Boo!

Jack and I were hanging around Target and came across the Halloween aisle. Jack looked at me and immediately said, "Can you imagine what Sam would do if we brought something home from here!? Which one shall we choose?"

Jack...that is terrible!

But let's take a look around!

So many things to choose from...I mean look at!!

This phone would ring and when you answered it, a spooky voice would say scary things!!

Jack loved it!!

Even Jack was a little hesitant to push some buttons!

Don't worry, we didn't buy anything to scare Sam!! 

At least not today! (wink wink)

Lunar Eclipse Super Blood Moon...

Did you miss it?

The event that takes place about every 33 years? 

The Lunar Eclipse Super Blood Moon.

Well, it's your lucky day!! I have the most beautiful picture taken from Sam's telescope of the moon. It was absolutely amazing and breath taking!!! The four of us had a fabulous time checking out this "once" in a lifetime event!! Stunning!!

 

Ok. I may have stretched the truth a little...our life is not a daily Christmas card by any means!!

Let me share the real story of our  viewing of the Moon...

I was laying in bed flipping through instagram. Jack was a good hour into his sleeping...Sam and Jason were laying in bed too, watching football. While flipping through instagram, I noticed several pictures of the Lunar Eclipse Super Blood Moon. 

Me: Hey guys, I think we missed the Lunar Eclipse Super Blood Moon.Did you hear about it?

Jason: I'm so over that. Remember last year when we waited to see the super moon? Nothing. 

Me: True.

(continue flipping through instagram)

Me: There sure are a lot of people posting pictures of the moon. Did you know it was an eclipse? Oh wow, it's reddish orange, too.

 (continue flipping through instagram)

Me: Guys, I think we are missing something here. Why didn't I know about this???  Look, Sarah Jessica Parker even posted pictures!!

Sam: If you want to see it, why don't you go outside and look?

Me: I'm too comfortable and don't want to get up.

Jason: And there you go, Sam.

Sam: I'll go out and look.

Sam leaves and shortly comes back,

Sam: I couldn't make it off the porch. I think I heard something in the bushes. 

Me: Yea, those rabbit are vicious.

Jason: I'll go out with you.

Both guys leave.

Sam comes back breathing hard.

Sam: You have to come out and see it. It's pretty cool.

Me: Why are you breathing hard?

Sam: Dad told me to run inside and get you because it's going to go away.

Me: Are you sure you guys aren't going to scare me?

Sam: No! Come on!!!

I very reluctantly get up and head outside to see the super moon. When we get outside Jason yells, "Hurry Up!! You will miss it!" (I think we already had and I don't think the moon moves that fast!)

I look up. 

Me: Wow, that is pretty cool!

And here are my pictures:

Welcome to real life and the our viewing of the Super Lunar Blood Moon. Maybe next time....Oh, and Sam doesn't have a telescope. Actually, we don't even own a telescope.

Dark Reading....

The books I am going to share with you today are dark. They are about dark subjects, but they were both great reads. I know that they are not for everyone... 

 

Both books have been compared to Gone Girl and The Girl on the Train. But, I must say, I enjoyed these two reads better than those books. You was so creepy and written with technology as the main stalking utensil. Both books jumped into the action and they were both page turners and cut into my sleep at night...because I stayed up reading. Both of these books lead you down a dark, dark path and then turn...to even a darker path. Considered yourself warned if you decide to pick up one of these thrillers.

 

And please do not say, "I can't believe Katie read these books!" I read lots of different books...feel good ones, to dark ones. I just happen to read two dark ones in a row.  Two good thrillers, as I would like to refer to them as!

 

*******************************************************

You by Caroline Kepnes

 

From debut author Caroline Kepnes comes You, one of Suspense Magazine’s Best Books of 2014, and a brilliant and terrifying novel for the social media age.

 

The narrator Joe Goldberg is a smart young man, a sort of descendent of Salinger’s Holden Caulfield from Catcher In The Rye. Too clever by half you might say. He works in a bookshop in New York’s trendy East Village and is a walking compendium of American Lit. Knowing, superior, he judges the customers by what they read. 

 

In comes Guinevere Beck, a student on a writing course. She’s clever too, beautiful, sexy, girly, perfect. Joe is determined to have her, even to the extent of going to Ikea with her and assembling her new bed. Greater love hath no man. 

 

His obsession extends to spying on her, stealing her phone so he can monitor her texts and emails and reading her tweets compulsively as he scours her social media for evidence that she feels as strongly about him as he does about her. 

