Blogmas: December Playlist

Hello!

Well, we are at the final week of Blogmas. Can you believe Christmas is next Monday? How crazy is that?!

This month has been somewhat hectic. While I was doing Blogmas, I was trying to finish out my reading goals of the year. By this time, I am actually reading something to pass the time, this year not so much. It’ll be interesting whether I decide to continue reading Christmas-y books two days after the holiday had ended. Honestly, I just hope I can get to 60 by New Year’s Day!

As far as I know, my little family is planning on having Christmas earlier as my sister has plans and my nephew will be with his daddy this year. Our actual plan is to do what we tried last year and let Nolan sleepover Christmas Eve, but my parents would like Kimber to spend the night too, I’d like to have both of them in my room for the sleepover, but Nolan becomes a little jealous when she tries to take away my attention on him. We also need to remember Kimber is wild. She can climb in and out of chairs, beds, couches, etc. She’s been like this since she was a few weeks old, she would literally roll off Blondie’s chest–she has no boundaries, which should be interesting in the future!

Last week I shared my “Ultimate Christmas Playlist” so I will not be adding any holiday songs on this post. These are my non-festive favorites for the month of December.

King of Anything by Sara Bareilles
Harleys In Hawaii by Katy Perry
When The Darkness Comes by Jeris Johnson
Might Love Myself by Beartooth
You’re Losing Me by Taylor Swift
Fields Of Gold by Ellie Goulding
Forged In Fire by Leaves;’ Eyes
Sun Meets Shadow by AG featuring Katie Herzig
Afraid To Die by P.O.D. featuring Tatiana Shamyluke of Jinjer
Come Little Children by Hildegard von Billingin’
The Grove by Hellsir
Cruel Summer by The Animal In Me
Trench by Elliphant
Battle by Yuna
Slayer by Bryce Savage
I Feel Like Dancing by Jason Mraz
Runaway Baby by Bruno Mars
Harley by Letters From The Fire
Header To Breathe by Letdown
Knives by Neoni featuring Ga$p
Castaway by Of Mice & Men
Toxic by Major Moment
Morally Grey by April Jal
Amaranthine by Halocene featuring Lauren Babic
Seeing Red by Architects

I don’t know if I’ve talked about this, but I’m not really a podcast kind of person. I’ve tried various of them in the past couple of years now, but nothing has really worked on me. Until I found LuAnna.

I was on Instagram watching hundreds of stories and reels, and I began to see these ladies talking about life topics and what I learned later was the majority of their material is sent in by other listeners and they are always hilarious! I just following them on IG, but one morning I wanted more and then I realized they were an actual podcast, and they were available on Spotify for free. It is hosted by Luisa Zissman and Anna Williamson, they’re based in the United Kingdom, they’re very British with their vocabulary and it can be difficult to follow along; the channel in general has a warning about the graphic messages and stories they tell on air,

My favorite part is the fact they’re out there and the stories they talk about the most are regular woman-ly things, like annoying spouses, motherhood, crazy kids, sex, etc. I am so happy to hear their podcast on a daily basis–they upload a new episode on Monday and Thursday. Thursday is when they basically continue their fun earlier in the week, but it’s just more stories. If you want to listen to these lovely ladies, look into their podcast on Instagram like I did or on Spotify instead–I’ve included the link in the paragraph above so you can check it out for yourself.

If you know any other podcasts like LuAnna that are on Spotify (for free) I might be interested in, leave it in the comments below! And of course, what music were you that wasn’t Christmas related?

Book Review: “The Best of Us” by Kennedy Fox

Hello!

One thing I wanted to do this year is limit the amount of romance books. I want to focus on other genres, but I saw the ladies of Kennedy Fox mentioned this one was free on Amazon last month, and I couldn’t help myself I had to get it before the opportunity disappeared. They were also in the process of releasing the fourth book of this series called “The Heart Of Us” so I figured I would check out the start of this collection.

I am still on the fence about it, mainly because I don’t really care for age-gap romances, but the snippets they shared on Instagram prior made me really happy, so we’ll have to see what comes out of this post. I’d still like to continue Travis and Viola‘s story of their Checkmate series, but these things take time apparently!

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What happens when the biggest blizzard of the year hits and you’re trapped in a cabin with your best friend’s brother? You take every opportunity to spend time together and make him fall in love with you.

The Best of Us is a best friend’s brother, opposites attract, and snowed-in together standalone romance.

taken from Goodreads.

