I’m pretty happy with how much I’ve been managing to read lately. Still probably not that much, relatively speaking, but I’m reading daily and I’m happy about that.
I picked up a couple new library holds yesterday so I thought I’d share what I’m reading.
Currently Reading:
📘The Girl in the Tower by Katherine Arden: Book #2 in the Winternight Trilogy.
(Read book #1 this past summer). So far, the second book hasn’t disappointed! If you recall, I chose this series as part of my goal to read at least 5 books from genres I normally don’t read in 2020. This is a fantasy/ fairy tale set in deep winter in Russia. It’s strange and whimsical and I don’t know why, but I can’t get enough! I love the fierce and fiery young girl protagonist.
📘Born Survivors: Three Young Mothers and their Extraordinary Story of Courage, Defiance and Hope.
I’m reading this one in the Kindle app on my phone, little by little (instead of scrolling social media!). It’s one I’ve had my eye on for a long time. It’s not a light read- it’s about 3 pregnant women (from different cities) whose husbands are murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust. The women defy all odds and manage to stay alive (and their babies). It’s the amazing story of these women, their children and the lifelong connection formed during that terrible, awful time. It has been riveting, moving and overwhelming all at the same time. It’s quite detailed but very easy to read, too.
New Reads:
I’m super excited about this one! It’s a “non-fiction, overview history of Christmas, from its pre-Christian roots through the birth of Jesus, to the holiday’s spread across Europe into the Americas and beyond, and to its mind-boggling transformation through modern consumer culture.”
I LOVE Christmas but realized my knowledge of a lot of the old, original historical traditions and its evolution over the years is seriously lacking. So I requested this book and can’t wait to learn more. 🙂
📘The Language Instinct by Steven Pinker
This is another one that has been on my to-read list for a long time. I love languages and am fascinated by language development. One of my favorite classes in college was my Spanish Phonetics class. After I recently read You’re Not Listening (all about listening skills, etc.) I decided to continue on the language/speech track and order this one.
I’m having a few second thoughts if I really want to read it right now or not though. It’s actually almost 500 pages and pretty small, dense print…I think it will take me a long time to get through! It’s more of an academic style book. We’ll see. Maybe I’ll hold off until this winter. Or maybe I’ll just give it a go. It does look like a book I will find extremely interesting.
A relaxing night
Last night was one of the nicest nights I’ve had in a long time. After a busy day messing around with the hot tub, some work, misc. household chores, etc., I spent some time READING (yay!) and then we played a few rounds of Pictionary. We aren’t the biggest “game playing” family ever, but we have a lot of games and it is really fun when we pull them out. I want to make a point to play more games this winter since who knows how much longer the boys will want to sit around playing games with their old parents! Haha. 😉
After that I ended up on the couch, by myself, watching a new Hallmark movie (we had it on during the game play but I missed most of it so I started it over). Ivan wanted to watch some Mexican soccer league championship soccer game or something, so he went to our room and I got the couch, fireplace and Christmas tree.
I can’t remember the last time I watched an entire movie, by myself, with no interruptions or distractions. It was heavenly.
P.S. HAPPY 70th Birthday to my amazing Dad today!! He is a 1 in a billion guy. ❤
I snuck this picture of him reading by the fireplace on Thanksgiving Day. 🙂
Daily Gratitude:
I am grateful for the warm, cozy glow of twinkle lights and lamps in the wintertime evenings.
GRATEFUL KAE 
The Language Instinct sounds interesting, although like you, I’m not sure I’d be able to get through the dense, academic style at the moment. Right now I’m super fascinated by language development since it’s unfolding right before my eyes, and I’m finding myself curious to know more about how language develops. It feels kind of magical to watch!
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i love watching a movie all by myself too, like i can really focus on the moment and not policing anyone for commentary 🙂
sounds like a perfect day.
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Way to go on fitting in more reading! I know you’ve been wanting to do that! Having a book going on your kindle ap is a good idea as that should make it easier to fit in snippets of reading during downtime. I had a huge reading month in November and I know it’s because I was off social media. So all the time I would have mindlessly scrolled IG, I picked up a book instead and it really adds up!
That language book sounds interesting but the dense text/length would probably be a turnoff to me right now. But I am not in the mind set for books that can be more challenging… So I’d probably need to own it so I could read it really slowly, like a chapter a day or something along those lines!
Your relaxing evening sounds perfect. We LOVE playing games so I look forward to days when our kids are old enough to play. Paul is getting some games for Christmas so hopefully he will catch on to those games. It would be nice to have another activity to do with him in the evenings when he gets squirrely! We used to do monthly card nights with another couple but haven’t since covid – that’s one thing I am most excited to resume when we can!
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