Boo !

Well the cobwebs building up around here on this blog are certainly apropos for Halloween, don't you think? This has been a pretty pathetic year of blogging for me.. so sorry about that.

October has been another whirlwind of a month for me.. lots of things going on. Mostly good or at least productive things going on.. a few not so good things, but everyone is healthy, hanging in there and doing their best so that's a plus.

So here I am on Halloween night and have no trick-or-treating costumes or stories to share with you because Anna didn't dress up this year and Maria is away at school. I do know she dressed up as a flapper for a Halloween party tonight and she did text me a photo that she also posted on instagram, but it's not the same as seeing her in her costume in person and taking my own photo. Then to top it off, we got ZERO trick-or-treaters at our door today! So sad...

Despite the lack of child involvement, though, I do have a few fun and festive Halloween photos to share.

This is a sunset photo that I took from the Home Depot parking lot a few weeks ago.

This is that same photo all dressed up for Halloween! I edited it right on my iphone using a really fabulous photo editing app called Rhonna Designs. I was lucky and bought it while it was offered for free but I think it's 99 cents now. Still a bargain if you're into this sort of thing.

Home Depot Sunset

Home Depot Haunted Sunset

I may have eaten a piece or two of Halloween candy before Halloween..

From where I stand at the welcome mat to our home..

Always a favorite time of year for black cats.

A house in my neighborhood with spook-tacular Halloween decorations. Even better up close in person and even spookier at night with creepy-scary music and sound effects. Yikes.

Trick-or-treat! I'm ready for the monsters to come!

There's something in the attic!!! (From the spooky house in town after dark.. )

I hope you had a safe and happy Halloween!

Do you have kids who dress up? If so, what were they? 

... still can't believe October is over already and 2014 is only two months away! Now THAT'S frightening!

From my Garden [Wordless Wednesday]

Another weekly blog meme I've been wanting to do for so long. But.. but..  WORDLESS Wednesday? That's going to be soooo hard not to type anything. See? I've messed up already. ;)

Oregano

photo taken on iphone 4S

For more wordless wednesday posts, visit here.

My November Adventures

November started out with some challenging days as our community was still recovering from hurricane Sandy that charged through the area in late October. Our school district was closed for nearly two full weeks, Halloween was more or less cancelled and the school calendar had to be re-worked to account for so many missed school days. Spring break is intact, but we lost some other days off in 2013 and now the last day of school has been pushed to June 25th! As much as I love a snowy winter, I hope we're not slammed with too many snow days this winter or the school year's never going to end!

In books: 
I read twelve books this month, but don't be fooled--only five of them were full length novels. Two others were novellas, another a graphic novel and then I also read five short stories, which are even shorter than novellas. Those short stories are counting towards my annual count of books read this year, which may or may not be cheating since they are so short, but I'm not stressing over it because my goodreads book count for 2012 is slightly off anyway because most of my re-reads this year aren't included in my total.

Total books read: 13
Romance................ 5
    [Contemporary Romance.... 2]
    [Steampunk Romance ....... 3]
Urban Fantasy........... 6
General Fiction ........ 1
Graphic Novel ........... 1

1. Poison by Jennifer Estep [online short story]
2. Web of Deceit by Jennifer Estep [online short story]
3. Spider's Bargain by Jennifer Estep [online short story]
4. Web of Death by Jennifer Estep [online short story]
5. Dream Lake by Lisa Kleypas
6. Through the Lens by K.M. Jackson
7. Web of Lies by Jennifer Estep
8. Wasted by Jennifer Estep [online short story]
9. The Iron Duke by Meljean Brook
10. Here There Be Monsters by Meljean Brook [RE-READ]
11. Fever Moon by Karen Marie Moning
12. Mina Wentworth and the Invisible City by Meljean Brook
13. This is How You Lose Her by Junoz Diaz

My favorite book this month is The Iron Duke, which I finally got around to reading thanks to the TBR Challenge! I loved it and can't wait to read more in this world. I also really enjoyed Dream Lake by Lisa Kleypas. I also recommend This Is How You Lose Her by Junot Díaz even though I didn't get anything really positive out of characters or their story. I'm glad I read it, but man was it sad in a pitiful way. It gets bonus points just for making me think about it so much.

In Photography: 

I'm still going strong with my Project 366 [leap year] photography project. I haven't missed a photo since one day last May, I think. I hope I didn't just jinx myself because I'm almost there!

Don't cry over spilt milk..
especially when you have kitties!
November 18. 2012

The spilt milk photo in the photo above was my 'most liked' photo of November. I had come home from the grocery store with a gallon of milk when it fell through the bottom of the bag onto the floor, splitting along the seam of the jug and a lot spilled out before I could pick it up and stop the spill. I only let them lap up the milk for a minute or two while I snapped the photo. They were so cute.

I've been having a lot of fun on Instagram, even though I think it is kind of silly from a non-user's perspective. I came across a link to a really funny spoof video about Instagram that shows you why. I laughed and cringed at the same time, because I do those things! So embarrassing, but who cares. I'm having fun documenting my year through photos and "meeting" people from all over the world.

Here's the link to the video:

http://www.collegehumor.com/video/6853117/look-at-this-instagram-nickelback-parody

But I swear wasn't being pretentious when I posted a photo of Anna Karenina! Honest!

The Great Swamp National Wildlife Refuge
.. on a 34.4 mile bike ride in 41 F breezy weather..
November 24, 2012

Instagram has new user profile pages that can easily be found if you know someone's username. Here's mine: http://instagram.com/thehappilyeverafter . They don't always load properly for me, though, so I'm not sure what's up with that.

Anyway, that's it for my November adventures.. I'm sure I did more than read and take pictures on my iphone, but I can't think of anything else to report. lol

Moments from our first snow of the season.
November 7, 2012

December is always a busy month of activities and of course, holiday celebrations. It also mention lots of baking! And eating... oh boy. I'm already planning on a January detox followed by seriously healthy eating.

Have you had any adventures lately?

I wish you all a delightful, delicious and joyous December!

My July & August Adventures {in books!}

I fell a little behind with my monthly adventure posts over the summer. I think being away the week July turned into August did me in. I am going to keep the adventures brief because I've already highlighted the most important parts anyway with my vacation and cycling posts. I'll focus on what I read over the summer instead--especially since some people complained that I don't blog about books enough anymore. You know who you are .... this post's for you. ; )

In books: 
JULY: 
Total books read: 6

Young Adult ....... 1
 Romance .............. 5

1. The Iron Knight by Julie Kagawa
2. The Witness by Nora Roberts
3. Danger's Kiss by Sarah McKerrigan
4. Somebody to Love by Kristan Higgins
5. Hearts of Fire by Kira Brady [novella]
6. Hearts of Darkness by Kira Brady

It seems like ages since I read this books, not two months ago! I really enjoyed reading one of Nora Robert's regular romantic suspense novels as opposed to her crime fiction books she writes under J.D. Robb. The Witness was a perfect blend of romance and suspense, with very realistic and likable characters. In the end, I'd have to say I would have liked a little more depth or elaboration to the romance, but overall I really liked it and would definitely read more of her books. Good thing I've got a mess of them on my shelves!

