Dreams, etc. // Minneapolis Lifestyle Blog

Books

Book Review // The Scythian Trials by Elizabeth Isaacs

Note – I received a copy of this book from the publisher through TLC Book Tours in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own. No affiliate links were used in this post.

About The Scythian Trials

Paperback: 372 pages
Publisher: Vesuvian Books (October 23, 2018)

For thousands of years, The Scythian Society has lived on the fringe of civilization, strengthening their race while protecting humanity. The last warriors of man, they live by one credo.

Strength through Equality. Power through Knowledge.

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Books

Book Review // Lifesaving for Beginners by Anne Edelstein

Note – I received a copy of this book from the publisher for review through TLC Book Tours. All thoughts and opinions are my own. No affiliate links were used in this post.

About Lifesaving for Beginners

• Paperback: 225 pages
• Publisher: Red Hen Press (November 7, 2017)

When Anne Edelstein was forty-two, her mother, a capable swimmer in good health, drowned while snorkeling in the Great Barrier Reef. Caring for two small children of her own, Anne suddenly found herself grieving not only for her emotionally distant mother but also for her beloved younger brother Danny, who had killed himself violently over a decade before. She finds herself wrestling not only with the past and her family’s legacy of mental illness, but also with the emotional well-being of her children. Part memoir and part meditation on joy and grief, the book will resonate with anyone who has ever struggled to come to terms with their parents, their siblings, their children, and their place in the world.

 

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Books

Books I Read This Summer (+ You Should Read Them If…)

Happy Tuesday! It’s an especially happy Tuesday because I’m so excited to share these book reviews with you. Reading has been such a struggle for a few years now. I’ve had trouble getting into books and haven’t had the attention span to read them in a timely manner, but I think I finally broke free from both of those issues over the summer and I really hit my groove with reading again. I’m so thankful for that, since reading is one of my favorite things to do and I’ve missed it so much the last few years. I’m also glad I put off a lot of these books until now. I read (or listened to) so many great books this summer and I don’t think I would have enjoyed them as much if I read them while it was difficult to read. As usual, I have a short (and not-so-great, since I’m writing them) description of each book, followed by my thoughts, and each review ends with a “You Should Read It If…” section. A lot of the books in this post ended with the same recommendation: just read them.

So, without further ado, here are the books I read this summer (and you should them if…)

Note – some of these links contain affiliate links, which means if you make a purchase using them I’ll make a small commission, at no extra cost to you.

Here's a list of the books I read this summer and a list to help you decide if it's the right book for you! What did you read this summer? // dreams-etc.com

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Creativity Life

3 Things to Consider When Setting Weekly Goals

In the past I’ve always been a goal setter, but for a variety of reasons I haven’t been as good about setting them this year. I realized how much this was actually dragging me down. There’s so much I’d like to do, but without these goals to map my way I wasn’t coming close to accomplishing them. So I reached out to a friend and asked if she’d like to set weekly goals. She had also been talking about all the things she wants to accomplish, but nothing was happening. We decided to start setting weekly goals, and also to meet and discuss weekly. We’re tracking our goals in a goals journal–both of us have a notebook that we write them down in. I also like to track a few other things in mine, which I’ll talk about more below.

I just looked through my goals journal and it’s crazy to realize that we’ve only been doing this for a month. It feels like we’ve been doing it longer because of how much it has improved my mindset and how much I’ve accomplished because of it so far. (Things like getting back into the routine of updating the blog.)

If you feel like you’re stuck or not making as much progress as you could in achieving your goals, I highly recommend creating a time and a place (like a goals journal) to start tracking and analyzing the things you’d like to do. Being so intentional about it has been helpful for me. I also recommend doing this with a friend, if you’re able to. The accountability is so helpful! Here are some things to consider as you set your weekly goals.

Setting weekly goals is so important to help you achieve your long-term goals. Here are three things to consider when setting your weekly goals. // dreams-etc.com

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Life

Little Moments // July + August 2018

Each month (in an ideal world) I look back through the photos that I took on my phone and I’m reminded of all the little moments that took place. Those moments that made you smile. Or maybe even those moments that irritated you, but you can look back on them and see that you got through it; they’re over and behind you and they seem like they happened so long ago. For some, they might even be the moments that bring joy in a dark period. Some of them might be part of a bigger memory, and some of them may have been forgotten. But they’re beautiful moments… they show the beauty of every day life.

So instead of looking for the best of the best photos for a grand post, I want to share all those moments. Some of the photos are a little blurry–quick snaps as I went about my day. I didn’t edit out Mina’s eye goop in a few. They’re real life.

In July and August, the little moments looked like…

Take a minute to reflect on the little moments from the month: those moments that made you smile, those beautiful moments of ordinary life. // dreams-etc.com

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Life Wellness

Summer Favorites // Wellness Edition

Happy Friday! And Happy Almost-September! 😳 Tomorrow is the start of September! I repeat: September. Starts. Tomorrow. And it’s Labor Day weekend. And school has started. So summer is over. I know technically the calendar says September 22 is the start of fall, but everyone knows summer is over once school starts. Seriously. It has been proven in the polls. And by “the polls” I mean a poll that I ran on one of the Facebook pages I manage. A majority of the people said summer is over once school begins. (It was a close vote, but that doesn’t matter, right? 😉)

Since summer is over we can chat about our summer faves. As I compiled a list I realized they all have something in common: they’re all “wellness” items. So, without further ado, here are my summer faves: wellness edition.

