What a fabulous (but busy) Wednesday

Yesterday was such a great day! This could be broken up into several posts but I'll spare you all that and make one really long one. Ready...go!

Some of you may or may not know but my grandfather was rushed to UNC about 8 weeks ago. There were quite a few days where we thought he may never make it home. It still makes me want to cry just thinking about this. However, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Yesterday.....HE CAME HOME!!! I'm going by after work tonight just to see him sitting in his recliner. It really means a lot to me to be able to see this sight again after all he has been through. Thank you Lord for answering my prayers as you know just how much my Papa means to me :)

Also, yesterday after work I headed to Gboro to 1) Drop off my quote at the BB 2) Pick up three of the books on my list that were waiting for me at the library and 3) go to my very first Supper Club. Much to my delight I completed everything on time and Supper Club was a hit.

The three books I picked up were:

Time Traveler's Wife
The Red Tent
The Kite Runners

Tonight I plan on starting one of them although I'm not sure which one. Thoughts?

Last but not least...Supper Club! I've already mentioned how great it was but seriously it was a lot of fun. Dagney was our host this month and she just has the cutest little family and such a great home to use to host these events.

She cooked stuffed pork tenderloin, salad, green beans, and mashed potatoes along with a chocolate cake for dessert. It was all fabulous and that is going to be a lot to live up to when I host in November.

We had lots of good conversation including politics and no one even got heated. This is just reason # 1,443,644 why I love my JL girls.

My only regret is having no pics of anything for like the last week including last night. I'm planning on working on that tonight :( Have a great evening!

Books On My To Read List

• Water for Elephants
• The Secret Life of Bees
• Molokai
• The Red Tent
• Eat, Pray, Love
• The Kite Runner

According to the library website just now three of them are in transit. I'm excited!

Book Review: The Mermaid Chair by Sue Monk Kidd

This book was written by the same author as The Secret Life of Bees. Before reading it I had gotten mixed reviews but all in all I *think* it was a good book. The jury is still out for me in a way because I'm not sure how I feel about the ending. On one hand I feel like I read the whole book just to get to the end and it sort of just ended but on the other I think there was a really good underlying moral to the story for married readers.

The book really has two different storylines going the whole time. One storyline is about a woman who has to go stay with her mom on Egret's Island where she grew up because her mother seems to be mentally ill. For some reason he mother has chopped off her finger. When the daughter arrives she finds her mother planting her finger in the soil. At the same time this occurs the daughter meets a very striking monk who also lives in a monastery on the island.

This is where the two storylines begin. The daughter (the whole book is written from her point of view) is married but has recently felt very distant from her marriage. Once she meets this monk she decides to tell her husband she wants to take some time apart. The majority of the book is then spent detailing her short lived relationship with the monk.

At the end of the book her mother chops off another finger and then everyone intervenes to discuss with her why this was done. She was trying to repent for helping her husband commit suicide many years prior because he did not want to succumb to a debilitating illness he had. The daughter then ends her relationship with the monk and she goes back home to her own husband and daughter.

All in all, I guess it was a good book if you consider the underlying morals but the ending sort of left something to be desired.

Book Review: The Innocent Man by John Grisham

At work I'm involved in a book club and this is the book we were to read for September. I'm a huge fan of books by this author and this one did not disappoint even though it was one of his only non-fiction works.

The book was about the investigation, trials, and outcomes of two murders in a small town in Oklahoma. It also delved into the corruption in the criminal justice system that was trying to solve these cases.

The main suspects were a group of men but it really focused on one or two throughout the book. As you read the book you knew these men were innocent but it really showed how the police wanted the crimes solved so they were doing everything in their power to make it look like these men had murdered these women. They went to the extreme of ignoring evidence and even confessions that did not make sense which caused these men to spend a large portions of their lives on death row when they should not have.

Through my life I have heard and read stories of this happening and I truly can't imagine. Once it was all over and the men were proven innocent they were just released from prison. That was basically it. No compensation, no apology, no assistance in getting their lives back together...just set free.

As citizens, we should be ashamed that this is even allowed to occur in this day in age but I'm sure somewhere, somehow, in America this is occurring as I type this. It's very sad to know that innocent until proven guilty is not the case the majority of the time.

This was a thought provoking book for anyone interested in this topic. It really makes you think about what you think you "know" in many aspects of life.

Long Time No Update

but I have lots to say today. First and foremost, I wanted you all to know that I did NOT fall off the face of the earth after our loss last weekend however I have been very busy.

What have I been doing you ask? My BFF Ashlee and her husband closed on their very first home on Friday and we helped them move until 2 am. Their house is very nice and spacious and we are looking forward to many get togethers at their new home in the future.

Saturday and Sunday were spenting watching the game and decorating our newly painted house :) It's so pretty and I'm so excited to spend more time (and money) decorating it. There are so many good ideas in my brain some of which I've already gotten to work on. Hopefully, this weekend I will get around to taking pictures and getting them loaded on here for you all to see.

Tonight the contractor is coming out to hang the tv on the wall. You see when we moved in it was a open box but we didn't like it so now it is a fully closed in wall and the tv will hang like a picture and hopefully be prettier.

Also, tonight I'm attending my very first Supper Club. As one of the JL Connections this year I've organized a Supper Club. It should be a fun way to relax with the girls plus steal a few good recipes. Tonight should be very good. The rumor is we are having some sort of stuffed tenderloin and a very yummy sounding dessert. I'm excited. Hopefully, I can get some pics and update on that one later as well.

What else has been going on? Not much work is busy and I haven't had the laptop at home so today is the first chance I've had to update on here. I've got a few more posts to write today as well since I've finished a couple of books over the last two weeks.

Have a great day!