Getting Organized: Budgeting, Debt, Groceries

Posted July 24, 2019 / Goals & Planning, Lifestyle, Personal / Information / Etc. / 6 Comments

Over the last month, I’ve become kind of addicted to watching Jordan Page’s YouTube channel and reading her blog, both called Fun Cheap or Free. I’ve followed, attempted, and adjusted many of her methods to fit my life. I’ve mentioned before that I’ve struggled with reducing my debt (hi, million-dollar student loans!), curbing my spending, grocery shopping using only the money I need to spend, and just generally budgeting my entire life CORRECTLY. In conjunction with the Artful Agenda (link will work next Wednesday), I’ve organized juuust about everything in my life. I thought it’d be fun (and hopefully helpful for some of you!) to share my favorite videos, explain what I’ve pulled from them, and how I’ve adopted them to my life. Groceries / Meal Planning I want to note before I get into this section that I’m someone who already knows a LOT of grocery shopping tips and hacks. I’ve watched videos before and been like “what? These are real tips people don’t already know?!” so I will say that Jordan Page has some other more basic shopping tip videos if you need those too. The ones I’m linking have some basic things but also include better tips that I’m implementing! How to meal plan using your fridge Summary: This video is about meal planning using what you already have in your fridge, pantry, and freezer. The whole “you’re doing it backwards” thing in the title card is because most people (myself included…) would browse Pinterest or various […]

Top Ten Tuesdays #245: Settings

Posted July 23, 2019 / Top 10 Tuesdays, Weekly Memes / 4 Comments

Settings I’d Like to See More (Favorite Settings!) Top Ten Tuesdays were started by The Broke and the Bookish and are now hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, where we make lists of our top ten books (or something else!) based on that week’s prompt. The topics are provided ahead of time and can be found here. Book links bring you to Goodreads or my review. I made a super quick list in my head when drafting this post and realized that I really just went ahead and listed my favorite settings. The topic is technically about settings I’d like to see MORE of, and a few of these are fairly popular ones, but still – I’d love to see more of my favorite settings too of course! 😉 Here are some of my favorite settings and/or ones that I don’t see enough and need more of! Boarding School I’m huuuuge fan of books set in boarding school. Yes, I chose a Zoey 101 gif because who didn’t want to attend PCA with them?! Good lord, that was the best show. ANYWAYS I’ve talked about my love for boarding school or private school settings a lot, with recommendation lists and read-bait posts, and could ALWAYS use any and all books set in boarding school. I do feel like it stems from that desire we all had as kids to live at a boarding school with a bunch of other people our age, living on a campus away from parents long before college. Beach […]

ARC Reviews: Stealing Home and The Wedding Party

Posted July 22, 2019 / Book Reviews / 0 Comments

I love a good sports romance. Football is always my favorite but baseball is usually my next best bet. There’s something about it that just grabs me (at least from a fictional perspective – watching baseball on TV isn’t my favorite but going to games in real life is so fun!). I’m happy to say that the baseball-related elements were large and in charge here. The main character, Ryan, was super into helping her dad run their minor league team (and wanted to take it over someday); she knew everything about the baseball business. When a top recruit heads to their team, sparks fly between the two. Ryan is a rule-follower though, especially when it comes to her beloved team, so she refuses to allow them to act on their feelings. I’ll be honest: I didn’t feel quite as much chemistry as I was hoping. For a super-slow-burn romance, I need to FEEL the tension dripping from the page in order for the eventual payoff to be worth it. That was very much not the case here. Sure, I was rooting for them to get together and they were good for each other, but I didn’t feel that magnetic pull toward each other like I want in this kind of romance. The ending, for this element of the story, was incredibly rushed and stilted. Aside from the romance, the other major plot point is that half of the team might get sold, and Ryan is determined to stop that from happening. This […]

