TWLOHA Day

I readily admit that I am the world's most pathetic excuse for a blogger.  Ok now that that's out of the way...

I want to speak to you about something I am quite passionate about! Today has been branded as To Write Love on Her Arms Day.   To Write Love on Her Arms is a nonprofit movement dedicated to presenting hope and finding help for those struggling with depression, addiction, self-injury and suicide. TWLOHA exists to encourage, inform, inspire, and also to invest directly into treatment and recovery.

So write the word LOVE on your arm, to support those fighting against depression. Show it off, tell others that you are supporting TWLOHA Day, helping to stop depression, and making 'love' the movement.
 

Showing the LOVE on TWLOHA Day



There's a lot of information available about TWLOHA here on their site.  They are also on Facebook, twitter, MySpace, YouTube and just about anywhere else you'd want to find them :-)  

Here's a little snippet from their site...  

We’ve learned that two out of three people who struggle with depression never seek help, and that untreated depression is the leading cause of suicide. In America alone, it’s estimated that 19 million people live with depression, and suicide is the third-leading cause of death among those 18-24 years old.


The good news is that depression is very treatable, that a very real hope exists in the face of these issues. We’ve met people who are getting the help they need, sitting across from a counselor for the first time, stepping into treatment, or reaching out to a suicide hotline in a desperate moment.

Take a minute today to read about TWLOHA because every life matters and everyone deserves to know they are LOVED!!!

Pick Up The Phone Tour in Philadelphia, April 2010

This is GREAT!!!

This sort of made my day today!!!!  How freaking great is it?? Enjoy a  "Spontaneous" performance in the Houghton College dining hall to Blue October's song "Jump Rope"

Katniss Everdeen, Girl on Fire

So today (well I guess technically yesterday, since it's 2:30 am lol) was the day. MOCKINGJAY, the 3rd and final book in the Hunger Games Trilogy came out.

We had a few failed attempts at trying to pick it up early. But, Becky was a superstar toting her son and my two kids to Barnes and Noble this morning to pick up our copies!  She kindly dropped mine off at my office for me where it sat and stared me down :-)

I had already read the first 2 chapters (during the failed attempts) and made quick time through Chapter 3 while eating my lunch.  So, as soon as I got home, I dove in, only resurfacing to make dinner, get a drink, kiss my kids goodnight... you know, the important things.  

I finished the book about half an hour ago.  There's not much I can/will say because I do not think a review should give away anything from the book and I don't think I'd be capable of sticking to that.  And also quite frankly, I am having trouble forming reasonable thoughts. 

I loved it!  That much I can say.  If I gave book ratings - this would definitely get 5 of 5 stars!

MOCKINGJAY does not disappoint. 

 If you haven't read the first 2 books in the serious (THE HUNGER GAMES and CATCHING FIRE) then get going! What are you waiting for??  :-)

 
Note:  In case you are interested....You can buy them all separately or together for great prices at Book Depository (they shop free to most places) or Amazon.  

What the Heck?

Ok so I am pathetic, yes it has been a really long time since I posted anything much here.  I said in my last post I was taking a blog break, which is itself sort of pathetic. I admit it.  And I've got no really good excuse.  What the heck is my problem??  I guess, sometimes real life gets in the way of things :-) 

I dreamt of a Summer Vacation from work and housework; I'd read, play on the Internet, Blog, Tweet, lounge by the pool, hang with the kids.  But here it is nearly the end of Summer and I have a messy house, laundry baskets of clean laundry which should be put neatly away, tons of issues with work, haven't read much at all and have two kids who are sick of coming to work with me and running around all the time. LOL, the American Dream :-)     HOWEVER, my glass is half full!    Let's focus on the positive....

Daughter hosted an Alex's Lemonade Stand this past weekend. I am so very proud of her.  Her BFF helped out as well.  The girls have raised about $300 so far! 

Jess met and exceeded all of her reading goals for the Summer. (i'm totally jealous)  I can hardly believe she's in 5th grade this year.  Man, I am getting old.

Son has had a big Summer.  After realizing he could do it all along, he learned to swim on his own.  He even 'helps' his cousin from time to time. (Nathan really doesn't need help, he loves to swim ;-)

BUT the biggest thing for Andrew this Summer??  He finally found a book series that he enjoys enough to SIT AND READ!  This, my friends, is huge!  He does not love to read (unlike Jess who never leaves the house without a book and would spend most of her waking hours reading if she could).  He normally fights our required 15 minutes of reading.  BUT he sat the other day for a good 45 minutes and read a book or two from start to finish!  The name of the books that have captured my 8 year old son... CAPTAIN UNDERPANTS lol.  Eh, as long as he is reading, I am happy!

