My Favorite Things // October 2014

Hi Friends and Family!

This is when I tell you what I’ve been doing in October and what I’ve been loving this month:


My Kindle

As an avid book reader and lover of all things paperback, I always swore I would never get an e-reader and facilitate the end of tangible books, but I caved (yes dad, you were right). Am I ashamed of myself? Maybe. Do I love my Kindle? Hell yeah. I got my Ken Doll in part because of Sarah, and in part because travelling to South Africa with a ton of books is just unrealistic. The Kindle is great because I can download almost any book instantly, it holds hundreds of books at a time, the battery lasts for weeks, I can highlight and look up words, and it’s super convenient to keep in my purse or backpack. For anyone who thinks reading a screen for hours will hurt your eyes – it doesn’t – cause Kindle has cool “paperwhite” technology, so the screen looks like the page of a book. Kindle is great, the end. (Does Kindle want to pay me for all this great publicity??)


Harry Potter

(This goes hand-in-hand with the Kindle). To say I’ve been obsessed with Mr. Potter and his adventures is a bit of an understatement. Obviously, I’ve read all the Harry Potter books before, but it’s been a while and it was about time for a re-read. I am always amazed by the details in each book, and every time I read, I come across something I missed before. Since I’ve been traveling a lot and I have a lot of downtime, my schedule lends itself to constant reading. And thanks to ABC Family, I’ve been watching allllll the movies (does anyone else feel like every other weekend is Harry Potter Weekend?).


Pumpkin Patch

How much more Basic can I get than pumpkin picking at a pumpkin patch in the fall while wearing flannel? Regardless, it was great fun. Emma and I went to Eckert’s Farm and Orchard in Illinois, which is only a short drive from our homes since we live on the Missouri/Illinois border. We went on a Monday so the farm/orchard was pretty empty, but we did get to ride on a tractor, which is really all you can ask for in life. Carter and Sitka met a camel (I guess nowadays camels are farm animals?) and the camel was not happy about it. We also listened to the entire Taylor Swift album, 1989, on the ride to and from Eckert’s and it was fantastic (it’s definitely a favorite, but I’ll be writing about it in a separate post). Check out Emma’s twitter for a pic of the Jack-O-Lanterns we carved from our punkins’ @emmyc6.


Buzz’s Milestone

While driving from Sarasota to Naples, Buzz hit 50,000 miles. Milestone, get it? In a way, it’s really a milestone for me too because I’ve been driving Buzz since he was a wee lad of 0 miles. I got my little, yellow Mini Cooper in June 2007, right after my 15th birthday and now, over 7 years later, he’s all grown up. So much of my life has happened with Buzz like driving to crew practice every day in high school, my first road trip to Tybee Island with Melissa, driving from STL to MIA so many times, driving to the keys… Orlando… Tampa…, the clutch burning out right outside of Mahoney, okay, you get it, I love my car and we’ve been together a long time.


Final Medical Clearance

This isn’t really a tangible thing I’ve been obsessed with, but it did happen in the past month. I’m officially considered healthy enough to live in South Africa for 2+ years! Woo! It’s the last hurdle of my Peace Corps application process, and now all I need to do is complete some online classes for the Peace Corps about HIV and rules etc. Oh, and pack, I eventually need to pack.


I hope your October was awesome (and your November is even better) and have a happy Halloween!

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