Reading Rush Sign-Up and TBR/Challenges

Posted July 19, 2019 / Book Challenges, Features / 3 Comments

I’d heard of Booktubeathon on and off over the years, but definitely assumed it was more for Booktubers. With the recent name change to Reading Rush (learn more and sign up there), I decided to finally investigate and participate! The gist is that you just try to read as much as possible during this week. The coolest part of the challenge, in my opinion, is that there’s a website you can sign up for and track your reading progress. All of your stats will populate and you can really see how much reading you got done during the readathon. Add me as a friend HERE! I’d love to hang out and track with ya 🙂 More information is here in the video: Goals This Reading Rush readathon will be taking place from July 22nd through July 28th, so I am trying to mold my July TBR into this challenge without having to skip books I’m supposed to read, or read too much outside of the initial TBR I picked. I can’t imagine that I’ll read 7 books for this one because I do have weekend plans that will hinder reading. I’d love to finish 4-5 books during the readathon and only finish/read books that meet challenges below. A few books from my July TBR will likely get read this week to finish off the month, but I’m hoping to sneak in a few other books I’ve been meaning to read (if I finish everything else in time!). The reason for this is that ARC August […]

ARC Review: How to Hack a Heartbreak

Posted July 18, 2019 / Book Reviews / 1 Comment

When this book was pitched to me, I jumped on the opportunity to read it. I already had it on my TBR and was eager to check it out. I’m always intrigued about books where women are working in male-dominated fields, because I experience it as a recruiter who works with primarily manufacturing companies. I knew it would make me rage at times and hopefully cheer for the main character by the end. The premise of the story is that Mel, a help desk technician at a tech incubator, gets tired of bad dates from online dating apps. She invents JerkAlert, where women can share their bad experiences and sort of “review” guys that stand them up, are secretly married, lie a lot, etc. in order to warn others when online dating. She starts dating someone from her office and ends up keeping the website (and what she finds on it!) a secret from him. I’ll be honest: this book was a bit of a rollercoaster for me! I was incredibly intrigued at the beginning and engaged in the story, then lost a bit of steam toward the middle (when I got frustrated with Mel), and then picked up again at the end. Mel was an interesting main character. She was kind of a wet blanket, in my opinion, and some of her actions were SO frustrating. I could see why she wanted to keep some things a secret from Alex but she made very immature decisions for someone in […]

Lauren Lately | July 2019

Posted July 17, 2019 / Features, Lauren Lately, Wrap-Ups / 1 Comment

Because my Bookmark Lit Bulletin wrap-ups got out of hand, I wanted to break up my monthly wrap-ups into two posts: one personal and one bookish/bloggy. I created Lauren Lately here to highlight all of the personal happenings in my life: events, activities, shows I’m addicted to, things I’m obsessing over, recipes I’ve loved, and goals for the next month. I decided to space them out so this wrap-up happens around the mid-point of the month and the bookish one happens at the end of the month. ✨ Check out my most recent bookish and bloggy wrap-up HERE ✨ What I’ve Been Up To Lobster rolls and local exploring | Chris and I went to a local lobster roll and ice cream shop when exploring into a new county near us. We had great food and walked through the woods to see their fairy gardens! They also sold nice plants and just had a great vibe in general. We went down to a skatepark nearby Chris was meaning to try too. Jen’s Mystic bachelorette | Chris’s sister chose Mystic for her bach location because she wanted something near the ocean and relaxed. It was perfect! I’ve never been on a bachelorette trip with such a small amount (meaning ZERO) of drama. Everyone was a virtual stranger to everyone else and there were no cliques at all. We got along great and had a fun/relaxing time! Book club, grad party, and the beginning of porch time | I’ve been going to book club at a local […]

Top Ten Tuesdays #244: Auto-Buy Authors

Posted July 16, 2019 / Top 10 Tuesdays, Weekly Memes / 4 Comments

Adult Fiction Auto-Buy Authors Top Ten Tuesdays were started by The Broke and the Bookish and are now hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, where we make lists of our top ten books (or something else!) based on that week’s prompt. The topics are provided ahead of time and can be found here. Book links bring you to Goodreads or my review. I’ve talked about my usual auto-buy authors over and over again, so I thought I would focus specifically on the ones who are writing “adult” fiction instead of my usually-stacked-with-YA list! I tried to go with people whose books I genuinely have bought or requested immediately when I saw they had a new release coming. Some are newer to me and some are tried-and true. Either way, you can bet your ass these authors’ new books end up on my TBR right away! Taylor Jenkins Reid Jenny Hale Bethany Chase Annie Rains Karma Brown Nicola Moriarty Liane Moriarty Helen Hoang Sophie Kinsella Beth Kendrick

