This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase after clicking them, we will be compensated, but there is no additional cost to you. All opinions expressed are our own. Thank you for your support.
The first week of the New Year was very hard on my resolutions! I was sick all week. First I had one strain of the flu, then another. I haven't been so sick for an entire week in a really long time! However, there is one bright spot. One of my goals for this year is to get back to reading. I mentioned in that post that I had started the book The Rules of Magic by Alice Hoffman. While laying around being sick, I was able to read and I finished that book!
I was quickly sucked into this prequel to Practical Magic and found myself waiting for magical things to happen. The characters were well developed and their story kept me engaged, but I would have liked to see a lot more of the magic. It was more of a story of finding a way to love and ways to "live a lot." It was at times heart wrenching and sometimes disconcerting. I didn't appreciate some of the language used. But, I know that a lot of people love both the book and the movie Practical Magic, so they will enjoy this story of the two revered aunts in that story and an uncle, I'm sure. Now that I have finished that book, I am looking for something new to read. Will you do me a favor and send me your recommendations? I need a good reading list for this year. I have a couple of other bloggers that I go to for suggestions, but I am wondering what else there is out there and what you, our readers would recommend. I love fantasy and sci-fi, historical fiction and non-fiction, and mysteries. Please give me your suggestions in the comments! You will be helping me keep one of my resolutions!
Another of my resolutions is to go through my books and keep what I love and give away what I don't. I am going to start on that this week. I came across these two books today and felt like I should give them another look!
So, those are a couple of suggestions from me, and I can hardly wait to read yours! I will create a list for everyone once I get your responses. Thank you!
Helen
4 Comments
This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase after clicking them, we will be compensated, but there is no additional cost to you. All opinions expressed are our own. Thank you for your support.
One day last week was National Play a Card Game Day. I was going to write this post then, but my new granddaughter was born and that post just didn't happen. But, since playing games is a big deal in our family, and because we had already come up with a bunch of our favorites to share with you, I thought I would go ahead and do that post today for Friday Faves #46! We came up with a bunch of card games that we really enjoy. Some are old favorites and speak for themselves in the collage above. Others are unconventional, but still use cards. Most of our choices have their own specialty card decks. So, here we go!
Last year, Tyler and Jessica received Dutch Blitz as a Christmas gift and I have loved it ever since. It is fast paced and so much fun! Because I am a grandmother, I am not as fast at it and Madalynn and Jessica always beat me. But, I am getting better! I love it anyway. I guess I am a glutton for punishment. I just noticed that there is an expansion pack for it that I will have to check out! Skip-Bo is a classic and one of Lindsey's favorites. Dutch Blitz is similar to Skip-Bo. In both games the object is to be the first to get rid of your pile of 10 cards. I think you would call Skip-Bo just a little more civilized because you take turns!
There you have it! Besides Hearts, Rummy, Uno and Spot IT, those are some great games that we would recommend to game playing families like we are.
If you have missed our other posts about games that we love, I am linking to them below! Have a fun weekend, and let us know of any games that you love that we have missed talking about or trying. We love to try new games!
This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase after clicking them, we will be compensated, but there is no additional cost to you. All opinions expressed are our own. Thank you for your support.
If you subscribe to this blog or follow us on social media, you know that Lindsey had her baby! We are so happy to welcome Baby Emily to our family. I haven't had a lot of chance to enjoy her because I have been down sick for the past few days. I am starting to feel better and I can hardly wait to get over there and cuddle her again.
In the meantime, I realized that I never told you about the baby shower Lindsey's MIL Joanne and I threw for her back in November. The holidays hit, and I saved it for later. Since Emily is here, now seems like the perfect time to talk about the shower.
Since Joanne had to travel from CA, we felt it was easiest to have the shower right at Lindsey's house. It turned out perfectly because we didn't have to pack up and haul the gifts away in a car. We just put them down in the nursery! I sent out the invitations. LIndsey asked people to give her addresses on Facebook so I would know who to send to. A few people didn't give me their addresses in time. Sorry! Here is a tip when designing your own invitations, Make them fit on postcard sized photo paper! The paper is glossy and looks nice and they are easy to print from home! I like to use Google Draw to design things like that.
We used a storybook theme for the baby shower. On each invitation we asked for a storybook instead of a card and those who did that would be put into a drawing for a prize. We also did a thank you drawing for people who brought diapers.
Lindsey's favorite children's book is Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak. She is using that as her theme in her nursery with colors and decor. I used a silhouette of one of the monsters and framed a picture for the room. I had seen it done somewhere and it was easy to design on Google Draw.
To decorate the refreshment table and to use in Emily's room later, Joanne did a project that I think is to die for. She found a used copy of Where the Wild Things Are and used it to decoupage the art work onto the letters of Emily's name.
