Life: It Goes On - July 26

The Big Guy & Mini-him

My dad and Mini-him

Happy birthday to Mini-him! I can't believe it's been 27 years since we welcomed him into the world. We were so nervous but he was so mellow and made life so easy for us...until he started
moving! Since then he has kept us on our toes but always with his great smile. We are so proud of the man he's become!

He's out of town today so we'll celebrate with dinner tomorrow.

It's been a very laid back week here, although we've had lots of times with our bookend kids around. Y'all know how much I love that!

This Week I'm:

Listening To: Tomorrow I'll start Sarah Vowell's Unfamiliar Fishes after spending most of last week listening to podcasts including Futility Closet (I love their lateral thinking puzzles), This American Life and Happier (more on one of those episodes that later this week).

Watching: More Orange Is The New Black with Miss H, probably too many episodes of Real Housewives (Orange County and New York), and a few old movies. Trying to avoid all of the summer reality shows but BG does love them.

Reading: I've been struggling with Among The Ten Thousand Things - a book that should only have taken a couple of days. Now the question is - what to start today? My friend has loaned me her copy of Go Set A Watchman but then I picked up The Good Lord Bird yesterday which I'm alway eager to get to. Or maybe Circling The Sun? Since today is the last day of the High Summer Read-a-Thon, I'm hoping to spend a good amount of time with which ever I decide on.

Making: Risotto, cast iron skillet oven s'mores, bar-b-que chicken, sloppy joes, and BBT's (bacon, basil and tomato - we were out of lettuce but what a happy discovery!).

Planning: A move for Mini-him. The owner of the house he's been renting is selling it out from under Mini-him and his roommate after just a few months. Yippee.

Grateful for: Air conditioning. The thermometer in my car registered 105 degrees on Friday. I am not amused.

Enjoying: Meeting with my book club the other night. We had a good discussion about the book which lead to a good discussion about how we saw ourselves reflected in the book which lead to a whole lot of fun and laughs. As usual. Love these ladies!

Feeling: Excited for Mini-me who is off in Chicago this weekend with his girlfriend. She spent a couple of years working there are has thoroughly enjoyed showing him the sights. He sent me this pic late last night from the 96th floor of the John Hancock building.

Looking forward to: Celebrating Mini-him's birthday, lots of reading (cuz so many new books in the house!), and some furniture painting.