July Wrap-Up

*Quick Note* I'm going to be camping this weekend, so I won't be responding to comments until Monday. :)

July. Is. Over. (Well, just about). I have mixed feelings, and how on earth is summer halfway over? 

Blog

My posts (I am not even going to try to color them--they're all links, even though they don't look like it):

Good, Better, Best: Books by Katherine Reay

"Ships, Secrets and Survivors" Cover Reveal!

The Fictional Vacation Tag

Review: "An Echo of the Fae"

One Quirk Later: Jem Jones Flash Fiction Linkup

Welcome to Catholic Liturgy Week!

Catholic Liturgy Week Tag!

Me in Book Characters Tag

Fun Things around the Blogosphere!

• Kenzie announced that she is Not Leaving and is hoping to revamp her blog! (Yay!--I was scared!)
• We had Catholic Liturgy Week! You can check out the roster of posts HERE or HERE.
• Jem Jones is continuing with her One Quirk Later series which is awesome. 
• Faith is starting an artistic business! 

Books

(As always, an asterisk is a reread, and feel free to ask me what I thought about any of these books in the comments!)

Float by Laura Martin

*The Thief by Megan Whalen Turner

Frozen by Erin Bowman

Forged by Erin Bowman

Beyond Bullets by Megan Rutell

Beast of the Night by E. E. Rawls

A Song Below Water by Bethany C. Morrow

One Bad Apple (eARC) by Rachel Kovaciny

Black Enough edited by Ibi Zoboi 

Instead of Three Wishes by Megan Whalen Turner

The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy 

My Bookstore by various authors

Really Truly by Heather Vogel Frederick

Out of Africa by Isak Dinesen 

*The Book of Three by Lloyd Alexander

*The Queen of Attolia by Megan Whalen Turner

*The King of Attolia by Megan Whalen Turner

*The Black Cauldron by Lloyd Alexander

*The Castle of Llyr by Lloyd Alexander

Floret Farm's A Year in Flowers by Erin Benzakein

The Basics of Permaculture Design by Ross Mars

Glitch by Laura Martin

Take the Mic by various authors

I Have No Secrets by Penny Joelson

*Taran Wanderer by Lloyd Alexander

An Unexpected Cookbook by Chris-Rachel Oseland

*The High King by Lloyd Alexander

*Murder in the Cathedral by T. S. Eliot

An Enchantment of Ravens by Margaret Rogerson

Inkheart by Cornelia Funke

This Train is Being Held by Ismee Williams

Dot Journaling by Rachel Wilkerson Miller

Parts of The End of the Third Age by Christopher Tolkien

*Parts of The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien (to my younger siblings)

Notes from a Young Black Chef by Kwame Onwuachi 

The Silence Between Us by Alison Gervais

Ships, Secrets, and Survivors (eARC) by Sarah Rodecker and Helena George

Hate is Such a Strong Word by Sarah Ayoub

The Art of Feeling by Laura Tims

Meet Me in Outer Space by Melinda Grace

Bloom by Kelle Hampton

To Siri With Love by Judith Newman

Parts of Love That Boy by Ron Fournier

I did read fewer books this month than in June (I, um, read 50 in June *hides*), but still an unreasonable amount. :)

Life

July was really packed where life is concerned! Here are a few things that happened:

We took Galadriel backpacking for the first time! It was a super rainy and cold trip, but there were some amazing views, like this one:

(I also used my DSLR on manual on this trip for the first time, and it was great! Yes, I took my DSLR backpacking. Perhaps inadvised.)

I started a bullet journal! It is probably the least aesthetic bullet journal of ever (perhaps it's so unaesthetic it's aesthetic?) but it's SO USEFUL.

(Yup, all black and white. Boring. But useful.)

I got a job! I'm working as an Urban Farm Steward at a farm about thirty minutes away, at the bottom edge of the city I live in. It's a lot of fun, and I'm getting a ludicrously awesome tan. 

(Here are some of the production beds, with the sheet mulch we were putting down in the edge of the picture)

My whole family went raspberry picking, which was a lot of fun!  

(I got nine pounds of raspberries!)

My mom got an appendectomy for the appendix that caused her trouble in May. She's recovered quite well, though, and a lot faster than she did from appendicitis! Yes, there is a picture of kittens here; they belong to Mom's anesthesiologist, who is also our neighbor. I watch her kittens for her when she has 24 hour shifts, which was several times this month. :)

(Kittens and King of Attolia--doesn't get a lot better than this!)

Guys. Best four words of a bookworm/writer's life: I. Found. My. Bookstore. I've never had a bookstore that I've been a regular at or really loved (the only bookstore near our house is a Barnes & Noble, and they literally never have anything I want). But at the recommendation of a friend, I took a ten mile hike with Pippin to go to a bookstore in the university district--not super close to our house, but on the way home from work. And reader, it was amazing. Used and new books, a maze of shelves, piano music, out-of-print A. E. Housman compendiums, 85 cent Penguin collections of John Donne...just. amazing. I meant to get one book, and came out with five, and without the one I wanted to get! I'm hoping to visit it every week, but only if I can limit myself to one book each time...

(My five books--and yes, our family does have copies of The Four Loves and Northanger Abbey, but I wanted my own copies for college.)

We got to go to Mass in our church, which was so amazing! It was so great to see the inside of it for the first time since March, and see all the people (unfortunately, Pippin and Merry went to a different Mass, but Frodo was there!).

(Me afterwards in my nice outfit--summer dresses are the best!)

I did Camp NaNo for the first time ever, and won! It was a whole lot of fun--I had a combined goal of 30,000 on my main WIP (the one whose characters are in my Characters in QT Tag) and the story that my sister and I are cowriting. It was a little grueling at times, but overall, it actually rekindled my love of writing quite a bit! (Although I'm definitely going to need a couple of weeks before continuing work on my main WIP, which I estimate will clock in at around 90,000 words or more. *dies*)

(Yes, I wrote the entire thing by hand, and hand-counted and tallied the words. 0/10 would not recommend)

I took one Saturday this month and made all of the hobbit meals! (Well, dinner and supper were lumped together, because my siblings can't stay up until 8 for a meal...). It was a ton of fun, but also a fair bit of work--I have more sympathy for all of those hobbit wives!

(Mass was not one of the meals--Dad just wanted to remind all of us when we were watching digital Mass)

There were also two other big events that aren't getting 'finished' this month, per se, so I'm saving those for August and December respectively. 😉

August Plans

• Going camping (on my birthday. Without my mom.)
• My birthday (the celebration for which will not be happening on the day of)
• Finishing work (it only lasts six weeks)
• Possibly finding a part-time job for the school year?
• Applying to college (send help. what is with these essays.) 
• Getting ready to start school (Running Start doesn't start until end of September, but homeschool observes no such reasonable rules)
• Crying about there being no state fair
• Swimming in a lake or river, possibly
• Watching the HamilMovie again (probably)
• The secret-big-event-that-started-this-month-that-I-won't-tell-you-about-yet getting finalized!

Do you have a bookstore you frequent? Do you like to get copies of books your family owns for yourself? Have you ever been backpacking? How was your July?