Weekly Weigh In ~ 6/1/2022

Once again (for the bazillionth time), I'm starting on a weight loss journey.  

My first mini-goal is to get below 280 lbs.  I'm giving myself a deadline of June 3, 2022 as that is my next doctor's appointment.  Yikes!  No pressure!

I'll be weighing in on Mondays and posting my results on Wednesday.  If you'd like to join in on the journey, I'd love to have some weight loss friends and support!

Feel free to use the "Weekly Weigh In" graphic and create your own post with as much (or as little) info as you are comfortable sharing and leave a link in the comments.  Or you can just report your results in the comments.

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I had a gain of 1 pound this week.

We did a lot of traveling this weekend and eating out.  It could have been a lot worse, I guess...

My check-up is Friday and I REALLY doubt that I'll be losing almost 5 lbs by then.  So, I didn't make my goal weight in time.  But, I'm just getting started!

I've lost over 15 pounds in roughly 10 weeks.  That means I'm averaging a loss of 1.5 pounds per week.  Pretty darn good, if I do say so myself.

I'm feeling motivated!  Now to stay consistent :)

Next week I'll be sharing my new goals.  Do you have any fitness goals for the Summer?

Weigh in #10:

Highest Weight ~ 300.0 lbs

Last Week's Weight ~ 5/23/2022 ~ 283.6 lbs.

This Week's Weight ~ 5/30/2022 ~ 284.6 lbs.

This Week's Total:   +1.0 lbs.

Grand Total: -15.4 lbs

Please let me know in the comments if you are on your own weight loss journey!  I'd love to follow along :)

 
Colletta

Book Review ~ Fourth and Long by Liz Isaacson

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Title:   Fourth and Long by Liz Isaacson

Series:  Three Rivers Ranch Romance

Pages:  179

Date Published: February 16, 2016

Publisher:  AEJ Creative Works

 Blurb:

Commander Brett Murphy left his family’s construction firm in Oklahoma City for a life of hard work at Three Rivers Ranch. Alone, without a wife and kids, Brett needs the camaraderie he enjoyed while serving overseas with his Army buddies, Squire Ackerman and Peter Marshall.

What Brett doesn’t need is the reappearance of his ex-wife. Fiery Kate Donnely has come to Three Rivers to confess to Brett that they’re still married, and oh, he has a seven-year-old son she never told him about. At least not in letters she mailed.

Eight years ago, Kate left Oklahoma City only weeks after Brett’s first deployment, shamed because of her bad choices and the unborn child of a man she’d already asked for a divorce. She needs him to sign the papers now or she can’t have access to her hefty inheritance. But Brett absolutely does not want Kate to take his son away from him again.

They strike a deal: She’ll stay at Three Rivers for the summer so Brett can have the opportunity to get to know his son. How far will they have to go and how much will they have to forgive in order to become a family?

My Thoughts:

This is the third book in this series by Liz Isaacson.  I really enjoyed the first book, "Second Chance Ranch."  You can read my review for that book HERE!  And the second book, "Third Time's the Charm".  You can read that review HERE!

I wasn't certain about this book in the beginning as I didn't really like the leading lady, Kate.  She had done a lot of questionable things and was continuing to make mistakes as she went along.

I really liked Brett who was introduced in "Third Time's the Charm" and didn't like that he was being treated so poorly.

After reading the transformation story, I grew to like Kate and was even rooting for her by the end.

I really like books that have emails and letters and it was fun reading the letters from Kate and the emails from Brett.  Especially after they actually started SENDING them!

I'm really looking forward to reading more of this series during the summer :)

I downloaded this book through Kindle Unlimited.

Onto the next book :)

Monthly Wrap-Up ~ May 2022

The Monthly Wrap-Up Round-Up is hosted by Nicole @ Feed Your Fiction Addiction and Shannon @ It Starts at Midnight.

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May 2022 Reviews:

I read 5 books in May.

Click on the cover to read the blurb and my review :)

Goodreads Challenge:

15/52 books.

Favorite Book of May 2022:

This is a hard one but I think I'll go with:

Book Review With the Most Views:

Where I've "Traveled":

Netherlands

France

Texas

My Weekly Bookishness:

This includes book hauls, teasers, and other great bookish fun :)

May 6, 2022

May 13, 2022

May 20, 2022

May 27, 2022

Other Posts:

A few of my favorite posts from the blog:

What's Up Wednesday ~ May 2022

Weekly Weigh In ~ 5/25/2022

Sunny Blue Hawaii 2

Coming Up in June 2022:

20 (or 10) Books of Summer is starting on June 1st!  Click HERE to read more!

