Sunday Bookends: New additions to the TBR

On October 26, 2025 By Lisa R. HowelerIn Sunday Bookends, Sunday Salon22 Comments

It’s time for our Sunday morning chat. On Sundays, I ramble about what’s been going on, what the rest of the family and I have been reading and watching, and what I’ve been writing. Some weeks I share what I am listening to.

This past week I received book-related stickers in the mail and was thrilled because I love stickers and putting them in books. I don’t have a lot of places to stick these stickers but it is still fun to have them. I have a reading journal, so I stuck some there and Little Miss took some for her phone.

Do you keep a reading journal? I was all excited to get one (which is just a journal with blank pages that I fill in) but then I ended up not taking the notes about the books I was reading, or doing much of anything I planned to do with it. I do keep a list of the books I’ve read throughout the year (which is much lower this year than last year) in it. I also keep a list of books recommended to me, books I want to read, my favorite books read, movies I’ve watched, and movies I want to watch.

I have a list going of Nancy Drew books I’ve read so far in it and that list actually isn’t that big. I think next year I will start a list of The Hardy Boys books I’ve read. So far, it’s exactly one.

I also ordered a set of magnetic bookmarks with cats on them last week. That was also exciting for me, but I will lose them quickly because I always seem to. I don’t know how. I lay them down next to me, get up, and they’ve fallen into some sort of portal! For example, I stood up tonight while reading to go pick up my kids after they were trick-or-treating and I dropped the bookmark and it was gone. Just gone. It’s possibly buried in my all-black purse, but even the purse seemed like some sort of portal because when I looked inside, it was gone.

Luckily, I have about 20 other bookmarks I can choose from to replace it. And then lose them as well.

In addition to the stickers and bookmarks, I also received an order of five books from Thriftbooks.

One of them is for Little Miss for school. It’s called Secrets of Civil War Spies by Nancy LeSourd.

The other four were:

Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier

Bombs on Aunt Dainty by Judith Kerr

The Silver Chair by C.S. Lewis

Murder, She Wrote: Aloha Betrayed by Donald Bain

The week before I received three new Nancy Drew books via the True Drew Podcast shop.

Those books were two from the 80s and 90s: The Nancy Drew Files Win, Lose or Die and The Nancy Drew Files Pure Poison. I also ordered an original book, The Mystery of the Fire Dragon.

This week I finished Trick or Treachery by Donald Bain, a Murder, She Wrote book. I finished it in three days after Little Miss told me I couldn’t finish it by the weekend. I showed her. I finished it three days early. She may have had an ulterior motive because with me reading she could get away doing what she wanted during the day. Hmmm…wait a minute!

I also started Home to Harmony by Phillip Gulley and The Nancy Drew Files Win, Place, or Die by Carolyn Keene. The Nancy Drew book is one of the books from the 1990s series. I’m about 50 pages from the end, which isn’t saying much since these books are only 150 pages total. I’ll finish it today. I have to say, I know these books are for kids or preteens, but the plot of this one really isn’t that bad. This is the first one I’ve read as an adult from this particular series. I am certain I read one in high school.

The Husband ordered me a copy of the latest Mitford book by Jan Karon (My Beloved) as a surprise, and it came yesterday. I’d had a bit of a rough few days with a sore tooth and feeling overwhelmed in life, so it was a wonderful surprise that brought me to tears.

I am going to start it sometime in November or maybe even December because it has a Christmas theme. I will not lie, I opened the book after I took a photo of it and inhaled deeply. It was so comforting.

Little Miss and I finished The Good Master this week, and we have been listening to — I kid you not — a Murder, She Wrote book before bed at night.

She said she’s actually enjoying it, so she requests it.

We are also reading the Civil War themed book for school and finishing the second Caddie Woodlawn book, which we forgot to finish when we got distracted by The Good Master.

The Husband is reading….? Oops … forgot to ask but it was Boone’s Lick by Larry McMurty.

The kids and I watched Mrs. Doubtfire last night. It has been years since The Boy has seen it and Little Miss has never seen it.

Earlier in the week I watched Petticoat Junction and yesterday I watched part of The Big Trail with John Wayne from 1930. That movie — wow. That was a crazy journey with very realistic scenes of the wagon trains traveling into the West.

