. This also really helps me understand why someone could say that they hate exercise. When I'm alone, I do to. But when I'm with a chum, I LOVE it!

(so how many did you count?)

Thursday, July 7, 2011

It's been a while, no?

Whenever I haven't posted for a while, I never know how to begin again. Should I try to catch up on all the stuff that I've missed? Should I just hit the ground running and pretend that I haven't been mysteriously missing for a month? I'll just hit the most important thing that I missed, then move on from there.

WE moved!! We are now westerners. Well, west Georgians. We moved to Columbus, GA which is on the western border of Georgia (Augusta, where we have been for the past 2 1/2 years is on the eastern border of Georgia). I think that I have been hesitating writing this post for several reasons:

1. Hello-I've been busy MOVING
2. I've already talked about why we moved and how I'm doing and all that over and over again to friends and family a million times and I just can't come up with the energy to hash it all out again.
3. I feel like a need to pay tribute to how much I loved Augusta and all the people there and how much I will miss them, but there is no way for me to do it (and them) justice. It makes me sad just thinking about writing this part.
4. Usually when I go through periods of not posting it's because I'm feeling blue. It's easy to feel like only happy or interesting things are blog worthy and when I'm feeling down, I don't really feel like sharing. I don't want this blog to be a mis-representation of my life by only including the my-life-is-soooo-awesome stuff (which it usually is) but like I said, when I'm down I'm not really inspired with interesting topics, and I don't do a lot of fun stuff.

Here a sample of what my daily posts would have looked like:

"I read a lot today, and the kids drove me crazy. Were they so bad because I was ignoring them by reading? Or was I reading so much because they were driving me crazy and I just wanted to escape the loony bin? Oh, and it was really hot today so we didn't really go outside"

Thursday, June 30, 2011

Book Review: The Other Boleyn Girl

The Other Boleyn GirlThe Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I enjoyed this book. I couldn't put it down and was always looking for a few minutes to read. However it still took me a while to finish, I'm not sure why, I guess it's just long.

I enjoyed the story of Anne Boleyn and her sister, Mary. Both sisters ended up being mistresses to the King. It was sad to see how Anne's ambitions took her there, and Mary was forced to do her fathers bidding.

I loved that you really got to see the consequences of their choices. Anne fulfills her goal to become Queen, at great cost to herself and everyone around her. Mary finally defies her family and finds true happiness by giving up the "wonderful" (scandalous) life at court.

This is a great historical fiction novel.



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Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Camping and the Lake

We finally went camping for the first time since before Jonah was born. We had so much fun! Jerry and I used to go camping all the time and we have sorely missed it. What's even better is we got to go with my friend Tracie and her kids.

Jonah and his girlfriend

"Jonah please look at the camera", "NO"


Tracie takin' pictures

Ollie chillin'


He loved these little camping chairs.

Roastin' 'mallow's

more marshmallow's

And more...

Lots and lots of 'mallows.



Playing games, the best part of camping. Although this was one part that is a lot more fun without kids. I do love candyland, but even I have a limit. And the kids love cards, but well, we all know how that ends up ;)


The next day we headed out to Richardson lake which was awesome! It was a VERY clean and nice lake with diving boards, slides, and nice beach. It was so much fun!


Doing flips and diving was my favorite! I miss diving boards!


Oliver absolutely loved it. And just look at how clean that lake is. There were no rocks, weeds, sticks or any other kinds of icky goo.