Harry Potter Theme Park

Hey Everyone! I mentioned in my last post that I was going to be absent from blogging for the next week or so because I was traveling to Florida. Me and my Husband went to Orlando on our honeymoon, and I also mentioned that we were going to the Harry Potter theme park and I was going to do a blog post on it when I got back. I thought since it was some what book related, I would post some pictures and share my adventures here on my blog!

The Harry Potter park was something that I was really excited about going to. When I first heard of this I always said I really wanted to go there but honestly never thought it was something that I would be able to do. I don't travel much and haven't traveled since I was a teenager so I never really gave a second thought to the park other than just hoping of one day being able to go. I'm was really excited that we decided to go. I do have to say that I really did enjoy the park and I'm definitely happy that I went. The only downfall to the park that it was so crowded that it was almost hard to enjoy at the same time. I did expect it though since Orlando is a huge tourist trap. 

When we were there we rode the simulator ride that you get to by going through the Hogwarts Castle. The ride was fun and even though it was really busy it wasn't a too bad of a wait. We ate a restaurant there, I think was the Three Broomsticks (I can't remember if it was that or the Hogs Head Pub) and we also tried the Butter beers which were so delicious. I looked up the recipe online and I want to try to make them at home too haha. We went into the Zonkos, Honeydukes, and Owl Post shops. The shops were so crowded it was hard to look around and shop. They were also super expensive, however I did grab a few souvenirs including a sorting hat which I put onto of my bookshelf! :)

I'm going to wrap up this post with some pictures that I took while I was there. I hope you all enjoyed and thank you all for reading!

January Wrap Up

Hey Everyone, today I am going to be doing my January warp up post for all of the books I read last month. I can't believe it's already February! I had a really good reading month in January, I read a total of 8 books! I'm also excited about a lot of the books that I plan to read this month.




-The first book I read this month was the 4th Harry Potter book. I started The Goblet of Fire back in December as part of my re reading books challenge. I started reading this one towards the end and never got to finish it so I decided to include it in this monthly wrap up. I absolutely love re reading Harry Potter books. It's one of the best feelings in the world. I am planning to re read the last 3 books sometime in the near future.






-Ask the Passengers by A.S. King. I absolutely adored this book. A.S King is a truly amazing author and I can't wait to read more books by her. I was really engaged into the story line of this book and I read it really quickly. It's such a wonderful book about self discovery, finding out how to be yourself and feel conformable with who you are. It's a really moving story that I just loved everything about. You can read my full review of this novel here.





-The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. This is another book that I really adored as well. I wanted to read it because the movie was made, which I have not seen yet, but I couldn't believe I never read this book before. The main character, Charlie was just so wonderful and innocent and I just wanted to squeeze him. (Ok that sounds weird). He has such a big heart and cares so much about everything and everyone around him. This was also a quick read, and I am really excited to see the movie! You can also read my review for this book here.





-Doll House and Paper Dolls by Anya Allyn. I read the first 2 books in the Dollhouse series which I purchased on my kindle. The first book, Dollhouse, was free from bookbub.com but it was regular $2.99. I purchased the second book for $3.99. These books gave me a lot of mixed feelings about them. I liked them, but I didn't like them. They were just okay for me. They were probably the strangest books I've ever read in my life, and the writing style kind of sucked. None the less, I will probably pick up the 3rd book when it comes out if I still remember what happened in them. You can read my reviews for both of the books here.








-Paper Towns by John Green. This is another book that I really loved this month. John Green is such a great writer and his books never disappoint me. He writes such phenomenal characters, and I just can't say enough great things about him or his books. I also wrote a review on this book here.








-The Lost Prince by Julie Kagawa. This book was another one that was just okay for me. I really love the original Iron Fey series so I had really high hopes for this book and I heard great things about it. Unfortunately I was a little disappointed, but I am trying to be optimistic with it at the same time. I will definitely continue reading the next books in the series when they come out. My review for this book is here.