I think I will write a post about it once I finish it. I would love to know more about the making of that movie.

I also watched another two-part Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mystery. Yes, I’ll definitely recap this one because it was a crazy ride with more romance between Nancy and Frank.

Last week on the blog I shared:

This post linked to my blog post about Murder, She Wrote. That was interesting….Being used as a source for an article.

|| Throwback Tuesday: Why I Don’t Ask Comprehension Questions and What I Do Instead by My Slices of Life ||

Now It’s Your Turn

What have you been doing, watching, reading, listening to, or writing? Let me know in the comments or leave a blog post link if you also write a weekly update like this.

This post is linked up with The Sunday Post at Kimba at Caffeinated Reviewer, The Sunday Salon with Deb at Readerbuzz, and Book Date: It’s Monday! What are you reading hosted by Kathyrn at The Book Date. Stacking the Shelves is hosted by Reading Reality.

Hello! Welcome to my blog. I am a blogger, homeschool mom, and I write cozy mysteries.

You can find my Gladwynn Grant Mystery series HERE.

You can also find me on Instagram and YouTube.

Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot Oct. 24

On October 23, 2025October 23, 2025 By Lisa R. HowelerIn Weekend Traffic Jam12 Comments

Welcome to the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot, where we offer a place for bloggers to link up and get a fresh set of eyes on their posts. We also feature one blog a week, letting our readers know about the blog and providing a link so readers can learn more about it. Please feel free to post new blog posts or old ones you want to bring attention to again.

Look for the post to go live about 9:30 PM EST on Thursdays.

This week, we have a little announcement because we are saying goodbye to Sue from Women Living Well After 50.

We are all sad to see her go, but Sue has some other things she wants to pursue and may take a break from blogging altogether for a bit.

I know Marsha, Melynda, and I certainly appreciate her being part of this link party and hope to see her in the blogsphere in the future. If you are interested in being a co-host please leave a comment and I will put you in contact with Marsha, our fearless leader.

Now, let’s introduce our current hosts for the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot:

Marsha from Marsha in the Middle started blogging in 2021 as an exercise in increasing her neuroplasticity. Oh, who are we kidding? Marsha started blogging because she loves clothes, and she loves to talk or, in this case, write!

Melynda from Scratch Made Food! & DIY Homemade Household – The name says it all, we homestead in East Texas, with three generations sharing this land. I cook and bake from scratch, between gardening and running after the chickens, and knitting!

Lisa from Boondock Ramblings shares about the fiction she writes and reads, her faith, homeschooling, photography and more.

Cat from Cat’s Wire is a bookworm, movie fan, crazy cat lady, armed with beads, cabs, wire and a very jumpy brain which loves to go down rabbit holes!

Rena from Fine, Whatever writes about style, midlife, and the “fine whatever” moments that make life both meaningful and fun. Since 2015, she’s been celebrating creativity, confidence, and finding joy in the everyday.

We would love to have additional Co-Hosts to share in the creativity and fun! If you think this would be a good fit for you and you like having fun (come on, who doesn’t!) while still being creative, drop one of us an email and someone will get back with you!

WTJR will be highlighting a different blogger each week this year! We invite you to stop by their blog, take a look around and say hello!

This week we are spotlighting: Ponder the Cat

A little about Ponder: The life of a hardworking cat and his friends!

Thank you so much for joining us for our link-up, Ponder and friends!! Be sure to be kind to your mom!

And now some posts that were highlights for me this past week:

Yum!! Creamy Lentil Pumpkin Soup!

(oooh…coconut thins from Eseme!)

(Such a cute Halloween craft!)

Are you watching life from the bleachers?

Important things to know about the link-up:

You may add unlimited family-friendly blog post links, linked to specific blog posts, not just the blog.
Be sure to visit other links and leave a kind comment for each link you post (it would be too hard to visit every link, of course!)
The party opens Thursday evening and ends on Wednesday.
Thank you for participating. Have fun!

*By linking to The Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot Link Up, you give permission to share your post and images on the hosts’ blogs.

Hello! Welcome to my blog. I am a blogger, homeschool mom, and I write cozy mysteries.

You can find my Gladwynn Grant Mystery series HERE.

