This week has been mostly calm. I don’t really know how to process that.

I started a program with SparkPeople, which if you’ve never heard of it, is a website that focuses on fitness and nutrition. Most of it is free, which is nice, although there is a paid tier as well that gives you access to more stuff. I’ve been trying to get healthier ever since I bought the FitBit, so this is one more step in that direction.

Work has been hectic, but mostly because one of my coworkers is leaving. She is starting her own business and I’m very excited for her, but it’s also a small office and we all work closely together, so any change is going to be a bit of an upheaval. I’ll also miss her. She’s a sweetie.

But here’s the big announcement, the best part about this entire week:

TODAY IS MY KIDDO’S BIRTHDAY!!

Fifteen years. How did that time go by so fast! It’s really hard to believe. I don’t feel old enough to be a parent to a fifteen year old!  She has had many issues over the years that have been super challenging (as I have mentioned a few times here), but I am also just so grateful that she is essentially a pretty good kid. We argue on occasion, sometimes a lot, but she is also such a kind, compassionate person. That is getting to be a rarity in this world. She is very empathetic towards everyone around her and would do anything she could to help someone in need.

She’s also an amazing artist. Here’s a picture she drew for Pride month.

I’m just so proud of her.

I need to stop before I start crying, so let’s see some stats for the week.

Reading summary for September 20th-26th:

• I read chapters 5 through 23 of The Memory Thief by Lauren Mansy, which finishes that book. The review for that one will be up on Sunday, so be on the lookout for that.
• I read chapter 8 of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling. You can reading the Chapter-A-Long post here. I feel better about changing Chapter-A-Long to once per week, although it does feel like it will take a very long time to get through these books now.
• I started The Vine Witch by Luanne G. Smith and read chapters 1 through 20.
• I started The Smallest Thing by Lisa Manterfield and read chapters 1 through 9.
• I started The Athena Protocol by Shamim Sarif and read chapters 1 through 4.

Pretty good progress, although I wish I had read more of A Torch Against the Night by Sabaa Tahir. I might try to get to more of that this weekend.

Challenge Progress:

• Not going to talk about any of them except my GoodReads challenge, which is now at 58 books out of 50 read for the year. No other progress made on my other goals.

Blog News:

• As I’ve mentioned a few times now, I have changed to having the Chapter-A-Longs once a week on Mondays instead of whatever I was doing before (basically a chapter whenever I felt like I had time to do it). The old way was getting stressful because it meant lots of posts (and those take a while) and I kept wanting to do it five times per week and kept falling short. That was the main reason I decided to stop. It will take a very long time to finish the Harry Potter books, but honestly, I wasn’t sure where I was going to go next anyway. I do want to keep up the Chapter-A-Longs, just because they are fun.
• I got approval for two new blog tours coming up next month which is exciting. I’ll be joining the tour for Siren Song by Alex Hayes hosted by Xpresso. I’m really happy they brought me on for that one, since I got to tour the first two books of that series (Silken Scales and Perfect Pitch) and loved them. I will also be joining the tour for Angel Mage by Garth Nix hosted by the Fantastic Flying Book Club (which is my favorite name of the book tour folks). This is the first tour I’ve done with an author that I was already familiar with previously, so that’s exciting!
• I’ve put out two episodes of my podcast, basically an audio version of the stuff I talk about here. If you haven’t checked it out yet, I will have a new episode out on Sunday!

I think that’s it as far as all the goings on. Surely that’s enough! Have a wonderful weekend, everyone!

Categories: Weekly Wrap-Up