"Fighting Words" a Proverbs 31 Online Bible Study is starting 5/31/2022 and running all summer long.  Click HERE to learn more!

The Kindred Readers Book Club reading selection for June 2022 is "The Book of Lost Names" by Kristin Harmel.  We'd love to have you come join along with the discussion!

Also linking up with:

Happy Homemaker Monday ~ 5/30/2022

Come join Diary of a SAHM for Happy Homemaker Monday. 

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Hello, and Happy Monday!

The weather outside is:

This weekend was BEAUTIFUL and Memorial Day is supposed to be GORGEOUS!  I don't even mind the thunderstorms here and there :)

On today's to-do list: 

We're having a cookout at my brother's house.  He's been working so hard to get their pool ready and even got a heat pump for the pool!  It is going to be lovely :)

Other than being Memorial Day, we are celebrating my nephew getting into the Tech Center for his first choice of Graphics and celebrating Laken finishing up her school work!  They both worked so hard!

Happening this week:

Proberbs 31's Summer Online Bible Study, "Fighting Words", starts Tuesday, May 31st.  It isn't too late to join in!

Wednesday, June 1st, The Kindred Readers Book Club will be starting to read and discuss "The Book of Lost Names" by Kristin Harmel.  Come join us!

Currently reading:

"The Rose Garden" by Susanna Kearsley is the Kindred Readers Book Club selection for July.  I like to read ahead and get the discussion questions ready.  I'm just getting ready to start reading this.

Watching:

We went to the theater to see "Top Gun Maverick" and it was AMAZING!  If you get a chance (and liked Top Gun) you really should go see it in the theater.  Great movie.

We recently got Paramount Plus so I think we'll probably be watching "1883" soon.  If you have Paramount Plus, is there anything we should watch?

Listening to:

This week for "Songs on Sunday" I featured "Let the Light In" by Joshua Micah.  I hope you'll check it out :) 

On the menu today:

Burgers, Hotdogs

In the Craft Basket:

I've been working on Sunny Blue Hawaii 2 but don't have any updated pictures.  I have probably 10-15 squares completed so far.

Picture from the Camera

Memory Verse

"But the lovingkindness of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him, And His righteousness to children’s children, To those who keep His covenant And remember His precepts to do them."

Psalm 103: 17-18

Have a great Monday!

Colletta

Songs on Sunday ~ Let the Light In by Joshua Micah feat. Owl City

Time to let the light in!

Enjoy :)

Colletta

My Weekly Bookishness ~ 5/27/2022

All things bookish!

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What I Read:

Read my REVIEW HERE!

Review to come soon!

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What I'm Reading:

Kindred Readers Book Club July 2022 Selection:

Blurb:

When Eva's film star sister Katrina dies, she leaves California and returns to Cornwall, where they spent their childhood summers, to scatter Katrina's ashes and in doing so return her to the place where she belongs. But Eva must also confront the ghosts from her own past, as well as those from a time long before her own. For the house where she so often stayed as a child is home not only to her old friends the Halletts, but also to the people who had lived there in the eighteenth century. 

When Eva finally accepts that she is able to slip between centuries and see and talk to the inhabitants from hundreds of years ago, she soon finds herself falling for Daniel Butler, a man who lived - and died - long before she herself was born. Eva begins to question her place in the present, and in laying her sister to rest, comes to realise that she too must decide where she really belongs, choosing between the life she knows and the past she feels so drawn towards. 

First Lines:

"I lost my only sister in the last days of November."

56%/Page 56

"The wind shook the branches, and leaves overhead and the scenery shifted again, faintly dizzying.  I closed my eyes."

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What I'll (Probably) Read Next:

Kindred Readers Book Club August 2022 Selection:

Blurb:

California’s gold country, 1850. A time when men sold their souls for a bag of gold and women sold their bodies for a place to sleep.

Angel expects nothing from men but betrayal. Sold into prostitution as a child, she survives by keeping her hatred alive. And what she hates most are the men who use her, leaving her empty and dead inside.

Then she meets Michael Hosea. A man who seeks his Father’s heart in everything, Michael Hosea obeys God’s call to marry Angel and to love her unconditionally. Slowly, day by day, he defies Angel’s every bitter expectation until, despite her resistance her frozen heart begins to thaw.

