I'm a few pages from finishing Black Robe Fever and about to begin A Weed in the Church. I also plan to begin The Testaments by Margaret Atwood. The reviews are fairly negative, so I am not beginning with high hopes. Our family's current read aloud is Ember Falls, the second book in The Green Ember series. The Green Ember was one of the few books that kept all my children engaged from teen boys to barely tween girls. As Princess Bride is to children's movies so is The Green Ember to children's literature. It has sword fighting, family loyalty, a secret prince, and soldiers.

Yes! We are in Fool's Spring as well! Coast or Mountains? It depends on my mood. If I could only choose one, it would have to be the coast. I enjoy the sand between my toes and hearing the water lapping at the shoreline. It doesn't hurt that my mother lives 1/2 way across the US 5 minutes from the coast! @Negin I loved your post!

Yes, this. I should've been more specific in the title. I included Cronovirus spinoff, but didn't explain further. Agreed. We live in tornado alley and I was shockingly unprepared during last year's season. This could turn into something scary and I would like to be prepared with at least the basics. MRE's are great, but having a few basics my family knows and loves or at least tolerates would be spectacular. I suspect if an all out pandemic broke out, one would need more than just a couple of weeks of basics food rations.

Any ideas are awesome. I was specifically thinking in terms of necessary emergency preparedness situation.

The title is pretty self explanatory. Share your shelf stable meal ideas. Bonus points if water isn't needed. Spaghetti noodles cooked in jarred marinara sauce. Serve with canned green beans.

You can cook spaghetti noodles in jarred marinara sauce with no water needed. The consistency isn't the best, but if one must ration water then spaghetti noodle consistency wouldn't matter that much.

I agree with your statement and want to add... Many people risk losing their jobs if they take all necessary sick days and some are just plain uninformed. A few years ago we had a lady at our congregation who's child was frequently sick. She would comment about said child having a fever that morning and how she gave her Tylenol to bring down her fever "so now she's fine." Um, no! Take that sick baby home!!

Good afternoon fellow bibliophiles! I didn't add another read last week after finishing The Count of Monte Cristo the previous week. I needed a bit of time to process it. For an online book club I'm continuing What is a Family? by Edith Schaeffer. Some chapters I've liked, some not. If not for the book club, I doubt I would finish this one. I'm also continuing Black Robe Fever by Gary L. Richardson. Dh suggested it to me and while it is an easy read with locations I am familiar with, I find myself putting it off. I borrowed Ember Falls, the second book in the Green Ember series, from the library. I will be starting it today as our family's afternoon read aloud. I haven't been paying much attention to the weekly challenges, but hope to incorporate them into my book selections. This is the first year I'm pretty confident that I will be able to reach 52 books. I will thrilled if I am able to accomplish that goal!

This came up on my facebook feed. I'm not sure if it is from a reliable source or not, but is scary if its true. January 29 at 2:13 PM In case you missed it, yesterday, Federal Agents arrested Dr. Charles Lieber, chair of Harvard University's Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, with lying to the Department of Defense about secret monthly payments of $50,000.00 paid by China and receipt of millions more to help set up a chemical/biological “Research” laboratory in China. Also arrested were two Chinese “Students” working as research assistants, one of whom was actually a lieutenant in the Chinese Army, the other captured at Logan Airport as he tried to catch a flight to China - smuggling 21 vials of “Sensitive Biological Samples” according to the FBI. ....The research lab the good professor had helped set up? It’s located at the Wuhan University of Technology. Wuhan China is ground zero to the potentially global pandemic known as the “Coronavirus”which is both spreading rapidly and killing people.

1. Below Stairs by Margaret Powell (Selfie, Pick Your Poison) 2. And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie (Soldier, Bingo) 3. 6 Day Body Makeover by Michael Thurmond (Making Stuff up, Pick Your Poison) 4. Whiskey in a Teacup by Reese Witherspoon (Inspirational or Quick Decisions, Pick Your Poison) 5. The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas (Gothic, Bingo) I just tried to access my Goodreads account and got an error message saying it was over capacity. 😂

I finished The Count of Monte Cristo. It was an interesting book, and though I had to look up summaries near the beginning of the book to keep up with the plot It is a fairly easy, albeit long, read. The copy I borrowed from the library was on a Playaway device that kept cutting out at important plot points and frustratingly left off the last five minutes of the book. I was able to read the ending online, but it was just not the same as finishing with the same format I started.

Yep. I respectfully disagree. I've been taught registries are borderline rude. While I know they are pretty much commonplace, showing up to a shower and being told what gifts to bring bothers me a bit. Yes!! Yes! I found a large, 6 or 8 quart, Pioneer Woman crockpot for $15. You better believe I scooped it up and plan to give it to a friend of our daughters at her wedding shower next month. It is worth double to triple that amount. It is also a style I know the bride to be would appreciate. She frequently attends potlucks, so the size will be appreciated as well. Of course I don't want to gift something someone would hate, but isn't it a little rude to dictate what people gift you?

Ugh! When flying you walk past people in close promixity that don't necessarily sit within 10 rows. You share lavatories and such. If one was showing signs of illness and wants to get tested, shouldn't they be able?

I wonder if this contributes to fewer cases of cold and flu in the summer months vs winter ones?

Dh and I just finished Containment a CW series that is currently on Netflix. That show has creepy similarities to this outbreak.