Tag Archives: reading goals

2022 Status Update – March through June

Posted in For the love of books by

Last time I posted a status update was for February. Work was pretty crazy after this and between that, my son having surgery in April, and just generally not getting as much reading done and not having as many updates – I decided to do these updates more on a quarterly basis than monthly. I have been getting more reading this past month but still not where I might normally be. My family and work have been taking a precedence over reading – plus I have been watching a couple new shows. For anyone that hasn’t watched Ted Lasso – I highly recommend it, it is so wholesome! Anyways, here is my reading progress for the last couple months.

Reading Stats:
# books read this update: 19
# pages read this update: 6,144
# books read year-to-date: 28
# pages read year-to-date: 9,251

Other Posts this post:

No other posts

Favorite books from this post:

Fix Her Up and Tools of Engagement – both by Tessa Bailey

Upcoming TBR List:

  • Catch up on books I missed in the last couple months
  • The Hookup Plan by Farrah Rochon (8/2)
  • Something in the Heir by Suzanna Enoch (9/20)
  • A Merry Little Meet Cute by Sierra Simone and Julie Murphy (9/20)

I have a vacation coming up next month (August) that will be very reading focused, which I’m looking forward to. Work will take up a lot of my time until then but I’m trying to find a balance! Hope everyone out there is enjoying the summer so far and has been finding something good to read. Happy reading!

2022 Monthly Status Update: February

Posted in For the love of books by

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February went by in a flash. Its been so busy at work and, with this being my first busy season with a baby at home, I’ve been struggling to get everything done. Suffice it to say I haven’t been reading as much as I might have at this time last year but I’m hoping to read more once busy season is over. But here is my reading progress for February:

Monthly Stats:
# books read this month: 3
# pages read this month: 1,361
# books read year-to-date: 9
# pages read year-to-date: 3,107

Other Posts this month:

No other posts this month

Favorite books from this month:

Nothing I’d call amazing from this month

Next Month TBR List:

  • Nothing on the March reading list – have to catch up on ones I missed in January and February and then I need to read the next Bridgerton book before the new series comes out!

I am hoping to still be able to find time for reading more this next month even as I continue to work a lot. Happy reading!

2021 Monthly Status Update: January

Posted in For the love of books by

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And so we begin the new year! 2020 definitely had it’s ups and downs but I’m excited to see the start of 2021 and we have lots of plans for this year! So far we’ve been busy meeting goals and working on projects, but I’ve had time here and there for reading. Here is my progress for reading in January:

Monthly Stats:
# books read this month: 10
# pages read this month: 3,726

Other Posts this month:

From Books to the Big Screen!

Favorite books from this month:

The Hating Game – 5.0 stars

Next Month TBR List:

  • Hit Me with Your Best Scot by Suzanne Enoch
  • Love at First by Kate Clayborn

Things will be very busy over the next few months as I try to keep up with busy season. I’m hoping to still find time to read at least a few books a month but we’ll see how the next few months go! In addition to my scheduled reads each month I’m also trying to read at least one book from my backlog and from my personal library. I’m looking forward to Valentine’s Day in a couple weeks and hopefully getting some Valentine’s Day chocolates. It’s chilly where I live and it’s snowing today so we’re hunkering down and trying to keep warm. Happy reading everyone!

2020 Monthly Status Update: November

Posted in For the love of books by

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November was again very busy work wise but I think the lack of a commute is really helping me have extra time for reading each day. Plus with a couple days off for the holiday weekend I was able to get a lot of books read in November! So here are some reading highlights from November for me:

Monthly Stats:
# books read this month: 12
# pages read this month: 4,264
# books read year-to-date: 90
# pages read year-to-date: 29,994

Other Posts this month:

No other posts this month!