But with her unexpected softening come overwhelming feelings of unworthiness and fear. And so Angel runs. Back to the darkness, away from her husband’s pursuing love, terrified of the truth she can no longer deny: Her final healing must come from the One who loves her even more than Michael Hosea does…the One who will never let her go.

A life-changing story of God’s unconditional, redemptive, all-consuming love.

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Book Haul:

Kindred  Readers Book Club selections for the rest of 2022!

 

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Book Blogger Hop:

Q.  Do you use the Kindle app on your phone or iPad for reading e-books? (submitted by Elizabeth @ Silver's Reviews)

A.  I don't read on my phone.  However, I do have a Kindle HD10 that I read ebooks on, mostly from Kindle Unlimited.

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Bookishly Yours,

Linking up to: 

   

  

 The Sunday Post, Sunday Salon,  Mailbox Monday

Tea Time ~ 5/26/2022

 

Grab a cup of tea, coffee, hot chocolate or your favorite drink
while I share a few things about my life lately...

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~The hubby got the cats a new toy :)  They LOVE it!  All night long I hear the little bells inside the balls jingling!

~My Mom and I went to a Ladies Tea hosted by a sister congregation about an hour from home.  It was nice to spend some time together and with other like-minded Christian women.  After the tea, we stopped at Eat-n-Park for dinner.  We haven't gone out, just the two of us, in YEARS!  We did get Laken some Smiley cookies to bring home to her :)

~While Mom and I were at the Ladies Tea, the hubby, Laken and my Dad went to see the new Dr. Strange movie.  (Not my cuppa tea!)  Afterwards, they went to Cracker Barrel for dinner.  Laken sent me some hilarious pictures of her Pap.  This is my favorite:

~I missed Church Sunday due to a stomach bug.  The hubby had it first and then passed it on to me!  Something I'd rather he hadn't shared!  Not a fun thing but I am feeling better now :)   I'm just hoping I was the end of the line for it in the family!

~Laken is DONE with 9th GRADE!!!!  It was a rough year of cyber schooling full medical tests and being sick which put her VERY behind by January.  After getting some relief by limiting Lactose and using Lactaid, she had a lot of work to catch up on.  I am so proud of the late nights, weekends and holidays that she worked on her schoolwork instead of having fun.  I am so glad that summer is here and I bet she is 10X as glad as I am!  Time to PARTY :)

How was your week?  What's new with you?

 

Colletta

What's Up Wednesday ~ May 2022

 

Link up on the last Wednesday of every month with Sheaffer and Shay!

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MAY 2022

What We're Eating:

We've been grilling a lot lately.  Mostly burgers, hot dogs, pork chops and chicken.  My Dad grilled THE BEST pork chops.  He's the grill master around here ;)

What I'm Reminiscing About:

This month was Mother's Day and I spent time reminiscing about my grandmother, aka Gram.  Even though it has will be 20 years this August since she passed away, this is still hard to write without tearing up.  I miss her so much!  Here is Gram with her beloved rose bush.  Wasn't she beautiful?

What I'm Loving:

I'm loving the fact that this is Laken's (youngest daughter) last week of school work!  Summer, HERE WE COME!

What We've Been Up To:

Nothing but schoolwork around here!  Laken was sick (Lactose Intolerant) for most of the school year and ended up being Cyber Schooled.  She got behind from all dr's appointments and just being sick in and of itself.  After we figured out the whole "Lactose" situation, she's been pulling double over-time to finish up her work on time.  She's worked so hard and I'm super proud of her.  But that means we haven't had much time to do anything else.  Come Friday, we're going to PARTY!

What I'm Dreading:

I go to my dr. on June 3rd for my annual check up.  Enough said...

What I'm Working On:

I'm working on a new granny square afghan that I'm calling Sunny Blue Hawaii 2 :)  You can read more about it and how it got it's name HERE.

What I'm Excited About:

Did I mention this is the last week of Laken's school?????   :) :) :)

What I'm Watching/Reading:

I haven't been watching much of anything lately but we are going to the movies to see the new Top Gun movie, Maverick, on Friday.  It will be the first I've been to the theater since before March 2020!

This month I've read the following books and I'm currently reading "Fourth and Long" by Liz Isaacson.

What I'm Listening To:

What I'm Doing This Weekend:

Going to see "Maverick" at the theater and possibly going to the local amusement park on Saturday.

What I'm Looking Forward to Next Month:

~Sleeping in!

~No School!

~Church Camp!

~10 Book of Summer

Colletta