You can also find me on Instagram and YouTube.

Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot Oct. 17

On October 16, 2025October 23, 2025 By Lisa R. HowelerIn Weekend Traffic Jam7 Comments

Look for the post to go live about 9:30 PM EST on Thursdays.

This week, we have a little announcement because we are saying goodbye to Sue from Women Living Well After 50.

We are all sad to see her go, but Sue has some other things she wants to pursue and may take a break from blogging altogether for a bit.

Now, let’s introduce our current hosts for the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot:

Lisa from Boondock Ramblings shares about the fiction she writes and reads, her faith, homeschooling, photography and more.

WTJR will be highlighting a different blogger each week this year! We invite you to stop by their blog, take a look around and say hello!

This week we are spotlighting: Maple Leopard

A little about Val:

I’m Val , Canadian born, Vancouver BC raised! Here you’ll find top resources to plan your dream trip: In the USA, Canada & Europe. We are experts in travel to Portugal , the Pacific Northwest, Vegas and other Hidden Gems Around the Globe. Thx for joining my journey!

Thank you so much for joining us for our link-up!

And now some posts that were highlights for me this past week:

Cat’s little halloween animals are out to get you if you don’t give them candy!

(A good message about the promises of God)

(A fun trip to see 21 Pilots )

Some fashion ideas for between seasons!

Important things to know about the link-up:

You may add unlimited family-friendly blog post links, linked to specific blog posts, not just the blog.
Be sure to visit other links and leave a kind comment for each link you post (it would be too hard to visit every link, of course!)
The party opens Thursday evening and ends on Wednesday.
Thank you for participating. Have fun!

*By linking to The Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot Link Up, you give permission to share your post and images on the hosts’ blogs.

Hello! Welcome to my blog. I am a blogger, homeschool mom, and I write cozy mysteries.

You can find my Gladwynn Grant Mystery series HERE.

You can also find me on Instagram and YouTube.

Comfy, Cozy Cinema: The Young In Heart

On October 16, 2025October 16, 2025 By Lisa R. HowelerIn classic movie impressions, Comfy, Cozy Cinema 2025, Movie Impresssions7 Comments

Erin from Still Life, With Cracker Crumbs and I are hosting Comfy, Cozy Cinema again this year and up this week was The Young In Heart.

And, yes, that title is the actual title: The Young IN Heart.

I feel like I cheated a little bit this week because not only have I watched this movie, but I also wrote about it when I watched it for the Winter of Douglas Fairbanks Jr. That means I had an advantage to Erin when it came to writing this week’s post because I am going to quote a lot of my original post.

This is part of what I wrote in that post: “I absolutely loved Douglas in this one. He played a more prominent role than in Gunga Din and was simply … shall I sound completely cheesy? Yes, I shall. He was completely delightful.

At one point, I texted my friend Erin that a drunk Douglas is adorable.”

Yes, I did text Erin this past January to tell her he was adorable. Yes, I am weird.

Before I forget, I found this one for free on YouTube.

So, let’s get to the movie.

The Carlton family, of which Douglas is a part of in this movie, are not a family you would want to know in real life. They are swindlers and grifters. They mooch off and manipulate people to scrape by in life.

We open the movie in the French Riviera with Douglas’s character (Rick) ready to marry a young woman whose father is rich.

Everything falls apart, though, when the police find out about the family and reveal their conniving ways to the family of Rick’s future wife. The family is told to get out of France and end up on a train where they meet a ridiculously sweet woman (Minnie Dupree) who has only recently come into a great sum of money.

Ironically, her last name is Fortune. George-Anne sets out to swindle the woman out of paying for their lunch, but the plan expands as the woman explains she lives alone in a big mansion left to her by a former suitor. She is saying how lovely it would be if all of them came to stay with her when there is a train derailment. Their car tips and at first Rick and George-Anne believe the old woman has died. She’s still breathing so the siblings carry her from the car and George-Anne covers her with her own coat.

We begin to wonder if the family is rotten through and through and are still playing things up as the woman later recovers and invites the family to come live with her.

George-Anne suggests to the family that if Miss Fortune believes they are a respectable family she will be more willing to let them live there and maybe even leave them money when she leaves. To play up this ruse she suggests the men get actual jobs and she and her mother act like caretakers and women who don’t swindle people out of money.

