TGIF!

I've had a busy week with online classes, volunteering, and chauffeuring.  Softball season is in gear and we finally had a decent weather week! Today of course it is cooler and we may seen snow this weekend, which will be fun when we have to spend like 6 hours at the ball fields with pictures/games/opening ceremonies.  Her game earlier this week was a wonderful 70 degrees!

My favorite picture from the week:

I totally had better focused photos but I just love the in action Easter Egg Hunt photo!

The high of my week was chaperoning a field trip and sitting outside reading a book on the porch!

The low of my week was the disturbing dream that woke me up early today.  Darn Criminal Minds getting into my dreams!

Meal plan for the week was  

Monday - Mac and Cheese and Brats

Tuesday -  Enchiladas and salad

Wednesday -  leftovers from Tuesday

Thursday -  Steak , Baked Potatoes and then cake/ice cream for my husbands bday!

Friday -  good question haha.. either eggs and sweet potato hash or we may get pizza

What I’m listening to podcasts! I'm catching up on old episodes of Unsolved and Atlanta Murders.

What I’m watching finally catching up on some old Criminal Minds we haven't seen yet.

What I’m reading: Rise and Shine by Anna Quindlen and Sisters First by Jenna Bush Hager and Barbara Pierce Bush.  Neither are amazing and are taking me way longer than I'd like.  I have to focus on finishing them this weekend.

My plans for the weekend softball on Saturday and on Sunday a cousin is coming over to play with the kiddo for a few hours.  Probably more moving tetris of re-organizing our house for another child!

What are you listening to? What are you reading?

TGIF!

This week we saw all Michigan seasons except real summer.  Because real summer would have included humidity.  But I did FEEL 70 degrees.  So, maybe? This week I did a lot of volunteering, organizing, and shopping for softball accessories.

My favorite picture from the week:

The kiddo had her art on display!

The high of my week was hanging out with Fridays on Saturday.  It was just an overall great day.  The weather was fabulous, we met some friends for lunch, I took the kiddo to practice, met back up with friends, the kids played outside, and we hung out until about 7:30.  It was just a great day.

The low of my week was trying to sleep comfortably.  I keep playing the roll over and sleep, wake up, roll over and sleep game.  I sleep well, but it's uncomfortable sleeping in on my side constantly.

Meal plan for the week was  

Monday - Chicken Fajitas and Green Beans

Tuesday -  Sweet Potato Hash, Eggs, green beans and toast

Wednesday -  Chicken Fajita Nachos and Creamed Corn

Thursday -  my husband and I got take out and the kiddo went out with her grandparents

Friday -  Lasagna , Bread, and Salad

I have high hopes for the lasagna tonight.  I haven't been consistently eating meat in months and lasagna sounds so darn good.

What I’m listening to podcasts! My current favorites are Missing and Murdered, and Over My Dead Body. 

What I’m watching we just started The Code, and I like it!

What I’m reading: Rise and Shine by Anna Quindlen

My plans for the weekend include more organizing and cleaning.  Definitely going to watch the Masters at some point.  No real plans at the moment.

What are you listening to? What are you reading?

What I've Read Wednesday

I had a very slow reading time in February/beginning of March.  Like when I was pregnant the first time, I literally cannot read in that first trimester brain funk from about 6 weeks to 13 weeks.  I just couldn’t.  I did manage to finish a couple things, but then the last week of March when I started to feel better I rattled off 3 books on our break!

Today, I am sharing the books I read this past week.

Pawley’s Island by Dorothea Benton Frank is the 5^th book in the Lowcountry Tales series.  This is a series that you most definitely do not need to read in order.  They sometimes have characters that show up in other books but you could read literally any in this series as a standalone.  I picked this up from fill a bag day at our local library many moons ago.  I am working on clearing off some shelf space as we make room for another human in our house!

Pawley’s Island is the story of Rebecca Simms and her very messy divorce, Huey Valentine and his generous nature, and Huey’s best-friend Abigail who retreated to the island after heartbreak.  These three mesh and bring about a nice quick story about friendship, moving on, and helping each other out. 

I like these books because they are quick reads that delve into characters and have a lot of South Carolina low country thrown into them.

Shem Creek by Dorothea Benton Frank is the 4^th book in the Lowcountry Tales series.  Which I totally read after the 5^th.  I only noticed one character that was in this book that made a brief cameo in the 5^th book as a buyer of art.  But I read these books so far apart normally that I wouldn’t even notice when other characters pop in!

Shem Creek tells the story of Linda Breland and her escape from New Jersey to her childhood home of South Carolina.  She needs to leave New Jersey because she is worried about her youngest daughter and sick and tired of only meeting men who forget to mention they are married!  This book covers her career transition and how she and her daughters adjust to their move.  I read it in one day.  Super quick.