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There were a lot of things I truly loved about this story. I mean besides the steamy sex scenes; it had a great and relatable plot amongst the characters. The main reason why I choose the word “relatable” is because everyone, especially Ryan, are coming out of the COVID-19 mess. He is a doctor who saw firsthand of what the virus did to his co-workers and patients. I thoroughly enjoyed Ryan as a whole, he was portrayed as a stoic person, but also showed a lot of emotion about his family and work. Whenever I read books like this, I am pulled towards the female character a lot of the time, but for this, I was fully on Team Ryan.

I want Kendall as much as she wants me, and the only thing coming between us is my insecurities.

Now with that being said, it doesn’t mean Kendall wasn’t an awesome character. I admired her sense of humor but most importantly her strength while wanting to find herself outside of her family and focusing on her charity work.

It was interesting to see how these characters share their reasons why they do what they do and you as the reader find out they are more alike in ways neither one expected, and I was surprised I didn’t find it annoying or unrealistic once they got over that hump–no pun intended there!–and began to think there could be more for them as a couple.

If you haven’t read anything by Kennedy Fox, I definitely you should grab this book. If you think using the pandemic as a prop for this story is a bit weird, because honestly, I thought I wouldn’t be into it either, trust me when I say it makes sense to use it to show you another side of Ryan’s life as a doctor.

Have you read “The Best Of Us” yet? If you have, what were your thoughts about this story of Ryan and Kendall?

Blogmas: Festive and Winter-y Baby Names!

Hello!

Last year I did a HUGE thing and made up over 100 name combinations for my second Instagram account. It was kind of hectic but really fun and I was pretty proud of myself afterwards. The page itself is centered around my love of names. I’ve never been interested on how the name(s) mean or sound really, I just share what I think looks cute and different and it allows me to learn more about other cultures too! I am a big learner and obsessed with various holidays and nationalities, and I’ve figured out I can multitask when it comes to creating these posts on my profile.

I had plans to do something similar during the month of October, because I also love fall and Halloween-eques type of names but I wasn’t motivated to do anything, and I was only able to release three girl pairings out of the entire thing. I was so bummed about it, but then I thought about creating a whole post about the names that I feel are perfect for Christmas.

This is one of the largest lists I’ve ever made, and I apologize for its size, but the original list was actually much bigger–I had the hardest time figuring out what to add. (This statement shouldn’t surprise you too much!) What I will do to make this somewhat easier for you is, I will talk about four names from each sex and discuss why I picked them out of the rest in their group, plus give you a fun middle name so it gives you some ideas later on.

Ambrose Gray

One thing you will notice in the list is that I chose some classic names like Ambrose, Benedict, and Emmanuel mainly because they are “warm” names to me. I feel like they are perfect names for boys (or girls) born in the colder months. They are snuggle-y and sophisticated. And despite using the middle as “Gray” I can see a lot of reds, navy blues, and beige colors that could illuminate the essence of the name. Yes, in a way your child will have a grandfather type of name but as they get older, you could adopt a nickname that could work with their full name!

Douglas Wolf

I have seen Douglas making a slow comeback and I seriously am here for it!

If you are interested in boho or nature, I think Douglas is an underdog to both of these styles. I love trees but I always forget to add them in my ultimate list. Douglas firs (or Evergreen trees) are unbelievably gorgeous! Once you see them out in their habitat, you instantly feel Christmas-y and want to do a full-on Griswold move and watch it explode in your living room with its huge limbs. Oddily enough, newborn babies can have a similar effect, but maybe not break any windows with their incredible wails though, but who knows, maybe they can…

Fairbanks Roland

Back in January, I actually began to collect names that were out of the Scandinavian range as that was one country, I talked about in the previous Christmas name posts on my Instagram. I also adore the Frozen franchise, so it wasn’t really a surprise when I just unleashed every week of different ones. However, I decided to change it up a bit and started searching for interesting names based around Alaska, which is how I found Fairbanks.

Why I thought Fairbanks could be a hit is because of two reasons: 1) it is both a city and word name, and these are really in nowadays! So, if you are tired of hearing about Aspen, Boston, and Denver, this could be your ticket! 2) as far as I can tell, Fairbanks is fairly low on the popularity charts. Technically, this combination is pretty low on their significant lists so you could be safe to having you child use an unique type of name that could rise later on.

Lysander Matthew

Personally, I have always had an uneasy relationship with Lysander. I like it, I think it’s interesting and could work around Halloween and winter, so in a way it’s like Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas, where it works around both of their celebrations.

