The Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted by Kimberly @ Caffeinated Reviewer. It’s a chance to share news~ A post to recap the past week on your blog and showcase books and things we have received.
Don’t forget to look at my giveaways on the right sidebar.
I was looking at my genres for the blog and it shows how many reviews are in each category. Contemporary Romance has 156 and Urban Fantasy has 137 reviews. Next is Romantic Suspense with 81, followed by Fantasy with 73 reviews, and Science Fiction with 60. I just thought it was interesting.
I spent plenty of time this week on the run. We had the usual physical therapy and doctor appointments, as well as massage this week. We had scheduled activities for four night in a row, Monday – Thursday. Shoot me now. I just want to stay home. No, I want my daughter to have friends and activities. By Thursday, she wasn’t feeling well and we didn’t go that night. We weren’t able to get together with her college advisor to declare her program, but have an appointment for next Monday.
I also made lots of phone calls trying to get the appointment with new gastro. They won’t make one without records from the two she has seen (very briefly) previously. I found forms for records and had my daughter sign them, then took one to the office here. I emailed the other one since they had an email address, only to call and find out they won’t take requests by email. Then why do you have a specific email address for it!?!?!?! Grrr, I got that faxed on Friday. I did get the appointment for the OBGYN specialist at the end of June, when she is back from maternity leave.
We enjoyed quilting again, and this time put the batting and backing to the top. I quilted it. Then we attached the binding and I learned a new trick for doing that. We just have to hand sew the binding this weekend at home.
I continued on my digitizing/ organizing projects. I found Google drive will take up to 15GB of any kind of data. I just have 5GB in documents, spreadsheets and PDFs. They also have a continuous auto-backup and sync program. I set it up and it’s working great. I am slowly getting everything backed up to Shutterfly by year, so far 2004-2011. As family photo keeper, I have the really old stuff converted from slides and film too. My next task is to delete old stuff of all file types to reduce the amount of space I need to store.
Amazon Prime does have free unlimited storage for photos. They also have a 5GB backup of any kind of files. It is $12/year for 100GB or $60/year for 1 TB. Microsoft has 5GB as a free plan. They also have other plans. For $24/year, you can get a 50GB backup. It’s a better deal for $70/year you can backup 1 TB and get Office 365 (Word, Excel, Powerpoint, OneNote. I don’t want to get into a subscription plan for Office but this could be worth it for the backup. I need about 200GB for my itunes music / audiobooks. That’s what I need to figure out. Apple has iCloud where you also get 5GB for free. They bill monthly $1/month for 50GB, $3/month for 200 GB and $10/month for 2TB. The storage can be shared with the whole family. There are also numerous other online services like Carbonite (my brother uses this one), BackBlaze and IDrive. I’m still researching.
March Reading: I had another good reading month. I read 34 books and some count for more than one challenge. I listened to 12 audiobooks, read 17 New Releases, read 13 library books, and read 15 Beat the Backlist books.
Things I Learned This Week:
OK if I’m asking for help, I’m also going to share the cool things I learn. You may already know them but hopefully it will help someone.
So awhile ago, I chose continuous scrolling on my Fire and couldn’t figure out how to turn it off. (Plus I heard if you continuous scroll in Kindle Unlimited I heard the author gets paid for 1 page instead of the pages?) Here’s how to do it.
To turn Continuous Scrolling on/off:
• Tap anywhere on the page in your eBook.
• Tap on the Aa icon at the top of the screen to open up the menu.
• Tap on the Continuous Scrolling toggle switch to turn continuous scrolling on/off.
Note: To learn if a book supports Enhanced Typesetting, go to the Kindle eBook Store and look for “Enhanced Typesetting: Enabled” in the features list. Continuous scrolling is not supported for Kindle in Motion books or other types of books.
So what do you think ? I normally post my weekend posts at 8am ET since sometimes we get up later and that’s only 4am on the west coast. BUT it’s 2pm or later for my European friends. All my during-the-week posts are at 7am ET. I’ve also thought about posting the Sunday post at 1 am ET which would be Saturday night or Sunday morning depending on your location.