I'm a big fan of Kristan Higgins' contemporary romances. The stories are chock full of quirky characters, charming characters, humor, misunderstandings, relationship blunders, family drama we can all relate to, and a sweet romance. Somebody to Love features Parker Welles, a young single mom, whose filthy rich father is suddenly broke and in prison, even after having spent Parker's trust money. All she has to her name is a decrepit little house in Maine that she inherited from her aunt. Parker heads up to Maine to turn the house around and get some cash into her banking account and who shows up to help her out but her father's young lawyer and right hand man, James Cahill. Of course they fight their love practically every step of the way, but what fun would it be if they didn't, right? While not my favorite Higgins' book, this one didn't disappoint! Good stuff.

Hearts of Fire, the prequel novella to the new Deadglass trilogy by debut author Kira Brady, and the first full length novel in the series, Hearts of Darkness were the last two books I read in July. Well written, fascinating setting, characters and series premise, Hearts of Darkness is a very creative and suspenseful story. If you like romance or urban fantasy do not miss this one!

AUGUST:
Total books read: 9

1. Strangers in Death by J.D. Robb
2. Deeper by Megan Hart
3. Gold by Chris Cleave
4. Beautiful Mess by Lucy V. Morgan
5. Before the Moon Rises by Catherine Bybee
6. Embracing the Moon by Catherine Bybee
7. No Rest For the Wicked by Kresley Cole [re-read]
8. Wicked Deeds on a Winter's Night by Kresley Cole [re-read]
9. Dark Needs at Night's Edge by Kresley Cole [re-read]

My favorite part of the day...
relaxing with a great book.
Deeper by Megan Hart
August 2012

It's always a good reading month when you've read a Megan Hart book. Entertaining, sexy and always thought provoking, Hart is always on the top of her game. I read Deeper in August, which was the perfect summer read from Hart's back list because it takes place in a beach town, but really, read it any time of the year.

Gold by Chris Cleave is a newer release book that captured the competitive spirit of Olympic athletes in training with a strong dose of women's fiction as the two main characters are friends, sometimes enemies and always competitors for the podium in women's track cycling. This book was at times uplifting and at other times, very heart breaking and frustrating. Not frustrating in the writing or story telling, but frustrating in that I wanted things to work out just so and they don't. Which is good actually, because you want a realistic story and real characters, flaws, mistakes and maliciousness and all. Because that's what life is like. Anyway, I highly recommend it.

I downloaded a few quick ebook reads that caught my eye on goodreads and twitter and I wasn't disappointed. Beautiful Mess by Lucy V. Morgan and two werewolf romances by Catherine Bybee--Before the Moon Rises and Embracing the Moon. Nothing earth shattering awesome or anything, but seriously fun and sexy reads.

Then as you can see, I indulged in a re-read of Kresley Cole's Immortals After Dark series. I read the first five full length books back in 2007-2008 as the books came out, but then I failed to keep up with new releases after that. Back in April, I decided it was time to catch up, so I picked up where I left off, which was the 7th book--Kiss of a Demon King. I got maybe thirty pages into the story when I realized I could use a refresher. The details about the other characters, the world, and all the little subplots were very fuzzy. I probably could have forged on through and done just fine, but since I really love "getting" all the little inside jokes and nuances between characters who know each other through past books, I knew I'd be a lot happier reading books 7 through 12 if I re-familiarized myself with this series. And what better way to do that than to go back to the beginning and re-read the first six books? So that's what I did. I put Kiss of a Demon King down and went back to the beginning, starting with the prequel novella that I never read, The Warlord Wants Forever, which is Myst the Coveted and Nikolai Wroth's story. I had a lot of fun re-reading these stories and have to say reading them in a row one after the other is very cool because these stories all overlap the same timeline so I'm remembering where people are going and what they're doing in other books as it's all mentioned again in subsequent books. It's been really fun!

Do you read the Immortals After Dark series? 
Which book is your favorite so far?

In photography: 

Butterfly in my garden.
July 2012

I had fun participating in a photo-a-day challenge hosted by the Fat Mum Slim blog, or @fatmumslim on twitter. I kept up for all of June, July and August. The fun daily prompts helped me stay on track taking a picture every day and the best part? I made some new friends on Instagram! I decided not to continue with that particular challenge through the fall and instead go back to just doing my own thing for my daily photo. I'm still determined to complete my Project 365! It's been almost 9 1/2 months now. I think I'm going to make it this time!

As always, you can follow my photography challenges on http://web.stagram.com/n/thehappilyeverafter

In the garden: 
My five tomato plants are doing pretty well considering I planted so late. I've been picking red or yellow cherry tomatoes almost every day in the last several weeks. Finally! I still haven't picked a ripe slicing tomato--they're all still green and growing. To encourage the plants to put their energy to fattening up and ripening their fruit instead of generating new plant growth, maybe two weeks ago I pinched off all the growing ends of the plants and any flowers that had not yet set fruit. I think it helped because now the green tomatoes have gotten bigger and just this week, two of the tomatoes have started turning red. I was beginning to think it wasn't going to happen and I'd be stuck eating nothing but fried green tomatoes from my garden! This is what happens when you wait until the 4th of July to get your tomato plants in the ground! Remind me next year to do it in May..

Thanks for reading about my July & August adventures.

Here's wishing you an stupendous September! Even if it is half over already. ;)

Hello July! ..What Happened in June?!

Holy smokes it's July 4th already! I hope you had a wonderful holiday and the fireworks were spectacular by you.. whether you saw them at the park or made some of your own at home. ; )

Well, I sure am starting to sound like a broken record, but dang it.. life has been busy, leaving me too few minutes in the day to read or blog and blog hop as much as I'd like. I thought the school year was never going to end there for a while, but it finally did on June 20. I swear we were the last schools in session in the whole country by then. Both girls brought home awesome report cards. My youngest ended 7th grade with all A's and a few B's.. honors in several of her classes, high honors in Language Arts. That's my girl! My oldest finished 11th grade--her junior year with a stellar report card. Also A's and a scarce B, most of her courses being honors and honors AP courses. She did so well, she boosted her overall GPA a smidgen and now has over a 4.0 GPA! YES! My girls are some smart cookies! So proud. ^_^

I imagined summer break was going to be lazy, easy, breezy, but alas it's been quite hectic. All good things, but my time management skills are forever a work in progress so I'm not very methodical about getting stuff done. Everything always seems half finished and I can't seem to carve out a decent block of time for myself to read or blog. I always think I'll get to it in the evening after dinner, but I don't know what happens. Well, I do know. I end up being too tired to be on the computer, so I decide to read instead, which ends up being pitiful anyway because I fall asleep after just a few pages. It's a vicious cycle.

My youngest is away at sleep away camp for the first time ever this week. We were busy getting ready for that last week, including packing, shopping for some supplies and getting a physical, etc. No phone calls to or from camp are allowed unless it's an emergency. It drives me batty not being in touch with my kid, but I'm trying not to worry about the little things and trying instead to picture her having a great time, making new friends, trying new things and basically having a really positive experience. I admit I'm looking forward to picking her up on Saturday.. seeing her face, hugging her and hearing all about her adventures.

