Hello everyone! I hope you are doing well. We are continuing our simple summer over here, although I am beginning to look ahead to the fall and specifically, our next homeschool year. It’s time to get organized and ready, so I have been working on plans here and there this past week. I have our history mapped out until December, and purchased the curriculum for science, nature, and art. Next week I will have my husband print all 714 pages out at work (he works for an industrial printer) and then I will dive in, reading it all over and seeing what I need to collect. Anyway, let us get to the wrap up!
The Books:
The Breakdown: I read six books and one short story. We were inside for a few weeks this month, due to weather warnings and air quality warnings, so I managed to read more than usual. I read a mix of cozy mysteries, classic mystery, horror, and cozy fantasy. July is summerween season, so I leaned into the scarier side of summer. I have also been in a place mentally where it is hard to read cozy gentle books. When I am feeling upset or anxious, I need books that are as jagged as my thoughts. The book settings took me a few places – a tourist town in Michigan next to Lake Michigan, upstate NY along Lake Ontario, England, and Long Island. Unfortunately, no nonfiction or translated fiction this month, so I didn’t add to my challenge numbers.
My favorite of the bunch ended up being The Haunting in Paynes Hollow by Kelley Armstrong, which I enjoyed way more than I thought I would! I got this one back in October from Book of the Month, and felt sort of ambivalent about it when I got it. Now though? Loved it!! It was the perfect summer creepy read though. A cabin by the lake, a family mystery, and Sleepy Hollow vibes? I am so glad that I read it in the summer, it just made it all the better.
The Screens:
This summer we have been introducing Wyatt to old nostalgic favorites from the 80s and 90s, and this month his favorite was The Goonies. Of course. Although he did really enjoy The Great Outdoors as well! Billy and I revisited I Know What You Did Last Summer and dang that was still a good scary movie!
As for television, Billy and I watched Only Murders in the Building, The Artful Dodger, and Murdoch Mysteries. The Artful Dodger season 1 was awesome, season 2 is not as good, but it is like they forgot the show is about Jack! Jack Dawkins was like a minor character almost and it just wasn’t as good. I will still watch a season 3 though if there is one, and I will hope that it gets back on track!
A Good Book and a Cup of Tea favorites:
I am cohosts with Lisa at Boondock Ramblings and Cat at Cat’s Wire, of the linkup A Good Book and a Cup of Tea for all things books -not just books read or reviews, but bookstore visits or author visits or whatever else bookish you can think of! You can find the link up for August here!
We have decided we will be featuring our favorite posts from the month here. I do read all the posts even if I don’t comment. I only like to comment from my actual laptop and not from my phone, which is a problem sometimes when I read the post on my phone. ( I am working on more time to read and comment though. )
My favorites this month:
From My Children’s Book Cabinet by Cat – she always has the coolest old books in that cabinet! I feel like it would be magical to look through
Recommendations Across Genres by Lisa Notes – I am a big fan of reading alllll the genres
Book Recommendations: Miss Buncle’s Book by D.E. Stevenson by Lisa – I have seen this book everywhere lately and I loved this review. Lisa is always so thorough!
And for some non-book related faves this month….
Moments with my mom, even if most of them are sad I am treasuring them
kites
seeing the Freedom Plane exhibit
long lazy days of reading
ice cream with friends
painting tutorials by Andrea Nelson
iced matcha lattes with vanilla and oatmilk
Wyatt doing so much walking with his gait trainer
art and books in general
And that is it from me today. Peace and love to all of you.
Despite the not so great weather it sounds like you had a lovely July. I find it can be really hard to focus and read when my mind is a mess too… this lead up to college is really throwing me for a loop this time around and I don’t feel like I’ve been reading nearly as much as I normally do. It seems like not matter what I pick up I just can’t concentrate on it.
Oh no! I am sorry to hear that you are going through a time! And that is exactly what happens to me too, I just can’t concentrate on most books right now. I hope that you things get easier for you.