Favorite books from this month:

One by One by Ruth Ware – 5.0 stars
One Night at the Lake by Bethany Chase – 4.75 stars

Next Month TBR List:

  • Truth, Lies and Second Dates by MaryJanice Davidson
  • The Princess and the Rogue by Kate Bateman

I have a short list for December so I’m going to be spending some of my other reading time (1) catching up more on backlogs from prior year’s lists and (2) reading some things just for fun! I think one of my favorite things I’ve been able to do this year is read more from my personal library, it feels like it’s been years since I’ve picked what I wanted to read on a whim. December will be a busy work month but if everything goes according to plan I’ll have some time off at the end of the month and can hopefully read a lot then. Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving, and hope everyone is able to do something fun to get into the festive Christmas spirit. Our Christmas this year, I’m sure like many others, will look very different this year. No large celebrations and I will be missing my family in a big way this year. But whether we’re together or apart, the love and joy that our family feels is still there. Hope everyone is doing well and staying safe. Happy reading everyone!

2020 Monthly Status Update: August

Posted in 2020, ARC August 2020, For the love of books, Reading Challenges, Ripped Bodice 2020 Summer Romance Bingo! by

August-Holidays

August flew by! The cooler weather is finally here (at least for the last couple days) and I am LOVING it. I also have set up a new desk space in my home so that I have a dedicated area while working from home and it is just perfectly functional and beautiful. I am really looking forward to the next month and to catching up with work tasks. I did have to focus a bit more on work over the last month so I haven’t had as much time for reading but I am trying to stay as productive as possible! Here are some reading highlights from August for me:

Monthly Stats:
# books read this month: 5
# pages read this month: 1,710
# books read year-to-date: 59
# pages read year-to-date: 19,413

Other Posts this month:

Here to Stay BLOG TOUR!!
ARC August Reading Challenge

Favorite books from this month:

I liked the books this month but didn’t particularly love any certain one

Next Month TBR List:

  • One by One by Ruth Ware
  • Nowhere to Hide by Leslie Kelly
  • The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner
  • Tools of Engagement by Tessa Bailey
  • The Glass Queen by Gena Showalter

Next month is also my BIRTHDAY month so I’m planning to read a couple books in the fairy-tale retelling theme! My husband and I have been watching Once Upon a Time lately and I always love the Descendants movies – I always find it so fun to hear a classic fairy-tale story told in a new way.

I hope everyone has a great September! Happy reading everyone!

2019 Recap and 2020 Goals!

Posted in For the love of books by

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I can’t believe 2019 is over already! This year absolutely flew by, I feel like I looked up and all of a sudden it was December. This year I spent some time trying to find balance – between my work and home life and my reading and time spent with my husband / family. There’s always room for more improvement but I did the best I could this year. As the year draws to a close there is more than ever developing at work and I’m hoping I’ll be able to overcome the challenges I face there. I’m also hoping to spend time where I can continuing to read – and not only read some great books published in 2020 but also read more off my backlog and from my personal library.

So anyways! On to the meat of this post – to recap on the goals list that I had set for 2019:

  1. Participate in certain reading challenges:
    1. ARC August Check! I participated in ARC August 2019 and got a lot of ARC’s read – see my posts on this challenge here  
    2. Bout of Books Challenges (2)
      1. BOB 24 January 2019 Check! I participated in this one, though I didn’t find it as productive as the May one so I’m cutting it from the list in 2020. See my posts on this challenge here
      2. BOB 25 May 2019 Check! I participated in this one, see my posts on this challenge here
    3. Bookish Bingo challenges! I’d like to participate in bingo challenges for certain months for fun: February, June, September and October Half check – I ended up participating for February and October but couldn’t fit it into the other months 
    4. Bookish 2019 Reading Challenge – 52 Ways to Kill Your TBR! Check! Read a few on the list, though not as many as I wanted. See my posts on this challenge here
  2. Keep reading my backlog list! Check! I used the 52 Ways to Kill Your TBR reading challenge to start tackling some of my backlog lists – hoping to continue hacking at these lists over the next year!
  3. Also read some of the books I own (there are too many) Check! I read probably a handful of books that I own, though I bought a lot more – oh well!
  4. And some personal goals! Lose weight, focus on healthier eating, exercise more often, more time at home, more time with Kris, and finish some house projects! Mostly check – I wasn’t really great with most of these but, again, did the best I could. Hoping to make more progress in 2020.

