Five Favorites Vol. 4

Linking up with Hallie for some #5faves:

1. Something Other Than God, by Jen Fulwiler (who I now feel is my close, personal friend as I have been with her each step of the way through her epic faith journey via her awesome memoir). I finished it this afternoon and have just been thinking about it since. I'll try to put a full review together soon, but it is definitely a favorite this week. 

2. Get Balanced by Prescribe Nutrition

Has anyone heard of this program before? I saw it come up on another blog this week, and I'm really interested in trying the course. They offer nutrition-based help for the following symptoms:

• You have the ability to feel tired yet wired at the same time.
• You hit the snooze button 6 times on your alarm.
• You have a ‘no speaking to me’ rule before your morning caffeine.
• You are eating well, exercising, and the scale will.not.budge.
• 4 pm strikes and you need sugar. And there is no stopping you.
• 10 pm strikes and you feel inexplicably motivated.
• 2 am strikes and you are wide eyed, yet exhausted

Most of which describe me pretty closely. Interesting stuff!

3. Maybelline Color Tattoo in Pomegranate Punk

I've mentioned these Color Tattoos before and they are SO good: they go on easily and don't budge. If you have green eyes, get yourself a Pomegranate Punk. Trust.

4. Bloglovin (would including the final "g" have killed them? Typing that word hurts me.)

I don't know the consensus on Bloglovin. Do people love it? Hate it? No clue. My Feedly feed was out of control so I moved over to Bloglovin to start fresh and... I like it. 

5.  Through the Dark by One Direction. 

I know. I KNOW! But I love this song and I can't hide it any longer!

Answer me this. First Attempt.

This has nothing to do with the post's content. I just love this series of her dancing at Disneyland more than life. 

Today I'm doing a new (to me, not in general) Sunday linkup with Kendra. Here we go!

1. Do you hate happy clappy church music?
The only kind of church music I hate with the fire of a thousand suns (too much?) is kumbaya 70's church music (is this the same category?). One of the parishes near us has a mass that is well known for its 70's mass (there is a tambourine) and I just cannot. 
I can really get behind some praise and worship from the 90s,/2000s though. It reminds me of the old days. It's not my preference, but I actually enjoy it on a nostalgic level. 

2. What is your priority: eating or sleeping?
Eating. I love sleep, but I gladly forgo it for any number of things. The same cannot be said for my favorite foods. I will list the first few I can think of (there are many, many more):
-homemade chocolate chip cookies
-pretzel bark (listen, if you didn't know about this already, maybe don't click on the link. For your own good.)
-popcorn
-this chicken salad on the Costco chia pockets (do people know about the chia pockets? I'm totally obsessed.)
-Waffle Cone ice cream
-White Cheddar Popcorners -A Dairy Queen blizzard with M&Ms
I think my health nut status is apparent to all at this point.
If there is an opportunity for one of those items, I am there with zero hesitation. 

3. What type of milk do you drink in your house?

This is a weirdly complicated question for our household. So, all the residents here prefer 1% (now that Sammy is out of the whole milk age), and all of the adults prefer the prices at Costco, but none of the Costcos around here carry 1% milk, so we usually buy 2% unless we go to the far Costco (the devotion to Costco is strong). 

4. What is a book that changed your perspective on something?

Love this question.  This could be a very long list, but I'll control myself. 

Four Three come immediately to mind:

-He Leadeth Me - Father Walter J. Ciszek - Jen recommended this many times before I finally purchased it, and then it sat on/in my bedside table for two years before I finally read it. It, quite literally,  completely changed my understanding of what following God's will means. I am still processing and praying over it, but it was a game-changer for me.

-Evangelical is Not Enough - Thomas Howard -  I read this book with a deep feeling of "uh oh."* It is one of the first books I read on Catholicism and it made me feel a bit like the earth was dropping from under my feet. It was, shall we say, quite instrumental in my conversion. He clarified some ideas that I had been poking around, but couldn't quite grasp until he articulated them. 

-The Screwtape Letters - C.S. Lewis - I know I'm not alone in having my mind blown by this book. It is eye-opening in a way only great fiction can be. I love C.S. Lewis. 

5. Who is your favorite saint?

Two: 

St. Maximillian Kolbe. I can't remember where I first read his story, but it is an amazing gift of sacrificial, joyful love. Amazing man. 

St. Teresa of Avila.  She was just so. dang. awesome. 

6. Introvert or extrovert?

 Is it possible to be exactly on the line between them? Some days the idea of talking to new people sounds fun and easy. Some days it sounds like the worst idea in the world. I love quiet time, but I need to talk to people to really process my thoughts and emotions.  I think I probably would be considered an extrovert in the classical sense. 

*My expression may have been somewhat more colorful.

7 Quick Takes Friday- Volume 2

--1--

I am pretty sure that blogging is supposed to include more than just Quick Takes, but the last two weeks have not been blogging-friendly.  Oh well, carry on (as Uncle Tim would say)!

 

--2--

I have a problem: I am completely addicted to Kindle samples.  It's really a problem.  I think I've downloaded about 10 books and about 30 samples.  Anytime anyone mentions a book, in any situation, I immediately go on Amazon and download the sample.  It works really well because I have sort of a "reading to-do list" on my Kindle at all times, but it is also contributing to my shortened attention span, I fear.

Here are a few of the many I have on there (most of which I really want to read to completion):

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

Furious Love: Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, and the Marriage of the Century

Blood, Bones, and Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef

The Hiding Place

Major Pettigrew's Last Stand

As Always, Julia: The Letters of Julia Child and Avis DeVoto

A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: How I Learned to Live a Better Story

There is a lot of non-fiction in there, now that I look at them together.  Usually that's not so much my bag.  Interesting.  If anyone has any suggestions for other books that I need to download (a sample of), do let me know!

 

--3--

This here?  This is a problem too.  Lots of problems around here, apparently.

That is an empty non-decaf coffee at about 3:30 yesterday.  I specifically requested a decaf, and much to-do was made about making it a decaf, but it was most definitely NOT a decaf.   For other, regular humans this might not be an issue, but I am not a regular human. My super-(sub-?)human caffeine sensitivity is well known hither and yon.  Anyways, my insane hyper chatter made my coworkers and then husband crazy for the rest of the day and I think I finally passed out once the caffeine had exited my system around 3am.  No more McD's coffees for me.

 

--4--

This is J's newest face.  No further comment.

 

--5--

I have two cooking posts coming up this week!  My poor husband has had to put up with my taking pictures of every step of our dinners for the past week or so.  He's such a good sport.

 

--6--

We're working our way through my birthday present: the ENTIRE series of I Love Lucy.  I had forgotten how much I love this episode:

I do love her.  She cracks me up.

 

--7--

No seven!  Can't think of anything and I don't want to pull a "high school junior" and BS the last one!

Thanks to Jen at Conversion Diary for hosting Quick Takes Friday!