I actually did a book review and linked up! I also loved Miss Buncle’s Book and am reading Miss Buncle Married. We started watched Only Murders the first season but never finished it. We’re still watching Grimm! I think we only have two more seasons, but each season has about 18 episodes! I’m glad Billy can print off your curriculum. That’s a lot of pages, but I’m betting you have a super cool way of organizing it all!
https://marshainthemiddle.com/
Lisa and I are reading Miss Buncle Married as well right now!
Look at all y’all reading it! That is great!
Lol I loved Grimm!! It is such a good show. I love Rosalee.
And it is so many pages. Lol. I wish I had a cool way of organizing it! I go through and stick all the different subjects in their own binders. I do have an electric hole punch though so that makes it easier.
I saw! It was cool post!
It’s interesting that you say you can’t read calm books when you are upset. For me, it’s just the other way round. I need calmer and lighter books to calm at least part of my system down for a bit. My vintage crime books usually work quite well for that.
Thank you for the shoutout!
I just can’t focus on them when they are calm or light. My mind wanders right back to where I don’t want it to. Calming therapeutic techniques don’t work either. I have to exert energy in order to calm down, like move my body by taking a walk or yoga or even really doing a good clean of my house. I am imagining that reading something like a thriller maybe does the same for my brain, gives it a workout. Nonfiction works sometimes too. I am sure I could track what was happening in my life if I looked at when I started big projects or looking at my reading history. If I have been reading happy calm books – you know I am feeling good. If thrillers and horror start popping up outside of October, something is going on. Lol.
Ok so I just did a quick google and it says that when people are like this, they are apparently stuck in high alert flight or fight mode, and your thinking brain is offline, your heart rate is high, and your nervous system sees calm advice as a threat.
Why Calm Fails High Adrenaline: Your body has a rush of stress hormones .
Brain Shift: Your survival brain takes over. Your logical brain shuts down.
Too Fast: Trying to go from panic to calm is too big of a jump.
More Stress: Forcing calm makes you feel like you are failing at relaxing.
What Works Better; Move Your Body: Walk, shake your hands, or stretch to burn off extra adrenaline.
It must force me to work through that and pop out the other side of flight or fight.
This post made me check to see if we were up-to-date on Only Murders in the Building. We were. In the process, I learned that the next season is set in London. I’m so excited!
Lol! Yes we are behind. And I didn’t know it was going to be in London! How fun!
I know July has been tough but I’m glad there has been some happiness too.
I love to see Wyatt with his friends!
I felt so rushed Friday that I didn’t even get to link to my favorites for the link up this month!
There has. It is weird how you can feel two such different things in a time period.
That is something that will always make me so happy too.
Lol! Summer is crazy! I will be ready for the normalcy of a school year when we start.
Sounds like a good July. And yep, back to school for me as well! I haven’t “taught” regularly for a while with being at the high school library, and have to prepare to be teaching more at the middle school this year. I’m excited but nervous since it has been so long! I know August isn’t starting off great after I read your post about your mom today. But I hope you can at least get some emotional peace as you think about your mom and time goes by.
https://lisalovesliterature.bookblog.io/2026/08/03/the-looooong-and-the-short-of-it-july-2026-wrap-up-post-and-looking-forward-to-august/
Glad to hear you’re having a lovely summer and the fact that your husband works for an industrial printer sounds super convenient, I love that for you haha 🙂 ! Oh hey, Lake Ontario is local to me, cool that one of your books is set there. I love Murdoch Mysteries so much! Although once it gets to the later seasons it loses some of it what makes it great which is a bummer since it’s SO GOOOD otherwise haha.
Lol I love it too! I’m always asking if they can print stuff for me and of course they do.
That was a fun book. I really enjoyed it! And I think Lake Ontario is maybe the only Great Lake that I haven’t seen. I need to do that.
I agree with that, about the later seasons, but it is still fun. I miss some of the characters that are gone. 🙁