As I mentioned with finding balance, I think I was able to mete out a good amount of time for myself to read this year. I also discovered PODCASTS this year, which are fantastic and they’ve really helped me develop my knowledge (and my TBR list) within the romance genre. I’m hoping to have a post up within the next week or so on what podcasts I’ve been listening to and what I’ve enjoyed so far. Any readers who have a favorite podcast definitely let me know, I’m always interested in checking out a new one! I also attended a couple book related events this year (including KissCon New England), all of which I enjoyed immensely. I just love being able to talk about books and listen to people talk about books and everything related to that. I’m hoping to make it to an RWA  or other romance writers conference sometime soon.

In looking back on my year of reading this year, I was able to read a comparable amount related to previous years. Below is a chart of the books I read by month this year vs previous years:

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I also really like the functionality of the Goodreads Year in Books summary for giving an overview of what happened during my year for reading. I don’t record 100% of the books I read on here so it doesn’t always match up with my own figures but I love having all the covers in one place, it makes for a neat graphic.

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And just for fun! Here are a few of my favorites from 2019:

Favorite Reads from 2019

The Winter of the Witch by Katherine Arden – 5.0 stars
The Bride Test by Helen Hoang – 4.75 stars
Wicked Deeds on a Winter’s Night (OMG IAD IS THE BEST!) by Kresley Cole – 5.0 stars
The Family Upstairs by Lisa Jewell – 4.75 stars

Favorite New Series

Pretty obviously this is the Immortals After Dark series. I have mentioned this series in a number of posts, it is bananas (to coin Sarah MacLean’s term) and amazing and a roller coaster of awesome. I would definitely recommend it if you haven’t read it already!

Favorite Podcasts

(Obviously) Fated Mates is great. I love the IAD discussions but also love the interstitial episodes where Sarah and Jen talk about recommended reads. I’ve also really been enjoying Learning the Tropes (Erin and Clayton are hilarious!) and Not Your Mom’s Romance Book Club (I love their back and forths and Ellen and her Mom remind me so much of me and my mom!).

Best New Author I Read in 2019

Has to be Helen Hoang – I should have read The Kiss Quotient last year but didn’t get to it til this year after I read The Bride Test. Both are amazing books and I’m so impressed by her writing and her as a person! I can’t wait for the next book!

Here we close out the 2019 year and we look ahead to the New Year!!

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Looking ahead to 2020 I can not help but be less hopeful than I was last year. I have found it hard to find enough time to devote myself to both blogging and reading while also doing everything else I need to do. So I’m hoping to change that this year. Slow down with my tasks and actually enjoy them and expand on them. I’m hoping to rediscover my hope in some areas and create happiness where I’m able. Overall I’m looking to be a little more creative and do a little more writing outside of my comfortable review box I’ve narrowed myself to. I used to really enjoy the “Top Ten Tuesday” posts and the “Waiting on Wednesday” posts I did in the past. My schedule has been squeezed so tight in recent years that I haven’t made time to do them but I’d like to dabble a little more in these again this year. There are so many different fun activities within the land of book bloggers and I’m hoping to find some of that fun again this year!

Looking ahead to 2020, here are some of the goals I plan to achieve:

  1. Participate in certain reading challenges:
    1. ARC August
    2. Bout of Books Challenge – BOB 25 (May 2020)
    3. Bookish Bingo challenges! I’d like to participate in bingo challenges for certain months for fun: February and October. I don’t think that the Bookish site is doing Book Bingo sheets anymore but I’m hoping I can find another site that has one for these two months.
  2. Keep reading my backlog list! At least one book per month
  3. Keep reading from my personal library! At least one book per month
  4. Write at least one non-review and non-blog tour post a month – can be one of the structured posts like Top Ten Tuesday or it can be informative or whatever I feel like!