My oldest landed a nice nanny/babysitting job three days a week for a family with three young girls... ages 10, 8 and 4, I believe. Even though it's a lot of work caring for and playing with the girls, taking them to the pool and activities, I'm not sure who's having more fun here... the little girls or my teen! She loves it. She's also in Volleyball training three nights a week and on her days off from babysitting she's out and about with her friends or her boyfriend. Never a dull moment.

Before I forget, here's a quick look at what I was up to in June. My memory's already getting fuzzy. :/

In fitness & health: 
My workout schedule has been pretty similar each week lately. Strength training, a weekly kickbox class, running and biking. I've spent most of my workout time on the bike, having ridden 274.6 miles in June! My longest single ride was 70.4 miles which was nearly five hours of cycling. Boy, was I tired that day!

I finished June with 133+ fitness challenge miles where 1 fitness mile = 1 mile run = 15 minutes of other cardio or strength training.

I have also been participating in the weekly Reader's Workout Meme hosted by Joy. Check it out over at her blog if you're interested in joining in. It's a low-key, casual thing.. and very welcoming. In the Reader's Workout Meme, some of the participants are tracking their exercise in total minutes spent exercising. I clocked in with 1884 minutes in June or 31 hours and 24 minutes! That averages to about 63 minutes a day. Not bad!

I recently recommitted myself [again, I know] to losing 20-25 lbs. between now and Thanksgiving. I'm working on a few aspects of my diet plus I want to add more strength training to my weekly workout plan. I'll keep you posted.

What did you do to keep moving last month?

In books: 
I read only five books in June.. I guess it's indicative of how busy I was with other things last month. Still, the five books I read were pretty darned good so I'm not complaining!

Romance .............. 4
                  Historical .... 3
                  Paranormal...1
Children's Lit........1

1. The Madness of Lord Ian MacKenzie by Jennifer Ashley
2. Lady Isabella's Scandalous Marriage by Jennifer Ashley
3. Odd And The Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman
4. Tangle of Need by Nalini Singh
5. Caine's Reckoning by Sarah McCarty

My favorites are The Madness of Lord Ian MacKenzie and Tangle of Need--both books get five stars from me.

What noteworthy books did you read in June?

In photography: 
I had fun participating in a photo-a-day challenge hosted by the Fat Mum Slim blog, or @fatmumslim on twitter. The fun daily prompts helped me stay on track taking a picture every day and the best part? I made some new friends on Instagram! Yay! :) I've decided to do the #photoadayJuly challenge too. As well as a fun daily picture challenge for book-mided people hosted by Cassandra at Indie Reader Houston. You can follow this challenge on twitter or instagram using the #dailybookpic hash tag.

Come back later for my favorite photos from my Project 366.. [I'll post them in the morning.]

As always, you can follow my photography challenges on http://web.stagram.com/n/thehappilyeverafter .

In the garden: 
I finally finished the new vegetable garden. For the most part, anyway. You're never going to believe this.. but I'm not so crazy with this location anymore. I think I might be re-re-establishing my vegetable garden to the backyard next year. So indecisive, I know. In the meantime, at least I have some tomato plants in the ground and growing! Finally! I'll edit pictures into this post tomorrow.. I want to post this now before I delay it another day. And it's time for me to get my beauty sleep. Zzzzz...

Thanks for reading about my June adventures. Here's wishing you a jubilant July! ^_^

My May Adventures

If you stopped by looking for my Neverwhere Read Along discussion, I'll be posting that tomorrow.

It's June! June! Three more weeks of school and then summer! This is such a busy time of year around here. I'm sure it's the same for all of you as well.

I posted earlier this month about my youngest daughter's dance recital--such fun! She's also been busy with girl scouts as her Cadette troop is working towards their Silver Award. I am starting to feel tapped out as a leader, so I'll be glad to have a bit of a break from it over the summer.

My oldest has been busy, too. Mostly with schoolwork and a very busy social life. Last week we attended a small Academic Awards ceremony at the high school at which she received an award from Brandeis University for outstanding academic achievement and civic service. She also recently completed a wonderful project for her high school orchestra for which she filmed, photographed and edited a video about the impact of water on our community that accompanied the orchestra's performance of a beautiful piece by Philip Glass. The video was projected on a large screen behind the orchestra. It was quite moving.. especially given the devastating effects Hurricane Irene had on our community last August.

Lots of proud moments in May! While I couldn't possibly top the accomplishments of my kids, I may as well tell you what I've been up to last month. ; )

In fitness: 
I easily met my 100 fitness mile goal for May with a total of 120 miles. Interestingly, I took quite a few rest days this month, but apparently I made up for it on the days that I did workout, especially in cycling. Most of my rides these days are 30-40 miles which is at least 2 hours on the bike. On Memorial Day, my cycling partner and I clocked just under 4 hours to bike 59.4 miles---my new longest distance in a single ride.

I mentioned last month [in April] that I wanted to increase strength training and aside from my Monday powercuts class and maybe 15 minutes of abs, light weights at the end of kickbox class and a bonus TRX class, I haven't been doing any other strength training. I need to work on increasing that. Here's a look at what I did in May:

Run 23.07 miles :     ~241 minutes
Bike 170.54 miles :   ~705 minutes
Kickbox & Abs : 300 minutes
Spin & Abs :       150 minutes
Strength training:        240 minutes
TOTAL:   1636 minutes     or     27 hours 16 minutes

What did you do to keep moving last month?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

In books: 
I read eight books in May and from quite a few different genres, too. I'm pretty happy about that.

Non-fiction ...... 1
     [Health & fitness]

Romance .............. 2
     [Historical]
Crime fiction ....... 1
Young Adult ....;;.. 1
Fiction .................. 1
Fantasy ................ 2

1. Creation in Death by J.D. Robb
2. The Governess Affair by Courtney Milan
3. Saving Grace by Julie Garwood
4. If I Die by Rachel Vincent
5. Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman
6. Food Rules by Michael Pollan
7. Cold Magic by Kate Elliot
8. Attachments by Rainbow Rowell

I have to say that I loved all of these books and would recommend each and every one. If I HAD to pick favorites? Hmm... The Governess Affair by Courtney Milan is a wonderful novella and the first in a new series. I have a review partially written that I hope to finish, but know that I did love it. It's Kindle lendable, too, so let me know if you're interested in borrowing it. I think I can lend it out at least twice.

Saving Grace by Julie Garwood. A timeless medieval romance and a favorite among so many romance readers. You can read my review HERE.

Attachments by Rainbow Rowell is a really solid, engaging read, too. A lot of readers classify it as romance, but it's not exactly. It's more general fiction with romantic elements. Not quite chick-lit either because most of the book is really about the male protagonist, so it's really more dude-lit which is a brand new sub-genre coined by Brie from Romance Around the Corner. You heard it first from her, folks. Remember that when dude-lit goes rampant. ;o)

Gigi likes Cold Magic by Kate Elliot!