Stacking the Shelves is hosted by Tynga’s Reviews and Reading Reality. These are the exciting ARCs I received this week:
Storm Cursed Crowfall Every Last Breath
Make Him Howl How to Live an Undead Lie
Thank you so much AceRoc, Sourcebooks Casablanca, Zoe Ashwood, and Tantor Audio. Wow! What a haul.
Rise of the Empire Wheel of Osheim
Crooked Kingdom Sakina’s Restaurant
Yes the Audible High Five $5 sale struck. Robin heavily influenced my choices. Sakina’s Restaurant was an Audible Original. I got 3 others from this month free through another deal.
It’s shocking how many I already own like Spinning Silver, Morning Star, many Jack Campbell books, a couple Larry Correia ones, Fool’s Errand, Thunderhead, The Chemist, Strange the Dreamer, Grey Sister, and The Bear and the Nightingale. There were about 15 more I have read or want to read but they have the audiobook at the library.
Now the really scary one. This is all the Kindle and Audible freebies I grabbed this past week. You can see why I need to do Thrifty Thursday to be sure I read a few at least one each month.
I really meant to cut back on freebies BUT they are free so I guess that won’t be happening.
I’m not including things like reviews posted or upcoming as they are always in the right sidebar. And, my challenge status is also there.
If you like this and want to see me do the Sunday post, as often as I can manage, leave me a comment and let me know.
Anne
I read all types of books but my favorites are urban fantasy and romantic suspense.I like some romance and some action / adventure / mystery in everything.I like sex in my books but please, only between TWO people.Intimate conversation is equally important to the sex in a book.It lets me see the characters.The other thing I enjoy is humor.
Friend or follow me at Goodreads.
- Thrifty Thursday: HGTV Edition @VoiceofCass @RaquelleJaxson #ThriftyThursday #Challenge #Giveaway #KindleUnlimited - September 19, 2024
- 🎧 We Solve Murders by Richard Osman @richardosman #NicolaWalker @PRHAudio #LoveAudiobooks - September 17, 2024
- Sunday Post – 15 September 2024 @kimbacaffeinate @readingreality - September 15, 2024
It’s always a grind when you have stuff going on every day and most nights. I don’t blame you for wanting a time out for home stuff. 🙂 But, yes, socializing is also a good stress release, too. Yay for getting the quilt nearly finished.
I can see where I am old-fashioned. I never considered trying to find free online storage sources for back up purposes. I have an exterior harddrive and thumb drives. Well, maybe I knew a little because I do store some pictures with Amazon and use Google Drive for a few spreadsheets, but yeah, I need to do this more.
I’ve got the Patricia Briggs and Danielle Garrett books, too. You got a nice haul of sale audios. Hope you enjoy all those.
Have a great week and no big tricks on April Fools, Anne! 🙂
Thanks Sophia! Yes the digitizing is important to me. Thumb drives or Hard drives are likely to be in my house or car so if there was a fire or something they would likely be destroyed, same as the computers. It’s World Backup Day today so there might even be deals.
Have a great week!
Some really nice things for you to read there! I hope you’ll enjoy all your new books! Happy reading!
Yes I got the best stuff to read. 🙂
If you pay for your hosting, you could technically keep your photos on a separate folder there. It’s usually up to 100 gigs, and we barely use it for our blogs!
Interesting. But I think I am better off at Shutterfly (unlimited) since I can easily share that with family plus they have all the tools to make books and calendars and such. Also I would have no idea how to do that. And it wouldn’t be enough space for my itunes music / audiobooks. I’m trying to get each type of data in one place. Great suggestion though, it may work for someone else.
That is more or less why I haven’t uploaded mine there either. I know it’s an option, but it just feels clunky 😀
Sounds like a busy week! And 34 books read in March is amazing.
I’ve never thought about posting for the different time zones. If I’m scheduling posts ahead of time, I’ll make them go live at midnight by me. And if I’m typing up my updates post, I just go live when I’m finished usually Sunday morning,those don’t get scheduled ahead of time.
Enjoy your books, I used to read alot of Nora Roberts, I want to again. May be this summer. Happy week!
Thanks for your input. I’ve thought a lot of different things on posting time so I wanted to see what others thought.
Glad to see your able to keep up with your hobby, quilting through all this running around.
Well, it is a good social activity for my daughter and I to do together. So we really make an effort to go. Plus these weeks were for charity.