He follows her correspondence with her girlfriends, develops a special loathing for one called Peach and twists with jealousy when Beck (as she prefers to be known) enjoys a #girlsnightin eating cupcakes with her chattering chorus of companions. 

 

Then there’s Benji who is the man in Beck’s life, a self-obsessed and dim-witted entrepreneur in the soda water business who has to be dealt with, somehow...

 

Even though we know that Joe is a psycho he is a very amusing one and the chronicling of how he gets to first base and beyond with the skittish Beck follows the familiar course of many a romance in the world of young, middle-class, Starbucks frequenting New Yorkers. 

 

A terrifying exploration of how vulnerable we all are to stalking and manipulation, debut author Caroline Kepnes delivers a razor-sharp novel for our hyper-connected digital age.

 

*******************************************************

The second book I recently finished was:

The Luckiest Girl in the World.

 

Twenty-eight-year-old narrator Ani FaNelli is living what she thinks is the perfect life - "cool job, impressive zip code, hungry body, and the kicker - dreamboat fiancé." But from the first page, when she imagines plunging a steel blade into husband-to-be Luke Harrison, it's clear that whatever she exhibits to the world around her, something inside Ani is dark and broken and desperate.

 

Something happened to Ani when she was a high school freshman at Bradley, an exclusive Philadelphia prep school. Back then she was TifAni FaNelli, from the suburbs, with dreams of fitting in with the old-moneyed crowd at Bradley which leads TifAni to make a lot of bad decisions in her first few months at Bradley, but what ultimately happens is horrifying and beyond her control. 

 

 Even so, the events of 2001 are what define Ani in 2014 - however she appears to Luke and her friends, in many ways she is still a fourteen-year-old girl struggling to make sense of a horror she can't escape.

 

***********************

Well, if a thriller is on your list, then I would recommend to pick up one of these two reads, but I warned you!!!

 

Why hello there....

Hello to my favorite aisle at Target.

I love to look at each one and what it had to offer.... 

But who am I kidding, I have several favorite aisles at Target!

A Stripe Shirt....

 

In this heat, Jason likes to keep the house cool....cold.

So at times I need to throw on a long sleeve even though it's 90 degrees out! I threw this fun and comfy little hoodie on one day.

I wore it all afternoon and evening. No one said anything.

I tucked Jack into bed. "Good night...little man!"

I was walking out of his room and heard...

"Good Night, Waldo!"

What I am Reading...

I just finished a wonderful, fun, heart warming book The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion.

 

Meet Don Tillman, a brilliant yet socially inept professor of genetics, who’s decided it’s time he found a wife. In the orderly, evidence-based manner with which Don approaches all things, he designs the Wife Project to find his perfect partner: a sixteen-page, scientifically valid survey to filter out the drinkers, the smokers, the late arrivers. 

Rosie Jarman possesses all these qualities. Don easily disqualifies her as a candidate for The Wife Project (even if she is “quite intelligent for a barmaid”). But Don is intrigued by Rosie’s own quest to identify her biological father. When an unlikely relationship develops as they collaborate on The Father Project, Don is forced to confront the spontaneous whirlwind that is Rosie―and the realization that, despite your best scientific efforts, you don’t find love, it finds you.

The story is told from Don's point of view and at first I had a hard time understanding what he was thinking or what was taking place. Then I realized Don is exactly like Jim Parsons character, Sheldon, in the TV show The Big Bang Theory.  

 At times, he thinking is hilarious! He is extremely literal and  doesn't understand why others don't think they way he does...things are so obvious!  He knows everyone thinks he is weird because he looks at the world differently. But what I enjoyed, was that he believes everyone else is weird because they didn't view the world as he does. He is the normal one. 

Then he meets Rosie. She pulls him out of his routine. Rosie wants to find out who her biological father is and Don decides to help her out. In doing so, they travel, meet new people and he discovers that his weirdness isn't all that bad. 

I would highly recommend this book! It's a quick read, but an enjoyable one too!

So True...

It's official.

I am not alone in my thinking.

 It's a hell of a lot of work, period!

Jack's Football Game..

Jack is playing flag football this year for the Vikings. (What?) Yep, Jack's team is the Vikings! How happy was his coach, who happens to be his dad, who happens to be a HUGE Vikings fan? Pretty exciting!

Side note:

I asked Jack last Saturday if he was excited for his first football game."Yea, but why aren't we playing until Monday night?"  (heehee) I explained how the Vikings, his team, plays on Sunday afternoon. The Vikings, the NFL team, opens on Monday night. "OH!! I didn't understand why dad kept saying "we" play Monday Night Football."