 

I wish everyone strength and happiness in 2020, Happy Reading!

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2019 Monthly Status Update: January

Posted in For the love of books by

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And here we begin on another year. The first month of 2019 is over and, while it wasn’t my strongest reading month, I did get a solid amount of reading done. I have a lot of reading coming up over the next month too, which I’m not sure I’ll 100% be able to keep up with due to my work schedule, but I’m going to do my best!  So anyways, here are some highlights from December for me:

Monthly Stats:
# books read this month: 7
# pages read this month: 2,117
# books read year-to-date: 7
# pages read year-to-date: 2,117

Favorite Books I Read this Month:

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Not only do I just LOVE this cover, I loved the book too! I rated it 5.0 stars, read my review here

Other Posts this month:

Bout of Books 24 Posts

Next Month TBR List:

-The Girls at 17 Swann by Yara Zgheib
-The Night Olivia Fell by Christine McDonald
-The Beast’s Heart by Leide Shallcross
-My Favorite Cowboy by Donna Grant
-Friends to Lovers series (boxed set) by Camilla Isley – there are 4 books in this series

Looking forward to the romantic month of February and being as productive both at home and at work as I possibly can! Happy reading!

 

Bout of Books 24 – Sign Up Post

Posted in 2019, Bout of Books 24, For the love of books, Reading Challenges by

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So for one of my goals this year to help me focus more on reading and having more fun with my reading schedule, I am participating in two Bout of Books reading challenges plus a handful of other challenge this year! I’ve participated in these reading challenges in the past couple years and I’m usually able to get a good amount of reading done.

I’m hoping to be able to find enough time for this reading challenge to get a couple of books read. Things are picking up at work, so it my be a little tougher during the week, but I have GOAL DAY next Saturday and I should be able to make up some time then.

For those of you who don’t really know much about Bout of Books, it is basically a week-long, no pressure read-a-thon that has been going strong since 2011! Here is a description directly from the Bout of Books blog:

The Bout of Books read-a-thon is organized by Amanda Shofner and Kelly Rubidoux Apple. It is a week long read-a-thon that begins 12:01am Monday, January 7th and runs through Sunday, January 13th in whatever time zone you are in. Bout of Books is low-pressure. There are challenges, giveaways, and a grand prize, but all of these are completely optional. For all Bout of Books 24 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog. – From the Bout of Books team

The Bout of Books Read-a-Thon was created by Amanda @ On a Book Bender on a complete whim in August 2011. It took on a life of its own and was such a hit that Amanda decided to do it again and turn it into a somewhat regular occurrence.

  • Bout of Books is a week long read-a-thon, usually from 12:01am on a Monday through 11:59pm on a Sunday in whatever time zone you are in.
  • It is low pressure, meaning participants are only asked to push themselves to read more than they normally would during any given week. There is no competition between readers.
  • How much time a reader wants, and can commit, to read, tweet, or network with fellow bloggers is left to individual preference. All challenges and giveaways are optional.
  • Networking with fellow bloggers is actively encouraged, though never required.
  • Use Twitter to post updates throughout the read-a-thon. Everyone will be tweeting with the #boutofbooks hashtag.

I’ve been reading pretty close to on schedule lately and I’m hoping to continue that trend over the next week!

Time Devoted to Reading

I plan to read at least 1.5 hours each day during the week (except for Friday I think), with hopefully additional hours on Saturday and Sunday. Friday I’ll be working all day and then we have a work trip planned trip to the casino Friday night! This does mean that I probably won’t get much reading done on Friday but I’m looking forward to letting off a little steam with my coworkers!

My Goals

My goals for this read-a-thon are that I’d like to participate in as much as I can: the daily posts plus reading every day. I’d really like to just focus on getting back into reading. I picked it up again over the holidays but I’ve lost the schedule again with how crazy the last week or so has been.