-Running with Scissors by Augusten Burroughs. This book was recommended to me by two different people. It's a memoir about Augusten Burroughs and his screwed up life. I don't know how else to describe this book lol. Anyone who has read this knows what I am talking about. It really did enjoy this book, but sometimes I don't have much patience while reading memoirs because they tend to go slow and I just want to know what happens. I did not do a review for this book and I am not planning on doing one. However, I do want to see the movie and I might do a movie/book comparison post.



This is all of the books that I read last month, I did try to read Delirium by Lauren Oliver, but I couldn't really get into the story. Hopefully I will try again someday soon and try to finish it. Thank you all for reading and I hope you enjoyed!

December Reading Wrap up + Reading Challenge

Hello Everyone and Happy New years! I am so excited for this new year to be here and to get onto reading some really great books! Last month in December, I made a reading challenge for myself and my goal was to only re read books that I have already read. I have successfully finished my challenge and did not read any new books. I have been wanting to re read a lot of my books for so long and I am happy that I finally was able to. Also since I was not reading new books last month, I did not buy any new books either! This has probably been the longest I have gone with out buying books LOL. You can probably expect a huge book haul from me in the near future :). 

Now I am going to share with you all of the books that I chose to re read and why I re read them as well.

-Harry Potter books by J.K Rowling. I re read the first three books in the Harry Potter series which are Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.I absolutely love the Harry Potter series and it will forever be a favorite series of mine. I have not read these books (especially the first few) in such a long time. It was great re reading them and I felt like I was re living my childhood a little bit! So those were 3 of the books that I re read this month.

-Looking for Alaska by John Green. This is definitely one of my all time favorite books and I could easily call this one my favorite book I've ever read (maybe). I am so glad that I chose to re read this one as part of my reading challenge. Looking for Alaska is a book that has stuck with me ever since I have read it the first time. It is a book that I couldn't stop thinking about even month after I read it. John Green is such a phenomenal writer.

-Number the Stars by Lois Lowry. This is a book I haven't read in at least 10 years or more. I kind of bought this one in a spur of the moment on my kindle to include for my reading challenge. It is a fairly short book and I read it really fast. This was my all time favorite book as a child and I have read it multiple times during my childhood as well. I can't say I enjoyed it as much as I use to reading it this time around but none the less it is still a great book.

-The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton. This is another book that I have read more times that I can count when I was younger. I don't think I have read this book in at least 5 years either, but I still absolutely love this book. It was really great re reading it and I'm sure this won't be the last time I re read it.

I am currently a little over half way through reading Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. I really wanted to include this book in my December wrap up but I haven't been able to get much reading done in the past week. So this book will be included in my January book wrap up. I am going to be doing other reading challenges in the future, with different topics but I will probably also do another re reading challenge as well. However since I have been having such a great time re reading Harry Potter I might continue to read the other books now instead of waiting for a new reading challenge.

I hope everyone enjoyed my December Wrap up and thanks so much for reading!

December Book Challenge!

Hey Everyone, Happy December!! For this month of reading I have decided to create a book challenge/goal for myself! I am going to only read books this whole month that I have already read. There are tons of books that I have been wanting to re read for quite a while but I never do because I always have so many new books to read. Even though I still have tons of new books, I am going to take a break from them and re read some of the great ones I already have. I thought December would be a perfect month for this challenge since it is the last month of the year! I'm really excited about this and I can't wait to share with you all the books that I choose to re read. I did a blog post in the past on books worth reading twice, which you can check that out here!  I may read some books from this list but I might pick some other ones that are not on there as well.

Since I am going to be re reading a lot of books this month, I might not post a whole lot of books reviews. There might be a few books that I will do a review for but I know there are some books that I'm going to read that I will not being doing a review for, because it would be a book I don't find necessary to review or I might have already done a review for it. I will keep an update along with different kinds of book related posts on here instead of reviews!

When I do my monthly wrap up post for December I will be sure to include why I chose to re read the books that I did as well. I'm not 100% sure which ones I'm going to be re reading yet, I do have a few ideas in mind. I might just start out with a Harry Potter book ;).

