What We've Been Reading Lately

Sorry it's been a little quiet on the blog lately! It's certainly not for lack of time to post! ;)  Now that the girls are in school all day {waaaah--I'm still not used to them being away from me for so long!!!}, I have suddenly regained a naptime break in my day! After not having a naptime break for the past two years, I don't really know what to do with myself during Brady's long afternoon naps! Every couple of days during his nap, I have thought to myself that I should sit down to blog..but I guess I didn't really know what to say or where to start. With the start of school and regular schedules, this move has become very real and change is so, so hard. I constantly find myself comparing the way their school is here to the way their previous school did things, which of course I know is futile! Both schools are absolutely amazing, they're just different. And it's taking time for me {as it always does} to settle in and feel comfortable, to feel at home. But, I'm getting there! We joined a small group at our church {completely out of our comfort zone}, attended Parent Orientation at the girls' school {which was nice to help us feel more connected with their teachers and classes}, and Shelby has started piano lessons with a new instructor. Slowly but surely, we're finding our way! The girls' school has a plethora of after-school activities that are offered, and we were inundated with fliers about them all over the past couple of weeks. Shelby was so eager to participate in two of them in particular, but we ultimately decided to just stick with piano for now. We're all still adjusting to these longer school days, and I think the downtime at home is important for all of us. The activities will still be there when we're ready!

Anyhow, since I wasn't ready to really blog about real life quite yet, I thought I'd at least pop in and share what I've been reading lately! 

First up is Tell Me More by Kelly Corrigan, and while I enjoyed it I much preferred another memoir by her called The Middle Place. My sister gifted me Sisters First {a good one!!}, and I borrowed The Light Between the Oceans {this one was just okay} from her as well as The Lake Season {another goodie!}. I love a lot of Liane Moriarty's books, but Truly Madly Guilty wasn't a big win in my book. What Alice Forgot is my favorite of hers! And you'll see a theme soon, but I love Kristan Higgins books! They read like romantic comedies, easy and fun! You can't go wrong!

As I'm writing this post, I'm realizing maybe I don't love memoirs. While I enjoy reading them, they're very rarely books I love or that I can't put down. And sometimes they're a bit too introspective for me, and I'm not sure I enjoy that when I'm reading! ;)  I'm already in my own head enough of the time as it is! Lilac Girls was recommended to me b/c I loved The Nighingale so much, and I really did love it but The Nightingale wins hands down. I have read all of Sally Hepworth's books, and they're all so good! And lastly is the Blue Heron series by Kristan Higgins. I checked out the electronic version of the first book in this series from our library when we were making the trek to San Antonio on a whim, and then I ended up devouring the whole series. Again, they're very romantic comedy-esque and totally predictable as you might expect, but I love them! This series kind of reminds me of the Winter Street series by Elin Hilderbrand with the big family. So if you liked those books, you might want to give this series a try!

And lastly, here are the books I've been reading aloud to the girls recently. As you can see, we've been on a Kate DiCamillo kick! For reference, Shelby is almost 8 and Hadley is 5. We love all of Kate DiCamillo's books, but I think The Tiger Rising and The Magician's Elephant have been our least favorites thus far. And the Mercy Watson series is great for kids who need an beginner chapter book b/c they are so funny and still have a great plot! We read that entire series a while back, but I needed one more book for this collage so I had to throw in good ole Mercy b/c you can never go wrong there! :)  So many nights I go to bed feeling like an inadequate mom for one reason or another, but I never doubt that this is one thing I'm getting right with my kids! Snuggling and reading is probably my very favorite way to spend time with them, and I hope these memories stay with them.