Books to Read

List is a little ambitious but with Saturday and Sunday focused on reading who knows how much I’ll get accompished! I would’ve loved to take the whole week off and just read non-stop but work has been consistently busy since over a year ago, plus things are starting to pick up in preparation for our “busy season.” Anyways, I’m really looking forward to this week-long reading challenge devoted to reading ! If you do want to join make sure to add yourself to the page’s Sign Up Post by Tuesday, January 8th at 11:59pm! Happy reading!

Bout of Books 21 Update – Day 1

Posted in 2018, Bout of Books 21, For the love of books, Reading Challenges by

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Started out strong yesterday for the first day of the read-a-thon! I met my goal of reading 2 hours and I got through a good chunk of reading! I’m trying to balance my work schedule this week so that I can spend more time reading, I have a meeting tonight though so I might be distracted today. So anyways my Monday’s progress is below:

Update

Monday

Time spent reading: (Approximately) 3.5 hours
Number of pages I’ve read today: 218 pages
Total number of pages I’ve read: 218 pages (Day one! Ha)
Books read: Finished The Girl in the Tower (see my review here) AND The Crown Prince’s Bride (review to be posted later today)
Challenges: I did the introduce yourself in six words challenge for Monday, posted it on Twitter here

Stay tuned for continued progress made in tomorrow’s post on my Tuesday update!!

Bout of Books 21 – Sign Up Post

Posted in 2018, Bout of Books 21, For the love of books, Reading Challenges by

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So for one of my goals this year to help me focus more on reading and having concentrated time for reading, I am participating in all 3 Bout of Books reading challenges / read-a-thons this year! The first one is next week (luckily its before my busy season at work officially starts).

For those of you who don’t really know much about Bout of Books, it is basically a week-long, no pressure read-a-thon that has been going strong since 2011! Here is a description directly from the Bout of Books blog:

The Bout of Books read-a-thon is organized by Amanda Shofner and Kelly @ Reading the Paranormal. It is a week long read-a-thon that begins 12:01am Monday, January 8th and runs through Sunday, January 14th in whatever time zone you are in. Bout of Books is low-pressure. There are challenges, giveaways, and a grand prize, but all of these are completely optional. For all Bout of Books 21 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog. – From the Bout of Books team

The Bout of Books Read-a-Thon was created by Amanda @ On a Book Bender on a complete whim in August 2011. It took on a life of its own and was such a hit that Amanda decided to do it again and turn it into a somewhat regular occurrence.

  • Bout of Books is a week long read-a-thon, usually from 12:01am on a Monday through 11:59pm on a Sunday in whatever time zone you are in.
  • It is low pressure, meaning participants are only asked to push themselves to read more than they normally would during any given week. There is no competition between readers.
  • How much time a reader wants, and can commit, to read, tweet, or network with fellow bloggers is left to individual preference. All challenges and giveaways are optional.
  • Networking with fellow bloggers is actively encouraged, though never required.
  • Use Twitter to post updates throughout the read-a-thon. Everyone will be tweeting with the #boutofbooks hashtag.

Since I’m so behind in my reading schedule, this will be a great week to devote to reading and catch up!

Time Devoted to Reading

I plan to read at least 2 hours each day during the week, with hopefully additional hours on Friday. Also the Saturday during Bout of Books I have Goal Day planned but then I have other family plans in the evening so I’m hoping for a good 4 hours of solid reading. And then Sunday I don’t have anything planned other than house work so hopefully a solid 4 hours that day as well.

My Goals

My goals for this read-a-thon are that I’d like to participate in as much as I can: the daily posts plus reading every day.

Books to Read

 

Hopefully I’m actually able to get through all (or at least a few)of those, if so I could at least catch up with one week of books which would be great. I have a long list of backlog books that I have to catch up with still from 2016 and 2017, but hopefully those will happen over the rest of the year. I’m really looking forward to this week-long reading challenge devoted to reading ! If you do want to join make sure to add yourself to the page’s Sign Up Post by Tuesday, January 9th at 11:59pm! Happy reading!