February 2025 in Review

Sigh, it’s March 4 and I’m just now starting this, and I’m already feeling overwhelmed with March. It’s just that kind of start to the year.

(there are affiliate links in here)

Week 1

The first few days of February were boring, but then Mom and I went up to visit Batman, and spent the first weekend visiting him. I forced him to take a picture with us. We went to the coolest mini golf place, it was a D&D themed mini golf, but since it was a black light, all of the pictures I took were not exactly great for sharing. I did force him to take a picture with me, and then with the three of us right before he headed out.

We had lots of fun hanging out together. We watched the new Gladiator movie, which my Mom was amused to listen to Batman and I complain about the lack of history, and the general bad tactics of the movie. Considering he’s not even my Roman history son, that tells you just how bad the history of the movie was.

On the drive back we only got a picture at the Arkansas Welcome Center, just the timing of when we hit various state lines meant we didn’t stop at any of the others. I got back and Leezard was very happy to see me.

No games played this week.

Books read:

• Wrought of Sapphire and Sea
• Wrought of Silver and Ravens
• Wrought of Serpent and Snow
• Wrought of Lions and Sand– all 4 of these are a series in case you can’t tell by the naming, and it actually starts with Wrought of Silver and Ravens, and I’m going to say I read all of these this week, but I didn’t really write them all down this week, because I kind of forgot to write down what I read when, but this starts with a retelling of 12 Dancing Princesses and then turns into a bit of political intrigue as they work into solving how to keep another country from invading them

Week 2

I made it back, and in our Bible study we talked about how we should really treat our time with God as a treat not a duty, so I sat down one day and made a point to make a pot of my favorite tea, grabbed my tea cup that looks like the Star Trek Next Gen cups, and did my Bible study.

Then, I started working on my questions for the next book quest for Lorehaven, we switched up how we are doing the quests there and are doing a much less formal quest style, which means less work for me when I lead one. This was an interesting book to discuss, sadly we didn’t have as many people reading and talking about it, as I would have wished, but it was a fun one to brainstorm questions.

I was sweeping the floor, and Leezard was exploring what I had swept up and looking through it. In case you were wondering, she is not very helpful. She is what you might call the opposite of helpful.

And the final picture is A Deadly Education, it was recommended to me as something I might enjoy reading, and I did. It’s a very interesting read, and now I need to get the next books from the library.

Books read:

• Sand and Storm– as we’ve read this in the Guild, I’ve been talking about it rather like a fantasy version of the Mummy with a bit of political intrigue
• Blood Traitors– the sequel to Sand and Storm, but this one is more of political intrigue, with a bit less Mummy vibes, but still lots of great interactions between the characters, I like both stories
• The Springborn– I super loved this book, but I’ll also warn you if you read this “magical realism” book, be prepared to cry as the characters will make you cry, it was awesome, but sad
• A Deadly Education– this was an interesting, darker version of Harry Potter, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Now I need to get the next book from the library.

I’m just randomly assigning books to weeks, so that looks like a good number to assign there.

Week 3

The college kids came home for the weekend, so I have pictures of games we played. Though I know we also played games other weeks, this particular week I took pictures.

I also came up with this genius idea for a project for Leezard, to entertain her, and it more or less kept her entertained, and was only mildly messy, so that’s a good thing.

And our craft for Sunday School was popular. The kids had fun making their mats for the lame man and then spraying them with the rubbing alcohol.

Books read:

• Truth Cursed– It’s like a combination of Ella Enchanted and Spy School, and it was a truly fun take
• Runaway Bride and Prejudice– meh, it was an amusing rom-com, nothing great or particularly memorable about it
• Her Modern Day Mr. Darcy– The only reason I finished this was because it was 100 pages, and there was no reason not to. The only resemblance to the aforementioned Pride and Prejudice it’s trying to resemble is the fact that he accidentally insults her on their first meet. Other than that, there is very little about her I found likable. Like she is hanging out with the “Darcy character,” and randomly bails on him because the “Wickham character” suddenly asks her out for dinner, literally she cancels on him in the middle of his getting them dinner. What about that makes me think you are a good person? NOTHING!

