ReReadathon Wrap Up!

The second rereadathon ends today and I have been a terrible host this time around. I'm so sorry but we've had a bit of a personal crisis (we're all fine, nothing to worry about) that's meant I've spent basically the entire two weeks cleaning and then it was also our fourth wedding anniversary so we were away for a little bit as wellll and that all pretty much adds up to me sucking at my hosting duties!

I think I tried to make the event too much of a big thing this time around. Next time I'll just keep it casual I think. I finished The Night Circus way back after the first few days and since then I've basically been reading Animal Vegetable Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver which I'm loving just as much as I did first time around and will definitely be finishing before moving on to Cress for the next stage of The Lunar Chronicles Readalong. It's also made me buy five (more) fruit trees for our garden next year (we already had apple and pear, now we have two more apple trees, one more pear, a cherry and a plum) and three more raspberry canes. It's achieving its intended goal of keeping my grow your own spirit well and truly alive so it can only be called a success I think!

My original TBR and the progress I've made in the past two weeks! Not as great as I'd hoped but realistically with two little ones and husband I love to spend time with it was always a tad ambitious. 

I hope you've all enjoyed rereading your favourites as much as I have! See you sometime in the first six months of next year for the next go :-) 

Finally, the winner of the challenge giveaway iiiiiiis Katie! Let me know what book you'd like and I'll get it out to you! 

ReReadathon Update

I have been the absolute worst at updating for the rereadathon. I have been rereading I promise, I just didn't think Instagramming a picture of the same book day after day would be all that fun really!

So anyway, I started off with The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern which is vying for the title of my favourite book ever. I haven't reread it for a while, but Hanna did during the first rereadathon and it felt like it was time. It feels like a very autumnish book for me and it really stands up to rereading. The first time I read it I thought that it was phenomenal but the ending was kind of weak. The more I reread it the less I think that, and the more I like the story. I did have to pause for a bit on Tuesday to attempt to make salted caramel chocolate biscuits. Unfortunately the dough ended up being too cakey and they kind of just fell apart. We've been eating chocolate salted caramel mush on ice cream for a week!

A photo posted by Bex Hughes (@armchairbythesea) on Sep 7, 2015 at 12:06am PDT

If anybody knows how to embed instagram photos without them being entirely the most massive thing ever, please share that information with me. I will be eternally grateful.

I finished The Night Circus on Wednesday and surprised myself by picking up Animal Vegetable Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver as my second pick. I only added this onto my pile at the last minute but it was just calling to me. I am currently obsessed with my garden, and as some of you will know I have a thing for self sufficiency as a concept so I adored this book first time around and was hoping for a burst of renewed motivation to keep actually learning about my garden rather than just bumbling along as best I can.

I'm only a little way in but I'm really getting into it now. I have also started rereading The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R Tolkien and The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky, which honestly is just making me crave the film a bit. I like the book but I'd forgotten how childish Charlie is. I kind of just picked up lots of books until something stuck. I think I drift in and out of being in the right mood for Animal Vegetable Miracle, but while I'm there I'll stick with it!

If you haven't seen, last week I posted the ReReadathon Challenge! If you've not done it yet, head over and check it out. Everyone who does it and enters the link into the challenge link up will be in with a chance to win a book of their choice, yay!

I hope you're enjoying your rereading! If I haven't commented on your blog yet I'm sorry, this week has been hectic but I will get to visiting you in the next day or two! Because I'm the master of timing, Autumn Ninja Book Swap sign ups close at midnight tonight so I have all the matching and emailing and admin for that to do which is fun but time consuming. Hopefully I'll make some headway with my book but we shall see!

As always, use #rereadathon on twitter and instagram so we can all visit each other and say hi!

Re-Readathon Kick Off & TBR Link Up!

Drumroll please!

It is 12:01am on Monday September 7th and I declare the second Re-Readathon officially begun! Break out your old favourites, crack open the snacks and follow the hashtag (#rereadathon) on twitter. Let the re-reading commence!

A few housekeeping & scheduling bits and bobs:

• If you want to enter challenges, giveaways etc that go on during the two weeks you must be signed up via the sign up linky. If you're not you can still sign up for the duration of the event here.
• If you want to do your re-reading quietly by yourself in a corner that's absolutely fine. However if you do want to chat I'd love to talk to you! You can find me here (obviously), on Instagram (@armchairbythesea),on twitter (@fairybookgirl/@NinjaBookSwap) and on the hashtag (#rereadathon). 
• There will be a twitter chat. This will take place on Sunday 13th September at 9pm GMT using the hashtag. We will be talking about what we're reading and just generally hanging out.
• There will also be at least one challenge. This will be announced on Thursday morning. There may well be a second one next week as well, we'll see how we go! 
• If you'd like to link up your TBRs for this event, whether it be in a blog post or a tweet or Instagram picture you can do that via the linky below. You can also link up any reviews or general re-readathon related blogs/vlogs etc here. 
• Please remember to check out each other's links and say hi!

And now that's all done, let's have a look at my TBR for the next two weeks! I have been tweeting and instagramming about this for a while, but my pile keeps changing. I've even added another book since I posted my definitive TBR here the other day... What can I say? I like making piles of books...