Honorable mention goes to Cold Magic by Kate Elliot. I originally shelved this book in young adult, but it really straddles into adult fantasy fiction. The protagonists are not minors at nineteen years old and older and in fact at the marriageable age. The setting is Victorian-England-esque alternate history with a steampunk component. A lot of fascinating people--powerful mages, princes, spiritwalkers and others-- cultures, histories and politics between peoples and three main characters whose fates get personally entangled with each other and those of power. There is a lot of information to digest in this book, but the story premise, setting and characters were so interesting that it was so worth reading. I'm looking forward to reading the second book in this trilogy, Cold Fire. The concluding book in the trilogy, Cold Steel comes out in 2013.

What interesting books did you read in May?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

A bouquet of African Roses

In photography:
My Project 366 is now a Project 362. Yes, I missed another TWO days in May. Ugh. Oh well. I decided to have a little bit of fun this month by participating in the photo a day challenge hosted by blogger fatmumslim who blogs at Fat Mum Slim. There's a daily prompt every day for the month and users post their photos on instagram, twitter, facebook, a blog, flickr or pinterest using the hash tag #photoadayJune. Fun!

As always, you can follow my photography challenges on http://web.stagram.com/n/thehappilyeverafter.

Are you on instagram? Friend me!

In the garden: 
The deer are in my yard almost every night munching on anything and everything green. I know what they're all saying..

"Hey, have you been to that organic salad bar down the street yet? It's amazing! They've got a wide variety of plants to choose from, loaded with tender shoots, plump flower buds, and lush leaves. Not only is it 100% organic but it's all you can eat AND open 24/7!" 

Nice. I woke up one day last week to discover they ate most of the tops off my budding purple coneflower plants last week. This means my coneflowers will be blooming late and won't be so lush this year. Again. I know they have to eat, too, but sheesh, I sure wish they knew how to show a bit of restraint so I could enjoy a few flowers. I have an inkling that the day lilies are on this week's menu. I haven't seen a day lily flower bloom in my yard for a couple of years now. But really, what are you going to do? They're only doing what they're supposed to do, right?

I started converting that section of my perennial flower bed into a new vegetable garden, but I haven't yet finished. In fact, that's on my to-do list for this week. A friend of mine gave me several pots of tomato seedlings that sprouted up in her garden from the seeds of last year's dropped fruit and I've got to get them in the ground soon. I'm already a couple of weeks late. A few of them even have flowers already. Oh how I love the promise of homegrown tomatoes! I'm not sure what else I want to try to grow this year. At this point, I'll be happy just to have a nice harvest of herbs and tomatoes.

Are you growing an edibles in your yard?


Thanks for reading about my month! Wishing you a joyous June! xo

My April Adventures

"Time flies when you're having fun." That explains why it's May already! 

What a month. It's been joyous, but also a bit bittersweet, when my baby.. whom I birthed, nursed, nurtured and protected all these years.. turned 17 years old this month and is now driving a car. This is way harder than the first day of school, first time away at camp, first period, first boyfriend... seeing your child get in car and drive away from home is SO SCARY. I am proud and happy to see that she has become a strong, capable, independent young woman so anxious to get out there in the world, who by the way, learned first hand how to jump start a dead battery about 60 hours after getting her license, but at the same time I miss the little girl who is no more. Never has childhood seemed more fleeting to me than it has this month. Did I mention she's smart, too? She was inducted into the National Honor Society in April. :)

In fitness: 
My workout pattern has been pretty predictable this month. I've been running twice a week outdoors and biking on at least one weekend day. At the gym, I'm either in spin or kickbox class. I haven't been keeping up with strength training this month and I can feel it! I'm making a point to get weights, planks, push ups and ab work back into my weekly workout plan--even if I have to do it on my own at home. Here are my running and cycling stats:

Run 21.0 miles [33.8km]
Bike 191.5 miles [308.2km] <-- A new monthly record for me!

I know there are many, many cyclists out there who bike way more than this in any given month, but for a weekend cyclist like me, I think 191.5 miles rocks! I'll probably end up breaking this record before the summer ends, but for now.. I'm pretty happy with this mileage. I also made some new personal records with distances in April. One is for the most miles in two consecutive days, which was 68.4 miles [110km] (42.5 on Saturday and 25.9 on Sunday). The other record was for my longest ride yet at 52.2 miles [84km]. This route was mostly easy rolling hills, with one climb at the very beginning (4 mile mark) and one at the very end (48 mile mark). Most of our rides have several climbs interspersed with rolling hills. Did I mention we're signed up to ride a Gran Fondo [103 mile (165.8km) cycling event] in September?

What did you do to keep moving in April? 

In books: 
April was yet another productive reading month for me! I read twelve books! Well, three of them were re-reads of a graphic novel and a fourth was another graphic novel, but since Lover Reborn was over 500 pages, it kind of evens out, right?

Non-fiction...... 2
   Health & fitness... 1
   Memoir ..................... 1

Romance ............ 6
     Paranormal ...........3
     Contemporary...... 2
     Historical ..............1

Graphic Novel .....4

1. Crazy, Sexy Diet by Kris Carr
2. The Warlord Wants Forever by Kresley Cole
3. Rainshadow Road by Lisa Kleypas
4. A Hunger Like No Other by Kresley Cole RE-READ
5. Lover Reborn by J.R. Ward
6. A Dangerous Beauty by Sophia Nash
7. The Sweetest Thing by Jill Shalvis
8. Amulet: Stonekeeper by Kazu Kibuishi RE-READ
9. Amulet: Stonekeeper's Curse by Kazu Kibuishi RE-READ
10. Amulet: The Cloud Searchers by Kazu Kibuishi RE-READ
11. Amulet: The Last Council by Kazu Kibuishi 
12. Paris in Love by Eloisa James

I plan to review Paris in Love by Eloisa James, so stay tuned for that.

Do you read memoirs? If so, what compels you to chose the memoirs you read?

A girl and her cat

In photography: 
I missed another day in my Project 366, but I decided against starting over from the beginning. I'm just going to continue doing the best that I can and if I miss a few days in a year, so be it. I'm not perfect and the project is still fun.



In the garden: 
I haven't done a thing! I'll be so annoyed with myself if I fail to get my vegetable garden re-established again this year..



Thanks for taking the time to read about my April adventures!