I am very impressed with the amount of regal looking the boy names are in the banner. I tend to enjoy hearing bold and masculine names around this time anyways. As I said about “Ambrose” there is something about these classic names that seem to radiant a sense of warmth and wholesome in the next few months. This being said though, I tend to go on a different route with the girls. I like shorter but Christmas like type of styles, thus the many vibes of the festive season.

I paired it with a very beloved name of mine and that’s “Matthew” as I feel like it adds a subtle sweet flair to how sharp Lysander looks and sounds. I don’t usually add other names that could work as possibly sibling sets in these types of posts, but I think Leander and Lior would be cool as they each have a mysterious and regal appeal to them.

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Faith Sydney

As with Lysander above, Faith is another one that hasn’t had an easy time with me. I normally to go back and forth with it, but since so many faiths are celebrated during this month, I thought it could stand to make a comeback amongst the charts again. There is another reason to list it here is because Faith is one syllable. People are really enjoying naming their children with one to three syllables and this was the reason why I included Sydney as the middle as it is kind of easygoing and plays well overall.

Honor Madeleine

Since 2008, I have been a huge fan of Honor, thanks in part to actress Jessica Alba and her husband Cash Warren’s first daughter being named Honor Marie. It was during that year that my actual love of collecting names officially started; I’d been storing a lot of them throughout my life, but this was the first time where I saw so many good names at once and my mom and I were just having a field day of sharing our thoughts on each one that was announced. This was the same year that Nicole Ritchie and her husband Joel Madden had their daughter Harlow Winter Kate, which is another beloved favorite of mine too! Honor and Harlow could be a great set as well!

Josepha Claire

This one is for those who would like to get out of using Josephine, now there’s nothing wrong with that variation, I’m actually a really big fan of that style, but I thought Josepha or maybe Josephe could be an interesting royal switch up.

Lately I’ve been doing royal family trees in my spear time, and I just finished doing Marie Antoinette’s maternal family line and Josepha is a HUGE name among her family. The majority of her mother, aunts, sisters, and nieces had it in their fairly large names, so if you are a fan of Marie Antoinette in any way, you could use Josepha as a nice way to represent her or the old Asturian-Hungarian royal family.

Neve Alexandra

One name that I just enjoyed last winter was Neve. I had heard about it prior to using it in my theme, but I never knew it meant “snow” in Italian. As much as I like the word “snow” having it as a name for a human, always makes me cringe a little, so whenever I can find names that mean it, I will definitely go with the alternative immediately. I also really enjoyed putting Alexandra with it as the middle since that’s another way I enjoy creating combinations too, starting small and continue with a longer and strong type of name can make it look almost regal.

Okay, well, that is it for this post. I really hope you enjoyed my selection of names, and the few I gave you with some ideas for middle candidates too. Now I would really like for you to comment below with your favorites from the banner or what you like to see throughout the season.

October Playlist 👻🖤

Hello!

It is FINALLY the week of Halloween!

I’ve been looking forward to the holiday since July but you would never know it if you saw my room right now. I only put out my plaid pumpkins around my window like last year, and mom managed to hang up the wreath that Rumer did nothing but bark at throughout the month of August. Thankfully Rumer doesn’t have a glue about it so we’ve been enjoying the quiet there. I’d still like to get another one for Christmas/winter with lights on it but I fear that’ll just provoke her so I’ll have to find something else…

Since we’re discussing festive music, I thought I’d let you know that I have updated my ultimate Halloween playlist I created about two years ago. It still has all of the classics but I have also tried to save anything I share on my Insta too, just in case you can’t check those out because you don’t have an account. If you’d like to take a listen to my favorites lately, click here I would also like to add that I did not forget about my promise about including my September playlist too! .

Here are my Top 25 songs for October, and if you are curious to see what else I got into, here is your final link of the post.

