Sundays with Sam is a combination of Sunday Post hosted by Caffeinated Book Reviewer and Stacking the Shelves hosted by Tynga's Reviews.
My Week in Review
Happy Sunday and Happy Easter! I hope everyone had a great week.
Last Sunday, my daughter and I went to the city. We got some Korean fried chicken and then saw Bigfoot the Musical. It was campy and fun. The actor who played Bigfoot was the same person we saw play Damien in Mean Girls. He was great. Monday, I drove my daughter to Newark airport and made it back to the train station by 5 am. It was short work week. The stock exchange closes for Good Friday, so we had off. I went to the dentist for my six month check up - still cavity free. Today, we are going out to dinner with one of our neighbors. Another low key holiday.
They finally installed the chairlift. It's a little easier for my mother to get up and down now. I really hope they get that part made soon and repair the elevator. It's been over 6 weeks since they closed it.
Did anyone notice an uptick in spam? All of a sudden, I am getting like 50 emails a day that gmail correctly routes to my span folder. I didn't use to get that much.
This year, my daughter and I planned to do a car trip instead of our normal big vacation. The problem is that neither of us likes to plan trips. I have always done tours, Disney cruises, or theme parks (Disney/Universal) which require no real planning. It's tedious, and I am not enjoying the planning. We may end up going nowhere because of this.
On the Blog
Stacking the Shelves
I picked up an auto-approval this week. It's the latest Before the Coffee Gets Cold book. I adore them. I saw The Cozy Nook Bookshop as read-now and downloaded that as well. The author is new-to-me, but it's a cozy bookshop, how could I go wrong?
I thought I had already purchased the Center short story, but I did not, so I did now. I love her stories! Both the invites sound good to me. I LOVED Skye's last book, so that one is a definite download for me.
Netgalley/Edelweiss
- Before I Knew I Love You by Toshikazu Kawaguchi
- The Cozy Nook Bookshop by Jeannie Chen
Purchased/Free
- Everybody's Favorite Guy by Katherine Center
- If We Love Again by Linda Barrett
- A Family Affair by Mary Campisi
Invites
- Ideal Life by Evelyn Skye
- So It Grows by Andie Burke
Read Last Week
My week did not start strong, but it finished with a bang. Brammer did it again with Good Joy, Bad Joy. I know I was supposed to care about Joy stepping outside her "good" image and doing some questionable things, but mostly I was here for the female friendship. Hazel and Joy had been best friends since they were eight, and here they were, 89 years old and Hazel was dying from cancer. Their friendship was one for the ages, and I loved learning about the important moments that shaped them and their relationship through the years. It was very moving.
I also really enjoyed Lucky. I generally like these books, but the characters and their fun romance stood out for me.
Find all my reviews on Goodreads
Books
- Picking Daisies on Sundays by Liana Cincotti -★★★ 1/2
- So Old, So Young by Grant Ginder - ★★★ 1/2
- The Real Ones by J. Rose Black - ★★★★
- Good Joy, Bad Joy by Mikki Brammer - ★★★★★
Audiobooks
- Lucky by Sawyer Bennett - ★★★★ 1/2
Currently Reading
- The Night We Met by Abby Jimenez
- Breaking the Ice by Whitney Dineen
To Be Read
- Just Friends by Haley Pham
- The Shippers by Katherine Center
- Before I Knew I Love You by Toshikazu Kawaguchi
Let us know in the comments!
I'm glad you had fun with your daughter! I also hate planning trips. That's probably why I rarely go on them.
ReplyDeleteI hate to shoulder the responsibility for if it's a good trip or not. LOL
DeleteI hope they get the elevator fixed. Wishing you a very happy Easter.
ReplyDeleteThey are saying late May which is insane. Thank you! Hope you had a lovely Easter as well
DeleteGlad you had a nice visit with your daughter! I hate planning trips as well. Its so hard to find things to do, figure out how to do them (do you need reservations? Are there special instructions?) and all that. Good luck!
ReplyDeleteMy daughter doesn't mind finding the things to do when we are there, but we need someone to find the hotel and plan the stops which neither of us have done.
DeleteYou might try to pick a general area you'd like to explore and look up travel blogs that have a suggested itinerary with lodging and restaurant suggestions for the location. I've done that in the past and it helped even if I didn't use all the suggestions. Do you know where you'd like to go? What kind of sites you want to visit? If you narrow that down that might help.
ReplyDeleteMy daughter like to pick the things to do, but she isn't forthcoming with where to stay, how many days, yadda, yadda. We know we are stopping in Salem, Boston, Sleepy Hollow, and Mystic. The last two are one day. I may just book the hotel in Boston for four days and we can drive the half hour to Salem.
DeleteOMG, we are going to do a road trip this year, too! I'm glad we'll see some new places, but I am NOT excited about being stuck in the car with a 4 year old for that long!
ReplyDeleteAre you driving far? We are only going to Boston/Salem. Not too bad a trip
DeleteWe're going all the way to Michigan and breaking it up along the way in PA and OH.
DeleteI told my daughter we should do MI next year. There are a lot of nice places to visit. We can drive from Chicago too.
DeleteIt sounds like you had a great Easter weekend spending time with your daughter. I had lots of fun times with family as well. Long weekends are wonderful and with my grandkids not having school on Monday, it made for a 4 day weekend. Happy for your mom that they got a chair lift in for her. Good Joy, Bad Joy sounds like a heartfelt story. I lost a lifelong friend 2 years ago. She was only 63, but we had been friends since she was born. (We were neighbours growing up) so I don't know how I would react to that one. I hope this week is going well, Sam.
ReplyDeleteMy daughter was gone before Easter, but I did have a nice visit with her the weekend before. Short one this time because of dance rehearsals. How wonderful that you had so many years together! Brammer always manages to make her books uplifting even when they are about sad things.
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