Here's wishing you a marvelous May! :) 

My March Adventures

Time sure does fly, doesn't it? March was a good month, busy as usual, but aren't we all? The biggest adventure around here last month was having my baby turn 13 years old! A teenager! Now husband and I are the parents of two teenage girls. Wow. Talk about adventures! :D

In health & fitness: 
Have you noticed the Crazy Sexy Eat Your Veggies, Ignite Your Spark, and Live Like You Mean It! Diet book by Kris Carr on my sidebar that I've been reading for the last couple of weeks? I read most of it last month and just finished this morning. It's a fabulously inspirational and instructional book on revamping your lifestyle choices for optimal health, happiness and overall vitality.  I have to admit that my focus on healthy eating has slipped in the past several weeks after having completed that WholeLiving action plan back in February. Crazy Sexy Diet has helped (re-)inspire me to get back on track. Today I did a 24 green juice fast as prescribed by Kris Carr in her book and starting tomorrow I am back to 'Crazy Sexy - Whole Living' eating. I'm not doing the 21 Adventure Day Cleanse in Kris' book. I'm just not ready for another cleanse after having done the WholeLiving one in January. But I am going to use it as a guide to keep myself in check. I know I've said this often, but this time I mean it. :o)

March was a good workout month for me. I stepped up the running quite a bit and was kept extra motivated by my husband who has been joining me once or twice a week. We came up with a 5 km loop from our house, so that's the minimum distance we do now. I'm still biking and can't believe that I biked all winter long. I'm looking forward to the earlier sunrises so we can get out on the road nice and early on the weekends, ride 40-50 miles [64-80 km] and be home by lunchtime. Here's a rundown of what I did in March to keep my body moving:

Bike 80.78 miles | 22 fitness miles | 5.5 hours
Run 30.57 miles | 30.57 fitness miles | ~5.5 hours
Kickbox . . . . . . . . 14 fitness miles | 3.5 hours
Spin . . . . . . . . . . .  16 fitness miles | 4 hours
Powercuts . . . . . . . 16 fitness miles | 4 hours
Cardio Interval . . . . 4 fitness miles | 1 hour

Total fitness challenge 'miles'* = 102.57 miles

Which is approximately 23.5 hours of biking running kicking spinning lifting and cardio blasting. Yeah, baby!

*[My monthly goal is 100 miles where 1 fitness challenge mile = 15 min of cardio or strength training = 1 mile run.]

What did you do in March to keep moving?

In reading adventures: 
I read 13 books in March! Hooray! This puts me on schedule to reach my goal of 101 books this year. Assuming I keep this pace, of course. And the year is young, so really.. it doesn't mean a whole heck of a lot. Of the 13 books, 3 were novellas and 4 were graphic novels.. but the other 6 books were full length novels, including the 500+ page book Eona by Alison Goodman which is the second book I vowed to read for this year's Big Book Challenge. Which means... ta da!!! I completed my 2012 Big Book Challenge! One down ... um.. a lot more to go?

Here's a look at which books I read last month:

1. Capturing the Silken Thief by Jeannie Lin  
2. Eona by Alison Goodman
3. Ecstasy Unveiled by Larissa Ione
4. Eternity Embraced by Larissa Ione
5. Sin Undone by Larissa Ione 
6. American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang
7. A Lot Like Love by Julie James
8. Where She Went by Gayle Forman 
9. Silver Sparrow by Tayari Jones 
10. The Good Neighbors Book One: Kin by Holly Black and Ted Naifeh
[RE-READ]
11. The Good Neighbors Book Two: Kith by Holly Black and Ted Naifeh
12. The Good Neighbors Book Three: Kind by Holly Black and Ted Naifeh
13. Eternity in Death by J.D. Robb

My favorite books this month are: Eona by Alison Goodman, Sin Undone by Larissa Ione, Where She Went by Gayle Forman and Silver Sparrow by Tayari Jones.

I couldn't narrow down to just one! Interestingly, they're all SO different. I like that.

What great books did you read in March? 

Other projects and adventures: 


Behind the lens:
I'm still plugging along with my iPhone instagram Project 366. Well sort of. I had a Project 366 fail when I forgot to take a photo on March 16. Ugh. I'm really bummed about this. I decided to give myself a get out of jail free card just this once because it's leap year. Lame excuse, I know, but if I still take a picture every day until the end of the year I will have completed a Project 365. I know it's not the same as going 365 days STRAIGHT but it is what it is. :/ The following is my favorite photo from March..

The view at the park on one of my March runs.
Camera: iPhone 4S

In the garden: 
I'm still hoping to finally re-establish a vegetable garden this year before it's too late. I had a backyard vegetable garden for years but our home addition a few years ago took over where the garden was. I don't really get enough sunlight anywhere else in the yard except my flower garden between the house and the driveway, which is kind of a weird place for a vegetable garden since it would be visible from the street. I think I can still make it pretty. Well, until I have to put netting around it all to keep the deer out. Hopefully I'll carve some time this week and next to start transplanting the flowers to other areas of the yard to make room for neat rows of vegetables. I can't wait! :)

Do you have a vegetable garden?

So that's about it for my March adventures. Thanks for reading all about it and I wish you an Amazing April! xo

My February Adventures

Happy Leap Day!

There's just something really special and fun about February 29, don't you think? For most of us it's like a freebie day, but for some... it's the birthday that only comes around once every four years! Can you imagine? I remember a few leap years ago, an elderly woman with whom I was acquainted was so excited to be throwing a Sweet 16 party for one of her girlfriends [64th] birthday? How cute is that? Sixty four years old and your true birthday only came around 16 times! That's special all right! :)

German Chocolate Ganache Cake 

Speaking of birthdays ... my husband celebrated another one earlier this month and for the third year in a row, I made him his favorite cake ever... the amazing German Chocolate Ganache Cake pictured above. Fortunately for me, his birthday was on the first day after I was liberated from the cleanse diet I was following. Very serendipitous, don't you think?

Health & fitness adventures :
I finished the Whole Living Action Plan detox cleanse diet thing earlier this month. Yay!!! I learned so much doing that cleanse and felt so good in the last week or two, but it was hard work. A couple of weeks later, I have to confess that I haven't been as good at sticking to the healthy eating since then as I had hoped. I did develop some new habits that I've been very good at keeping up, such as no caffeine [can you believe it?], hot water with lemon first thing every morning, drinking more water, eating more vegetables and nuts, but I also resorted to some of the old not so good habits. In the form of cookies. :-/ It's not that I'm eating whole sleeves of girl scout cookies or anything. Honest! They haven't come in yet. But a cookie here and a cookie there every day.. it adds up. :/

This week my 16 year old and I started a "healthy eating diet" to help us get on track with healthy eating. We're going [mostly*] vegan and gluten free for two weeks, eating lots of fruit, vegetables, beans, soy, nuts and seeds, with moderate servings of oats and rice. We're starting every morning with a mug of warm water with fresh squeezed lemon to stimulate our liver followed by a fruit and soy smoothie for breakfast. I haven't made us a green smoothie yet.. wonder how that will go over. No processed foods and no refined sugars. My daughter's looking to simply eat healthier, more vegetables and fewer chips and snacks, and also hoping eating better will boost her moods. Yes, please. Minefields. Seriously. I'm looking to improve how I feel digestively again--I really did feel SO much better when I wasn't eating as many gluten foods on the cleanse. I wouldn't be disappointed I got back on track losing some extra pounds, too!

[*My daughter is being strict about the vegan part, but I'm allowing some Greek yogurt, fish and lean chicken or beef because I feel I need it to fuel or refuel my workouts.]

I'm finally working out every day-ish again after a bad head cold took me out of the gym and landed me on the sofa for a almost a week! Needless to say, my fitness hours reflect some of that downtime, but at least I still got my body moving when I could! Here's a look at what I did in February:

Bike . . . . . . . . . 2.5 hours [34.3 miles]
Run . . . . . . . . .  2.5 hours [14.34 miles]
TRX. . . . . . . . . 4.0 hours
Kickbox . . . .  . 3.75 hours
Spin . . . . . . . . .  2.5 hours
Powercuts . . . . . 2.0 hours

Total fitness challenge 'miles' . . . 72.34 miles

[My monthly goal is 100 miles where 1 fitness challenge mile = 15 min of cardio or strength training = 1 mile run.]

