Free Gift!!

Ok so to celebrate my birthday, throughout August I will be giving a blank ACEO card inside one of my envelopes, with every purchase on my etsy store... Gems Menagerie or click the store widget on the right...
A bit of a crap free gift I hear some of you cry...Well fear not theres another part to this. When you get your order with the blank ACEO I will also include my email address so once you've created your fabulous ACEO, just email me a pic with any links to etsy stores, or your own blog and I will be more than happy to post a blog entry here for you! And don't worry it won't take me as long as my last post to write it!
So happy viewing in my etsy store!

Xmas,New Year and various sicknesses

So its been a while!...I hope everyone had a fantastic Xmas and New Year, we did but ever since hubby came down with tonsillitis in between the two it seems like the sick bugs have been rife in our house, G and I had throat infections then it was back to school and the nit problems that just seem to love our daughter just don't seem to be letting up. Its a definate case of vigilance on that one that's for sure.
The past fortnight its been eye infections with the kids going from G to Ted and now Dub came out with it last night. And if that wasn't the worst hubby has just got over another throat infection and I'm feeling like I could be coming down with it too, which has really knackered my half term week of cleaning.
Oh well, but on a lighter note Ted is now 7 months and has slept through 5 whole nights not together but he's getting there...

Book 20

Ok so it's confession time... I acted like a spoilt little kid when my sister gave me this book for my birthday, I was ungrateful and acted like a brat. The reason being (although it doesn't excuse my behaviour) I don't like/read King, his books are too long winded and I get fed up with them, I just can't get into his style of writing. Not only that she did give me the gift when I was in the hospital after having Ted, I was tired and grumpy and had been there for three days already. (This also does not excuse my behaviour, merely placement within the narrative as it were).

I did apologise to my sister because I did appreciate the gift, and I liked it even more when I realised it was a compendium of short stories. There would be little time for my aversion to Kings descriptive writing to kick in, I hoped.

And because it was a gift from my sister and she didn't have to, I thought the least I can do is read it. My mind wanders absently to the two mammoth King tomes sitting in the kitchen gathering dust, which will not be read by me but will be when I've donated them to the library.

I do feel bad for this almost phobia to King novels if you will because I even read the introduction and I thought he seems like a likeable person. So I feel a little bad for not liking his novels.

But all that aside, I really did enjoy it. My favourite stories were:

Willa, Stationary Bike, The Gingerbread Girl, The New York Times at Special Bargain Rates and A Very Tight Place.

One thing that did irritate me though was the fact that some of them stop without explanation or a conclusion. ( I don't like having to make assumptions to how their lives go on after the events).

If you've read it let me know which stories you enjoyed and why.

Book 17: The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner by Stephenie Meyer

I was saving this for whilst I was in hospital, (note: I'm a little behind in posting my book reviews and am copying them straight from a notebook), to have our third baby Ted but instead it was due to a mouth infection from a chipped tooth and no sleep to give me the decision to read it early. I really enjoyed it and if you've read the Twilight saga you will know why I was dragging my feet to finish the book because obviously Bree ultimately dies. It made a nice change to see the writing from a different angle and I really liked Bree's character which was new because I just couldn't warm to Bella in the other 4 books. And even though I knew the ending I kept my fingers crossed that she might survive...Oh Well!...Here's the backpage:
"I watched his body change. He crouched on the roof, one hand gripping the edge. All that strange friendliness disappeared, and he was a hunter. That was something I recognised, something I was comfortable with because I understood it.
I turned off my brain. It was time to hunt. I took a deep breath, drawing in the scent of the blood inside the human below. They weren't the only humans around, but they were the closest who you were going to hunt was the kind of decision you had to make before you scented your prey.
It was too late now to choose anything."

Meet Little Ted

Ok so I finally remembered to plug in my phone so now you can see little Ted too...

Book 15 and 16 The Vampire Diaries: The Fury/ The Reunion by L.J.Smith

These were a little difficult for me to get into as they are the third and fourth in the series and I have been living under a rock and haven't as yet seen the TV show to get a feel for the story. There were a lot of characters already established within the plot, but saying that L.J.Smith did give a little background but I think I would need to read the first 2 volumes to get to know them a lot better. Once I got past that though I did get swept away with the plot and thoroughly enjoyed both books immensely. And this now has added another DVD to my wishlist...Oh Christmas is all taken care of for the next few years... Here's the backpage:
The Fury:
"Elena struggles to control her desire for blood. Damon hungers for the golden girl and revenge against Stefan. Stefan is tormented after losing Elena, he will do anything to get her back. Even if it means becoming what he once despised..."
The Reunion:
"Elena is threatened by a terrifying evil. Damon, summoned by Elena to face a common enemy, puts his trust in the brother he loathes. Stefan attempts to keep his promise to Elena and protect the town from its most powerful villain yet..."

Book 14- The Witching Hour by Anne Rice

Phew! This was a mammoth tome of a read and considering a lot of it feels like the cataloguing of the Mayfair family tree my concentration never seemed to waver. I enjoyed it immensely. Here's the backpage:
"On the veranda of a great New Orleans house, now faded, a mute and fragile woman sits rocking. And the witching hour begins...
Demonstrating once again her gift for spellbinding storytelling and the creation of legend, Anne Rice makes real for us a great dynasty of witches in this engrossing and hypnotic tale of the occult spanning four centuries- a family given to poetry and incest, to murder and philosophy, a family that over the ages is itself haunted by a powerful, dangerous, and seductive being"