We've been busy here! This is a light blog post to document some of our happenings thus far as this year starts to wind down. We are now on the downhill slide to 2016. Holidays, here we come!
I started a book club in June. It has been great! I've met so many women here who have challenged my perspectives. I made a goal to read 40 books this year - overzealous, and I'm behind but who is counting?! Here's what I've read so far:
All
the Light We Cannot See (Anthony Doerr)
Americanah
(Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie)
At
the Water’s Edge (Sara Gruen)
Big
Little Lies (Lianne Moriarty)
For
the Love (Jen Hatmaker)
Go
Set a Watchman (Harper Lee)
Incendiary
(Chris Cleave)
The
Girl on the Train (Paula Hawkins)
The
Girl You Left Behind (Jojo Moyes)
The
Lotus Eaters (Tatjana Soli)
The
Martian (Andy Weir)
The
Sandcastle Girls (Chris Bohljalian)
The
Secret Keeper (Kate Morton)
Unstoppable
(Christine Caine)
What
Alice Forgot (Lianne Moriarty)
What
She Left Behind (Ellen Marie Wiseman)
If it's bold, then it was a favorite. I also add books I enjoyed to the book recommendations page here.
We've made a couple road trips since our cross country trip. You can read about our weekender to Louisville here. This past weekend, we did a turn-around trip to Mississippi to visit family. We drove almost 10 hours Friday night, stayed overnight in Laurel and finished the last ~1.5 hours the next morning and then drove the full 10 hours Sunday late afternoon. It was a short trip with lots of time with sore and numb butts, but this is why we moved here - to be able to see family when needed. I also checked another state off my list - Arkansas. Before 2015, I had visited 9 states only IN MY WHOLE LIFE. So far this year alone, we have together traveled to:
Alabama
Arizona
Arkansas
California
Illinois
Indiana
Kentucky
Mississippi
Missouri
New
Mexico
Oklahoma
Tennessee
Texas
We decided on a church and are now settling in to The Gathering and getting plugged in. Luba joined a men's group and I started in a women's group. It's at 6am on a Monday- that attendance needs a special anointing and weekly prayer!
Fall is finally teasing us! We had such beautiful cool weather this last year. I'm diving in with the pumpkin things and we took my niece and nephew apple picking to kick off the season!
I started a side business! I want to be able to see a few kiddos on the side for speech and language therapy so that I keep my hand in it. You can visit the site at www.synergytherapy.net. I'm proud of it - I built it myself with help from Weebly. Go check it out!
We've had a little taste of South Africa thanks to a few local families and friends. It has only left me wanting to go back sooner and for longer!
We are saving now in hopes of visiting South Africa in early 2016. Look at these sweet faces we miss. Luba has not been home since he came in 2013 and my last trip was 2012. I had grown accustomed to going yearly since 2007 so it's been too long of a break! I wish someone wealthy in skymiles would get us 2 tickets. I'm used to almost $2000 for the ticket on a solo trip- now we have 2 to buy!
Happy Fall!
Danielle