That's 17.25 hours biking running kicking spinning lifting TRX-ing.

All of a sudden it doesn't seem like a whole heck of a lot of activity...

What did you do in February to keep moving?

Adventures in reading :
After a very slow start in January, February proved to be quite productive with 14 books read! Possibly a new record for me, but in truth, some books were pretty short--three graphic novels and two novellas, so it's not that crazy. I did read a long one, though--Eon Dragoneye Reborn by Alison Goodman, which is one of the books I chose for The Big Book Challenge [500+ pages]. I loved it and am going to start the sequel Eona tonight! Here's a list of the books I read in February:

1. Born in Death by J.D. Robb C+
2. The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien, graphic novel B
3. Innocent in Death by J.D. Robb A
4. Wicked Intentions by Elizabeth Hoyt B+
5. Dragon Bound by Thea Harrison [re-read] A
6. The Bro-Magnet by Lauren Baratz-Logsted Thanks, Brie! :) B
7. King Lear by Gareth Hinds, Shakespeare graphic novel, original text B+
8. Eon Dragoneye Reborn by Alison Goodman A
9. Conor's Way by Laura Lee Guhrke A
10. "Thicker Than Blood" by Meljean Brook, novella A
11. Archangel's Consort by Nalini Singh B+
12. Archangel's Blade by Nalini Singh A
13. Anya's Ghost by Vera Brogsol, graphic novel B
14. Forever Mine by Delilah Marvelle, novella C-

Unfortunately, I was horrible at writing reviews or even mini reviews on goodreads for most of these books. I really need to get into the habit of writing at least a few lines, but once I move on to the next book, I lose reviewing momentum rather rapidly.

Are there any books listed above that you'd like to hear about?
Maybe I'll try to write up a few.

What great books did you read in February?

Other projects and adventures :
Guess what? I've been keeping up with the Project 366 [leap year ;)] photogrpahy project to take a photo every day of the year. I think I'm finally going to pull this project off after three prior failed attempts! Wahoo!! *knock on wood!*

I'm still thinking of a way to make a monthly collage to post here, but in the meantime, to see my photos click on My Project 366. All photos are taken with my iPhone 4S. Lots of pictures of cats and food.

Traveling adventures :
I met up with blogging friends Hilcia, Mariana and Natalie on Saturday afternoon. We met at a cool fondue restaurant in Hoboken called The Melting Pot where we ate fondue of course! Cheese fondue [with bread, apples and vegetables], Seasoned broth fondue [with meat, fish and vegetables] and of course.... chocolate fondue! We had a milk chocolate and white chocolate yin yang fondue with fresh strawberries, marshmallows, red velvet cake, brownies, cheesecake and rice krispie treats. Wow. Pictures of fondue on my Project 366 link above! And while the food was delicious and fun. .. the best part was hanging out with these lovely ladies chatting about books, jobs, family and life. Hilcia came with a generous bag of books to share with us [Thank you, Hils! xo] and we had the loveliest of afternoons. I can't wait to do it again soon.

Do you ever meet blogging friends you've met online in person?


That's about it for my February adventures. Thanks for reading all about it and I wish you a marvelous March! xo

My January Adventures

Instead of doing a 'Monthly Reads' post for each month, I thought I'd try making a monthly post recapping anything noteworthy that went on in my world such as the books I read, athletic adventures, travel or anything else interesting. Interesting to me, anyway, but hopefully to you, too.

January 2012 was surprisingly jam packed with adventure for me. This post ended up much longer than I expected. Feel free to scroll to the parts that most interest you. ;)

Reading adventures:
I had my all time record low reading month since December 2007 when I didn't read a single book! Last month, I read only THREE books!

1. The Longest Night by Kathleen O'Reilly
You can read my review for this book HERE, which I read for January's TBR Challenge.

2. Tides of Passion by Tracy Sumner
This book had the makings of a great story--interesting characters, a fun premise and a wonderfully unique setting. Unfortunately, I felt the main characters said or did things out of character one too many times and it weakened the credibility of their story.

3. Wife by Wendesday by Catherine Bybee
This book has been on the top of the Amazon Kindle charts for a really long time now. I don't know if the author has any secrets for keeping it up there, but I can tell you this story was really fun and I thoroughly enjoyed reading every page! It's a contemporary marriage of convenience turned true love story. Utterly adorable and believable, too! The ebook is only 99 cents!
Amazon Kindle
Barnes & Noble
Smashwords

I sure hope February is a better reading month for me or I'm never going to get to 101 books by the end of 2012! Good thing February has an extra day this year. ;)

Did you read anything good in January?

Health and fitness adventures:
So what was I doing with all that time that I clearly wasn't spending reading? Detoxing, working out and a bit of traveling, that's what!

As many of you already know, I started following the 28 Day Whole Living Action Plan featured in Whole Living magazine and on their website earlier in January. It's a food based detox-type-mind and body cleanse. It's kept me busy preparing new food dishes, healthy snacks and smoothies and because my caloric intake was naturally so low because of the plan and I wasn't drinking any coffee or tea with caffeine, I admit I napped a lot the first week or two. I have a few more days to go before I'm finished.. but already my diet feels close to normal again, but heavier on the fruits and vegetables. That's always a good thing!

Since the detox-cleanse is meant to be restful and healing, I eased up on my regular workout schedule a bit, which I thought would drive me crazy, but actually felt welcomed in the early weeks of the plan. Giving up coffee for the diet combined with fewer calories overall made me very tired and sleepy this month! I still managed to keep my miles and hours spent exercising at a decent level, though, so I'm happy about that. Here's a look at what I was doing in January to keep my body moving and my heart rate up:

Run ...................... 14.0 miles
Bike ..................... 56.7 miles
Snowshoe .............  3.5 miles

Spin class ................. 2.5 hrs
Kickbox ................... 3.5 hrs
Strength training .....  5.0 hrs
Cardio interval ......... 2.0 hrs

Total fitness challenge 'miles' ..... 77.5 miles
[My typical monthly goal is 100 miles where 1 fitness challenge mile = 15 min cardio or strength = 1 mile run or snowshoed.]

Other highlights:
I ran a 5K Race on New Year's Day hoping to break my 30:02 PR, but ran 30:31 which is still under a 10 minute mile, so that's cool. Maybe next time. :)

I started new small group TRX training classes in January after my gym had TRX Suspension Trainers installed. TRX suspension training is a fully body strength training workout in which you suspend your body weight by straps and do various strength exercises all the while your core is fully engaged.
Want to see a video? Visit trxtraining.com or go straight to the video HERE.

I went snowshoeing for the first time when I participated in the Tubbs Snowshoes Romp to Stomp out Breast Cancer Snowshoe event. and loved it! I want my own snowshoes! Thank you again to everyone who supported me and donated to the cause on my behalf! xo

How did your workouts go in January?


