Living a Joyful Life

  What We're Eating This Week... Monday: Fries & cheesy bread Tuesday: Chicken with rice & veggies Wednesday: Salad I'm not sure about the rest of the week. What I'm Reminiscing About... My trips to the lake. What I'm Loving... My family came to visit for a week and I loved spending time with them. I've also been watching a lot of sports (baseball, college basketball, NBA). What I've Been Up To... Watching sports/TV/movies, spending time with my family. What I'm Dreading... Nothing at the moment. What I'm Working On... Filming & uploading videos for my YT channel. What I'm Excited About... I won second place in the Men's March Madness Bracket challenge. If Duke had beat Houston in the final four, I would have won first place for the second year in a row. What I'm Watching/Reading... Watching: All of the sports, TV shows, movies, and two Netflix documentaries. Reading: I read 4 books this month. My book blog post will be up next we...

  Currently… (What I've Been Doing Lately)   Celebrating: Winning second place in my March Madness Men's bracket challenge Drinking: My typical drinks: Iced coffee, water, Propel, Olipop Eating: Salads Reading: I finished Finlay Donovan Digs Her Own Grave (book 5 in the series) by Elle Cosimano the other day and haven't started a new book yet.  Listening: A playlist I found on Spotify that has music I loved as a teenager. It's a been a fun nostalgic throwback. Watching: Men's & women's March Madness, MLB (Let's Go Mets), NBA, regular tv shows, Netflix Wanting: All of the stickers/planner acessories & books, as per usual. Haha. Loving: Spending time with family. Feeling: I'm always feeling so tired. Welcome to life with a chronic illness. Buying: Barebell Protein Bars, Peace Tea Iced Teas. Excited About:  My family visiting soon! Planner launch season for Erin Condren & Callie Danielle! Grateful For: My amazing ...

  Here are the books I read in March: While we’re Young –K.L. Walther My Rating: 4 stars (really 4.5 stars but Goodreads doesn't have a half star system) I always love all of K.L. Walther’s novels. Her novels are always so fun to read. This book is told from multiple POV’s and it worked perfectly. If you’re looking for a great YA author, I highly recommend K.L. Walther. Deep End –Ali Hazelwood My Rating: 5 stars I love this book so much. This novel was such a fun read. I enjoyed it from the start. I also loved that the sports that were focused on in this book were diving and swimming. I was on my local swim team growing up and if any of the high schools I attended had had a swim team, I would have tried out for the team. I loved this book so much and I didn’t want it to end. Not In Love -Ali Hazelwood My Rating: 5 stars Another fabulous novel by Ali Hazelwood. I love the relationship between the main characters and I loved the relationships between the main characters...

  What We're Eating This Week... Monday: Pasta with meatballs Tuesday: Caesar salad I'm not sure about the rest of the week. What I'm Reminiscing About... I'm still reminiscing about my two trips to the Caribbean. I wish it was summer right now because if I can't be in the Caribbean ocean, I'd take the pool or lake. I just love the water. What I'm Loving... Watching college basketball. I am in a March Madness Bracket Challenge with my brother, nephews and a bunch of people they know. Last year, I won it all. Right now I'm in 5th place going into this week's games that start tomorrow. What I've Been Up To... Watching lots of college basketball (both men's and women's), reading, filming for my YT channel, going to physical therapy appointments for my hip (unfortunately, they don't seem to be helping). What I'm Dreading... Pollen... it's been so bad here and my allergies are a mess even with being on two allergy medications. What...

  Here are the books I read in February 2025: The Rival –Emma Lord My Rating: 4 stars Emma Lord’s novels never disappoint. She knocks it out of the park in every novel she writes. This story focused on two rivals who compete over academics and pretty much everything else. Not only are they rivals but they have grown up together because their parents are best friends. This novel focuses on the start of their college journey and it’s a doozy. I highly recommend this book and all of Emma Lord’s novels. If Goodreads had a half star system, I would have rated it 4.5 stars.   Dinner with Vampires: Life on a Cult TV Show –Bethany Joy Lenz My Rating: 3 stars I was really looking forward to this book as Bethany Joy Lenz is one of my favorite actresses (she was one of the stars of One Tree Hill which is one of my all-time favorite TV shows and she’s starred in a lot of Hallmark movies and some Lifetime movies that I love). So this book was a good read but not a favorite....