I am so excited for the release of MOCKINGJAY next week! Sadly here in our little corner of the world there will be no midnignt release. Becky and I will instead drag our kids to B&N first thing Tuesday morning to pick up our copies. Even more sad is that it will sit on my desk and stare at me while I work on Tuesday - how will I ever concentrate? In preparation for the big release, Husband is reading the HUNGER GAMES! This makes me happy! Well. it's more like I am forcing husband to read HUNGER GAMES, but it still makes me happy.  He is the exact opposite of me and could drag a book he likes out over months (UGH!) instead of days or hours. I am going to push him into read this faster! It'd be like slow torture to drag these books out :-)    

Rebecca and I have spent lots of time on FallenArchangel stuff this Summer.  We are so ridiculously excited about CRESCENDO!  Seriously.  It is sooooo good!  And we'll be launching a new website soon (possibly within a week!) which is a lot of work, but hopefully will be well worth it.

So, there's my Summer in a nutshell.  In less than 2 weeks my kids will be back in school, I will be back to my regular work/office hours and life will return to the routine we all love to hate. 

I really do want to be better about blogging so if anyone has any suggested blog topics for me, please leave 'em and maybe I'll be inspired! OR maybe I'll try out FormSpring, we're having some fun with that on FallenArchangel ;-)

Taking a Blog Break

Thanks for stopping by... I am on a sort of blog sabbatical right now.  Hopefully I will learn to manage my time better and can start to blog more regularly.  For now I will try to stop by once in a while and I appreciate anyone who still follows me :-)

Exciting News!

My sister Rebecca and I are so excited that we were able to announce this morning that FallenArchangel.com will be live streaming the CRESCENDO cover reveal.  CRESCENDO is the follow up to Becca Fitpatrick's NY Times Bestselling HUSH HUSH!!  Exciting Stuff.

FANG by James Patterson

Review: FANG, A Maximum Ride Novel by James Patterson
(Aka Maximum Ride Book 6)

Description (from the official Maximum Ride website, Max-danwiz.com):
FANG WILL BE THE FIRST TO DIE!
For years, Max has been desperately on the run from evil forces trying to prevent her from her destiny to save the world – but nothing has ever rocked her world like this horrifying prophetic message. Fang is Max’s best friend, her soul mate, her partner in leading her flock of winged children. A life without Fang is a life unimaginable.

Max’s desperate desire to protect Fang brings the two closer than ever. But their world is turned upside down yet again when another winged boy, the beautiful Dylan, is introduced into the flock. Raised in a lab, like the flock, he exists only for one reason: He was created to be Max’s perfect other half. Now a battle of science against soul and perfection versus passion unfolds, twists, and turns…and meanwhile, the apocalypse is coming.

Info:Juvenile Fiction
Published by Little Brown & Company
In Stores Now

Review (Note this is a discussion we had about the book):
Jess and I recently read Fang, the 6th book in the Maximum Ride series. We are big fans of the Maximum Ride books and recommend them for all ages.
Jess finished this book last week and I found her curled up in a ball crying when she was done…

Not really Mom I was walking around crying. It was sad.

'Falling In' Contest

Thank you so very much to all of you who took the time to read our first Mother/Daughter MG book review last week. Jessica is so very excited and can't wait to do the next which, by the way, will be FANG the newest Maximum Ride book by James Patterson.

The Falling In contest winner has been notified by email.

Falling In by Frances O'Roark Dowell

(This book was given to us, for review, by Simon & Schuster.)

Description:

Middle-schooler Isabelle Bean follows a mouse's squeak into a closet and falls into a parallel universe where the children believe she is the witch they have feared for years finally come to devour them.

Info:
Middle Grade, Fantasy
Published by Simon & Schuster
In Stores Now

Review (Note this is a discussion we had about the book):
Hey Jess, thanks for doing this with me. I think it’s great when Moms or Dads read with their kids. Let’s tell everyone how we did this.

I think it’s great too when parents spend bonding time with their kids, I was excited to read this with you. We each got a copy of this and read it, although….you took a very long time reading it.

Yeah, well sorry about that, I’ve been pretty busy the last few weeks lol

Uhhhh huhhhhh, ok.

Hey it’s not fair, you get to read at school and after homework and I have to work you know :-) Let’s talk a little about the story. What did you think about it?

I thought it was a really good book, once I started reading it I couldn’t stop reading it. What did you think of it?

Mother Daughter Fun!!

Let's start by ignoring the fact that I did the worst really quick cut and paste on this picture, don't judge me.

My almost 10 year old daughter is a voracious reader, reads just about every spare minute of every day. Some days when she has trouble getting up for school I sneak into her room and find a flashlight and book stowed away under her pillow from the night before. She frequently asks if she can read what I am reading. Now obviously that's not going to happen, some of the books just have way too much mature content. Let's be honest, I really don't want to answer some of the questions they might bring about :-) Sooo I thought maybe she and I could read some Middle Grade together. I asked her if she'd like to read some of the same books and blog about them. Guess what? She sure does!

