Time to End My Spring To-Do List

It is definitely summer now where I live.  It's been in the 90s for days, we've taken the kids to the pool repeatedly, and we've even had some lovely thunderstorms.  And, of course, Memorial Day has come and gone.  So it's high time I wrap up my spring to-do list and get busy on a summer one!

(All photos are my own.)

~ Finish re-reading The Lord of the Rings  Fail.  I did finish The Two Towers, though, and now I'm into Return of the King, so I'm confident I'll finish it soon.

~ Finish the first draft of my Beauty and the Beast retelling  Fail.  Oh my goodness, friends!  This first draft is 60,000 words and still growing.  That's half again as long as the final draft of Cloaked.  Whaaaaat?  I did not realize this was going to be so much bigger.  But I am absolutely loving the ride.  It has been a genuine pleasure to get to know these characters.  I can't wait to share them with you!  

Meanwhile, I do have this little teaser graphic I whipped up recently, if you'd like a little peek into the terrain where it takes place and the actors I would cast if I was making this as a movie instead of writing it as a book:

~ Finish leading the Sense and Sensibility read-along on my book blog  Check!  I had the loveliest time, and I hope participants did too :-)

~ Read 3 books about/by someone who is not white  Check!  I read six:

• Recipe for Persuasion by Sonali Dev
• Devil in a Blue Dress by Walter Mosley
• Hard-Boiled by Peggy Thompson and Saeko Usukawa
• Tall in the Saddle by Peggy Thompson and Saeko Usukawa
• The Poker Bride by Christopher Corbett
• Asian Americans in the Old West by Gail Sakurai

~ Read 3 books for my latest Classics Club list  Check!  I read five:

• The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy
• Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome
• Elizabeth and Her German Garden by Elizabeth von Arnim
• Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
• Kilmeny of the Orchard by L. M. Montgomery (review to come)

~ Read 9 books off my TBR shelves Check!  I read (are you ready for this?) SIXTEEN!  They were:

• Laura Ingalls Wilder Country by William Anderson
• Dearest Josephine by Caroline George
• The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy
• The Winter King by Christine Cohen
• Hard-Boiled by Peggy Thompson and Saeko Usukawa
• The Canary Trainer by Nicholas Meyer
• Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome
• Tall in the Saddle by Peggy Thompson and Saeko Usukawa
• A Girl from Yamhill by Beverly Cleary
• Yesterday or Long Ago by Jenni Sauer
• Elizabeth and Her German Garden by Elizabeth von Arnim
• The Last Fire-Eater by Charity Bishop
• The Lady and the Lionheart by Joanne Bischoff
• The Poker Bride by Christopher Corbett
• Land of Hills and Valleys by Elisabeth Grace Foley
• Kilmeny of the Orchard by L. M. Montgomery

~ Watch 6 movies off my TBW shelves  Check!  I watched:

• The Buccaneer (1958)
• The Moonstone (1996)
• Little Women (1949)
• Rhapsody in Blue (1945)
• Man in the Middle (1964)
• The West (1996)

~ Watch WandaVision  Fail.  I will probably watch this with my best friend in the future.  Right now, I'm more excited about Loki's show, though.

~ Go see Black Widow (I HOPE!!!)  FAIL.  But this is not my fault -- they shoved the release date back again.  Sigh.

~ Take an afternoon river cruise on a tall ship Fail.  Again, not my fault -- they didn't start up their cruises as soon as they said they would.  We're hoping to try this over the summer, though.

~ Visit Colonial Williamsburg  Check!  We went there for my birthday :-)  My mom was visiting at the time, so she got to go along too!  It was the perfect time to visit, as allll the flowers were in full bloom.

~ Finish the baby blanket I'm crocheting for a relative who's expecting  Check!  I don't think I ever got a picture of it, but I sent it to them a couple weeks before the baby arrived, so yay!

~ Bake a pie for Pi Day (3/14)  Check!  I made this Keto Snickers pie and it was magnificent :-9

~ Hang a hammock in the backyard  Check!  I'm not a big fan of hammocks (they mess with my back), but my kids love it :-D  They've been asking for a hammock for a couple years now, so we gave them one for Easter and rigged it up when it got warm enough.  They use it pretty much daily.

Well, there you have it.  Five fails this spring, but nine checks, so all in all, I'm satisfied :-)  How about you?  Did you accomplish this spring that you were hoping to do?