Meanderings – Page 48

Morning Meanderings…. Quick Florida Recap!

Published on November 6, 2013 by Sheila (Book Journey)4 Comments

Good morning! I am back and I had a blast with College Son in Florida! We came back LATE Monday night, I think I hit my driveway about midnight. We had three full days in Florida and here are a few pictures for recap:

**Me outside Harry Potter World at Universal Studios Orlando.**

I dont want to give all the pics away as I may use them for Saturday Snapshot, but you get the picture… we had a blast!

As for reading, yes, you will be happy to know I did read – book 4 of the Mortal Instrument series and I am hooked HOOKED HOOKED! Starting book 5 tonight and I have reviews to catch up on… especially since when I read book one of this series and reviewed it I said in my post,

While I found City of Bones to be interesting and well written, I don’t see myself diving into the rest of the series. It was good, but didn’t hook me to the point I need to go and get the second book right now! (I don’t quite want to dig out the Spoiler page for this one but did anyone else get a Harry Potter vibe on this one? They are looking for the Mortal Cup…. there is a bad guy trying to get to the cup first named…. ~~Voldermort,~~ I mean named Valentine.)

Mmmmmm hmmmm…. we will be discussing what changed my mind. 😀 That ever happen to you?

Morning Meanderings… And I am Off!!!

Published on November 1, 2013 by Sheila (Book Journey)5 Comments

Good morning all! Happy November and all that comes with it… the scent of pumpkin, cool walks and runs, baked goods and we break out the crock pots for soups and chili. Just last night I made white chicken chili that was oooooh so good!

I know I have been quite the absentee blogger and I am working on getting back in gear. I have reviews to post, and fun things to share, I just seem to have booked myself pretty solid lately and that is where I am trying to learn yet another step to time management. 😀

What have I been doing? Working out in the early mornings, working on my home when I am not working at my job, volunteering, and training for a half marathon again – now aiming for April. Oh, and today I am excited to say that I am leaving this afternoon to go to Florida with College Son for a fun weekend of hanging out and Harry Potter World (SQQUUEEE!!!!!) will be back Monday evening to Minnesota.

For this week, I have asked Vicki from I’d Rather Be Reading At The Beach to post and host It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? She has graciously offered before and if she says yes, I will post a link on Sunday to connect with her for the meme, and if she can not do it this week, I will post the link up here as usual. 🙂

ANyhoo – enjoy your weekend! My life should slow down a bit once I return. Winter is always my slow time as I do not like cold, wet, and snow. Yeah yeah… I totally live in the wrong part of the world. 😛

Morning Meanderings… A Look At Girls Night Out – Halloween Style!

Published on October 26, 2013 by Sheila (Book Journey)16 Comments

Happy Saturday! I have about 30 minutes before I am leaving for the Monster Dash in Crosslake Minnesota. My friend Amy and I did this one last year – a 5k in full costume. Last year she was wonder woman and I was a zombie bride, it was crazy fun.

This year…. well… you will see.

On Thursday of this week we fall our October Ladies Night Out. Twice a year businesses hold this event. You (girls only!) pick up a punch card at a participating business up to the night before the event. Then the day of you have a set amount of hours that you can go these businesses and get your card punched acknowledging that you were there. You have a certain time to turn the card in to a specific business – this fall it was 8:30 pm with as many punches as you can. You trade in your card for one ticket per punch and the next day they announce winning numbers on a local radio station and if your number is called you can win, among other things $1000.00.It’s local and community and fun. Many of the businesses offer horduerves, snacks and wine. Some have samples of products and others have coupons to bring you back into the store.

The October one offers a bonus: a costume contest. Ooh we were all about that. Here are our pictures (thanks Saturday Snapshot!)

**My friend Amy as Medusa (she really gets into her work!)**

We had a blast! We didn’t win in the costume contest but it was still a great time and there are still a couple other contests going on so we will see 🙂

I posted these delightful pics today for Saturday Snapshot, click the link and check it out. It is a lot of fun!

Have a great Saturday!

Morning Meanderings… Things I Have Recently Learned In Books

Published on October 25, 2013 by Sheila (Book Journey)8 Comments

Good morning all! At least it is morning here at the time of this typing in Central Minnesota. We have had the heat on for a couple weeks now and as much as I dislike the cold and really do not like the upcoming snow… I am trying to embrace the season.

I have dived into some good books as of late and wanted to share what I have been learning, a few fun facts from the books. I believe you can learn something from all books – fiction and non fiction alike.

