Sunday Social Week 115 Linky

It’s time for another Sunday Social with Ashley Lately and A Complete Waste of Make-up!
It’s been so long since I’ve done one, and I really missed it.  So here I am linking up.  If you’ve never linked up, please do.  I’ve found so many wonderful blogs doing this link-up; and Ashley and Neely are just the best.  Enjoy and thanks for stopping by.

Social Sunday
1. What is one item you wish you could splurge on right now
A Vacation!  Oh man I want to go on a real, long, vacation with the kids so bad right now.  That’s what I would splurge on right now.
2. If you had an entire weekend of no plans what would you do?
I would probably do my cross-stitch pattern I’m working on right now, read and just relax.  I don’t get to squeeze that in too much during the week.  that would be really nice.
3. What is the next place you are visiting outside of your current city?
I want to visit some of the smaller towns down south from where we are.  We’ve spent a lot of time exploring so many nooks and cranies of DC, but we haven’t ventured out too much and I really want to do that.  Pennsylvania and New York are also on my hit list soon.
4. Are you a neat freak or a clutterbug?
I think I’m somewhere in between.  I’m not a crazy ocd neat freak, but I’m definitely not living in a pig sty.  So that’s pretty good….a little bit of both and somewhere in the middle
5. What is your favorite summer purchase?
I finally had to get rid of some of my favorite summer sandals.  I just couldn’t figure out what to
replace them with. I just loved them so much.  But I finally found these little babies at Target and on clearance too.

They have them in black and white too.  The white are pretty darn cute.

Thanks for stopping by and stick around awhile.  Let me know if you’re new or if you see something you like!

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My Favorite Books of 2013 {The.Book.Chat} w/ The Tangerine

I am happy to say that this year I completed my Goodreads Book Challenge for the year!  I think I had set my sights a little high the last two years I did it…although being extremely sick while pregnant with little #3 and then moving across country the next year probably stacked the odds against me a bit.  This year I found a nice number and went with it, fifty.  I’m actually over it at fifty-three, which is awesome.  There are actually several books I didn’t submit on the list, like a ton of little novellas that I read over the course of the year as well.  Suffice it say I’m pretty proud of myself and now I just need to decide what my number for next year will be.  The Book Chat link up question for this time around was your favorite books of the year.  I’m not sure how I can narrow it down through fifty-three books.  There are so many that stick out in my head, but I’m going to give it a try here.

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This was new author for me, and a whole series of books that I’m still working on.  These books are from quite awhile ago, but were re-published with new covers recently.  I wasn’t quite sure how I would like it, or if I would get into it because at first the fact that it was slighty “dated” was pretty apparent.  In the book the emails and computers are still relatively new – with chatrooms and all that as well.  But I ended up absolutely loving it, and so far all the books that I’ve read in the series.  You can find my review here.
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This year I accidentally became obsessed with military-themed romance novels.  It seriously was an accident, but now I’m hooked.  When I was roaming the aisles of the books store I came across a books cover with a fighter plane and a guy in a flight suit on it.  I had never seen a fiction book that was military-themed like that.  Crazy right?  So I snagged it up and then became obsessed, in a good way I promise.  This was also the time I discovered that Romance novels weren’t really what I had thought they were.  I had this whole milk-maiden, Fabio, gross sex stuff in my head….but it really wasn’t that at all.  Although I am sure that is out there.  It really was about romance, and the story.  I didn’t do a review of this one, but here is the Goodreads page for it.
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I swore I would never read another Nicholas Sparks book after A Walk to Remember, and I didn’t until Safe Haven.  Frankly I just didn’t want to read a sad book.  It wasn’t the year for them.   I blame the movie….I saw the previews and wanted to read the book before I saw it.  I’m glad I did.  Great book, great movie.  And it wasn’t ridiculously tragic as far as the main characters go (which is usually Mr. Sparks style).
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Another new thing for me this year were Amish novels.  Never read them, never really had any interest to either.  However, some of the publishing houses I work with have an abundance of Amish novels to review.  So I thought, “why not, I’m not paying for it.”  Again, super surprised that I liked them.  Cindy Woodsmall has definitely jumped to the top of my favorite authors list.  Amish Vines and Orchards is a series that I have barreled through and am trying to patiently wait for the next book to come out *not until Spring of next year, ahhhhh!!!*.  This is book one and I think my favorite.  You can find my review here.
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Debbie Macomber is also a new author on my list.  I’ve read all six Navy series books, and I’m going through the Cedar Cove series (because I watched the tv series on Hallmark!).  This is probably one of my favorite of the six, but they are all really good.  These are definitely romantic, and they all have a great story line so its not just fluff.  Debbie is a great author, and I would highly recommend trying any of her books.
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I had the extreme pleasure of being able to read and review the 25th Anniversary edition of this book.  When I first announced that I was doing it, my facebook page was flooded with people who had their lives greatly affected by this book and were in shock that I had never read it.  It is an absolutely amazing story of love, of love between a man and a woman; and about the redeeming love of Christ (hence the title).  The book is basically a metaphor.  Even if you are not one to read “Christian” books this is still a great read and I would recommend it especially to young woman in the older highschool/college age range.  I will definitely be giving this to my daughter when she gets older.  You can find my review here.
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This is a cool series that I started reading mainly because we live where they are written.  How cool is that?  I can actually go to the places that are talked about in the books.  Another cool little tidbit is that the author, Margaret Truman, is President Truman’s daughter.  Pretty neat.  Murder in the Supreme Court is probably my favorite so far, but I’ve only read four of them.  There are a ton!  I’m excited to continue you on with this series and visit all the places talked about.
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Apparently this book series is supposed to be a movie soon, although I haven’t really done the research on that.  It popped up on my free book deals notice for Amazon, although I don’t know if it is still free.  It is classified as a Young Adult, and is very Twilightesque…although they aren’t Vampires.  Similar but different.  I thought it was written really well, probably a little better than Twilight.  It was a decent story, with some twists and turns.  It was a nice, easy and fun read, especially after some of the heavy books I read this past year.
Can’t wait to read what other people on the linky have as their favs of the year.  I’ll probably be adding them to my cue.   Did anyone else participate in a book challenge this year?  Did you finish?  Did you have a favorite book for this year?