Oh Anne I know what you mean by wanting some rest yet wanting your daughter to have friends. The things we do for our kids can be exhausting yet so rewarding. Lots of hugs going your way!
Thanks! It all worked out in the end. By Wednesday night we both were pretty tired though.
Just reading your schedule from last week exhausted me? Being out four nights in a row would level me.
I see you picked up The Witness! Hope you love it and I will always regret not getting that on audio. Happy reading and enjoyed the week?
Thanks. I just like to stay home. I can entertain myself endlessly and I can cook better food than I can get at most restaurants. And I have books.
I saw it was Julia Whelan for narration and decided I should have it since the library has so few.
Have a wonderful week! We’re finally in that sweet spot for weather I like most of the time.
Your books look good. I loved The Witness. I don’t read a lot of romance, but I love romantic suspense. Also, thrillers and contemporary fiction, with some memoirs thrown in.
Enjoy your week, and here are MY WEEKLY UPDATES
Thanks. I prefer romantic suspense also because there is an additional suspense / mystery / action plot along with the romance.
Ugh I get so foot stompingly frustrated over having to deal with doctors and referrals and all the little things that make it so hard to just get an appointment! And weeks where you are running so much can be so tough too! Hopefully this week is a little easier on you all! 🙂 Enjoy your reads!
Thank you! Hopefully they will have the records next week and I can get things scheduled.
The quilting with your daughter sounds like a lovely way to spend time together. I can relate to your hectic schedule. I rarely make it home after I walk out the door without at least two stops. Have fun with your new books:)
Thank you! I love that she really wants to do the quilting so much and that we work together. It’s the best of all worlds. At home, she sticks to herself and doesn’t work with me as much. She’s growing up and needs to be her own person of course, she always has been. But she relies on me for so much it has to be hard and I’m the one who ends up making so many decisions.
When you find a storage you like the best, let me know, I currently have icloud but was told that it doesn’t actually back up your stuff it’s just storage, I need a storage outside of external hard drives and my computer.
You had a very productive week!
I want to read Crowfall so I am looking forward to seeing your thoughts on it.
I hope this week is awesome for you Anne! Happy Reading! xx
Yes straight storage like I am using at Shutterfly is best for things that don’t change. I don’t know how much you have in GB but that will affect what you choose. I highly recommend the Google drive as they have the backup and sync so it is always current. At the very beginning (for a few hours), it will slow down your system when it uploads all your stuff initially (in the background). But that 15GB free with the syncing is a great deal and you can start with your most crucial directories.
I set all of my posts to go live at Midnight but I usually blog ahead 2 months at a time for a lot of posts. It’s crazy the hoops the doctors offices will make you jut through just to get something simple done.
I schedule everything ahead even if it is just the day before. I work ahead when I can. I have this tendency to go off on a tangent when I’m ahead and read library books or purchases. lol Thanks for the input.
I use dropbox and have for years. I pay the yearly fee (like $99 I think) and get 1 TB. I also pay the 1 dollar for the upgrade iCloud for my apple stuff (music, photos, etc). I like having access to all my stuff anywhere, so dropbox is great for that. All my devices are apple, so the iCloud is good for that.
As for the time to post, I have always struggled with that too, but I don’t think it matters in the end. People will read it when its convenient for them!
Have a great week!
Thanks for all the input. I am going to look at dropbox too. Icloud makes some sense for backing up all my itunes and they have the 200GB size which I’m at 160GB now. I will do some cleanup though. I do have a bunch of CDs I want to load to my computer though and either get rid of or store the actual CDs.
Wow you are busy. But it is great for your daughter. You had a fab reading month. Oh my I am so slow the last few months.
Love the cover for Crowfall. Lots of bloggers got Storm Cursed. I still have yet to try this series and heard great things about it.
Happy Reading
JoLee
My Sunday Post / Stacking The Shelves
Thanks. If you want to try the Mercy Thompson series I suggest you join us in 2020 for the Read-along if you can wait. There will be reviews, games and prizes. And there will be the 12th book in the series releasing next year!
Thanks Anne for the invite. That would be fun.
Those stories with doctors just make angry. So many procedures and bureaucracy…
Great month book wise you had!!