  What We're Eating This Week... Monday: Turkey, potatoes, veggies Tuesday: Cheesy bread (had a salad for a late lunch) I'm not sure about the rest of the week. What I'm Reminiscing About... My two trips I've taken to the Caribbean (2011 and I think 2016) which both happened in February. What I'm Loving... My sister C, BIL A, niece A, and nephew M came to visit for 8 days and it was really nice to see them and spend some quality time with them. I couldn't do a lot because of the pain in my hip but we manage to do a few things that didn't require a lot of walking for me. What I've Been Up To... Spending time with family, cleaning, relaxing. What I'm Dreading... The pollen coming with the start of Spring. I'm allergic to it and it bothers me so much. What I'm Working On... March content schedule for my Youtube channel. What I'm Excited About... Spending time with family, bestie day with A & A. What I'm Watching/Reading... Watching: ...

  In January, I typically still read Christmas books that are leftover from my TBR that I didn't get a chance to read in November or December. Here are the 5 books I read in Janurary 2025: The Christmas Crush -Noelle Douglas My Rating: 3 stars This was a cute Christmas romance. It talked a lot about baked goods so I was always wanting sweets (but I always crave sweet in general). While I thought the novel was good, it wasn’t my favorite Christmas novel I’ve read and not one I’d re-read. The Sleight before Christmas (Holiday Hijinx series #2) –Kate Stewart My Rating: 3 stars I was so excited to see a second book in this series. I didn’t love it as much as the first one (The Plight before Christmas) but I still really enjoyed it. The first novel in this series follows the story of Whitney. This novel follows the story of her sister, Serena & her husband Thatch. I would love to see more novels in this series.   Single & Ready to Jingle –Piper Rayne My Rating: 2 stars (...

  What We're Eating This Week... Monday: Pizza Tuesday: Caesar Salad Wednesday: Fajitas Thursday: Baked ziti Friday: Leftovers I'm not sure about Saturday & Sunday What I'm Reminiscing About... I have been looking at photos of my nieces and nephews from when they were younger and thinking of all the special memories we shared. What I'm Loving... I've been loving all the football. I really wanted the Buffalo Bills to make it into the Superbowl but sadly they did not. I've also been loving: reading, cuddles with my cats, filming for my Youtube channel, watching my nephew Nicky's basketball games (on streaming). What I've Been Up To... My mom had surgery on her foot so I've been taking care of her. I've also been watching lots of movies, TV shows, and sports. My niece came home from college for a weekend and we went to the bookstore and had coffee there and got some books. I purchased some books for myself and two books for my niece. Credit: Pip...

  Currently reading? The Christmas Crush by Noelle Douglas. I have a few more Christmas books to read in January.   Your book goal of 2024? 70   How many books read in 2024? 71   Fiction/Non-fiction ratio? 71/0 Male/Female authors? 71/0   Favorite book(s) read? 1.          This Summer Will Be Different –Carley Fortune 2.         The Burning (Kate Burkholder #16) –Linda Castillo 3.          First Lie Wins –Ashley Elston 4.         Funny Story –Emily Henry 5.         The summer Club –Hannah McKinnon 6.         The Break Up Pact –Emma Lord 7.         Nothing Like the Movies (Better Than The Movies #2) –Lynn Painter 8.  ...

  Here are the books I read in December: All the Jingle Ladies -Beth Garrod My Rating: 4 stars This book was so fun and cute and I enjoyed it a lot. This author had a Christmas novel come out a few years ago called Blame It on the Mistletoe , which is a fun read too. Some Like It Cold –Elle McNicoll My Rating: 4 stars I didn’t know when I purchased this book but the female main character is on the Autism Spectrum. As a woman on the Autism Spectrum it was so refreshing and unique to see a female main character on the Spectrum. I really loved this book a lot. I could relate to a lot of the things that the main character talked about in regards to being on the Spectrum. I loved the characters in this book. The Mistletoe Mix Up (Falling in Mistletoe #3) –Codi Hall My Rating: 4 stars This is the third and final novel in the Falling in Mistletoe series. I loved this series. I love all of the books that I’ve read by this author. She also writes novels under the name Codi Gary. The Chri...