October Month in Review – Adventures in a Messy Life

October has been so insane. I’m attempting to catch up with it all, and get life caught up, and I don’t know how I thougth life would slow down once the kids were in college. Clearly I was insane to think that.

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Week 1

This is all from that weekend I think towards the end of the first week. The kids came down for their friends’ graduation, which I don’t really have any pictures of, but I do have pictures of a family dinner.

That weekend Superman came down Friday night and we played games with him, Clank Legacy 2. Then The Artist came in very late Friday night after an event she had at college. The next morning she had an event with friends, so we played another game with him and then went with him to the Chalk Walk (top picture) and saw his old demo team perform.

Then we had dinner with my family and then my brother and his family came over so I could trace my niece for her to be the dead body I could use for my upcoming murder mystery I was doing for a class. It was amusing how very excited she was for it.

But, the most amusing news was an author I read launched a Discord for her books, and a few of us joined, and then a day or so after that she dropped the advanced copy of her new book, and suddenly we were all discussing all sorts of reader theories of that new book.

Then we went back and reread the entire series and discussed all sorts of things in the previous books. We have all been so bad about spoilers in the series. It has been pretty hilarious. Once she unlocks that thread with all the spoilers it will be rather insane.

Books read:

Mirror of Argent– Y’all this book is soooooo good, and that cliff-hanger for the next book and then she released the blurb for book 5 AHHHHH!!!!!!!
Tattoo of Crimson– So I went back and reread the first book for hints of what happened in the later book, and they were already there
Ruins of Bone– And oh my goodness so many crazy things for this, and WOW

Games played:

Clank Legacy 2– such a fun game
We played another game, but I forget what

Week 2

On the list of hilarious things, Leezard was over by her crate frantically scratching and trying to get in there, and I go over there and she wants to get between her crate and the wall. So I push her crate to the side, and you know what she wanted? Just a very little bit of her food that had fallen out of her food bowl. That’s what she desperately needed me to push the crate out of the way for.

Then I’ve got a skirt I’ve been slowly working on, I stitched this nice little flower on, so I had finished getting the hand stitching done, and so I stitched up the skirt and it’s all done. I think it turned out nice and pretty.

And then, Jeff was quite nice to come with me to a Pride and Prejudice themed tea-party event. Really it was just an event that a new bookstore was holding so people would know about their new store. They had a Jane Austen quiz and then we watched the 2005 Pride and Prejudice movie. Jeff was the only guy there, but he we willing to do that with me, and I had fun watching it. We both agreed we prefer the 1995 mini-series version.

I won round 2 of the Jane Austen trivia with 11 points out of 12, just barely.

Oh, and funny story. So, my local quilt store had a class on how to use the Lutterloh system, and the guy doing it is the grandson of the founder. So, he calls someone up to show us how to measure for the two measurements.

Now, for the first measurement, it’s across the bust, and that was just like normal. Then, for the second measurement, it’s supposed to be the hip measurement.

Okay, this is the part that blew my mind. If you’ve sewn before you know that you are supposed to take the measurement straight across.

That wasn’t what he did.

He did this diagonal measurement that went across the “fullest part of the body.” Catching a bit of her tummy, so that it included her waist, since her waist wasn’t perfectly flat, and this was a truer measurement than a perfectly level measurement.

When I was telling Jeff this story, I was rather exaggerated and vocal as I talked about how my mind was completely blown by this crazy idea. He was not as impressed by it as I was. Mind-blowing. Absolutely mind-blowing, and had me re-measuring my hip, which sadly added a few inches to my measurement, but has gotten me better results afterward.

Books read:

Lord of Winter– This used a few tropes that are not my favorite and it’s interesting to me how that changes how I thought about the book, so I was mulling that over a little bit
Binding of Silver– Final official book in the Blood of Fae series, and I enjoyed finding the breadcrumbs she has laid out for what has been revealed so far
Various novellas in the Blood of Fae series- I don’t feel like linking to these right now, but I read them as well

Games played

Week 3

I just remembered a story I need to add for the second week of October, be right back…

Okay, hilarious story about a sewing class added in.

But I was working upstairs painting, and Leezard gave me a good fright as she pushed her way into the room, opening the door. Being me, I was absolutely convinced it was going to be some kind of serial killer come to murder me. Because that makes all sorts of sense.

In the process, she got some paint on her, and had white tipped ears for a few days.

After trying to scare me, she then proceeded to sleep on my lap desk, in what looked to be the most uncomfortable position ever.

I had a fun little hairclip I’d made, and finally remembered to take a picture of it. There are a few details I wish I’d made a little different, but overall I like it.

And the final picture is me modeling my new skirt I made, I like how it turned out. It’s bright and cheerful, and has nice big pockets.

Books read:

Mirror of Argent-I finished rereading the series and so read the new book again. We had so much fun discussing the different theories in the Discord. After reading the other books and reading the new book I found so many things I had missed.
Magical Beings Rehabilitation Center– I had picked this up several months ago, and decided to go back and read it. I don’t like this as much as some other books she’s written, but it is amusing. Basic idea is magical beings are using a rehabilitation center to help them adjust to modern society. The writing is not as good as some of her other books, but it was a decent read.

Games Played

Week 4

Look at the butterfly I found as I was walking the dog!

Okay, all of the other pictures are from Halloween. I had a lot of migraines in October, and spent a fair amount of time painting The Artist’s old room.

Friday, we headed up to ACU for my 25th college anniversary. I met a few of my friends from college. You can see a picture of me from my college days in my college yearbook.

We went to the homecoming musical, Shrek, and halfway through, right before intermission, the fire alarm went off. But instead of a noise alarm, it was a light going off. So the entire audience just thought it was part of the show because the show was still going on. Finally, an announcer broke in and told us all we needed to leave the building because the smoke alarm was going off.

Only no one left the building. They just stopped in the atrium, and so it took over 5 minutes to get everyone out of the auditorium. As we were finally leaving the auditorium, they announced they were going to go ahead with intermission then and make it an extra 5 minutes longer. If there had actually been a fire, we probably would have died because we didn’t make it out.

But, the play was okay. I’m not a huge fan of the Shrek musical, the music is not that great, and it’s just a less funny version of the movie. The guy playing Lord Farquad did a great job and was hilarious, but the guy playing Shrek was only okay.

Books Read

Kissing my Fake Date– I finished this last week and I remember nothing about it, that’s how boring it was, good thing it was free
Becoming Hook– This has sat unread on my Nook for 2 years, and I finally read it. I liked it well enough. It is very clearly more inspired by the Disney cartoon than by the book. Like there is a scene lifted straight from the cartoon, and the character of Smee is clearly visually inspired by the cartoon. I didn’t dislike the book, but I also didn’t like it. I’ve heard people talking about it positively, and I was just meh.
Betraying Korth– This is the third book in the series following Becoming Hook, apparently they’re vaguely interconnected series retold from the villain’s point of view. I got about halfway through this one, and decided that I just don’t care enough. I was talking with one of my college friends about how they decided on when to finish a book, and I was realizing I just don’t care enough about the characters, and I don’t really care enough about the characters to finish it.
Beyond the Filigree Wall– I can’t quite decide how I feel on this one. There was parts of this book that I enjoyed and other parts of this that I was vaguely indifferent to. There are two more books in this series, and I can’t decide if I actually want to pick them up right now. The first one was good but not great.