The first book we are reading is called Falling In by Frances O'Roark Dowell (we received our copies from Simon & Schuster, for review).

Watch for our review to come in the next few days, and maybe we'll even give a copy away to celebrate our first review together.

Read Across America Day - Spread the Love

Today, in honor of Dr Seuss' birthday, is Read Across America Day!

How appropriate that I sent my kids off to school this morning with envelopes for their Book Fair. :-) I'm a bit jealous of the fun they'll have looking through all the great books and selecting a few to bring home. Also jealous that they are having Green Eggs and Ham for lunch today!!

In honor of Read Across America Day and of Dr Seuss' Birthday, take a little extra time out of your crazy day to read... to yourself, your kids, someone who has trouble seeing, your dog, your neighbor, your neighbor's kids, you get the idea. Spread your love of the written word and remember how lucky we are to have access to so many wonderful books. Thank you to everyone who makes that possible - writers, editors, publishers, book sellers, readers and everyone in between!

Music Monday: Lifehouse - Broken

OK it's a few hours too late for Monday, but close enough.

Here's one of my favorite (older) songs from Lifehouse, one of my fav bands. They have a new album hitting stores next week.

Once upon a time, my sister wrote a book that had a lot of Lifehouse music in it ... I'll always love that book. LOL, Beck, elephants and all!! ;-)

A Look at Tyler: Behind the Scenes of Remember Me

Everytime I see something new from/about this movie I fall a little bit more in love with it...

Happy Valentine's Day a little early

I have a soft spot for Valentine's Day and when I saw this the other day (thanks to Isa) I thought it would was so cute that it would make a perfect Valentine post.

Happy Valentine's Weekend. Hubby and I don't really have any special plans, but I guess just being together is special enough LOL (wow I am sooo not usually that sappy)

The Uglies Movie(s) Moving Forward

This post is mostly for my daughter's benefit, she's almost 10 and she LOVES to read. She would especially love to spend her time reading YA. Since lots of YA subject matter is too old for her, I mostly force her to stick more to MG. We share a love of reading and both love some of the same book series. Last night we sat head to head, reading a preview of the upcoming Maximum Ride book, which prompted her to pick up the series and begin to re-read it. A snow day today helped her finish book 1.

She just danced across the room Yahoo'ing at this news about a series we both like a whole bunch, so I thought it deemed blogging.

MTV Hollywood Crush is reporting the following about The Uglies by Scott Westerfeld...

Industry sources have confirmed to MTV News exclusively that Screen Gems
.... is developing — and in fact, fast tracking (!) — a film version of "The Uglies" series.

While there haven't been any decisions made regarding things like casting yet, we can tell you that our source said production of the movie is planned for later this year. That means we will all hopefully know soon enough who could be playing the beloved teen Tally Youngblood in the futuristic, meaningful tale about a dystopian society that places an incredible emphasis on looks.

Are you a fan of The Uglies Series? Looking forward to the movies? Have an opinion on casting?

Maximum Ride: FANG

FANG, the newest installment of the Maximum Ride book series by James Patterson is due to hit the stores on March 15. Today as a fan of the series, I feel like I struck gold....

A fabulous preview of FANG, Book 1!!

It's available in at MaximumRide.com and at the Amazon Kindle store. There's also an 'app for that' LOL

It's been so long since I read any of the Maximum Ride books I had forgotten how much I enjoy them. Now I am really looking forward to this next one. My 9yr old is asking for it for her birthday at the end of March, I'm thinking I'll buy it for her and sneak in a read before I wrap it :-)

Music Monday

I thought I'd start making more of an effort to blog. Every Monday over on Twitter is #MusicMonday. Today I am calling attention to the song that inspired the name of my blog. It's Just Me by Blue October. I promise I'll try not to use Blue October songs everytime I do a Music Monday post.....no promises.

Spreading the word about the Pick Up The Phone Tour

Blue October has rescheduled their Pick Up The Phone Tour. I've got my ticket to see them in Philadelphia, one year after seeing them in the exact same place! Really can not wait!! Anybody else planning to see them??

Worst Blogger Ever.... Yep, It's Just Me

I think I am unofficially the worst blogger ever. I mean it's been a REALLY long time since I posted anything here. :-( Sadness...Failure But in my defense I have been really busy with other on-line projects, mostly FallenArchangel. Things over there have really taken off - in a great way. In a few days we will be announcing the newest member of our FallenArchangel team. We are super excited!!

I've been working hard to be more conscious the great things people are doing these days to help each other and the environment, and I'm trying to live that way as well. The other day I was shopping at Target and to my delight they saved one great big plastic bag by slapping a handy dandy handle on the package of toilet paper. It was easy to carry and just imagine over time how many bags that would keep out of the environment!! One more reason to Love Target!! Lots of little things being done by lots of people can have a big impact.