Note: Some of the links used in this post are affiliate links, which means if you make a purchase using one of them I’ll make a commission at no extra cost to you.

A few wellness favorites that have been go-to's throughout the summer! // dreams-etc.com

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Life Wellness

3 Simple Changes I Made to Encourage a Positive Mindset

Happy Wednesday! Is it just me or is Wednesday sometimes the hardest day of the week? Even though the weeks typically fly by, I still wake up on Wednesdays and feel like the rest of the week looms ahead. That’s a good description for how life feels sometimes. I marvel at how fast the year goes by, but at the same time, it sometimes feels like the year is an endless sea of work. Now don’t get me wrong. I love the work I do. This is the first time in my career that I can say I really love (most of) the tasks I do on a daily basis. But when I say daily I mean daily… sometimes it is seven days a week. It says a lot about my mindset this year that I haven’t updated this blog much. Not only that, but two of that small number have been posts about how to take care of yourself when you’re in a funk, or frustrated, or generally just feeling down. Yep, that’s how I’ve felt a lot this year and I hate it. So, I decided I needed to take active steps to fix my mindset. Now, before I get into what I’ve done, I want to say that if you have concerns about your mental health, you should definitely seek a professional. They’ll know how to give you the best support and care.

I knew that a lot of my frustration was due to certain stressors in my life and while I can’t necessarily change those stresses (or if I do, it’ll create a new set of “issues” that I’d be frustrated about), so I needed to make changes to my lifestyle that would leave me feeling less frustrated. Here are three things I’ve done to help create a positive mindset.

Feeling overwhelmed, in a funk, or frustrated? I've felt that way! Here are 3 simple changes I made to encourage a positive mindset. And you can too! // dreams-etc.com

 

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Life

Don’t Turn Off Your Anthem

One summer my musical tastes looked like this: Shania Twain and Kamelot. All I listened to was Kamelot’s The Black Halo (still one of my faves) and … one of Shania’s CDs. (Yes, that’s right. I said “CD.”) I blasted that album all summer long and whenever “Man! I Feel Like a Woman” came on I belted along. I was young, independent, and the world was at my fingertips. That song was my anthem.

I was housesitting one week and I got off work a few hours before my boyfriend was supposed to. We were going out later that night, so I went “home” to hang out with the cats and get some writing in before he came over. When I turned down the street singing along with my anthem I saw his car in the driveway, so I slowed down to get in every second that I could with that song and I thought, “Don’t turn off the car until the song is over. Who cares if he’s there?”

He was seated in a chair out front and got up when he saw me. And I still remember this so clearly:

I turned the car off. 

There was a minute left in that song. I could have continued to sing along with my anthem, but when I saw him coming I turned it off.

And I instantly regretted it.

It’s a moment that has stayed with me because I learned something new: don’t ever turn off your anthem.

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Life Wellness

The Perfect Recipe to Soothe Your Frustrated Soul

Over the summer there were two water-related issues in the house. 1) A room flooded. All the carpet had to come out. My life was in disarray for a little over a month until the room was fixed and everything was back to normal. 2) A few weeks later there was a tiny leak the size of a pin-prick in my closet. The carpet in my closet had to come out. I stayed with friends for a few days until the room was fixed.

This post is about the tiny leak. Sometimes it’s the smallest issues that throw you for a loop.

This is how it started: after showers, I noticed water pooling in the middle of the bathroom floor. There was a wet patch on the rug and every time I stepped on it I felt like I found a new wet patch I hadn’t noticed before. I dried the spot, put a new rug down, and that was that. It happened again a few days later. There was a wet patch in the middle of the bathroom floor and I could have sworn I knew how to dry off after taking a shower, but considered the possibility it was a basic life skill I abruptly lost. I dried the spot and replaced the rug.

As I started to get ready I noticed a spot on the floor of my closet. Little One doesn’t go to the bathroom inside of the house, but maybe I ticked her off and she decided to show me, or maybe I missed an outing and she couldn’t hold it any longer. I cleaned the spot.

A friend came over. We were going out and thought it would be fun to get ready together. I realized I must not have dried the spot well, because the corner of the rug was wet. I pointed it out and we started to get ready, but the more we walked over that rug the bigger the wet spot became. Just to make sure I wasn’t crazy I mentioned it to my friend and she agreed. Definitely growing.

And then I saw wet footprints on the carpet in my closet. That’s right. I had a to-do list a mile long, a weekend that was supposed to be quiet in which to complete it, and the motivation to do all the things. But this happened…

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Beauty Life

You Are Beautiful + You’re Going to be Awesome

“Pretty nails,” my friend’s four-year-old daughter told me as she ran a finger across my fingernails one night. My friend lives a lot closer to my office than I do, so I periodically spend the night at her house when I’m tired of driving so much.

“Next time I come I’ll bring some nail polish and paint your nails if you’d like,” I told her. She nodded with a grin.

The next time I stayed at their house I brought a few different bottles of nail polish with me–all in her favorite colors–and painted her nails.

 

“I’M SO PRETTY.”

The next morning she had an appointment at the preschool she’ll attend this fall. As everyone got ready, she spun around the house in the dress she was wearing for the day, staring down at her nails. “I’m so pretty!” I heard her repeat.

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