Lost & Found... Map Gone AWOL!

[herewego]

Oooh I have mudbound in my pile of books to read, so glad it's good!!
I've also have Engleby by Sebastian Faulks and a few other ones that my friend brought over last night. Yesterday I only had 3 books for Xmas. Then my friend bought a few more last night and today I received a parcel from Amazon and my brother had bought me several books from my wish list for Xmas so now I have loads!!

I'm in Starbucks nearly every day but hardly ever even look at the food. I'll have a look next time I go in as it sounds as if they are doing some healthy options now.

 

[coley144]

Oh I LOVED the Summer Book. Read it for my reading group and it was my fav for the year. I loved the Moomins books as a child.

Sorry just butting into your conversation but had to agree on that one.

 

[alexmummy07]

Hi Katy

So glad to be back, and to have caught up on your conversation with KD too. I am definitely taking lots away from it tonight, and DP even offered Pringles which I managed to comfortably say no to tonight - a good achievement of late.
I know how unhappy I feel with the extra lbs clinging to me at the moment, and I can feel the extra weight on my tummy, so it's not something I want to be doing at all, but learning to go back to eating pre wedding/birthdays etc was getting v difficult, but with you and KD's words I know that slowly slowly I can get there. There really is no reason why I can't.
Xmas I have always used as a binge excuse, as does my mum and lots of other people I know. I mentioned things being a little tough getting back into the swing of what I am trying to call 'normality' the other night, and in reply had the 'It's Xmas' talk about may aswell leave it now, start again in Jan etc. I really don't want to get bigger before January. 5lbs is enough to have to lose, I don't want anymore to be gained in that time, and I have to agree with KD's post about food not being everything...so I (apart from rambling on here) am making a pact to myself to really enjoy the social side, and the festivities and NOT to make this Xmas about the food and drink, and in that I will make sure that I drive home on both Xmas and Boxing Day - thus really proving to myself, it really is about company, social, and just being with those people who mean so much to me. Food is definitely NOT my Xmas wish this year. x

 

[Katycakes]

Thanks AlexM for that fantastic post... what i needed to hear and what I believe as well, it has pulled me back on track as have been drifting over last few days... when I don't post, there is usually a reason, and that reason is usually that there is nothing good to report! Have totm (yukky & OTT) achey head, REALLY tired and the weight of the Xmas work deadline pressing down on me. Bought choc yesterday to eat today... I really, really DON'T want to eat it. I agree, 5lbs is enough. That's what I have to shift too.
Christmas is not food... it is family, friends, giving, loving, sharing... finding the magic. I never yet found any magic in a bar of chocolate, or a mince pie either... in spite of decades of searching.
Thanks, thanks, thanks. Have tried to rep you but it won't let me... but a big hug for the right words at the right time. We can do this... WILL do this.

xxx

 

[Katycakes]

Coley, I love Tove Jannsen too... so mysterious and slightly spooky, the Moomins! Will check out the Summer Book. I need a bit of summer right now! And glad to have you in the conversation hun, the threads are quiet enough just now!

Books... Bess, will find the one about the sisters you mentioned. I used to LOVE Burne Jones, read all about him when i was younger, Georgiana was his wife I think? HAVE to find that book. Loved the Pre Raphaelites, & was sooo happy they made a series about them this year... even if they did ramp it up a bit and make it a bit saucy... actually, it's not like they needed to invent stuff!!! Now my daughter, (16 tomorrow!!!) is mad about them, has the book of the series under her bed... lol.

I haven't been reading much lately as up to ears in work, & long hours. Have read An Equal Stillness by Francesca Kay (beautiful, dreamy, but a bit too plot-free for me) and Linda Grant's The Clothes On Their Backs, again, lovely but left me feeling I was missing something just out of reach. Have been relying on Tesco for books just lately and the choice at our local one is not good!

Best books of year for me have been teen ones... I read a lot of them as they link a bit to work for me. Some of the best writing around at the moment for me. So... loved:
Love, Aubrey by Suzanne LaFleur (heartbreakingly beautiful, a new US writer who is just incredible)
The Sky is Everywhere by Jandy Nelson (a proof, out properly in Jan, AMAZING.... just FAB. Sad, lovely, wonderful... again, American I think.)
The Bride's Farewell by Meg Rosoff (brilliant, Hardyesque novel with gypsies, lurchers, tragedy, love... Meg is another American, but living in UK. I love everything she writes.)