So off to the game we went on SUNDAY!

Look how far I can stretch my mouth and still keep my mouth guard in it!

Sam was on the chain gang and made sure his shoes looked good! (wink wink)

It was a family affair! There's Jason...AKA "Coach." 

Jason puts play sheets into the arm bands for all the kids to wear. They love it!  Here they are checking out the next play.

 At one point, Jason's pay call was, "You are going to get the ball and run it in for a touchdown." the kiddo he told that to, looked at him and said, "OK." And...that kid got the ball and ran his heart out and scored!! Can you imagine him going home and telling his parents, "Coach told me to score. So I did"

Hey. dude. What time you got?

Hmmm...I think my watch is slow.  

Jack was all lined up for this play...notice he is on the goal line. 

These two had a beautiful hand off. Jack had to get around one player and he turned on his guns and scored a 90 yard+ touchdown!! I didn't get a picture. I was cheering. Yea....sometimes I turn into that mom. 

The Vikings (Jack's team) got a win under their belt this day. A great start off to this Vikings season!

Footbll Season is Here...

Football season is in FULL swing at our house. We have had Fantasy Football drafts, Jack started his football season yesterday and Sam has started school ball! I am glad to say that everything is going well (phew!)

The biggest change this year is that Sam has started school ball. As would be expected, Sam wasn't sure about the whole idea, but after starting, he loves it! It's a whole different ball game and change this year was good!

I was super excited to pull out my camera and take a few pictures (147) of Sam in his "new" uniform at his first game. 

Sam, if you didn't know this already, loves tennis shoes. He "researched" for his cleats this year and made the decision to  purchase a pair of maroon and gold stripe like cleats. I love them...because I can spot him, due to most other players having black cleats! This selection of shoes will also help you spot him in the following pictures!

 

 Sam got two sacks in the game, (YAY!) which I did not capture in a photo. I did get this almost sack though!!

 OH MY, SAM! What happened to your left arm? It's a little small!

 Sam is on kick off, too.

 Another attack at the QB.

Where's Sam?

Find the shoes!

 It was a great win for the first game!

 Sam actually got excited!! His doing a little fist bump!!

It's so fun to watching your kiddo have fun!

YAY, Sam!!

IDK

I don't know about you...

...but I am thinking we need to clean our gutters.

Shopping with Sam

I had to do some errands and I love it when one of the boys goes with me. That way we have some one-on-one time together for talking and catching up! Sam came with me on this evening. 

When we reached our destination, he wandered off and was soon back. " Hey mom, come here and check out these wooden letters!"

Hmmm...Those are cool. I like the font.

OH!

You are one cleaver boy Mr. Sam.

Do you see it?

Bleeding Ears...

Jack is in fourth grade *sniff* and I completely forgot that this is the year of the dreaded recorder. I know...I should be encouraging and supportive, but oh my...he plays it all the time! Which is good practice.  And he hasn't had his music lesson on how to play it...so it squeaks and squawks and he blows as hard as he possible can when he gets frustrated.

 

He plays while walking around the house.

 

He plays while in the car.

 

He plays while we wait to pick up Sam.

It's a lot of playing, but on a bight note, he has taught himself "Mary has a Little Lamb" and "Hot Cross Buns."  Yay, so now I can listen to those TWO songs for the next two months. Go, Jack.

Decisions Decisions...

I REALLY want to keep up on my scrapbooking and crafts. There is so much I want to do and there is just not enough time in the day for all my crafting, work and my naps! :)

So, of course, I made a list of the projects I want to do and the work projects I need to get done at this time too!

This should be a no brainier project! The pictures are printed out from the boys' track season. All I need to do is put them in the pockets and call it good! I even have most of the memorabilia gathered, too.  So what is stopping me? I have no idea!!

Oh wait, it might be the fact that I have 200+ photos!! 

Overwhelming!! I just need to put on some good reality TV or Netflix or Hulu (my new addiction) and start stuffing pockets!

This time of the year is BUSSyyy at the store with the holiday season quickly approaching! I love this time of the year! My head is full of ideas!

I've created a couple Halloween mini books. This one is made with the Graphic 45 collection: Rare Oddities. One of my favorite Halloween collections of the season. 

I also created a countdown to Halloween calendar. The idea is to place a die cut or image on each day (or for little ones, each night or sleep) until it's time for Trick or Treat!

 At this time, I have six other projects and classes that I need to create for the store.Which I really enjoy doing!!

So, before I get going, I think I should get in a quick nap to reboot! 

(wink wink)