Six Years - Book Review

Image via Goodreads

From Goodreads:
Six years have passed since Jake Sanders watched Natalie, the love of his life, marry another man. Six years of hiding a broken heart by throwing himself into his career as a college professor. Six years of keeping his promise to leave Natalie alone, and six years of tortured dreams of her life with her new husband, Todd.
But six years haven’t come close to extinguishing his feelings, and when Jake comes across Todd’s obituary, he can’t keep himself away from the funeral. There he gets the glimpse of Todd’s wife he’s hoping for . . . but she is not Natalie. Whoever the mourning widow is, she’s been married to Todd for more than a decade, and with that fact everything Jake thought he knew about the best time of his life—a time he has never gotten over—is turned completely inside out.
As Jake searches for the truth, his picture-perfect memories of Natalie begin to unravel. Mutual friends of the couple either can’t be found or don’t remember Jake. No one has seen Natalie in years. Jake’s search for the woman who broke his heart—and who lied to him—soon puts his very life at risk as it dawns on him that the man he has become may be based on carefully constructed fiction.


This was a really good book. I don't read very many mystery/thriller books but I'm glad I read this one. Jake makes a promise to Natalie to leave her and her new husband Todd alone. He keeps that promise until he finds out that Todd has passed away. He begins searching for Natalie taking him on a crazy and dangerous journey no one would have expected. I thought several times that Jake should just give up his search. There were SO many reasons to stop trying to find her. Towards the middle of the book is when this became a real page turner for me. Every time I thought that maybe I had it all figured out...or at least some of it something would change and I had to keep on reading to see what this new information meant. 

I think I need to check out a few more Harlan Coben books.

Hold the phone!

Really. Put the phone down. I'm talking to myself here....
I check my phone a lot... a LOT. I use my phone for everything. Joey teases my about it all the time. The only time I actually sit down at the computer is right now when I'm blogging. I check my social media accounts with my phone. I read blogs on it. I use Pinterest on it. I shop on it. Of course I text on it too.

Yesterday I noticed my right thumb was hurting a bit. THEN I noticed that as I held my phone in my hand thumb poised to do some scrolling it was shaking some. My thumb that is. Not the phone. Weird!

It's called "text thumb". Who knew there was such a thing? There are splints you can wear and exercises you can do such as:

In your texting hand: -
• Tap each finger with the thumb of the same hand. Repeat x 5
• Pull your thumb firmly with the other hand. Repeat x 5
• Wrap an elastic band around the tips of fingers and thumb and open your hand against the resistance.   Repeat x 20
• Palms down wrap an elastic band around each thumb and force apart. Repeat x 20
• Tap the palm and back of your hand on your thigh as quickly as you can. Repeat x 20
• Massage thumb web, back of forearm and front of forearm. 2 minutes.
• Press and rub in a circular motion the painful nodules in those muscles. 30 seconds for each nodule.
• Reach up high with both arms and shake your hands. Reach down low with both arms and shake. Repeat x 3.


How odd... I wonder if this is an injury that qualifies you too call in sick for work.
 "Sorry but I've got text thumb. Gotta stay home and do my rehabilitation exercises."

It's funny but not funny. It does hurt...BUT I did it to myself.
Maybe I'll check the phone a little less from now on....

The Book Chat - YA Books

Finally I'm participating in the book chat again! It feels like it's been forever!

I loved YA books before I knew I was actually reading YA books. I just took recommendations from friends, read the books, and loved them. It wasn't until about a year ago that I realized this was actually a genre...a genre that I read a lot of. Since discovering that the books I loved were in fact YA I started immediately heading to that section of the library. 

YA books are NOT just for young girls.They deal with so many different topics and issues. Some of the most emotion provoking books I've read have been YA. These are a few of my favorites:

The Delirium Trilogy

The Book Thief

 The Fault in Our Stars

Want! Want! Want!

I HATE...absolutely hate bringing Noah to the store with me. Noah has developed a bad case of the gimmes. For some reason he thinks that he should get something from every store we go to.
Walmart
Target
Walgreens
THE GAS STATION!

I can't take it. As soon as we get there he asks, "Can I get a toy?"
The answer is almost always, "No, you have a ton of toys at home. You don't really need more right now."
This inevitably leads to whining and him following me around the store repeating favorite phrases like:

This one is five dollars. That's cheap!
Why are you getting stuff but I'm not? (Because I'm buying groceries and we have to eat?!?)
This says buy one get one half off!
You never let me have anything!
This isn't fair!
Please! Please! Please!!!!

Noah knows he can save his money up and buy what he wants. He does it all the time. He really does have way too many toys and I refuse to buy more. I'm tired of whisper yelling at him to stop asking up and down every aisle of the store. I've tried grounding him from things when he doesn't stop asking. He hates not being able to go play with his friends so that is usually the first thing to go. Even that doesn't stop him from begging the next time we have to go somewhere.

I really have no idea how to get him to stop. I avoid taking him with me as much as possible....

Do your kids want want want? How do you make it stop stop stop?!?

