Saturday 31 August 2013

Monthly Roundup // BEST BOOK OF AUGUST // This Month's Hearts

Heyyyy everyone! So, I got home from holiday last week, but since then a lot has happened - not least going back to the Place of Learning on Wednesday - and so there was no Art Tuesday. I know, I know. Try to control your gasping sobs. I had a good camp and holiday etc etc, but more on that in TM<3s - that is, a list of things I've been loving this month or things I've enjoyed. First though, it's time for monthly roundup, and the best book of August!


Now, monthly roundup. Oh, and as always - if you want to do this meme, or part of it, leave me a comment and I'll set you up! :)

Art Tuesday

Blog Awards

Book Reviews

Haul Posts

... That took FAR TOO LONG. I hope you guys actually use these links ... Now, best book of August. This was a tough choice, cause I read some amazing stuff - and in the end, I had to award a tie. 


BUT ALSO ...


Both these books were AMAAAAZING - The House on the Strand was a fantastic, gripping mystery/fantasy/DU MAURIER IS A GENIUS-TRIBUTE and The Age of Miracles was just ... oh my goodness. Compelling, clever ... utterly brilliant. There will be reviews on both in the quite near future! :D

Now then, TM<3s!

~ CAMP. Summer camp was fantastic, as great (if not greater O.o) than last year. It's always an amazing place to make friends, grow faith and have fun, and I'm glad to say I did all three! Not to mention the Extremely Sophisticated poetry debates we had - yes, I met teenagers who actually wanted to discuss poems - and the fact that one of them was someone I know from an online writing group. CRAZAY, no? Along with all the onsite activities, Bible study - we were blessed to have some great leaders/speakers - and mad games, we went to St Andrews for a day trip, which was wonderful! There was a bookshop that I would happily have lived in - it was all BEAUTIFUL old second hand books, and one of my friends got a 71-year-old Rudyard Kipling for £1.80 - and there was a food shop with bread in the window that made me want to DIE. (Of happiness.) We didn't ask the price, of course ... However, we did each purchase a piece of cheese (Katherine bought the crackers) and the five of us poetry-lovers borrowed a knife, a board and some apples and had an extremely sophisticated cheeseboard that evening. All in all, I think camp could be summed up as AWESOME. I am already excited for next year! Oh, and if you live in the Glasgow/Edinburgh area ... YOU SHOULD COME. It would be so good! :D :D :D

~ Holiday! On the day camp finished I was picked up from the bus station and we drove straight up north to a tiny island in the Hebrides. I mean tiny - as in, three houses, no electricity and no permanent inhabitants. As in, take-all-your-food-for-a-fortnight-bake-bread-use-gas-lamps-pick-bilberries-on-the-hill-and-make-pie. I think it goes without saying that it was BRILLIANT - days were filled with reading, scrapbooking, walking,  playing games, writing and EATING. Honestly, the amount we ate .... On the last day we went to Tobermory which was gorgeous as ever and I got a birthday present for my friend Natasha - a silicone muffin pan and some pretty petit four cases - two books from a charity shop and a top from a Himalayan craft bazaar! It was made in Nepal by a company called  (please take a minute to appreciate this name) The Rampant Yak, which works with refugees and abused women, and it has some metal bits sewn on so that when I walk, it jangles. This, you must agree, is exciting. Look out for it in August: The Best and the Rest! Overall, the holiday was really great - it was so relaxing, and it was lovely to see my brothers and sister-in-law and spend time as a family! :)

~ [this doesn't really belong on this list but you guys want to know these things, RIGHT?] In terms of The Novel, I wrote about 8000 words (I think - I've not typed it yet) on holiday and it was going pretty well until I realised ..... I have no idea - absolutely NONE - what Corrie's day-to-day life in Teyvanidan will be like. Obviously my story is set in a different dimension but society, technology and demographics are roughly based on the seventeenth century. And do I have a single clue what court life would be like in the seventeenth century? No I do not. Wikipedia shall be my friend though - and I'm going to get some books out of the library. ~nods~

~ As I mentioned in the bit about my holiday, I have started a scrapbook! It is for pictures, quotes, poems, Bible chapters/verses, tickets, tokens, postcards, old birthday cards ... basically every that's important to me. I've not filled many pages so far but I'm proud of what I've done and I have a feeling that I will keep going with this new hobby for years to come. I might show you guys some pictures soon, if you'd like?

~ I have started watching Sherlock. I have a feeling that I am going to be sucked into a fandom from which there is no return and maybe become a Benedict Cumberbatch fan maybe ROSEMARY I SAID MAYBE. 

~ Watched Monsters, Inc. with my sister. This may seem like a small one but she's going to uni in a week! D: D: We need to
[source]
"So I said to her, 'If you talk to me like that again, WE'RE THROUGH!'" 
          "~gasp~ What'd she say?!"
          "You know my mom ... she sent me to my room!"
~ Started watching The Great British Bake Off. I have this feeling I am HOOKED ...

~ Gone back to school WAIT A MINUTE, SCHOOL IS A PLACE OF TORTURE! Three days we've been back - and one of them we only had one lesson! - and I've got SEVEN PIECES OF HOMEWORK. SEVEN. I'm not sure what THAT is about ... honestly! Don't they know I have a life to lead? A novel to write? A blog to run? A TBR list so long it threatens to consume humanity? A bunch of books/characters/fit guys to fangirl over? GEE. So inconsiderate.

Overall, August was a good month - but now it's back to the algebraic grindstone. Sigh. I guess that means blogging less frequently, so sorry about that - blame the institution that sucks the joy from all our lives. Love you all, and hopefully be posting again soon! (Though maybe not - we've started Expressive unit in Art, and I have to produce four pieces in under a fortnight. I've spend most of today on a (still far from completed) tonal of a bath's clawed foot and ..... ~sobs quietly~ any drawers among you will know That Feeling. Triple sigh. Wish me luck ... )


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