I will also be doing a lot of other themed reading challenges/goals in the future as well. I won't be doing it every month but I will be doing some more in the near future. If anyone has any suggestions for a theme for the reading challenge feel free to comment below and leave your suggestions! If anyone would like to join me on this read challenge then please do so!  Thank you all for reading and I hope you enjoyed this post!

Day and Night book tag!

Today I'm going to do another book tag survey! I usually find this tags somewhere on youtube and I always think they are so fun so today I am going to do the Day and Night book tag. Basically you go through each letter from day and night and it asks you a question about reading! I hope you enjoy this post and happy reading :)

QUESTIONS:
D: Do you read more in the morning or at night? I would say I read mostly in the morning/day time because I get most of my reading done while I'm at work during my down time. After I get home from work at 7pm I am usually doing other things and don't have time to read. Unless I am really close to finishing a book (50pgs or so) I will read before I go to sleep so I can get the book finished and start a new one in the morning. 
A: Are there any books that changed the way you thought about things? Lots of books have changed the way I think about things. I have read many books that have brought different aspect to my attention and blew my mind away. Each and every book I read is important to me and gets me thinking about some thing or another. 
Y: YA or Not? Definitely! I love reading young adult books. 

A: Are there characters that you honestly believe are real? Only Harry Potter. ;)
N: Nobody touches my books or I don't mind loaning my books out? I don't mind loaning my books out. When I read a really great book I love to share it. I'm always thinking 'Who can I let read this book?'
D: Do you ever smell your books? Sometimes. If I have acquired a really old book for instance, I will smell it to see if it has that old book smell. 

N: Not everyone loves books...is this a positive or a negative? Negative!! Just kidding, liking books is a personal preference. Although, I wish everyone would love to read as much as I do. Talking about books makes for a great conversation. 
I: I keep my books in the best condition or maybe not? Which are you? I try to keep mine is the best condition. I love for my books to look brand new but I do have some that don't and I am fine with that too. I always have a book in my purse and the paperback ones tend to get bent a little. 
G: Gosh I have to many books! True or False? You can never have too many books! No but really, I am a book hoarder. 
H: Have you ever spilled or stained your books before with something, and if so how? Only once! I knocked water over my copy of The Notebook on accident one time. It definitely has some water damage to it and I was really upset at the time but it dried out and is still readable. 
T: Toned or untoned while reading? ..or in other words...Do you read and workout at the same time? LOL no. I have never tried to read while working out, but I might enjoy listening to an audio book while working out. Maybe I will try it. 

7 Deadly Sins of Reading

Hello Everyone! Today I'm going to do a blog post on the 7 Deadly Sins of reading. This is a book tag that I saw going around the book community on Youtube. I thought it was fun, and even though I wasn't tagged, I still wanted to participate in this book surgery!

Greed- What is your most inexpensive and expensive book? 
My most inexpensive book that I have purchased is The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. I bought this at a used book sale for $1 last summer. My most expensive book is probably the 7th Harry Potter book, which on the inside flap has a price for $34.99

Wrath- what author do you have a love hate relationship with? 
I'm going to say Nicholas Sparks. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love Nicholas Sparks and I love all of his book as well. However I find some of his books to just be okay and not amazing like some of his others. So I picked him for a love hate relationship because I always have really high expectations when he writes new book and I don't like being slightly disappointed when one of his books aren't as good as the others!

Gluttony- What book have you deliciously devoured over and over with no shame at all? 
Definitely every single book in the Harry Potter series. I've read the books so many times and I just love them and want to read them again!

Sloth- What book have you neglected reading due to laziness?
The Lord of the Rings Trilogy by J.R.R Tolkien. I've read half of the first book, some of the second book and none at all of the third. I've also neglected reading The Hobbit, which is on my fall TBR list because the movie is coming out in a few months!

Pride- Which book do you often talk about to sound like an intellectual reader? 
I don't really talk about books to make myself intelligent, I mostly read YA novels and I have no shame in that!