This is all very baffling to the family who has always cheated and stole for a living. When the men decide George-Anne’s plan might work and go to look for jobs, the scenes that follow are some of the most hilarious tongue-in-cheek moments I’ve seen in a movie.

Spinning around in the background of the family’s drama is the romance between George-Anne and Duncan Macrae (Richard Carlson), who she originally considered marrying when she thought he was rich. Duncan learned she was a con-artist along with everyone else and was shattered but still ends up chasing her down on the train back to London to tell her he still loves her.

The rest of Rick’s family — father, Col. Anthony “Sahib” Carleton (Roland Young), mother Marmey Carlton (Billie Burke), and daughter George-Anne (Janet Gaynor) — are thrilled with this plan because they know it will also set them all up for a rich life. George Anne might be even more thrilled because then she can marry a poor Scottish man who she’s fallen in love with, and the rest of her family will support her financially.

She tells him to get lost, believing he’s much too good for her and . . . well, you’ll have to see where all that ends up.

Rick is also having his own romance with Leslie Saunders (Paulette Goddard), a secretary and the engineering business he applies at for a job.

This is the second – or shall I say third – movie I’ve watched in recent months with Billie Burke and there is no mistaking that voice if you have seen The Wizard of Oz.

Yes, she is Glenda the Good Witch.

The screenplay for this movie was written by Paul Osborn and adapted by Charles Bennett from the serialized novel, The Gay Banditti by I. A. R. Wylie. That title certainly would have had a different connotation in the modern day, eh?

Anyhow, the novel appeared in parts in The Saturday Evening Post from February 26 to March 26, 1938.

The movie was released in November of the same year. They certainly worked fast back then.

I found it interesting when I read that Broadway actresses Maude Adams and Laurette Taylor screen-tested for the role of Miss Fortune and that the footage is the only audio-visual samples that existed of both of them.

The movie was produced by – can you guess? Because it feels like every movie I write about lately is produced by him.

Yes. David Selznick. The man who produced what is considered one of the biggest movie triumphs in the world — Gone with the Wind.

This movie was one of many he produced leading up to Gone With The Wind. The Prisoner of Zenda, which I wrote about a couple of weeks ago, was another. Goddard was actually rumored to be being considered to play Scarlet O’Hara in Gone With The Wind, which later, of course, went to Vivien Leigh.

While I was watching the part of the movie where Mr. Carleton goes to apply for a job, I was fascinated by the fancy car they showed. It was spinning like a pig on a spit at the front of the building and it was a very modern looking car and a very modern looking set up altogether.

According to Ultimate Car Page and Wikipedia, https://www.ultimatecarpage.com/car/1905/Phantom-Corsair.html

The six-passenger 2-door sedan Flying Wombat featured in that scene was actually the one-of-a-kind prototype Phantom Corsair. The Phantom Corsair concept car was built in 1938 and designed by Rust Heinz of the H. J. Heinz family and Maurice Schwartz of the Bohman & Schwartz coachbuilding company in Pasadena, California.”

I also found it interesting that this was Gaynor’s last movie before retiring while she was at the top of her career. She made one last movie in 1957 called Bernardine.

Like I said above, I loved this movie. It was just what I needed to watch this week with so much sadness going on in the world. There was a lot of humor from all the cast, but Douglas really had me smiling throughout. Not only because he is my latest old Hollywood star crush (watch out Paul Newman!).

Have you seen this one? What did you think of it?

You can read Erin’s impression of the movie on her blog.

Next week we will move into a bit of spooky with Coraline.

The rest of our movie list can be found on this graphic:

Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot Oct. 10

On October 9, 2025 By Lisa R. HowelerIn Weekend Traffic Jam7 Comments

Look for the post to go live about 9:30 PM EST on Thursdays.

Now, let’s introduce our hosts for the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot:

Lisa from Boondock Ramblings shares about the fiction she writes and reads, her faith, homeschooling, photography and more.

Sue from Women Living Well After 50 started blogging in 2015 and writes about living an active and healthy lifestyle, fashion, book reviews and her podcast and enjoying life as a woman over 50. She invites you to join her living life in full bloom.