A quick Q&A with Noah

1. What is something Mommy always says to you?
I love you and clean up your room

2. What makes Mommy happy?
hugs

3. What makes Mommy sad?
When I am naughty

4. How does Mommy make you laugh?
Tickle me

5. What was Mommy like as a child?
Probably bad... maybe good a little

6. How old is Mommy?
28 (He's right!)

7. How tall is Mommy?
58 inches...He's very close =) I'm 62 inches

8. What is Mommy's favorite thing to do?
Read a book!

9. What does Mommy do when you're not around?
Nap.
I do nap... =)

10. If Mommy becomes famous, what will it be for?
Singing
I highly doubt I will EVER be a famous singer lol

11. What is Mommy really good at?
Reading

12. What is Mommy not very good at?
Playing video games.
I'm awful at video games. Noah won't even let me play with him.

13. What does Mommy do for her job?
Nothing
Thanks Noah...

14. What is Mommy's favorite food?
Crab legs

15. What makes you proud of Mommy?
When you don't ground me from things.

16. If Mommy were a cartoon character, who would she be?
Sandy from spongebob.
What? A squirrel?

17. What do you and Mommy do together?
Play outside and go to the library

18. How are you and Mommy the same?
We have the same last name. Our eyes are the same color. Our skin matches.

19. How are you and Mommy different?
You are taller. You have baby in your tummy and I don't.

20. How do you know Mommy loves you?
You cuddle me a lot.

21. Where is Mommy's favorite place to go?
Library! or Walmart.
It's definitely not Walmart lol.

Pregnant women are hot...

SERIOUSLY! Someone get me an industrial fan and an ice pack! Its not even August yet and I'm melting. It's really bad at night. It never fails. I wake up at 2am and my body is on fire! I have to get a cold washcloth and drink lots of ice water. Of course, then I'm wide awake and it take me forever to fall asleep again. If I'm awake I might as well head downstairs for a snack. Oh look! My book is on the kitchen counter. Well I'll just take this to the couch and read since I can't sleep anyway.......

The next thing I know it's 4 or 5 in the morning.

This is a terrible pattern to start. It leaves me exhausted during the day. It doesn't matter if I nap or not. When the middle of the night comes I will be hot and I will be wide awake.

We have 10 weeks until Emily will be here. I'm sure then I'll be missing the little sleep I do get now =)

Strangers!

A while ago I was at Burger King. This woman came up to me and said, "can you keep an eye on my daughter while I take my son to the bathroom?"
Before I could answer she quickly walked away.
My heart started racing "Is she crazy? What if I was nuts and wanted to steal her baby?"
She was gone maybe 6 minutes. Obviously I was not nuts and did not steal her baby. I can see if Noah had been with me she might have thought, "Oh this nice mom will understand my situation and help me out" but it was just me in the back of the restaurant NEAR the door. I would never leave Noah alone with a stranger for even a moment. Even now that he's seven I still tell him all the time at the store, "You have to stay by me. You can't just run off and go look at something."

You just never know what crazies might be out there.

I don't want him to be terrified about something bad happening but I want him to know that there are people out there that you can't trust.  I used to just teach him about not talking to strangers and never go anywhere with a stranger. Then I read this article.  Now I teach him what kind of strangers are "tricky".

Back to Blogging

After a VERY long break, I'm back! We spent about 2 1/2 weeks in Louisiana and blogging was the last thing on my mind. I think one of the hardest parts of being back is going to be getting used to the quiet AND the boredom. Every day in LA I had somewhere to go, someone to see, and people always stopping by. If you don't already know... We moved from Louisiana to Illinois last year. It was a move for Joey's job. Both of our families live in Louisiana so this move has been really hard. I STILL haven't adjusted to the distance. We've lived far away before in Italy and Germany but for some reason this move has been tough. 

Shockingly I didn't take many photos while we were home...well not as many. I guess I was caught up in the fun. I met my friends for dinner one night and none of us took any pictures! What?!? I'll share what I do have though ;)

My mom has a pool in her backyard. We were in that pool every single day. My nephew Jacob spent a lot of time at my moms while we were there. He is the same age as Noah. Watching them play together is hilarious.

FOOD was a big part of my vacation. I went somewhere to eat every day whether it was for lunch or dinner. I have a special fondness for Buttercup's Cupcakes. They are AH-mazing! I really wished they shipped their delicious treats... If you're ever in the Shreveport-Bossier, LA area go get a cupcake! My mom  and sister bought my LOTS of cupcakes. We were very sad on our last cupcake day. I also finally got to eat my favorite pickle chips. My mom sent me home with several bags. My sister took me to get something I've been craving...fried pickles!!! MMM!

Noah spent a lot of time hanging out with my brother AKA the best uncle ever. If Bryan does something then Noah wants to do it too whether it's "helping" hang new gutters or just goofing around outside. Bryan is a firefighter/paramedic. Noah thinks that is just the coolest thing ever. When we're home he loves to visit him at the station =)

We spent time shopping with my dad, hung out at his house, and went to lunch a bunch of times. Noah was thrilled when Papa told him we could stop by Build A Bear!

We realized my mom, brother, and Noah all have the same pajamas so naturally we needed to take a picture. My mom let Jacob and Noah paint her pool rocks...AND she let them paint on the patio. They thought that was pretty awesome.

Leaving was really hard. I didn't cry until I was back here. Noah was upset about leaving and I didn't want me crying to upset him even more. The whole time we were there he asked when we could move back. When we drove by houses for sale he would say, "We could just buy that one!" Seeing him really sad when we drove away broke my heart. Hopefully in a few years we will be in a position to sell this house and move back. Until then we'll just have to visit as much as possible!