Lust- What qualities do you find attractive in male and female characters?
I like characters who are humorous, witty, and who can make me laugh. I also like really strong characters who you can see progress through out the novel/series. I love characters who have really strong and real emotion to them as well. This goes for both male and female characters.

Envy- What books would you most like to receive as a gift? 
Any book! Books are my favorite gifts and I love it when people give me a book to read, even if I'm just borrowing them! :)

I hope you enjoyed this post and anyone can feel free to join in on this book tag!

On a side note- I just finished reading Tilt by Ellen Hopkins. I'm still not sure if I am going to do a review on this book or not. I sometimes find Ellen Hopkins books hard to review for some reason. If anyone reading this wants me to do a review on this book then I will, just comment and let me know.I'm about 300 pages into A Game of Thrones. This book is taking forever to read. I took a break so I could read Tilt, but I hope to finish reading this book by the end of this month. I'm currently reading Venomous by Christopher Krovatin on my Kindle and I'm really enjoying it so far.

Thank you for reading! Find me here on goodreads!

Books Worth Reading Twice.

Today I'm going to share with you books that I think are worth reading twice, or rather books that I personally would read twice (or more). I think a book definitely has to be totally amazing for me to read it more than once. A lot of the time when I try to re read a book I will get bored mid way through it, but  there have been a good handful of book that I was just as enthralled reading them the second time as I was the first.

-The Harry Potter series by J.K Rowling. I have read this series so many times I can't even count how many. I've read each book at least 3 times, some of them I've read 4 or 5 times. I just absolutely love everything about Harry Potter. I've been wanting to re read this series again lately so hopefully sometimes this fall/winter I will!

-The Hunger Games by Suzanna Collins. I have only re read the first book in this series before the movie came out and I will definitely be re reading the second and third book as well.

-The Help by Kathryn Stockett. I really loved this book and it's definitely one I will be re reading one day.

-A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray. This is the first book in the Gemma Doyle Trilogy. I've re read the first book and I was still totally amazed by it as I was the first time I read it.

-Divergent by Veronica Roth. I re read this one right before Insurgent came out and I'm glad I did because I couldn't remember some of the end details. I will be re reading Insurgent before the 3rd book comes out.

-The Vampire Academy series by Richelle Mead. I've re read the first 3 book in the series and I want to re read them again along with the other series.

-The Pact by Jodi Picoult. This is one of my recent reads but I just loved it so much that I will probably re read it someday.

-Night Road by Kristin Hannah. Another book that I will re read someday again simply because I just loved it so much.

-The Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare. I have not re read anything in this series but it's one of my favorites so it is one that I will probably re read someday but not anytime in the near future.

-The Outsides by S.E Hinton. This is super random and I forget about this book a lot but I read this one while I was in middle school, and I sware this is the only book I actually enjoyed that they made us read in school. I've already read this one 3 or 4 times but I will probably read it again soon!

I hope everyone enjoyed this post and thank you so much for reading!

What books have you re read or would like to re read?

Fall TBR List

I haven't had a lot of time to read this summer because I've been really busy at work and at home as well. I hate it when I don't have time to read because it puts me in a serious reading rut, also I've felt that I haven't picked up a really great book in a while. So that being said, I'm super excited for fall to get here so I will have more time to read! I've started putting together my fall TBR (to be read) list so I thought I would share it here on my blog. I'm not going to go too crazy with it, most of the book on my list are ones that I've already purchased and have been sitting on my shelf for a few months now. Although I've added a few books to my list that are coming out in the fall and I'm really excited about reading!

1. The Golden Lily by Richelle Mead. I've had this book since it came out and I've been dying to read it! I can't even believe I haven't read it yet!