This Fire Inside by NerdOur featuring Halocene
Invincible by Saysh x Anderson Rocio
Legend by Holy Wars
Get Better by Leslie Mosier
This Town by ELLA EX
Queen by Hidden Citizens featuring Ranya
Ain’t My Fault by Zara Larsson
Let Me Love You by Love and Death featuring Lacey Sturm
Whose Side Are You On by Tommee Profitt featuring Ruelle
Parachaute by Saint Chaos
Rebel by Pep Squad
God Only Knowns by for KING & COUNTRY featuring Echosmith
Show Yourself by Idina Menzel and Evan Rachel Wood
Down by The Birthday Massacre
Wicked Game by Violet Orlandi
Crawl Back In by Dead By Sunrise
Everybody Hurts by Avril Lavigne
Somebody Else by VERITE
Does He Love You by Reba McEntire featuring Dolly Parton
Dead Inside by Nita Struass featuring David Draiman
Emily by James Arthur
Friday by Jeris Johnson featuring Trippie Redd
No Rest For The Wicked by Lykke Li
How Soon Is Noe by AG x Dressage
Gravedigger by MXMS

One thing I have been really enjoying is sharing my “Halloween Inspired” theme of ‘Song of the Day’ on Instagram’s stories in the evenings. It is the only thing I was able to keep up with throughout the entire month as the others failed fairly quickly!

I try to change it up every other day with various backgrounds and of course the music too. We started off with Ice Nine Kills’ new track featuring Jacoby Shaddix of Papa Roach “Hip To Be Scared” as I felt like it was a great way to start off the spooky season. The band itself is really interesting, they are definitely a metalcore type of band but like to muddle with other subgenres like my ultimate favorite: symphonic metal. I love anyone who is different from the rest and what I love about this band is that, they focus on horror films. All of the elements of those amazing, cult-like, movies like American Psycho, Halloween, etc. They recently released their newest album: “Welcome to Horrorwood: The Silver Scream 2” which is totally awesome, you should definitely check it out before the month is over.

What were your listening to this month?

Book Review: “Ruthless Creatures” by J.T. Geissinger

Hello!

Welcome back to another book review.

I have to say, I love doing these posts almost as much reading the actual books! And considering everything that went on in this one, it is a bit of an understatement. Don’t worry! I’ll explain what this means in a minute but first, read what the blurb of the first story of the Queens & Monsters series by J.T. Geissinger below.

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Five years ago, my fiancé disappeared. He left me with a wedding dress I’d never wear. Left me with the kind of scars that can’t be healed. The man I built my future on vanished like a ghost. All that remained were my broken heart and unanswered questions.

Until a mysterious stranger arrives in town.

Tall, dark, and dangerous, Kage is as full of secrets as he is sex appeal. Though I know he’s hiding something, I’m drawn to him like a moth to flame.

The intensity of our connection is addictive, unlike anything I’ve ever felt before. Heat crackles between us with every look, desire flares into passion, and I fall hard, unable to resist.

But when I discover how he’s tied to the darkness in my past, I learn what happens when you fly recklessly into fire:

You get burned. 

taken from Goodreads.

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I only decided to read this book because I kept seeing practically everybody talking and posting heavily decorated sexy banners about the sequel, Carnal Urges, as it literally came out two months ago. I thought it was the first book in the series because my Instagram feed was just full of it. I was slightly irritated that another story was in front of me but once I started reading Ruthless Creatures, I quickly changed my tune and just about melted on the spot.

I might only be a middle school teacher with a shitty car and a pathetic dating history and an inability to multiply single digits without a calculator, but I’m his queen now.

There is nothing vanilla about this book.

It was completely, dangerous, dark and dirty and I absolutely loved it!

I actually have another dark mafia romance on my Kindle and I remember mentioning on my Mid Year tag saying I wasn’t really interested in that type of thing, but I guess I was wrong…I will definitely give them another shot once I finish this series.

In the beginning, you meet Natalie, she’s a bit of a wreck and still heavily grieving over the disappearance of her fiance David. It’s been five years and on the day he goes missing, she goes out with her best friend Sloane (who is a damn firecracker!) and on that same day, they meet a new person in their neck of the woods. The moment the two of them meet for the first time, he is a bit of a jerk to her but then you learn why exactly he’s there and everything starts to make sense, but for Kage, something happens and he can’t exactly think straight afterwards.

Kage has a rough exterior to match his alpha personality but on top of all of this, he is very caring, which is saying something for his line of work. I mean, a part of me thought it was odd to make him this dominate figure in the bedroom because of him being in the Russian mafia and always having to be that way, but this would generally melt away with how gentle and seductively sweet he was towards Natalie. I enjoyed the banter between the two of them just as much as they did! You think that these sex scenes are for him in the beginning, when in reality, it’s all about her. She has the power of him completely and you, as a reader, become comfortable and safe with him too.

Have you read J.T. Geissinger’s first book in the “Queens & Monsters” series yet? If you have, what were some of your favorite moments about it?