Fascinating to me, I just recently finished listening to Dr. Sleep by Stephen King. I had to give this one a try as this is the continuing story of The Shining. What I learned was that Danny (the little boy in The Shining and the now grown up protagonist in Dr. Sleep was a character that stayed with King all of these years, nagging at him with the “what ever happened to him?”…

In Anything That Moves by Dana Goodyear I learned about Kopi Luwak, the expensive coffee that is made out of Civet poop. Mmmm hmmm…. I couldn’t make this stuff up. I have also learned that we live in a strange STRANGE world where “extreme eating” is a thing and the more unusual the better…. I think I will pass on the cricket tacos and live octopus. 😉

In Billy Crystal’s Still Foolin ‘Em, I learned about his incredible relationship with his wife and daughters, his love for baseball, and his ritual before doing the awards shows.

From The Mortal Instrument series (my current guilty pleasures) I have discovered I really really like the name Jace…. AND I wish I had powers like the Shadow Hunters. 😛

In other news… I have recently been added as part of the awesome Bloggers Recommended group! This is a group of Bloggers headed by Nicole from Linus’s Blanket and Jen from Devourer Of Books. They put out a monthly newsletter of hot titles coming out that month that great bloggers have recommended as must reads! I am new to this and just getting my feet wet. I submitted my first recommendation for the November edition. You can subscribe to receive it here and you can check out the website here. 😀

What have you learned in books recently?

Morning Meanderings… Things I Love About My Town

Published on October 15, 2013 by Sheila (Book Journey)9 Comments

Good morning! Hope this Tuesday finds you all well.

Yesterday morning as I was walking into work I seen the guy who walks by the front of the building I work in singing each morning. He is quite into it, ear buds in, voice loud and hands usually air drumming. He is fascinating to watch. Usually, I am up in my office on the second floor when he goes by on the sidewalk below but I hear him all the same and rush to open the window each time to watch him and listen. He makes me smile.

Once, a couple summers ago I was walking out of that same building one evening and there were a group of musicians on the lawn. They had large instruments like cello’s and wonderful ones like violins and flutes and they were playing the most amazing music. On a warm summers eve it was about as good as it gets as I watched them, apparently a random gathering of friends who chose a spot to play. It was as close to Stars Hollow (yes yes… Gilmore Girl reference) as I have been.

Stars Hollow. Fictional town from Gilmore Girls.

and this is Brainerd…

Street dances, zombie crawls, arts in the park, St Patrick’s Day parade….. maybe I have a little bit of Stars Hollow right here. 🙂

I have a “take it one step at a time” day. This morning I work and then I have a funeral to attend. The husband of a friend was hit by a car while riding his bike last Thursday. It is a very sad and painful situation. Later I am resetting the window at the library and staying to host for author Lorna Landvik when she speaks tonight at the library.

Morning Meanderings.. A Few Books In My Mail Box!

Published on October 6, 2013 by Sheila (Book Journey)7 Comments

Good morning!

I am excited to say that I finished the book club book, Giants In the Earth (all 500+ pages!) last night. I feel kind of like a rock star! It started out super slow and I thought this is going to hurt…. but on Friday evening I sat down to really work at it and did not emerge for 5 hours.

Now, my reward is back to what I was reading before I had to move on the book club read, City of Glass by Cassandra Clare.

My summer and book requests did not mix so I had pretty much resisted the offers that were coming in because I honestly knew I did not have time for them. It was sad to see an empty mailbox – free of books day after day but it really was for the best. It is fun now as I have started saying yes again, to see the books come in and I am so excited to actually be able to sit down with a book again.

Here is what showed up this week:

Prey by Andrew Fukuda – I ordered after reading the first one!

Anything That Moves by Dana Goodyear – I am super excited about. I love food memoirs.

Before I Met You by Lisa Jewell – looks good!

Theory Of Remainders – from Winter Goose Publishing

Flo and Wendell – not sure how I got that one but here it is 🙂

SO thats what is new in literature here. I have work to do (again) in the book room… it needs a little TLC, perhaps tonight after I return from my board meeting.

Have a Super Sunday!

Morning Meanderings… The End Of The Season

Published on October 5, 2013 by Sheila (Book Journey)25 Comments

Good morning! How are ya all doing this Saturday? It is cold and damp here in Minnesota. There is still a possibility of snow and I am hoping that is not true. If any of you know the author Sandra Brannan, here is one of the pictures she posted on Facebook from South Dakota yesterday:

Yeah… I am seriously not ready for that. They were hit with a big storm.

Anyhoo… enough of that. This past week our kick ball season came to an end. Yes, yes… kickball…. like in grade school. Big red bouncy ball… we kick it and run (try to run) the bases. Its not always pretty…. it is usually fun.

The group I play with are a mix of friends and we have played for the last 4 years now, possibly more. I missed last year as my schedule was just too full… but I was back this year and it was a lot of fun to be back.

There are about 16 teams and we stitch out each week and play two or three games on Tuesdays.