Bess, i read the Lionel Shriver book last year, but didn't like it... made me feel so uncomfortable and upset, but I think that was probably the point... hard to read about parents not loving their children, though. Sometimes it is hard to read a book that has been hyped a lot, you feel guilty if you don't like it! There was a coldness about it, but again, I think that was obviously intentional.

Anyway, rambling here... will check out the Yeats, Gertrude Bell & Vita Sackville West books too... love them, so would like to read about them! Haven't read Sebastian Faulkks but son is reading him at the moment.

Hey, we have our own Minis reading group here! Thanks Alli, you got us all thinking!

xxx

 

[Wales]

Morning Katy. And thanks to Alex Mummy, very well put and exactly how I want to look at Christmas festivities.

Sorry you are not feeling so well, I know how that feels, plus work pressure is a bind, I also understand that!! I hope you start to feel better soon, and that the chocolate stays in the packet (I am avoiding the twitch to eat the Christmas choc).

Have a good day and keep warm xxx

 

[Katycakes]

Morning Lovely Wales, hope you are feeling better too, sending a Saturday hug.

xxx

 

[herewego]

Morning Katy!

It's lovely to catch up on posts this morning as there are some really good ones! KD, Coley and Alexmummy's posts around maintenance were really useful and reading about all these books make me go all warm and happy!

Standing on the scales this morning did not make me happy however. I have put on 4lbs in 2 weeks and it has to stop here. My tummy is feeling sore this morning and so you can guess how much I ate last night. It's TOTM and I think I've been using that as an excuse, but who am I trying to make excuses to - myself? That's just ridiculous

I've got a Xmas party tonight and so will wear a loose fitting dress instead of the fitted one I'd planned to wear. I know I wouldn't feel comfortable wearing it so might as well wear something I feel good in. Still - it's a slippery slope this with Xmas just around the corner so will take control today. I'm not going to go silly - just track my calories and aim for 14-1500. No point in less at the moment as there's too much going on.

Books - I didn't like we need to talk about Kevin either. Actually that's not right I did like it, I just didn't love it. It wasn't the content, I just wasn't keen on the writing. I tried to read Lionel Shriver's next book and couldnd't get on with it either.
I'm partial to Scandinavian crime writers, such as Henning Mankell, Stieg Larsson and Jan Nesbo. Henning Mankell has written a couple of great books aimed at teenagers as well. They're called A bridge to the stars and When the snow fell and are lovely "growing up" books about a 12/13 year old boy. Right now I'm reading Let the right one in by John Ajvide Lindqvist. It's a book about a boy who befriends a 200 year old vampire (looks like a 12 year old girl). I initially didn't want to read it as I'm not into fantasy type books, but it's good. Not at all Buffy-esque, but again more about a 13 year old boy dealing with issues like bullying, falling in love, taking responsibility etc.

What I love about the above crime writers is that not only do they have a good plot etc, but they are also really good at creating personalities and an environment you can actually picture. So many crime thrillers focus on the plot and falls flat when it comes to the surrounding and people in the book. It's quite a personal thing, I guess. I can't get on with Kate Atkinson's books as even though she describes the environment well, I find Jackson Brodie two dimensional. I also hated the Da Vinci Code for the same reason. I felt it was really flat and that Dan Brown was just showing off the amount of research he had done...most people that I know loved it though so maybe it's just me.

Anyway - enough about books LOL! I need to dig out the children's ski clothes as they want to go outside and make a snowman!

Have a great day!

I've just put The sky is everywhere on my wish list on Amazon. Lovely cover as well!

 

[Katycakes]

Morning Alli... I loved the maintenance thread as well, blimey, NEEDED to read that.

Have bought OH the stieg larrson books for xmas.

I didn't like Da Vinci Code, thought it was very clever but very formulaic and the ideas obviously weren't original, he just hit on an idea that hadn't been exploited big time before... think that was what grabbed everyone. I have to admire him for what he did with this, but felt he made every single point a million times over, it was the opposite of subtle. But... not really allowed to say you didn't like it, as everyone else in the world does!

I loved Kate Atkinson's books before she started doing crime... they were beautiful. But I won't read her again, like you I don't find anything real or moving in her Jackson Brodie books which is sad.

Will check out Henning Mansell teen stuff, & the vampire ones my daughter would like...

Better go do some work.