Late ARC Reviews: One Night at the Lake and The Flatshare

Posted July 15, 2019 / Book Reviews / 0 Comments

I’m genuinely shocked I waited this long to read ONE NIGHT AT THE LAKE. I’ve absolutely adored Chase’s other books – they’re some of my all-time favorites. One of my book clubs decided months ago that they wanted to read this one but they needed to wait until it was released… unlike me. I just have the worst memory so I kept putting it off and now here I am in July. I DIGRESS – on to the book! This book was very much not quite like her other books. I can’t say that it’s a bad thing, by any means, but it was my least favorite from her so far. I like that she had a bit more mystery in this one (not majorly – I would still classify this broadly as contemporary fiction but not necessarily romance). I definitely wanted more development in some spots. I hate to say this too but I didn’t really like Leah… or June that much either. It made a lot of chapters either frustrating or kind of boring as a result. June was a very bland character for me and Leah was too much on the opposite end of the spectrum… she was annoying. I liked how well the chapters alternated, going back and forth across time. June’s took place in present day, when she first returns to Seneca Lake with her now-fiancee (ex-boyfriend of her friend Leah, who died that summer 7 years prior). I thought that Chase masterfully wove the […]

Reviews Made Me Reconsider

Posted July 12, 2019 / Discussions, Features / 5 Comments

I’ve been thinking of writing this post for a while but was afraid it would come across as mean or bashing these particular books and authors. I know a lot of people don’t enjoy writing bad reviews for books (I love a good rant sometimes, but not all the time!), so I wasn’t sure how to approach this. AND THEN I said screw it, because it’s my blog and I do what I want. There are plenty of books out there that make their way onto my TBR and then the reviews start rolling in… and I change my mind about reading them. Of course, the reverse is also true: I wasn’t sure if I wanted to read a book and then some glowing reviews came in and I decided that I should try it out. Here’s a little list of some of those books and why they’re on or off my radar now, thanks to my favorite bloggers. Again, but Better by Riccio | I did actually start reading this one but didn’t jive with the writing style, to be honest. I stopped reading it because many, many others did not enjoy this one as much. I saw Chelsea discussing her thoughts on it, plus reviews from Madalyn (which wasn’t necessarily bad but just mixed!) and Amber (mostly about the writing and telling instead of showing) that didn’t make me want to prioritize finishing this book. The Wedding Date by Guillory | This is a weird one because I went on to […]

Christmas in July

Posted July 11, 2019 / Book Lists, Features / 6 Comments

You guys know how much I love reading Christmassy books during the holiday season, usually just between November and December. This year I thought it would be fun to do a little “Christmas in July” list to share which holiday books I’m already thinking about for my 2019 reading list. I was somewhat inspired by YA Book Nerd’s recent TTT about Christmas romances! I won’t actually read any of these books prior to November, I’m certain, but here are some early reads for your TBRs 😉 Christmas Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella Series: Shopaholic Pub date: October 17, 2019 Celebrate Christmas with the ultimate Shopaholic! The brilliant laugh-out-loud festive novel from the Number One bestselling author. Becky Brandon (née Bloomwood) adores Christmas. It’s always the same – Mum and Dad hosting, carols playing, Mum pretending she made the Christmas pudding, and the next-door neighbours coming round for sherry in their terrible festive jumpers. And now it’s even easier with online bargain-shopping sites – if you spend enough you even get free delivery. Sorted! But this year looks set to be different. Unable to resist the draw of craft beer and smashed avocado, Becky’s parents are moving to ultra-trendy Shoreditch and have asked Becky if she’ll host Christmas this year. What could possibly go wrong? With sister Jess demanding a vegan turkey, husband Luke determined that he just wants aftershave again, and little Minnie insisting on a very specific picnic hamper – surely Becky can manage all this, as well as the surprise […]