WTJR will be highlighting a different blogger each week this year! We invite you to stop by their blog, take a look around and say hello!

This week we are spotlighting: Where The Wild Things Were

Thank you so much for joining us for our link-up!

And now some posts that were highlights for me this past week:

The cutest pumpkin pigs!

(This was a fun day for Erin!)

(Gluten free recipes! Yum!)

The cutest little tablescape!

Important things to know about the link up:

You may add unlimited family-friendly blog post links, linked to specific blog posts, not just the blog.
Be sure to visit other links and leave a kind comment for each link you post (it would be too hard to visit every link, of course!)
The party opens Thursday evening and ends Wednesday.
Thank you for participating. Have fun!

*By linking to The Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot Link Up, you give permission to share your post and images on the hosts’ blogs.

Hello! Welcome to my blog. I am a blogger, homeschool mom, and I write cozy mysteries.

You can find my Gladwynn Grant Mystery series HERE.

You can also find me on Instagram and YouTube.

Saturday Afternoon Chat: Teaching my kids about Whitney Houston and a shared moment with strangers

On October 4, 2025October 4, 2025 By Lisa R. HowelerIn everyday musings, Saturday Afternoon Tea18 Comments

Good afternoon! Care for a cup of tea?

Which one would you like to try?

Simply Cinnamon Apple?

Salted Caramel?

Peppermint Bark?

Pumpkin Spice?

I personally liked the peppermint bark, but not as much as plain peppermint.

The last couple of days we have been celebrating Little Miss as she turned 11 on Thursday. We didn’t mean to celebrate her for four days but that’s how it worked out because activities we wanted to do with her were spread out a bit.

On Thursday she wanted to have pancakes at a diner downtown so her brother and I took her down. She had chocolate chip pancakes and a fresh fruit cup. The owner sang happy birthday to her.

The diner was decorated very nicely for fall. This diner always does a very nice job at decorating, from what I understand, but I have only visited there twice. My dad and son have visited there more.

After breakfast, we hung out at home for a bit and then Little Miss and I headed to my parents’ for some pizza and to celebrate her birthday with them.

We played a board game called Aggravation and Little Miss won (with a little help from Grandma and me this time, but usually she wins outright on her own). What was funny was my dad was going to play but sat down in his room for a few minutes and drifted off to sleep. I decided I would play for him and for myself until he woke up, but in the end, he didn’t wake up until the game was almost over.

Dad usually wins at this game, and he almost won this time, even though he was asleep. He was three spots from winning when my mom sent him home again because she didn’t have any other moves she could make.

After we played board games, Little Miss had an animal club meeting on Zoom and then she went home and rode bikes with her brother and then …. Yes, there is more… they watched two Disney movies. She really wrung every last minute out of her birthday and crashed pretty hard that night.

The Husband had to work on her birthday but yesterday he took the day off and we all went out to dinner at a nice restaurant and then they all went in Walmart to pick out a new dog bed and a gifts for the dog because that is what Little Miss wanted to do for her birthday. She also picked out a gift for her friend who is coming for a sleepover today because that little girl’s birthday was this past Monday.

I stayed in the car due to a sore leg and read my book. It was very cozy.

Tomorrow we are headed to a reptile zoo called Reptileland because Little Miss loves reptiles.

We are already fairly tired from celebrating already. By tomorrow night The Husband and I will be virtually comatose. We will be this way because we are, as Little Miss has reminded us a few times this week — old.

She’s been watching YouTube Shorts making fun of life in the 1990s and early 2000s and asking us if that is what it was really like “back then.”

It is hard to accept those years are so long ago, so I just pretend they aren’t and ignore her. Ha!

To show how old I am and how I have failed at educating my children about the 1990s — I learned yesterday that neither of them knew who Whitney Houston was. They sort of rolled their eyes when I mentioned her. There was some meme that mentioned her and my almost 19-year-old son said, “I don’t even know who that is.”

I was horrified and pulled up YouTube to educate them. They did recognize “I Want to Dance With Somebody” and “I Will Always Love You,” but I also made them watch her doing the Star Spangled Banner and The Boy was blown away.

“Okay, yeah, she was amazing,” he told me.

