Stop, Drop and Blog

April and May were rough months goal-wise. I went into June with an optimistic outlook and, wouldn’t you know it, that optimism paid off.

1. Project365. I did pretty good at keeping up with my photography this month (and editing/uploading in a timely manner). There were only three days when I took pictures of stuff at the last minute because I almost forgot to take a picture for the day. (That’s better than last month!) I’ve also been trying to make sure I have an almost-even-amount of pictures of the boys separately, a handful of them together and other things that aren’t boy-related including a self-portrait or two throughout the month. I succeeded this month. I’m pretty proud. You can always view our Projec365 set on flickr but here is our Monthly Mosaic for June.

2. Reading. The good news is that I am no longer terribly behind on my goal of reading 50 books this year. As of the end of June, I am sitting at 21 books read. That is four books shy of what I should be and I can pick up an extra book here and there to bring myself back up to speed. I’m not worried so you shouldn’t be either. I read some good books this month.

1. The English American by Alison Larkin. (Of note: her website recently changed due to some drama with her domain being stolen! Update your links!) I wrote my full review of this book on the birth parent blog. Briefly: it’s a great read about an adoptee who returns to America after meeting her birth parents. Drama and laughter ensue. I enjoyed the poignant but not-overly-stereotyped view of adoption.

2. Sunday’s at Tiffany’s by James Patterson. I liked this book much more than I thought I would considering it was a far-fetched storyline. In short: small girl has an imaginary friend. As an adult, she meets her imaginary friend again but real this time and they fall in love. Very City of Angels without the angel part. Despite the similarities to the movie (which happens to be high on my list), the book was unique in many ways. I did enjoy it.

3. Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen. I surprised myself by realized that I’ve never read this book. I’ve watched the movie more times than I could count. And so I was really surprised by how much different the movie was from the book. As usual, of course, I preferred the book to the movie. (I also find it interesting that Angelina Joelie’s character, for which she scored an Oscar, wasn’t as important in the book. She was also given some characteristics and events done by other girls. Interesting.) All in all, I’m glad to have added this to my “to read” list. Finally.

4. Family Tree by Barbara Delinksky. I couldn’t put this book down. It was such an interesting look at family and the issue of race in various groups of our society. In short, two very white looking people give birth to a very non-white child. After the issue of fidelity is argued over and proven, the couple starts to look through the wife’s lineage to find the “culprit” and finds much more than they imagined. FireDad and I had many interesting discussions while reading this book.

I almost finished another book for June but didn’t quite make it. That will be just another book for July! I’m planning on taking quite a few books to camp later this month. As there are no technical distractions (read; no TV and no, gulp, internet), it’s ten days of reading when I’m not chasing children around the cottage. As always, you can view all of my books on my Goodreads list.

3. Weight Loss. I’ve lost two pounds this month. And no, we haven’t yet joined the gym. As we’re going to be gone for the whole second half of July, it didn’t make sense to join just yet. (Yes, we’re kind of cheap.) Thanks to the weather, we haven’t been getting out in the evenings to walk for the last week either. So, I’m pretty proud that I can say that I’ve lost two pounds. I’m hopeful!

I have to go now because LittleBrother is trying to crawl!