Enjoy your books and have a great week!
Thanks Yvonne! Have a great week too and I appreciate you visiting.
Wow, you’ve been busy. I don’t think I could keep up with that schedule. Enjoy your new books. Have a great week!
I can’t always keep up with that schedule. Sometimes I fall asleep in the car while waiting for my daughter. lol. Mostly I listen to audiobooks. Thanks!
What a busy week. I love your book haul. You have some I’ve read and others I’d like to try. I hope you have a wonderful week ahead and happy reading!
My book haul would be overwhelming if it weren’t spread over months In fact I’ve already finished 2 of the ARCS I got. I’m grateful to get the great stuff I wanted. Have an amazing week, Angela! Thanks for visiting.
I should take a look at and track my genres a little closer too, just for curiosity’s sake. And 34 books! Holy moly- that’s a ton 🙂
Well some of those are Robin, KC and Melanie. Definitely they would be the numbers for horror or historical romance. But the bulk are me. I did find it interesting. I stumbled onto it because I saw a genre tag of anthology and thought – no that’s not a genre, so I went to fix it and started looking at the numbers.
Yes reading frenzy right here! Also, LOTS of waiting in the car during my daughter’s classes and appointments. I also knit while listening to audio.
I hope your daughter will find the program she wants soon!
I love Google Drive – and I think if you convert the files, it’ll take zero space, which is a fantastic bonus in my opinion. I have Prime, Microsoft and iCloud as well, but I rarely use them. There’s a few that I’ve heard through Mashable that gives 1TB for a discount and I think Mashable frequently has a deal for that in their store.
Thanks for the input Sophia! I’ll have to look at Mashable. Good info on the Google conversion. I’m not yet ready for that but I might get more there.
It’s hard to be out 4 nights during the week! I just want to stay home, too! You got quite a bit of reading done!
I can’t wait for Storm Cursed. Like you, I have to get a few books out of the way before I can pick it up. I also bought a copy of Beautiful Mistake from the Audible sale. Happy reading, and hope you have an easier week ahead, Anne! 🙂
Thanks Rachel. Since I always pack as much as possible into a timeframe, it is unlikely to change ever but I do like to pack the tasks in at home instead of on the run. At least the weather has been really good, with only a day of sporadic rain a week, so it makes it easier to be out and about.
You obviously like all the best books, enjoy them!
I am glad to hear that I am not the only one that archives my photos. I upload all mine to Shutterfly and make scrapbooks and also make a CD of all the photos for the year. All your books are new to me. Ghosts Gone Wild looks fun. Have a great week.
I have bunches of scrapbooks and also digital (then printed) photobooks. I used to do CDs of the year but I am switching over to the online backup. I might even upload to 2 sites for extra backup once I get organized. I do need to spend a bit of time on some of the years still converting from slides or 35mm. And deleting all the ones that are completely black, blurry, etc.
Ghosts Gone Wild is part of a fun, cozy series I am reviewing on audio as it is released, about one a month or so. It is also in Kindle Unlimited as ebooks.
You have some great ARCs to choose from. I hope you find a solution to your cloud problem.
Have a great reading week
I did get the best ARCs the last two weeks. I’ve already finished 2 of this week’s haul.
I’m sure I’ll find a solution; the trick is how much it will cost and how much I can get for free. Thank you!
I really like some of the books your grabbed this week. Especially the Necromancer series. Dealing with doctors can be the worst at times. I really hope everything you need gets scheduled. Have a wonderful week!
Thanks Barb! I already finished the necromancer one yesterday! I’ve gotten some awesome ARCs the past 2 weeks and I’m devouring them. Luckily, I can do that while doing chores (audio) or waiting in the car for my daughter. I am in a reading frenzy with such great options.
I love that you and your daughter quilt together. That sounds like so much fun.
Hope you enjoy all of your new reads!
It really is great to work together and have a social event and sometimes do for charity. We are really enjoying it.
I am looking forward to starting a few of these myself. Enjoy your new haul. Wow, you have been busy, busy, busy! I hope you get a little down time 🙂
Thanks! I am so excited to start these. I actually have finished 2 of the ARCs I got last week already. There is so much to do right now and so much I want to read. Yeah, even when I have down time I think of more things I want to do or read. That’s not happening. lol.