We had a lot of good food, and we played a couple of games at the party. Joanne hit the jackpot at a thrift store she frequents and found a boxful of plastic pacifiers on ribbons. She picked them up for a song. We gave one to each guest as they arrived and told them that if they heard anyone use the word baby they could take away their necklace. (I always lose that game immediately.)
Another game we played was a spin off from Scattergories that we called Scatter Baby! You can download the double sheet below. We used the babies initials on the blank lines and gave everyone 2 minutes to fill in the blanks. Then we would start with whoever had the most filled in and had them read what they thought of. If anyone had a match, then they had to cross it off. Whoever ended up with the most ideas not crossed off won the game. It is a lot of fun if you remind everyone to think out of the box. Let me tell you, you had to think out of the box with Emily's initials. We used E G because her name is Emily Grace. Or you could use the first and last names. Just click on the image to get a prinable version.
The shower went very well and Emily received many beautiful gifts! Fun was had by all. Now that she is here and using the gifts, we are all so appreciative of the love that was shown to her and her mother. We hope you can use some of these ideas at your next baby shower! For more ideas, check out past posts about baby showers here and here.
This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase after clicking them, we will be compensated, but there is no additional cost to you. All opinions expressed are our own. Thank you for your support.
I know that sometimes it seems cliche to make resolutions at the New Year. I mean, you can set goals anytime of the year and keep them. But, I think the reason I actually use the New Year to make my resolutions is because after the holidays and I have put away all of those trappings and the house is cleaned up and fresh again, it seems like an appropriate time to make a fresh start with many things. Not only that, it feels good to look ahead to an entire year that is full of promise and already divided into times and seasons to use as incremental deadlines to keep myself on track. It is easy to remember that I began something in January. If I begin a new goal in May, I may not recall when I started it. That is just me. Finally, It is nice to reach the holiday season and look back over the year and feel peace about what was accomplished during the past year. That adds to my feelings of thankfulness.
Last week, on this post, I told you about the great calendar/planner that Maddy gave me for Christmas and how I was going to use it to help me keep my goals for 2018. (That link is to the customizeable planners at Minted. There are other choices listed on that other post.) I also promised to share my goals with you when I had them all decided upon. Soooo.....
Happy New Year!
Here are my 2018 goals and how I plan to actually keep them this year! If you haven't made any resolutions for yourself this year, maybe my ideas will jog your brain to come up with some of your own. :) I hope that by recording them here, it will make me more accountable for them as well.
As I mentioned in my original post, I took the time to reflect and ponder on the things that I wanted to improve on in the coming year. I divided my goals into 5 categories:
Personal Goals:
Spiritual Goals:
I only set one goal in this category because I feel like many of my other goals will ultimately help me spiritually as well. (Such as journaling and healthy eating.) 1. Scripture Study-I used to always read my scriptures in the morning. Now, that just isn't working for me. Since my children are all going different directions and my husbands work hours are changed, I am finding many things changing in my life and I have to change old habits to fit these changes. I need to carve out 30 minutes a day for scripture study and I am going to try for the early evening. If that doesn't work well, I will try something else until I find what works. Another part of making my scripture study more successful is remembering to pray before and after I read. This goal is very important to me. I will be sure to journal about my progress and insights as I work on this goal.
Preparedness Goals:
It is very important to my husband and I to try to be self sufficient. In the event of a job loss or some other emergency, we want to be prepared. This can lead to needing financial goals and preparedness skills. Financial goals are something we have together and work on all of the time. This year I have included some skills goals that I need to work on.
Home Improvement Goals:
This is one of those areas where I have continued to make the same goals year after year and I always get side tracked and never get as much done as I hope to. This is also an area that will have to wait until my son and his family are gone in order to accomplish them. Although, we did get somewhat of a start in organizing rooms in order to make room for my grandchildren to sleep! There is always a silver lining!
Blogging Goals:
There are so many goals that I could make for my blog, and I know that there are things that the girls and I will do over the year on the blog that I am not even listing. But, here are two goals that I really want to be sure to do!
Those are my 2018 goals! Surprisingly, I do not feel overwhelmed, but I feel excited. I just discovered yesterday that my new planner came with stickers that I can use as I plan and journal in it. One of the stickers that I just put on my goal page says, "Don't Call it a Dream, call it a Plan!" That is how I feel about it! Please let me know if you have any suggestions or if you want to share any of your resolutions for this year! Here is wishing everyone great success in the coming year!
Helen |
Creators of Hot Cocoa Bombs! (copyrighted)
Author
Helen Reynolds: Mother of six children , grandmother to eleven! I love to cook, craft and create things and I especially love doing that with my family, So, when my lawyer daughter, Lindsey, my artist daughter, Madalynn, and I came up with the idea of Hot Cocoa Bombs, this blog was born. Then, one more daughter, with her technical and science skills, plus creativity has joined in to round us out! Read more about us here! Archives
May 2024
|