Sunday Bookends: Too much depressing news, but also fun on birthday

Welcome to my Sunday Bookends post where I ramble about what I’ve been doing, reading, watching, listening to, writing, etc. each Sunday.

 What’s Been Occurring

Last Sunday was my birthday and we spent it with my parents. They bought steaks to cook on the grill and then my dad built a fire in the side yard and the kids made s’mores.

I ate some of the chocolate but can’t do full s’mores because of my weird food allergies (I know. I’m so weird. I swear I only mention it because my weird food issues just crack me up sometimes, not to try to paint myself as a victim. It is not the end of the world I can’t eat s’mores. Really. I can eat plenty of other things that are bad for me, including chocolate. . . as long as said chocolate doesn’t have corn syrup).

The rest of the week was very tame, other than the fact cold, wet weather moved in and as it always seems to happen when that happens, Little Miss got sick. As of last night she was running a 102-degree fever off and on, pretty run down, but still insisting she was getting better. She might be right because each year when the weather changes from warm to cold, this happens to her, including the fever. It lasts about a day and then it’s gone. I am hoping this keeps the same trend.

If she is feeling better by Thursday, and no one else comes down with anything, we will be going to a science class at a local Christian camp and then next Saturday we will go back to the camp for their fall open house, which will also be on her seventh (hold me!) birthday. Next Sunday we will celebrate her birthday with my parents.

 What I’m Reading

 I finished the fifth book in the Rembrandt Stone series and am now impatiently waiting for book six, which is supposed to be the last. Boy, I hope they clean up this guy’s timeline mess-ups in the last book or my head is going to explode!

It’s a good series. Easy to read and captivating. I recommend it to anyone. It is clean but does mention some crimes that are hard to read about.

It is written by two Christian fiction writers and one of the writer’s sons, but it is not Christian fiction.

I am planning to exclusively read The Weather Girls Book One: Sunny this week, but also finish up Creative Fusion, a book about how creativity is given to us by God. Both of these books are for book tours for Celebrate Lit and I will provide reviews for them, and the Rembrandt Stone books, in October.

So far, The Weather Girls is a good book and capturing my attention more than Creative Fusion. I think that’s because Creative Fusion has some very deep thoughts and I am having issues focusing on anything too deep these days. It is extremely well written, and it is a book I will most likely go back to from time to time in my writing/creating journey.

I really hope to finish the Longmire book next week, but I will probably take a break this week because it has a heavy subject matter and after reading way too much about the Gabby Petito murder case, I can’t really handle a book about the murder of a young girl. It makes me extremely down, depressed, and anxious, so I will take a break and pick it back up next week. I really do want to find out what happens and I enjoy Craig Johnson’s writing.

What I’ve Been Watching

I’ve been watching way too much on the Gabby Petito murder case this week, but then I started to break it up with The House of Eliot because that show has a much lighter subject matter.

Hubby and I also watched more of Upstart Crow, a British sitcom about the life of William Shakespeare. It’s ridiculous and I need that right now with all the craziness of the world.

I barely check the news anymore. Just can’t stomach it and I have no idea who is telling the truth any longer.

What I’m Writing

I’m working on The Next Chapter and shared a chapter this week that I found a ton of typos in after I posted it. Argh! I will probably replace what I posted with a corrected version later this week. Oh well, my fiction is a work in progress, as I often explain. And it is just fiction I am posting for fun on my blog, so I am not going to stress too much.

On the blog this week:

Comfort reading with The Cat Who . . . book series

Randomly Thinking: Florida men stories, murder case obsessions, behind on blog reading and other random thoughts

Fiction Friday: The Next Chapter Chapter 4

Blog Posts I Enjoyed This Week

I mentioned in my Randomly Thinking post this week that I am very behind on reading blogs. I did, however, read a few good ones this week as I caught up on my favorite bloggers and thought I’d share a few of those posts with you.

Erin’s After Dark Musings hit a nerve with me because it sounded a lot like how I have been feeling lately.

I also enjoyed this post from Words From Annelli about entire houses being moved.

Our Little Red House wrote about her adventures going to five stores in one day. She always makes shopping sound fun.

Mama’s Empty Nest wrote about her love for lighthouses and one she visited in Rochester, N.Y.

So that is my week in review. How about you? Let me know how and what you have been doing in the comments.