February Recap

Goodbye February, I’d barely gotten used to you when I had to say farewell. As always, you raced past.

Well, except for those days in the middle where I had two sick kids and a sick husband. Those days weren’t the speediest I’ve ever experienced.

But I certainly do appreciate that I never got sick, because all those platitudes about moms not being able to take sick days? Totally true.

The Month in Stats

• Books Read Last Month: 19
• Books Read For The Year: 34

Best Things I Read

• Sense and Sensibility
• Cinder
• The Joy of X
• Cake
• Almost Home

Most Popular {New} Posts

• Announcing the 2013 Reading Challenge
• 31 Days of Great Nonfiction Reads
• Why to Track The Books You Read

Most Popular {Archived} Posts

• Announcing the 2013 Reading Challenge
• 31 Days of Great Nonfiction Reads
• Why to Track The Books You Read

Things That Happened

• How sad is it that I’m trying to think of what I did/saw in February and am coming up blank. There was a lot of cold weather. Snow. Ice. Freezing rain.
• After months of thinking about it, I’m cautiously dipping my toes into the world of essential oils. And at the risk of already sounding like a complete and utter fangirl, one of the first things I tried was this one oil that supposedly takes away bad smells. All right oil, let’s see what you can do when faced with a horrifically stinky diaper pail. I think poop smells have seeped into the plastic, because even when it’s empty it still reeks. The bathroom where we keep it? Open the door at your own risk, because the smell hits you like you’re walking into a wall of stank.
  
  I’m both astonished and thrilled to report that two drops of oil have knocked out virtually all of the stench. If you really try and smell anything, you can detect a lingering under-note of grossness, but I’m fairly confident now that a touch more oil, and all of the aroma will be gone – GONE. All overnight guests will have a much more pleasant bathroom experience now that the trash-can-o-doom no longer taints the air so much.

Best Things I Did or Saw

• I went to a girls-night-out get-together the last weekend of the month. I skipped the movie and met them for dinner and it was nice to catch up with some friends I see very infrequently, especially when you consider that we all live in the same part of town.
• This may seem really silly, but I figured out that I can use my new phone’s camera to scan the ISBN and easily enter books I finish into Goodreads. Seriously, it is so quick and easy. No typing all those numbers to find the precise book. The geek in me is delighted. And how disappointing when I’ve had a couple of books without ISBN symbols to scan. Such a sad, wasted opportunity.

What’s Cooking

• I feel like I’ve been cooking all the same things in February that I did in January. I’m in a bit of a food rut. I’m on the hunt for an awesomely awesome version of red beans & rice though. I’ve got a version that I currently make, and it’s good. I’m looking for great.
• I made some bars for book club, and forgot to put the nuts in the chocolate layer. Usually nuts/no nuts are such a taste preference kind of thing, but in this case? The bars are so much better with nuts. I feel like I should apologize to my friends for bringing the ones I did. I had no idea the lack of nuts would be such a difference-maker.
• For several years, I’ve been trying to find the *perfect* chocolate chip cookie recipe. Perfect to my tastes I mean; I’ve tried probably dozens that claim to be “perfect” and they might be perfect for the recipe author, but they’re still not what I’m searching for. I’ve got a new one to try thanks to Pinterest, and I’m crossing my fingers that this might be The One.

What I’m Anticipating in March

• Reading The Grand Tour: Around the World with the Queen of Mystery. Yup, this was on my anticipation list last month, but it didn’t arrive from the library in time for me to read it last month. I’ve got it now though!
• Baseball is back. Kind of anyway. Spring Training has always been one of my favorite times of year, and is when I most miss living in Florida or Arizona. Many years we time a vacation to catch some games as well as visit family, but thanks to two big trips already last year, we’re skipping it this Spring. Hopefully next year we’ll be going to one or the other.
• Deciding if I’m going to go through with a possible monthly series for April. It would be fun, so I’m leaning towards yes, but I’m trying to get a fair amount of the content written ahead of time so that I can feel confident I’ll get it finished (just in case life gets crazy in April.)
• Spring flowers! While I didn’t plant any tulips last fall (and yes, I’m kicking myself now), we’ve got something growing in the front. What a nice surprise it’ll be once I see what appears. Spring is definitely on the way, and I am very excited to have warmer temps that will make it easier to have the kids play outside. Hopefully for ages and ages and wear themselves out!

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