I went to tell him how she threw her life away and it was so heartbreaking to me and started to cry. She shouldn’t have died so young. No matter her talent and her beauty, she never seemed to feel worthy enough to enjoy her life of happiness and health and that always broke my heart. Now all we have left of her is her music and memories and we should have had her for so much longer.

Thank God we still have her friend and my favorite female singer CeCe Winans.

I am going to have to show them videos of CeCe this week too.

Earlier in the week I saw a beautiful sunset and even though I’m having an issue with my sciatica and leg, I made it outside to take a photo. While I was there, two guys (probably about my age) riding bikes came by our house. We do have some bike or foot traffic on our street but it is a back street so we don’t as often as some streets.

I was startled a little by them but had to laugh when the one guy looked at the sunset, pumped his fist and yelled out “’Merica!”

The other guy, with a shirt or something wrapped around the top of his head, looked up at me smiling and said, “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

I said it was, and they kept going while smiling and left me smiling.

Later, Erin (Still Life, With Cracker Crumbs) told me she thought it was cool that we’d had that shared moment together. I hadn’t thought of it that way, and her comment made me think.

After weeks of anger, hatred, and just all out sadness in the world, it was nice to have that shared moment of joy while admiring a gorgeous sunset.

The photos do not do it justice.

How about you?

How was your week last week? Anything exciting coming up for this week?

Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot Oct. 3

On October 2, 2025October 2, 2025 By Lisa R. HowelerIn Weekend Traffic Jam16 Comments

Look for the post to go live about 9:30 PM EST on Thursdays.

Today is my daughter’s 11th birthday so we started our day with a pancake breakfast at a local diner. This afternoon we had some pizza with her grandparents and this weekend we have a lot of other events planned, including a sleepover with a friend and a trip to a zoo called Reptileland. Yes, they have a lot of reptiles.

I hope all of you are having a great week!

Now, let’s introduce our hosts for the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot:

Lisa from Boondock Ramblings shares about the fiction she writes and reads, her faith, homeschooling, photography and more.

WTJR will be highlighting a different blogger each week this year! We invite you to stop by their blog, take a look around and say hello!

This week we are spotlighting: Bettie G’s RA Seasons!

A little about Bettie:

I’ve been blogging for a few years now, and thought it would be fun to share a little more of who I am with all of you.And in the process, I hope that you will feel comfortable to share a little of your story with me as well.

I was raised in a Christian home, and my Mom told me that I asked Jesus to come into my heart when I was only 4 years old. But when I was 9 years old, and sitting in my Sunday School class listening to my favorite teacher praying, I suddenly realized that I could not remember telling Jesus that I wanted to live for him. That conviction caused me to stand up in front of all my friends and say that I wanted to spend my life following Jesus forever. It’s been an adventure ever since.

Thank you so much for joining us for our link-up!

And now some posts that were highlights for me this past week:

Such a relaxing post from Thrifting Wonderland

(Beautiful decorations, as always, from Debbie Dabble Blog!)

(Very cute idea for fall activities with littles!)

Banana chocolate muffins. Need I say more?

Important things to know about the link up:

You may add unlimited family-friendly blog post links, linked to specific blog posts, not just the blog.
Be sure to visit other links and leave a kind comment for each link you post (it would be too hard to visit every link, of course!)
The party opens Thursday evening and ends Wednesday.
Thank you for participating. Have fun!

*By linking to The Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot Link Up, you give permission to share your post and images on the hosts’ blogs.

Hello! Welcome to my blog. I am a blogger, homeschool mom, and I write cozy mysteries.

You can find my Gladwynn Grant Mystery series HERE.

You can also find me on Instagram and YouTube.

Sunday Bookends: Disappointed in humanity but enjoying silly books to forget all that

On September 28, 2025September 28, 2025 By Lisa R. HowelerIn Sunday Bookends, Sunday Salon21 Comments

This past week was rainy and muggy but our leaves are changing and at least our nights are cooler.

The feel of autumn is in the air for sure on those cooler nights. The apple fritter scented candle my husband picked up this weekend is helping that mood even more.

Yesterday the kids and I took advantage of the “nicer” weather we had after a week of rain and headed to a playground about twenty minutes from us. It was a gloomy and muggy day, but the kids still had fun playing on the zipline and in the creek. Little Miss made a new friend she might never meet again but they had fun at least.

