7 Quick Takes: August Edition

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1. Who can believe August is almost over?  Of course, while my northern friends and family are preparing for the cooler weather of autumn I'm down here in Florida just trying not to get heat stroke.  Seriously, the pumpkin craze is delicious, but it's a little strange in 90+ degree weather.

2. Have you seen any of my "All Dolled Up" posts?  I'm running a whole series right now all about dolls.  Yep, I'm totally reliving my childhood.  It's awesome.

3. For those of you who don't do Disney World this won't mean a thing to you, but those of you who do  . . .  The other day we went to Hollywood Studios and happened to walk by Toy Story Mania when the wait was only 15 minutes.  In the middle of the afternoon.  We have no idea why, because the line filled up almost immediately after us, but it was amazing!  We got to ride it twice (the second time was with our Fast Pass) with minimal waiting in line.  I even scored my personal best and one of the times I even beat my hubby!  Of course, the second time he beat me by quite a wide margin.  We are unabashedly competitive.

4. Speaking of competitiveness, we've been playing lots of Settlers of Catan.  (It's such a great game!)  Catherine, who's only six, totally "gets" the game but is getting annoyed that she hasn't won yet.  She's been close on more than one occasion, but either Daddy or I end up victorious.  But it brings up an interesting discussion -- do you, or should you, let your kids win?  What do you think?

5. The Princess in the Opal Mask and The Opal Crown are two really nice quick reads.  I thoroughly enjoyed them.  I had picked up Opal Mask on a whim and tore through it and then had to wait what seemed like eons to read Crown -- it was about two weeks.  The writing style is pleasant, the story entertaining (albeit slightly predictable), and it's clean (finally, a more grown up book without cussing and sex).  I really hope that Jenny Lundquist will continue to write!  I am sorely disappointed that my library doesn't have her two other books, but I added them to the collection requests.

Also, I just LOVE the cover art for these two books.  Gorgeous.  Simply stunning.

6.  I mentioned this before, but we bought a house.  There are lots of projects that we'd like to do, some projects that we have to do, and some projects that we dream of doing.  One of the smaller projects that my husband recently finished is in our living room. We have a slightly dated built in flanking a fireplace (yep, in sunny Florida).  Here's a rather awkward photo of the built ins -- you are looking at the living room over the kitchen counter.

It's not bad or anything, but it's not quite my taste.  I have dreams of doing something like this:

Dream Inspiration Found Here

Isn't that gorgeous?  But, you know, we're not really ready to start busting up walls and everything else that is needed for a transformation like that.  However, my husband spent some time adding some shelves and I'm totally loving the difference that it makes!  Here's how this space looked before.  Nothing really fit quite right in those bottom spaces.  They both just ended up being filled with random electronics and pool stuff.  (By the way, Qwirkle is quite a fun family game.)

Here's how they look now!  I think it's a fairly large transformation for such a simple project.  The baskets were ones that we already had, but I think they fit just about perfectly!  Now we just have to hide all the wires from the electronics and get the decor in the arches perfected. It's all a work in progress.

7. My kids are asking for second breakfast. I'm raising hobbits.

I'll be linking up with Kelly.