Games played

• Bloodbourne– Superman loves this game, Jeff and I are rather indifferent to it
• Cthulhu Death May Die– I had a fun new character I tried this time
• Camel Up card game– I got this thinking it was a 2 player game and it would play well for just Jeff and I, since we liked the full Camel Up board game, but we played it and discovered that while it can be played by 2, it would be more fun with more.
• Aeon’s End– and then we played this game, it’s another cooperative deck-building game, and we’ve been having fun learning it, and there are a couple of expansions for it, that we’ll probably slowly pick up. We’ve now played two of the bosses and beat them. Though it was a near miss for them.

Week 4

Huh, I think I may have combined weeks accidentally. It looks like the college kids may have come down a week later. Oops.

Okay, so the college kids actually came down this week. So ignore all that, and we celebrated Superman’s birthday with my brother and his family. We went out to a sushi and ramen restaurant, which made my brother very happy because he loves sushi but rarely gets to eat it. We also got a key lime pie for his “cake” that we ate together.

Then we played the Stormlight Archive game I got him for Christmas, and barely won it. I really have no clue what I was doing, but that can be what happens when you are playing a game vaguely based on a book that you have never read.

I was able to advance through the different ranks and I was never quite sure how I managed to do it, but Superman is enjoying the game, so it’s all good.

And that bottom left picture is from when Leezard decided to eat a spatula. You read that right a spatula. In case you’re wondering, silicon can show up on an x-ray. The technician took a sample x-ray just to find out, but I still ended up deciding not to give her an x-ray under the theory that she’s big enough and apparently she had chewed it up enough (she did throw up some of it after they gave her whatever they give dogs to make them throw up), and so I was told to give her an extra big meal and watch her go to the bathroom.

That means, all Leezard learned from this was: If I eat the spatula, I get to ride in the car, where I will find a paper bag that once held a kolache that I will attempt to eat while on my way to the vet. When I get home I will be fed two big cans of soft dog food, and when I’m given dinner I will be given a giant meal in an effort to make me go to the bathroom. She spent the night enacting gas warfare on me as Jeff had to work late that night. It was not pleasant. Not at all.

Books read, everything else left from the month:

• Text Me on Tuesday: All is Fair in Love and Texting– this would be the book where I learned it can be a closed door romance and have people sleeping together a fair amount. Most of the books I’ve read previously were all closed door, only kisses. This one was closed door as in fade to black, and it was very obvious what went on behind that door. But also, it just wasn’t that well written, and I finished it more so I could finish it, I did a lot of skimming. I didn’t feel like they were together because they liked each other, but because the author wanted them together, bleah
• Mishelved Magic– This was a fun book, basically the MC works in a library, and this library is also in charge of all magic in the world, and there are mysterious creatures in charge of that magic, and something is wrong there, and how do we solve that? Many mysteries and it is fascinating in a cozy sort of way
• The Duke Who Hates Christmas– ugh, this one disappointed me. It started off interesting, but here’s the problem, the concept was an enemies to lovers book, but there has to be some reason for them to go from point A to point B beyond “wow other person is really hot,” and then even more ridiculous, this is set in the Regency period, and she was raised to be a good Christian girl, so why is she suddenly hopping into this Duke’s bed? No seriously, it made no sense, this is another one that I mainly started skimming to finish because it was short, and I wanted to see just how they were going to try and finish this book. Oh, and even more ridiculous, apparently this author just thinks that Gretna Green just has people lining up to elope like in Vegas because it gets mentioned as the place to go to elope in Jane Austen books. Because that was a thing that happened in this book. I cannot emphasize how stupid this book is.
• Don’t Date the Haunted– This was a very amusing book, so the world of fiction is divided up into different worlds, and our main character is from Horror and she wants to get out of Horror, so she saves up and applies to go to college in Romance. Hijinks ensue.
• The Werewolf of Whitechapel– I’d say this is steampunk, but it’s a bit more gaslamp in feel even if it’s Victorian era, but what if all of the royalty was vampires, werewolves, and sirens? I highly recommend this series
• Anarchist on the Orient Express– book 2 in the series
• A Vampire in Bavaria– book 3 in the series, I tore through the series so fast and stayed up way too late finishing them, I’m guessing some of these books were finished last week