2. The Book of Blood and Shadow by Robin Wasserman.

3.  The Fault in our Stars by John Green.

4. Looking for Alaska by John Green.

5. The Forsaken by Lisa M Stasse.

6. Mercy by Jodi Picoult.

7. Home Front by Kristin Hannah.

8. Home Again by Kristin Hannah.

9. Angle Falls by Kristin Hannah.

10. When Lightening Strikes by Kristin Hannah.

11. Waiting fro the Moon by Kristin Hannah.

12. Sarah's Key by Tatiana De Rosney

13. Bones of Faerie by Janni Lee Simner

14. Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin

15. Endlessly by Keirsten White.

16. The Hobbit by J.R.R Tolkien.

17. Beautiful Redemption by Kami Garcia (coming out October 23)

18. Whispers at Moonirse by C.C Hunter (coming out October 2)

19. Hidden by P.C. Cast (coming out October 16)

20. The Iron Legends by Julia Kagawa, which is three novellas from the Iron Fey series which comes out on the 28th of this month!!

This is only 20 books that I've picked to read this fall (even though the list could probably go on forever), I'm going to try to stick to this list but I probably will read a few (or many) other books as well. These are in no particular order but as you can see I'm pretty excited to read The Golden Lily and I did put it first on my list for a reason ;D and I am a huge Kristen Hannah fan so I've purchased a lot of her books this summer that I'm excited to read. Also, I've been wanting to re read the entire Harry Potter Series as well so I hope I can start those books this fall too!! I hope everyone enjoyed reading this post and I encourage you all to make some TBR lists of your own!
Happy Reading :)

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Top 10 favorite book series

Hello Everyone, I wanted to share my top 10 favorite book series here on my blog!



1. Harry Potter series by J.K Rowling
Harry potter will forever be my favorite book series of all time.

2. The Gemma Doyle Trilogy by Libba Bray
This is a trilogy made up of three books. A Great and Terrible Beauty, Rebel Angles, and The Sweet Far Thing. This series is completely amazing and everything about it is so magical and enchanting. This is one of the best young adult fantasy series I've ever read.

3. The Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare
City of Bones, City of Ashes, City of glass, City of Fallen Angles, City of lost Souls. I also love the prequel series, The Infernal Devices, but I enjoyed the mortal instruments series a lot more.

4. The Vampire Academy series by Richelle Mead
Vampire Academy, Frostbite, Shadow Kiss, Blood Promise, Spirit Bound, The Last Sacrifice. This is a series that I really loved when I was in my 'vampire book' phase. I still love the series despite the fact that I am not into vampire books anymore because it is a really wonderful series! I also like the spin off series Bloodlines.

5. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, MockingJay. This probably comes to no surprise that the Hunger Games is another one of my favorites. It will aways be a series that I love as well.

6. Divergent by Veronica Roth
I also love the 2nd book Insurgent and I believe this is going to be a 3 book trilogy. I can't wait until the third book to see how the rest of the story goes!

7. The Books of Bayern by Shannon Hale
The Goose Girl, Enna Burning, River Secrets, and Forest Born are the books in this series. I'm not exactly sure if I would consider this series to be in the young adult section. They are pretty long books, but I would say they are more lighter reads then your typical young adult book. It is a fantasy series but it isn't harsh or heavy in action, but there is definitely a great story.

8. The Iron Fey series by Julie Kagawa
The Iron King, The Iron Daughter, The Iron Queen, and the Iron Knight. This is the only series about fairies that I've read the I've actually enjoyed.

9. Beautiful Creatures series by Kami Garcia
Beautiful Creatures, Beautiful Darkness, Beautiful Chaos. I absolutely love this series about caster/witchcraft. I can't wait for the 4th book to come out.

10. The Blue is for Nightmares series by Laurie Faria Stolarz
Blue is for Nightmares, White is for Magic, Silver is for Secrets, Red is for Remembrance, and the graphic novel Black is for Beginnings. This is a wonderful series that I read a few years ago that I often forget about. It's really captivating and a little suspenseful.

This is my top 10 favorite series and they are ones that I've recommend a lot of people to read. I am also planning of doing another blog post of my top 10 favorite stand alone novels as well. As you can tell all of my favorites series are in the fantasy genre, but none of my favorite stand alone novels are! I hope you enjoyed reading this post, and look forward to my favorite stand alone novels! :P

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