I'm starting with The Night Circus because I love it so, so much and it's such an autumnal kind of book so with the weather suddenly turning into 'you must wear a jumper outside and have your wellies at the ready' kind of weather, it's perfect. I'm also tying it in with RIP. After that I'll either move on to The Ocean at the End of the Lane (also an extremely autumny read) or Animal Vegetable Miracle just because I'm so into my garden at the moment and I need a bit of a refresher to motivate me towards actually acquiring gardening knowledge rather than relying on my usual haphazard enthusaism. After that, we'll see! I am planning to throw myself whole-heartedly into the re-reading, so hopefully I'll get a bit done! Please feel free to say hi in the comments and let me know if you're reading/would like to read/hated/have never heard of any of the things I'm reading!

Happy Re-Readathon, everybody! 

ReReadathon #2

Guys, I'm super excited to announce that the Re-Readathon is BACK by popular demand! This one will run over two weeks, as people found that one just wasn't long enough last time. It will feature a mini challenge or two and a twitter chat, date TBD. As with last time the rules are simple:

• Sign up via this linky at any time before or during the re-readathon
• The re-readathon will run from 12am Monday 7th September until 11:59pm Sunday 20th September. 
• Re-read old or new favourites at some point during the two weeks. Link up reviews or discussions via the link in the starting line post I will put up closer to the time! You don't have to dedicate the entire two weeks to re-reading - as long as you do some re-reading during the time you're still participating!
• Use #rereadathon on twitter and instagram to share the rereading love. Follow me @NinjaBookSwap (where I'll probably be tweeting from) or @armchairbythesea (on Instagram) or say hi in the comments. 
• To enter any giveaways run during the event you must be signed up via this link up. If you are not signed up your entries will be disqualified. 

That's it! All the details are still to be determined. If you have ideas for mini challenges or would like to host a giveaway of your favourite reread please contact me via the buttons in the left hand sidebar, and please spread the word in all the ways you know how! Last time it was so fun talking about rereading and connecting with new and old friends and I'm hoping it will be this time too, the more the merrier! 

Re-Readathon is Heeeeeere!

You'll have to forgive me if I'm a bit excited, I've been looking forward to this practically since I came up with the idea! Today is the first day of the re-readathon; a week long readathon dedicated solely to reading things you've already read before, and yes that is literally the only criteria for taking part. You must read things you've already read. You don't have to have a blog, you can take part on Twitter and Instagram (using #rereadathon) or Tumblr or wherever. 
Here are the rules (in handy bullet points so you won't forget);

* Starts Monday 4th May 2015. Ends 11:59pm Sunday 10th May
* Read stuff you've read before
* Talk about it on your blog/twitter/instagram/tumblr/in the comments of other people's posts/not at all. Silent re-readers are welcome too! (although I do like to chat)
* Post daily, a couple of times, just once, or not at all. Link up your posts here - each link gets an entry into the giveaway!
* Twitter chat Wednesday 6th 9pm GMT (@NinjaBookSwap/#rereadathon) 
* A challenge will be announced during the twitter chat. This is just for fun, obviously. 
* Use #rereadathon on social media so I can wave at you all :-) 
* HAVE FUN! 

I'm hoping there will be a few people joining in, mostly because I don't want to be chatting to myself on Wednesday evening, it wouldn't be good for my anxiety, but also because I've already been so excited to see people's TBR piles for the week and some of the fantastic stuff that's going to be read! Please feel free to leave comments on my posts telling me what you're reading, what you're loving about rereading or just generally share your excitement, keep the conversation going!

I'm diving in with Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life by Bryan Lee O'Malley; the first in the series of books which became the amazing Scott Pilgrim vs the World movie. Happy rereading everyone, give me a wave if you're here!

Day 2 & 3

Pages read: 462

Books read from: Maine by J. Courtney Sullivan and Anne of Green Gables by L.M Montgomery

Favourite rereading moment: Everything about Anne of Green Gables. I think I'm appreciating Marilla as a character so much more this time around!

I've read a lot this last couple of days which has mostly been because Rhys had an extra day off work today so I was able to finish Maine which was just as good as I remembered, and start Anne, which I've not reread for years and years! I'm having such a good time with this readathon so far and now I'm just hoping at least one other person remembers the twitter chat in half  an hour so I'm not talking to myself!

Day 1

Pages read: 368 (technically today and yesterday as I cheated slightly by reading Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life mostly yesterday)

Books read from: Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life and Scott Pilgrim vs the World by Bryan Lee O'Malley, and Maine by J. Courtney Sullivan

Books finished: Both of the Scott Pilgrim books.

Favourite rereading moment: "Bread makes you fat??". I get hysterics every single time I see this scene in the movie but had totally forgotten about it until I read it in volume 2 today and couldn't stop laughing for about forty minutes. I have no idea why it's so funny but it is. 

There will be a picture or two added to this later this evening after I've charged my phone as my charger is currently in the room that Rhys is trying to get Ben settled down for bed in. 

I love how many people are taking part. I'm trying to get around to everybody's blogs but if you could let me know you've posted/tweeted/instagrammed by linking up here or commenting that would be seriously helpful. How's everyone's first day been?

(just to clarify, I count pages because I'm a geek. I like knowing how much I've read, it gives me a sense of achievement. You in no way have to do this or even keep track of your reading in any way at all. Do whatever makes you happy)

I'm here, on twitter, Instagram and Facebook and I'll be talking about this all the time this week. Consider yourselves warned.