Good luck Alli with keeping the weight steady... I am so struggling just now. Stress mainly. But... food doesn't exactly de-stress me, does it? Sigh.

xxx

 

[KD]

I'm another one who didn't get on with the "We need to talk about Kevin" book. Try as I might.

I love anything by Margaret Forster. My first read of hers was Have the Men Had Enough which was sad, moving and also hilarious. About a grandmothers decline into dementia and the family around her. It was ages ago I read. Think I'd probably appreciate it even more now.

Click here

I do love anything from Forster, including her historical biographies, but some books are better than others.

My favourite of all time is the Earth Series by Auel. Especially the first two

Click Here

About a girls life in the Ice Age and being brought up by the Neanderthal clan. Auels excellent research made this so believable. The type of book that when you finish you continue to wonder 'how the character is doing now' and 'hope she's okay'

 

[Katycakes]

Oh I used to love the Jean Auel books. The last one was a very long time coming... I used to ask in bookshops and look on net and try to find out... and then it came out, and the magic was gone for me, the wait was just too long and I'd 'lost' the moment. But I did LOVE those first ones, they were amazing.

Love Margaret Forster too, haven't read her in forever...

xxx

 

[Bess]

Wow, lots of lovely book ideas here....Just read one on forensic medicine, non fiction....and rather wish I hadn't....I'd decided that we were all quite safe, that society is paranoid about perceived dangers, but today I'm wondering if there are nutters lurking round every dark corner waiting to do dark deeds.
Margaret Forster for me too, KD I think I've read all of hers and love them, such a descriptive writer and Nina Bawden too, she hasn't just written for children although I loved them too.

 

[Bess]

Happy birthday to your daughter! Hope she had a lovely day.

 

[Katycakes]

The b'day is today, she had three friends staying over after going to the gig in village... managed to get one of them home this morning, the other two are snowed in with us! It's BEAUTIFUL out there... a marshmallow world... but thick snow and our lane becoming impassable, the main (ha) road worse because snow has compacted and cars are sliding around everywhere in spite of gritter.

So, we have acquired two children. Have rescued son from other village & his job, 'sent home' by employer, and called in on mum to bring coal in and check she is OK, though couldn't get car into the street, too thick & it's on a hill.

All this... but snow makes everyone so happy, and we have 16 & 17-year olds galumphing around the garden building snowmen... ah.

xxx

 

[Wales]

Proper snow, how wonderful. We still have a light dusting which is well and truly frozen solid with another small dusting on top. It is very cold, though the sky is just clouding over and looks like we might get more snow shortly.

Hope your snowmen last xx

 

[Katycakes]

Ha, the snowman building was quickly succeeded by a 'snow photoshoot' which involved daughter posing in snowdrifts wearing a black sleeveless goth frock with holly berries in her hair while friends directed & 'shot' the pics... she has just about thawed out, five hours on!

Snow has stopped and roads are getting better, have shed another of our snowbound teens, just one staying for another night. Hope to get her home tomorrow en route to town, we had to cancel our Xmas day food shop today so hoping to take daughter tomorrow, after mum has been to doc.

Bonus is I have got on with more work than planned, but it seems to be getting more & more unwieldy... will I EVER finish? Please, please. By Thursday.

xxx

 

[Wales]

Snow is all well and good until it stops you getting to the supermarket!!

I have a friend at work who has just had an offer on a house accepted somewhere in Galloway. I don't know my geography well enough to be more specific, but it is 2 miles from the coast and from the pics I have seen looks wonderful. He just needs to get himself extracted from work to be able to enjoy it. Am trying to ensure he sets up a b&b!!!

 

[Katycakes]

Wow, wonder where he is? Galloway is huge, and very underpopulated. We are maybe 40 mins drive from the sea, but it is gorgeous on the coast. Hope your friend is very happy!

xxx

 

[herewego]

Good Morning Katy - Hope you have a lovely day & not too stressed out over work commitments!

I remember doing similar photo shoots when I was a teenager! I wouldn't want to be a teenager again, but oh what fun it could be!

 

[Bess]

Bet the photo's are great, glad she's thawed out. My silly youngest has chilblains on her feet from wearing stupid fashionable light shoes in the winter.....now she's listening to 'she who knows best' and wearing big fluffy booty things at home and.......socks!! We made her buy some proper boots the other day too. Did I listen to my mother's advice when I was 17?....weeeeell........... No.