Bookish (and not so Bookish) Thoughts

Link up, link back, say hey!

1. No matter how many stacks of papers I have (a lot), it's still always great to finish a pile and put them in the grade book.

2. I'm reading History of Wolves by Emily Fridlund right now and it's really disturbing me. It's good, definitely, but she alludes to something happening to a young boy at the beginning so I'm just on pins and needles for this bad thing to happen. Since I've become a mom I have a really hard time with this sort of thing, but I'm sucking it up for the writing.

3. Joe Biden's new memoir, Promise Me, Dad and Andy Weir's Artemis both came in the mail for me yesterday. I think this will conclude the book buying until after the holidays. 

4. Starting on Saturday I have things going for nearly a weeks straight, but I am SO excited, since it's all fun stuff (I have next week off for our Thanksgiving break). I'm running a 5k at UCLA, I'm taking Sawyer to Knott's for a few hours (we have super cheap annual passes, so I can do that now and not feel bad), I'm getting my hair done, I have plans to see friends, and hopefully some reading, running and relaxation. I just have to get through the next few days at work.

5. I think the site Cupcakes and Cashmere is a little fluffy, so reading her blog is definitely a guilty pleasure. She did post something timely for me last week, though, about remembering that a lot of the time when people act negatively towards you it really is a problem on their end. So, basically, yes, people may hurt your feelings but often it's because they're having a rough time, are insecure, or thrive on negativity. Obviously that's not always true, since we all deserve attitude from others on occasion. But recently someone I care about greatly has been a little judgmental towards me and I've remembered to pause and look at things from a different perspective. 

6. So, it has to happen- we're getting more crappy Ikea bookshelves. We have several tall Billy book cases with shelf extenders in our great room, but we've outgrown them. We want to do custom shelving, but that is probably after a year or two of saving for the Big Remodel. For now I'm going to get a few small white units for our dining room, which means I get to reorganize. 

7. I made this pumpkin cake, minus the toppings, and layer instead of sheet, last weekend and it is so good! It's basically pumpkin bread in cake form with an extremely delicious.

8. One of Sawyer's teachers is leaving next week and I am so bummed. She is the lead teacher for his room (the other two teachers are great, though) and has been such a huge help transitioning him there. I know this is part of the process, but I still was sad when I head the news.