Embracing Life

Hannah Kizer is a caterer who spends as much time away from her family as possible.  The black sheep of the family, Hannah, is surprised to get a call from her mother asking her to come home for her step-sister Sarah's wedding. The wedding is one day away... Hannah was never invited. On her way home, she realizes that there is something coming with her. A fairy? That's impossible; they aren't real.  After a disastrous evening, she finds a big clue that leads her to question who she is and where she came from. Family secrets, mystery spells, and a mischievous fairy intent on destroying Sarah's wedding and leaving all the blame on Hannah make for a very interesting read! Cynthia Cooke writes a great story - the characters are fun, the bed scene is hot, and the story line leaves the reader wanting more. Hannah is a bad girl but you can feel how desperately she truly wants to fit in with her family.  The end leads the reader to believe that this is just the start t...

Last month, my local library recommended a book called Carved in Bone by Jefferson Bass.  I wondered what a body farm was, and after I did some internet-searching, I was super-excited to check out this book!  The Body Farm, or more accurately known as the University of Tennessee Anthropological Research Facility in Knoxville , is an actual place. A morbid place to some, but truly is a one of a kind research facility that studies human decomposition for not only anthropological purposes, but also to provide assistance to "the State Medical Examiner System for the District Attorney General's Office, arson investigators, and various state, local, and national law enforcement agencies and county medical examiners for over thirty years" . This book was great! The authors are actually a team: Dr. William Bass, founder of the program at the University of Tennessee, and Jon Jefferson, a journalist.  The main character in the book is Dr. Bill Brockton (basically the li...

Our first full day in New Orleans began with Keith getting up super early for a run.  (I slept in.)   When he got back, we took advantage of the expanded continental breakfast that the hotel offered.  It was yummy, except for the waffle-making incident someone incurred. ;)  After I finished getting ready, we headed out to walk around the French Quarter. We found ourselves on the other side of Jackson Square for my first beignet in 10 years.  It was wonderful! I love the cafe au lait as well.  Even when you order one around Chicago, it just doesn't taste as good as when you have it at the Cafe du Monde. :)  After eating, we walked down to the French Market, this amazing flea market that has basically everything you could imagine.  For lunch, we ate at the French Market Cafe - Keith had an alligator po-boy, dressed, and I had a muffaletta.  Thank goodness I only ordered half - Keith had to finish it! It was huge!   ...

For fun and memories, I'm sharing a day-by-day recap of our anniversary trip to New Orleans. We arrived on November 3. Our flight left Chicago at 11:30 a.m., so our morning was a flurry of getting kids ready for school, last minute packing (for me and the kids), and driving to the airport. The flight was uneventful - I am glad we went with Midway since it's smaller. The hotel shuttle dropped us off at the amazing Dauphine Orleans hotel. Choosing a hotel was one of the hardest decisions I had to make about this trip. I wanted something in the French Quarter, close to everything we love, as well as steeped in history... and ghosts . Yup, that's me. :)  Now, sadly, we did not see a ghost, but we still had a great time! Our room. We stayed in one of the carriage house guest rooms. I loved the look and feel of the room. The view outside our door Another view from our doorway The door to our room After checking out the hotel (they serve iced tea and cook...

We just got back from an amazing 10 year anniversary present to ourselves: New Orleans! I'll be blogging about the trip soon, but wanted to share the present I got in NOLA. Every time we go, I buy a piece of jewelry from a place where everything is made by local artists. Here is my newest piece:

Twelve. Twelve of the deadliest beasts ever forged in the fires of hell have escaped onto our plane, and they want nothing more than to rip out the jugular of Charley Davidson and serve her lifeless, mangled body to Satan for dinner. So there’s that. But Charley has more on her plate than a mob of testy hellhounds. For one thing, her father has disappeared, and the more she retraces his last steps, the more she learns he was conducting an investigation of his own, one that has Charley questioning everything she’s ever known about him. Add to that an ex-BFF who is haunting her night and day, a rash of suicides that has authorities baffled, and a drop-dead sexy fiancé who has attracted the attentions of a local celebrity, and Charley is not having the best week of her life. A tad north of hell, a hop, skip, and a jump past the realm of eternity, is a little place called Earth, and Charley Davidson, grim reaper extraordinaire, is determined to do everything in her power to pr...