A photography adventure:
One last adventure to share with you. After three failed attempts at doing a 365 Project, I started fresh again for the fourth time on January 1 and so far I haven't missed a day! I'm doing this project exclusively using my iPhone 4S and Instagram. I know this is probably a ridiculous way of doing a 365 Project when I have a fantastic digital SLR, but the iPhone is SO convenient and I always have it with me, so I'm hoping the convenience of it will enable me to stick with the project and take a photo every day. Oh wait... I just realized this is a leap year. I guess this is a 366 Project? ; )

Have you ever done a 365 Project? 

Traveling adventures:
My husband, daughters and I took a long weekend getaway to Florida over Martin Luther King Weekend and had a really great time even though it was really cold that weekend! I wanted sunny warm 70s--not chilly, cloudy 50s. I heard it got warm the day after we left. Figures.

We have very close friends who moved to the Orlando area several years ago and who were always inviting us to come down to visit them, trying to lure us with all of the theme parks in the area. [We are more of a National Park kind of family--not the amusement park kind, but it was still really fun.] We really enjoyed visiting our friends the whole weekend in their lovely home. It was so relaxing staying with them!

Hogwarts
 Harry Potter World in Universal Studios
Orlando, FL

The first day we went to Universal Studios and pretty much beelined for Harry Potter World which was SO COOL!!! It really felt like you were walking through Hogsmeade and into Hogwarts castle. The ride in Hogwarts is a simulated broomstick ride and omg it felt so real! I admit I screamed when the dragon ... well, I don't want to give anything away. We went into Honeydukes, Ollivanders wand shop and of course, Zonko's! And we ate lunch at Three Broomsticks. We even had Butterbeer!
How cool is that? :)

Totoros!
From 'My Neighborhood Totoro'

The second day we went to Epcot. We had fun walking around, doing some of the attractions, visiting the international pavilions, but I don't know... it didn't seem so amazing. Even the fireworks were just okay. We ate lunch in 'Japan' and got giddy over the souvenirs from our favorite Hayao Miyazaki films.

The third day we went to an Indian Kite Festival with our friends. I had no idea kite flying was so competitive! We arrived with numerous kites in our arsenal. You'd think it's challenging enough to just get your kite up and flying, but no! All the other kite fliers will start maneuvering their kite to cross yours and with the right tension and direction, their kite string--which is actually finely coated with glass--cuts your string and your kite falls to the ground! So you have no choice but to be both an offensive and defensive kite flier to keep your kite in the air. On a side note, I ate some amazing Palak Pakoras [spinach-chickpea fritters] there. I had forgotten how much I LOVE Indian food. Mmmm I want some right now!  photo to come... maybe.

The Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB)
Kennedy Space Center
[photo taken from tour bus]

The fourth and last day, we went to Kennedy Space center. We spent time walking around the visitors center and then took the up-close tour of the space center and Vehicle Assembly Building. We actually got to walk inside the VAB and see the orbiter Endeavor up-close! Then bus took us around to the launch pad. Afterwards we spent an hour or two in the Apollo Saturn V Exhibit.

Endeavor 

I loved the up-close tour! I think it was especially meaningful for me because after college [I had just earned my B.S. in Electrical Engineering] I worked for an aerospace company that was a subcontractor of a subcontractor of NASA, updating and writing new test software for two electrical devices we built for the space shuttle program. So I was familiar with the very basic picture of preparing the space shuttle for launch and then the retrieval of the solid rocket boosters after each launch. Anyway, visiting the Kennedy Space Center was definitely a highlight of this trip for me!

Did you go anywhere special in January? 

Thanks for taking the time to read about my January adventures. I assure you January was unusually adventurous for me and future monthly posts will be much shorter!

Wishing you all a fantastic February! xo

New Year's Resolutions & Challenges 2011

BIRDSEED IN THE SNOW

Happy New Year! :)

I've made a few New Year's resolutions and challenges for myself in books, health and fitness, photography and ... well... a resolution to work on my list of goals. You know that last one made a lot of sense when I wrote it down... now it sounds really silly. :o)

BOOKISH GOALS:

I had so much fun with the reading challenges I joined in 2010 even though I only met 7 out 12 of those challenges. So of course, I'm inspired to join several new ones this year!

My reading style really expanded in 2010 such that I've read more books from a wider variety of genres than ever before in my life and I loved it. I did not meet my goal of reading 100+ books in 2010--I read 83, yet I'm not even that disappointed because what I did read was so enjoyable. Yet I'm still going to try for 100 books in 2011. ;)

I'll be making individual posts on the following reading challenges and book clubs over the next few days so that each one has it's own place for me to keep track of the books I read, but here's a list of the reading challenges and book clubs I'm joining this year:

In Death Series Reading Challenge hosted by Me [ongoing]
Steampunk Challenge hosted by Rikki
What's In a Name 4 Challenge hosted by Beth Fish
Take a Chance Challenge 3 hosted by Jenners
A-Z Mystery Challenge {by the author} hosted by Michelle
100+ Books in 2011 hosted by ???? [still looking for one to join...]

Authors by the Alphabet Book Club hosted by Paula
Women in Fantasy Book Club hosted by Erikka

Sounds like fun reading, right? :)


HEALTH & FITNESS GOALS:

My 5K Personal Best:
One of my fitness goals for 2010 was to run a 5K in 31 minutes. I participated in a 5K last year on New Year's Day and ran it in 34:51. I signed up for the same 5K race today, but it was unfortunately cancelled due to all the snow and ice still on the roads around here from last week's blizzard. The race is rescheduled for January 30, 2011 so I'll have to wait till then to see if I met my goal. :)

Fitness Challenge 2011
I'm aiming to exercise for 100 "fitness miles" per month in 2011. One "fitness mile" is equivalent to one mile walked or run OR 15 minutes of other cardiovascular or strength training activity that elevates my heart rate to my target heart rate zone. In fact, I'm planning on hosting this as a challenge for others to join in on a monthly basis. Let me know in the comments if you think you might be interested in something like this. All you'll need to do is keep your own log either privately [for example, on a piece of paper, your computer, etc.] or you can keep a log on your blog, like I do. See my fitness blog see how she runs... if you want to see how I did it. More information on this to come... :)

Triathlon
September 11, 2011
Already signed up!!! Weeeeeeeee!
Still haven't started training for the swimming component, but I did buy a fitness swimsuit at least. Now to get myself in the darned pool...

Get to my target weight.
Some of you who follow my blog regularly already know I started using the Lose It! App on my iPhone last April. I've lost nearly 37 lbs. in the last nine months, but have a bit more to go to get to my goal weight. I just got my body fat measured at my gym this morning and was pleased with my results. I'm currently in the 70th percentile for my age group, meaning that out of 100 women, 30 have a lower percent body fat than me and 70 have a higher percent body fat than me. I'm going to repeat the body fat test in June after I've lost these last 23 lbs., hoping to end up in the 85-90th percentile.