I capped off my night with a Cary Grant movie, The Talk of the Town. It was a bit of a quirky film that was supposed to be a comedy but bordered on a drama at times.

This week I am going to work on being less overwhelmed with the world. To do that I am going to try to go on a media fast of sorts. Very limited scrolling and almost no news. My nervous system is overstimulated, overworked, over…something.

I have a lot going on with my parents’ health right now and some other things in life so I can’t take on the hurts and pains of the world too.

And I do take them on. When I see people hurting and then see people who do not care about that hurt because they have become desensitized to the pain of others with the 24/7 news cycle I start to realize that people around me are also probably thinking these horrible things that people are writing online too. It feels like people care less these days unless it is some political cause they are behind and while they are promoting that political cause they are tearing down others and yelling that is actually the other people tearing them down.

It’s exhausting and I’ve heard this over and over and over recently —that our brains were not built for all this news and 24/7 stimulation from social media. As a pastor I listen to once said, “We were not meant to be walking around with the entire world accessible via our butt bone.”

Of course he was talking about people who slide their phones in their back pockets and can slide it out at any time and at any time see the horrors of the world unfolding in real time. We can see good things too but we all know that the worst of the worst that is happening is what sells news and makes people stop scrolling.

More of us need to put our phones down and actually interact with people. As an introvert this is hard for me to say. I don’t like people. Ha. I know there are good people out there, though, and we need to find those people and interact with them more and the grumpy mouthy people on the internet less.

It’s a goal anyhow and I want to work more toward it.

Erin from Still Life, With Cracker Crumbs and I are still hosting crafternoons but completely blanked on setting up a date on September. We both started homeschooling and had other events and all of the sudden September was over. It’s crazy to me how fast it went by!

We will be announcing a date for October later on, probably next week.

If you are wondering what Crafternoons are it is a monthly Zoom meet up where we get together with other bloggers/crafters and do a craft while we chat about life and books and all kinds of other things. We do our best not to focus on religion or politics so we don’t depress ourselves.

If you are interested in the crafternoon, you can find more information here.

Erin and I are also hosting a monthly bookish link party called A Good Book and A Cup of Tea. It is almost over for September but you can still get your bookish links in. They do not have to be recent posts, just related to books in some way. I’ll have a new link party up on Wednesday.

I am finishing up the Nancy Drew book The Clue of the Broken Locket and will probably take a bit of a Nancy break.

These books were written for the youth of the day back in the 1930s and then rewritten a bit in the 1950s, so I get that there is some unrealistic stuff in there, but did they not know about concussions back then? I suppose they didn’t but these characters are always taking headshots waking up, getting a cold cloth on their head and a drink of water and then continuing on their day. Like in this book, a huge rock was thrown through a front door, supposedly hit the couch, and knocked two people forward where they hit their heads on the hearth and were both knocked unconscious at the same time.

Hmm….oookay….let’s go on and believe that could happen but then let’s also believe that no one thought they should take both of these people to a hospital to have them checked out???

So the Nancy Drew books can be silly at times, but they aren’t written for adults, and the mysteries themselves are actually very interesting and sometimes even give me ideas for my own book. I suppose that is why I keep reading them off and on. All that being said, it is time for a little break and to read something more mature.

That’s why I’m reading The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis. Hahahaha! Really I just have a goal to reread The Chronicles of Narnia so I am reading another children’s book but it’s less annoying than the Nancy Drew books can be.

I am actually reading an adult book by Agatha Christie called Come, Tell Me How You Live but I put it down somewhere in the house and could not find it all week. I found it yesterday finally!

So I shall be reading an adult book this week!

I am also starting one of my fall books, A Fatal Harvest by Rachael O. Phillips, this week since I will finish Nancy Drew today and probably will finish the Narnia book later in the week.

I might start Death of a Gossip by M.C. Beaton this week too, depending on my mood. It’s the first book in the Hamish MacBeth Mystery series. And Emma Lion. I totally forgot I want to start that this week! That might come before Death of a Gossip.

Little Miss and I are going to finish up The Good Master this week. We did not read it last week for some reason.