**Most of the team… we were missing a couple subs (missed Paula, Andy! 😦 ) and a few regulars – Greg, Dawn and Jon.**

**My friend Amy and me. Amy is also in the Bookies book cub which just goes to show you… us readers do more than read. 🙂**

These are my pics for this weeks Saturday snapshot sponsored, hosted, supported by: West Metro Mommy Reads. Stop over and check out what other people are posting pics of this week and feel free to write your own post as well. 😀

Today I plan to go to St Cloud (about an hour away) and look at their costume shop. I need a few things for book club this week and I have a Monster Dash coming up October 26th that I want to see what would be good fun running wear.

Hope you all have a great Saturday!

Morning Meanderings… Cold Weather and Giants have hit Minnesota

Published on October 4, 2013 by Sheila (Book Journey)19 Comments

Good morning! After the last few days I am so glad that we had the week we did for our canoe and camping trip last week! Temperatures have dipped to 30 in the mornings and the last few afternoons as the ones coming through the weekend have, and are calling for rain.

On the bright side, this will plant me in the house to work on reading our Classic read for Book club on Tuesday, Giants In The Earth.

Basically it is about a family that moves from Minnesota in the 1870’s to South Dakota. The book talks of this Norwegian families trials as they try to make a new home for themselves. Per Hansa (oh yes the names are hard) is the man who believes his future is ahead of him and all things will pan out. His wife, Beret wishes they could go back to the comforts of what they had.

Lets just say I am struggling with this read. I pick it up and long to read something else. I need this weekend to get a good feel for the book and for our review on Tuesday. On the bright side, I believe the review will save this one. We are going to have our meeting in an 1800’s cabin with no electricity that one of our Bookies owns. We will have kerosene lamps, and rumors of a potato bar for our dinner as they ate a lot ( A LOT) of potatoes.

This afternoon I am going to go look for some “prairie wear” for the meeting and see if someone can make me a bonnet.

SO thats all happening here. I have some things to do this morning and then off I go. 😀 Hopefully I will get a review up this afternoon. That’s the plan anyway.

Have you ever read (attempted) this book? Are there other classics you have read that you struggled through?

Morning Meanderings: Its Heartbreaking Really… and makes me a tad bit crabby ;)

Published on October 3, 2013 by Sheila (Book Journey)16 Comments

Good morning. 🙂 Long term readers of Book Journey know that I am a HUGE Gilmore Girls fan. I own every season and watch them all usually once a year. You can imagine my excitement when last fall I hear about a show called Bunheads claiming to have the same quick whit and charm and even in a couple cases the same characters ( Liza Weil (Paris!), Kelly Bishop (Emily!), and Sean Gunn (Kirk!) just to name a few.

Of course at first I was skeptical of a show about a ballet school and a former exotic dancer turned good girl… but I was quick to see the show had value and in short time I became a fan…

and I loved the dancing…

And now I know its not coming back replaced by the other “dance shows” that I do not watch.. and I am sad. Buggers. I guess back to the books…. reading (still) City of Glass – book 3 in the Mortal Instrument series but I must put it down and get into Giants Of The Earth which is our book club pick due on Tuesday. Eep! At least I have a low key weekend. 🙂

Any shows that you loved that didnt make the ratings cut or (as in the case of Bunheads) were pitted against other highly watched shows and a decision was made against them?

Morning Meanderings… Banned Aid!

Published on September 20, 2013September 20, 2013 by Sheila (Book Journey)8 Comments

Good morning. Crazy day already. I came home at 1:30 am after seeing Wicked in the theater in the cities. Now I am staring at a table full of things to pack (or not) and for the life of me can not find my digital camera that has been in the same place for years. GAH. I leave this afternoon for our cabin and then off to Ely tomorrow to join the rest of the group to go on our canoe and camping trip. I feel….

disorganized. 😯

Ok – enough of that for now though… lets talk banned books because we are around the corner and hitting the finish line of the event today and tomorrow. Today….

After seeing Wicked last night (banned book by the way!), I was thrilled to see that Erin from Quixotic Magpie wrote a post with a witch theme, The Witch Of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare. I loved the post and the crazy reasons this book was banned. Erin is also doing a giveaway!

Tracy at Uncharted Parent talks about book banning and The Absolutely True Diary Of A Part Time Indian. She has some good thoughts about banning.

Florinda (love her!!!!) at the 3 R’s Blog shares her thoughts on censorship. Well worth the read.

Suey at It’s All About The Books writes on the book Thirteen Reasons Why ( a book I really enjoyed!)

Julia at Diary of A Book Nerd posted a great review of Looking For Alaska and has a giveaway going too! 😀

I hope you check out these great posts today and I really hope that as this weekend is approaching fast that you pick up a banned book from the list and dig in to something good!

I will posts pics of Wicked in the morning. I have a lot to get moving on this morning. 😀 Have a great day!