3 Books I’m Reading This Week + What I Read Last Week

I took a few weeks off from posting my book updates because in between life and writing my own book, I’ve just not found a lot of time to read more than 5-15 minutes per day, if that. At that rate, it takes me quite awhile to get through books! But I finally have an update for you!

Books I’ve Finished Recently:

All In — I’ve been so blessed by all three of the Mark Batterson books I’ve read so far and was excited to dive into this one. It did not disappoint. Mark always motivates me to dream big, aim high, and jump out and do. It’s not enough to plan or dream if I never do anything with those plans or dreams. This book challenges you to go “All In” for God. To not hold back. To not settle for less than everything you’ve got. You might not agree with everything you read (I rarely do when I read Batterson), but I guarantee you’ll be challenged.

Eight Twenty Eight — I knew very, very little about this couple before this book showed up on my doorstep from the publisher. Honestly, I’m not sure what I think about it. I didn’t particularly care for the writing style as it kept jumping back and forth between different time periods making it feel disjointed. I also don’t know what I think about marrying someone who was just your boyfriend and you’d only known for 10 months before the traumatic brain injury. I get why Larissa (his now wife) would want to stay by his side, because she genuinely loved him, but the book just left me feeling unsettled and hurting for her. That said, I don’t know them personally and it’s not my place to question decisions they’ve made. You can watch a video of Ian and Larissa here.

Manage Your Day-to-Day — This book came highly recommended to me by a friend whose book recommendations I value, and I found it to be very worthwhile. It inspired me to evaluate how I’m spending my days and make sure I’m putting first things first. I loved the differing perspectives and thoughts from multiple voices in this book.

Own Your Life — Since the time my children were babies, I have been so challenged by reading Sally Clarkson’s writings. She’s inspired me to embrace each day, find simple ways to cultivate beauty in my home, and take time to invest in myself so that I can better nurture and bless my family. If you are a busy woman who longs to live a life of meaning and purpose, you’ll be blessed by reading Own Your Life. It’s packed with heartfelt encouragement and practical strategies to savor life more and make each moment count. {I received a pre-release copy of this book. It releases in a few months.}

Books I Hope to Finish This Week

I Thought It Was Just Me (But It Isn’t) — I’ve had this one started for quite awhile, and it’s good. It’s just deep and it’s taking me awhile to get through!

A Proper Pursuit — I’ve not started this book yet, but am hoping to have some down time some evening this week so I can actually read a fiction book from cover to cover. It’s been quite awhile since I’ve done that and I’m itching to just get lost in a good story!

Love, Skip, Jump — Multiple readers have told me I must read this book. It looks good and I can’t wait to dive in!

Podcasts I Listened To:

Brilliant Business Moms — So someone suggested this podcast to me when I first started writing my next book (it’s on how to increase your income, increase your impact, and not lose your joy in the process). I turned on one episode and listened for a bit and wasn’t all that impressed. So I turned it off. In all honesty, I was just going to delete it off my iTunes playlist, but then, a few more people highly recommended it, so I listened again — this time to most of an episode. And I loved it.

I’m glad I gave this podcast a second try as I’ve learned so much and been inspired in very practical ways from it. Highly recommended — and be sure to listen to more than just 10 minutes of one episode. I’ve found that the value in these is really in listening to an entire episode. Hearing these women entrepreneurs unpack what has and hasn’t worked and share their stories is highly educational and beneficial!

Movies We Watched:

Captain America: The Winter Soldier — We’ve loved all of the movies in this series and, once again, we not disappointed with this one. I loved that there was a clear good versus evil storyline, that the film was very clean, and that it was action packed. In fact, Jesse and I were planning to watch half of it one night and then finish it the following night. But we got so caught up in it that we just couldn’t turn it off! 🙂

And, of course, we’ve been watching lots and lots of baseball. How about our Kansas City Royals?? Silas and Jesse are HUGE fans and it’s so fun for me to see their team doing so well in the post-season. 🙂 We’re pretty stoked about Friday night’s game! 🙂

What have you read recently? What are you planning to read this week? Any good book recommendations for me?