I’m not sure what The Husband is reading at the moment because I forgot to ask him before he went upstairs for a nap before work and I’m going to publish this before he gets up.

The Boy isn’t reading a book right now but he’s getting ready to read a book based on the Halo games.

This past week I watched less TV than normal but I did watch one of the worst Murder, She Wrote episodes I’ve ever seen. I’ve seen a couple of stinkers and this one was…well, weird and creepy. Jessica essentially had a college guy stalking her. A college guy who looked about 30, I might add. Either way he was obsessed with her and all older women. It was …. Ew.

The Husband and I later watched another one that wasn’t very good either. That’s how it is with series, though, there are good and bad ones. Can’t be helped when a series runs for 12 years!

I stared a movie called The Talk of the Town with Cary Grant last night but didn’t finish it yet. It’s weird. That’s all I can say. It’s also funny. Cary is accused of burning down a building with a person trapped inside but escapes from jail and Jean Arthur decides to let him stay at her rental house even though a law professor is renting out the house at the same time. Cary must prove his innocence to the professor played by Ronald Colman.

It’s a bit crazy, in other words, but I really had an itch to watch an old movie.

I also enjoyed this video about comforting reads from a new-to-me vlogger:

Last week I worked a bit on Gladwynn Grant Goes Back to School.

I also pulled my books out of Kindle Unlimited on Amazon because I feel like Amazon takes advantage and rips of indie authors. My ebooks and paperbacks are still for sale there but they will not be exclusive there anymore. I also introduced new book covers for the Gladwynn books.

On the blog I shared:

|| Embrace Autumn: Tea Breaks and Kitchen Moments by Thrifting Wonderland ||

|| Insomnia: The Nightmarish Gift That Keeps on Giving by Coffee Addicted Writer ||

|| Things I Know by From This Side of the Pond ||

Please keep praying for Mama’s Empty Nest’s family:

|| Traumatic Thursdays by Mama’s Empty Nest ||

Now It’s Your Turn

What have you been doing, watching, reading, listening to, or writing? Let me know in the comments or leave a blog post link if you also write a weekly update like this. Link up below if you want to:

Hello! Welcome to my blog. I am a blogger, homeschool mom, and I write cozy mysteries.

You can find my Gladwynn Grant Mystery series HERE.

You can also find me on Instagram and YouTube.

Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot September 26!

On September 25, 2025September 25, 2025 By Lisa R. HowelerIn Weekend Traffic Jam7 Comments

Look for the post to go live about 9:30 PM EST on Thursdays.

This week fa truly set in and we also finally got some much-needed rain. When I say fall set in, I want to be clear that the temps didn’t necessarily get cooler. In fact, it was humid and sticky most days as the rain came in.

The trees are changing beautifully but I am sad that the leaves are already almost the way off our tree in the backyard.

What is the weather like where you are?

Now, let’s introduce our hosts for the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot:

Lisa from Boondock Ramblings shares about the fiction she writes and reads, her faith, homeschooling, photography and more.

WTJR will be highlighting a different blogger each week this year! We invite you to stop by their blog, take a look around and say hello!

This week we are spotlighting: Postcards from the Third Planet

Thank you so much for joining us for our link-up!

And now some posts that were highlights for me this past week:

These dishes look amazing! And that doctor is infuriating!

(Wonderful Tribute to Gail’s Mom)

(What a beautiful Alaskan cruise)

No need to try to fix a reading slump!

Important things to know about the link up:

You may add unlimited family-friendly blog post links, linked to specific blog posts, not just the blog.
Be sure to visit other links and leave a kind comment for each link you post (it would be too hard to visit every link, of course!)
The party opens Thursday evening and ends Wednesday.
Thank you for participating. Have fun!

*By linking to The Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot Link Up, you give permission to share your post and images on the hosts’ blogs.

Hello! Welcome to my blog. I am a blogger, homeschool mom, and I write cozy mysteries.

You can find my Gladwynn Grant Mystery series HERE.

You can also find me on Instagram and YouTube.

	Paula @ Grace~Filled… on A Good Book and A Cup of Tea A…
	bigskybuckeye on Saturday Afternoon Chat: A bri…
	Joanne on A Good Book and A Cup of Tea A…