Knit Two by Kate Jacobs is the second book in her Friday Night Knitting Club series.  I honestly read the first book over 10 years ago and you could totally read this book as a standalone too.  They make enough references to things that happened in the first book that it worked.  Because I literally couldn’t remember anything besides that I loved the first book! If I was a person with oodles of time, I’d re-read the first and then read this, but clearing the shelves is the main goal right now!

The book joins up with the characters 5ish/6 years since the last book.  It catches you up with their lives and how they are changing and growing and if they are all the same people who met together and perhaps touches on if they have out grown each other.  This was a sweet tale, with international travel and good character growth. 

All of the books I read this week were super quick, totally would be great beach reads and had great characters.  Which, if we delved into the week before was all murder and mystery.  I keep it changing!

I just started Rise and Shine by Anna Quindlen and I’m about 10 pages in.

What did you read this week?

Currently

It’s been awhile since I posted regularly (again), but I have an excuse! I am 15 weeks pregnant and my brain turned mushy and I felt like crap and looking at screens made me pukey for about 10 weeks,  We are very excited!!!  But, I’m back!!!!!!!!!!  

Reading: Knit Two by Kate Jacobs.  I remember LOVING the first book she wrote but that was well over a decade ago.  I am weeding books off of a bookcase I need to move and trying to grab books I know I want to read once and get rid of.  Hoping, that it’s not hard for me to catch myself back up with the characters that I do not remember at all!

Loving:  the time I have at home to work on reorganizing our house and preparing for major paint/flooring that needs to happen.

Feeling: sad that we returned from our epic road trip to the land of freezing cold again.  I need summer! 

Anticipating: softball season! My kiddo starts practice this weekend and I’m excited to watch her play for her third season.

Grateful: that my husband’s family does a small getaway for employees each summer.  This year we are going to a resort/spa.  It’s family friendly but we decided to do it adult only and go up a day early.  Probably our last trip alone for quite awhile!

Working: on weeding out crap from our spare bedroom/office.  So much stuff that lived there that needs to go elsewhere.  I have donated 3 garbage bags full this week.

Listening: to lots of podcasts! On Fridays, I try to catch up on some true crime podcasts I like.

Watching: the Final Four! GO GREEN!!!!

Wishing: for summer time!!

What are you reading and listening to currently?

Alice & Gerald: A Homicidal Love Story

Alice & Gerald is a true crime story about two psychopaths (my conclusion).  Alice and Gerald meet when their trailers are parked next to each other in Wyoming.  They both have multiple failed marriages between them when they end up falling in “love”.  I use quotations because as messed up as these two are, do they even know what love is?

Alice appears to be a very controlling person who feels past relationships should stay in the past.  Gerald, however, has an ex-wife with two children he adopted and is responsible for their health insurance and child support.

One day, Gerald’s ex-wife and two boys disappear.  The police aren’t concerned because it’s Wyoming, the mom is nomadic, and her mother, Claire, receives a message that says she’s in Illinois.  However, the ex-wife’s mother is pretty convinced that Gerald is involved.   Since her daughter had called a lawyer, THAT DAY, to talk about more child support and the fact that Gerald and Alice had been very hostile towards his ex-wife and her children.

So began 20 plus year cold case investigation where Gerald and Alice remain free, even with a lot of circumstantial evidence against them.  It takes some very determined investigators to keep the case moving and the victims remembered.

The book takes you through some of the horror that Alice’s children faced while growing up, and the many twists and turns that the investigators take while trying to prove Alice and Gerald are responsible for the disappearance of Gerald’s ex-wife and her two boys.

Alice & Gerald: A Homicidal Love Story by Ron Franscell will be released on April 9^th!

Description: True-crime master Ron Franscell tells the grisly story of a cold case involving multiple murders committed by a husband-and-wife team. The appalling details are made even more vivid by the author's familiarity with the Wyoming times and places that formed the backdrop of his national bestseller The Darkest Night.

Would you kill for love? 

After Alice, a desperate young mother in a gritty Wyoming boomtown, kills her husband in 1974 and dumps his body where it will never be found, she slips away and starts a new life with a new love. But when her new love's ex-wife and two kids start demanding more of him, Alice delivers an ultimatum: Fix the problem or lose her forever. With Alice's help, he "fixes" the problem in an extraordinarily ghastly way ... and they live happily ever after. That is, until 2013, almost forty years later, when somebody finds a dead man's skeleton in a place where Alice thought he'd never be found.

Featuring a femme fatale whose manipulative, cold-blooded character rivals Lady Macbeth, this page-turner by bestselling true-crime author Ron Franscell revisits a shocking cold case that was finally solved just when the murderers thought they'd never be caught.

Do you like reading True Crime?

I received this book for review, all thoughts and opinions are my own!