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Sunday Social, Week 69

Happy Sunday Ya’ll!  It’s another week.  Is it just me or is time flying by faster?  I’m not sure if its because I specifically don’t want it to, or life is super busy right now, or a combination of all of that.  Maybe I’m just old?  Needless to say we’re plugging along.  Is life flying for anyone else right now?  Before we get going make sure to check out the giveaway on the blog.  It’s a wonderful little animated children’s film, Legend of Kung Fu Panda!

Sunday Social

Time for my favorite linky, thanks Ashley Lately and A Complete Waste of Make-up.  Seriously, I can’t believe I missed last week.  It was all about purses…come on man!!!! 

1. What is your dream job?

Well my degree is in Criminal Justice/Psychology.  There was a time where I wanted to be a sentence report writer.  Kind of the best of all worlds, a little police, a little law, a little investigative.  I would still love to do something like that, but being a mom is a pretty awesome job.  Right now though, being in DC, I feel like dream jobs surround me.  I would absolutely love to work in politics.  It would probably be a love/hate sort of deal; but if I could do something in the advocacy area for the military that would be awesome!  Maybe get paid to do some of the awesome volunteer work that I do. 

2. If you won the lottery and didn’t need to work for money, what would you do with your time?

Definitely do more of volunteering and attending conferences and seminars so that I could educate myself more.  The hardest part for me is really the babysitting issue.  Mr. Air Force is gone quite a bit, so that can be really hard.  I have some amazing babysitters, but they do cost money.  I’m so thankful that he is so supportive of me and tries to make sure I do as much as I can.  However, I wish I could do more.

3. What piece of career advice would you give to someone just starting out in your field?

So this is kind of funny.  If you happen to be expecting your first little one, surround yourself with those that are like minded in your parenting style and choices.  Supportive friends that will be there for you.  I have a few friends that I always go to to bounce stuff off of, or ask questions.  Many of our friends have similar parenting styles and we support each other in our decisions. 

If you’re a blogger – get out there.  Jump in with both feet.  I started making friends, networking, talking about what I like.  You don’t necessarily have to find one specific niche, although there are many successful bloggers that talk about only one subject.  Keep it light and fun.  Whenever I start to get overwhelmed blogging is the first thing to go, in more then one respect.  I take a break for a day or two or else my blogging goes down hill.  I want to be on my A Game when I’m here.

If you are interested in more volunteering, find what your passionate about in life.  If you like working with kids, volunteer with kids; if you like animals, work at a shelter.  There’s nothing better then giving back and helping someone in need.  Who knows, maybe someday it might lead to a paid gig.  Volunteer work can not only be rewarding, it can be priceless experience.

4. What would be your ideal “just for fun” job?

probably something retail, like clothing (Old Navy maybe), or maybe a craft store.  Who needs a pay-check right?!

5. What was your first “real” job?

I’ve definitely had some awesome jobs.  I worked at a very awesome collectibles store in “old” part of town, it was so fun.  I was a dance teacher for awhile; but my first “real” job was at a law office.  It was pretty awesome – reception and errand runner, but I learned some cool things.

Can’t wait to read everyone’s responses.  Make sure to enter the giveaway mentioned above, and start checking out my updated resource tabs up top as well.  If you are military, or know someone in the military, hopefully they will be a great help.  I’m still working on growing the resources, but its a start!

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