You had another busy week! I have thought about trying to store my audiobooks online and did upload some to dropbox. Now my dropbox is full and I don’t really want to pay for more storage. Enjoy your new books and have a great week!
Yeah it’s a problem. I do want a backup of my audios that aren’t in the cloud at Audible or on CD. Like the ones I bought at Tantor, there’s no more downloading them. So I’ll have to do some backing up. I’m working on figureing it out. Thanks! I hope your week only gets better!
I can’t imagine digitizing all those pictures. That sounds like a lot of hard work. Good for you though, all those memories are worth to keep.
Hope you have a great week.
Yes I’ve been working on the picture digitizing for about 20 years and technology keeps changing on me.
I recently up’d my iCloud storage to the 2TB plan. I have a MacBook and I like that the files auto shift between my computer and the cloud. My kids and I also all have iPhones, so the family sharing is nice. I’ve realized it’s the world we live in, and I finally purchased it. My phone I just got is 256 GB, so I couldn’t even back it up to my computer if I tried. I have so many photos – I really need to go through and start deleted the bad shots, extra copies, etc. I’m good about that now – I do it right away, but back 15+ years ago – who would imagine I’d be running out of storage?! I do also use dropbox for sharing files, and Google to back up my blog. I have a great plug in that backs it up daily. *phew* I hope you have a good week.
Thanks for sharing. I think I will be ending up with something more especially for all the itunes library. I definitely have some work to do on deleting bad shots. Like you, I’m good now but not so much 10 years or so ago.
Have a terrific week!
Wow! 34 books in March?!!! That’s more than a book a day. You’re a super fast reader/listener! I would like to up my pace :). It’s super hard to find a good gastro. My daughter’s on her second one and I’m thinking about switching again. I like your blog!!!
Thanks Lindy! I listen to lots of audio books during chores, errands, waiting for my daughter, crafting, etc. Some of the shorter audios I do listen to in a day. Also a 300 or less page book I’ll often read in just 1-2 days also. But there’s just so many things I want to read. I won’t always have this pace.
That’s a lot of running around for one week – I’d be ready to drop. Hopefully this week isn’t quite as hectic. I pay the 99 cents/month for the extra iCloud storage and it works like a charm. To not have to worry about extra space for $1 a month is so worth it. I always use Carbonite so it’s great to feel like we’re covered no matter what.
Thanks for input on the storage issue. I haven’t fully decided but I keep working to figure things out.
This week we were set to be out Mon-Tues and Wed but tonight (Tuesday) got cancelled. I can’t say I am sorry.
I am glead to hear you found some solutions for your storage problems.
Your new books look great and I wish yoy happy reading! 🙂
Thanks Irena! I feel good about making it happen.
I feel like my week has been crazy too. I’m hoping things will slow down a bit, but I’m at least not feeling quite as drained this week. I hope you’re having a great week.
Melanie @ Hot Listens & Books of My Heart
I’m so glad you were feeling less drained. I’ve had a busy and somewhat tiring week. But I got some key things accomplished.
I’m tired just thinking about the amount of running around and activity you do in a week. If I have to be out more than 3 nights a week, I’ll actually have a meltdown, lol.
I really need to read the Mercy series. I remember the first book years ago but not loving it much but it seems to have taken off in a big way so now I wonder what I’ve missed… I love the Alpha and Omega series.
Yes I’m not excited about being out at night so much. This week Tuesday night activity fell apart which was sad but great. Their other activity is Sun afternoon, but then she has a school even Sunday night. Still it was better overall for being home at night.
Well I’m doing the Mercy read-along in 2020 and hope you will join me, about 1 book a month, probably every 4 weeks to get them all in actually.
WOW, you have read/listened to a ton of books. I think I am up to 12 so far this year. Working on my 13 book with going back to school. Have a good week.
Mary
Yes I waste no time running errands, cooking, doing chores or crafting or waiting for my daughter’s stuff – I am always listening to an audiobook. It’s easy now that it is second nature. It’s increased my books by at least 100 a year and there are SO many things I want to read. Plus it’s like the personal time for reading is sacred to me, more important than sleep sometimes as it’s time to myself.