Monday, June 07, 2021

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:

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

~ 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?

13 comments:

  1. I'm really excited for the Loki show, too! Time travel and timeline shenanigans are one of my favorite storytelling tropes.

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    1. Katie, it makes me grin already, so I feel like that's a good sign.

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  2. All the flowers are so pretty!
    The Scarlet Pimpernel and Alice in Wonderland are so good! I don't think I've read the other ones, but love those two.

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    1. Thanks, Elizabeth! Have you read more of the Scarlet Pimpernel books? I hear they're lots of fun too, so I'm hoping to read more of them.

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    2. Are there more of them?! I only knew about the one.

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    3. Elizabeth, yes! There is a whole series! Here's a list :-)

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  3. What did you think of Kilmeny? :P

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    1. Eva, well, I'm hoping to finish my review of it today. In a nutshell, it felt like a first novel. I know it wasn't, but that's what it felt like.

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  4. I wasn't even sure I would watch Wandavision and then I was surprised by enjoying while I was planning on watching Falcon and the Winter Soldier and I didn't even finish, I might skim it when I get back on +. So I'm wary of Loki since I was looking forward too it. Seems I'm better off not looking forward to things, I always have too high expectations. I've lost track of how many times they've pushed Black Widow back. I assume I'll see that eventually. Most of what I'm looking forward has been pushed back to the fall (Dune, I think it's been moved twice), and Death on the Nile (pushed back at least once), and Spider Man.

    I have baby blankets on my to do's (knitted) that are bleeding over into summer . . . waaaay late, but oh well.

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    1. Livia, I was disappointed by Falcon and the Winter Soldier and didn't even watch the whole series.

      My local theater is now selling advance tickets for Black Widow, so I feel like it's for real happening :-D Maybe the others I've been looking forward to for what feels like years, Death on the Nile and the new James Bond movie, will happen at last too!

      Good luck with your knitting :-)

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  5. I love that collage for your Beauty and the Beast retelling! It sounds like an amazing experience. What did you think of the 1949 Little Women? That's the movie I want to see more than any other at the moment!

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    1. Thanks, MC!

      I quite liked the 1949 Little Women. June Allyson was a delightful spunky Jo. Peter Lawford might have been almost toooooo dreamy for Laurie, but I didn't mind cuz I like Lawford. And Margaret O'Brian was so wonderful as Beth. Everyone else was okay. I liked it about on par with the 1978 version -- enough to want to watch it again, for sure!

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