The Books I Read Last Month ... and the Final Days

How is it already the start of February, January usually seems to drag on for what seems like months, but this year it has flown by.

I didn't have time for a lot of reading last month, and some of the time that I could have spent reading I instead found myself too tired to concentrate, therefore it was oh so easy to simply turn the television on and binge watch programmes or catch up on my YouTube watching.

Anyway the books that I did manage are here for posterity.  😄

The first book straight after the New Year was An Ideal Husband by Erica James.

This was a really well thought out and well executed story, not too predictable and with some neat twists and turns and well worthy of it's No.1 bestseller status on Amazon.  It's inspired me to look out for more of Erica's books on the charity table in Booths ... which was where this one came from and went back to after I had finished reading it.

I am being quite ruthless with my books this year, if I doubt that I will read them again they will be donated right after I finish them.

My next read was Laura Ingalls Wilder's The Long Winter.

I read this book over the snowiest, coldest and windiest couple of weeks for a long time.  The atmospheric conditions here made it an even better read.  

I highly recommend this book ...

... especially if you used to liked watching The Little House on the Prairie.

For me it worked out cheaper to buy this book as a modern reprint and as a full set than it would have been to buy a single new or even used copy, absolute madness but that's how it was.  I will be keeping this book and all the others at least until I get around to reading them all.

After finishing The Long Winter I struggled with what to read next, so in the end I switched to reading a few cook books.  The first one was Deliciously Ella by Ella Woodward, I bought this book way back in 2015 and have been cooking from it on and off ever since.

My most used recipes from it are the hummus recipes and the Cauliflower and Potato Curry, and it was this book that introduced me to Banana Ice-cream.

Of course this will be remaining in my collection.

The next two books will not though and have already been donated to the Booths charity book table yesterday morning.  There was nothing that I wanted to make from either of them.

Vegan on the Go

And Vegan Cakes and Other Bakes, both by Jerome Eckmeier and Daniela Lais.

While there are a multitude of good recipes in both, there are none that think that I would go out of my way to make, and nothing outstanding enough to make me want to keep them on my shelf for future reference.

To round the month off nicely we had two garden centre visits during the final days of the month.  

At Barton Grange, which is just five minutes from our front door, we had lunch and then got acquainted with some friends.  

Alan with a Grizzly Bear.

And me with Eric ... I'm not entirely sure who Eric is or was, but this bench is called Eric's Bench and he's sat on it.  😀

Neither of our friends had much to say for themselves!!

Then yesterday to take last minute advantage of the two free coffees per month that I am allowed with my Dobbies Plus Card, we went to Dobbies in Preston.  

We had our coffees along with a fish and chips lunch each, and with the multiple discounts that were on for January managed to get our lunches for a combined total of just £18.60, saving us a whopping £19.30.

I also had £9.50 of Dobbies vouchers, so these were used towards buying a fresh bag of bark chippings to go on the back garden later this month when we have a tidy up.  Somehow Mavis, who was with us all day, managed to talk her Dad into buying her a doggie pick n' mix biscuit box.

So we all came away very happy. 🐶

Sue xx