If one of your goals for 2011 is to lose some weight and get in better shape, I recommend you download the free Lose It! app to your iPhone or iPod Touch today and get started. You can also now use the Lose It! app for free by setting up an account on their website at http://loseit.com. And there's a brand new Lose It! book out, too. If you start using Lose It! and want someone to compare notes with and help keep you motivated, request me as a friend and we can support each other. If you know my gmail email address, you can find me there with that. Otherwise email me at the email address on my blogspot profile and I'll let you know how to add me.


It's a fantastic tool. I'm telling you, if you use it, you will Lose it! :)

OTHER FUN GOALS:

Project 365 Take Three.
I'm making another attempt at a Project 365 --a photography project on Flickr. The idea is to take at least one photograph a day for a whole year. I failed at this twice already in 2010, so I'm trying it again. They say the third time's a charm, right? I can only hope! LOL

My first photo is the birdseed in the snow photo in this post. :)

My daughter is still going strong with her Project 365 at day 192!

My 101 Things to do in 1001 Days
I started this personal challenge in May 2010 and haven't accomplished too much yet, so I'm going to make a bigger effort to make a dent into this list in 2011. 


So what do you think? Over ambitious or achievable?

I'd love to hear about any New Year's Resolutions or goals you've made for 2011. :)


Wishing you all a peaceful, happy and healthy New Year! xo

Lunar Eclipse Photos

Happy Winter Solstice!  :)

Did you get to see the lunar eclipse early this morning? I hope you did, because this particular lunar eclipse event is a pretty rare event... the last Winter Solstice Lunar Eclipse was 456 years ago!!!

We were very fortunate to have very clear skies last night in the New York Metro area, so we were able to view the entire eclipse. It was really quite a show.

The eclipse took place in our EST time zone from around 1:30 am to I think 5 am, so my husband and I got out of bed at 1:30 am, bundled up and set up outside to watch and photograph the eclipse. We tried to wake up our daughters a couple of times, both of whom were quite determined as of a few hours prior to stay up for the entire eclipse, but in the end, were near impossible to rouse from sleep! I tried waking up our 11 year old three times, even just to look at moon out her window, but I couldn't even get her to open her eyes. The teen at least sat up to look out her window twice, followed by a "maybe I'll come out in a few minutes..." So instead of it being a family affair, viewing the eclipse last night very early this morning turned into a romantic star gazing rendez-vous for two! :)

My husband and I set up our tripods side by side in the yard and took pictures every several minutes--apart for nearly two hours. It was pretty darned cold outside in the mid 20s (-4 C), so we were going into the house every so often to thaw and once for a bowl of cereal and milk. :) Why is it that cereal tastes so much better in the middle of the night than it does in the morning for breakfast?

Anyway, thanks to my husband's expertise and assistance with adjusting and tweaking the manual settings on my camera (you should see his pictures!), I was able to get some neat pictures of the eclipse. These are a few of my favorites:

1:55 am EST

December 21, 2010

2:00 am EST

December 21, 2010

2:12 am EST

December 21, 2010

2:19 am EST

December 21, 2010

2:22 am EST

December 21, 2010

2:34 am EST

December 21, 2010

2:44 am EST

December 21, 2010

At this point, the earth's shadow was now blocking most of the moon's brightness so I needed to do a quick adjustment to allow more light to reach the lens. Now I was able to capture the red glow of the eclipsed moon in the photos. We were already able to see the reddish hue of the eclipsed portion of the moon with our naked eye for the last 20 minutes or so, but I couldn't capture it with the camera when there was still a sliver of the moon so brightly lit by the sun.

2:44 am EST

December 21, 2010

2:54 am EST

December 21, 2010

3:09 am EST

December 21, 2010

3:19 am EST

December 21, 2010

I took my last photo at 3:29 am and called it a night. I was too cold and too tired to stick it out for the second half of the event when the earth's shadow moved off the moon.

Did you get to see the lunar eclipse where you live?

My Halloween weekend

I had intentions of sharing a few Halloween themed posts here last week for the days leading up to and including Halloween, but life happens and I had some wicked busy days that kept me from blogging. Now it's days after the fact and I sat here debating whether or not to follow through with them at this point. For example, I had a post nearly prepared titled, "How to sew a Powerpuff girl costume without a pattern." I did that last week. Three times, actually, because you can't have Blossom without Bubbles and Buttercup, right? I even have some of the instructions typed up already and have photos to go with the instructions, too. But who wants to know how to sew a Powerpuff girl costume in November? No one, right? So that post isn't gonna happen.

Instead, I'm just going to share a few photos from Halloween weekend.

As I've shared before, my teenage daughter has developed a passion and creative talent for photography this year. Over the weekend, I took her up to the reservation for some fall foliage photo opportunities. She brought along a friend which I should have known instantly changed my role in this trip from companion photographer to mere chauffeur. I drove them to the head of a trail that goes around a lake and we weren't even ten feet from the car and my daughter's asking, "You're not really going to go with us, are you?" I looked down at my camera hanging around my neck ... "Well, actually... " and before I said anything else, I realized that even though this was my idea to come up here together, it's not the mother-daughter outing that I thought it was going to be. So when we get to the part of the trail that goes around the lake... I went one way and daughter and her friend went the other way. :(

Here are some photos I took on my solitary walk around the lake...

I took the photo above from the end of the lake.  The lake is above that stone wall, the water level of which is low at this time of year, but during heavy rain and snow melt, the river would overflow at this point into the stream bed in which I'm standing to take this picture.

Most years, we try to make a family event out of driving to a farm, going on a hayride to the pumpkin patch to pick our pumpkins, displaying them on our stoop for a week or so before carving them for Halloween. This year found us at the farm stand down the street ten minutes before closing time on the night before Halloween, picking a pumpkin from a selection of pumpkins laid out on wooden pallets. We didn't even get to carve it that night, but on Halloween afternoon. Talk about last minute! At least it was finished by nightfall.

Concentrating on pumpkin guts

Photo credit to my husband

Canon EOS 40 D

Li'l Monster Pumpkin

Photo credit to my husband

taken on his iPhone

I later escorted the Powerpuff girls--Buttercup, Blossom and Bubbles trick-or-treating. I barely got them to stand still for a picture as they were on an important mission... get as much candy as they could before they froze. It was a very chilly Halloween this year, but they managed to trick-or-treat for over two hours. ^_^

The Powerpuff girls... 

Buttercup, Blossom and Bubbles :)

Pretty Kitty   :)   

Photo credit to my husband
Canon EOS 40D

My eldest daughter left for trick or treating while I was out with the Powerpuff girls, so I didn't even get to see her before she went out. Fortunately, my husband snapped a photo of her with his phone before she left.

I guess two hours was the chill factor threshold for trick-or-treating this year, because my eldest and her friends lasted about the same amount of time before they called it quits, too.

I don't know how it is where you live, but in our area a lot of teens in high school still go trick-or-treating. When I was a kid, most of us stopped in middle school! I used to think that teenagers were too old to be trick or treating, but now I think it's kind of nice that they're still interested in having some wholesome fun. But I still expect to hear "Trick-or-Treat" and "Thank you" when they ring the doorbell!

How old were you when you stopped trick-or-treating? 


If you live somewhere other than the US, do kids trick-or-treat in your country?